Must the Maiden Die (30 page)

"A deputy? Why?" Tamar asked, looking
straight at Glynis, her fingers kneading the sheet.

"Constable Stuart thought it best that
Gerard stay at the lockup overnight, because he was very angry
about what had happened to you. The constable was afraid that he,
Gerard, might try to punish those responsible."

Glynis waited.

Tamar continued to gaze at Glynis, then at
last asked, "Did the man with the shotgun run away then?"

"No, that man is dead," Glynis answered.
"Gerard killed him before he could shoot at you again."

"If the constable knows that... Does he
know?"

"Constable Stuart and a search party were
looking for you. Do you remember, before the man with the shotgun
came after you, that hounds were baying?"

"I remember."

"Those bloodhounds belong to one of the
deputies who was searching for you. The dogs led the constable and
his men to where you and Gerard were being attacked by two bounty
hunters with shotguns. And to answer your question, yes, the
constable knows that to protect you Gerard killed one of the
men."

"Then why is he in the lockup?" Tamar asked
and struggled upright, her eyes again beginning to widen with
fear.

Glynis helped the girl to sit up, and
plumped a pillow behind her, at the same time wondering if she'd
done the right thing in saying so much. And now, it was too late to
back away. "Constable Stuart is questioning everyone who knew the
Brant family," Glynis said, watching the girl closely, "in an
attempt to discover who killed Roland Brant."

The girl's eyes fluttered, and she clutched
at the sheet. "Gerard didn't kill him," she said in a whisper.
"Does the constable think he did?"

"Constable Stuart thinks he might have had
reason to kill Roland Brant," Glynis told her.

"No, Gerard didn't kill him!" Tamar said,
her eyes in the moonlight now brimming with tears. "I killed
him."

And I, whither shall I cause my shame to
go?... He would not harken unto her voice; but being stronger than
she, forced her, and lay with her.

—Second Book of Samuel

"SERVANT GIRL CONFESSES TO MURDER OF
LEADING CITIZEN"
blared the boldface headline. Neva, having
just arrived at the refuge, hurled the morning newspaper onto the
table in the heretofore quiet kitchen where Glynis sat drinking
coffee.

While Glynis gaped at the paper, Neva threw
herself into the nearest chair. "This is absolutely monstrous!" she
stormed. "Glynis, do you have any idea where that wretched paper
could have picked up such a thing? Aren't there laws against
slander? Why doesn't someone take a horsewhip to the editor of that
contemptible rag? Why aren't you
saying
something?"

"I'm numb," Glynis replied. She had also
just awakened a short time ago.

She pulled the paper toward her to read the
first lines of the article.

The investigation into the murder of distinguished
Seneca Falls merchant and philanthropist Roland Brant has concluded
with the capture of his killer. Tamar Jager, an indentured servant
in the Brant household, confessed to the heinous crime when she was
seized yesterday in the area of Montezuma Marsh. Miss Phoebe Jones,
another servant at the Brant estate, said she was not surprised to
learn that Jager was a murderess, and went on to state that she had
always known "the girl was queer in the head."

Glynis could read no more. "This is worse
than I would have imagined," she said, pushing the paper away in
disgust.

Neva had jumped from her chair to pour
herself a mug of coffee, and now began pacing around the table.
"How can they print something like that?" she exclaimed, her face
flushed with anger. "I was with that girl for hours and she said
nothing about Roland Brant. Nothing! And you were with her all last
night—" She suddenly stopped pacing and gave Glynis a direct look,
the question in her eyes explicit.

"Did you see Tamar this morning?" Glynis
asked quickly. "She seems much better. At least to my mind, she
does."

"She was asleep when I just looked in on
her," said Neva slowly. "Glynis, did she tell you something?"

"She woke just once to use the chamber pot,"
Glynis answered, truthfully. "She slept much of the night, as did
I. But Neva, I really need to go home now and ..."

Her voice trailed off as she saw that Neva
was studying her with narrowed eyes of skepticism. Glynis knew how
rapidly her friend could spot evasion, and she was badly botching
her evasiveness. She simply hadn't expected the newspaper to print
the story so soon.

She sat there in discomfort while Neva
asked, "Why do I think that you're trying to change the subject?
And that you're concealing something?"

Before Glynis could form an answer, Neva,
each word pronounced with deliberation, went on, "I've just
realized that you don't seem irate, or even surprised at the
newspaper report that Tamar has confessed to murder."

"Oh, I'm surprised—"

"Let me finish, Glynis! If Tamar did kill
Roland Brant, was it because...because
he
was the one who
raped her? My God, could that be true of Roland Brant?" Neva seemed
stunned beyond words. Glynis didn't reply, and after a minute Neva
went on, "But if that's the case, you must know that I couldn't
possibly condemn her."

"Neva, you should not say the girl was raped
by Roland Brant, and neither should I! Rape will not save Tamar
from hanging for his murder. I hope you understand that."

Neva brought her open palm down on the table
with a resounding slap. "It's outrageous! It is just outrageous
that a man can violate—"

"Yes," Glynis interrupted, "but that is the
way it is. And has been so for centuries. Neva, do you believe for
one minute that a jury of men would set that girl free because she
claimed Roland Brant had raped her? Of course not! If nothing
else, they would choose to believe it wasn't true—that she was
lying to save herself."

"I can testify to her condition!" Neva
snapped.

"But you cannot state absolutely that she
was raped," Glynis argued, concern bringing her to her feet. "And
certainly not that she was raped by Roland Brant, who in death
seems to be taking on all the trappings of sainthood. All you could
testify is that you have seen evidence that she
might
have
been raped. By someone. And how do you think a prosecutor would
approach that? By saying she was unchaste, that's how. Just a
wanton, little baggage who seduced leading citizen Roland
Brant—enticed him so as to win her release from servitude or for
myriad other reasons. The girl has no protection and no standing,
Neva. Even Clements, another Brant
servant,
described Tamar
to me as 'only a kitchen maid.'"

Neva had slumped into a chair, and was
staring at her with an expression of incredulity. "Glynis, I regret
to say that you're beginning to sound exactly like Jeremiah
Merrycoyf. That is not meant as a compliment. I have never seen you
so...so antagonistic. And to me, your supposed friend!"

"You are my friend, Neva, but I am afraid
for that girl. If you so much as imply to anyone that she should
plead rape as justification for killing Roland Brant, a prosecutor
will snatch it up and run like the wind with it. And Tamar will be
lost."

Neva shoved her chair away from the table
and stood up, her voice clipped when she demanded, "So what, Madam
Prosecutor, is your solution? Since the girl has confessed to
murdering Brant."

"That wasn't precisely what I heard
yesterday from Cullen," Glynis answered with caution, "and he is
usually quite accurate. So what Tamar said must have been
distorted by the time it reached the newspaper. And I have to
assume it reached there by way of someone in the search party."

"So what
did
she say?"

"She talked —undoubtedly in shock when she
did—about a knife. It was her knife, she said, that killed
him."

Neva groaned. But then, her forehead creased
in thought, she said, "It may be splitting hairs, but that's not
exactly the same as saying
she
killed him."

"No, it's not," Glynis agreed. "But it
evidently sounded like a confession to the men who heard it."

"Speaking of your friend the constable,"
Neva said brusquely, "I saw him on my way here. He said to tell you
that Elise Jager has filed a petition with the court clerk in
Waterloo. For full custody of her daughter."

Glynis drew in her breath. "Did he say when
it would be heard?"

"Heard?"

"The application. Heard by the court."

"As I said, you sound far too much like
Merrycoyf. But to answer your question, Judge Endicott is back from
circuit court, so Cullen said he would probably get to Elise
Jager's petition this afternoon. He, Cullen, wants to know if you
plan to attend."

"I think I should."

"Fine," Neva said, turning to leave the
kitchen. "Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get to work."

"Neva, I apologize if I said something
disagreeable. Or something that hurt you."

"That's quite all right," Neva said over her
shoulder.

But Glynis knew by the stiff set of the
shoulder that it was not all right.

***

Several hours later, a light breeze sent the smell
of honeysuckle and freshly tilled earth through the open windows
of the Seneca County Court House. Glynis sat waiting in the
second-floor courtroom, as did everyone else there, for the
appearance of Judge Tobias Endicott. Just a handful of people were
present, and Glynis, the better to observe them, was content to sit
alone at the end of a row halfway down the center aisle, grateful
that she would not be called upon to testify. She'd been required
to do so on previous occasions, but could still at times be gripped
by her lifelong fear of speaking in public.

With Cullen and Neva and Jeremiah Merrycoyf,
she had traveled in a four-passenger phaeton the six miles west to
the town of Waterloo. During the ride, there had been little
conversation. That was not unusual for Merrycoyf. Glynis knew from
past experience that he rarely spoke before a court appearance. The
lawyer, a stout St. Nicholas figure, had sat beside her on the rear
carriage seat, the only indication that he was not asleep being an
occasional nudge of the spectacles which had a tendency to slide
down his small, round nose.

Neva's silence, however, had been unusual.
The only breaks in it had come when she replied in perfunctory
fashion to Cullen's infrequent comments. After he had directed the
carriage around the square in front of the courthouse, and had
reined in the horses under a rustling canopy of tall elms, they
climbed from the phaeton. Neva took Glynis aside to briefly
apologize. But the doctor's rage at what had happened to Tamar had
obviously not abated; nor had Glynis's own rage. She and Neva
simply had different ways of seeking resolution. And Glynis did not
view all men as the enemy.

Realistically, it was time, not rage—no
matter how justified—that would free the girl from a murder
charge. Time to find the real murderer, because Glynis was nearly,
if not completely, convinced that Tamar was not Brant's killer. In
addition, the girl's highly publicized confession was now seen by
Glynis as possibly useful. It might give the killer a sense of
security, perhaps just enough to be caught off guard and to make a
careless mistake.

Of one thing Glynis was absolutely certain:
that for months Tamar Jager had lived with terror and shame, preyed
upon by the town's leading citizen and philanthropist Roland Brant.
Yet if this were spoken aloud, few would believe it. Since his
death there had even been talk of naming a grammar school for him.
And Glynis had to admit that she wouldn't have believed it either,
had she not known the history behind Gerard Gagnon's fury, had she
not caught the cook Addie's cryptic remark, had she not heard a
stable boy's hesitant whisper. There must be other instances of
Roland Brant's casual violence, his exploitation of power, but they
had perhaps been better-hidden ones.

The incident of Brant shooting a healthy
horse nagged at Glynis. It surely had been meant to serve as a
graphic warning to Tamar; to what would happen to her if she
"talked." But why had a warning so cruelly explicit been necessary?
Had she already told someone? Or had Roland Brant believed that
someone had guessed and might question the girl? Whichever, the
warning clearly had been effective.

The most confounding puzzle, though, was
that Tamar, despite her confession, did not know whether it was she
who had killed Roland Brant.

The night before, after she blurted "I
killed him," Glynis had persuaded her to tell what she knew about
Brant's death. It had not been without difficulty. Even now, seated
here in the courtroom, Glynis was ashamed that she had implied to
Tamar that Gerard Gagnon could be charged with complicity—as Cullen
had suggested—unless the true killer was found. A harsh strategy.
But as Neva herself had said earlier that night, was it worse than
allowing the girl to die? For a crime she had not committed?

The threat to Gerard had proven to be the
key.

Glynis had begun by asking Tamar:
Why had
she spoken of a knife, her knife?
Tamar answered that several
days before Roland Brant's death, she had taken a knife from the
kitchen and hidden it under the mattress in her room.

Why had she taken it?
She had vowed
to kill Roland Brant, or to kill herself the next night he came to
her room. But on that last night, as he opened the door, he was
interrupted.

How?
Someone called him. He went
upstairs, and after what sounded like an argument, he must have
fallen into bed, because she heard a thump and the bed-springs
squealed, or maybe it was someone crying. She thought he was
hurting someone.