Nobody's Secret (16 page)

Henry went on. “Tell me what I can do to help. If I can’t tempt you outside, the least I can do is assist with the baking.”

Emily shook her head with a smile. “I can’t see you cooking. Your clothes are too fine.”

“That can be remedied,” he replied, removing his suit coat and hanging it over a chair. He rolled up the sleeves of his linen shirt. Emily noticed his thin wrists and long fingers. She remembered the strength of James’s hands as he had lifted her off the stable floor. She wanted to reach out and touch Henry’s hands, but stopped herself. What was she thinking? Despite their resemblance, Henry was not his cousin.

Emily turned away, feeling a flush moving up her neck to her face. She pushed two eggs toward him. “Very well. I need these cracked into this bowl for the coconut cake.”

“That sounds easy enough.” He grabbed an egg and squeezed it into his fist over the bowl. Emily began to giggle as he turned his hand over, letting the sticky mess drip into the bowl. She handed him a clean cloth.

“There’s a trick—I’ll show you. But first let me rescue that egg,” she said. “Mama always says, ‘Waste not want not.’” She picked the white bits of shell out of the golden yolk. “Like snowflakes in summer,” she murmured.

“I beg your pardon?” Henry asked.

Her clean hand reached for the hidden compartment in her corset for her notebook until she remembered Henry’s presence. She glanced about the kitchen and spied Jasper’s shoeing bill from the smithy. She took her silver pencil from around her neck and scribbled on the paper. The words secure for later use, she replaced the pencil around her neck. She looked up to see Henry staring at her.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I needed to write something down.”

“May I see?”

“No!” She caught herself. “I don’t show anyone my words.”

“Words?” He raised his blond eyebrows. “So Miss Emily Dickinson considers herself a writer?”

What was the mysterious power these cousins had? No one outside her family knew her secret—but James and now Henry had discovered it in no time at all.

Hurriedly, she changed the subject. “Can you check my recipe for the amount of cream of tartar?”

With a small grin, he picked up the piece of paper. “One teaspoon cream of tartar.” His eyes, dancing with mischief, rested on her face. Could he see the blood rushing to shame her expression? “Will you write about me later, Miss Emily?”

“Absolutely not,” she said. “Why on earth would I write about you?” Here was a difference between the cousins. When James had discovered she wrote, he had talked about Emily. Henry spoke of himself.

“I’m an intriguing character,” he teased.

She picked up a wooden spoon and shook it in his direction as though she were brandishing a sword. “I’m not interested in intriguing characters.”

“Then what does interest you?”

“My impressions of what I see around me. My own thoughts.” Too late, she realized how immodest that might sound.

“I’m sure your thoughts are a fascinating study,” he said, a mocking gleam in his eyes.

Catching her lower lip between her teeth, she pointed to the recipe in Henry’s hand. “And the soda? How much?”

“One half teaspoon.” He turned the page over. “Where are the instructions? Shouldn’t a recipe tell you what to do?”

“Not mine.” She flashed him a quick grin. “I like lists of ingredients. Then I decide what to do with them.”

“To what end?”

“Chemical combustion!”

“The way your eyes glisten quite frightens me,” Henry said. “What does an Amherst miss know of combustion?”

“Quite a lot,” Emily assured him. “We take chemistry lectures at the College. Hasn’t Ursula told you?”

He spread out his hands. “If it doesn’t involve fashion or botany, Ursula is a closed book.”

“All her clothes are lovely, and she’s very clever in botany,” Emily conceded, stirring in the tartar. Henry took a seat at the table and watched her, his chin resting on the bridge of his interlaced hands. “And now the soda.”

“The ladies in my family wouldn’t have the first idea how to make a coconut cake, much less kill a capon. That’s a job for the servants.” he said idly. He sat up straight. “I beg your pardon, Emily. That sounded snobbish. You’ve met my mother—I would hate to sound as pretentious as she.”

“Not at all,” Emily said. “We Dickinsons are true to our Puritan forebears—don’t pay anyone to do what you can do yourself! But that doesn’t mean everyone else has to be a slave to our principles.”

She added a cup each of coconut and sugar to the bowl and then two cups of flour.

“My mother believes in the domestic arts,” Emily confided, glancing guiltily at the door to the parlor, “but I would happily trade my baking duties for a pencil and paper and a quiet desk.”

“And what will you write? Gothic romances? Chemical treatises? Poetry?” He caught sight of her expression. “Ah, a poet in the making.”

Emily’s mood turned wistful. “Your cousin managed to get me to admit that, too. You two must have been quite the pair.”

Henry stared out the window. His clouded face was in sharp contrast to the clear summer sky. “We were indeed. We only saw each other at school holidays, and away from Mother. She didn’t approve of James or his father. But we had plenty of adventures.”

Emily felt a guilty pang that it was so easy to talk with Henry. Had she forgotten James so quickly? But she couldn’t resist hearing stories about him. “Tell me,” she prompted as she stirred.

“Once we climbed Mount Washington in New Hampshire. We were caught by a freak snowstorm in October. We almost died.” A reminiscent smile played on his lips. “Those were excellent times.”

Emily shook her head. “An excellent time? Almost dying? It amazes me what young men find ‘excellent.’”

“Even the almost dying was fun—because of course we didn’t! But James and I liked pushing ourselves.” His eyes took on a sad cast, perhaps remembering that his cousin would never again rise to the challenge. “Whenever we visited Uncle, we used to race each other across the Connecticut River—the faster flowing it was, the more we liked it.”

Folding over the batter and working in the thick coconut, Emily rolled her eyes. “The river isn’t safe—it’s a wonder you weren’t drowned.”

He shrugged. “The danger was the fun part.”

“Sometimes I could scream at how little adventure I am allowed to enjoy,” Emily said. “But do tell me more. If I cannot have adventures, it gives me pleasure to hear of other people’s.”

“Well, I remember the time we camped in Rattlesnake Gulch. We swore we would bring home a rattlesnake!”

Pouring the cake batter into the pans, Emily asked, “And did you?”

He looked rueful. “No. We saw a bear and came running home. After that we stayed closer to Uncle’s house, exploring the Indian trails.” He sighed. “I miss those days. I wish James wasn’t dead.”

There was silence, finally broken by Emily. “The batter is ready,” she said. She crossed over to the oven, opened the door, and stuck her hand in. Henry stared while she counted.

“One, two, three, four . . . ” When she got to ten, the heat was unbearable and she snatched her hand away. “The oven is ready,” she said.

“Emily!” Henry grabbed her forearm to examine the redness on her hand. Without releasing her, he poured water from the pitcher onto a cloth and carefully wrapped her hand. “I had no idea that baking was so dangerous!”

“All domestic duties are hazardous to your health,” Emily retorted. “One is apt to die of boredom! I’d rather have rattlesnakes and bears any day.”

Henry laughed loudly. Emily hushed him, but it was too late.

“Emily!” Mrs. Dickinson’s querulous voice could be heard from the parlor. “Who’s here? Did I hear someone?”

“I’ll be right there, Mama,” Emily called.

Henry stood up. “I had better be going and leave you to your alarming household chores.”

“I would rather have gone for a ride with you,” Emily said, shocked at how easily the sentiment slipped from her lips.

“Another time,” Henry said, pleased. With a slight bow, he took his leave.

Emily turned on her heel toward the parlor. Her hand was on the doorknob when a thought suddenly occurred to her. Henry had told her that he and James were strong enough swimmers to race the swift-moving Connecticut River. Then why had he been so willing to believe that James had drowned? Was she the only person who saw the questions surrounding his death?

“Emily!” Her mother’s voice was full of her drugged sleep.

Emily put aside her suspicions for later consideration. Summoning a suitably cheerful tone, she called out, “Coming, Mother.”

Until they lock it in the grave,
‘
T is bliss I cannot weigh

The next morning Emily was ready to return to her investigation as soon as the breakfast dishes were cleared from the table. Her mother was gone, Emily’s coconut cake in hand, to spend the day with Mrs. Hitchcock. Emily tried to leave quietly by the front door, only to find Vinnie blocking her way.

“You’re staying inside, Emily Elizabeth,” Vinnie said. “We can talk about the case here.”

“We can talk, but then I’m going out. Alone,” Emily said. She sank down on a sofa, trying to quell a cough in her chest.

“Only if I decide you are well enough to go,” Vinnie said firmly.

Knowing she was defeated for the moment, Emily took a deep breath and began. “James’s death was meant to look like an accidental drowning, but he had no water in his lungs. And someone dressed his body in Horace Goodman’s clothes and deposited it in our pond.”

Vinnie said, “Was it Henry Langston?”

“Henry? I don’t think he’s a killer,” Emily said.

Vinnie shot her sister a penetrating look. “You call him Henry now?”

Blushing, Emily said, “Never mind.”

“Do you think you have let Henry’s charm keep you from looking at the facts with a clear head?” Vinnie asked, collapsing next to her on the sofa.

“Of course not,” Emily insisted. “I can be completely disinterested.”

“Prove it!”

“I can’t deny there’s a strong case against Henry,” Emily admitted. “Who else knew James was alive?” She started counting on her fingers. “One, he admitted meeting his cousin the day before he died. Two, Henry drives the carriage that probably brought James to the pond. It’s his uncle’s carriage; remember Sam Wentworth wasn’t home the day James stopped by the farm, because he was buying the carriage.”

“Go on,” Vinnie said.

“Third, Henry certainly had motive enough to want James dead; his family’s fortunes depended upon it.”

“Very damning,” Vinnie said in a thrilled whisper.

“And we know Henry is a liar,” Emily pointed out. “He told his mother that he just arrived, but he’s been here for several days.”

“What if there’s an innocent explanation?” Vinnie asked.

Emily raised her eyebrows.

With a mischievous grin, Vinnie asked, “If your mother were Violet Langston, wouldn’t you want to avoid spending time with her?”

They giggled. Then Vinnie, sobered, said, “But if Henry lies so well to his family, how can we depend on anything he says?”

“We can’t,” Emily said decisively. “But let’s look at the case for his innocence. Henry was genuinely upset when he saw his cousin’s body. Unless he is a marvelous actor, I would swear he didn’t know James was dead until that moment.”

“A point in his favor,” Vinnie agreed.

“And there are logical reasons to believe his innocence as well. How did he get Horace Goodman’s clothes to dress the body? Henry is a law student who lives in New Haven. Would he even know the family’s handyman, much less trust him to disguise a corpse?”

“That’s an excellent point,” Vinnie agreed.

“Unless he had an accomplice,” Emily said. “Anyone in his family had the same motive.”

“That does make it more difficult,” Vinnie said.

The silence in the room offered proof of the hard thinking going on.

“Emily, this is making me a little worried about Father.”

Emily gave her sister a puzzled look. “Why?”

“That codicil you found said James was dead. His own father said so, yes?”

“I have serious doubts that Jeremiah Wentworth knew anything about that codicil. He was in the Dakotas at the time,” Emily said.