Nobody's Secret (7 page)

“Then we mustn’t tell her,” Emily said earnestly. “For her health’s sake.”

“You mean so you can be free to do whatever you like.”

Shrugging, Emily squashed her bonnet over her hair.

“Where are you going?” Vinnie’s voice rose in pitch. “I’m not baking by myself today.”

“We need sugar. I’ll get some from the store.” Emily stepped toward the front door.

“Emily Elizabeth, don’t you dare abandon me again!” Vinnie cried. “We have plenty of sugar.”

“Then salt.” Emily flung open the door.

“We have a whole box. Emily, come back at once!”

Before Vinnie finished her sentence, Emily was through the garden gate and up the hill to Cutler’s dry goods store.

Amherst had two general stores. Mr. Nobody’s new clothes had come from Cutler’s. Unfortunately, the Dickinson family patronized a rival store, Mack and Sons. Emily had rarely shopped at Cutler’s, whose owner had a crotchety reputation.

Mr. Cutler himself was behind the counter, his skeletal body framed by shelves that stretched to the ceiling. He was waiting on a little boy who was fetching baking powder for his mother. Emily could see the boy eyeing the jars of candy on the counter.

As she waited, Emily looked around the store. In the far corner was a table stacked with work shirts and pants. She felt the fabric of a rough blue shirt and examined the label inside the collar. It was identical to Mr. Nobody’s. The trousers, too, were familiar. The canvas boots she was looking for were in neat rows on the shelves against the wall.

“That will be two pennies, son,” Mr. Cutler said from behind the counter.

The boy stuck out a palm containing exactly two pennies. He glanced again at the jars, his gaze lingering first on the butterscotch, then the caramels and the peppermints before coming to rest on the lollipops.

“Thank you,” the boy muttered. He took his little package of baking powder and shuffled out.

Emily stepped up and put a penny on the counter. “May I have a lollipop? Quickly, please.”

Deft from long practice, the dour storekeeper folded up the candy in a twist of paper.

“I’ll just be a moment.” Emily hurried out and saw the little boy had gone no further than the wide porch outside. “Here you are,” she said, handing him the candy. Without stopping for the boy’s thanks, she returned to the store counter, a smile on her lips.

Mr. Cutler’s face was still grim. “What do you need today, Miss Dickinson?”

Emily sighed. Did everyone in town know who she was? “Mr. Cutler, I’d like to ask you something rather unusual.”

He waited.

“Have you sold one of those shirts and a pair of pants together? Perhaps the boots as well?”

With a bark of laughter, Mr. Cutler said, “Do you know how many of these I sell? Every farmhand and factory worker in Amherst wears my clothes.”

Emily refused to be discouraged. “Would you recall if a gentleman had purchased such a combination?

“And if I did, why should I tell you? My customers rely on my discretion.”

“For the purchase of work clothing?”

“For any purchase. Tell me young lady, why are you asking?” He paused, but Emily couldn’t think of a reasonable answer. “Do you want to buy anything?” he asked pointedly. “Another candy, perhaps?”

She decided to abandon the clothes for now. She had one more clue to follow. “Honey,” she said.

“How much?” Mr. Cutler appeared to soften a bit, like a dollop of honey melting into hot tea, Emily thought whimsically.

“I’m looking for a particular type,” she said. “It’s an unusual flavor—with apple, clover, and a hint of honeysuckle.”

“Fancy.” Mr. Cutler scowled. “I don’t have any more.”

“But you did at one time?”

He nodded. “Not now. I can offer you a honey that tastes of wildflowers.”

“I want only this particular honey,” Emily insisted.

“My honey isn’t good enough for you?”

Flustered, Emily sought the words to soothe the cantankerous shopkeeper. “I’m sure your honey is delicious, but my mother is partial to the honeysuckle.”

“I never have much to sell. Sam Wentworth only sells enough to pay for his groceries. And none at all this year.”

“Sam Wentworth?” Emily pounced. “I don’t know him. Where does he live?”

“You don’t want to drop in on him. He doesn’t like people much.” Mr. Cutler sounded as if he was in complete sympathy. Emily wondered why he kept a shop if he disliked the public so.

“I’m sure when I compliment his honey, he won’t mind,” Emily said.

“Find him yourself. It’s not my job to send customers elsewhere.”

“It was a civil request . . . ” Emily began.

“Civil?” Mr. Cutler snorted. “You Dickinsons had your noses in the air and your heads in the clouds. My store has been too good for you all these years, but now you ask me your impertinent questions. And to add insult to injury, you want me to help you buy honey somewhere else. Cutler’s doesn’t need your business, Miss Dickinson.”

Emily was unused to discourtesy in any form. Usually the name Dickinson opened every door in town. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Cutler. I’ll be certain to tell my father of your courtesy.” She turned on her heel and stalked away from the counter. She bumped into someone standing in the doorway.

“Miss Emily?” It was her father’s law clerk, Mr. Ripley.

“Mr. Ripley.” Emily worked to keep surprise out of her voice. Although her father’s office was on the street adjoining the Common, she rarely saw Mr. Ripley outside of it. “You’re playing truant from the office?” she asked.

He began to rub his hands together nervously. “I needed tea,” he said. Everything about him was nondescript. His height was middling and his mousy brown hair was parted on one side, giving him a lopsided look. Emily usually had the impression Mr. Ripley did not expect to be noticed. Today he seemed anxious.

Before Emily could make her way past him, he asked, “Did I hear you mention Mr. Wentworth?”

She blushed as she realized that Mr. Ripley had no doubt overheard Mr. Cutler’s rudeness. “Yes. Mr. Sam Wentworth seems to be responsible for some exceptional honey. Do you know where he lives?”

“Oh, that Mr. Wentworth.” His face went slack. “I think he lives on the road to Northampton. I don’t know. If you’ll excuse me, I must go.” Without lingering to make his purchases, he scurried back toward the law offices of Edward Dickinson.

“But your tea!” Emily called after him. Mr. Ripley didn’t stop, and Emily stared after him, perplexed.

The grubby little boy was still sitting on the porch steps, sucking hard on the lollipop. His earnestness made her smile. He pulled the boiled taffy out of his mouth and said, “That man was wrong. Mr. Wentworth lives out toward Pelham. It’s a red house, on the right side of the road, but you can hardly see for the apple orchard. The house needs paint.”

Before she could thank the boy, he had popped the lollipop back in his mouth and shuffled away.

This Mr. Wentworth sold—or gave—Mr. Nobody a bit of fresh honeycomb a few days earlier, Emily thought. Surely he must know the man’s identity. And if Emily were lucky, perhaps Mr. Wentworth knew more than that. But would he tell her.

The pedigree of honey
Does not concern the bee—
A clover, any time, to him
Is aristocracy.

Emily marched purposefully down Main Street in the direction of Pelham. Silhouetted against the sky, a crow perched on the roof of a large house, its sharp eyes watching her. As she passed the house, it screeched. Its cawing was answered by a chorus of other crows in the elm trees scattered around the garden.

Emily stopped to stare and savor the moment. “‘The ancient crows hold their sour conversation in the sky,’” she recited aloud. Ralph Waldo Emerson had a way with a poem. Her father didn’t approve of her reading modern poetry, but she secretly considered Mr. Emerson a kindred spirit. When she read his poetry, she felt as though she were flying.

She continued past farms and meadows. Emily’s doubts about the wisdom of her excursion increased with every step away from her familiar neighborhood. After a mile or so, she spied her goal. The property was impossible to mistake, with its overgrown apple orchard and enormous honeysuckle bushes competing for air and light. Through the tangled branches, she glimpsed a tiny red house with peeling paint. The porch railing had rotted through and had fallen into jagged pieces on the porch. The shutters hung crookedly, and one dangled by a single rusted nail.

She hesitated, her hand on the gate. Across the road was a field of corn, the tall stalks swaying in the faint breeze. A scarecrow in the center of the field seemed to question her resolve. Emily looked down the road in both directions. It was reasonably busy with passing carriages and wagons. At least she wasn’t completely alone.

She pushed open a creaking gate and stepped carefully through the brambles. They grabbed at her ankles as though they were trying to snare her. She steeled herself to keep going.

Although there was no sign of human activity, everywhere there was movement. Bees darted among the apple blossoms, the honeysuckle, the clover. Emily hesitated, staring up at the forbidding house. She wasn’t one to shirk her self-imposed duty, but she was reluctant to climb those rickety steps and knock on that door.

But perhaps she didn’t have to. The honey had led her here. If the honey was not the same, she need not knock. It was only prudent to verify the flavors first, she thought. She pushed away the knowledge that she was being cowardly.

Through the trees, she saw half a dozen wooden hives. She went closer. Glancing back, she was relieved to see that the house was lost to view behind a dozen apple trees. She wouldn’t be observed.

Each box quivered with the crawling of hundreds—no, thousands—of bees. The thrum of their activity made the bones behind her ears shiver. Her brother had tried to keep bees one summer without success, so she had some experience with the creatures.

Trying to act as though she had every right to do so, she lifted the top of a hive and peered inside. She could see the honey in combs at the bottom, their sweetness out of reach.

Emily climbed on an old crate and reached down to the honeycomb. In an instant, her hand was carpeted with swarming insects. The bees whirred, and she felt as though she were buzzing too. She didn’t dare move and for a moment the honey was forgotten, as was her investigation. Emily couldn’t take her eyes off her hand, as though it were something separate from herself. She had never felt anything as consuming as the sensation of a thousand bees crawling across her skin.

A bee flew up and tangled itself in her hair. With her free hand, Emily shooed it away and brought herself back to her task. Gently brushing the bees off her hand, she broke off a piece of comb, soaked with honey the color of burnt gold.

Carefully replacing the hive’s cover, she moved away and brought the honeycomb to her lips. It dripped in her hand, staining her sleeve. It smelled like perfume distilled from the orchard and flowers all around her. Her finger touched her lips and the burst of flavor spread through her limbs.

It was unmistakably the same honey. Mr. Nobody had been here. He had tasted this honey and carried some away to Emily. She floated on the memory of his callused finger on the tip of her nose.

“Ow!” While Emily was lost in her reverie, a furious bee that had followed her from the hive stung her hand. She dropped the honeycomb and took stock of the damage. A stinger was sticking upright in her skin. Wincing, she pulled it out. She prodded at the small swollen lump, acutely aware of the poison spreading through her blood like the bindweed that infiltrated her flowerbeds.

Emily looked around for the well that she knew must be there—cold water would relieve the sting. Unfortunately, wells were always close to houses. Now that she knew that Mr. Wentworth’s honey was the same as Mr. Nobody’s, she would have to approach anyway. She made her way through the orchard toward the dilapidated house.

As she trudged forward, she heard faint voices from inside the house. She abandoned the idea of finding the well and wondered whether she should knock on the door—or would she learn more if she played spy.

Straining to hear the voices, she approached as stealthily as one of Vinnie’s hunting cats. Emily detoured from the front door to a window, open to catch the least breeze. She flattened her body below the sill and listened hard. The heat felt as though it was pressing down on her skin. Her heart hammered in her ears, nearly drowning out the voices of the men inside.