Now we’re talking.
A gift to Lenora from her long-dead parents, it has sentimental value. It’s likely also worth a lot of money. It’s an antique, for one thing, and I doubt people like Winston and Evangeline Hope went for a cheap snow globe when choosing one for their daughter.
I pick it up, convinced Lenora would never, ever, not in a million years let it fall from her grip. The journey from the sideboard to the bed kicks up some of the gold flakes resting at the bottom of the waterless globe. They sparkle and swirl as I hold it upside down over Lenora’s hand.
Flat on her back, Lenora strains to see what I’m doing. When she spots the gold flakes inside the snow globe, she takes on a panicked look. Her eyes burn bright, and a grunt rises from the back of her throat.
I ignore it, holding the snow globe steady, waiting for the right moment to drop it. I tell myself I’m doing nothing wrong. That Lenora can catch it if she really wants to. That the reason she’s so stressed is because she knows I’m on to her.
Both of us stare at the snow globe, watching the gold flakes settle into the curve of the overturned dome. When the last one falls, I let go.
The snow globe smacks against Lenora’s palm.
I hold my breath, watching and waiting.
For her fingers to curl around it.
For her to prove that she can use her right hand.
For the moment when at least one of my suspicions is confirmed.
Instead, the snow globe topples from her hand and rolls across the mattress.
Then it hits the floor and shatters.
The sound coming from behind the closed door of my mother’s room was unmistakable.
Breaking glass.
Upon hearing it, my sister gasped. I merely flinched, as if whatever my mother had just thrown across the room was flying directly at me and not at my father.
“For Christ’s sake, Evie,” I heard him grumble. “Haven’t you destroyed enough?”
“I could ask the same of you.”
My mother’s voice was loud and clear behind the door. A sign that she was well and truly furious. Normally, the laudanum kept her sounding meek and muddled. It pleased me to hear her sounding like her old self again, even though I knew it was prompted by the worst fight my parents had had in years.
“Nothing is destroyed,” my father said. “Everything is fine. The firm is just going through a rough patch. Which is why it’s so important right now that we have the money to keep it going.”
My mother let out a derisive snort. “Our daughters’ money, you mean.”
“It should be our money.”
“Over my dead body,” my mother said.
This prompted my father to reply, “Don’t tempt me.”
“My parents had good reason for creating that trust,” my mother said. “If you could get at that money, you’d spend it all in a year and Lenora and Virginia would have nothing.”
“Nothing is exactly what they’ll have if the business goes under and this place is foreclosed on.”
My sister and I exchanged worried glances. We had no idea things were that bad, even though we should have suspected it. My parents barely spoke, let alone fought, which is why when their argument echoed down the hall, we both ran for the door to listen in. We knew something big had to have caused it.
“They’ll be just fine if it does,” my mother said.
“And what about me? You won’t care if I lose everything?”
“I’ve already lost everything,” my mother said. “Why shouldn’t you? Or are you more worried about your little whore? I suppose I should say whores, since there have been many over the years.”
“Don’t act so innocent with me, darling,” my father shot back, spitting the term of endearment he used on me with undisguised venom. “We both know the truth.”
My mother’s reply was so quiet that my sister and I had to press our ears against the door to hear it. Even then, we could barely make out the half-whispered “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do,” my father said. “I know why you married me. Just like I know that Lenora isn’t my daughter.”
I gasped. So loudly I was certain my parents heard it through the door. My sister was certain, too, for she clapped a hand over my mouth and whisked me down the hallway to the first open room. She yanked me inside just as the door to my mother’s bedroom opened. We huddled in that darkened room, my heart pounding and my head woozy from shock, as my father looked up and down the hallway.
“Girls,” he said in a voice so stern it turned my blood cold. “Were you eavesdropping?”
My sister kept her hand over my mouth as my father passed the open doorway, mere inches from us. I’d started to cry then, and my tears dripped over her fingers.
“Are you there, my dear and my darling?”
When he paused just past the door, I became certain he was about to leap inside, grab us both by our necks, and drag us out of the room. To my utter surprise, he moved on, down the hallway and to the Grand Stairs. When his footfalls faded to silence, my sister and I finally emerged and hurried to my bedroom. Inside, I threw myself onto the bed and began to weep, fully and openly.
My sister stood by the wall, her arms folded, in no mood to comfort me. I’m sure it never even crossed her mind.
“Do you think it’s true?” she said. “That we could lose Hope’s End?”
“That’s what you’re concerned about? Even after what Father said?”
“Oh, that.” My sister shrugged. “Mother was in love with one of her parents’ servants and got pregnant. He abandoned her and she had to marry Father to avoid a scandal. I thought you knew.”
I shook my head. I had no idea.
Although, in hindsight, I think I should have. My sister and I bore only a slight resemblance to each other. Our noses were different. As were our hair and eyes. We looked less like siblings and more like cousins, which strangers had mistaken us for on more than one occasion.
“Well, now you do.” My sister paused as a cruel smirk formed across her lips. “Honestly, you should be relieved. Now you know where you get it from. And that you’re not the only slut in the family.”
She then swanned out of the room, leaving me alone and with a hollow feeling in my gut that she knew about me and Ricky.
And it was only a matter of time before she told everyone else.
The only choice I had was to beat her to the punch and tell at least someone other than Archie. In my mind, the best person was my mother. She’d take the news far better than my father, for one thing. Also, I hoped she’d understand, having gone through the same predicament herself.
My mind made up, I walked to the end of the hall and crept into her room. My mother was barely awake, even though it was only late afternoon. Sunlight peeked between the drawn curtains at the windows, trying to trickle in the same way water did through a crack.
“Is that you, my darling?” she murmured from the bed.
I stood at the foot of it, trying to come up with the right words to say. But there was so much to be said--and so many questions to be asked--that I simply blurted out, “Is it true? What Father said?”
A sigh rose from the covers my mother had buried herself under.
“Yes, my darling.”
“So you don’t love him?”
“No,” my mother said.
“Did you ever?”
“Never.” My mother sounded dreamy and distant. Like someone talking in her sleep. “Never, ever. He knew it, too. He knew it and paid the man I did love to run away and never see me again. When that happened, I was trapped. I had no choice but to marry him.”
My mother’s voice drifted into a slur.
“No choice at all.”
The slur became a whisper.
“Sorry, my darling.”
The whisper faded to a gasp.
And then . . . nothing.
“Mother?” I rushed to her side, grabbing her shoulders and giving her a good shake. Jostled by the movement, her right hand flopped against the mattress, releasing the laudanum bottle she’d been holding.
It was completely empty.
She’d swallowed it all, likely right before I’d entered her room.
“Mother?” I cried, shaking her even harder, trying to jolt her back into consciousness. But it was no use. As my mother lay there, motionless, the empty bottle of laudanum rolled across the mattress and hit the floor with a crash.
TWENTY-NINE
Lenora is giving me her version of the silent treatment, which involves refusing to tap out a response to even the most basic questions. Still, I try, continuing to ask her what she’d like to do this evening.
“Would you like to try typing?”
Lenora’s left hand doesn’t rise from the bed.
“You can listen to more of the book Jessie recorded for you. Would you like that?”
Again, nothing.
“Or I could read to you instead,” I say. “That might be fun for neither of us.”
This at least gets a reaction. The corners of Lenora’s mouth perk up into a half smile. But it fades as quickly as it formed, and her face returns to stony expressionlessness.