The unbelievable sight silenced him. He dropped his carpetbag, running forward. He reached down to lift her, certain she was only unconscious. He couldn't recognize the significance of the blood sopping the carpet, the great throat wound.
He saw the open dormer window, the rain driving in to soak the carpet. He saw one of the teardrop earrings he'd given her, but not the other.
The mirror caught his attention. He moved toward it, choking on the stench of the wet wool rug. On the mirror, in blood, were four letters.
B E N T
He looked from the mirror to the open window to his motionless wife. The bottom of the T on the mirror grew, swelled, blood accumulating in a fat drop that finally burst. The blood trickled down from the upright of the T, making it longer and longer.
"I thought he was dead," George said, not aware that he was screaming.
BOOK FOUR
THE YEAR OF THE LOCUST
Intelligence, virtue, and patriotism are to give place, in all elections, to ignorance, stupidity, and vice. The superior race is to be made subservient to the inferior. ... They who own no property are to levy taxes and make all appropriations. ... The appropriations to support free schools for the education of the negro children, for the support of old negroes in the poor-houses, and the vicious in jails and penitentiary, together with a standing army of negro soldiers will be crushing and utterly ruinous. ... The white people of our State will never quietly submit
ALL LOOKS WELL. THE CONSTITUTION WILL BE VINDICATED AND THE ARCH-APOSTATE PUT OUT OF THE WHITE HOUSE BEFORE THE END OF THE WEEK.
Telegram to the
39
That night the rain changed to sleet. In the morning the temperature plummeted. Iron cold gripped the valley. Bleak skies hid the sun.
Jupiter Smith handled arrangements for the funeral; George was incapable. Even in the worst days of the war, he had never experienced anything like this. He had no appetite. When he tried a little broth he threw it up. He was stricken with continuous diarrhea, like that which killed so many men in the wartime camps on both sides.
He swung back and forth between not believing that Constance was gone and outbursts of grief that became so noisy he had to lock himself in a bedroom — not the one they'd shared; he couldn't stand to enter it — until the violent emotion worked itself out.
The homes and churches of Lehigh Station prepared to celebrate Christmas, though with less exuberance than usual because of the dreadful event at the mansion on the mountain. George thought the pieties of the season an abominable joke.
Christmas Day was somber and misty and, at Belvedere, joyless. Patricia played a carol on the great gleaming Steinway piano. William, ruddy and vigorous from a fall season of rowing at Yale, stood beside her and sang one verse of "God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen" in a strained baritone. He stopped singing when his father got up from the chair where he'd been sitting silently and walked out of the room.
Late in the afternoon, Jupe Smith called on them. He told George that all the telegraph messages had been sent to relatives and friends. He specifically mentioned Patrick Flynn, Constance's father, who was up in years now. "In his case, I described the cause of death as heart seizure. I saw no point in telling an old man that his daughter was, ah —"
"Butchered?"
Jupe stared at the floor. George waved, condoning the falsehood, and with a listless air walked back to the sideboard. He rummaged among cut glass decanters, accidentally overturning one. He was trying to get drunk on bourbon. His stomach had rejected it all afternoon.
He righted the decanter, dripping sour mash on the polished floor. "Where did you send the message to Charles Main?"
"Care of General Duncan at Fort Leavenworth."
"And Billy? Virgilia? Madeline? Did you —?"
"Yes. I warned every one of them, exactly as you instructed, George. I said that anyone in either family might be a target of this Bent, though I wander if that's really likely."
"Likely or not, it's possible. What about the earring?"
"I described it for each of them. Pearl, with a gold mount forming a teardrop. I don't quite see why —"
"I want them to know everything. Bent's description as I remember it — everything."
"Well, I took care of it."
George poured a drink. His linen stank, his speech was full of long pauses and unfinished thoughts, and his usually calm dark eyes had a wild glint. Jupe decided to leave.
"He's sick, Mr. Smith," Patricia whispered as she ushered the lawyer through the door. "I've never seen him act so strangely."
George had recovered slightly by the day of the funeral, which was held two days before the New Year.
Madeline was present, all the way from South Carolina. She was self-conscious, oddly shy. She was forty-two now, her hair heavily streaked with gray, which she refused to touch up with coloring. Her coat and mourning dress of black silk were old and shabby. When George first saw her, he greeted her with forced warmth and held his damp cheek against hers a moment. She didn't think he noticed her impoverished appearance. She was thankful.
Virgilia came from Washington. She was neatly though not expensively dressed. In her presence, George felt weak and small, very much the younger brother, even though there was only a year's difference between them. Much of Virgilia's old rage had been purged by her new life. She was able to embrace George with real feeling, and express her sorrow and mean it. The change confounded some of the townspeople who remembered the radical harridan of years past.
About three hundred men and women from Hazard's and the town joined the family for the funeral mass at St. Margaret's-in-the-Vale, then drove or walked in the freezing air to the hillside burying ground maintained by the church. Father Toone, Constance's priest, intoned his Latin beside the open grave, then traced the sign of the cross. Gravediggers began to lower the ornate silvered coffin on its straps. On the other side, red-faced and uncomfortable, Stanley and Isabel stared everywhere but at the grieving husband. Fortunately for everyone's peace of mind, they had not brought their obnoxious twins. Although it was not quite two in the afternoon, Stanley was noticeably drunk.
From behind George a gloved hand touched his arm. He reached across to take the hand without looking. Virgilia held tightly to her brother's fingers. The crowd broke up.
The bitter wind whipped the hem of Father Toone's surplice as he approached George and the two crying children. "I know this is a grievous day, George. Yet we must be confident in God. He has His purpose for the world and each of His creatures, no matter how hidden by clouds of evil that purpose may be."
George stared at the priest. Pale and hollow-cheeked, he bore a strong resemblance to photographs of the demented Poe in the last months of his life, Madeline thought. Stonily he said, "Please excuse me, Father."
It was the obligation of the Hazards to open the doors of Belvedere that afternoon and offer food and drink to the mourners. All of the rich breads and cakes, cloved hams and juicy beef rounds and oyster pies that normally would have been prepared for Christmas Day were served instead at the wake. Alcohol loosened tongues, and, before long, groups of guests were chatting noisily, even laughing, throughout the downstairs.