Sailor scrambled to a sitting position but did not wag his tail. Josephine looked at Flora, waiting for her to react, and when she continued to stare, silent, reached down and stroked the dog.
“Yes,” she said. “It’s extraordinary, but it affirms that that is where she is. We can look on a map. You can try sending her a letter, although…” She picked up the letter again. “…this Reverend Snelcroft says he sent letters and didn’t hear back.”
“Oh, but Enid would have written.” Flora felt a visceral power—in her jaw, in her voice—as she spoke in defence of a sister. A family member. Here, in Canada. She felt taller, her eyes saw more clearly. “She’s not well lettered but she would have written back. I know she would’ve. Maybe she’s not…maybe there’s been a mistake. Maybe it’s not her but some other girl.”
“No, no. Don’t worry. He says right here, see?” She handed Flora the letter, pointing at the sentence.
I am happy to report that one of them was Enid Salford.
Flora went back to the beginning and read to the end…raise these English children from the gutters in which they were found…
She stared at the letter. The words were true, she was now convinced; but she felt a great mistrust of the people who had been put in charge of her little sister and wondered at the reasons for her silence.
“Why hasn’t she written? It must be the people she is with won’t let her. Or don’t mail her letters. Like what happened to me. Or don’t want her to be found.”
Her voice raised. Hard. Wild.
Josephine took off her reading glasses and set them on the table. She contemplated the stained glass, chin in hand.
“Mr. Fairweather said he would try to send for Enid.”
“You can’t send for someone you don’t hear from. This Mr. Mallory doesn’t even write back. We can’t just…just…send letters.”
Josephine turned on her chair. Flora had slid to the edge of her chair, holding the letter with both hands. She stared at Josephine, furious. Accusing.
“Someone needs to go,” Flora said. “Someone needs to go to Nova Scotia. Find her and bring her back.”
“We will write…”
“No. No!”
“Flora, I—”
“It’s not enough. She could be in danger.” Her voice trembled, broke.
Sailor scrambled to his feet and nosed Flora’s skirt. Josephine, too, laid a hand on Flora’s skirt. Patted her knee.
“I will talk to Mr. Fairweather again, Flora. I’ll tell him that someone should go over there.”
Flora stroked the dog’s silky black hair. Through tears, she saw Sailor’s eyes soften, relax.
She could not speak.
“Maybe Mr. Fairweather himself will go,” Josephine said. “I will ask him, Flora. I promise you. I will ask him to go fetch her back.”
—
On the following afternoon, Jasper Tuck took Flora into his confidence.
“I have a plan.”
Flora cut a piece of carpet into small squares, leaning forward in a wicker chair, a basket of samples at her side. Her scissors chewed through the carpet with a final effort. March wind rattled the window in its frame, rampaged through the treetops with a sound like surf. Last summer, she and Maud had sat on these same wicker chairs, set around a wicker table on the veranda—drinking lemonade, playing checkers—and heard a frantic peeping. They climbed onto the roof and inched on their bellies to peer into a swallows’ nest. The babies clustered like a handful of finely feathered bones, beaks gaping. She would show all these things to Enid. She would show her a clutch of chicks, in the henhouse. They would stand in the summer sunshine. Enid would hold a bucket, scattering corn. Her hair—dark, now, or blonde? Short or long enough to braid?
“You figure in it,” he added. He lifted a compass, punched it into a sheet of paper with a crispy pop. He swung the pencil, little finger lifted.
He’s a strange one.
She set the small square on her knee, smoothed it. Her job, now, was to stitch over the cut edge and attach a knotted border.
“I’m going to make that house down the street. Hilltop, I hear tell it’s called.”
Of course, Flora thought, with a sudden thrill. Pleasant Valley’s most elaborate house. Where the MacVey sisters lived, purportedly holding seances and musical evenings, hosting visiting dignitaries. She always paused to gaze at the terraced lawns and the rose gardens.
“First…”
He did not finish the sentence, sliding his pencil along a protractor.
“First, we need to talk about that money.”
“What money?”
“Don’t be smart with me. You know what money.”
“I don’t know what you’re taking about.” A flush started in her neck, creeping upwards in revelatory petals.
He exploded from his chair. He seized her arms, half lifting her from her seat, squeezing, his breath sour in her face.
She dropped the scissors, the little carpet. “Let me g—”
“You shut your mouth. I heard you on the other side there. Watching me. Now you listen to me. I been thinking what to do about you. That’s my life savings and it’s my business and nobody else’s. I don’t want one word spoken about my money. Not one word. If you say one word about that money to any of them,” he nodded at the house, “I will know.” He lowered his voice. “I’ll see it in their eyes just like I seen it in yours. People look different at a man with money.”
“I won’t say anything. Why would I? Let me go.”
He released her arms. She fell back in the chair.
“You promise?”
She rubbed her arms. “Promise.”
“Say ‘I promise I won’t say anything about your money.’ ”
“I promise I won’t say anything about your money.” She stared at him, suddenly emboldened by curiosity. “Mr. Tuck, it’s only money. Why do I care? Most men have money, I suppose. I don’t know why you don’t put it in the bank, though. What if there was a fire?”
He kicked his chair back to its place in front of the table. He sat, staring coldly at the
