The Bone Garden: A Novel

Rose.

He scrambled over the railing. Once before, he had plunged into the Charles River. That time, he had docilely surrendered his fate to the whims of providence. This time, he surrendered nothing. As he flung himself off the bridge, he stretched out his arms as though to seize this one last chance at happiness. He sliced into water so cold it made him suck in a startled gasp. He surfaced, coughing. Paused only long enough to heave in and out several deep breaths, washing his lungs with air.

Then he plunged, once again, underwater.

In the darkness, he flailed blindly at anything within reach, feeling for a limb, a bit of cloth, a fistful of hair. His hands met only empty water. Out of breath, he popped to the surface again. This time he heard a man's shouts from the bridge above.

— There's someone down there! —

— I see him. Call the Night Watch! —

Three quick breaths, then once again, Norris dove. In his panic, he did not even register the cold or the growing chorus of shouts above. With every passing second, Rose was slipping away from him. Arms churning, he clawed at the water, as frantic as a drowning man. She might be only inches from his grasp, but he could not see her.

I am losing you.

A desperate need for air drove him back to the surface for another breath. There were lights on the bridge above, and more voices. Feckless witnesses to his despair.

I would rather drown than leave you here.

One last time he dove. The glow of the lanterns above faintly penetrated the dark water in shifting ribbons of light. He saw the shadowy strokes of his own arms, saw clouds of sediment. And drifting just below, he saw something else. Something pale, billowing like sheets in the wind. He lunged toward it, and his hand closed around cloth.

Rose's limp body drifted toward him, her hair a swirl of black.

At once he kicked upward, pulling her with him. But when they broke the surface and he gasped in lungfuls of air, she was limp, as lifeless as a bundle of rags. I am too late. Sobbing, gasping, he hauled her toward the riverbank, kicking until his legs were so exhausted they would scarcely obey him. When at last his feet touched mud, he could not support his own weight. He half crawled, half stumbled out of the water, and dragged Rose up the bank, onto dry land.

Her wrists and ankles were bound; she was not breathing.

He rolled her onto her stomach. Live, Rose! You have to live for me. He placed his hands on her back and leaned in, squeezing her chest. Water gushed from her lungs and spilled out of her mouth. He pressed again and again, until her lungs were empty, but still she lay unresponsive.

Frantic, he tore the bindings from her wrists and turned her onto her back. Her face, smudged with grime, stared up at him. He pressed his hands against her chest and leaned in, trying to expel the last drops of water from her lungs. Again and again he pressed as his tears and river water dripped onto her face.

— Rose, come back to me! Please, darling. Come back. —

Her first twitch was so faint, it might only have been his desperate imagination. Then, suddenly, she shuddered and coughed, a wet and racking cough that was the most beautiful sound he'd ever heard. Laughing and crying at once, he turned her onto her side and brushed sopping hair from her face. Though he could hear footsteps approaching, he did not look up. His gaze was only on Rose, and when she opened her eyes, his face was the first thing she saw.

— Am I dead? — she whispered.

— No. — He wrapped his arms around her shivering body. — You're right here with me. Where you'll always be. —

A pebble clattered across the ground, and the footsteps came to a standstill. Only then did Norris look up to see Eliza Lackaway, her cape billowing in the wind. Like wings. Like the wings of a giant bird. Her gun was pointed straight at him.

— They're watching, — Norris said, glancing up at the people who stood on the bridge above. — They'll see you do it. —

— They'll see me kill the West End Reaper. — Eliza shouted toward the crowd: — Mr. Pratt! It's Norris Marshall! —

Voices on the bridge rose in excitement.

— Did you hear that? —

— It's the West End Reaper! —

Rose struggled to sit, clinging to Norris's arm. — But I know the truth, — she said. — I know what you did. You can't kill us both. —

Eliza's arm wavered. She had only one shot. Even as Mr. Pratt and two men from the Night Watch gingerly worked their way down the steep bank, she was still standing there, undecided, her gun swinging between Norris and Rose.

— Mother! —

Eliza went rigid. She looked up at the bridge, where her son was now standing beside Wendell.

— Mother, don't! — Charles pleaded.

— Your son told us, — said Norris. — He knows what you did, Mrs. Lackaway. Wendell Holmes knows, too. You can kill me here, now, but the truth is already out. Whether I live or die, your future has already been decided. —

Slowly, her arm dropped. — I have no future, — she said softly. — Whether it ends here, or on the gallows, it's over. The only thing I can do now is to spare my son. — She raised her gun, but this time it was not pointed at Norris; it was aimed at her own head.

Norris lunged toward her. Grabbing her wrist, he tried to wrench the gun free, but Eliza resisted, fighting with the viciousness of a wounded animal. Only when Norris twisted her arm did she finally release her grip. She stumbled back, howling. Norris stood pitilessly exposed on the riverbank with the gun in his hand. In the space of a heartbeat, he realized what was about to happen. He saw Watchman Pratt take aim. He heard Rose's anguished scream of — No! —

The impact of the bullet slammed the breath from his lungs. The gun dropped from his hand. He staggered and sprawled backward on the mud. A strange silence fell over the night. Norris stared up at the sky but heard no voices, no footsteps crowding in, not even the swish of the water against the bank. All was calm and peaceful. He saw stars above, winking brighter through the clearing haze. He felt no pain, no fear, only a sense of astonishment that all his struggles, all his dreams, should come down to this moment at the water's edge, with the stars shining down.

Then, as though from far away, he heard a sweet and familiar voice, and he saw Rose, her head framed by stars, as though she gazed down from the heavens.

— Is there nothing you can do? — she cried. — Please, Wendell, you must save him! —

Now he heard Wendell's voice as well, and heard cloth rip as his shirt was torn open. — Bring the lamp closer! I must see the wound! —

Light spilled down in a golden shower, and as the wound was revealed, Norris saw Wendell's expression, and read the truth in his eyes.

— Rose? — Norris whispered.

— I'm here. I'm right here. — She took his hand and leaned close as she stroked back his hair. — You're going to be fine, darling. You're going to get well, and we'll be happy. We'll be so happy. —

He sighed and closed his eyes. He could see Rose floating away from him, carried on the wind so swiftly that he had no hope of reaching her. — Wait for me, — he whispered. He heard what sounded like a distant clap of thunder, a lonely blast of gunfire that echoed through the gathering darkness.

Wait for me.

Jack Burke yanked up the floorboard in his bedroom and frantically scooped out the money he had hidden there. His life's savings, close to two thousand dollars, clattered into the saddlebag.