Page 34 of The Invisible Hour

Mia gestured for the employee to come closer, and he did, curious, for she was a stunning figure with her red hair loose, nearly reaching her waist, and her old-fashioned black dress. The summer intern was a college student who had written a paper on The House of the Seven Gables.

“I was here earlier, and I lost an earring in the garden,” Mia told him as he drew near. She sounded so distressed. “May I look? Please, I’m in a terrible rush.”

The intern glanced over his shoulder. He was meant to set the alarms and lock the doors, then set the bolt on the gate after he’d left. It was his first time closing up alone. According to the rules, no one was allowed on the grounds after hours, but he found himself moved by this woman’s plight.

“They were a gift from a dear friend,” Mia confided. “She’s passed on and they’re all I have left of her.”

Joel was on the property now. She spied him on the corner, coming towards them.

“Can you open the gate?” Mia sounded truly desperate now.

“Sure,” the young man said, won over when he saw tears brimming in her black liquid eyes. He leaned in to unlock the latch. “Can you do it quickly?”

“Absolutely,” Mia assured him. She ran into the garden. The trellis was abloom with the last of the fading roses, climbing New Dawn, a delicate pink variety of small rose that did well in salty soil. Mia knelt down. She would not let one man ruin her life. She would not be bound by history or fate.

“Stop right now,” she heard Joel shout.

Mia thought of her mother kneeling before him, she thought of the days when women had to confess their sins. Finally, she held the fern-seed and was at last invisible. A haze descended, and the young employee of the Seven Gables disappeared in that murky light, as if a fog had rolled in from the sea and nothing was as it had appeared to be. She heard the gate slam open, and her name shouted out, but she didn’t have to obey Joel anymore. The young man who worked at the museum shouted Hello! Are you still there? but by then Mia was curled up beside the hedges outside Nathaniel’s house, there in the bright sunlight in the summer of 1837.

THE SALEM OBSERVER WAS being delivered by a young boy who nearly tripped over Mia. He hadn’t noticed her on the brick walkway, where she now sat cross-legged, her head aching, overheated and starving. She felt as if she’d traveled halfway around the world. The air was lazy and yellow and thick, and it wasn’t easy to breathe.

“Miss,” the newsboy said, unnerved in her presence. “Should I direct you to the Seamen’s Widow and Orphan Association?”

“No, thank you,” Mia said, rising and brushing off the rose petals that clung to the fabric of her black dress. It was the last burst of summer, and the day would be blistering. Mia wished she had thought to wear lighter clothing. It occurred to her that she hadn’t properly prepared, just as when she had run away from the Community, for she’d taken nothing with her but the painting, the book, and her mother’s letter tucked inside a canvas bag worn over her shoulder. Travel light. Don’t look back. Take only what you need most of all.

The newsboy helped Mia to her feet, then awkwardly bowed, as if he stood before a queen. He found the stranger extraordinary, with her loose red hair and strange crimson-colored boots. The boy thought perhaps he’d found a fairy who lived beneath the hedge, and perhaps he’d have three wishes granted, but he wasn’t bold enough to stay. “Good luck to you, miss,” he declared, before he took off running.

Nathaniel’s sister Louisa watched the encounter between the newsboy and the stranger from the window; curious and nervous, she called her sister to her. Elizabeth always knew what to do. But when Elizabeth came into the room and looked out the window, she said, “Oh, damn!” She crossed her arms in front of her chest and studied the scene on the path leading to their house. Of course, Mia couldn’t leave well enough alone. People in love were such fools, they made up excuses, they wound up doing as they pleased no matter how much good advice they’d been given. A small part of Elizabeth was impressed by Mia’s recklessness. If she had some of that herself, perhaps she’d be in Barbados right now.

“Do you know who she might be?” Louisa asked of the woman in the black dress.

There’d been good reason not to inform Louisa about Mia’s existence; Elizabeth’s younger sister was too softhearted, and if given free rein, she would have likely invited the stranger to move in with them. She pursed her lips, as she always did when she was thinking deeply, which was much of the time. She wore a plain muslin dress and a quilted jacket, having planned to do nothing but read all afternoon. Obviously, those plans had now been interrupted, but she’d gotten rid of Mia once, so it was likely that she could do so again.

“You stay here,” Elizabeth told Louisa. “Keep Eta up in her room,” she added, using their nickname for their sensitive mother. “She doesn’t need to be involved in this.” As so often happened, the children had become the caretakers of their fragile parent. Frankly they had been ever since the death of their father at sea, and Elizabeth, for one, resented her position in the family, not that she would ever shirk her duties as Nathaniel often did, forgiven by one and all, including his older sister.

Elizabeth went outside and shook her head as she glared at Mia. “You did the right thing, yet now you’ve seen fit to return and do damage. Did we not discuss applying logic to the situation?”

Mia felt quite dizzy standing in the sun in her long black dress. “I’m not here to do damage,” she said. “And I had no choice, Ebe.”

“There’s always a choice,” Elizabeth said briskly, grateful that her brother was not at home. He was a romantic and a fool and a genius and the person she loved best in the world, and he needed absolute concentration so he might focus on his great gift. She had thought she and Mia had agreed upon that.

“Really?” Mia said. “Do you have the choice to attend Harvard?”

“No more than you would if you stay here,” Elizabeth shot back. “I thought you understood you needed to go back. He was ill for weeks after you left, he talked about you in his fevered dreams. Do you think that is helpful to him or to his work?”

“I’ve thought of a way to be a fish and still breathe air,” Mia said.

“Have you now?” Despite herself, Elizabeth was curious, then she was immediately distracted when she heard a tapping behind her. There was Louisa at the window, trying to get her attention. Elizabeth waved to her sister, who reluctantly drew the curtain. All the same, if Elizabeth knew her sister, and she did, Louisa would have already arranged breakfast at their table for this unknown guest.

“And I have used logic.”

“Really? I seriously doubt it.”

“I won’t hurt him,” Mia said.

Elizabeth shook her head. “Open your eyes. Someone always gets hurt.”

ELIZABETH RELUCTANTLY BROUGHT MIA inside, and both sisters studied Mia as she ate. She was ravenous and had the manners of a sailor. She poured warm milk on her oat porridge, a portion enough for three people rather than one, and ate two slices of bread with butter.