After a night that never seemed to end, Abby sunk into her own bed in the early hours of the morning, while darkness still lingered. Her face burned, her muscles ached, and her ankle throbbed. Fatigue weighed her down as if she could literally sink into the mattress. A gentle rain resumed, but even the soothing patter on the tin roof failed to lull her to sleep. Her mind refused to cooperate and let go. Instead it re-played the past few hours over and over again, in an endless loop.
The far-off murmur of thunder dragged Abby’s thoughts backward. A mosaic of images flitted through her brain, fragments burned there after Jack disappeared over the cliff into the river. Bike tires hissing on wet limestone. Hating Jack/loving Jack. Electric candles glowing in the windows at the end of the bike trail. Home at last. Electricity back on, unable to reach Lisa, message left at the hotel. Numbness filled her.
Abby twisted and turned, pulling the pillow over her head. She didn’t want to live it all over again. But the montage wouldn’t stop.
The simple act of finding the right phone number had seemed daunting; calling the F.B.I. even more so. The knock on the door came soon after. Then the telling that had to be repeated and repeated—Jack’s letters, his dangling bike shoe, frothing waters. The hush of whispered conversations between men wearing dark suits and angry frowns made the murky hours of night last forever. Waiting, waiting, for something to happen as minutes ticked away, prolonging the nightmare. Chewing her fingernails until nothing was left to chew. Wishing Silas would appear to whisk her away.
When it seemed impossible to sit still the news arrived: Jack alive and in government custody, belongings confiscated. The police found his gun, pried a bullet from the pine tree, and discovered an inscription on it, “For Etienne.” His father arrested.
Abby massaged her throbbing temples. She couldn’t believe they expected to keep everything a secret, even for ‘National Security,’ whatever that meant. Maybe Jack would go to a hospital instead of prison, maybe they would be reunited someday after he got well. That’s what they said; were they telling the truth? She had to believe it, or never, ever rest. He had to be okay. She would learn to be okay.
Names and faces from the long night were already blurry, except for Mrs. Blank wringing her hands, murmuring prayers over a rosary. And images of the men in dark suits leaving Bikers’ Rest before daylight, as if nothing happened. Case solved, next terrorist please.
Tears spilled onto her pillow. Dad dead. Jack gone. Silas—somewhere.
“Rest now.” Silas slipped under the sheet beside her. The buttons on his uniform pressed into Abby’s back as he pulled her close.
“I want to stay awake. With you.” Abby’s eyelids, against her will, became heavy. The gentle tickle of Silas’s fingers stroking her arm lulled her into dreamless sleep at last.
Sunlight streaming through the window roused Abby. Silas had gone, but the impression left by his head remained on her pillow. She kissed the indentation, wondering if this would be her life from now on. Loving a ghost would not be easy. But love him she did. No matter what it might mean. She heard faint noises from below and crawled out of bed.
She limped across her room and found her phone on the dresser. Seven o’clock? And there were already people downstairs? She yawned but knew she had to check it out. When she reached the kitchen, she stopped and stared.
“Hey, Abs! Top o’ the mornin’ to you.” Morton did a little jig and put a plate of pancakes on the table, next to a glass of chocolate milk.
Abby fought the urge to rub her eyes. “You made breakfast? Why aren’t you with your mother?”
“Whoa. One thing at a time.” Morton held out her chair. “My mom has to stay at her friend’s house until the fire department gets the road open. I called, and she said it would be okay for me to hang here. So I slept on your couch. And yeah, I made the pancakes. Check them out; I put in some M&M’s.”
Abby sat down and took a cautious bite. “Not bad. I thought my mom must be home early when I heard the noise down here.”
Morton raised one eyebrow. “Mom? Not Lisa anymore? What happened?”
“I figured some things out when I couldn’t sleep last night, that’s all.”
“Gotcha. I’m gonna take out the trash. Right back.” Morton grinned. “I’m the good guy today, right?”
“Every day.” Abby put down her fork and carried the dirty dishes to the sink, quickly pushing the pancakes into the garbage disposal. Her reflection in the window glass stared back at her, like a younger version of Lisa. No perfect person existed. At least she had returned when Abby most needed her.
On the counter Abby caught sight of the photo Jack had enlarged for her, Daddy loves Abby. She picked it up and whispered, “I always thought you were perfect, even when I grew up. Then I found out you kept my mother away. You must have had your reasons.” She sighed. “I guess everyone makes mistakes.”
She ran her hands over the picture frame Jack had chosen and closed her eyes.
In her mind she could imagine his blue eyes, crinkled at the corners, his white-blond hair, the feel of his calloused hand tousling her hair. And vowed to focus on what had been right between them, not wrong.
Morton interrupted her thoughts. “Have anything else to eat?”
“You’re a food machine. Give it a rest. And since you’re here and such a ‘good guy,’ will you help me clean up the mess from yesterday? When I kicked out the wall from the secret stairs into the kitchen it was about survival. But I want to start over with my mother, and the plaster and wood all over the floor won’t help.”
Morton surveyed the damaged wall in the kitchen alcove. “Let’s open it the rest of the way and take out the old wood. If we do that and sweep, it’ll look better.”
They worked for an hour, pulling the old boards away from the bricked arch. When they finished, Abby ducked under the frame. “It’s awesome. The stairs to the third floor are here and you can see the Underground Railroad room below. I hope we can keep it like this.” She stopped. “Morton, check it out. There’s a shelf inside the wall, with some old jars.”
Morton reached in and pulled out a dusty glass jar with a metal lid. “You know what I think? I think in the old days there must have been shelves across this whole opening, like a panty. One time I read about something like it. I’ll bet it hid the door to the room where slaves were concealed. That’s the perfect answer for this. Add a ladder behind the shelves, and it would explain how they got the slaves into the room down below. Hey, I have to pee. Right back.”
Abby pulled out several more jars of old fruit or tomatoes. One looked different from the rest, with a piece of paper instead of canned vegetables inside. She held the jar up to the light.
“Abigail … you found it.” Silas materialized in the gloom of the space, solid and unwavering. His dark curls looked neat, tucked under the blue cap tilted on his head. The uniform fit him well, the brass buttons polished and shiny.
A deep sense of peace and calm overtook Abby. Silas looked whole, well, stronger, as if he had been infused with new life. “This?” She held up the jar.
Silas nodded.
Abby threw her arms around Silas and breathed him in. He now smelled of soap and fresh linen dried in the sun instead of smoldering fires and burnt coffee. “Does that mean you can stay with me? We can be together here—and you’ll never leave me again?”
His arms tightened around her. He kissed the top of her head, down the side to her ear, and onward to her lips, gentle kisses that spoke of love. But not of passion. With a deep sigh he pulled back.
“You’re leaving.” Abby choked back a sob. “But I thought you loved me.”
“Oh, Abigail, indeed I do love you. I been searching so long, and now things have been set right. I kin finally rest in peace.”
“I don’t understand.” Abby clung to him, unwilling to let him go.
“You will.” Silas released Abby and held her hand in the particular way he always had, his thumb gently stroking between her thumb and finger. “Remember this one thing: love is a river that flows without ceasing. Once the water leaves its source anything might happen. That ole river kin rush, flood, taint, or git clean. Don’t matter none, ’cause it still keeps on flowing. The power of a mighty river won’t never be denied. And neither will the power of love.”
“Is this good-bye?” Abby held her breath, the whole of her being suspended in the moment.
Silas nodded. His smile lit the golden flecks in his eyes with an amber glow, like sunset over the river. “Sweet Abigail …” He vanished.
Abby closed her eyes and held the jar to her chest. She had a sense of loss, but it held an aura of wonder. She didn’t fully understand what he’d meant about love being a river, but expected that as all things with Silas, it would be revealed in time.
“So, you gonna hug that thing to death or open it?” Morton poked Abby in the arm.
Abby blinked and unscrewed the rusted lid. The metal top squeaked in protest, but she worked until she got it open. She turned over the jar, and the piece of paper fluttered to the floor.
She picked it up and scanned the faded writing, sucking in her breath. Her heart accelerated, and her hands trembled. “Morton, listen to this.”
“Miss Leticia, she dun hid me reel good so’s I can be free. My dear daughter Abigail, good Lord rest her sweet soul, could’a bin safe too. I s’pect she died of a broke heart when Mr. Silas got called off to war and leaved her here. Said he wud ‘fite the good fite’ for freedom, ’cause he loved her. Too much dyin’ and now the good Lord ‘bout ready to take Miss Leticia home wif him. I tol her I been a houseboy and dun learned my letters good. She sez wud I rite sumthin and hide it fer her. I jest be glad to hep this fine God-fearin’ lady. Here is jest what she dun tol me:
My son Silas saved Pres’dent Lincoln’s life. He wuz s’posed to be hid until the war wuz over then folks wud’a knowed he dun a brave deed. But that were not the Lord’s will. Silas died with the typhoid fever a ’fore they cud move him from prison. My baby died wif no one to hold his hand.
I dun hid his di’ry in my Bible. His secrets got buried wif him in his grave marker. I hope sum kind soul finds this and makes things rite. Greaves me, he lies in shame when shud be hero. He is a hero to me. I, Leticia Jean Munroe, promise to the God I am about to meet this be the truth. I always keep my promises, ‘specially to Him.’
I give my word this be what Miss Leticia dun tol me. Twones Allen, freeman.”
“Now we know it all.” Abby scanned the letter again. “Knowing is good, even if everything isn’t the way I wanted it to be. Silas and Leticia should have lived long enough to see him become a hero after the war, and they didn’t. But now the world will know what truly happened. I used to make up happy endings when things were sad. I guess I’ve learned it’s more important to deal with what’s real.”
Abby kept silent on a certain part of the letter; Morton would ask too many unanswerable questions. It seemed clear that the first Abigail had been Silas’ true love, and that he felt guilt after her death because he left her to fight against the South and slavery. Helping—and loving—Abby had provided a path for him to eternal rest. It had left her longing for the love that had gone on with him. She was his second love. He was her first.
“Abs, it’s all too cool.” Morton bounced on his toes. “This is a letter from a former slave; that’s history right there. I bet everyone will be interested in Bikers’ Rest. You have old letters and a diary, an Underground Railroad stop—Civil War stuff no one ever knew before.”
“Let’s put these other jars back where we found them.” Abby looked up at the sound of a truck engine outside.
Before she could move the back door opened. “Abby?”
Abby ran across the room and enfolded Lisa in a hug. “Mom.”