school, wanted desperately to get away from that picture-perfect house and the expectation that it would hold a picture-perfect family. When she thought of those years it was often of the hours spent in a spacious, cold dining room, sitting ramrod straight at that vast polished table while being forced to endure formal meals with older parents for whom she’d been an unwelcome surprise.
They’d had their three children, the five of them a perfect tableau for family portraits and the annual Christmas card. Her mother was forty-two when she found out she was pregnant again. Lauren’s arrival disrupted the plan and she’d grown up with the burden of knowing that it was only because of allegiance to their Catholic faith that she’d been born at all.
“I’m sure many of our traditions will be familiar to you,” the guidance counselor said.
“Yes, we’re very big on tradition at St. Ursula’s,” Alice said. “Everything must be done in the same way as it’s been done for the last one hundred years.”
Leonard rolled his eyes. “Not if left to you, Alice. I’m sure we’d be doing liturgical dance in chapel if left to you.” He shuddered. “As a history teacher, Ms. Kavanaugh, I’m sure you’ll find the history of St. Ursula’s very interesting.”
“St. Mary’s didn’t have any ghosts?” James said. “Tell her about our ghost, Leonard.”
“What ghost?” Lauren said.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Ryland said with an uneasy laugh. “That’s just an old story.”
“I’ve seen her,” Alice said with conviction. “It’s not just a story.” She leaned toward Lauren. “When the school was founded there were eight nuns living on the top floor of the main building. One of them, the youngest, hanged herself from the railing over the main stairs.”
Lauren’s mouth was dry. “Why?”
“She was pregnant,” James said.
“Rubbish!” Leonard wiped his hands briskly with his napkin and threw it down on the table. “There’s no evidence of that, no evidence at all.”
“What are you talking about, Leonard?” Natalie argued. “Her grave’s clearly marked—”
“Okay, one of the sisters died and died young. That doesn’t mean she committed suicide, and as for the pregnancy story, it’s just that.”
“I know what I saw,” Alice said.
Ryland gave a condescending chuckle. “Shadows, Alice. We’ve all seen them in that building late in the day.”
“They weren’t shadows,” Alice insisted. “If Candace was here she’d tell you.”
Lauren saw Natalie shift in her seat. “I don’t know what you saw, Alice, but I do know that there are some things that fall outside our understanding of science.”
“Throwing out the scientific method?” Leonard said, but there was a twinkle in his eye. Natalie smiled, but Alice just shook her head dismissively and leaned across the table toward Lauren.
“She walks the halls at night,” she said. “If you listen you can hear her footsteps on the marble floor.”
She watched the new teacher with the intensity of a scientist studying a specimen under the microscope. It was entertaining to observe somebody new, to note the obvious physical differences and uncover the nuances.
The teacher was eating a salad, though she was already thin. A poor appetite or some sort of medical problem? Perhaps she was prone to anxiety. That would be useful to know.
She took her little notebook out and jotted down “health?” as a reminder to check for this when she went through the files. Nervousness could be exploited.
Miss Kavanaugh spilled some iced tea. That was interesting. What had caused that little accident? She peered over the cover of her book at the teacher, watching for and spotting the faint tremor in the woman’s forearms. The new teacher hid it by tucking them in her lap while sad little Bolton mopped at the stain. Something had upset her. What was it? Were they discussing Morgan Wycoff?
Foolish Morgan with her silly beliefs. She was a liability for St. Ursula’s. Everybody knew that, but only she dared to act.
She remembered tightening the rope around that wet, white skin and felt a delicious shiver running through her. It was a secret vein of gold running like a beacon through the dark mine of her body, that pleasure. When she was little she’d thought that everyone thrummed to its internal pulse.
How old had she been that time in the park? She didn’t know, only that she was young enough that the nanny had been there, sitting on a bench with the other foreign women, all of them twittering about their employers when she came running up with the dead bird hot in her small palm.
Her baby girl’s voice high and bright with the wonder of it, trying to capture nanny’s attention with the story of pressing her little thumbs against the fine bones of the thin neck hidden under that ruff of feathers.
She could still remember the horror on the woman’s round face when she held the bird out to her, its small head twisted to one side, a film already forming on its bead-like eyes.
She’d learned from this that the gift must be kept secret. So many didn’t understand and those that did lacked the strength to follow through if she wasn’t there to push them forward. Even those closest to her didn’t really understand. It was a strange power, this intense feeling. When the others hesitated, she was the one who acted, searching again and again for that exquisite sensation.
She looked up from her notebook and saw that Miss Kavanaugh had gotten up, tray in hand, preparing to leave the dining hall. She stood up as well, following at a discreet distance as the teacher wove her way through the throngs of students clustered outside the dining hall and along the walkways that led from classroom buildings to dormitories.
The wind pulled wisps of Miss Kavanaugh’s blond hair free from the clip holding it tight against the back of her neck. It blew about her face and she pushed it back with an impatient hand. She walked with her shoulders slightly raised, as if expecting an attack at any moment. Where did all that anxiety come from? How could it be exploited?
She followed along behind the teacher, her own shoulders relaxed, her stride relaxed and even, a little smile playing on her lips. No one who looked at her knew what was going on in her mind. They couldn’t know that she imagined placing her hands around that slim neck, feeling the marble column beat its nervous pulse against her fingertips. She imagined the skin cool to her touch, the fluttering of the heartbeat, the pressing of her fingers deeper and deeper into the flesh.
She smiled at Miss Kavanaugh’s back and walked on.
Chapter Five
The annual start-of-the-academic-year chapel service became a memorial service for Morgan Wycoff.
The school chapel stood to the right of the main building toward the center of campus, a stone building in a Gothic style. Lauren directed the girls of Augustine House into the building, noticing the high, arching stained-glass windows that ran the length of the chapel on either side, casting faint red and blue shadows against the wooden pews.
The
