The Widow Of Pale Harbour. Hester Fox

a trembling hand, Sophronia slowly reached out and touched it, half-hoping that it would be as fleeting and insubstantial as the delusion that had just gripped her in the kitchen. But the soft bristles met her fingers with heart-sinking solidity.

      Sophronia’s blood ran cold as she jerked her hand back. It had been still and quiet in the house all morning. How had someone managed to hammer in the nail without her hearing anything?

      It was as if whoever had left the ravens had read the doubts in her mind and wanted to make certain that she understood none of this was coincidence or an accident. This was as bold a statement as Martin Luther nailing his theses to the church door. This was a declaration, but of what?

      In a fit of panic, Sophronia tried to pry the nail from the door. When it wouldn’t budge, she snatched at the feather, sending torn black filaments floating to the ground. But the quill would not budge.

      “Blast it.” She would have to ask Garrett to pry out the nail and patch the hole. At least it could be easily fixed, and Garrett was nothing if not discreet.

      But that was little comfort to Sophronia, who felt as if the world were pressing in around her. Felt as if eyes watched her every movement, even through the walls of the house. If she had thought that the change she had felt coming to Pale Harbor was to be positive, then it seemed she was sorely mistaken. Now it was a growing sense of dread that hung over her, as if a predator was circling just beyond her line of sight, slowly closing in on her.

      With a letter in his pocket, Gabriel wandered down toward the harbor, looking for the post. It was a small town, with most of the homes and buildings rising up from the edges of the water, clinging to the salty lifeblood that provided its food and industry. His walk took him past the same run-down houses he had seen the previous week, now benevolently gilded in gentle sunlight. He had been in Pale Harbor for a week now, meeting with the townspeople, cleaning out the church and generally gathering his bearings. But it still felt wrong, and he no more felt that he belonged in Pale Harbor than he had in Concord without Anna.

      Restless and a little homesick, the night before he had written to the only person in Concord he considered a friend, Tom Ellroy. Tom, who he had known since they were both boys running wild through the Massachusetts countryside, had stuck by him through thick and thin, and there had been plenty of thin, especially when they’d both joined the navy on a boyish whim. Gabriel had four older sisters, and Tom was the brother he’d never had. Tom alone was privy to Gabriel’s reasons for coming to Pale Harbor and the deception he had practiced in getting here.

      The morning dawned dry and warm, a crystal-clear September day. Dirt mingled with sand, and every breath carried with it the faint promise of the great ocean beyond. Gabriel was small and inconsequential, a drop of salt water among many in the seaside town, and how liberating it was. In the light of day, the dark discovery in the church seemed far away, and his awkward dinner with the Marshalls insignificant. Maybe he would not be a success as a minister, but he had come this far, and if nothing else, it would be the fresh start he so desperately needed.

      Despite the fair weather, the waterfront was quiet, subdued. Only a few small boats bobbed in the placid water, and a handful of dockworkers leisurely unloaded nets full of fish. Mr. Marshall had told Gabriel that twenty-five years ago, Pale Harbor would have been a bustling port, with all sorts of languages being spoken as ships unloaded their goods from lands as far away as China. But the war with the British in 1812 and the subsequent closing of trade routes had strangled the cosmopolitan breath from the town, leaving it choked and withered.

      Gabriel ambled down to the water, watching seagulls squabble over a dropped fish. Despite his pledge to take all the rain as a penance, he was enjoying the early autumn sun on his face.

      He found two young men taking a rest from unloading crates on the dock, their shirts stuck to their backs with perspiration, their sleeves rolled to the elbows. When he asked them where he could post a letter, they directed him to the dry goods store on the other side of town.

      He thanked them and was about to turn to leave. He knew he should introduce himself, tell them about the new church. That’s what a minister was supposed to do. But the idea of proselytizing made him shrink into his skin, and despite days of practicing in front of the mirror, he still tripped over his words and came across as a fool. They would probably scoff at him, just as the Marshalls surely had as soon as Gabriel had left their home, and he couldn’t bear to hear Anna’s dearest beliefs disparaged.

      “Not from around here, are you?”

      Stopping in his tracks, Gabriel reluctantly turned back. He took a fortifying breath. “No, not from around here.”

      The man who spoke had light brown skin and a musical voice with an island lilt. “Thought you might not be local,” he said. “Not with that accent.”

      Gabriel hadn’t bothered trying to disguise the brusqueness of his lower-class voice; he felt comfortable here on the docks in a way he hadn’t in the Marshalls’ dining room. But apparently he had been found out as an outsider anyway.

      “Might as well be from Dixie,” rejoined the other man.

      “Concord,” Gabriel told them, and then added, “Massachusetts. My name is Gabriel Stone.”

      “Well, Gabriel Stone from Concord, I’m Manuel,” said the man with the lilting voice. “And this useless lug is Jasper.”

      Jasper nodded his introduction. He was young, red-haired and pale, with a smattering of freckles. “You’re the one taking over the old church, then?” he asked Gabriel without preamble.

      “That’s right.” Gabriel hoped that his curt response would be the end of it, but Jasper was giving him an assessing look, and both of the men’s curiosity seemed to be piqued.

      Manuel raised a brow. “What is it you’ll be preaching?”

      Damn it. Gabriel had memorized his little speech, which he had given some dozen or so times in the past week. Unsurprisingly, it came out mechanical and dry.

      “Transcendentalism. It’s the belief that God is in nature, and that the answers of the universe can be found within man instead of without. The spirit comes from nature and so knows more than our minds. It’s, uh...” He paused, trying to remember all the correct words. “It’s very popular in Concord,” he finished lamely.

      There was painful silence until Manuel finally said, “Meaning no disrespect, but you don’t do much in the way of putting a polish on your creed. If Saint Peter had been as ho-hum in his preaching, then I doubt Jesus would have had a church to name him the rock of.”

      The man was right, of course. Without conviction in his words, Gabriel came off as a charlatan. “Well, if you change your minds, you’re always welcome.” He was just about to turn to leave when Jasper stopped him again.

      “Seeing as you’re new here, you wouldn’t happen to be looking for some help around the house, would you? A cook, maybe?”

      “I might. Why?” Gabriel had imagined that he would keep his own council, moving about an empty house as a monk might a cell, reveling in the solitude. But the mundane day-to-day tasks of keeping a house were proving a drudgery, and the night crept in so close and thick that he longed for some sound other than the groaning of the wind. A light footstep around the house would be welcome, and that was to say nothing of a hot meal. For the past week, he’d been subsisting entirely on bread and molasses and the charity of the townsfolk, the latter of which he was eager to stop using.

      “My sister, Fanny, she needs a new position.”

      “Does she have references?”

      Jasper’s sharp green eyes darkened. “She works up at the castle for that woman,” he said, barely able to choke out the last word.

      Gabriel looked between the two men, brow raised. “Woman?”

      Manuel gave a jerk of his head toward the hill. “Mrs.