Instead, Dr Bowen gave me a shot of beautiful warm medicine underneath my skin that made me feel feathery and strange. They seated me in the dining room with Mrs Churchill and Bridget and said, ‘You don’t mind that we ask each of you some questions, do you?’
The little room was cloying and heavy with the odour of warm bodies and grass, of police mouths smelling of half-digested chicken and damp yeast. ‘Of course not,’ Mrs Churchill said. ‘But I shall not discuss the state Mr Borden was in.’ She started to cry, made a whirlwind sound. In my mind I drifted away to the upstairs of the house where everyone became an echo. I thought of Father.
An officer kneeled in front of me, placed a hand over my hand and whisper-spat into my face, ‘We will find who did this and come after him with our full force.’
‘Men do such horrid things,’ I said.
‘Yes, I suppose they do,’ the officer said.
‘I hope Father didn’t feel any pain.’
The officer stared at his hands and cleared his throat. ‘I’m sure he didn’t feel too much.’ He gripped his notebook. ‘I wondered if you could tell me everything you remember about this morning?’
‘I’m not sure . . .’
‘There are no wrong answers, Miss Borden.’ A sing-song voice. His Adam’s apple bobbed, made me think of Halloween games.
I looked the officer in the eye and grinned, there are no wrong answers, how kind he was to put me at ease. I knew for sure God would smile on him from now on. ‘I was outside in the barn and then I came in and found him.’
‘Do you remember why you were in the barn?’
‘I had been trying to find lead sinkers for my fishing line.’
‘You were going to go fishing?’ Scribble, scribble.
‘My uncle is going to take me. You should see what I can catch.’
‘You’re expecting him to visit?’
‘Oh, he has already. He’s here.’
‘Where is he?’ the officer asked, a pony searching for feed.
‘He’s out conducting business. He arrived yesterday.’
‘We’ll need to ask him questions.’
‘Why?’ My fingers beat together, pulsed beat, beat, beat, beat, all the way into the centre of my body. I followed the feeling, looked down at myself, noticed a soft, grey pigeon feather stuck on my skirt. I picked it off, rubbed it between my fingers, got all hot and boiled.
‘Miss, I hate to be blunt, but a murder has occurred. We must ask your uncle if he saw anyone unusual outside.’
I flashed up at him, ‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ I stuffed the pigeon feather into my palm, carried it like love.
The officer kept with questions. I glanced around the room, then up at the ceiling, tried to see through spider-web cracked plaster and wood into the rooms above: a few hours before I had been up there, had seen Father and Mrs Borden help each other ready themselves for the day. Mrs Borden had plaited her light-grey, thick-mop hair and pinned it to the top of her head and Father had said, ‘Always charming, my dear.’ They did that from time to time, their being friendly and pleasant to one another. The officer kept with questions and a fog settled in my mind.
Next to me, I heard Bridget squeak to a second officer, ‘Her sister is visitin’ a friend in Fairhaven. She’s been gone for . . .’
‘Two weeks,’ I interrupted. ‘She’s been gone for two weeks and it’s time she came home.’
The second officer nodded, gruffed, ‘We’ll send for her immediately.’
‘Good. This is too much for me to take alone.’
Then Bridget said, ‘I lock the doors. House is shut tight all the time.’ The second officer took notes, wrote furious until sweat formed through his thick moustache. Sometimes Father’s beard would wet with anger and when he spoke to you, came close to your face so you could hear his words, the wet would stroke your chin and sink in. A fog settled in my mind. I had the feeling of wanting to stroke Father’s beard and face until he looked like the past. I glanced at the sitting room.
‘And you know for sure the doors were locked this morning?’ the second officer asked Bridget.
‘Yes. I had ta unlock the front door this mornin’ ta let poor Mr Borden in when he came home early from work.’
The way Bridget spoke about Father made me smile. I turned to face her and the officer. ‘Actually,’ I said, ‘sometimes the basement door isn’t locked.’
Bridget looked me over, her caterpillar eyebrows cracked like earth, and the second officer took notes, took notes. My feet traced circles across the carpet. I opened my eyes wide, felt the house move left then right as the heat ground into walls. Everyone pulled at their necks to unloose their tightly wound clothing. I sat still holding my hands together.
Outside, I could hear swarms of people lining themselves out the front of the house. Voices sounded cannon fire. I swayed with the heat, heard the nails in the floorboards give themselves up. The sounds of pigeon feet tacky-tacked across the roof and I thought of Father. The sun moved behind a shadow and the house popped. I jumped in my chair. Bridget jumped in her chair. Mrs Churchill too. ‘Seems we all have fright,’ I said, wanted to laugh. Mrs Churchill started crying again, made my skin shiver. Inside my head a butcher pounded all sense out of my ears and onto the dining table. My corset groped my ribs and small pools of sweat filled the spaces between arms and legs. Bridget stood from her chair, pulled her dirt-white skirt away from the backs of her thighs and went to Mrs Churchill, comforted her. They spoke. Police took notes, entered and exited rooms, watched me.
I wiped my palm across my face, let the feather fall onto the carpet, noticed tiny droplets of blood sitting on my fingers. I put them to my nose then my mouth. I licked, tasted Father, tasted myself. I swallowed. I looked down at my skirt, discovered blood spots. I stared at the stains, watched them become rivers across my lap, I know these rivers! and I thought of the times I played in the Quequechan River with Emma when we were younger, the way Father would yell out to us from the banks, ‘Don’t go in too deep. You can’t be sure how far down it goes.’
My body craved a past with Emma and Father: I wanted to be small again. I wanted to swim then fish, have Emma and me dry ourselves under the sun until our skin cooked. ‘Let’s be bears!’ I’d tell her, and we’d grow brown and giant, our bear paws swiping each other’s black noses. Emma would draw blood and I’d dig into her fur-covered ribs, touch her heart with my claws. Emma would want to swipe me again but Father would say, ‘Emma, be kind to Lizzie,’ and we’d embrace each other.
It was only two years ago that I was on my grand European tour. The freedom I had. Emma wasn’t there to tell me how to behave or what to say and so I got myself a life. On Father’s insistence I went with cousins, Bordens of blood and of marriage who I barely spoke to back at home, and we set sail, gulped ocean winds, learned how to stand against waves. The things we did.