“I saw her, too,” said another man.
“It was her,” someone whispered. “The woman in the water.”
“The woman in the water?” I asked, my voice trembling.
“She grabbed me,” Smitty said. “Pulled me under. She wouldn’t let go.”
“We’ve all seen her,” said another man, the stonemason. His voice was raised, high and frantic. “Haven’t we? Hasn’t every man here seen her at least once? Heard her calling?”
“Who?” I said. “Heard who?”
“Please, Ethel,” Will said. “Go back inside.”
“Yes,” I heard men saying. Then whispers, as one by one they each admitted it, each beginning his own tale in a hushed breath. I only caught a few words:woman; beautiful; she sings to me sometimes; “come swimming,” she says.
“It was Eliza Harding,” said Galletti as he stepped farther away, eyes on the dark water of the pool.
“That’s impossible,” Will said.
“Eliza,” I repeated.
“Go inside, Ethel,” Will ordered, his voice stern. “Now.”
Eliza.
I closed my eyes, heard her voice—the voice of the nightmare Eliza with weeds in her hair, pale green skin, and black eyes:Don’t you understand? She belongs to the springs.
The world went black as if I was the one who’d fallen into the pool. I felt the dark water rushing up around me as I was pulled farther and farther down.
When I opened my eyes, I was on the settee in the living room.
“Maggie,” I said.
“She’s fine, Ethel. She’s upstairs sleeping. You fainted,” Will said. He was beside me, holding a glass of brandy. “Here, sip this.”
I sat up, took a drink of the brandy. “Are you sure? Have you checked on her?”
“I’m sure. She’s sound asleep. How do you feel?”
“I’m fine,” I said. “A little woozy, maybe.”
My name is Mrs. Monroe, and I am sipping brandy on my couch. Everything is fine.
“How’s Smitty? I think he needs the brandy more than I do.”
Will frowned. “He’s gone.”
“Gone?”
“The entire work crew quit.” He took a long pull from the glass of brandy. His hand seemed to tremble slightly. “Damned fools.”
“All of them?”
He nodded. “Even Galletti. The ridiculous stories they tell! Talk of curses and ghosts. Superstitious fools.” He ran his hands through his hair, exasperated.
“What will we do?” I looked around at the walls and ceiling that weren’t yet plastered, the pile of trim boards stacked in the corner of the room. “We can’t finish it on our own!”
“Of course not.” His jaw tensed. “I’m going to interview more men. Men who aren’t from Brandenburg, who haven’t heard all these crazy stories. I’ll go back to New Hampshire if I have to. Or get men all the way from Boston. There are so many good men out of work these days, I’ll have a line of candidates a mile long. I’ll offer double pay if they can get the work done by fall—half the salary on a weekly basis and the other as a lump sum when they finish. The lure of hard cash should be stronger than ghost stories and folktales.”
