Liam saw Joseph on the threshold. “Tell her, Joseph,” he begged. “Tell her you only love once. That everything else is meaningless.”
Joseph opened his mouth to argue. He’d been taught these answers so long ago. He’d taught them so often himself:This is why you must never love a created thing more than the Creator. Only God is deathless. Only He will never fail you.
Yet his sister’s own childish words invaded his thoughts:
“I do love Our Lord—but I can’t hug Him!”
“The grave’s a fine and private place…”
Joseph could only cover his face and turn away. In that moment, he didn’t care about God’s will or even His love. It was weak and it was wicked; but he wanted his sister to stay.
When their father dragged himself back up the stairs, Hélène smiled at him. “I know you did everything you could, Papa.”
His face crumpled again.
“You did the best thing you could have done: you let me marry Liam.”
Their father wiped angrily at his tears and glanced at Josephbefore he answered: “My child asked me for bread. I was not about to give her a stone.”
One more time,Hélène pressed the key to Tessa’s garden into Joseph’s palm. His sister’s eyes blazed like blue flames. “You have fasted for so long, Joseph…”
To soothe her, he accepted the little box. But at the first opportunity, Joseph slipped across the hall to Hélène’s dressing room, where he tucked the key into a drawer in her wardrobe.
He must direct her thoughtsawayfrom sin. This was his last chance. “Dearest sister…” Joseph prayed before she left them, words that might have been written for this moment alone and had never been more painful to pronounce:
“Freed from the fetters of this body, mayest thou return to thy Maker, Who formed thee from the slime of the Earth. … May Christ place thee in the ever-verdant gardens of His Paradise… Lord, be not mindful of her former transgressions and excesses which passion and desire did engender. … Blessed Joseph, patron of the dying, I commend to thee the soul of this handmaid Hélène, suffering the throes of her last agony…”
The agony passed. The end came as gently as sunset. Such a simple change: a final breath, a stilling of that vibrant heart. But Hélène’s sun would never rise again. Not on this side of the grave.
Joseph celebrated the long Rite of Buriallike some kind of automaton, as if he were one of the mechanical figures on his grandfather’s clocks. When it was over and he had unvested, he returned to his father’s house. He climbed to the third floor and stared into his sister’s bedchamber as if all of it might have been a mistake.
But of course the bed was empty. His parents were downstairsaccepting condolences. Liam had announced his intention to drink himself unconscious, and Joseph did not doubt it.
Perhaps Tessa had seen him go upstairs. Somehow, she appeared at his side and took his hand. That was when the tears began. Within a few moments, he could barely see her.
“I’m here,” she said simply.
In his blindness, Joseph let her lead him away from Hélène’s chamber, down the stairs and into his old room. Tessa pushed the door closed and pulled him into her arms. Even this was not enough. His legs shuddered beneath the weight of his grief, and Tessa swayed with him. As powerless as wheat before a scythe, they fell onto his old bed.
He clutched her so tightly he could feel not only the softness of her throat but also the stiffness of her corset and petticoats through his own garments. Her skirts were a hindrance; but as much as they let him, without thought of propriety or violation, even his legs clung to hers, like a vine climbing desperately towards the light. She didn’t resist him. When he felt wetness on his forehead, he knew she was weeping too. But Tessa held him more than he held her.
In time, the storm calmed, as all storms must. He found he could breathe again, albeit with difficulty. He loosened his grip on her, though he did not let her go. He pulled back just enough to see her beautiful face taking shape in the dimness. Only gauzy white curtains covered the windows.
Her fingers sunk into his hair, Tessa’s thumb stroked his forehead as if he were a child. The comfort suffused him like sunlight. With every caress, her own tearful eyes communicated her thoughts:I know. I understand.
Joseph didn’t. Why should the loss of Hélène wound him more deeply than Sophie’s passing? The only answer he could find wasregret. He’d chastised his sister because he loved her, because he didn’t want to spend eternity without her—had she understood that?
“If my Ordination granted me one miracle,” he whispered hoarsely, “if I could raiseoneperson from the dead as Christ raised Lazarus…”
Tessa tried to smile.
For a moment, Joseph closed his eyes to chastisehimself. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t say that. You’ve lost so much.”
“I still have you.”
He avoided her eyes now, looking past her to the windows.
Tessa’s thumb stilled on his forehead. “Your father said you were planning to leave Charleston?”
