“It’s hard to believe that this is how it ends,” says Jack as they watch the street.
“This isn’t an ending,” says West. “It’s just an intermission.”
“You think theater will ever return to Richmond?”
West shoves his hands in his pockets. #8220;?‘Time heals all wounds.’ Isn’t that what they say?”
“It’s difficult to imagine.”
“Yes, but thankfully, that’s what we actors are good at,” he says, and he gives Jack’s arm a light squeeze.
In the distance, the bells toll. “I thought I might join the procession,” says Jack. “Pay my respects to the dead.”
“That’s a nice idea.”
“Do you want to join me?”
“The stagecoach will be here soon,” says West, “so I think this is as far as I go.”
Jack tucks West’s letter into the valise, then gives the case an affectionate pat.
“Goodbye,” he says as the two shake hands.
Jack is halfway down the tavern’s porch steps when West calls after him, “Is that Anderson’s bag?”
Jack turns. “It might be,” he says with a sly grin.
West laughs. “He won’t hear a word about it from me.”
SALLY
Sally stands on Mrs. Cowley’sfront porch, looking for any sign of Birdie or Dr. Foushee. It’s half past nine, and Birdie’s been gone for almost two hours.
It’s no surprise. The city is overflowing with people and the streets are packed with funeral goers. Sally puts the girl’s chances of locating Dr. Foushee, not to mention convincing him to pay a house call during the funeral, at less than nothing. Still, she watches the road.
Upstairs, Mrs. Cowley is giving Margaret a sponge bath. They have tried a willow bark tincture and a yarrow root tea, too. The most any of these treatments can do is fight the fever—not the infection—which means that all they’re really doing is making Margaret more comfortable.
Archie has not shown back up at Mrs. Cowley’s, and Sally can’t say she’s surprised. The city is grieving, but it’s also chock-full of out-of-towners, and if she knows Archie—and she thinks she does—he is shaking hands and offering condolences like calling cards. When he eventually comes to check on his wife, Sally will have a hard time looking at him, much less explaining the turn Margaret’s condition has taken.
Sally can watch the funeral procession snake its way around the perimeter of the green. It is just as it was described in theEnquirer. First the city’s clergymen, then the immediate families of the deceased. Dignitaries—members of the Common Council, the Court of Hustings, the legislature, and half a dozen other entities—are next, and behind them are regular citizens on foot and, finally, on horseback.
Among the city’s clergymen, she recognizes Reverend Blair and Reverend Buchanan from Sunday services at the capitol; they are accompanied by a rabbi, a priest, and several other men of God whose robes Sally doesn’t recognize.
When the families of the deceased pass by, she spots the governor’s wife right away. The young woman wears a stunned expression on her face and istrailed by at least a half-dozen children, including the boy who sat between her and her husband at the theater. He looks a good deal older than he did three days ago.
Sally also catches sight of the actress she spoke with at the capitol. Was her name Nancy? No, that was her daughter. The woman has shed her bloody nun’s habit, which is an improvement. Instead, she wears a long cloak, in funereal black, with a bonnet to match. Sally is intrigued by the fact that she proceeds unaccompanied; she’d have thought the members of the theater company would have come out in droves to mourn the loss of one of their own.
Sally does a double take when she looks out into the crowd and sees William Wirt walking—head down—amid the mourners. To her knowledge, no one in his family has died.
Eventually, the procession stops in front of Mrs. Cowley’s house and a man approaches the porch. “We’re here for the girl you’ve got waiting for us.”
Sally clears her throat and says, “This way.” Then she leads him and another man through the front door and down the hall, until they are all staring at the dead girl, wrapped in a sheet, under the stairs.
“Have you discovered who she is?” Sally asks as the men stoop to pick her up.
“We haven’t,” says the man. “There are so many missing girls. And only a few of their bodies have been identified.”
“Should we try though?” Sally asks as she follows them back down the hall. “Surely, her parents are somewhere in the procession.”
