Page 39 of The Women of Wild Hill

“I’m supposed to take my girls down to the city tomorrow. They’re doing a summer program at Barnard. I guess we can all go a bit early,” Flora said.

“I’d prefer if you stay in Mattauk, Mrs. Duncan.”

“Ms.,” Flora corrected him with a note of annoyance.

Calum stepped forward. “The girls are old enough to go to the city on their own. We can get a couple of rooms tonight and put them on the train in the morning.”

Flora nodded, but she seemed to know there was going to be trouble.

PHOEBE TURNED TO HER DAUGHTER to explain.

“The bodies belonged to Charles Campbell and Henry Jansson—”

“And Ivy poisoned them both and buried them in the basement,” Sibyl finished the thought.

“How did you know?”

“The ancestors showed me,” Sibyl told her.

“Yeah, well no one ever mentioned a word of it to me or your mom,” Brigid said. “So imagine our surprise.”

“ARE THERE GOING TO BE any more surprises?” Calum was standing at the window in the caretaker’s cottage attic. In the distance, workmen were pouring the concrete foundation of a house being built on Culling Pointe. “I can’t even imagine what people are saying.”

“Why would you bother imagining what people are saying?” Flora asked absentmindedly as she sorted through a pile of boxes.

“I might want to get back into business someday. Now I’ve got this scandal hanging over my head.”

Flora glanced up. “It’s my scandal. Why would anyone think you’re responsible?

” When there was no response, she went back to searching through the boxes.

“After my parents died, I brought their personal belongings up here to the attic. I always planned to go through them someday. I guess this is the day.”

She pulled out a photo album. “Here we go.” She flipped through the pages until she found what she was looking for.

“Henry Jansson. My grandfather. My grandmother, Rose, claimed he drowned after a boat crash. But now they’re saying he’s one of the men buried downstairs.

If so, he must have done something terrible.

Aunt Ivy wouldn’t have killed anyone who didn’t deserve it. ”

Calum came over to look. “And they still don’t know what did him in?”

“No,” Flora said. “But I suspect it was poison. Aunt Ivy was a master botanist. She used to sell tonics and such to women in Mattauk.”

“What did your mother do?” he asked.

Flora’s brow furrowed with confusion at the change of subject. “I told you. My parents were both chemists. They owned a company that made skin cream.”

“Did they ever murder anyone?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Flora said with a laugh.

“So then, this must be harmless?” Calum had found an old-fashioned ladies’ carry-on bag and removed two small vials of a clear liquid.

Flora grimaced at the sight of the valise.

It had been among the luggage recovered from the plane crash that killed her parents.

In all the years since, she’d never found the strength to open it.

Like so many of Lilith and Levi’s belongings, it had made its way to the attic, where it sat, gathering dust and waiting to be rediscovered.

“May I?” Flora held out her hand and he placed one of the vials in her palm. It was two inches long and closed with a wax cork. The label read Poison Ivy.

“You look surprised,” Calum noted.

“I’m sure it was just a joke.” Flora tucked the vials back into the little suitcase. When Calum wasn’t looking, she would stash it someplace safe.

“YEAH, THAT STUFF WAS DEFINITELY not harmless,” Sibyl said.

“What was it?” Phoebe asked.

“The poison Lilith used to kill Nazis.”

“What are you talking about?” Phoebe scoffed. “Lilith didn’t kill anyone.”

“Here we go again.” Sibyl sighed. “You want to tell her?” she asked Brigid.

“Apparently Grandma went on quite a killing spree,” Brigid explained. “The ancestors told Sibyl.”

“Boring old Lilith?” Phoebe still couldn’t believe it. “How many Nazis is she supposed to have murdered?”

“Five hundred. And it’s true. I was there with her,” Sibyl said. “Why didn’t anyone tell you before I came along?”

“Maybe because they died?” Phoebe responded tartly.

“Smart-ass,” Brigid added.

“Gen Z, am I right?” Phoebe rolled her eyes.

CALUM STEPPED THROUGH THE FRONT door of the cottage. He’d been in town most of the day.

“I think your aunt Ivy might have been a serial killer,” he informed Flora.

Flora looked peeved. “What makes you say that?”

“I just spent some time at the courthouse. Over the last fifty years, the death rate in Mattauk has been higher than in any other small town in the Northeast. Seventy percent of those deaths have been men, and a high percentage of those men have died at an early age.”

“What’s been killing them?”

“As far as I can tell, natural causes.”

“And you think my aunt was responsible for men dying of natural causes?”

“They say your grandfather died of natural causes, but we both know that she killed him. What if your aunt Ivy was selling poison to women who were after their husbands’ money?”

Flora’s face flushed with anger. “You think that’s why women kill their husbands? Money?” she asked. “I can think of a million reasons that are far more likely. There are a lot of bad men in the world. Some of them deserve to be killed.”

“I agree one hundred percent,” Calum told her.

“STILL THINK CALUM WAS A catch?” Phoebe asked her daughter.

“Here we go.” Brigid feigned a yawn.

“You two ready to admit I was right?”

“He hasn’t done anything yet,” Sibyl noted.

“Yet,” Phoebe said.

FLORA SAT ON THE FRONT porch, reading a copy of the New York Times. The phone rang inside the house and Calum answered it. A few minutes later, he appeared on the porch.

“James passed away yesterday.”

“Oh no!” Flora put the paper down. “How did he die?”

“Heart attack, apparently. Down at the new building site.”

“Who was it that called to tell you?” Flora asked.

He could barely contain his excitement. “The board of AMN. They want me to come into town. The company IPO is just around the corner, and now that James is gone, they need someone to take charge right away.”

“You?”

“I know the business better than anyone.”

“Do you want to do it?” Flora asked.

“Of course. It’s what I always wanted. I’m going to hop in the shower and then drive into the city, if that’s alright with you.” He bent over to kiss her on the cheek.

“Sure,” she said.

Calum almost skipped inside. Once he was gone, Flora lifted the paper once more and resumed reading.

The article was an obituary of James Calder, who’d only recently taken the reins at AMN, the company he cofounded.

He’d agreed to the ouster of his partner after investors found Calum Geddes’s vision for the company “dystopian and disturbing,” one calling Calum “Machiavellian verging on sociopathic.”

“I FUCKING TOLD YOU!” PHOEBE said. “He’s going to kill her.”

“Oh my god,” Sibyl said when the next vision took them back to the attic.

FLORA SAT ON THE WOODEN floorboards of the attic with her mother’s carry-on bag in front of her.

She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and then slid the locks to the side and opened it.

She fished around in the bag, but only retrieved a single vial.

Panicked, she emptied the case out on the floor and looked through everything.

There was only one vial left in the bag.

“I’m sorry.” Bessie was standing by the window.

“He killed James Calder, didn’t he?”

“Yes,” Bessie confirmed.

Flora looked as though she might melt into the floorboards. “I thought the Old One brought us together.”

“She did,” Bessie said.

“Why would she do that to me?”

“Because she sees greatness in you, Flora. You need only embrace it. I can bring Calum back here, and you can resume the happy life you were leading together. Or I can show you a path that will change the world. Only it’s not yours. It belongs to your daughters and granddaughter.”

“Why show me a path that’s not mine?” Flora asked.

“For this path to begin, yours must end.”

“Oh,” Flora said solemnly.

“Few would be brave enough to make the sacrifice.”