as if he was determined to stop the sun from rising by sheer force of will. When he spoke again his voice was so soft, so different from his previous bluster. “Do you...do you ever feel as if you don’t matter? That your life is already mapped out for you, and your wishes are inconsequential? And that even if you accept your lot, bow down and take it gladly, it’s still not enough. Just by virtue of being you you’re a disappointment, with no hope of redemption.”
It was a rather grown-up speech, and though Tabby didn’t know the source from which it sprang, she did know what it felt like to not matter. She might have told him as much, but he was already smoothing back his curls and clearing his throat. “Well, I should be going back,” he repeated with resigned conviction. “I won’t ask what a little thing like you is doing all alone at night in a graveyard, if you forget that you ever saw me.” Then he gave her a heart-melting wink, and was gone.
Tabby stood in the cool night air, her blood pounding fast and hot. It stung that he referred to her as “a little thing,” but one thing was for certain: Tabby would never, ever forget the dashing young man with kind eyes.
* * *
Every night for the next week, Tabby crept out into the cemetery, waiting with her heart in her throat to see if the young man would return. She knew it was foolish, knew that it was dangerous, but she couldn’t help herself. Even just to catch a glimpse of him would help staunch the flow of loneliness that threatened to drain her completely. As far as she knew, Alice had never returned for her, and whatever little flame of hope had flickered in her heart was well and truly extinguished now.
So on the eighth night when Tabby heard the rustle of weeds, she hardly thought twice before stealing behind the column and waiting for the young man to appear, her lips already curving into a smile in anticipation. But her smile faded as a sinister figure dressed all in black materialized out of the gloom. A sinister figure whom she had seen before.
The next day, Tabby watched as the caretaker stood by the empty grave and rubbed a weary hand over his face. After the robbery the previous week, he had walked the perimeter of the cemetery, repairing the fencing and checking the locks on the gate, but had not summoned the police. But it seemed that fences and locks could not stop the grave robbers. She had developed a sort of affinity from afar for the gentle man with the long, careworn face, and it made her bruised heart hurt to see him brought so low.
She had known that there was evil in the world, had seen the darkness and greed that had driven her aunt and uncle, had felt the devastating injustice of being robbed of her parents. But she had never known the depth of depravity that could lead men to steal the bodies of the dead. The trials of this world were bearable because of the promise of divine rest, of reuniting with loved ones on the other side; how could anyone endure life otherwise?
As she watched the caretaker heave a sigh and get to his knees to clean the gravesite, Tabby vowed that someday she would see the men that did such vile deeds brought to justice.
2
IN WHICH THERE IS A REUNION.
Boston, June 1856
THE CARRIAGE JUTTED and lurched over the steep cobblestoned hill, threatening to bring Caleb’s lunch up all over his neatly pressed suit. Perhaps if it did then he would have an excuse to bolt. Caleb hated funerals. Well, he supposed that no one really enjoyed funerals, but it was more than that. They were just so...so messy. All that sobbing and wailing, and never mind the ridiculous costumes. (Caleb drew the line at those absurd weeping veils that men insisted on putting on their beaver hats—better to leave all that frippery to the ladies.) They were public displays of what should be private. When he died—which, God willing, wouldn’t be for decades yet—he hoped that his friends would just quietly put him in a grave, raise a glass to his memory, and be done with it.
Across from him, his mother was exemplifying just the kind of fuss that Caleb was sure his father wouldn’t have tolerated. She was burying her face