The Other Side of Silence

THE OTHER SIDE OF SILENCE

Celia Ashley

This is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination
or used fictitiously and any resemblance to persons living or dead, locales,
businesses, or events is coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part
of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, electronically
or otherwise, except with the express written permission of the author.  Please
do not participate or encourage piracy of copyrighted material in violation of
the author’s rights.

Cover design by Robin
Maderich.

PROLOGUE

“If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary
human life,

it would be like hearing the grass grow and the
squirrel’s heart beat,

and we should die of that roar which lies on the other
side of silence.”

George Eliot 1819-80;
Middlemarch
(1871-2)

Pennsylvania

October
1765

Struggling for a moment against the
binding of his hands, Roger calmed himself.  In these, his final moments, he
possessed nothing but his dignity and made a conscious decision to retain that
much of the man he had been.  He understood the soldiers could not let him walk
freely to the scaffold, as they feared an attempt at escape. Given the
opportunity, he likely would have tried, and might even have succeeded.

Roger drew a deep breath beneath the
loose blouse he wore, a garment grown soiled in his long days of confinement.  Air
fragrant with crisp smoke and fallen leaves and the lingering autumnal chill
wafted away baser scents from his nostrils.  He did not want his last memory to
be one of the prison’s foul odors, nor of the rank press of bodies gathered
round to witness his hanging.

Mounting the steps to the scaffold,
Roger lifted his head, his dark unbound hair flying in the wind.  The minister
walked at his side, muttering prayers from the open book held in his hands.  The
preacher was a short man, and Roger could see the bald patch on the man’s pate,
the place at his shoulder where the seams of his frock coat had separated, the
dirt beneath his nails as he trailed his fingers along the printed words
to hold his place on the fluttering pages.  Roger,
on the other hand, had always been distinguishable by his height, taller by a
full head and more than most men he had ever known.  Perhaps had he taken into
consideration the ease with which he might be identified by his height he would
have chosen a different occupation, but there was nothing for it now but to
accept his fate.

Red-coated soldiers lined the yard
and the lane beyond in an attempt to keep order, musket barrels settled against
curved palms, bayonets gleaming in the sun.  With a twist of amusement to his
lips, Roger watched the pickpockets ply their trade among the villagers crowded
together.  A particularly enterprising young lad hawked what he purported to be
locks of Roger’s own hair.  No one had come to sever even a strand from his
head, but if these citizens were willing to part with their hard-earned coin
for a fraudulent memento, then so be it. Perhaps the lad would feed his family
this night on something more than watery porridge.

Not a single face gaping up at him
showed any sign of remembrance.  And why would they?  Why would they recall the
winsome lass who had given her life for his own, in order to keep him from the
hangman’s tree? And for naught, as here he stood, waiting for the noose about
his neck to pull tight.

His heart wrenched in his breast as
he thought of her, of young Janet Black, the innkeeper’s daughter.  Misguided,
mistaking a kiss in the dark as a promise of more, feeling just cause to place herself
in front of the soldier’s muskets.  God, he would make it up to her if he
could, but there was no chance of that now, was there?  She was dead, because
of him.  He had not loved her, but he would now, if he could, just to do right
by her.  He would care for her for the rest of her days…but she had none left. 
And neither did he.

The soldiers had driven him in the
cart past her grave at the edge of the kirkyard, just to torment him.  He
recalled the leaves skittering across the ragged grass up against the
headstone.  Recalled as well her father’s eyes watching him from a short
distance, dark as his daughter’s but without her remembered, joyful laughter.  Winsome,
yes, she had been so, and kind-hearted.  He should have loved her while he had
the chance.

The minister’s voice grew louder, as
if trying through the strength of volume to make Roger pay attention to the reading
of scripture.  Roger raised his eyes to the sky, to the skein of geese winging
overhead in the bright, bright blue.  Their disharmonious voices called to him,
spoke to him of limitless freedom, of distant places, of the passing of the bountiful
seasons and the start of the long, cold winter. Of Janet’s grave beneath the
snow.  Of his own.

His eyes watered in the sun and he
lowered his head, dark hair drifting across his brow.  The noose slithered down
to rest against his throat and he stepped forward, planting the soles of his
boots on the mark in the boards at his feet.  His gaze fell on a place just
beyond the crowd, caught movement there, sought it out to follow the flutter of
long black hair blowing back from a face as fair and delicate as a dove’s.  She
was here, she was here, young Janet, ghostly with the sun shining right through
her skin, her clothes, telling him in silence not to be afraid.  He tried to
answer that he wasn’t, but the words would not come.  Her eyes, those dark blue
eyes like midnight, held his as he felt the vibration of the platform beneath
his feet, felt the sudden plunge, heard the passage of rushing air in his ears,
of exploding blood in his heart, and then…nothing.

CHAPTER ONE

Pennsylvania

April
2004

“Well, of course the chainsaw needs
gas, and of course the gas is all the way over in the barn and I’m all the way
over here trying to wrestle with this stupid freakin’ tree lying right in the
middle of my stupid freakin’ yard…”

Pausing for breath, Sunny glared at the
offending victim of the storm, broken in two and blocking both the pathway to
the pond and the entirety of the driveway.  It wasn’t the whole, massive, ancient
oak tree, just one bough of it.  Quite big enough, though, nearly the circumference
of many of the other trees lining the roadway.  Sunny lowered the inoperable
chain saw gripped in her right hand to the blacktop driveway and straightened,
wondering, not for the first time, why she’d fought so hard and took on so much
debt just to keep living in a two-hundred-fifty-year-old house that constantly
needed upkeep.  For a while, Scott had thought her effort merely contrived to
thwart him.  But it had never been about keeping the house out of the hands of
her ex-husband.  No, it had been about wanting to stay in a place that had, at
one time in her life, contained so many possibilities. 

“Crap.”

Shoving one hand into her jacket
pocket to grab her ringing cell phone, she ran the other through her tousled
hair, checking caller id.  Seeing her sister’s name, she answered with a smile.

“Jess!”

“Hi,” said Jess brightly, “what’s
doing?”

Sunny glanced at the sky, blue and
cloudless, and thought about the weather of the night before.  Except for the
shattered limb and the various puddles dotting the driveway, it was hard to
imagine the intensity of the storm. 

“I’m just trying to clean up last
night’s damage,” she told her sister.  “A huge branch came down, which I could
just ignore until a more opportune time, except it’s keeping me from getting
out of the driveway and come Monday I’m going to need to get to work.  Otherwise,
no big deal,” she muttered with a sarcasm Jess picked up on straight away.

“That so?” she said.  “What tree are
we talking about?”

“The huge oak standing close by the driveway. 
You know the one.  The historical tree.”

“Historical tree?” Jess echoed,
making it clear by her tone that either Sunny had not mentioned the fact
before, or Jess had no recollection of it.

“The Hanging Tree, they call it,”
said Sunny. “You don’t remember?  Not that there’s any record of anyone being
hung from the actual tree, but the scaffolding stood there, and impromptu
trials used to be held beneath the branches, as well as auctions and village
meetings and that sort of thing, back when the main house was built.”

Sunny could hear Jess making cooing
sounds to the toddler before she responded.  “Really?” she said.  “That’s kind
of creepy.  Don’t you worry about ghosts?”

Sunny laughed, hard.  She knew how
much time her sister spent watching television shows about that type of thing.
“Ghosts?  No. If there’d been anything to worry about, I would have caught wind
of it by now.”

“Right,” said Jess.

“Have you ever seen anything when
you’ve been here?”

“Well, no.”

“There you go.  You haven’t seen
anything, and you’re actually looking for it.  Ghosts wouldn’t bother with me. 
It’s the historical aspect I find of interest.”

“Ah, well, you know me and history,”
said Jess.  “Not a fan.  How big of a mess is it?”

Sunny studied the length of the
shattered bough and the multitude of smaller branches and bits of bark
scattered across the grass.  If she ever got the chainsaw going, it would
probably take the better part of the day to cut and remove the debris.  She
said as much to her sister.

“Wow, that’s bad,” said Jess. “Where’s
Scott?”

Brows lowering, Sunny kicked at a
small branch with the toe of her boot, watching it skitter across the
blacktop.  A single brown leaf still clung to the brittle end, breaking into
small bits as the limb rolled over it.  Oaks were the last to lose their leaves
in the fall, the last to regain them in the spring.  

“One would presume,” she drawled
after a moment, “that he’s off doing something wildly exciting with that new
girlfriend of his.”

“How new?  New new?  Or still Kathy? 
I thought they broke up.”

“No,” said Sunny, “it’s still Kathy. 
I don’t think they’ve broken up.”

Following a brief silence at the
other end of the connection, Jess apologized.  “Sorry,” she said.  “I just
thought he was still stopping by on occasion to lend a hand around there.”

Scratching her right eyebrow, Sunny
blew a breath out, dislodging a single, clinging strand of honey-blonde hair
from her lip.  “Yeah, well, he is, though God knows I’m not encouraging him.” 

At that precise instant, she heard
the recognizable sound of Scott’s pickup truck coming down the road.  Sunny
glanced to the top of the drive, where the truck pulled to a stop.  “Speak of
the devil,” she said.

“He’s there?”

“Indeed, he is.  And there’s someone
with him,” Sunny added, as the passenger door of the truck swung open.  A glare
on the windshield prevented her from seeing clearly inside.  She got the
impression, though, of height and bulk.  Not a woman, then.  Or at least not
Kathy.  “I don’t think it’s the girlfriend, though,” she said.

“Well, I should hope not!”

“He has brought her, on occasion,”
Sunny said, recalling the first time her ex-husband had shown up at the house
with his newest girlfriend.  Awkward had been the least of it.  Sunny could
tell Kathy hadn’t been comfortable at all with the way Scott had acted.  And
odd thing, Sunny had actually liked Kathy.  She just hadn’t liked the
situation.

“You never said anything about
that.” 

Sunny could hear the hurt in her
sister’s voice, a faint disturbance caused, no doubt, by what appeared to her a
breakdown in what was usually an open and active line of communication between
them.  Sunny shared everything in her life with her sister, or had, at any
rate. Something about the fact Scott felt comfortable enough to bring his
girlfriend to the house the two of them had shared had awakened a pain Sunny
had been inclined to keep to herself.
 

“I know,” she answered
apologetically.  “I haven’t been too keen on it happening, let alone talking
about it.  Look, let me run and see what he wants.  If he’s willing to help,
I’ll let him.  What the hell, right?”

“Alright, but call me later.  I can’t
believe you never told me he brought her there.”

Sunny’s lips twisted in affectionate
amusement.  Sometimes it was like high school all over again.  “I’ll tell all,
later.  Love you, sis.”

“Love you, too, Sunny.  And Sunny?”

“Hmm?”

“You’ll find someone again one day. 
I know you will.”

Rolling her eyes, Sunny made a noise
in her throat and stowed the phone in her pocket.   Happily married with a
toddler, Jess had declared it her mission in life to encourage Sunny in a
similar direction.  Like a mule, Sunny had been digging her heels in and refusing
to go. 

Clambering over the fallen tree,
Sunny started up the driveway, boots crunching over debris.  Scott and whoever had
come with him had gone to the back of the truck to unload something from the
bed.  Cutting through the still-damp grass, Sunny called a greeting as she
approached the side of the pickup. 

“Hey, Sunny-girl,” Scott called back. 

Sunny hid her irritation at his continued
use of the pet name from their marriage.    Utilization while husband and wife
had been one matter, but while “amicably” divorced another thing entirely.  Didn’t
it ever occur to him he might be trying a bit too hard to prove to the world
all was well?  As she neared, he grinned down at her from the bed of the truck,
looking—happy, damn him.  The new girlfriend must be good for him, after all. 

“Heard you had some damage—” he
began.

“How did you hear that?” Sunny
interrupted, although she wasn’t altogether surprised.  Word traveled fast in a
community the size of this one, a rural Pennsylvania charmer whose size and
close-knit mentality had captivated her at the onset of her residence within
it.  Still did ten years later, although in instances like this she might have
preferred the anonymity of the city.

“Ned drove by earlier this morning
and saw the tree down, so he gave me a call.”

He called Scott
, Sunny thought.  Why?  If her
neighbor didn’t think her capable of taking care of the job herself, why didn’t
he just stop in and offer to help, instead of giving her ex-husband a call? 
They all knew he had someone else in his life.  Dammit, it was humiliating.

“I guess he figured the little lady
couldn’t tackle the job on her own,” Sunny muttered, reaching up to grab a pair
of loppers Scott handed over the side of the truck bed. 

“Now, don’t be like that, Sunny,”
Scott said.  “You have to admit, even someone as feisty as you would have a bit
of trouble moving this wood alone.  Or were you planning on cutting it up into
bite-sized chunks?”

Grinding the handle end of the
loppers into the soil at her feet, Sunny eyed him with tolerant concession. 
“Maybe I was,” she said.  “A little gas in that chainsaw might have gone a long
way.”

Scott snorted back laughter.  From behind
him came an echoing noise, recalling Sunny to the fact Scott had not come
alone.   Peering around her ex-husband’s legs, she raised her hand in a brief
wave of greeting, and then quickly straightened her spine, startled by the
presence of a complete stranger.  Scott apparently picked up on her disconcert,
because he made a hasty introduction.

“Sunny, this is Roger Macleod. 
Roger, Sunny.”

Leaning the loppers against the truck
fender, Sunny stepped around the back with her hand extended.  “Nice to meet
you,” she said.

A hand that nearly dwarfed her own
closed around her fingers in a warm, sturdy grasp.  The dark-haired man stood
about six and a half feet tall, causing her to have to tip her head back to
meet his eye.  Shaded by thick lashes, the gaze that met her own was the color
of amber.

“Nice to meet you, too,” Roger said
in a voice both gravelly and deep, the way sharp stones might sound rolling
against each other in an uneven mixture of honey and water.   The sound of it
made her hold her breath and cut a quick glance at him from beneath her lashes
as she bent to pick up the fallen pruners.  His gaze hadn’t left her.  When he
saw her watching he smiled.  Friendly, just friendly, she told herself, but she
still blushed.  Annoyed at herself for doing so, Sunny hiked the loppers up
under her arm, turned on her heel, and headed back down the driveway.

*        *        *

Hours later the timber had been cut
into manageable sections and piled neatly beside the barn, debris raked and
disposed of.  Grateful and exhausted, Sunny stood on the porch flinging
remnants of iced tea from plastic tumblers into the garden beds before stacking
the glasses to carry them into the house.  From beneath her lashes she watched
Roger Macleod make his way around the barn pushing the last wheelbarrow of
branches. 

Seated on the porch steps, Scott lifted
the hem of his tee shirt to wipe his brow.  The jacket he had cast aside
earlier hung over the porch railing, flapping in a mild breeze.  He, too,
appeared to be watching Roger, but not as though he saw him.  His thoughts
seemed elsewhere. Turning toward the house, Sunny paused with her free hand on
the screen door latch.

“Scott, thank you,” she said. “Thanks
for all your help.  You were right.  There’s no way I could have done that by myself.”

Lowering his shirt, he glanced in her
direction, then down at the walkway below his feet.  “No problem,” he said.

“I mean it.  That was a lot of work.”

“I know you mean it,” he said. “But I
look at this way, Sun: I owe you.”

Sunny felt her throat tighten.  She
blinked back unexpected moisture from her lashes, biting down hard on the
inside of her cheek, feeling old anger and a small amount of sorrow competing
with gratitude and threatening to win.  “You don’t owe me anything,” she said.

He turned to look at her over his
shoulder again.  “I do,” he said.  “You know I do.”

Inhaling, Sunny fumbled the door open
and went inside, striding down the corridor beside the stairs to the kitchen.  She
rinsed the glasses in the sink before setting them in the top rack of the
dishwasher.  At the front of the house the screen door opened and shut. 

“I’m sorry, Sunny,” said Scott,
coming into the room to stand behind her. 

“I’m fine,” she said, not turning.

“No, Sunny, listen to me.  I never did
say I was sorry, did I?  For everything.”

Sunny took a moment to wipe her damp hands
on a tea towel, spreading it to dry on the handle to the oven door.  “You never
did,” she said.

She could feel him there at her back
with an old, familiar ache.  Lifting her head, she looked through the garden
window above the sink into the backyard.  The daffodils beneath the newly
budding maple danced madly in a spiraling current of air.