But there the bag of sugar sat, unmistakably real.
I circled the table, staring warily at the sack as if it might contain a poisonous snake, agitated and ready to strike. After a moment, I opened it and examined the crystals, even sampled them. The lingering sweetness confirmed everything for me.
It was sugar.
It hadn’t been a dream.
My shawl hung by the back door. I grabbed it and wrapped it around my shoulders before slipping out to the porch. Curiosity burned in my veins.
They sat on the steps, positioned so I couldn’t miss them. Five sacks of sugar waiting for me, just as Whitaker had promised.
Five bags of five pounds, plus the sixth from last night.
Thirty pounds of sugar. Exactly what I needed.
I couldn’t help but burst into giddy laughter. All of yesterday’s worries had vanished with three drops of blood.
Whitaker had saved us.
He’d saved the bees, he’d saved my sanity. I couldn’t wait for Merry and Sadie to come down and see our good fortune.
I brought the sacks in and lined them across the kitchen table. Standing back, I inspected my work with a critical eye. They didn’t look particularly impressive that way. Maybe if I put them in a basket, like a cornucopia of good fortune?
But that looked wrong too.
Perhaps if I laid out Mama’s best tablecloth—it was cause for celebration, after all. But as I knelt beside the basket of linens in the larder, I realized what bothered me about the entire setup.
The sugar was precious.
Too precious to lay out.
I couldn’t leave it out in the open, I decided. It would be too tempting to steal pinches of it. Pinches would turn to sprinkles, sprinkles to tablespoons, and soon we’d be baking enough cookies and pies to cater to every sweet tooth in the Falls.
The safest course of action was to make the sugar cakes and be done with it, but until we got a hard frost, the cakes would be in danger of drawing ants. They’d invade the hive boxes, and we’d be in an even bigger mess. We’d have to slip the cakes in sometime after the first real snow. I wanted to laugh—or cry—as I pictured us resurrecting those ridiculous canvas tarps.
No. I’d have to hide the sugar.
But where?
I glanced over the shelves of the pantry, but they seemed an obvious choice if someone came looking for sugar.
The supply shed was out of the question. Anyone could access it without our knowledge, and while I didn’t want to think poorly of our friends and neighbors, it was impossible to forget that one had so recently set fire to the shed, gravely wounding my mother in the process.
I spotted two tall, empty metal canisters stored at the top of the larder. They’d once held coffee, but the beans were long gone. Mama had liked the cheery red paint and had kept the tins for storage. The six sacks would neatly fit within them, sealing off the sugar and preventing it from contamination.
As I pulled the second one down, standing on tiptoes and stretching my arms, a wave of clarity washed over me.
I was being patently ridiculous.
No one was out to get our sugar.
No one even knew we had it.
No one except Whitaker.
Why was I going to such absurd lengths to keep it safe?
I shook my head, feeling the last bit of possessive concern dissipate. I would leave the sugar right where it was and wait for Merry and Sadie to wake. We’d take the afternoon off to celebrate. No chores, no work. I might even pack us a picnic lunch. We could go down to the big rocks near the waterfalls—the sun warmed them like an oven even on the chilliest days—and we could skip rocks into the Greenswold.
It would be the perfect day.
Through the open doorway I spotted a dappled shape perched on the kitchen table.
Buttons.
He was poised near the sugar sacks, batting at the last one in line with his outstretched paw, wholly intent on knocking it over.
“Buttons, no,” I whispered, then dove for the bag as he pushed it off the table. I imagined it striking the ground and bursting open. The sugar would explode everywhere, like dynamite in the mines. Five pounds lost in an instant.
The coffee canisters clattered to the ground as I dropped them. My only concern was saving the sugar. I lunged in time to catch the sack.
Buttons sauntered away with an extra swish of his tail, as if pleased to see me in such an undignified posture.
I cradled the sugar bag in my arms like a baby.
I wasn’t being overly protective.
The sugar did need safeguarding.
It needed to be kept somewhere out of the way and hidden. Someplace where no one could find it, neither roving neighbor nor malicious pet. I’d need to think through it carefully, choose the right and perfect spot.
The sugar was too precious for anything else.
Picking up the coffee tins, I went to work.
Bessie’s milk hit the side of the empty pail with a hiss, steaming in the frigid morning air. Her udders were warm in my hands, full but pliant, and she snorted softly as I worked, as if pleased to have me there.
After three pulls, I paused and leaned backward, looking out the stall.
The two canisters were in the center of a makeshift table in the middle of the barn.
It was just an hour or so before sunrise, truly too early to be up and working, but I’d not been able to fall asleep. I’d spent half the night jumping out of and back into bed, checking on the canisters, moving them around the house to safer locations, certain Buttons was on the prowl, ready to destroy them.
When I could slip into shallow rest, my sleep was plagued with nightmares of Cyrus Danforth’s mystery woman, a shift of white always lurking in the corner of my vision, eyes glowing an eerie silver, elongated fingers stretching out for me.
My restlessness finally woke Merry, who’d snapped irritably before covering her head with a pillow. After a moment’s indecision, I’d grabbed the tins and spent the rest of the night pacing the sitting room, jumping at every sound, certain the woman had come out of my dreams and was now stalking about the house.
When the grandfather clock had chimed four, I’d thrown on Papa’s work coat and knit hat.
Making my way to the barn, the clouds had seemed low enough to touch. I’d whispered a prayer for snow before ducking inside.
Today we’d boil down the sugar and make the bees’ cakes.
We had to.
I felt as if I was going mad.
Bessie shifted impatiently from foot to foot, bumping against me with her round side to win back my attention. Dragging my eyes from the sugar, I turned to the cow and the task before me.