Margaret Atwood - Alias Grace

“It was a shame to lose that kerchief; I’d had it such a long time. It was my mother’s. I should have taken it off Nancy‘s neck. But James wouldn’t let me have it, nor her gold earrings neither. There was blood on it, but that would have washed out.”

“You killed her,” breathes Lydia. “I always thought so.” She sounds, if anything, admiring.

“The kerchief killed her. Hands held it,” says the voice. “She had to die. The wages of sin is death. And this time the gentleman died as well, for once. Share and share alike!”

“Oh Grace,” moans the Governor’s wife. “I thought better of you! All these years you have deceived us!”

The voice is gleeful. “Stop talking rubbish,” she says. “You’ve deceived yourselves! I am not Grace!

Grace knew nothing about it!”

No one in the room says anything. The voice is humming now, a high tiny music, like a bee. “”Rock of ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in thee! Let the water, and the blood…‘“

“You are not Grace,” says Simon. Despite the warmth of the room, he feels cold all over. “If you are not Grace, who are you?”

“”Cleft for me…Let me hide myself, in thee…‘“

“You must answer,” says DuPont. “I command it!”

There is another series of raps, heavy, rhythmical, like someone dancing on the table in clogs. Then a whisper: “You can’t command. You must guess!”

“I know you are a spirit,” says Mrs. Quennell. “They can speak through others, in the trance. They make use of our material organs. This one is speaking through Grace. But sometimes they lie, you know.”

“I am not lying!” says the voice. “I am beyond lying! I no longer need to lie!”

“You can’t always believe them,” says Mrs. Quennell, as if talking about a child or a servant. “It may be James McDermott, come here to sully Grace’s reputation. To accuse her. It was his last act in life, and those who die with vengeance in their hearts are often trapped on the earthly plane.”

“Please, Mrs. Quennell,” says Dr. DuPont. “It is no spirit. What we are witnessing here must be a natural phenomenon.” He’s sounding a little desperate.

“Not James,” says the voice, “you old fraud!”

“Nancy, then,” says Mrs. Quennell, who doesn’t seems at all affected by the insult. “They are often rude,” she says. “They call us names. Some are angry — those earthbound spirits who cannot tolerate being dead.”

“Not Nancy, you stupid fool! Nancy can’t say anything, she can’t say a word, not with her neck like that. Such a pretty neck, once! But Nancy isn’t angry any more, she doesn’t mind, Nancy is my friend. She understands now, she wants to share things. Come, Doctor,” says the voice, cajoling now. “You like riddles. You know the answer. I told you it was my kerchief, the one I left to Grace, when I, when I…”

She begins to sing again: “”Oh no, “twas the truth in her eye ever dawning, That made me love Mary…‘”

“Not Mary,” says Simon. “Not Mary Whitney.”

There is a sharp clap, which appears to come from the ceiling. “I told James to do it. I urged him to. I was there all along!”

“There?” says DuPont.

“Here! With Grace, where I am now. It was so cold, lying on the floor, and I was all alone; I needed to keep warm. But Grace doesn’t know, she’s never known!” The voice is no longer teasing. “They almost hanged her, but that would have been wrong. She knew nothing! I only borrowed her clothing for a time.”

“Her clothing?” says Simon.

“Her earthly shell. Her fleshly garment. She forgot to open the window, and so I couldn’t get out! But I wouldn’t want to hurt her. You mustn’t tell her!” The little voice is pleading now.

“Why not?” asks Simon.

“You know why, Dr. Jordan. Do you want to see her back in the Asylum? I liked it there at first, I could talk out loud there. I could laugh. I could tell what happened. But no one listened to me.” There is a small, thin sobbing. “I was not heard.”

“Grace,” says Simon. “Stop playing tricks!”

“I am not Grace,” says the voice, more tentatively.

“Is that really you?” Simon asks it. “Are you telling the truth? Don’t be afraid.”

“You see?” wails the voice. “You’re the same, you won’t listen to me, you don’t believe me, you want it your own way, you won’t hear….” It trails off, and there is silence.

“She’s gone,” says Mrs. Quennell. “You can always tell when they go back to their own realm. You can feel it in the air; it’s the electricity.”

For a long moment nobody says anything. Then Dr. DuPont moves. “Grace,” he says, bending over her.

“Grace Marks, can you hear me?” He lays his hand on her shoulder.

There’s another long pause, during which they can hear Grace breathing, unevenly now, as if in troubled sleep. “Yes,” she says at last. It’s her usual voice.

“I am going to bring you up now,” says DuPont. He lifts the veil gently from her head, lays it aside. Her face is stilled and smooth. “You are floating up, up. Up out of the depths. You will not recall what happened here. When I snap my fingers, you will awake.” He goes to the lamp, turns it up, then comes back and places his hand close to Grace’s head. His fingers snap.

Grace stirs, opens her eyes, looks around wonderingly, smiles at them. It’s a calm smile, no longer tense and fearful. The smile of a dutiful child. “I must have been asleep,” she says.

“Do you remember anything?” asks Dr. DuPont anxiously. “Anything of what has just passed?”

“No,” says Grace. “I was asleep. But I must have been dreaming. I dreamt about my mother. She was floating in the sea. She was at peace.”

Simon is relieved; DuPont too, from the look of him. He takes her hand, assists her from the chair. “You may feel a little dizzy,” he tells her gently. “It is frequently the case. Mrs. Quennell, would you see that she is placed in a bedchamber where she may lie down?”

Mrs. Quennell leaves the room with Grace, holding her by the arm as if she’s an invalid. But she walks lightly enough now, and seems almost happy.

Chapter 49

The men remain in the library. Simon is glad he’s sitting down; he’d welcome nothing so much at the moment as a good stiff glass of brandy, to steady his nerves, but in present company there’s not much hope of that. He feels light-headed, and wonders if his earlier fever is returning.

“Gentlemen,” DuPont begins, “I am at a loss. I have never had an experience quite like this before. The results were most unexpected. As a rule, the subject remains under the control of the operator.” He sounds quite shaken.

“Two hundred years ago, they would not have been at a loss,” says Reverend Verringer. “It would have been a clear case of possession. Mary Whitney would have been found to have been inhabiting the body of Grace Marks, and thus to be responsible for inciting the crime, and for helping to strangle Nancy Montgomery. An exorcism would have been in order.”

“But this is the nineteenth century,” says Simon. “It may be a neurological condition.” He would like to say must be, but he doesn’t wish to contradict Verringer too bluntly. Also he is still quite unsettled, and unsure of his intellectual ground.

“There have been cases of this kind,” DuPont says. “As early as 1816, there was Mary Reynolds, of New York, whose bizarre alternations were described by Dr. S. L. Mitchill of New York; are you familiar with the case, Dr. Jordan? No? Since then, Wakley of The Lancet has written extensively on the phenomenon; he calls it double consciousness, although he emphatically rejects the possibility of reaching the so-called secondary personality through Neuro-hypnotism, as there is too much chance of the subject’s being influenced by the practitioner. He has always been a great foe of Mesmerism and related means, being a conservative in that respect.”