The Late Mr. Preston’s Wife
Alistair Preston never appeared to her in the flesh again, in the years that followed. Sometimes she’d catch a reflection in the glass as a door closed shut, other times in the gleaming polished lancewood of a passing coach, but in the split second she saw him, all she could make out was the suit he was buried in, with beams of light blooming from the collar and cuffs. In the Christmas of 1899, the same year she donated her husband’s vast coal fortune to the church and moved in with her sister in San Jacinto, she felt a discordance spreading beneath her feet, like her nerves were violin strings being harshly bowed. Sitting in the kitchen looking into her tea, she saw a ripple trembling outward, and fleetingly glimpsed a hand in the reflection, reaching for her, about to crack the surface of the thin green liquid.
The crucifix hanging in the foyer shook loose, and as it touched the ground, the earth split open, swallowing the cross, a bearskin rug, a bookshelf, and more every passing second. The knife block in the kitchen tipped over, sending knives spinning up and down the linoleum floor as the house rocked one way, then the other. She hid behind a chair as the roof caved in, the knives sliding past her feet, the candles catching the Christmas holly on fire. She screamed for her sister but didn’t dare move to the drawing room to be with her. As she would soon discover when the earthquake subsided and she stumbled there, it was a wise move. The crossbeams had splintered above, keened down and impaled her sister through the chest, pinning her to the center of the room in a kneeling position, leaking red.
She nursed a cut on her foot, stained in tea, and wailed up the stairs to the bathroom, which hissed with steam. When she flung open the door, she was astonished to see it was the only room completely untouched in the earthquake. Pristine, even. The other thing that was curious: The sink was filling up with hot water, and just as the water was about to crest over the edge and spill onto the floor, it shut itself off.
She choked back a sob and slowly limped towards the sink, the long thin mirror dulling her reflection with a thick coat of steam. Gripping the sides of the sink, she knew what had to be done. She pulled her hair back, clenched her teeth, and bent over, dipping her face in.
When she adjusted to the heat, she opened her eyes, to find Alistair staring inches from her face. Everything else was darkness.
“Hello, Dear,” he said without moving his lips. “Open your mouth. Let me show you what I found down there amongst the coal.”
Firemen arrived on the scene hours later to the shattered house on the hill, seeing for the first and last time in their lives the sight of a woman drowned whilst standing up. It took the strength of three of them to pull her body from the sink, and when they fell backwards with her frozen body, her face looked like she was at peace, like she had seen something beautiful in the water.
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