“You could get a locksmith,” Toby said.
“Top of my list of things to do,” Lexie said and they’d laughed.
Now Toby saw that the key to the box was sticking out. It made sense that it would be in her dream since she’d been curious about it. She turned the key and opened the box. Inside, perfectly fitted in satin-lined compartments, were twelve jade figures of animals. She recognized them as Chinese zodiac symbols. “What a beautiful collection,” she whispered aloud as she closed the lid and turned the key.
“There you are!” came a woman’s voice so familiar that it made the hair on Toby’s neck stand up. This is my dream, she thought as she closed her eyes very tightly. Go away! she said to herself. Go away right now!
“Tabitha?” the woman said. “Valentina said you weren’t feeling well.”
Toby’s fingers closed over the key to the box, and when she turned around, she looked into the face of her mother.
But as alike as the face was, there was a difference. For one thing, she wasn’t glowering at her daughter as though Toby had yet again committed some great sin. That had been the expression she’d grown up with, the look her mother had given her all her life. As far as Toby remembered, she’d never pleased her mother in anything she’d ever done.
But this woman in her dream wasn’t looking at Toby like that. While it was true that there wasn’t any genuine happiness in the woman’s eyes, there was concern. It was as though she really cared whether or not Toby was feeling well.
“Mother?” Toby whispered.
She gave a small smile. “You look as though you’ve never seen me before.”
“I’m not sure I have, actually,” Toby said.
The woman laughed—a sound Toby didn’t think she’d ever heard before. Her mother was a very serious person. Taking care of her household, helping her husband with anything he needed, and, above all else, finding her daughter a husband were jobs that consumed her.
“Come along, dear, and get something to eat.”
When she slipped her arm through Toby’s, Toby’s eyes widened in shock. Casual affection was not something that her mother demonstrated. Toby couldn’t help that her eyes began to grow teary.
“Valentina was right. You are a bit off tonight. Come away. Silas will be here soon. He is delivering a coffin. People die at the most inopportune times, don’t they?”
At that callous statement, Toby laughed. This was the mother she knew. “Valentina is the red-haired woman?”
“You know that.”
“Yes, of course I do,” Toby said and remembered hearing that long ago Captain Caleb and Valentina had been lovers.
As they walked toward the doorway, another woman entered the room. “Lavinia, Tabby,” she said in greeting and they nodded to her.
Outside this vivid dream, in the real world, her mother’s name was Lavidia. “Lavidia, Lavinia, Toby, Tabby,” she said aloud.
“No more cider for you, dear,” Lavinia said, patting her daughter’s hand.
They went across the hall to the dining room, where a long table was laden with food. Several people were around it, holding beautiful plates that Toby had seen on display in the Nantucket Whaling Museum.
“Did Captain Caleb bring these back from China?” Toby asked.
“You helped unpack them.” Her mother was looking at the food, picking over it.
It was when Toby reached for a plate that she realized she still had the key to the box in her hand. But then, it made sense that her dream was reconciling the lost key. Maybe if she put the key back in the box it would be there when she woke. Smiling at that idea, she picked up a plate and reached for a piece of fish with mushrooms on it. “So how is Captain Caleb?”
To Toby, it was an innocent question, but her mother turned to her with the angry face Toby had seen all her life. “No sea captains!” she said in a voice that was more a hiss than human.
Toby took a step back. “I didn’t mean anything by my question. Isn’t this his house?”
Lavinia seemed to need a few breaths before she could speak. “Of course it is, but don’t let his riches fool you. You know as well as anyone what it’s like to marry a man of the sea.”
“I guess so,” Toby said as she picked up a little bowl full of what looked to be custard. “I take it Silas has nothing to do with the sea?”
Lavinia looked at her daughter across the table. “What has happened to you tonight? You do not seem to be yourself.”