Roberta Harold

a 2001 graduate of the Bread Loaf School of English at Middlebury College; studied fiction writing with novelist Jonathan Strong and poetry with Paul Muldoon, winning the 1999 Poetry Competition there; a 2009 finalist for the Orlando Award in Short Fiction of the A Room of Her Own Foundation; a member of Sisters in Crime and of Grub Street, Boston's creative writing center; currently at work on her third novel, a re-imagining of the life of a Civil War widow; her first two books, Heron Island and Murdered Sleep, are mysteries set in the early 1900s and published under her pen name of R.A. Harold.

The boat gliding southeast from Heron Island to the Vermont shore might have held a courting couple out for a Saturday excursion, the woman reclining under a lacy parasol in the stern, the man pulling steadily and evenly on the oars.

“But, Mr. Wyatt, surely I can persuade you to join us for the ceremony?” Mrs. Van Dorn’s tone was half entreaty, half protest.

The oarsman paused, the lines of his arm muscles softening. His dark eyes met her china-blue gaze.

“You’re very kind – but I promised Mr. Dodge a game of chess when I get back, and he is so rarely at leisure,” a slight, apologetic lift of one shoulder. “One wants to be a good guest.”

She leaned towards him, letting the shade of her hat-brim deepen the blue of her eyes. “I’m sure Warren would understand – don’t you want to see the new steamer?”

It was a perfect midsummer afternoon, the sky blue as a flag, dabbed with just enough cloud-fluff for decoration. Tiny wavelets danced on the surface of the lake’s darker blue. The Vermont III would be the largest steamer ever launched on Lake Champlain, and there was to be a band concert in Burlington afterwards.

Wyatt bent again to his oars. “I’ll hope to have a ride on it before the summer’s out. I’m sure you and Mr. Van Dorn will have a fine time.”

The rebuff stung, though gently delivered. It almost spoiled the small victory of getting more than ten words out of him after a campaign of five days, an effort that must end with her husband’s imminent arrival. She settled back among the cushions and let her gaze wander from the honey-colored ribs of the Adirondack boat, rolling slightly from her movement, to the play of muscle along Wyatt’s shoulders and arms.

A week’s sun had bronzed the cheekbones of his long face, and with the thick, dark mustache bracketing a wide, well-shaped mouth, he could pass for a pirate, or a lawman of the Wild West. Her mind’s eye pinned a sheriff’s star on his collarless white shirt, replaced the boater which shaded his eyes with a grey Stetson.

The Van Dorns often socialized with the Dodges back in the City, but this was their first invitation to Dodge’s private island with its newly built Camp. Her husband, Gerald, a genial, portly merchant banker at Morgan’s, was to join her by train from New York. The company of Mr. Dade Wyatt, mannerly but laconic and thereby fascinating, had driven all thought of Gerald from her head. But the object of imagination and curiosity was not yet to be drawn out, and the shoreline was fast approaching.

“You will be here for Mr. Roosevelt’s visit, won’t you, Mr. Wyatt?”

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