“If we could only find a way to definitively place him at Top Withens that summer,” Charlotte said. “But even so, I cannot imagine it. He is a quiet man, a man often seen in church. Compare him to Clifton Bradshaw and all that his name evokes. It seems impossible that the devil could be any other than he.”

“I believe our best chance of finding the answers we need is to locate Annie Fielding, as listed in the ledger,” Emily said thoughtfully as she ate. “To be able to speak to someone who was at Top Withens Hall at the time—someone who was not a child then or who is not now so old and addled that they can barely remember their own name—would be extremely helpful. Though where one begins to find that particular person, I do not know. I know of no Annie Fieldings at all. Do you, Martha?”

“I do not,” Martha said as she collected up the dishes. “I do know four Fieldings, miss.”

“I was thinking of Annie as we returned from Ponden,” Anne said. “It seems to me that if a young woman had the determination to stay up at Top Withens Hall for almost a full year, when hardly any did, then she might well have reason to want to stay close: family in Haworth or another nearby village—or a sweetheart, perhaps. And if that was the case, then there is a chance she might still be nearby and living under a married name by now.”

“Do you know of any married Fieldings, Tabby?” Anne asked as Tabby returned from the back kitchen—after all, she seemed intimately acquainted with the lives of every individual within a twenty-mile radius.

“I know five Fieldings,” Tabby said shortly. As kindly as she had been to them on their return, plying them with warmth and comfort, she was still cold and stiff. Anne knew that Tabby was withholding her full love as punishment for their insistence at continuing to explore all that she considered to be most dangerous and foolish. And Anne loved her all the more for it.

“There’s Harriet Fielding who goes to the school, just turned eight,” said Martha. “Or Susan Fielding from Oxenhope—she’s as old as the hills, older than Tabby even. Or Sarah Fielding, whose pa caught her with Leonard Ackley in the back pasture, taking—”

“I believe she’s known as Sarah Ackley now,” Anne said hastily before Martha could add any more detail. “But none of those sounds the right sort of age.”

“If it were Agnes Fielding you were looking for, that would be another matter,” Tabby remarked.

“Why do you say that, Tabby?” Anne asked, already on her feet ready to fetch the ledger.

“Well, she keeps house just down the hill,” Tabby said. “Never married.”