It wouldn’t be until the Life story came out four years later, after the success of The Black Veil, when her life would have already changed so vastly, that she would really recognize the extent of the isolation Jacob must have felt that night a town pointed its collective finger at him. In the beginning, new in New York, she just wanted to find him. She was only half an hour into the train journey when Cascade and her months as Mrs. Asa Spaulding began to feel as remote as the plot of a half-remembered movie. A staid porter maneuvered a tea cart down the aisle, and Dez was reminded of her school days, when she used to travel alone, by train, back to Farmington. No matter how morose she felt at the station—her father bending down to kiss her cheek, slipping some wrapped surprise into her pocket, assuring her that Christmas was just around the corner—she would, within minutes of the train’s departure, be strangely happy to be exactly where she was: in her own company and settled into her plush velvet seat, face turned to the window.
