“Not even a hint. We’re only guessing.”
“Educated guess, I must say.”
“You would,” Starnes said.
Starnes started the truck and we were driving out of the parking area. An old lady approached cautiously and waved at us. Starnes slowed the vehicle and rolled down her window.
“I don’t mean to interfere,” the lady began, “but I was sitting in the lobby waiting on the hospital to discharge my husband when I saw a young girl helping an older man out the door. What caught my attention was that he was a very big, extremely large man, you know. He was walking slow-like. Maybe he was still in pain. And she was carrying a suitcase. Probably his. Looked like brother and sister maybe. But I overheard you talking with the people at the desk. Just thought I’d let you know what I saw.”
I smiled.
Starnes thanked the lady, and we watched her walk back inside the hospital.
“You feel like driving up to Homer’s cabin?” I said.
“I have a bad feeling, Clancy,” she said.
“Me, too. We have to check.”
“Yeah, we have to check.”
An hour later we were slowly maneuvering our way up the infrequently used road-bed to Homer’s cabin in the Walnut Creek community. There was no way the two of us were hiking up that mountain to his place. The drive was difficult enough, but walking was completely out of the question. When we reached the edge of the open field, we stopped and left the truck in the shadows of the forest.
We walked to the cabin with the dogs. We were cautious, but neither of us felt threatened by going there. I was reasonably certain that Homer wouldn’t shoot us with his crossbow.
Starnes knocked. There was no immediate answer. I looked in one of the windows but could see no movement inside. We went to the back door and knocked again.
No one answered the door. There were no sounds, except what nature was doing all around us.
“Suggestions now?” Starnes said.
“We can sit and wait,” I said.
“You think they’re coming back here?”
“Frankly, I don’t know what to think except that they are two lonely people who somehow found each other.”
“That kindred spirit crap?” Starnes said.
“Crappy or not, yeah, I guess that’s what they think they have. Soul-mates, or something like that. Who’s to say? Maybe they do have it. I don’t know. I know they have both suffered a lot in their very young lives. Maybe their friendship will sustain them.”
“She’s nearly fifteen, and he’s … thirty?” she said.
“That’s about it.”
“Not what I’d call a perfect match by any stretch.”
“But not oil and water either,” I said, trying to find a good spin on a tough situation.
“No, in this case it’s more like that line from the nursery rhyme – and the dish ran away with the spoon. They have things in common, but the whole idea of it is absurd.”
“A lot like the human family. Absurd is a way of life for many of us.”
“So, we wait around here to see if they turn up?” Starnes said.
“For a while. If they don’t, we can go and then come back later. I don’t know where else they could go, except maybe to her home.”
“And you think we can stop them?” she said.
“Stop them? Stop them from what, being friends?”
“Living together.”
“Oh, that. I hadn’t thought about that. Maybe legally we could thwart that sort of thing. Wow, fourteen and thirty? I have some questions … but, I don’t know. Certainly, there are legal ramifications to a relationship with those parameters, … but still. We’re not her legal guardians.”
“She’ll be handled by DSS,” Starnes said. “They’ll put her into the system and try to find a foster home for her.”
“Until she’s eighteen, right?” I said.
“Yeah, eighteen.”
“If they can find her,” I said. “Lots of places to hide in these mountains. And, there’s that other thing soon to happen.”
“What’s that?” Starnes said.
“She’s about to get her hands on $50,000.”
“Oh, my. That’s a lot of running-away-and-hiding money.”
“Two kids, really. And the youngest of the pair is leading the way,” I said with a twinge of resignation.
“Not a typical fairy tale ending, I suppose,” Starnes added.
“Well, I have a variation on that Mother Goose rhyme I mentioned moments ago,” I said as I headed back towards Starnes’ truck on the far side of the open field, down from the cabin.
“I’m listening,” Starnes said as she joined me in our trek towards the truck.
“The wealthy dish ran away with the useful spoon,” I quipped, but didn’t laugh.
“To turn a phrase,” Starnes said.
She didn’t laugh either.
Also by M. Glenn Graves
The Clancy Evans Mystery Series
One Lost Soul More
Mercy Killing
The Peace Haven Murders
Revenge
Desperate Measures
The Outcast In Grey
Out Jumps Jack Death
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M. Glenn Graves
About the Author
M Glenn Graves has been writing fiction since graduating from college in 1970 but did not begin to work on novels until 1992. Born in Mississippi, he has lived in Tennessee, North Carolina, Missouri, Virginia, Costa Rica, and the Dominican Republic. He graduated from Mars Hill College with a BA in English and Religion. He received a Master of Divinity in 1977 three years after he finished his four-year tour in the United States Navy. Married to Cindy, they have three grown children – Brian, Mark, & Jenn. They also have three grandchildren – Jonathan, Matthew, & Phoebe. Glenn, Cindy, and Sophie, their Lab, currently reside in the mountains of western North Carolina where he is the pastor of a local church.
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