Out of the Darkness

by Robert D. McKee

  “Stepdaughter. Soon to be ex-stepdaughter,” she said.

  “Yes,” said Chester, “so I’ve heard. You’re planning to sue Emmett for divorce.”

  Cedra looked at Micah. “As soon as your lawyer friend here can draft the papers.”

  “Divorce is a serious business, Cedra. I don’t have to tell you that. You’re an intelligent woman. I’m sure you’ve given it considerable thought and you have your reasons. But your relationship with your husband is not what concerns me. My concern right now is for your daughter. Now tell me who is responsible for this beating she received.”

  “Well, Dr. Hedstrom,” Mrs. Pratt began, “Polly’s terrified of what the man will do if anyone finds out, but, despite that, I will tell you.” She raised a finger for emphasis. “I’ll not, however, tell Sheriff Collins. He would never have the courage to make an arrest, anyway.” She placed her hands in her lap and laced her fingers together. She turned her gaze to the floor and drew in a deep breath, held it, and exhaled. Without looking up, she said, “The person who beat my daughter was her stepbrother, Sonny Pratt.”

  Micah could see the surprise flash across Chester’s face. He wondered if by Mrs. Pratt’s answering that question, she had also answered the unspoken question he’d heard Chester ask her earlier.

  She had responded to Chester in a matter-of-fact voice, without emotion. Now she lifted her gaze from the floor, and when she did, she appeared more like the woman Micah had met at the park that afternoon. She pinned her powerful gray eyes to Chester, held him fastened, and said, “But you didn’t ask who beat her, did you, doctor? You asked who is responsible for her beating, and the answer to that question is you.”

  Micah had no idea what she was talking about, and he looked to Chester, expecting some reply.

  But Chester only returned the woman’s hard gaze with a look tinged with sadness. “Micah,” he said without taking his eyes from Cedra, “would you mind leaving us alone?”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  When Chester Hedstrom graduated from secondary school at the age of sixteen, he wanted more than anything to become an engineer. He was fascinated by machinery of all kinds. He loved their function, their form, and their power.

  At the age of twenty, Chester graduated cum laude from the Colorado School of Mines with a degree in mechanical engineering and was immediately hired by a firm in Pennsylvania that was in the business of manufacturing locomotives.

  Chester’s first month on the job was exciting. The engines produced by the factory were beautiful. And to Chester, equally beautiful was the machinery used by the factory in the production of those engines. It was as though the factory itself was a huge machine, and all the machines used within the factory were components of that greater machine.

  The smells, the sounds, the power that surrounded the place were all exciting.

  But by his sixth month, he realized he’d made a terrible mistake. He still appreciated the theory, the mathematics, the physics of engineering, but he discovered he had no talent for what he was doing. He’d even become a joke. He heard the snickers of the workmen as he walked past them on the factory floor. And he knew everything they whispered was true. Chester had the skill to master the concepts of engineering, but he lacked the ability to translate those concepts to the cold, three-dimensional world of steel.

  By his eighth month he had submitted his resignation and applied for admission to the Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons. After all, Chester told himself, the human body was a machine. Like any engine, the body required fuel, maintenance, and repair. As it happened, Chester found that his aptitude for medicine matched his aptitude for engineering, but with medicine he had the ability to translate that aptitude into everyday life. He accomplished this by possessing a sensitivity to the needs of his patients.

  At least until now he had believed he was sensitive to the needs of his patients. But maybe Cedra Pratt was right. There was a lot he didn’t understand. It could be he was responsible for what happened to Polly tonight—not because of something he’d done, but because of something he had refused to do.

  What they asked of him, though, was too much.

  “I’m sorry, Cedra.”

  “Sorry?” Cedra said, looking past him at her daughter. “That’s a wonderful word, isn’t it? Sorry.” She turned her gaze back to Chester and, with a look that seemed to drop the room’s temperature she said, “No matter what you do, if you’re sorry, and you tell the person you’ve wronged how sorry you are, then you’re absolved. It’s magical. What power there is in that one word, sorry.”

  Chester had known Cedra since before she married Emmett Pratt. He’d always admired her strength. After the death of her first husband, she had returned to normal college and obtained her degree. She had become an excellent teacher. And she did all this while raising her little girl.

  “What would you have me say?” he asked.

  “That you’ll reconsider.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t do that.”

  “Why?”

  He stood, shoved his hands in his pockets, and walked to the window. He stared out into the night. There was no moon, and the darkness was heavy.

  “Why?” Cedra repeated. “What happened to Polly is not her fault, Chester.”

  “Of course it’s not her fault. Neither is it my fault. It’s Sonny Pratt’s fault. I think we should notify the sheriff and Sonny should be punished.”

  “Sonny wouldn’t be punished.” She said this without explanation. She didn’t need to explain. Chester knew what she said was true. It wasn’t only that Sonny’s father was a powerful man. He was, but the sons of powerful men and the powerful men themselves had faced justice in this county before. Not in recent years, perhaps—not since Brad Collins and Earl Anderson had begun to administer the law. They were both more concerned with the feathers in their own nests than with justice. But it wasn’t that Emmett Pratt wielded influence. In fact, Pratt’s influence was minimal. He was powerful and well-to-do, but most people in the county thought both Pratt and Sonny got by with way too much.

  The biggest reason Cedra was right when she said Sonny wouldn’t be punished was because Sonny Pratt was smart. Chester knew Sonny well, and Chester was certain there would have been no witnesses to his beating Polly. Chester expected Sonny would have even arranged an alibi. In the end, it would be Polly’s word against his. Besides, it was clear from Polly’s reaction earlier that she would be unwilling to testify against her stepbrother.

  There was prairie and cedar-covered hills outside the window, but it was impossible to see into the inky night. Instead, what Chester saw was his own reflection, and below his shoulder he could see Cedra sitting in her chair, her hands folded, watching him.

  Cedra was fourteen years older than Chester and had always been a beauty. As a teen he’d had a boyish crush on her. In those callow years he would have done anything she asked.

  Now, though, the only time she had ever asked him for anything, he had told her no.

  Did he resent her for what she wanted from him? Many people had to face what she and Polly were facing. Perhaps this situation was more complex than usual. Chester realized its complexity when Cedra answered his question about who had attacked her daughter. Still, it wasn’t fair that she would lay this burden on him.

  He watched in the glass as Cedra stood and crossed to the table where Polly lay. She took the girl’s small, limp hand in her own. “When I said it wasn’t Polly’s fault, I wasn’t talking about what happened tonight. I was referring to the other thing.”

  He nodded. “I understand. When I asked who beat her, I was sure the answer would also tell me who the father was. I guess I’m not surprised it’s Sonny. He’s always had a way about him.”

  With that Cedra looked toward the ceiling and laughed out loud.

  “Chester,” she said, wiping an eye, “this is not the results of some little affair. It did not happen that way. Polly did not become mixed up with some boy.”

&n
bsp; With effort Chester forced himself to turn from the woman’s reflection and face the woman herself. “No,” he said, “not some boy, her stepbrother.”

  Cedra lowered her head and pinched the bridge of her nose. She looked older and very tired. “No, Chester,” she said, looking up. “Polly didn’t have a romance with Sonny Pratt or anyone else. This situation is not because of anything Polly did. That’s what I am telling you.”

  Chester was confused, and it must have shown, because in a tone of bitter exasperation, Cedra said, “Chester, Polly is—” She stammered. “She’s expecting because Sonny and two of his friends carried her down by the river two months ago and spent an afternoon taking—” Again she stammered. “—taking advantage of her.”

  She stepped around the table and came toward him. “Sonny Pratt is responsible for what happened to Polly at the river,” she continued, “but you, Chester, are responsible for what happened tonight.”

  “Because I wouldn’t perform the surgery you requested?” he asked, knowing what her answer would be.

  “Precisely.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” He wasn’t going to let her do this to him. He felt bad enough without assuming the responsibility for Polly’s beating.

  “We’ve already moved out of Emmett’s house. If you had been willing to end her situation, my daughter and I could have begun our struggle to get over this nightmare. As it is, there is no getting over it, not ever. Both Polly and I will be dealing with this for the rest of our lives.”

  “What you ask me to do is a criminal act,” Chester said. “You came in here last week wanting me to commit a crime, Cedra. Now you tell me it’s rape, but even that doesn’t change anything. The law doesn’t make allowances for rape. As a matter of fact,” he added, “even your seeking an abortion is a crime. Merely asking for it carries a six-month jail term.”

  Her jaw set and her lips disappeared. “I don’t give a damn about what is or is not a crime.” She flung her arm in the direction of the table and said, “My daughter was beaten tonight, Chester, beaten, and it is only going to get worse. This happened because Polly approached Sonny at the picnic today and told him of her condition. Yes, it was a stupid thing to do. Sonny had threatened her before, right after they’d finished with her. She was still lying in the weeds on the river bank, and he stuck a knife under her chin and said if she told anyone what had happened he would cut her throat.”

  Chester suddenly felt tired. He crossed to the chair where Cedra had been sitting earlier and dropped into it. “Why would she tell him?” he asked. “What did she want him to do?”

  “I’m sure she didn’t know. Polly’s beside herself over this. She can’t sleep. She can’t think straight. She told Sonny she would make him pay for what he’d done. She said she was going to the sheriff, and even if the sheriff refused to arrest him, she would still tell everyone in town.”

  “That’s exactly what she should do,” Chester said.

  “I agree. I’ve tried to get her to do that very thing, only report it to the marshal in Cheyenne, not Collins. But she won’t. I would do it myself, but she becomes hysterical every time I mention it. You saw how she was tonight. What she said to Sonny was an empty threat. In truth she’s terrified of him.”

  “Why would she provoke him like that then?”

  “Anger. Humiliation. The frustration of having no control. Most of all, the horror of bearing a rapist’s child. I think a part of her wanted him to kill her right there. It would be quick and over with. And I’ve known Sonny since he was ten years old. I’m surprised he didn’t.”

  Chester didn’t say anything, but he had to agree that Sonny Pratt was capable of murder.

  “But he won’t be able to risk the truth coming out once people know of her condition,” Cedra continued. “When Polly starts to show, I’m convinced Sonny will kill her.”

  Chester could feel the muscles in his shoulders tighten. Like thunder preceding a storm, this tightening meant within the hour he’d have a headache that would lay him low.

  He rubbed the back of his neck. As he did, he heard a rustling, and he turned toward the sound. Polly, her face now swollen almost beyond recognition, pushed herself to a sitting position. Chester stood and was about to go to her, but after a step he stopped. She leveled her one good eye at him and stared across the room without speaking. He returned her gaze, and he could see her sadness. Her hopelessness and despair made him ache. As he searched that wounded face, he saw that although at eighteen Polly still had her youth, this girl who clung to his examination table was no longer young.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Jackson Clark was not impressed with Chester Hedstrom’s hot dogs. He’d eaten half of one, tossed the rest in a garbage barrel, and went back to drinking beer. Once the picnic broke up, Jackson had made his way downtown to Buck’s Saloon, where he spent the next six hours socializing with the boys. Now, as he pushed himself back from the bar, his legs felt a tad wobbly, and he told himself it must be because—like a fool—he’d skipped his supper.

  He drained the last bit of suds from the bottom of his mug, blotted his mustache with the back of his hand, and tossed Buck a two-fingered salute from the brim of his derby. “I’ll be seeing you, Buckley,” he said as he turned toward the door.

  “Where you headed, Jackson? It’s still early yet.” Buckley Daggett was a ruddy-faced fellow with a thick chest and a gut that hung low over the front of his white apron. He was originally from Tennessee and had come to Wyoming as a young trooper in the army. Although sizeable and healthy-looking, Buck was an infirm man whose left arm was drawn up and shrunken. He had been stationed at Fort Fetterman during the Indian hostilities, and once while out on patrol, he’d taken an arrow in the shoulder. It was a painful and unpleasant experience, and his arm had never been the same since.

  As a result, Mr. Daggett had no fondness for the red man. Many times he’d asked patrons whose features were darker than average, “You ain’t an Injun, are ya, mister?” He was mindful of the Wyoming Statute prohibiting the sale of spiritous drink to Indians. And he took it as his duty to warn any customers of that law whose appearance suggested an ancestry on this continent that might predate the Mayflower’s famous voyage. He would give them this warning with a wicked smile while jabbing the thumb attached to his good arm toward a sign behind the bar that proclaimed in blood-red letters, “No Indians Allowed.”

  Except for this prejudice, he was a friendly enough man with a personality suited to the dram-shop trade.

  “You’re welcome to one on the house,” he called out to Jackson. Buckley was a shrewd businessman and often coaxed his customers into having just one more. But Jackson Clark always stayed until he was done, then, even with the promise of a free drink, he would leave.

  “No, sir. Thanks, though,” he said. “Except for half of some kind of sandwich that defies description and two of those vinegary eggs of yours—” He pointed toward a large jar of hardboiled eggs at the end of the bar. “—I’ve not had a bite to eat since breakfast. It’s time I was on my way.” He bade farewell to all his cronies and stepped out into the night.

  Once outside, Jackson pulled his watch from a vest pocket. He held it out the full length of his arm, both in an effort to catch the light that spilled from the barroom window and to bring the numerals, which seemed to get smaller every year, into better focus.

  Not quite ten.

  He wondered if Lottie’s would still be open. He craned his neck in an effort to see up Second Street, but he couldn’t tell if her lights were lit or not.

  Lottie’s Café was not officially recognized as offering the best food in town. That reputation went to the restaurant in the Glendale House Hotel. But let the travelers and passersby do their dining there. The locals and the railroaders alike knew the truth: Whether all you wanted was a steak and potatoes, or some of that strange Louisiana French stuff she liked to serve, Lottie Charbunneau’s was the place to eat in Probity.

  Jackson made his way down Second,
and once there, he saw lights were still burning; but when he tried the front door, it was locked. He rattled the knob a couple of times trying to find the right degree of jiggle to communicate an eagerness to come in without being brusque. He prided himself on his ability to walk thin lines between getting what he wanted and accomplishing it without seeming pushy. He liked to think he acquired that characteristic as part of his lawyerly training, but he knew in truth it was one of the many traits that kept him from success. The most successful lawyers didn’t give a whit if someone thought they were pushy. Many of them honed their pushiness skills both night and day.

  After a bit, Lottie herself, wiping her hands on a rag, came out from the back of the café and cracked open the door.

  “Lottie, dear,” Jackson said, giving her his most pitiful but charming smile, “I realize you’re closed for the evening, but what’s the chance you could fry me up a steak? I’m starving, and you’re my only hope.”

  Jackson had known the woman ever since she’d landed in town eighteen years before. Lottie, her husband, Gaston, and their daughter had been traveling from Louisiana to the Yellowstone country Gaston loved so well. They had made it as far as Probity when Gaston took a slight fever. It didn’t seem serious at the time, but a week later the Frenchman was dead. Jackson Clark had openly questioned the Gallic ability to ward off disease ever since.

  “Are you drunk, Jackson?” the woman asked in her scolding Southern drawl. She was small and thin, but she had the voice of a woman twice her size.

  “Drunk? Why Madame Charbunneau, you know I would never attempt to enter your premises while intoxicated.”

  She cocked her head and looked him in what he suspected were his bloodshot eyes. It was his eyes that often gave him away. “Don’t you lie to me, lawyer,” she said.