“Maggie?” Beau spoke her name with urgency. “Maggie. Look at me.”
“She prayed for him to die, Beau. I heard her, more times than I can count, praying that God would…” Her eyes opened wide and she stared into Beau’s shocked expression.
“Beau? Do you think…did Mama kill him?”
Verna was changing, right before Maggie’s eyes. Not once, but on two occasions, she’d chuckled at Rascal’s foolishness. And for the first time in years, Maggie saw her mother as more than the target for Edgar O’Neill’s miserable temper. As her bruises faded, her bowed head lifted higher. Her voice became stronger, and wonder of wonders, she’d laughed. Now, in the early morning hours, that same sound drifted up the stairway, reaching the bedroom.
“Beau? Did you hear that?”
“Hmm…” He turned from the window, buttoning his shirt. Maggie clutched the bedpost, her head tilted to one side. “Did I hear what?”
She lifted her hand, finger touching her lips. “Shh…listen, Beau.”
And then it rose again from the kitchen below, the unmistakable sound of two women, one of them speaking, the other laughing in response. “Your mother?” he asked.
Maggie nodded, her eyes glazed with tears. “I haven’t heard that sound…maybe it’s been forever. Mama doesn’t laugh. Once in a while, she smiles, but most of the time, she just looks hopeless.”
“Not lately, she doesn’t,” Beau reminded her. “Between her and Sophie, they’ve about baked and cooked the pantry full, and had a good time doing it.” He tucked his shirt in and fastened his belt. “We’re going to be celebrating Christmas in a big way, if they have anything to say about it.”
“I think Mama’s looking better, don’t you?”
He nodded. “Give her a couple of weeks, and she’ll be rounding out, same way you did.” Stepping closer, he stood behind her, his hands itching to possess the curves he viewed.
“Me?” Her tone was offended as she looked down at her slender form in a critical survey. “You think I’m getting fat?”
“Not yet, sweetheart. But one of these days you’ll be rounding out, right about here,” he murmured over her shoulder, his arms circling her waist, allowing his hands to rest against her belly.
Maggie bent her head, and her fingers covered his. “Would you like that?”
“You betcha, I would,” he stated emphatically. “Now that we’ve got your mama here to help out, we can concentrate on making it happen.” Beau nuzzled her neck and she obliged him, tilting her head. She smelled sweet, her skin was smooth and soft, and he pulled her firmly against himself.
Again, laughter pealed from below, and Maggie turned quickly in his embrace, winding her arms around his neck. “You made this happen, and I love you for it,” she whispered. “I don’t know what all they’re having such a good time over down there, but my mama’s acting like a young girl, Beau. She’s not walking all stooped over anymore, and she’s been taking a bath almost every day, just because she can.”
“I’m thinking we need to put that tub in the storage room and leave it there,” Beau said. “In fact, I’d ought to order a regular bathing tub and install it. Conrad says he’s gotten them for most everyone in town. I’ll get some pipe and lay it under the ground come spring, let it drain out back.”
Maggie’s eyes widened. “You can do that? We could take a bath without having to carry the water out to the porch?”
“Folks do it all the time in town,” he said. “I don’t know why we can’t.” He bent to kiss her and then whispered a suggestion that elicited a gasp from her lips.
“Beau! There’s no way two people can fit in a tub, not at the same time.” She pushed against his chest. “You’re just pulling my leg.”
“We could give it a shot,” he told her. “It’d sure be fun to try.”
The brown scarf was almost completed. She’d only had a scant few minutes here and there to work at it for the most part, and compared to Sophie’s work, it was woefully inadequate. Maggie held it before her, her narrowed gaze critical as she noted several lumpy areas, and the uneven edges. It hung from her hands to the floor, certainly long enough to wrap around Beau’s neck with enough left over to tuck across his chest beneath his coat.
“You might want to cast off the stitches now,” Sophie said from across the room. “I believe it’s about as long as it needs to be.” Amusement colored her words and Maggie ignored the gibe.
“I don’t know how,” she said after a moment. “I’m not very good at this.”
“He’ll like it, no matter now long it is,” Verna assured her, turning from the stove. “He likes everything you do, girl.”
Maggie felt her cheeks burn. Beau was not above wrapping his arms around her, no matter who watched, and her mother had viewed more than one embrace right here in the kitchen. “He’s good to me, Mama. I wanted to make him something, just from me.”
“All you gotta do is exist, Maggie. Just being his wife appears to be enough for Beau. I heard him singing to you last night after we went to bed. He plays that guitar real pretty.”
“He’s teaching me,” Maggie told her. “One day I’ll show you the books he got me.” Her hesitation was long, aware that her mother felt keenly her own lack of education. “I’m learning to read, Mama, and Beau taught me to cipher.”
“I should have done that for you, girl, at least taught you what little I know.” Verna spoke softly, her words heavy with regret. “There wasn’t ever book number one to read from, and your pa made it hard to do any teaching. He didn’t ever hold with girls getting any schooling. I was lucky I got to send Emily and Roberta for a couple of years. By the time it was your turn, he thought y’all needed to stay home and work the fields.”
“It’s all right,” Maggie told her, clutching the scarf and needles to her chest as she rose from her chair. She turned, deposited the project on the table, then went to her mother’s side. Her arms enclosed the frail woman and she bent her head to rest against Verna’s shoulder. “I love you, Mama. You did the best you could.”
“I didn’t protect you, Maggie. You took too many licks from your pa. He made you the scapegoat, mostly ’cause you was the spunkiest of the lot.” Her tone was gruff. “I reckon you needed to be, runnin’ away like you did.” Her hand was soothing against Maggie’s face. “And now, just look at you.”
“You better hide that scarf.” Sophie stepped to the window. “Rascal’s makin’ a fuss. Sounds like the men are on their way in for dinner.”
Maggie snatched her project up from the table and stuffed it in a tapestry bag. Too small for her own hand-work anymore, Sophie had passed it along for Maggie’s benefit. “When can you show me how to end this thing?” she asked, brushing past Sophie to stash the evidence on a pantry shelf.
“Maybe tonight.”
But it was not to be. Midafternoon brought the sheriff to the door, and before the day was over preparations were being made for a trip to town. Tomorrow morning was designated as the time for a hearing, and Sophie spent the evening taking in a dress for Verna to wear. The three women worked in the kitchen long after dark, and finally Maggie slipped into the parlor, where Beau sat in the over-stuffed chair, next to the lamp table. A book lay across his lap, and his head was tilted back.
She hesitated in the doorway, watching the rise and fall of his chest, aware of the soft sounds he emitted as he succumbed to slumber. And then her stockinged feet moved quickly across the carpet and she knelt beside him, her head resting against his thigh. The warmth of his palm cupped her head and he shifted, bending forward.
“Maggie? Are you all right?” he whispered, his long fingers slipping through her hair. He loosened the braid she wore, lifting it from her back and releasing the short piece of yarn she’d tied it with. Brown yarn.
“About as all right as a body can get,” she murmured. “All but for worrying about tomorrow, I suppose.”
Beau drew her hair onto his lap, admiring the shimmering depths of color in the lamplight.
“Tomorrow will take care of itself,” he told her. “Things will work out.”
“The judge is going to want to know what happened, Beau. And no one has any answers, at least not that I know of.” She clutched at his wrist and brought his hand to rest against her cheek. “Did the sheriff say anything to you?”
Her face was flushed and he traced the line of her jaw, massaging the tension there. “He’s got some ideas, I suppose. It might have been one of your pa’s customers.”
“Maybe.” She sounded dubious and Beau privately agreed. And then her head lifted and she met his gaze. “Will they question Mama?”
“Probably. She was there, honey.” He’d held it in for three days now, and it was time to tell her what he’d found out. “When I went to the farm the other day to gather up the chickens I brought your pa’s shotgun from the barn, Maggie. You told me he kept one in the house, too.”
A flare of comprehension lit her gaze. “The one in the house? It was gone, wasn’t it? Probably the one that killed him, Beau.”
“We’ll let the judge figure it out, honey. Myself, I don’t care how it happened. I never thought to be joyful over a man’s death, but I was proven wrong.”
“It’s sad that no one mourned him,” Maggie whispered. “And I can’t bring myself to be the first, Beau.”
“Come up here on my lap.” He lifted her from the floor and she curled in his arms, her head against his shoulder. “No matter what happens tomorrow, your mother will be all right. Sheriff Clemons might know more than he’s saying, but my guess is that he’s as much in the dark as any of us.”
The judge looked like any ordinary man, sitting behind the tall desk in the courtroom. His collar was too tight, and his glasses slid down his nose as he looked at Verna and her daughters. “I understand y’all are the survivors of Edgar O’Neill,” he intoned, peering back at the papers in front of him. “Now we need to decide just what happened to the man.” Still perusing the document, he waved his hand. “Take a seat, ladies.”
The three sisters settled into wooden chairs, Verna in their midst, their husbands in a row behind them. The judge leaned to one side, murmuring in Tom Clemons’s ear then sat erect once more, clearing his throat. His gavel pounded the desk, and Maggie stiffened in her seat.
From the back of the small courtroom, a man entered, carrying a shotgun. Reaching upward, he placed it on the desk before the judge. “This here’s the gun they brought in with O’Neill’s body.” Turning on his heel, he shot a quick grin at the four women. “Nuthin’ to worry about,” he whispered, bending to offer encouragement.
The judge took note of the weapon. “Anybody here in the courtroom recognize this weapon?” he asked sternly, his gaze raking the group assembled.
“I can’t tell one gun from another,” Emily said firmly, and Roberta nodded her agreement.
“It looks like the one my pa kept in the barn,” Maggie said quietly. Beside her, Verna moved restlessly, and Maggie’s hand reached to enclose the woman’s fingers, halting their fitful movement. Verna looked up at her, her chin trembling, her lips pressed into a tight line. “Hold tight, Mama,” Maggie whispered. “We’ll be out of here in no time.”
“Well, I’d say the perpetrator is unknown,” the judge said, his eyes kindly as he inspected the women before him. If he took special note of Verna’s fading bruises, he did not linger, but allowed his gaze to sweep past the four women to the men behind them. “I think you gentlemen need to take your ladies home now. We’ll probably never know what happened to…” He bent to read the name from the paper in his hand. “Edgar O’Neill died from an unknown hand,” he repeated, banging his gavel twice against the desk. “And that’s the decision of this court.”
“I didn’t even have to testify,” Verna whispered. “He didn’t even ask me anything.” She stood, her daughters rising as one, surrounding her with loving arms. Behind them, Beau met the judge’s eye and nodded his thanks. The statue of justice in the corner of the courtroom made more sense to him today than ever before. She was blind, perhaps because she saw with her heart, as did the man sitting at the bench.
Emily’s kitchen was once more the scene of a family gathering, and in the midst of voices raised and relieved laughter, Verna was silent and subdued. Around her the talk was of Christmas and gifts and the church service to be held only two days hence to celebrate the holiday.
Maggie was vigilant, watching as her mother sat quietly, listening to the family around her. Trembling fingers held the teacup to her lips and then replaced it carefully in its saucer. Pushing back from the table, Verna rose, and the voices around her were silent, hushed by the pale, anguished look she cast from one to another of her family members.
“I got something to say to y’all, and I need to tell you this, so don’t be hushin’ me up.” She walked to the far wall where a wide window looked out upon Emily’s garden, and then turned to face her daughters. Her words fell like stones against hard ground, firm and implacable.
“I shot Edgar myself. Didn’t anybody else pull the trigger but me. I hit him with two blasts, just in case one didn’t do the trick.”
Facing her audience with defiance evident in her uplifted chin, she drew in a deep breath. Bruised and battered she might have been in the past, but today Verna spoke without fear. “It was time and beyond that somebody called a halt to his meanness, and I couldn’t see that anybody else was about to do it.” With deliberate movements she unbuttoned the cuff of her sleeve and shoved it up to her elbow. Bruises, yellowed but still evident, came into view and Maggie smothered a cry of pain.
“There’s more like this just about everywhere you look,” Verna announced, and then with care, she replaced the sleeve and fastened the cuff. “I figured I could either let him into the house with his jug of whiskey and watch him get drunker than a skunk again, or I could use his shotgun and save myself another day of misery. When he started up the steps I just opened the door and let him have it, both barrels right in the chest.”
She tightened her jaw. “I should have done it a long time ago, instead of lettin’ my girls be worked like slaves.” Tears flowed now as Verna’s gaze touched each of her daughters. “I’m sorry I ever let him touch y’all the first time.”
“It’s all past now, Mama,” Roberta said quickly.
“We love you.” Emily’s words were fierce, and her eyes snapped as she spoke. “And no one else needs to know about this. There ain’t a judge in the world would blame you for what you did.”
“There ain’t a judge in the world will ever get the chance,” Amos said firmly. “What we know goes no further. Agreed?” The other two men nodded without hesitation.
“The judge made his decision,” Beau reminded them. “It’s finished. No matter what, it’s over.”
Epilogue
“‘There were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.’” Verna lifted her head, pausing to wipe at her eyes with a brand-new white hankie. “I haven’t read those words in years,” she said. “Not since—well, not in a long time.”
“Keep reading, Mama,” Maggie urged. Sitting on the floor beside the sofa, she smiled up at her mother. “What’s the next line say?”
Verna read on and Beau heard the familiar story anew, each word already tucked away in his memory, brought forth now on this Christmas Eve he would never forget. The days of childhood, when his father read the verses with majestic, booming tones, then later, when he’d sat in the back pew of various churches during his wandering years, listening as black-frocked ministers told the ancient story anew to their people.
“‘…a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying…”’ Verna’s voice was stronger now, and Maggie leaned even closer, one hand clasping her mother’s knee.
So might his children one day sit, Beau thought. Watching the candles flicker on the Christmas tree, hearing the familiar words of the story, maybe even listening to their grandmother’s voice. Family was a wondrous th
ing. His children would know the love of parents and a grandmother, probably grow up with Sophie in their midst.
Verna looked up and met his gaze. Her index finger marked the stopping place and she veered from the words to speak directly to Beau. “My Maggie girl said you wouldn’t take offence by her givin’ me your mama’s Bible. Did she speak true?”
Beau nodded. “I gave it to Maggie. It was hers to do with. If it pleases her to see it in your hands, then I’m happy, too. When you’ve finished with it one day, it can come back to Maggie.” Her hand brushed the crown of Maggie’s head, her smile in agreement with his words. “Maybe,” he suggested, “you can use it to help her with her reading, evenings when we sit in the parlor.”
Verna nodded. “Reading words puts them in your mind. You never forget. Even when you don’t get a chance to dwell on the music, you can hear it in your head.”
“Music?” Puzzled by her choice of words, Beau lifted his brow.
“Can’t you hear the music?” Verna asked him. “The good book’s got melodies all through it. You just hafta listen for them.” She bent her head once more.
“‘…and on earth peace, good will toward men.”’ The parlor was silent, snug against the wind blowing beyond the windows, warm with more than the heat from the wood-stove. In the circle of light shed by the parlor lamp, Maggie shifted, rising to her knees.
“Beau, do you want to open your present?” she asked, and he caught a look of apprehension in the depths of blue eyes. Not waiting for his bidding, she rose, turning toward the tree to search amidst the wrapped gifts. A bulky package, bundled carefully and tied with a length of yarn was deposited in his lap and he touched it with care. No matter the contents, it would be priceless, for Maggie’s were the hands that had given it.
His fingers fumbled a bit as he untied the brown yarn, and his memory traced a night not long gone when her braid had been tied with a piece of the same color. When her hair had shimmered in lamplight and his hands had found silken treasure there, her scent rising to tempt him.
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