“I’m sorry about your wife. As far as I know she’s been decent to Dory and Jeanmarie when they’ve met.”
“Yes, I know about the meetings arranged by Mrs. McHenry. Frankly, I was furious at first, considering—”
“—Considering that my sister is a whore?” James jumped to his feet.
“Sit down, James. I was going to say considering the circumstances under which Mick died.”
“Hell. I had nothing to do with that.”
“I know. You were in Coeur d’Alene that week.”
“You checked on me.”
“Of course. Wouldn’t you have checked on me if the situation had been reversed?” Chip turned to Ben, abruptly changing the subject. “Where are you from. Waller?”
“Over near Spokane—and north along the Pend Oreille Lake.”
“I’ve heard that the Pend Oreille River is a mean one for log driving.” Chip’s eyes went to James, then back to Ben.
“Not as mean as the Wishkah. There loggers have built a splash dam to hold their harvest. The problem is when they open the gates there’s such a rush of water that many of the logs get hung up along the riverbank. And you know what that could mean. A massive jam.”
“I’ve not been over around the Wishkah.” Again Chip’s eyes darted to James. This time they stayed. “You been over there, James?”
“No.”
Chip shrugged again, and turned back to Ben. They discussed weather, Indians, politics, the war between the states and every other topic Chip could think of without bringing the Malone or Callahan lumber companies or the donkey engine into the conversation.
Ben realized that Chip was trying to keep the conversation impersonal and was relieved when Jeanmarie and a woman of Indian or Mexican descent appeared in the doorway.
“Señor, I’ll be back for the niña after I speak to Consuela in the kitchen.”
Jeanmarie peeked from around the woman’s skirt and saw James. She darted across the room to him.
“Looky what the lady give me, Uncle James. I can take her home.” She placed the doll on his lap. “She’s got hands and feet and ever’thing,” she said excitedly. “See her under-drawers. They’re like mine. See.” She swiftly lifted her dress past her knees to reveal the legs of white drawers. “They’re like Odette’s too. She’s goin’ to show me when we get home.”
Trying to keep the grin off his face, James pulled the doll’s dress down and cradled the china head in his palm as he inspected her face.
“What’a ya know. She’s even got a nose.”
“Uncle James! You’re… silly.” Jeanmarie giggled and grabbed the doll. “I got to show Odette’s papa.” She went to lean against Ben’s knee. “Want to see her underdrawers?” The child’s laughing eyes looked up at him expectantly.
“Why sure. Hmmm… they match her dress.”
“Does Odette’s match her dress?”
“Well, ah… Odette’s a big girl. Guess I’ll have to ask her.”
Ben glanced at Chip. His eyes were riveted to the child. James was trying not to laugh.
“The lady that made the dress and the drawers said the dolly’s head will break.” Jeanmarie held the doll close to her, reached up, and pulled Ben’s head down so she could whisper. “I’m not goin’ to let Uncle Louis see her.”
Ben didn’t know what to say. He was sure the other two men had heard the child’s words. In the quiet that followed, he gave her a gentle push toward Chip.
“I bet Mr. Malone would like to see your doll.”
Ever friendly, Jeanmarie tilted her head to look at Chip.
“You got red hair,” she blurted, then giggled. “Mama said my papa had red hair. Want to see my dolly’s drawers?”
Something like a smile flitted across Chip’s face. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen a young lady’s drawers.” He flipped up the doll’s dress. “They are very pretty.”
“You got a little girl?”
“No. The lady that works here has a little boy.”
“I don’t like boys. When they grow up they’re mean. But not Uncle James and Wiley and Odette’s papa.”
“I guess some grow up mean, but not all.”
“Are you mean like Uncle Louis and Uncle Milo?”
Jeanmarie leaned against his knees and looked up at him with eyes so like Mick’s that Chip looked back at the child as if seeing her for the first time. He ruffled the red curls on her head, then took her small hand and held it between his. He had to swallow hard several times before he could speak.
“I sure as hel… heck hope not.”
He was grateful when Rita appeared in the doorway.
“Señor, the meal is ready. I will take a tray to Maria, and send the others down.”
The good-byes were said in the middle of the afternoon. Ben and James insisted that they get back to the homestead before dark. Dory was misty-eyed when she left Marie’s room with the precious box of mementos Marie had put in her care. James took it and Odette to the wagon while she put on her bonnet and Jeanmarie’s. Without looking directly into Chip Malone’s face, she thanked him for the dinner.
“Thanks for coming and bringing Jeanmarie. I want you to know that we don’t hold any bitterness toward you and the child.” After he finished speaking he squatted down and spoke to Jeanmarie. “Take care of that young lady,” he said, touching the doll she held clasped in her arms. “And thank you for showing me her underdrawers,” he whispered.
Jeanmarie giggled and hid behind Dory’s skirt.
Holding tightly to her child’s hand, Dory went out to the wagon, which Wiley had brought to the front of the house. Odette was already seated in the back. James lifted Jeanmarie up to sit beside her and then helped Dory up over the wheel and onto the seat.
The dreaded visit was over. She had been afraid when she arrived, and she was leaving with a heavy heart.
Why was it that it was the good people who had to die?
CHAPTER
* 14 *
Dory stood on the porch. Oh, how she loved spring. She liked the gentle touch of the warm wind on her face, the smell of the pines, the promise of seeds and bulbs parting the earth, reaching for the sun. Odette, completely recovered from her illness, was taking the clean dry clothes from the line. Jeanmarie followed along behind her cuddling a kitten that had mysteriously appeared in the barn after James’s last visit.
Dory was happy—almost.
Since James had told her about the murders, he or Ben had come to the homestead each evening just after dark and left again at dawn. It was a long journey for both of them. Dory had tried in vain to convince them that it was a trip they didn’t have to make.
“It isn’t that we don’t trust Wiley to do his best to protect you,” James said. “If someone got to him first, you would be on your own.”
“Someone could get to both of you,” Dory argued.
“It’s not likely before one of us got to him.”
Tonight would be Ben’s turn. Would the pattern be the same? Would he visit for a few minutes with Odette and then go to the bunkhouse? It was as if Ben and James had decided between them to spend as little time as possible with them. On the nights James came to the house, he played for a few minutes with Jeanmarie, then cautioned Dory about barring the doors, and then departed, leaving a disappointed Odette looking after him with troubled eyes.
Dory was sure that Ben was responsible for her brother’s attitude toward Odette. What had he said to him the night he had hurriedly left the room and followed James downstairs? James had looked happier that evening than he had in a long time. He had ignored Odette the day they went to the Malones’, and since then he avoided her as if she had the plague. Poor Odette. She didn’t understand why.
Tonight Ben would be later than usual. The donkey engine was to be moved. Teams of oxen would pull it five miles over a treacherous trail to where the big logs were trimmed and peeled and made ready for the chute that would take them downhill to the river.
“I w
ill be late, but I will be here,” Ben had said, then had added drily, “Louis is so excited he is almost pleasant to be around.”
“That would be a sight to see,” Dory had said laughingly, hoping to get a smile from Ben. But it wasn’t to be. The distance between them was widening. It was as if he had never held her in that darkened hallway, sheltered her in his arms, or buried his lips in her hair.
Standing there on the porch, she suddenly realized that the sun had been gone for a while now and all that remained was a red glow in the western sky. The air was cooling rapidly. The twilight time of evening was short in the mountains.
Odette had brought in the clothes and gone back out to play with Jeanmarie and the kitten.
Dory called to Jeanmarie. “It’s time to come in. Tell Odette.”
She watched the child tug on Odette’s hand and motion to her. Odette looked up and waved. Dory beckoned and waited until they started toward the house before she went inside to light the lamp and tend to the beans she had left simmering on the stove.
Odette and Jeanmarie ran to the house. They were laughing and breathless when they entered the kitchen. Jeanmarie had the black and white kitten in her arms.
“I’ve put some beans in a bowl for us,” she said, looking directly at Odette as she spoke. Then to her daughter, “Put the kitten in the box behind the stove, Jeanmarie, and wash up. I’ll take the beans out to Wiley. He’ll keep them warm until Ben gets here.” Dory wrapped a rag around the bail of the pot and lifted it from the stove.
“You want the bread?” Odette asked.
“Oh, yes. Jeanmarie, come along and carry it.”
“I’ll set the table,” Odette replied. She wrapped a pan of bread in a cloth and placed it in the child’s outstretched arms.
Wiley was at the washbench when Dory opened the door and called, “Here’s supper.” She set the pot on the stove.
“Got bread,” Jeanmarie announced proudly.
“Bet ya baked it all by yoreself.” Wiley wiped his face, then walked over and put his gnarled hand on the child’s head.
“Huh-uh. Odette did. Mama showed her.”
“Wiley, do you have plenty of butter and jelly?”
“Got plenty.”
“I churned today. I can bring you some fresh buttermilk.”
“Got some of that, too. Ben’ll be later tonight. Hat yore supper an’ get yoreself up to that room and drop the bar.”
“Oh, Wiley—”
“Don’t ya be oh, Wileyin’ me. It’s what Ben said fer ya to do.”
“But… I’ve lived here all my life and I’ve never had to lock myself in at night. Somehow it goes against the grain.”
“Times is changed, missy. There’s goin’s-on ’round here that ain’t been before.”
Dory looked down and saw her daughter looking up at her with large, curious eyes and decided to end the conversation.
“I put the last of that ham you smoked in the beans. We’ll have to find us a hog or two to fatten up for winter. Come on, puddin’ pie. Let’s go see if Odette has the table ready.”
It was almost dark when they left the bunkhouse. Walking along the path to the house, Dory heard a horse snorting a greeting to the horses in the pen beside the barn. She turned, expecting to see Ben coming out from behind the screen of pines. Instead she saw two riders. Milo was on his big buckskin. The other rider was unmistakably Sid Hanes.
Scooping Jeanmarie up to straddle her hip, Dory hurried toward the house, hoping the men hadn’t seen her.
Sid let out a whoop.
“Yore a-goin’ the wrong way, Dory. Ain’t ya goin’ to come to meet me?”
Dory’s heart was racing by the time she got to the porch. Odette met her with a worried expression on her face. Dory handed Jeanmarie to her.
“Go upstairs and bar the door.”
“No,” Odette shook her head. “Stay with you.”
“I’ll be all right. Go. Bar the door and don’t open for anyone but me. I don’t think they’ll bother you unless they are drinking. Understand?”
“Understand.”
Dory wondered whether or not to tell her about the loaded rifle that lay on top of the wardrobe but decided against it. She and Odette had not talked about guns and she didn’t know if Odette knew how to fire one. Tomorrow, she told herself, tomorrow I’ll show her how to load and fire.
Things had come to a pretty pass when a person had to think about taking a gun to her own kin.
By the time Milo and Sid had turned their horses into the corral and headed for the house, Dory was well on the way to getting her nerves under control. It wouldn’t be any different, she told herself, from any of the other times Milo had come down to the homestead in the middle of the week, except that he would be more mouthy. He always showed off when one of his cronies was with him.
She watched the men approach the house and felt a moment of relief when both of them appeared to be steady on their feet. Milo was bad enough when sober, but drinking he was as unpredictable and as dangerous as a wild dog. Sid was fairly dancing along beside him, his short legs pumping to keep up with Milo’s longer stride. And he was listening to Milo with a silly grin on his face as if every word were hilariously funny.
The first words Milo said were, “Where’s the dummy?” He stood inside the door looking around. Sid crowded in behind him.
Dory’s velvet green eyes glittered with a cold light. She looked first at one man and then at the other with raised brows, all the contempt she felt for them revealed in her expression.
“She is not a dummy and she isn’t here.”
“That’s a pile of horseshit. You got her up in that room with the bar across the door. Hell, it don’t make no never mind ’bout that. We got all night to get in there, ain’t we, Sid? A few blows with a sledge’ll do it. Fix us some supper, Whory Dory.”
His words sent a chill of fear over Dory. Milo was different tonight. He was always mean, but tonight he was mean without the usual pretense of humor that went with his meanness.
“Beans and bread are on the table.”
“That ain’t enough ta feed a horsefly,” Milo complained.
“I didn’t know you were coming.”
“Fry us up a batch of eggs.”
“I don’t have any. The hens have quit laying.”
“Goddamn, Sid. She ain’t goin’ ta be decent a-tall. Yore goin’ ta have ta learn her ta have grub ready when her man comes home.”
“I plan on it. I sure as hell plan ta whup her in line.” Sid’s eyes were bright as stars and his thick lips spread, showing tobacco-stained teeth. He was more cocky than usual.
Dory felt the hair rising on the back of her neck. “What are you talking about?”
“You’ll find out. Get a jug a sorghum and a crock a butter. If’n we got to make out with this we need somethin’ to fill in. We got work ahead. Ain’t we, Sid?”
Sid snickered.
The uneasiness that had crept over Dory was now full-fledged fear. Milo and Sid were up to something that included her and Odette—something unpleasant.
Ben, please hurry.
Dory brought the butter crock to the table and went back for the sorghum. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the kitten come out from behind the stove, stretch, and amble toward the table. She hoped that Milo wouldn’t see it.
“If it ain’t a cat!” Milo reached down and grabbed the kitten by the scruff of its neck. “There ain’t nothin’ I hate more’n a goddamn cat.”
“Give it here. I’ll put it back in the box.” When Dory reached for it, Milo threw the kitten to Sid. “Give it to me,” Dory demanded.
“Give me a kiss first.”
“I’d sooner kiss a warthog! Why don’t you hightail it back to the dung heap you crawled out of?” Her voice was coldly wicked and cut into Sid’s pride like a finely honed knife.
“I’m goin’ to have to learn ya some manners after we’re wed,” he said, and tossed the kitten back to Milo.
“Wed? Ha!
You filthy mule’s ass. I’d sooner wed a polecat,” she spat the words contemptuously and hurried around the table, but by the time she got there, Milo had the kitten on the floor with his heavy boot on its head. The kitten was mewing and thrashing in an attempt to free itself.
“That’s cruel. Let it go.” Dory stooped to pull the cat out from under Milo’s boot.
“Leave it be, or I’ll squash its brains out,” Milo said in a low, mean voice.
Dory looked up. The eyes that looked into hers told her that he hated her with every fiber of his being and that he would do exactly as he said.
“Why are you doing this?”
“’Cause I want to. Do as I tell ya or I’ll grind its head into the floor.”
“What is it you want me to do?” Dory tried to stay calm and close her ears to the kitten’s pitiful cries.
“Me and Louis has give ya to Sid to wed. I want ta see ya kissin’ him.”
Dory was stunned, but only for a moment. “Have you lost your mind? You think I’d marry a filthy piece of horsedung like him? Not if my life depended on it!” Her voice rose until it was a strangled screech.
“Ya… ya… bitch,” Sid snarled. “Ya just better watch out what yo’re callin’ me.”
“It just might not be yore life dependin’ on it,” Milo said calmly. “It just might be that brat of yores.”
Oh, sweet Jesus, he’s crazy!
The hatred that blazed in his eyes struck her like a lash. Horror and outrage washed over her. She wanted to smash his hateful face.
Sid moved in behind her, put his hands on her arms and tried to pull her back against him. She elbowed him in the gut as hard as she could. He merely laughed.
“It’s up to you… whore.” Milo’s voice was low and strangely calm. “Ya been lettin’ ever’thing with a stick ’tween his legs feel ya up. Now, it’s Sid’s turn.”
Terror knifed through Dory. Then her fright turned to anger. She would have spit in his face but for the hand that shot out and gripped her jaws. Milo’s fingers bit into her cheeks.
“Stand still. Old Sid’s horny as a two-peckered goat.”
Sid’s wet mouth began to nuzzle her neck. “Yo’re goin’ to behave, ain’t ya sweet thin’? Yo’re goin’ to like old Sid’s lovin’ oncet ya get used to it. I got somethin’ in my britches just itchin’ to get in yores. It might be jist the biggest one ya ever had.”
Sins of Summer Page 16
