Tattler's Branch

by Jan Watson

  Chanis rubbed his jaw. “There’s way more to this than Miz Armina’s able to tell. I talked to the Blair boy yesterday. He saw a fellow hanging around in the alley the same place as I did. He told me something interesting about the man—said he was the guy who’d been in your office a few days before. Said he had long braided hair.”

  “Yes, Timmy and I talked about it. Remember me telling you about the fellow with the puncture wounds? That was last week on Tuesday. He said he’d stabbed himself gutting fish.” Excited, she took hold of Chanis’s arm. “I found the baby in Armina’s house the night before!”

  “That man’s the one who broke into your office. It’s center as a die.” Chanis’s eyes narrowed. “He’s up to no good, and I aim to stop him.”

  While they were talking, Mazy had come out. With the white-and-gold scarf draped over her head and across her shoulders, she looked like the woman she was fast becoming. Lilly felt a little glitch in her heart, as if she were going to lose her sister. Chanis’s grim appearance had changed the instant he saw her.

  Now Lilly slipped into Mazy’s room and gently shook her awake. “Mazy, I’m going to the office. Keep a close eye on Armina, okay?”

  Mazy opened one eye. “Do I need to get up now?”

  “No, just keep an ear bent. I’ll come home at noon.”

  Kip jumped up on the bed. Mazy threw one slender arm over him and pulled him close. He gave Lilly a look, then snuggled down.

  “Traitor,” Lilly said, smiling at the sweet picture they made. Surely it was only yesterday that Mazy and Molly were mere babies. Mazy was always bubbly—always smiling—while Molly was careful, restrained. Mama would say Molly took after Lilly.

  Lilly stopped in the kitchen to finish her breakfast over the kitchen sink. A cold biscuit and jam along with her tea sufficed this morning.

  She was halfway to the office when she noticed she’d forgotten to change her shoes. Her attractive new Red Cross high-tops were still in the box, and the sturdy deck shoes peeped outlandishly from under the hem of her skirts. It was a decidedly unfashionable look. She turned to go back but thought better of it. Time was wasting. She’d just keep her feet under the desk. The good thing was her stone bruise was much better.

  She opened the clinic door and went in through the back, stopping in the kitchenette to put the kettle on. Another cup of tea would hit the spot as she went through the mail piled on her desk. Lilly sorted through periodicals and business envelopes—and a letter from Tern. The postman had mistakenly left it here instead of at the house. What a sweet surprise. Her heart skipped a beat as she slid the letter opener under the corner of the flap.

  How’s my sweet girl? he opened as salutation. Tern always got right down to business. Lilly couldn’t help herself and went straight to the ending. She couldn’t wait to see his proclamation of love for her penned in his distinctive left-handed scrawl. And there it was: Forever and always, unending love, your husband.

  Husband—how she cherished the thought and word. It was wonderful to be loved and to love. Lilly knew she was blessed.

  She backed up and read Tern’s account of the men who had died at the mine disaster and of the ones the crew managed to save. Lilly was sad to think of the women whose husbands had gone to work and never come home. Tern told her how much the area reminded him of Kentucky and how the people in Canada were so kind to him and his men. They talk a little funny, he wrote, referring to a private joke between them—how no matter where he traveled, folks knew he was from Kentucky whenever he opened his mouth.

  The best news was that he would soon be home. Lilly’s whole mood lightened. She felt like a girl waiting for cake on her birthday.

  When the teakettle shrieked, Lilly fairly floated to the kitchen on her ugly plimsolls.

  Turning her chair to face the window, she raised the blind and watched the town wake up while she sipped her honey-sweetened tea. The gaslights winked off one by one like giant exhausted fireflies. Mr. Tippen’s wagon rolled past. He would be going to the tracks to fetch the huge blocks of ice a railroad worker would pitch to the ground from the night train rolling through. The elderly black man who sometimes helped Mr. Tippen rode on the lowered tailgate with his legs hanging over the edge. He had his hat pulled down over his eyes as if he were catching a nap. Lilly hoped he wouldn’t fall off the back of the wagon.

  Every Wednesday, Mr. Tippen restocked the diner, where they stored the ice in the cellar between heavy layers of straw. The fresh-chipped, slightly straw-flavored ice was why the diner’s iced tea tasted like a summer day. He also filled the clinic icebox and the one at her house as well as many others in town.

  Lilly should check to see if Hannah had emptied the drainage trays yesterday, but it felt so good to sit idly for a moment.

  She watched the commissary lights blink on and saw a man drive a mule-drawn cart into the alley and unload the trash bin. As soon as he backed out, there was Timmy swinging his small bucket of cream with his good arm. Just outside the cream station, he paused and wound his arm like a baseball player getting ready to strike a batter out. He swung the tin container around and around faster and faster. Lilly held her breath, praying the lid was secure. Timmy just begged for trouble.

  Lilly turned to set her teacup down. She’d make sure the icebox was clean and ready for Mr. Tippen before she pulled charts. From the corner of her eye, she caught a flash of movement in the alley. Her skin crawled with apprehension. As she lowered the blind, she thought of Chanis Clay’s warning to never be in the office alone, but who would be watching this early in the morning? She stopped the blind midwindow. There was Timmy coming out of the cream station, counting his change before he headed for home.

  Lilly rapped her knuckle on the windowpane as if the lad could hear her. Timmy stopped and stuffed the money into his front pocket, then whipped his head toward the alleyway. Lilly hurried to the door and twisted the knob. Her silly boat shoes tripped her up as she neared the street. Kicking them off, she ran to the alley just in time to see Timmy’s feet disappear around the back corner of the cream station. It looked like he was being dragged, but she didn’t hear a yell of protest as she pounded up the passage.

  “Stop,” she screamed when she saw a man hauling Timmy away by the scruff of his neck. “Let him go!”

  The man who had Timmy stopped when he heard her. She opened her mouth to scream bloody murder, and that’s when he drew the gun. A rush of fear raced through her body like a dash of ice water. He was the man from last week—the man with the puncture wounds. The man Chanis was sure was behind the break-in. They were in trouble.

  Timmy bared his teeth and bit down on the man’s arm. “Run, Doc, run!” he yelped and struggled free as the man swore.

  Lilly ran toward Timmy. She couldn’t leave him, not even to save herself, but the man with the gun was swifter than she. He grabbed the boy and secured him with a hammerlock. Timmy’s toes scrabbled against the ground. The man was strangling him. With his gun hand, the man motioned for Lilly to come closer. When she did, he let Timmy go, grabbed her, and with a violent motion jerked her around to face a rough tar-paper wall. He pasted Timmy up beside her.

  “This ain’t exactly what I planned,” he said, “but it’ll work.” With a cord he tied one of Lilly’s hands to one of Timmy’s. “Now we walk.”

  Lilly looked around. They were right beside the back door of the cream station and just beyond the grocery’s loading dock. On the other side of the alleyway, she could hear carts and wagons on the road. Surely someone would come this way. But there was no time for that.

  The man pointed toward the scruffy, untended woods that crept down the bank behind the stores. They plunged into a haphazard stand of spindly sourwood and stubby serviceberry trees. “Straight on,” he said from behind them. “Just keep going.”

  It was hard going through the pocked, stunted forest, where trash cedars seemed intent on taking over and thorny locusts conspired to nip at their arms and legs. Webworms dripped from loose, slopp
y nests strung along the tips of the sourwoods like Christmas lights. Lilly brushed one from her hair and felt one squish beneath her heel. She shuddered in distaste. She had to wonder why God created webworms and the aggravating gnats that flew in her eyes and up her nose.

  With one arm secured and the other in a sling, Timmy had a hard time keeping his balance. He tripped over a gnarled root and fell hard. Lilly toppled over him. Without a word the man gripped her elbow and helped her to stand.

  Timmy scrambled up and looked at the knees of his jean pants. His eyes narrowed and red patches colored his cheeks. “My mommy’s gonna be really mad at you, mister. These here are my good britches.”

  “Shut your trap,” the man said. “Keep walking.”

  For a time they were traveling straight up the side of the mountain. It would have been hard enough if Lilly were climbing alone, but with Timmy attached, it was a strenuous uphill battle with no time to plant her feet or search for an easier way. Fear fluttered in her belly. What did the man want? It had to be about the foundling baby, but why abduct her and Timmy? Maybe he was one of those people who had no conscience. Maybe he would shoot them both just for sport or misdirected retribution. Lilly forced herself to remain calm, to ignore her fear and the stitch in her side by focusing on the farthest tree on the path ahead. Lord, give me the strength to make it to that tree became her only prayer.

  Finally, after a meandering switchback, they reached the summit. The morning fog was dissipating, burned off by golden sunshine. The air was pure, free of dust and coal smoke. In the distance a cow’s bell tolled. They were standing on a bald knob high above the town. From this vantage point, the buildings looked like children’s blocks. On any other morning it would have been a beautiful sight.

  “Lookit,” Timmy said. “There’s the church and there’s the store. Wow, you can see everything from up here.”

  Lilly turned her head to take in the view from all sides. Suddenly she knew where they were and where they were headed. The Beckers’ homestead was down the mountain from this point. Anne would be going about her morning: tending her babies, feeding her chickens, slopping Sassy, maybe fussing at Cletus over some little something, while, unbeknownst to her, peril crept its way toward her house like a cloud of noxious brimstone.

  Lilly tightened her lips, choking back questions and concerns. She sensed this was not the time to try to engage their captor. Better to keep silent and plan how she and Timmy could escape.

  The man gave them a little breather, then herded them to a steep one-cow path that descended the mountain to yet another ridge. On one side of the path a green meadow beckoned, but on the other there was nothing but a sheer drop-off. A body wouldn’t even bounce on the plummeting way down.

  Lilly would not have thought it, but going down was harder than going up. Since they were tethered together, and since the path was so precipitous and narrow, Timmy had to follow behind her, which twisted her arm in a painful way. Her knees screamed in protest at every downward step. It was probably good that she was barefoot and her hose had long since turned to shreds, for she had to grip the dusty ground with her toes to keep from sliding over the side of the mountain. How did the cows do it? She supposed it would be easier to climb up and down this hill if that was where you wanted to be and if you didn’t have a gun at your back.

  After a while they came into a clearing and to the back of a boarded-up house. A pleasant, sweet scent tickled Lilly’s nose. Honeysuckle abounded on the wire fence that ran along one side of the house. She knew this place from the other side! This was the weather-beaten house she and Chanis had passed on their trip to the Beckers’. Just seeing it gave her a sense of hope.

  Surely someone would have missed them by now. Chanis would put two and two together. She began to pray that he would think about the back way to Anne’s place. It wouldn’t take thirty minutes for him to get here from Skip Rock. Maybe he was already on his way.

  “Sit,” the man said, indicating the flat porch built low to the ground.

  He walked to a metal well pump on a rotted wooden platform and, kicking around in a patch of weeds beside the pump, retrieved a mason jar. After wiping the lip of the jar on the tail of his shirt, he began to pump the handle. The platform creaked under his weight. Rusty water dribbled from the mouth of the well, but he kept at it until clear water gushed forth.

  Timmy winged Lilly’s side with his elbow. “Maybe he’ll fall through and drown like a rat,” he whispered.

  Lilly wondered what she would do if he did. Would she try to rescue him? It was a terrible thing to contemplate, but she was beginning to hate this man. Lord forgive her, she’d never felt this way before. “Let’s pray for him,” she whispered back to Timmy.

  “I ain’t in a praying mood,” Timmy muttered, picking at the dried blood on the knees of his pants.

  They both kept quiet as the man started their way.

  “Ladies first,” he said, handing the full jar to Lilly.

  She drank gratefully, then held the jar to Timmy’s mouth.

  “I ain’t drinking no skunk water,” Timmy said, turning his head away and slapping at a sweat bee in the crook of his sling.

  Lilly’s arm jerked with his. Water splashed down her front. “Timmy, you need to drink.”

  “Suit yourself,” the man said. His Adam’s apple bobbed with each slug as he drank from the mason jar. When he finished, he dashed the rest of the water out at Timmy’s feet. He tossed the jar back toward the well. It rolled next to the platform.

  The man jerked the pistol at the door. “Inside.”

  Lilly’s stomach sank. There was little hope that anyone would think to look for them inside the house. It would be so much better for them to stay on the road.

  A dusky gloom greeted them beyond the door. An animal of some sort skittered away from the sudden burst of light. Lilly’s whole body tensed, preparing for the flight she couldn’t take.

  “It’s just a coon,” Timmy said. “He won’t bother us none.”

  “Don’t try anything stupid,” the man said, pocketing his gun.

  With swift movements he untied them. Blood rushed tingling into Lilly’s hand. She rubbed it vigorously, then started to take Timmy’s.

  Suddenly the boy launched himself at the man, planting his head in the gunman’s midsection. A whoosh of air escaped the man’s lips as he doubled over.

  Stunned, Lilly headed for the door, sure Timmy would follow. This was their chance to escape.

  She stopped and whirled around at the sound of a slap. Timmy’s nose dripped blood. The gun was pointed at his head.

  The man herded them down a short hall and kicked an interior door open. “In there,” he said.

  Lilly went in first.

  “Not you,” the man said, jerking Timmy backward. “I’ve got a special place for you.”

  Chapter 24

  Armina’s pounding head pulled her out of sleep. The clock on the dresser spoke of eight o’clock. Who lay abed until 8 a.m.? That sleeping draught Doc had insisted on giving her had turned her into a dull-witted sluggard. She wouldn’t take it again.

  She poured water into a bowl from the Blue Willow pitcher on the washstand. Mazy had chided her for not wanting to avail herself of the fancy indoor outhouse at the end of the hall, but Armina couldn’t get used to it. She liked the old ways. She just couldn’t see having your water spigot right next to your commode. How’d the water keep from getting all mixed up? Her half-moon toilet with its specific purpose seemed tidier to her.

  Now Tillie Tippen, she had it right. Her outhouse had linoleum on the floor and a fancy basket for paper and rags right there on the bench between the two holes, and curtains—lacy curtains on the door window.

  Armina paused midsplash. Why would you want a window just there? But Tillie was such a busybody, Armina supposed she wouldn’t like a minute when she couldn’t see what everyone else was doing.

  Armina felt bad for her mean thoughts of Tillie. The woman had been so good to her of
late, sending food right to her door while she was laid up and offering to do her laundry for free. Thankfully, she’d had Hannah for that. Doc Lilly could take Hannah’s wages out of Armina’s own pay. A body didn’t want to get beholden to the largesse of others. Soon as Armina was fully well, she’d find some way to give back to Tillie. Maybe shuck a chair seat for her. If it happened to be Turnip’s chair, she’d weave a cocklebur in it. Armina tee-heed at the thought.

  Mazy had draped the new red scarf on the corner of the mirror; just looking at it made Armina feel squeamish. Why couldn’t she remember where she’d found the baby? Doc Lilly had told her about the little thing she called Glory and how no one had claimed her. Armina felt awful over it, but for the life of her, she couldn’t make her ornery brain rewind. Doc said she shouldn’t push herself. She said it would all come back when Armina was ready.

  She finished her ablutions and twisted her hair into a knot. She found a clean cotton shift in the wardrobe and her shoes sitting beside the bed. When she finished dressing, she hurried to the kitchen. Maybe there was still time to prepare Doc’s breakfast.

  But no, there was Doc’s teacup on the drain board. Good gravy, Armina would be glad when she was up to taking care of things again. She could hear Mazy stirring in her room. She’d scramble a couple of eggs to share.

  She set the skillet on the stove before fetching some milk from the icebox. Humph, the drain pan was overflowing. Wasn’t this Wednesday? She pulled the pan and emptied it in the sink. Usually she’d empty the icebox on Wednesday mornings and wipe everything down with baking soda, but there wasn’t time just now. Turnip Tippen would be by any minute with more ice. She’d need to tell him not to leave any at her own house. No sense wasting it. By next delivery date Ned would be home and everything would be back to normal.

  Normal—there was a good word. It sort of meant regular, like everybody else. Armina had never thought she’d be a regular person with a regular husband and a regular house. She’d grown up without a mother or a father, bouncing from one kin’s house to another, never being wanted. One of the aunts worked her like a mule and another watched every bite she ate like Armina’s hunger was her own hair shirt. And then Aunt Orie took her in and things got better.