Stay a Little Longer

by Dorothy Garlock

  Before he could set about finding answers to his many questions, another wave of dizziness washed over him. This seizure was worse than the last, strong enough to drive him down to one knee in the road. Pulsing pain assaulted his senses and he had to squelch the urge to vomit. He touched his forehead with the back of his shaking hand; it was hot. He was sick, but he refused to allow his illness to keep him from the answers he so desperately needed. Gritting his teeth, he pushed to his feet and breathed deeply, settling his racing head.

  “Hold yourself together,” he commanded himself.

  Once he was sure that he wouldn’t pitch face first into the road on his first step, Mason set out for the only place he could think of to get the answers he wanted; Eliza Watkins’s home across from the train depot. While he knew he couldn’t just go up and pound on the door demanding answers, he could watch and hope he might learn something. Going there would be a risk—there was really no way to get there other than by crossing through the center of town—but it was a risk he was willing to take.

  Mason stuck to the shadows of the buildings along Main Street, taking great care not to be noticed. Still, it was hard for him not to stare at the way Carlson had changed in his absence; there was a new lawyer’s office next to Hamilton’s Grocery, a new steeple atop the Lutheran church, and even a new balcony running the length of Carlson Bank and Trust.

  Struck by all these changes, Mason was also prompted to recall old incidents from his youth: chasing after his father as he made his way about his business, sloshing through mud puddles with his brother, and painstakingly choosing which candy he would purchase from Laurson’s Mercantile with his shiny new penny. Carlson remained a part of him, no matter how many miles he’d traveled or how many years he’d been gone.

  He had just stepped down from the boardwalk, gawking at all of the changes, memories swirling about his dazed head, when he collided with a man so violently that they both nearly fell to the ground.

  “What in the name of—?” a gruff voice spat.

  Quickly straightening himself, Mason was horror-struck to find himself only inches away from Samuel Guthrie, a man he had known since birth. With his hawkish nose and unruly brush of a mustache, the man was unmistakable, even with the wrinkles that lined his face. Mason clearly remembered running into his father’s office at the bank and being greeted by Samuel’s quick smile.

  “Why don’t you watch where you’re going?” Samuel snarled.

  “I’m sorry Mr. Gu—” Mason caught himself, rapidly adding, “sir…”

  Watch your tongue, you fool!

  “No-good, worthless bum!” the man snapped before walking away in a huff.

  Watching the man go, Mason realized that he hadn’t been recognized. Though Samuel Guthrie had once held some hope that Mason would wed his own daughter, he hadn’t known who had collided with him, even at a distance of inches. In Guthrie’s eyes, he’d been nothing but a destitute fool, a blight upon the town.

  Catching his reflection in the nearest window, Mason had to admit that there was reason for Mr. Guthrie’s assumption: his coat and pants were both dirt-streaked; his satchel was a littered mess of patches and temporary stitch jobs. His unruly hair and beard, his skin worn by the elements, and the wildness of his eyes were all frightening.

  The realization of just how far he had fallen struck Mason like a thunderbolt from a stormy sky. Before he’d set foot on that train bound for the European war, he’d had everything: admiration, an adoring wife, a future… Now he was lucky to have what was in the bag slung over his shoulder. He had gone off to fight for his country and had been changed forever. Now he was unrecognizable. He had lost everything.

  “No one will remember what I once was…”

  As well as he could manage, Mason continued toward Alice’s mother’s home, this time paying more attention to those around him. He was only a couple of blocks from the depot, from turning the corner to his destination, when what he saw stopped him cold; crossing the road in front of him, a cigar clasped between his teeth, was his brother.

  Zachary had also changed in the eight years since Mason had last seen him; considerable weight had been added to his frame and his hair had begun graying. But much about his brother seemed the same. His dress was still expressive of his belief that he was better than everyone around him; nothing but the best had ever been enough for Zachary Tucker. His look was still angry; his brow was furrowed and his hands clenched into fists as he walked.

  Mason knew that if there were anyone in Carlson who would have benefited from his disappearance, who would have even welcomed it, it would have been Zachary. The financial responsibilities that their father had been grooming Mason to assume would have gone to his brother. He’d always been a greedy child and had in turn grown into a greedy man. Without Sherman Tucker’s steadying hand, he couldn’t imagine what Zachary would become.

  “You’re someone I don’t want to run into, brother,” Mason mumbled.

  While he could write off part of Samuel Guthrie’s failure to recognize him to the man’s advanced age, Mason knew that he couldn’t take that chance with Zachary. He had no doubt that if they were to come face-to-face, there would be no mistaking his true identity.

  Before he could make up his mind what he should do, Mason was struck by another wave of sickness, this one greater than all of the others put together. For an instant, his vision went black and his world was turned upside down. His satchel fell to the ground and he crashed down onto his knees beside it. Vomit poured from his mouth as his stomach heaved, the nausea threatening to overwhelm him. Wild panic raced through his mind, panic that his condition would attract unwanted attention, and he struggled to rise to his feet, running from the street. There was no hope that he could wait outside Eliza Watkins’s house. He had to get away.

  Any hope of seeing Alice would have to wait.

  Slowly and as carefully as he could, Mason made his way among the tall trees on the far side of Lake Carlson. He wasn’t sure how he’d been able to walk such a distance, but he refused to allow himself to fall again too close to town. Even with such determination, he nearly toppled as another shudder raced through him and his knees nearly went out from under him.

  I feel as weak as a newborn kitten!

  Blots of sunlight dappled the leaves that swayed above him, but Mason was thankful to be in the shade. Though the October day carried with it a coolness remembered from his childhood, he felt as if he were burning up with a fever. He’d somehow managed to strip off his heavier coat, but sweat poured freely from his body.

  The other thing that burned at him was shame; it had embarrassed him to run away to the woods. Ever since that fateful day eight years earlier, whenever he’d been hurt, whenever he had been threatened, his first instinct had always been to run for safety. If he were ever to change, he would have to stay and hold his ground.

  Once he had crossed the edge of town, Mason knew exactly where he’d been headed. Picking his way through the trees and underbrush, he tried to examine the ground for faint signs of the path while his head continued to throb painfully. He passed a lightning-struck evergreen, its needles brown and long dead, skirted a depression filled with muck, mire, and the occasional rotting tree branch, climbed a low rise that almost took his meager breath away, and then came to a clearing he recognized. A surprised squirrel skittered away noisily as he stumbled to the far side of the open space. And there it was.

  “The old shack,” he said aloud.

  Leaning against a majestic elm tree was a rough hut. No more than ten feet wide and an equal amount in depth, the building had obviously seen better days. The roof sagged at its crown, an indentation that was clearly deep enough to let in rain. The glass of the lone window had long since fallen out. The white paint that had once been proudly slapped on its sides was now peeled and chipped away until only a few flecks remained to cover the graying wooden planks. Still, the shack was a sight for Mason’s eager eyes.

  As a child, he had come her
e often, as had nearly every child in Carlson. For a moment, worry at being discovered played across his thoughts, but he knew that it was already far too late for such concerns.

  Another spasm of sickness assaulted him and he had no choice but to once again vomit. Even though his stomach was empty, he continued to dry-heave, noisily retching on his knees. Summoning all of his remaining strength, he rose and stumbled toward the shack.

  He pushed open the door and entered on unsteady feet. The cool darkness of the inside was as welcome to him as the musty, fetid odor was unpleasant. The furnishings were meager; an uneven table and the rotten remnants of a mattress. Mason didn’t mind the squalor; all he wanted was shelter and to be out of sight.

  Wandering over to the corner farthest from the door, he collapsed into a heap on the warped planks. Darkness once again rose to overwhelm him and he knew he would be unable to resist any longer. His last thought before slipping into unconsciousness was of Alice.

  I… just need… to get some… rest…

  Chapter Eight

  WITH HER BROW KNIT in determination, Rachel ran a rag over the dusty top of the oaken bureau in the boardinghouse’s sitting room. Over and over again, she polished the worn surface until she was finally happy with the glassy sheen. Even as she finished, she knew that it would soon have to be done again. Nothing in the house stayed clean for long.

  Though it was still early in the day, Rachel was thankful that she had not seen any sign of Jonathan Moseley since their encounter at the clothesline the afternoon before. She doubted that it had been any sense of shame at what he had done that kept him away from the dinner table the night before, and she kept a wary eye open, half expecting him to jump out and accost her from some shadowy hiding place.

  All through the day and night, Rachel had pondered her decision not to speak to her mother or uncle about what had happened; Eliza would be horrified if she knew. If Rachel did tell, she had little doubt that Jonathan would be evicted from the boardinghouse, probably after receiving a beating at Otis’s hands. But in the end, she had decided that her first instinct was the right one; to make him leave would do nothing but take money out of her family’s pocket. He would remain dangerous, but now she would be wary.

  If he bothers me again, he’ll pull back a stump!

  Suddenly, there was an insistent rapping at the front door. Tossing down her rag, Rachel hurried to answer, hoping that it might be someone seeking a room; but she was instantly disappointed to find Zachary Tucker waiting for her. On his face was a lopsided grin.

  “What do you want?” she asked curtly.

  “Now is that any way to talk to someone that was once part of your family?” he replied in mock indignation. “Why, there was a time when you and I were practically brother and sister.”

  “We both know that time has long since passed.”

  “Indeed, it has,” Zachary said, acknowledging Rachel’s harsh words with a chuckle. “May I come in?”

  From the very first time she met Zachary Tucker, Rachel had found the man to be nearly insufferable. Loud and obnoxious, unwilling to extend any generosity without attaching a price tag to it, he acted as if everyone he met was beneath him. Even though he was undoubtedly the richest man in Carlson, the townspeople had no wealth of affection for him. She and Alice had wondered if Mason and Zachary were even related; no two brothers had ever been more different.

  Still, her mother had taken great pains to instill manners in her, so she held open the door and let him enter, even if the thought of being near him repulsed her.

  “If you’ve come wanting to speak to my mother, I’m afraid that you’ll leave without getting what you want.” When Rachel had ventured inside her mother’s room before dawn, a tray of food in hand, she’d found Eliza Watkins to be in a particularly foul mood, even for her. She’d been worried, more preoccupied than normal about some unknown danger. Nervously wringing her hands, her mother was so fearful that something bad might happen to her daughter that she had pleaded with her to stay in her room, and had been irritated when Rachel had refused.

  “Actually,” Zachary explained, “I came to see you.”

  “Me?” Rachel responded in surprise. “Whatever for?”

  Zachary wandered over toward the window, pulling the lace curtains aside so that he could look outside for a moment. Rachel was beginning to wonder whether he had heard her question when he said, his back still to her, “Do you enjoy living this way?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do you enjoy living like this?” Zachary asked with a wide sweep of his arms around the sitting room. “Making a living from a boardinghouse in a town as small as Carlson, working day in and day out for strangers. Well, that just doesn’t seem like smart business to me. To be quite honest with you, Rachel, it seems rather foolish.”

  “We make do,” she answered defiantly.

  “Do you?” Zachary replied with skepticism. “I can tell you that from outside appearances, that is certainly not the case. Hell, I would be willing to bet that whatever meager profits you manage to eke out of this place are most surely washed down Otis’s gullet!”

  “It’s not… that way…”

  “We both know that it is,” he answered bluntly. “While I certainly respect your desire to stand up for your family’s good name, it cannot be denied that you’re hanging on by the thinnest of threads.”

  The truth in Zachary’s words stung Rachel; though it pained her to admit it even to herself, the boardinghouse hardly managed to provide them enough to feed themselves. Every day seemed a greater challenge than the last. That Mason’s brother chose to remark on their difficult circumstances only reminded her of what they had all lost.

  “Things would have been different if Mason were still alive.”

  “For the both of us, Rachel, my dear,” he replied with a malicious smile.

  But you’re the one who’s glad about it, she thought.

  Much had been spoken around Carlson about how Zachary Tucker had gained from his brother’s death, although it had all been carefully whispered for fear that the man would hear. With Mason gone, all that Sherman had built had gone to his younger son, for better or for worse. Rachel could see that it was clearly the latter.

  “Why did you come here, Zachary?” she asked, the anger rising ever higher in her breast. “If it was to tell me about how my life hasn’t amounted to much or to have a laugh at my expense, I have better things I could be doing.”

  Zachary sighed, fixing her with a steady, serious stare. “I came here because it has always been clear to me that you’ve been the intelligent one in your family,” he explained. “Because while your mother hides away in her room, reliving her daughter’s death over and over again, and while your uncle drinks himself into a stupor, you’re the one who knows what terrible trouble you’re all in.”

  “Trouble?” Rachel echoed the banker.

  Turning his heavyset body from the window, Zachary slowly walked toward Rachel until he stood very close to her. He was a large man, much taller than she, and he seemed to tower over her. With an ample stomach and piercing, menacing eyes, he had the look of someone who could more than hold his own. For a brief moment, she was reminded of her encounter with Jonathan Moseley, but she refused to allow herself to shrink before Zachary; the truth was that she wasn’t frightened by him, nor would she ever show any hint of weakness.

  “What are you talking about?” she asked again.

  “How much longer do you think you can keep this up?” Zachary asked with carefully measured intent and a syrupy tongue. “How many more long years will the burden of this boardinghouse’s upkeep be yours and yours alone to bear? When you’re your mother’s age, will you still be here, still just doing what is expected of you? Without help, and without the large sum of money that will be needed to fix all of the many things wrong with it, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to learn that it had all fallen down about your ears. If you let it, this place will be your grave!”

>   “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because I am the one person who can change your future.”

  Excitedly and in great detail, Zachary explained the deal that he had struck with the Gaitskill Lumber Company. Patiently, he explained the tremendous benefits that would be brought to Carlson: the countless number of jobs, the boon all of those men would be to the livelihoods of the town’s businessmen, and even of a pledge made to build a brand-new schoolhouse at the lumber company’s expense. He also told her of the one condition placed upon him by the deal, that he acquire all of the buildings located around the train depot so that they could be converted into offices for the lumber company. And that was where her family came in.

  When he told her about the generous offers that were made to purchase all of those properties, particularly the price that he had been asked to give for the boardinghouse, Rachel at first thought he was joking, but upon realizing that he was not, she found her breath taken away.

  “You made… this offer to my mother?” she asked hesitantly.

  “I did.” Zachary chuckled, a deep rumble that would have unnerved her if his words hadn’t already done so. “But she wouldn’t hear of it. She’d rather continue having you slave away as if you were nothing but the hired help than leave this place with all of your problems solved.”

  “What reason did she give for turning you down?”

  Instead of answering, Zachary regarded her with a keen interest. “Are you telling me that she didn’t even bother to tell you about it?”

  Confusion reigned in Rachel’s thoughts. While she didn’t expect to know everything that went on around the house, what Zachary had explained to her sounded important enough that it hurt her that she had not been told, that a way out of their troubles existed.