“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’ll get you home to your family, somehow.” Colleen looked down and left the barn.
Mark watched her set the bundle of clothing down outside of the opening and pull hard to drag the big door closed. He knew she’d be back later, in the darkness, her arms filled with hot food, fresh bread, her amazing butter and a sweet smile on her face. He wished that instead of telling her where he was from he had run his fingers through her tumble of curls.
Mark scooted down onto his makeshift mattress and laid quietly, his mind traveling back to memories of Stavewood and pictures of Colleen pushing back her hair.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Timothy Elgerson examined the dusty interior of the shack. Most of the still had been taken out, just one rotting barrel and a few sections of pipe remained. He stepped out and walked around the stumps, but it was clear that the area had been deserted for some time.
“Show me where you found Sam.” Timothy mounted his horse and followed the sheriff in silence.
Everything that he saw depressed him - the train station, the boarding house, the isolated shack. It began to paint a picture in his mind and he did not like the view. Mark had come here, stayed here, and very possibly fallen into drinking here because he was punishing himself. He had tried to punish himself after his mother had died. Now he was punishing himself for Bernadette. It might not seem the most logical or even the most sensible thing to do, but it was very clear to him now. Mark blamed himself for all of it. He had left Stavewood not only to forget, but because he felt guilty for Bernadette’s situation, and likely for the effect of her claim on the family, the business and their lives.
He didn’t want to take Sam with him. He had wanted to go alone. Sam didn’t deserve his fate. Timothy shook his head.
The big man looked up and saw the sheriff slide from his horse’s back at the edge of the woods. The forest opened up to a wide plain. Even in the dark it would be easy to see the silhouette of a man standing there. He was probably a very clear target. Mark would have known better and stayed low.
Timothy looked out over the fields believing his son was still alive somewhere.
The sheriff took off his hat and looked down. “The girl was left in the creek up that way. Her father said he found the two boys in the shack and flushed them out. He was taking them to me, or so he claimed, when they ran across her body. He said she’d been meeting with them for a while, not coming home and such. Mr. Catslip said the boys admitted to drowning her and leaving her body up there.”
“Impossible.” Timothy squatted down and looked at the ground. “I’m not just saying that to you sheriff because one of them was my boy. I know him, I know the boy he was with, too. Neither of them is capable of what you are telling me. They might have been coming up here to drink, but they could not have killed that girl. No. How did they find this place?” He stood up and faced the sheriff. “They didn’t build that still, but someone up here did. Where’s he?”
“Well,” the sheriff said, turning to face the field. “My guess is that this is a McHerlong still and no one seems to have seen any of those fellows since right before the girl came up missing. I have to ask you, sir, do you think your boy might have taken off with them?”
“Willingly?” Tim asked.
“Or not.” The sheriff put his hat back on his head.
The sheriff showed Timothy where the girl’s father claimed to have found her body. It was clear that it had been chosen for the moss covered overhang. It would have been a perfect place to conceal her, until the heavy rain fell. Whoever had put her there did not want her discovered, at least not right away. Timothy knew his son was not capable of this grizzly slaying.
“There are a couple of ways they might have gone,” the sheriff said as he stood beside the gurgling creek.
“There’s that meadow where the one boy was killed, but I suspect they split up, which is why Catslip only got one of them. There’s the back woods, hard travel and you have to know your way around in there, and down the meadow that way.
“There’s a farm down there, the milkman’s place. I’ve seen him out making his deliveries every day since then and I’m sure we’d have heard from him. Old Muldoon’s got a young daughter and he’d have shot your son himself if he headed that way.”
“Let’s start there,” Timothy suggested.
“Alright.” The sheriff turned towards his horse.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Emma held Rebecca close to her as she cried out her grief. She knew her pain and she knew that some of it only time would heal. Emma was not even sure that had Timothy been there he could have helped, but she knew that Rebecca would have wanted him there.
“No. Absolutely not.” Emma had never seen her cousin so adamant.
“You cannot wire him and tell him,” Rebecca had insisted. “Why? So he can give up on finding Mark and rush home even more worried? There’s nothing he can do. There’s nothing anyone can do.” Rebecca held her handkerchief to her face and took a deep breath.
“Oh Emma,” Rebecca sat down on the chair in the big kitchen. “I don’t know what to do. Of course I want him here, but he just can’t be here for me. I know he’d want to know, but he has to find Mark. He just has to find him first.”
Timothy had sent a wire every day, but none had good news, only that he was still looking.
“I agree,” Emma said and sat across from her cousin. “But, you know there will be hell to pay when he gets home.”
“I know,” Rebecca sighed. “But, once he finds Mark he’ll be so happy. We’ll all be so happy.” Rebecca looked out the window across the yard.
“It’s so hard. I didn’t know.” Rebecca turned to her cousin.
“Losing one?” Emma asked softly.
“Yes. It’s as if a little part of you gets torn away, a little bit of your heart.”
“It stays like that. You should know that. You accept it in time, but that little space is always there.” Emma took Rebecca’s hands across the table and held them tightly.
“I never told you how much I missed you when I left England. So many times I wanted to write to you to beg you for money so I could come home. I was terribly frightened and alone when I first arrived. Even later, even after I knew how much I loved Timothy, even then, I missed you awfully. I’m sorry I wasn’t there when you lost your baby, Emma.” Rebecca held Emma’s fingers to her lips.
Emma choked back her tears. “We are here now, and there will be other babies and there’s Loo and Phillip and Tim will find Mark. I know he will.”
Rebecca smiled at her cousin sweetly. She wanted to believe every word she’d said.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Mark pulled apart the wheat biscuit and filled it with a generous pat of the soft-churned butter. He had grown up in a home with delicious meals and generous portions, but Colleen’s cooking never failed to delight him. After hours of sleeping or of pure boredom in the drafty barn, the aroma of her cuisine as she entered the barn would make it all seem worthwhile.
Each bite of the roasted asparagus was more delicious than the last. There were baked bits of fresh garlic clinging to the buttered spears and blackened roast beef with its dark crust surrounding a tender slice of meat that melted in his mouth.
“Colleen,” he said, gulping down a mouthful. “I have to say, my mother is quite good. And our cook can really put together a nice meal too. But your cooking is the best I think I have ever had. I’m sure the three of you women in one kitchen would be very amazing indeed!” He filled his mouth with another forkful.
Colleen watched him seriously, afraid to take his compliments to heart. Memories of the night of Mark’s delirious fever flashed back to her mind. He could not live in the barn forever and she couldn’t go on every day trying to hurry through the drudgery of her deliveries so she could rush home to him. She had to find some way to get him out of the barn, out of Barite and back home.
“What is Stavewood?” she asked straight o
ut.
“What?” Mark looked up at her surprised. He was certain he had never mentioned the name of his home.
“Stavewood. Where is it? Is it someplace in Minnesota?”
“How do you know about Stavewood?” He wondered if possibly she had spoken to someone in town.
“You said it.” She looked candidly into his eyes. “While you were feverish. You said you wanted to go back there.” Colleen swallowed hard.
Mark looked down at his plate and sighed. “Stavewood is home. It’s the name of the house my father built. Yes, it’s in Minnesota. It’s beautiful.”
“Is that where you want to go? To Stavewood?”
“Yes, I do.” He watched her face and could see her disappointment. “I should never have left.”
“Alright,” she whispered. “I’m not sure exactly how yet. Can you get there on the train?”
“Yes.” He could see the resolve in her face.
“Okay.” She sat silent for a moment, looking down at her hands and then pushed back her hair.
“How is it beautiful?” she asked and took a deep breath.
“Ah,” Mark sighed and set the empty plate aside. “Stavewood might be just about the most beautiful place in the world,” he smiled.
“Right now, in the winter like this, there will be snow on the ground. A lot of snow. Everything will be white and fresh and the sky is so blue that it can almost hurt your eyes some days. It’s coming up on Christmas already,” he sighed. “My father and Roland, our friend, will be out looking for the perfect tree.” Mark chuckled under his breath at the thought of the two men bickering good-humoredly.
“They’ll get a huge tree and they’ll stand it up in the big ballroom. Rebecca, my mother, will have candles just about everywhere and she’ll string all those garlands of evergreens around all the doorways and the long banister that bends around the big staircase in the foyer.
“In the spring you can stand out on the porch that wraps around the house and you can smell the apple blossoms on the breeze. There are so many birds everywhere that the trees are just alive with the sounds they all make. And the lawns turn a bright green. The big tree on the lawn just seems to burst with new leaves and the daffodils that grow around the stable seem thicker every year.
“When it gets warm enough you can chase fireflies in the yard. My sister Loo will probably show my little brother Phillip how to catch them this summer.” He furrowed his brow.
“And the fall?” she asked quietly.
“It’s the most perfect time of all at Stavewood. There are so many colors on the hillside you can’t believe that they are there just by accident. The shades are so perfect against the blue sky. When the sun shines it looks like a magnificent fire. The apples are ready then. You pick one off the tree and you can hear it snap when you bite into it and the cider is tangy and sweet. It almost stings to taste it.
“My father usually gets out the big hunting rifles then. We’d get up so early we could barely see our way into the woods. Sam usually came with us.” Mark rubbed his forehead. “My father taught me how to hunt and fish. He taught me a lot of things.” Mark cleared his throat.
“It sounds perfect.” Colleen smiled wistfully. “Why did you leave?”
“I trusted someone there. I was a fool to do that. I just wanted to forget all about it. But the most foolish thing of all was to leave.”
Colleen knew then that there was a woman back home. Whatever had happened between them would probably be forgotten now, or at least soon, and she was likely waiting for him right now. She was probably worrying like all of his family was. He said his father had built this Stavewood place and for it to be so perfect he must have built it with a lot of love in his heart.
“You need to go home.” She swallowed hard. “Tomorrow I’ll help you try to walk around some. You’ll need to be on your feet to get you to the train. I don’t have much money, but you need to be well first. Somehow we’ll get you home to Stavewood, I promise.”
Colleen gathered the tray. “Good night,” she whispered.
Mark watched her walk away and frowned. He knew he wanted to go home to Stavewood more than just about anything in the world, but he was beginning to realize that there was something else he wanted too.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Timothy Elgerson stood in the milkman’s home silently listening to his conversation with the sheriff. Muldoon had seen nothing, heard nothing and nothing unusual had happened. The Irishman scowled at the big man through narrowed eyes. He knew a Yankee when he saw one. This one might be as tall as a mountain, but every man had his weakness, Shane thought.
Colleen wrung the clothing out in the icy water beside the pump and tossed the items over the swaying clothesline. She looked up from her laundry and saw the sheriff crossing the yard. Colleen froze and her heart began to race. She clenched her fists and considered running to the barn but it was too late for that. She’d act casual, she thought. Maybe the lawmen would not look in the barn.
“Good afternoon, Sheriff,” Colleen greeted him boldly. “What brings you out this way?” Her voice was clear as she called out to the man.
Mark heard her plainly from the old barn and, as he pulled himself to his feet, he felt his throat tightening up. He looked up at the ladder to the loft. He could attempt to climb it, but he had never been up there before. Uncertain that there was a place to conceal himself in the upper part of the barn, he looked around quickly for an alternative.
“Hello, Colleen,” the sheriff smiled.
She wiped her hands on her apron.
“I was just talking to your father.” He gestured towards the house where she could see her father and the other lawman standing by the front door. “There was a young man shot up in the hills there a while back. You might have heard about it.”
“I did,” she nodded casually and tried to keep her voice relaxed.
“It seems he wasn’t up there alone. There’s another man we’re looking for. You haven’t seen anyone hanging around your barns, have you? Anything unusual?”
Mark kicked the straw about, scattering it and tried to peer out through a crack in the boards. He stood against the barn wall, behind the door, and pulled the blankets to him with his feet. He could see the sheriff’s back, but no one else. If they found him they would surely try him for murder, maybe Sam’s killing as well. He listened in terror. They’d want to take him in like a criminal. Maybe in handcuffs. They’d treat him like a killer. Colleen would be scared and her father would never understand. He quickly realized that the only good outcome would be if they did not find him. His head spun and he leaned against the wall trying to clear his thoughts.
Colleen shook her head. “If there were anyone down here from those hills you know my Da would be at him with that old pistol of his, Sheriff.” She looked up at the man and tried hard to appear casual.
“You’ve been in all of the barns lately?”
“I milk the cows in that one every day,” she pointed to the newer barn. “We don’t use that one much anymore, but I do go there most days to read a bit of poetry. Please don’t tell my father, he thinks that reading is dreaming my life away.” She strained to smile nicely and watched the taller lawman walk towards them. Colleen had never seen him before, and he wore no uniform, but she was certain he was working with the sheriff.
The sheriff nodded and walked towards his companion. The men crossed the yard and walked along the tree line.
Sheriff Mason strode back to the girl and announced that he wanted to check the barns just to be sure. Colleen could feel the blood drain from her face.
She led him to the newer barn and she struggled with the door. The sheriff pushed it open easily. He looked inside all of the stalls while the cows lowed softly. As they crossed the yard towards the other barn Colleen chattered to the man, pleading in her mind that Mark had heard them and found somewhere to hide.
The sheriff walked around inside of the old barn. He climbed up into the loft. Colleen looked aro
und, unsure as to where Mark could possibly be hiding and she held her breath. She spotted a corner of the wool blanket poking out from behind the door. She called up to the sheriff in the loft and shoved the blanket behind the door with her foot. The exposed piece disappeared quickly.
“Anything up there?”
Sheriff Mason climbed down the ladder and dusted off his hands.
“I’d think twice about coming out here alone, Colleen,” he suggested. “There are a couple of McHerlong boys missing as well and I know you have had trouble before. You’re a pretty girl and I’d hate to see anything happen to you.”
“Aw, Sheriff.” Colleen smiled nervously. “I’ll be careful.”
“Why don’t I ever see you out at the dances in town, Colleen? A pretty girl like you should be dancing with all the boys.” He winked at her in a friendly manner.
“With my Da about with his pistol, Sheriff? I expect he wants to make an old spinster of me.” She wished the man would just hurry up and leave.
The sheriff chuckled, crossed the area and stopped in the doorway.
Colleen tried not to look towards the door where Mark was hiding.
“I’m going to stop by in a few days, just to be sure.” The sheriff said.
“Oh, Sheriff Mason. You don’t need to go to all of that trouble for me.” Colleen walked up beside him and led him from the barn.
She pulled the door closed behind her and paced across the yard. The sheriff tipped his hat and walked to where the other man was searching the edge of the woodland. When the two men finally mounted up and rode away Colleen thought she would faint.
“You look tired, child,” her father remarked as she walked into the house.
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