The Stills

by Jess Montgomery

  But in the end, the coins had been traded for white lace curtains purchased on a rare trip that Mama and Fiona had made into Kinship. There’d been enough left over for Fiona to buy a pretty item, too—a cut-glass candy dish.

  Crystal! little Fiona had exclaimed.

  The shopkeeper had laughed at her. No, just glass. But I guess you can pretend. Maybe get real crystal someday. Then he’d given Fiona and her mama a look that conveyed he didn’t believe for a moment that that would ever happen.

  Fiona had bought it anyway. It was pretty, even if she couldn’t imagine she’d ever have much candy to put in it. But she could pretend it was crystal.

  Later that soft spring day, Mama beamed at the gentle billow of white lace curtains in the open window, so much more pleasant than the dull flap of a burlap bag. Her pleasure dimmed quickly when Daddy came home and glowered at the curtains, then sputtered out altogether when he grabbed up Fiona’s candy dish and threw it at Mama. The dish gashed her cheek, before hitting the wall, then falling to the floor. A bit of glass broke off from the rim, but otherwise the dish remained intact.

  Flecks of Mama’s blood dotted the curtains.

  “Lady?” The man sounds even weaker than he had down in the woodshop, and his knees buckle. He falls back into her, clunking against the pocket where she’d tucked Uncle Henry’s blue bottle. Fiona twists—she doesn’t want the bottle to break; on the slow, plodding trek over here she’d come up with an idea for what to do with it. The hammer, in her other pocket, thwacks against her thigh.

  She helps him stay upright. “Go on.” She prods him toward the cabin.

  At the door, she pushes him across the threshold. When she ran away years ago, she swore she’d never come back here. And she hadn’t—until now.

  As the man staggers into the cabin, Fiona stills. She can’t bring herself to cross the threshold, plunge into the derelict structure’s greedy, gobbling darkness.

  She opens her mouth to holler for the man to come back.

  She’ll tell him, I’ve made a mistake; Luther’s back at the farmhouse after all, and once there let George deal with him however he wishes. Make an excuse for having come here first with the man. Do as George wishes with the properties. With his business. With Luther, Elias, Abe, Klara—all of them. Give up on trying to draw Lily out to the farm. Why had she ever thought she could get away with playing one person off another, with taking control?

  Fiona gasps with panicky breaths. She braces one hand against the doorframe, puts the other hand on her hip as she bends forward, forces her breath to stretch and slow.

  As she bends, the bottle in her pocket hits against her thigh. She sees again it flashing blue on the shelf, is shocked anew at what she’d put together upon seeing it, just before also discovering this man. Shudders as she examines the horrid truth: Aunt Nell wasn’t just paranoid; George truly had been willing to murder her uncle Henry—well, not by his hand, likely leaving that task to Elias—to make it easier to get his well-situated farm for his own expansion purposes.

  This reality smacks her back to the moment, firms her resolve for what she has to do for her future—for her children’s futures. She wills herself to focus: The past no longer exists. It cannot touch me. I will not let it.

  “Lady?” The man’s stringy voice tugs at her.

  Fiona looks up, realizes she is already in the cabin. The man has stumbled into a chair, by the cast-iron potbelly stove. Milky light diffuses through the cabin’s only other window, this one intact, by the stove, on which still sits a cast-iron skillet, slick with old bacon grease, flecked with flies and small spiders who’d sensed they’d found a feast but then got stuck to their doom.

  The man’s face has pinched and paled. She grabs an old ceramic bowl, left on the table, pulls it free of strands of spiderweb that have tenuously bound it to the log wall, holds it under his chin. His puke is thin and watery. Just stomach acid.

  Fiona waits as he leans over the bowl, and considers: He is dehydrated, hungry. Injured, obviously. Filthy. Ill prepared for being in the wild, particularly in the winter. But somehow, he’d come to the farm, asking after Luther, claiming Luther had shot him.

  But he’s also naive, and being hurt and hungry hasn’t helped his judgment. Immediately sharing his name, identifying himself to be a prohibition bureau special agent—foolish. Or maybe it just shows that he doesn’t see her as much of a threat simply because she’s female. A farm woman—even more harmless.

  Fiona sets the bowl aside, pulls out one of Aunt Nell’s handkerchiefs, wipes the man’s mouth. She leaves the handkerchief on the table.

  His eyes start to close, and he droops forward.

  “Hey, mister!” Fiona snaps her fingers thrice next to his ear. “Don’t pass out on me.”

  Not just yet.

  He looks up at her with bleary, almost glassy eyes, swimming with confusion.

  “You said you’re Colter DeHaven?”

  His head bobs once in affirmation.

  “And you’re looking for—” She stops. Better to sound, for now, like she doesn’t know who he’s asking after.

  “Luther Ross.” Just saying the name seems to perk the man up. He straightens in the chair. “Told you that already; you said you knew where he was, you were taking me to him.”

  Well, yes. She had said as much, drawing him away from the farm. A special agent looking for Luther, she’d thought, could be useful to her. Letting him be found on the farm would only put him in George’s control—or worse.

  She just needs to be sure not to get caught helping this man—and to have a good excuse ready in case she does.

  Fiona makes her eyes go wide, her voice quivery, like the nervous farm woman she’s playacting. “You aiming to bring him in for something?”

  “He was working for me—or I thought he was. But he shot me. Left me for dead—” He grabs her arm, grimaces as he stands. “Don’t try and play me for a fool. I know he’s staying at your farm, and you said you’d take me to him.”

  Too many memories of her time in this cabin, when she thought she could not fight back, rush up from deep within, propel Fiona to her feet. She shoves him back down, whips out the hammer, holds the claw end under the soft part of his neck.

  “Don’t think, mister, I won’t gash your throat. Or bash in what’s left of your head,” Fiona says. In her own voice, she hears the mean grittiness of her father, threatening her and her mother. So be it. She is, at last, someone who will fight back. Whatever it costs her. “Yes, Luther Ross has been at the farm. Belongs to my aunt. I’m visiting, because my cousin and her husband are visiting too. I’ve met this Luther. He works for my cousin and her husband. But he hightailed it outta here the day after Thanksgiving.”

  “Lady, I’ve seen the armed men on the farm. I’ve seen George Vogel there. You gotta know the kind of man he is, your cousin’s husband! So why’d you drag me out here?” His hand trails to the inside of his coat. Maybe he does have a weapon.

  Fiona presses the claw of the hammer up under Colter’s chin. He leans his head back as far as he can, so far that as he stares at her his pupils are half-moons over his bottom lashes.

  All right, so Colter has seen George out on the grounds with his men but hasn’t spotted her. It was just two days ago—God, but it seems a lifetime—that she would have been out walking with Aunt Nell, past the woodshop, on the way to the cemetery. So this man, Colter, hadn’t been hiding out in the woodshop then.

  “You just up and announce to me that you’re a special agent, looking for Luther, with Mr. Vogel and his men wandering all over the place,” Fiona says. “You oughta be grateful I didn’t just scream for help, then and there.”

  “Why didn’t you?” Doubt and defiance tinge his voice. Weak as he is, he still has some sense and fight left.

  “Maybe I don’t like or trust them,” she says. She pulls back the hammer but doesn’t put it away or sit down. “Why’d Luther shoot you?”

  His face reddens. “Do you mind if I get o
ut a smoke?”

  She hesitates. He could be reaching for his gun. But if he has it—or wants to use it—wouldn’t he have already? “Go ahead.”

  He pulls out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Shakily, he lights a cigarette. After his first puff, he says, “Another agent, from the Columbus office, has been working for the past few months with Luther as an insider to Mr. Vogel’s, ah, operation. It’s very complex, so I won’t trouble you with details.”

  Fiona resists rolling her eyes. Oh yes. Don’t upset the little woman with information she won’t understand anyway.

  “I got brought in from a bigger office—Chicago.…” He pauses, as if expecting her to ask where that is. She just gives a little nod, and he goes on. “That’s because the case got bigger than what Columbus could handle. But I started having my doubts that the Columbus agent was fully on board. That he might be giving Luther the runaround, be on the take.” Colter shrugs. “Just some things Luther said.”

  Fiona could see Luther sowing doubt with one agent, to play off the other. To what end?

  “I was supposed to come over next week, take the lead working out of Columbus, but Luther asked if I could come early. He wanted to show me something, he said, that he didn’t want the other agent to know just yet.”

  And you fell for it? But Fiona keeps her face placid. She is, after all, not supposed to be Fiona right now. She’s Fiona’s naive farmwife cousin. So she infuses sympathy into her tone. “You came before Thanksgiving?”

  Colter takes another drag on his cigarette. He doesn’t say anything. Not the time for exploring why he’s alone for the holiday. Fiona goes down another path. “But Luther shot you?”

  Now the revenuer stares at the ember tip of his cigarette. “I thought I could trust him.”

  Fiona almost feels sorry for him. She sees in him that quality that made Martin so dear—wanting to trust others. Of course, it had led him into foolish mistakes at poker games. And it’s a terrible attribute for a man in Colter’s position.

  She sits back down but keeps hold of the hammer as she rests it on the table—just in case. “Luther Ross has quite the reputation in these parts—from when he ran a coal-mining company over in Rossville. He’s duped many a person.” The thought of Martin, killed at the hands of one of Luther’s hired thugs, makes her heart twinge. It must show in her face, for now Colter looks sympathetic—and a little comforted that he’s not the only one Luther’s ever tricked. “You must have been shot nearby, but I haven’t heard any gunfire around here.”

  “It was near some still, a place where Luther Ross was supposed to show me evidence that Vogel is…” Colter pauses, looking for the right words.

  Fiona puts this together with what she’d learned during her visit with Dr. and Mrs. Goshen. So Luther had shot this man at Marvena Whitcomb Sacovech’s moonshine stand. Left him for dead. Why would he do that? Surely he’d know that sooner or later someone would find this revenuer, dead at Marvena’s site?

  It hits Fiona—maybe that was the point? Maybe he wanted to get Marvena into trouble? Marvena had, after all, once rallied miners to try to unionize at the coal company Luther had owned. And Luther hates Sheriff Lily Ross, who is friends with Marvena. Maybe he took some pleasure in knowing how it would hurt Lily to have to arrest her friend.

  Would he risk George’s ire over the attention this would have surely brought?

  In any case, Luther would have later learned at the Goshens’, while getting heart medicine for Elias, that a farm boy from the Harkins family had been there—a possible witness. And maybe the boy had helped Colter? After all, this farm is a long way from the Harkins place—at least by foot, and certainly in this weather. No wonder Luther had run off in a panic. Had he gone to the Harkins farm then, to try to find out?

  Colter stumbles on. “Vogel is engaged in illicit activity.”

  Fiona gives him a wide-eyed, perplexed look.

  He can’t help but explain. “Bootlegging. A big plan, involving your aunt’s farm.” His look turns concerned. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but I think you and your aunt should know that. Luther revealed that Vogel is planning to buy the farm.”

  Fiona says softly, “I overheard Fiona say to our aunt that she wanted to talk with her about buying the property.” How odd, yet thrilling, to refer to herself as a whole other person. But it’s best not to keep focus on her assumed identity. She asks Colter, “Why not just make your way to the sheriff, after he shot you?”

  Colter starts to laugh, but the effort turns into a watery cough. “Luther already told me she’s on the take with your cousin’s husband.” Fiona has to bite back a laugh. Lily Ross? On the take? She’s always been so self-assured, self-righteous. “Just like his half brother was, when he was sheriff. Now I know he could be lying. Telling me the reason he wanted to help us with Vogel was to set things straight after his brother was a yes-man for Vogel.” Fiona swallows another yelp of incredulousness. She recollects Daniel as a lot of things—curious. Brave to the point of carelessness—he’d gotten shot, himself, in an altercation with a prisoner he was transporting, the prisoner then running away, never to be caught. At least that was the story everyone told—but Fiona isn’t so sure. Daniel seemed too clever for that. And he sure wasn’t a yes-man. “So I did my own digging, read a lot of news stories about how Daniel Ross used to box for your cousin’s husband. Seemed like Luther could be telling the truth.”

  That was always the problem with snakes like Luther. They always seem like they can be telling the truth.

  Fiona shifts in her chair, suddenly uncomfortable. She seems like she’s telling the truth, too—and it’s a habit that quickly becomes easy to rely on. So thrillingly easy.

  “I don’t know Sheriff Ross well,” Fiona says softly. “Luther might could be telling the truth about her. And, well, I’d say you ought to go back to your room at the Kinship Inn—I reckon that’s where you checked in?”

  Colter looks away. “Never got around to it. Met up with Luther first.”

  “He still has your travel bag?”

  Colter turns a hard gaze on her. “By now, I’m sure he’s tossed it away. But I still have my gun. Bring him to me.”

  “Sorry, but he took off Thursday after dinner. I reckon he didn’t like our quiet little evening. He’s probably back in town, carousing it up—I hear tell there’s a speakeasy—”

  Colter tries to stand. Quickly sits, moaning.

  “Mister, you’re weak. Got a fever, I can tell. Not thinking straight, if you’re trying to go to town to find him.”

  Colter frowns.

  “Not your fault he double-crossed you,” Fiona adds quickly. “Luther has quite a reputation throughout the whole county. Way I hear tell it, he’s done that many a time. I—I think it’s dangerous to confront him while you’re so weakened. But listen—stay here. I can help you get strong, until the other agent comes back, Monday you said. I can bring you food, some ointment. Clean clothes.” She smiles at him.

  Colter nods. “That—that might be for the best.”

  “I’ll be back soon,” Fiona says. “Just stay here—no one comes to this old cabin. It’s been abandoned for years.”

  Colter looks suspicious again. “How do you know about it, then?”

  “It was my parents’,” she says. “I lived here before I married. I inherited it, but we never did anything with this land. Too hard to farm.” Each piece of what she’s said is true, though she’s rearranged the pieces to suit the meaning she wants him to take. So easy, the more she does it, to do that with bits of truth. Easier, at least, than outright lying. Less to keep track of.

  She stands, acts as if she’s about to leave, but turns back around. “Who told you how to find my aunt’s farm? I know just about everyone here and I could tell you if they’re really to be trusted—”

  She stops, seeing that suspicion grow in his gaze. Best not to press too hard, too soon. She’d bought herself until Monday, she thinks, with Colter. She has to keep Colter hidden away long enoug
h to figure out how to use him to ensnare George—and Abe. That just leaves the problem of Elias and Luther.

  Colter’s eyes, though, are narrowing on her. “I’m not sure I should be trusting you. Why would you help me?”

  Again, stating the truth, or at least mostly the truth, works to her advantage. Fiona lets her true fear bloom in her face. “Mr. Vogel scares me. I—I think my cousin is in over her head.”

  Colter nods. “You are wise. He is a bad man.”

  Fiona gives him what she figures he’ll want—and what will work best for getting him to trust her for just a little while: a submissive yet encouraging smile. He’ll tell her the name soon. “Just rest. I will be back.”

  She steps out of the cabin, trudges away. When she gets almost out of sight of the cabin, though, she turns back, stares at it.

  This is the first time she’d been back since that last awful night.

  Fiona had run to Uncle Henry and Aunt Nell’s a few weeks after Mama died—when Daddy had tried … things … with her. She was fourteen, but she’d sobbed like a little girl when she told her aunt and uncle the truth. Aunt Nell had gone pale, and Fiona saw the truth in her face—Fiona’s father, Aunt Nell’s much older brother, had done the same with her.

  Would she have run back, if Aunt Nell hadn’t been so cold with her? Blaming her distance and aloofness on her morning sickness when Uncle Henry whispered to her, It’s not the girl’s fault. She’d heard them, when they talked after they thought she was asleep.

  And when she did sleep, she dreamed, of all things, of that crystal—no, cut-glass candy dish, and one night she ran back. Thinking, foolishly, she could get away with sneaking in, rescuing that dish. Her one pretty possession.