As they approached the pond, Annie slipped her hand into Christian’s and gave it a squeeze. “Would you mind?” she asked, glancing Nathaniel’s way.
After a few parting words and an embrace, Christian and Edmond made for the other side of the pond and a pair of stones.
Annie watched them leave and turned. Before she could say a word, Nathaniel put his hand over her mouth, holding it there until he could see the beginnings of a smile from the set of her eyes. Satisfied, he lowered his hand and wrapped her in his arms. As she laid her head against his chest, he rested his chin atop it, and looking out over the pond, he decided to test the waters. “Do you really think I’ll let you run off without me having a say in it?”
“You’re an attorney, Nathaniel. I could hardly keep you from it.” Annie looked up, grinning, before settling back against his chest. “I have to go,” she whispered, simultaneously fearing and hoping he’d press his suit and ask to follow.
Whatever else she might have said—ambiguous arguments, insincere denials—was forgotten as Nathaniel lifted her chin with a finger to caress her upper lip. He worried her mouth open with his tongue to kiss her with greater promise, his fingers snaking through the hairs at the nape of her neck. He stopped long enough run his thumb along the length of the vein that pulsed like a drumbeat and cupped her face in his hands to kiss her again.
A sudden gust of wind swept past, buffeting their bodies with cotton-ball clouts that stirred the surface of the pond. From behind them, Annie heard a series of rapid-fire crunches and broke away to see Cap’n pelting up the path.
“Wait up!”
Reaching their side, Cap’n dropped something in Annie’s handbag and leaned over with her hands on her knees, panting. “It’s…it’s a mock-up of tomorrow’s article,” she said.
Annie turned to Nathaniel. He reached out, placing his palm on her cheek, and offered her a broken smile. He shook his head and turned to walk down the path.
She almost called out to him, but he disappeared behind a thicket, and it was too late. She closed her eyes, praying she’d made the right decision. After a moment, she opened them to look across the pond.
Cap’n followed her gaze to find Christian and Edmond sitting on a log, their backs to them. She straightened, smiled, and, uncertain what to do, looped a thumb through her suspender and started grinding the gravel on the path with the toe of her shoe.
Annie noticed there was a hole in it.
Finally, Cap’n said, “Well, I guess I won’t be seeing you no more, huh?”
“Come with me.”
Words are like rivers, constantly altering the landscape, and those three words produced a remarkable result within Cap’n, eroding the remainder of her distrust, the thin veneer of her selfreliance crumbling alongside it.
It was a considerable shift, but the only evidence of the change Annie witnessed was the fluttering of Cap’n’s eyelids—that is, until she suddenly rushed forward, throwing her arms around Annie’s waist.
Annie dropped to her knees and began to cry, as words and half-words reflecting loss and love tumbled from her mouth, words she wished she’d also shared with Nathaniel. She rocked until both were able to regain their self-possession.
Cap’n stepped back to toy with the lace on Annie’s bodice, then shook her head, smiling—her cheeks shiny and pink. “I can’t,” she said. “There’s the gang to look after.”
Annie nodded. “I know, I know, I know…” she said as she straightened Cap’n’s cap. She struggled to her feet, studying the girl’s face, committing it to memory. Then she withdrew a slim booklet from her handbag and held it out.
“What is it?” Cap’n asked, accepting it with as much grace as she could muster. She flipped through the pages before looking up into Annie’s eyes, her own wide with shock. “Your checkbook?”
“And a letter of transfer.”
Cap’n gawked at the sum and, in a gesture that reflected the shine beneath the spit, handed the booklet back to Annie. “I can’t take it,” she said.
“It’s of no use to me where I’m going.” Annie gently folded Cap’n’s hand around it. “I can’t give you back your mom—lord knows, I wish I could—but, one way or another, I am going to make sure you have a home,” she said.
Cap’n took off her cap, her pigtails tumbling down her back, and fidgeted with its brim as Annie continued. “Listen to me,” she said. “I don’t know if what I’m about to tell you is wise. Tinkering with time has proven to be a tricky proposition. So, to ease my conscience, I’m going to give you a riddle to solve.” Something in the tone of Annie’s voice made the little hairs on Cap’n’s arms stand on end. “I made certain Mr. Culler bet on the wrong horse.” Annie raised an eyebrow and added, “And it’s only a two-horse race.”
Cap’n seemed confused at first. After a moment, she looked at Annie, her lips forming a perfect O to match the roundness of her eyes.
The wind chose that moment to pick up again. A gust swirled around them, lobbing a leaf into Cap’n’s hair. It perched just above her ear, quivering erratically, as if it alone found the humor in good-byes. Annie plucked it, watching as it dipped and swayed until alighting atop the pond. Sighing, she said to no one in particular, “It seems the west wind is calling me home.” She reached for the cap and placed it on her tiny confederate’s head. “You”—she brushed Cap’n’s nose—“watch out for yourself.”
“Bye,” said Cap’n, the word popping out her mouth like a hiccup.
“Bye.”
Finding no other excuses to remain and feeling a little lost, Annie touched Cap’n’s shoulder and drifted toward the pond.
“Wait!”
Cap’n pounded after her, stopping a few feet away, suddenly too embarrassed to look Annie in the eye. She took the cap from her head and worried it into a tube, clutching it to her chest. “This was Pepper’s,” she said. “He gave it to me when Fabian made me Cap’n.” She held out her hand, offering her greatest treasure.
Annie took it in both of hers as if it were the Eucharist. Wise enough to know that there are some gestures you can’t ignore, gifts you can’t refuse, she reverently placed it atop her own head.
Cap’n nodded, giggling at the sight, and gestured for Annie to kneel so she could rework the brim. She whispered in her ear, “Don’t forget me.”
And then she was gone, running down the path—a jackrabbit in overalls.
When Cap’n had disappeared from view, Annie broke down. Loss hurts, and hers was doubled. Blotting her eyes with a tissue, Annie circled the pond to the log where Christian and Edmond were seated.
Christian stood to give her a hug. “You okay?” he asked, staring at the cap atop her head.
She looked across the water, then back to him. Without a word, she crossed the lawn to stand before a pair of boulders draped in night-blooming jasmine and altissimo roses.
Christian and Edmond stood behind her to stare at the gateway through which they’d stepped into Kansas. The sun was sitting in the sky at that perfect angle, illuminating the flowers in such a way that that they seemed to create a border of fire around the stones.
“Is it going to take us home?” Edmond asked.
“It brought us here,” Annie said. It was the best she could offer.
“That’s great, but did you book a round-trip ticket?”
Thank goodness for Edmond, she thought. She looked across her shoulder, grinning at his attempt at levity, and stared at the stones with the honeysuckle halo. “Let’s find out,” she said. Hooking her arms around both Edmond’s and Christian’s like Dorothy with the Scarecrow and the Tin Man, she led them through the brush between the stones.
When their heads stopped spinning, they found themselves looking around a very familiar place—Annie’s kitchen.
She closed the back door and peered at the clock above the sink. “Well, we’re home. The question is when?”
“I can answer that,” said Edmond, looking stunned. He pointed to the breakfast table where
a set of chattering teeth bounced across the surface and over the edge onto the floor.
Annie leaned over to pick them up, looking first to Christian, then Edmond as the toy slowly wound down in the palm of her hand. She set it aside before settling into the breakfast nook to unfold the sheet of newsprint Cap’n gave her. It was identical to the yellowed clipping from the Antiquarian, but she could now read the text made illegible by age. The paper reported that the money clip was found in her father’s hand and that Culler was wanted for questioning. Even better, there was no further mention of the elderly woman who had been seen leaving Abbott’s home.
Scanning through the remainder of the article, she found the other item she was looking for:
Even more chilling is the fact that nothing has been discovered regarding the location of Annabelle Abbott, who appears to have disappeared into thin air. The case of the missing daughter is turning out to be more mysterious than Mr. Abbott’s murder…
“Thin air,” Annie whispered. “I suppose that’s exactly what I did.”
Christian read the article from over her shoulder while Edmond wandered across the room to raid the refrigerator. He laid his hand on her tapping forefinger to get her attention. “Mission accomplished. Elsbeth’s off the hook. What’s next?”
Annie stood and peered out the kitchen window, noting that one of the solar lamps she’d installed the year before had fallen over. She wandered over to rest her hands on the sill. “Christian?” she asked. “Don’t you find it odd that we can see my English garden from here, but only Elsbeth’s back forty the minute we step outside?”
He joined her at the window as a flash of iridescence zipped across the pane. “Look, a hummingbird.”
After the bird caromed over the fence and out of view, Annie turned to Christian. “What’s next? I think you should go home and get out of your play clothes while I write to my grandmother.”
Edmond closed the refrigerator door and caught Christian’s eye. He shook his head slowly. “The bad guys?” he mouthed and began applying mustard to slices of wheat bread before heaping deli meat and some cheese on top.
Taking the hint, Christian turned, leaning against the sill with his arms crossed over his chest. “Annie, I’d rather we stay here tonight, if you don’t mind.”
“Is this about Mr. Culler and his odious friend?” she asked. “How do you propose they find their way to San Francisco with the door safely tucked away and under guard? The only other way to get here is through a pair of stones they know nothing about, or a misplaced house in the middle of a wheat field.”
Far from certain that Mr. Culler lacked the cunning to ferret out Elsbeth’s address, Christian started to protest, but Annie cut him off by pushing him toward the breakfast nook. “Eat up and let me get on with the business of writing to El. She needs to be warned.”
Edmond passed out the sandwiches, along with potato chips, sliced tomatoes, and lemonade, and the three set to it with gusto, not having eaten all day. Wiping mustard from his hands with a napkin, Christian watched Edmond clear the dishes and broke the silence. “Leave your cell phone on,” he said.
CHAPTER
THIRTY-THREE
A Bad Investment Decision
The secretary for the investment division of New York Life was stewing in her juices, or, as her daughter would put it, “positively wild.” Her anger was so palpable that the night guard and janitor, usually up for a good conversation, were keeping a wide berth.
Mr. Adcock, her boss, had once again left early to meet the head of the division at the Gentleman’s Club where they would no doubt smoke their expensive cigars, sip their twenty- year- old port, and congratulate each other with a slap on the back. The liquidation of Mr. Culler’s orders and subsequent purchases in Tesla Electric— as well as the run Mr. Adcock had created by talking up investment opportunities with the company’s elite clientele who were more than willing to jump on the insider bandwagon— had surpassed their quarterly quota, spelling big commissions, not that she’d see a penny of it.
She slammed her desk drawer closed and began sorting through carbons while assigning the two men their proper roles in the animal kingdom. The head of the division was definitely an orangutan— a gluttonous, obtuse orangutan— while Mr. Adcock was a… What was he? He was a weasel, that’s what he was— a corporate- climbing little rodent who’d step over anyone’s back to reach the next rung. His avariciousness was going to land him in hot water one day, and she was going to buy a front- row ticket for the show. Take Mr.
Culler, for example. No one in his or her right mind would handle that man’s money. He was a wolf, and Mr. Adcock was going to get bitten one day.
It tickled her sense of the ironic to know that Miss Aster had pulled a fast one on them. She wasn’t sure how, but she was certain that neither the head of the division, her boss, nor Mr. Culler was going to be very happy when Miss Aster’s high jinks saw the light of day. An unhappy wolf meant a hungry wolf, and when wolves were hungry, they hunted weasels.
So it was with a feeling of grim satisfaction that she saw Mr. Culler stride through the entry as if on cue, his posture broadcasting that Mr. Adcock was on the menu.
He wandered directly to her desk and tapped it with his forefinger. “Is Mr. Adcock in?”
The secretary looked up from her desk with a smile, determined to squeeze as much entertainment out of the exchange as possible. “I’m afraid he left early today,” she said. “You might find him at the Gentleman’s Club with our division head. Perhaps I can help?”
“Not unless you can explain why my cash account is empty.”
“Oh yes,” she said, sorting through several files. She withdrew a stack of carbons from one, holding them out for Mr. Culler. “Mr. Adcock left these for you.”
“What are they?” he demanded as he snatched them from her hand.
“Your sale and purchase orders, of course.”
The corner of Mr. Culler’s left eye spasmed at her response. It was the work of only one muscle, and a tiny one at that, but it was enough for the secretary to confirm her suspicions. She’d obviously poured a little gunpowder on his day and decided it wouldn’t be complete without lighting a match. “The ones delivered by your secretary, Miss Aster?” she added sweetly.
The explosion took place out of sight—in Mr. Culler’s gut—but the secretary was certain it had packed quite a punch, judging from the silence that followed.
It took a supreme effort of will for Mr. Culler to marshal his expression, as he’d experienced a disconnect—a flutter of uncertainty—while considering the possibility that he was simply outmatched by Miss Aster. He quickly discarded the notion, making a pretense of examining the carbons, all the while deciding his next course of action.
“Thank you. Tell Mr. Adcock that I will follow up with him very soon.”
He marched out the building and onto the street, just as the evening edition was being delivered to the corner stand. It landed in a heap of paper and twine, the headline reading, Suspicions Shift in the Abbott Murder.
Mr. Culler looked up as Mr. Danyer arrived—surprisingly calm. “Get the horses.”
“I thought we were going to Pawnee by train.”
Mr. Culler pointed to the paper. “Change of plans.”
CHAPTER
THIRTY-FOUR
Into the Frying Pan
Elsbeth was having a difficult time of it.
She could hear the kitten mewling under her cabin but couldn’t see it anywhere. Two had already been collected and were resting in a large crate sitting by the rocker she’d filled with hay. Looking under the floorboards with her back end wagging in a most undignified fashion, Elsbeth was finally able to nab the rogue kitten before it could back farther under the steps. She held it up with one hand as it spat and batted at her with its paws.
Cackling as she walked onto the porch, Elsbeth said, “You are a feisty little one, aren’t you? Noisy too. I’m going to call you Bristle.” Holding it up, Elsbeth added
,“A boy… Makes sense.”She wandered into the cabin and placed the little gray- and- black ball of electric fur into the crate.
Ordinarily, Elsbeth would have left the kittens under the porch. Their momma would be more than capable of taking care of them. However, she’d found a dead cat by the road, and the kittens had been mewling for more than a day. These kittens were clearly orphaned, and it tickled Elsbeth to take care of them— especially since she and Annie had traded barbs on just such a topic.
She dropped heavily into her rocker and reached for a basket of yarn as Bounder, the great- great- granddaughter of Tom’s favorite hunting dog, ambled over to see what all the fuss was about. Bounder sniffed at the kittens, prompting Bristle to stand on his back legs, waving his front paws like a prizefighter. Undaunted, Bounder nudged him with her muzzle, and Bristle tumbled over backward, only to right himself and get ready for another go.
As Bristle straddled Bounder’s snout, hissing and clearly thinking she would shortly succumb to his death grip, the dog looked morosely at Elsbeth, who said, “Don’t look at me. Solve your own problems.” So she did. Stepping delicately into the crate, Bounder circled a few times before settling down with her body wrapped around the kittens. Bristle, who had tumbled onto his brother and sister, hissed one more time for good measure, then, thinking better of it, started to knead at Bounder’s belly.
Elsbeth placed the basket of yarn in her lap and was beginning to wade through its contents when she heard a low rumble. Looking over to see Bounder staring at the window, she lowered the basket to the floor and eased herself out of the rocker. Pushing the curtain aside, she noticed a cloud of dust and the faint outline of what appeared to be a horse as it worked its way up the road toward her cabin. Well, that didn’t take long, she thought.
The Lemoncholy Life of Annie Aster Page 25
