Unspoken Fear

by Hunter Morgan

  But if it was possible, the pain seemed even worse. Every time she saw Noah's haunted shadow of a face, every time he spoke, every time he looked at Mallory... she remembered what they'd had, what they had lost.

  Abraham.

  Isaac.

  Joanne and Mark.

  The Marcuses.

  Noah.

  Ghosts flying around the house, around her bedroom. Around inside her head.

  So many innocents. It was so unfair. So damned unfair. Another violent sob wracked her body. All gone. All dead. Noah's life as good as gone. Noah as good as dead. And it was all her fault.

  * * *

  Noah had just started up the engine to the John Deere lawn tractor when Mallory bounced down the porch steps, dressed for preschool, her green Shrek backpack dangling off one shoulder. This morning she had settled for a shirt and shorts that matched, to please her mother no doubt. "Where you goin'?" she shouted above the rumble of the engine.

  "Town to get some things at the hardware store for Mateo." He cut the engine so he could hear her better. The way everyone else in the house except for Mateo avoided him, she was his best buddy right now, after Chester, and he didn't want to miss a word she said.

  "Because you was bad and went to p-rison and you can't drive Mama's car?" she said.

  He nodded chuckling. "Something like that."

  She swayed side to side, her hands tucked behind her back. Today she wore her blond hair in a ponytail with a flowered bucket hat pulled over her head. "Mama says you wook siwwy, a g-rown man d-riving in town on a wawn-mower."

  He adjusted his ball cap, resisting a grin. "Does she now? What else does she say about me?"

  She tucked her hands behind her back and turned one way and then the other, rather coquettishly for a preschooler. "She said she thought you was cute."

  This time he couldn't resist the grin. "And what brought that up?"

  "I thought you was cute." She looked at him curiously, pointing at the lawn tractor. "Think I couwld have aw... ride?"

  "To school?"

  She nodded.

  "I don't believe your mama would go for it. You know, me already looking silly driving down Main Street on a lawn mower."

  She slowly pushed her lower lip out into a pout. "But I don't think you wook siwwy, Mr. Noah."

  "We're working on your Ls next week." He poked his finger into her soft belly.

  She giggled and stepped back. "Pwease?"

  "How about a ride around the yard and to your mama's car, hmm?"

  She hesitated, then held up fingers. "Two times awound the yard?"

  "You drive a hard bargain." He slid back on the tractor seat and offered his hand. "Madame, your chariot awaits."

  She hopped up into his lap and he started the mower, blades off. They were just finishing their second turn around the front yard, ducking under a silver maple tree branch, when Rachel walked down the porch steps.

  "Uh-oh," Mallory called.

  "Uh-oh," Noah echoed, steering toward the garage. He stopped near the door and cut the engine. Mallory hopped off without having to be told.

  Rachel passed him without saying a word.

  "I'm going into town to get some wire and a couple of other things Mateo needs; you need anything?" he asked Rachel.

  "Washing machine is acting up again. You think you could bring back one of those from the appliance store balanced in your lap?" She opened the car door and then halted, leaning on the roof to look at him. To his surprise, she was smiling, though her tone was a little dry for eight-thirty in the morning.

  "I understand that some people think I look silly driving this thing around town."

  "You should get a bicycle," she told him.

  "Can't cut cross country on a bike."

  "You could on a mountain bike."

  "Can't hitch the utility wagon to a mountain bike."

  She laughed and shook her head. "I'm taking Mallory to school and then I'll be back."

  "What about Mattie?" he asked.

  "He'll be fine. He's in the house helping Mrs. Santori with the laundry. She saves the socks for days for him. Sometimes it takes him hours to match them up, but he likes doing it." She lifted one shoulder in a shrug.

  Noah glanced away, then back. "I feel like I haven't been spending much time with him, but I can barely catch him. He plays that organ by the hour. If I didn't know better, I'd think he was avoiding me."

  "Yeah, well, you were gone five years. My guess is that he thought you were avoiding him."

  He thought for a moment and then couldn't resist a lopsided grin. He adjusted the brim of his battered Orioles ball cap that he'd found in a box in his room with stuff marked "yard sale."

  "I get your point. What do you suggest I do?"

  "Just give him time. Keep approaching, but don't push it. You know he doesn't respond well to pushy."

  She gave him a smile, a hesitant smile that made him smile back. It was a smile he remembered from a very long time ago.

  "Got it. Thanks." He slid his hand into his pocket. "Well, guess I'll see you after awhile. You'll probably beat me back here." He crossed the lawn and got onto the seat of the lawn tractor, surprised that he was still smiling when he headed across the blossoming apple orchard.

  * * *

  In town, Noah stopped at Burton's Hardware and Appliances and paid for a new washer and arranged to have it delivered in the afternoon. He felt completely inadequate in Rachel's presence, and so guilty about leaving her with so many responsibilities for so long while he was in prison, that if he could help her out in any small way, even by buying her a washing machine that ran, he was happy to do it.

  He was just crossing the street from the hardware store when he spotted Snowden Calloway striding down the brick steps of the police station. Noah meant to just tip his hat, but when Snowden started in his direction, he felt like he needed to meet him halfway on the sidewalk.

  "Noah."

  "Snowden." Noah nodded. He remembered almost nothing of the night of the accident except that Snowden had been the first responding officer on the scene. He remembered the blood on Snowden's large hands. He remembered the anger in the man's voice as he handcuffed him and put him in the back of the black and white, which was actually black and white. Noah felt his face grow warm with shame as Snowden put out his hand, and Noah accepted it.

  They shook and Noah stepped back.

  "How you doing?"

  Noah shrugged. "You know."

  "A little hard."

  Noah was surprised by the tone of Snowden’s voice. There was no accusation. No anger. He looked up into his eyes. He was a tall man, six four at least, with café-latte-colored skin and the most intriguing pale blue eyes, eyes that really penetrated you, eyes that seemed to see you for who you were, not who you wanted people to think you were.

  "Yeah, a little hard," Noah agreed, glancing away, then back at Snowden as he eased his hands into his jeans pockets. "And a little weird, you know."

  "I can imagine." He chuckled, touching the brim of his uniform hat as some elderly ladies crossed the street half a block away. "I've sort of always felt like I belonged more on the island of misfit toys than in Stephen Kill."

  Noah chuckled. "Right. Guess you have."

  Snowden nodded in the direction of the John Deere parked in front of the hardware store. "I see you've figured out a way to get around. You making your AA meetings?"

  "I sure am. Todd Corkland's my sponsor. You know him—Roland's father, retired from the state forestry service."

  "Yeah, I know him. Fishes a lot out of Bowers Beach."

  "That's him." Noah glanced up at Snowden, hesitant to say what was on his mind, but feeling like he couldn't help himself. "Hey, listen, I know everyone's probably been bugging you about the Johnny Leager thing, but I keep thinking about it. I knew him pretty well." He looked away, watching a clerk struggle with a Welcome flag that fluttered in the spring breeze as she tried to slide the wooden pole into its bracket on the wall outside
the shop door. "I keep going over it and over it in my mind, you know. How he died. I was just wondering if you've got any leads. I just can't imagine who would have done something like this. Johnny was a good man. Worked hard. Loved his family."

  "You think you know anything that might be helpful?" Snowden shifted his weight, standing a little taller.

  He was watching Noah more carefully now, more carefully than Noah cared to be watched; suddenly, he felt uncomfortable.

  "No, no, obviously I haven't seen him in years, I just..." Noah slipped his hands out of his pockets and rubbed them together. He didn't even know now what had made him bring up Johnny. Maybe because he had laid in bed last night thinking about him?

  Or was it because he had woken up on the floor of the garage the night Johnny Leager had been murdered and he didn't know where he'd been or what he'd done?

  It was a ridiculous thought. One that lasted only a moment before he dismissed it.

  "He was one of your parishioners, wasn't he?" Snowden said.

  "Yes, he was."

  "Did you counsel him?"

  "I counseled many parishioners in the years I was at St. Paul's."

  "That wasn't an answer, Noah."

  Snowden's directness took Noah by surprise. Noah turned to watch the young policewoman who'd just left the diner try to balance a cardboard tray of coffee and foil-wrapped sandwiches with a newspaper under her arm. "I hate even days," she called out to Snowden. "People always making smart-aleck comments about me fetchin' your darned coffee. Don't they notice odd days when we ride together you get the coffee? Even days I get it? No, they do not." She crossed the street, walking up to the two men.

  "Sergeant Swift, Noah Gibson," Snowden introduced.

  "Pleased to meet you," she said, setting the tray on the hood of the black and white cruiser.

  "Noah was the priest at St. Paul's before Father Hailey."

  She nodded. One look and Noah knew she knew the whole story.

  "So back to my question," Snowden said. "Did you counsel him?"

  Noah felt a smile tug at his mouth. "Back to my answer, Chief. I counseled many men and women in this town. I had certain responsibilities to privacy as the spiritual advisor to these citizens, and despite my fall from grace, as it was, I'm guessing I still have that responsibility." He looked up. "Why do you ask? Something going on with your investigation that the Watkins sisters and I don't know about?"

  Chapter 5

  "That son of a gun, he knows something." Snowden reached for his cup of coffee as he watched Noah from the passenger's side of the cruiser.

  Noah walked slowly down the sidewalk, his hands stuffed in his pockets, his head down, his Orioles ball cap shadowing his face.

  Delilah studied him from behind the wheel. Because even days were her days to get breakfast when she trained with the chief, that also meant she got to drive. Despite the teasing from some of her fellow officers, she didn't mind her training days. In fact, she found she liked them. Chief Calloway had a lot to offer; he was a good cop. Not half bad to look at either.

  "Don't get your boxers in a twist, Chief. He was just saying he can't be tellin' you everything Johnny Leager told him in confession, else he'd be violating some kind of priest vow he took or something."

  Snowden removed the lid from his Styrofoam coffee cup and slurped off the top of the steaming coffee. "Episcopalians don't go to confession, Delilah. That's Catholics."

  She raised both her hands as if to surrender to him, hands tiny and delicate, easily half the size of his. "How am I supposed to know? My family's been Baptist since John lost his head." She reached for her egg, scrapple, and cheese biscuit, home cooked at the diner. So far, fast food hadn't found its way to Stephen Kill, although she heard there was talk that Taco Bell was looking to buy land.

  "No." Snowden took another sip of his black coffee, still watching Noah. "He was looking guilty from the minute he brought Johnny Leager's name up. It was as if he didn't want to mention it, but felt compelled to do so."

  "If he had something to do with the man's murder, you think he would have walked up to you and started the conversation?" She frowned. "That kind of reasoning just doesn't fly with this gal, Chief." When he didn't respond, she went on. "Come on, Cora Watkins has asked me four times in the last two days if we've got any leads. You think that means she killed Johnny Leager?" She shook her head. "Naw. From what you say, any guilt Noah Gibson's carrying around could come from a hundred things. Wouldn't you feel guilty if you were him?"

  Snowden stared out the windshield. "So are we going to see Johnny Leager's shift boss this morning or aren't we?"

  "We are." She made no move to start the car. "But not until I have my breakfast. It's not safe to eat and drive. Besides, I thought we'd sit here a few minutes and see where else Mr. Gibson goes. Who else he speaks to, since he's so curious about Johnny and what we know about his murder."

  "I thought you didn't think he looked guilty." Snowden grabbed his breakfast sandwich from the cardboard tray between them and began to unwrap the foil.

  "You know me, Chief. Everyone looks guilty to me." She gave a nod in the direction of the woman Noah had stopped to speak to on the steps of the post office. "Even the nuns."

  * * *

  "Noah, it's good to see you." Sister Julie came down the old red brick steps, an armful of manila envelopes in her hand. "How are you?" She smiled, offering a one-armed hug, her pleasure seeming genuine.

  He accepted the hug, figuring he could use all the hugs he could get these days. "I'm doing okay."

  "You going to AA regularly?"

  "You're the second person to ask me that in the last five minutes."

  "Good." She grinned, tucking her mail under her arm.

  Sister Julie Anne Thompson didn't look much like a Catholic nun to him or anyone else. She didn't wear a habit or any form thereof, and she in no way resembled the little old ladies who came to mind when a person envisioned a holy sister. She was easily five foot nine, with a long mane of rich chestnut hair she wore in a ponytail, and though she was probably pushing forty, she could have easily passed for thirty with a little makeup. Still, she was pretty, and nothing about her appearance gave her away as a nun, not the blue jeans and white sneakers or the blue Nike T-shirt. The only possible telltale sign was the simple gold crucifix she wore around her neck.

  "I hope someone reminds you at least once a day to go to AA," she told him, poking him in the center of his chest with her finger. "It's got to be hard when you first get out. Probably hard the rest of your life."

  He wanted to look away, at least squirm in his sneakers, but Sister Julie wasn't the kind of woman who would let you get away with that kind of thing, so he just nodded. "So," he said, "how's the place doing?"

  Sister Julie and several women from her order and a host of volunteers ran a home for unwed mothers at the edge of town. It was one of those places that had lost favor in most small towns in the United States years ago, with many teenage unwed mothers now collecting their food stamps or other social services, flaunting their big bellies in public schools, proud of their reproductive accomplishments. But there still seemed to be at least a small need in the country for the kind of place Sister Julie and the nuns ran, where girls who chose not to have abortions or keep their babies could have some privacy for a few months once their conditions became noticeable. Young girls came and went, staying a few months, being homeschooled by the nuns until they gave birth. The babies were usually given up for adoption through Catholic social services, and then the teenagers quietly returned to their lives in Boise or Dallas to finish out high school or college, their pregnancy often unbeknownst to most family and friends. Occasionally, word drifted down Main Street that a young woman had decided to keep her baby, and she returned home with the nuns' blessings and her bundle wrapped in a pink or a blue blanket, but that didn't happen often. Sister Julie offered a sanctuary for young women to rest a few months until they could pick up their lives where they'd left off, a li
ttle older, a little sadder, and hopefully a little wiser.

  Noah had always admired what Julie and those women did, because they didn't just talk about their beliefs, they stood behind them. They didn't just tell young women they had solutions beyond the obvious, they offered solutions with kind words and actions to back them up.

  "We're good. Seven girls staying with us right now, two about to deliver." Julie brightened at once as she always did when anyone asked about Maria's Place. "Short of funding, as always, of course, but we're making ends meet. We're having a fund-raiser later in the month, a picnic and auction. You should come and bring Rachel and Mallory and Mattie."

  He grimaced. "We'll see about that; we're not exactly one big happy family right now, if you know what I mean."

  Sister Julie studied him for a moment, still standing a step above him on the stairs, so that she looked him straight in the eye. "You know, Noah, what you've been through, what you did, was terrible, it was just plain damned awful."

  He blinked. Nuns that cursed. It pleased him for some reason to think that there was still something in the world to take him by surprise. Gave him a weird sense of optimism. He studied the dirty toes of his sneakers.

  "The way I see it is that now that you're out of prison, now that you've paid your so-called debt to society, you've got two choices." She waited for him to respond.

  When the silence got unbearable, he finally met her gaze. "And what two choices might those be, Sister?" he asked, unable to hold back just a hint of sarcasm. All he could think of was that there was no way she could have any idea what he was feeling inside right now. What it was like—every day of his life—to know that he had killed two other human beings. It was pretty easy to tell people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps when you didn't know what it was like or how far down it was after they fell.

  "Well, Noah, I'm going to tell you. You can let your past sins drag you down and you can let them ruin your life and ruin the lives of those around you, those who love you: Rachel, Mattie, that cute little Mallory. Or, you can do what the good book says—you can accept atonement for your sins, you can accept the forgiveness that's been offered, stop feeling so damned sorry for yourself, and get on with the rest of your life. Get on to the living part." She waved an envelope in emphasis. "Because there're a lot of people out here who still need you. A lot of good still left to be done on this earth before you're called home. Obviously God's still got work for you, otherwise you'd have died in that car accident with the Marcuses." She finished her discourse with a firm nod of her square chin. "I'd better be going." She smiled as she passed him, as if they had just shared the most pleasant of conversations concerning no more than the amount of rainfall they could expect or the Orioles' winning record. "Have a great day. Say hi to Rachel for me, and do think about coming to the auction." She took the last two steps backward. "We're still accepting donations if you'd like to make one. Gift certificates are always nice. A nice gift basket with a bottle of wine, some cheese, some wine glasses, maybe?"