by Jim Beegle
“Anything wrong?” she inquired.
“No. I was just thinking. If you sleep in your clothes, they’ll get wrecked. If you don’t sleep in something, you’ll freeze tonight.” He thought for a moment. “I’ll see if I can find you something to sleep in.” Before she could say anything he disappeared out the door of her room and down the walkway. He was only gone a moment and returned carrying a large light- and dark-blue flannel shirt. “Here,” he said offering it to her. “This is one of mine. You are welcomed to it if you like.” Marin took the proffered shirt and looked at it. “I washed it, it’s clean,” he told her with a smile. “Need anything else?” Marin just shook her head. “If you do I am just down the hallway.” He indicated the direction with a jerk of his thumb over his shoulder. “Just yell.” He smiled again. She returned it with one of her own. “Well, I’ll leave you to it then.” He started to walk out but Marin stopped him. She leaned into him and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.
“That’s for being a nice guy.” Mark felt his face flush and was grateful for the lack of light in the room. He wished her a good night and closed the door behind him. Marin sat down on the bed and kicked her shoes off. The combination of the long drive and the wine had now made her realize just how nice it would be to go to sleep instead of driving home. She got up and folded the covers down on the bed. She undressed, folding her clothes and laying them across a chair. She stood for a moment in her underwear and shivered. Mark was right; it was too cold to sleep like this. She picked up the shirt he had left her from the foot of the bed and slipped in on. It was much too big for her if she had intended it to be anything but a nightshirt. The same thing that made it unusable as a shirt made it the perfect nightshirt. She buttoned it quickly, turned off the light on the dresser, and climbed into the bed with the cool, well, cold clean sheets. She snuggled deep into the layers of covers, pulling them up tightly around her chin. She lay there, still, and began to notice some things. The slight aroma of Mark’s pipe tobacco rising from the shirt. He must have been smoking his pipe at some time when he was standing close to it. She liked the smell and was thinking about it as she drifted off to sleep.
Marin was startled awake by a noise. The room was very dark and she sat up in bed and was instantly confused as to where she was. It took a moment for her to remember the trip to Runaway Bay and orient herself. She sat there in bed and listened. She heard the noise again. Something like a crack of wood. Then she thought she could smell the slight odor of smoke. The first thought that crossed her mind was a fire in the house. She got out of bed, not really sure what to do. Her feet touched the cold floor and she shivered. In the darkness, she slowly crossed the room while trying to remember the layout of the furniture. When she got to the door she just stood and listened. The noise was gone and the smell of smoke had faded but was still present in the air. Slowly, trying not to make any noise, she opened the door just a crack and peered out. Her eyes were instantly drawn to the light and movement in the living room. Mark was closing the chain mesh covering the fireplace. He put down a small hatchet that he had used to split a larger piece of wood and walked to a chair still within her view. He sat down in it, picked up his pipe, tamped the tobacco in it, and lit it with a lighter from the small table by the chair. When wisps of smoke began coming from the bowl, Mark put the lighter down, leaned back into the chair, and picked up the papers Marin had brought with her. She stood there and watched him for a minute or two. All of her concerns put to rest, she closed the door as slowly as she had opened it and went back to bed.
* * *
There was something about the air away from the city that caused people to rise early in the morning. Mark was, by nature an early riser. The mornings were his favorite time of day. But for some reason, he found it especially hard to stay in bed when he was out here. The digital clock on the nightstand read five-thirty. With a routine similar to the one he had in Dallas, Mark got up and directed his first effort of the new day to make coffee. In consideration of his houseguest, he put on a robe and tried to make as little noise as possible as puttered around the kitchen. When the coffee was well on its way to being brewed, he returned to his shower. He dressed in the same clothes he had worn the night before and once more headed downstairs. He stopped in the kitchen just long enough to get a large cup of the black brew before grabbing his hat and heading out the kitchen door.
There wasn’t much more snow on the ground now than there had been when he talked Marin into staying for the night. The sky had cleared sometime in the early morning hours and the stars showed clearly. Mark made his way to the barn. He grabbed an old coffee can and filled it with feed from a wooden bin with a hinged top. He walked out into the corral area and began spreading it on the snow-covered ground. Within a few seconds of his arrival with the feed, gobbling turkeys began to descend into the corral. They immediately began eating the feed, oblivious of the provider. When the coffee can was once again empty Mark walked to their trough and kicked at the thin layer of ice that had formed on top of the water. He got a bucket and filled it half full with water from a faucet on the other side of the barn. When he had filled the trough he took the empty bucket and the coffee can and replaced them in the barn. He leaned against the fence rail and watched as the turkeys enjoyed their breakfast. He stood there drinking his coffee and found himself once again lost in thought over the millions of dollars in his name in a bank in Nassau.
He had sat up for a good period of time after Marin had gone to bed and thoroughly read the papers she had brought him. They had contained little more information than she had told him before dinner. He was no closer to a decision of what to do now than he had been days ago, but at least now he was beginning to consider options. The first was to look upon the fortune as a lucky windfall and spend it. The second was to take the money and try to do some good with it. Cecil would like that, and it had a good deal of appeal to him. The third and final thought was to simply find a way to return it to the rightful owners. Intertwined with all these options was still the question of what to tell Amy, if anything at all. He was still pondering all this when the cold of the early morning began to cut through his coat. His coffee cup was empty and there was only one solution to that problem and it was in the kitchen.
He could smell the food cooking before he opened the door. Inside he hung his hat on the hook and removed his jacket. Instead of being dark as he had left it, all the lights were on and Marin was standing at the stove with her back to him. She was still wearing the shirt he had given her the night before, but below the waist, she was wearing a pair of jeans. They had been a pair that he had bought for Cecil. The last few months of his life Cecil had lost a good deal of weight. Mark had bought him some clothes at Wal-Mart and kept them here for him. He looked at her for a moment and thought that Marin looked much better in them then Cecil ever had.
“Mornin’,” he said as Marin turned with a pan in her hands. Not hearing him come in, the sudden sound of his voice had startled her so much she almost dropped the pan. She recovered in time to keep this from happening and put it down on the counter. Mark walked to the coffee pot and refilled his cup.
“God,” she gasped, “you scared me to death.” Mark sipped his coffee and leaned against the counter. “I hope you don’t mind. I decided to return the favor from dinner and fix breakfast.”
“I don’t mind at all.”
“Good,” she said with a smile. “How do you want your eggs?” Mark told her scrambled and took his cup and seated himself at the table that was already set. In a few minutes, they were both eating breakfast. While he ate Mark tried to remember the last time Amy had cooked breakfast for him.
“I also hope you don’t mind,” she said to him when they finished eating, “I borrowed a pair of Amy’s jeans.”
“Oh, I don’t mind, but they aren’t Amy’s.” This caused Marin to look up at Mark with an odd expression on her face. It took him a minute to figure out what it meant and then he laughed.
> “No, it’s not what you think. I have had a regular guest here off and on but it wasn’t of the female variety.” A look of relief crossed her face and was replaced almost immediately with one of more questions. Mark fetched the coffee pot and refilled both their cups. Once he sat down again he began to tell Marin the story of his friend Cecil. Not the whole story, just the part from the accident up to the funeral. He was careful as he told it to make sure that there was no way to draw a correlation between Cecil and David Cameron. Two hours later, when he finished, Mark could tell that Marin was moved by his tale.
“Do you miss him?” she asked when Mark stopped to drink his now cold coffee.
“More than I ever imagined.” He said, not really to Marin but more to himself.
The sun was well up in the sky when they walked out of the house to Marin’s car. “Thanks again for the information. It will be a big help. Now, don’t forget! I want to know how much time you have in this. And count last night too. The guys I work for can afford it.”
“It was my pleasure. Thanks for dinner, and letting me stay.”
“Thanks for staying and breakfast.” He hugged her again this time without the awkwardness of the first hug the night before. She got into the car as Mark held the door. “Listen, if you happen to find out anything else about this David Cameron guy or the money, email it to me if you would.” He took out a piece of paper and started to write his email address on it. Before he could finish she reminded him she already had it.
“I will send you whatever else I find. “Oh, she said looking down at her legs, “I will get the clothes back to you too.” He had told her when she was getting ready to leave that she could wear the stuff she had on. It would be much more comfortable to drive back in jeans than try to wear the office attire she had come out in. He didn’t have to tell her that it would be best if she did not try getting them back to him through Amy.
After she drove off Mark returned to the barn intending to finish replacing the starter. He also wanted to give some more time to the ever-growing problem in his mind of the money. The work went better in the daylight and within forty-five minutes he had the truck running again. He was putting his tools away when Mr. Willies came walking through the barn door with Mark’s mail in his hand. Mark knew that delivering the mail was not what prompted the trip. The Willies watched over him like he was their son. He was sure they had seen Marin’s car arrive yesterday. He was equally sure that they had seen it leave just an hour ago. Mr. Willies was here on an information gathering chore. Mrs. Willies was in the command center across the fields waiting for the return report. They exchanged hellos and Mr. Willies followed Mark outside to the split-rail fence of the corral. Mark slowly packed tobacco into his pipe and waited. He didn’t have to wait long.
“Had some company?” Mr. Willies asked as casually as he could.
“Yep, a lady that works with Amy. She was helping me with a project I am working on.” Mark lit his pipe. Mr. Willies just nodded as if to say that this was something that was easily passed on to Mrs. Willies.
“She drive all the way back out here from Dallas this morning?” It was all Mark could do to suppress a grin.
“No, we worked kinda late and when I realized that it had snowed I insisted that she not try to make the drive back last night. She spent the night in Cecil’s old room.” Mr. Willies was watching Mark as he talked. Mark knew he was looking for those signs that every parent can detect when the truth isn’t being spoken. It took a minute of close examination for him to be satisfied that the truth was being told.
“Well, that was a good thing for you to do. Can’t be too careful, especially with the folks we care about.” Not for the first time since he had known the Willies did Mark have to resist the internal pressure to revert back to the tact he used to take with his own dad. But the subtle message from “dad” Willies was clear: It don’t matter how bad things get at home, stepping out on your wife is never a good thing to do. The lesson continued. “Sometimes doing the right things aren’t always the easy thing to do, but it always makes it easy to sleep at night.” For some reason, Mr. Willies’ comments caused Mark’s mind not go to Marin and Amy, but to the bank in Nassau. Mark pulled on his pipe, thinking for a long moment.
“You always do the right things?”
“Nope,” Mr. Willis answered honestly, “but I always try to. I’ll tell you somethin’, Mark. The good Lord made us so that deep down inside us we always know the right thing whether we do it or not. Some folks calls it their conscience. Others calls it their moral compass. Whatever you call it, you always know what right and wrong is, and what you are supposed to do when faced with confusing situations in your life.”
“Sometimes the temptations are pretty great.” Mark said, more to himself.
“Oh, I can tell you they are.” Mr. Willies agreed with him. “Especially when it involves a whole lot of money or people we love or think we love.” Mark knew this last little bit once again was aimed at him. He looked very hard at the older man, taking in what he had just told him. He knew for a fact this was not just something Mr. Willies believed, but Mark had seen him practice it as well. The memory of that application of the lesson being offered caused something to stir in Mark. A question that he suddenly wanted to know the answer to slipped out of his brain and into his mouth.
“Did you ever consider not paying the bills from Danny’s hospital stay. I mean keeping the farm and just let the bill collectors try to get their money some other way?” Mr. Willies looked at Mark before answering.
“Sure I did. In fact, I still do from time to time. I see the other farmers in the spring, busting up the ground, getting ready to plant. I listen to them at the diner talking about what the crops ’ll bring this year at market, and if we get an early or late rain in the spring. Sometimes I wish I still had my place and could join in the conversations, but it wouldn’t be right. If I had let the bills go then maybe somebody else would have had to do without. What if the doctor needed the money to feed his family? What if the hospital could buy some of the equipment they needed to save some other kid’s life? I don’t think I could sleep well at night knowing somethin’ like that could have happened.”
Mr. Willies was looking across the fields at his house as he finished speaking. Mark turned to look at his friend, wondering not for the first time where a man who spent his whole life digging in the dirt and taking care of animals had gotten so much wisdom.
Mark could make a collection of silicon and diodes do all kinds of wonders with the things that he knew. People like Amy and her friends made a good living from their wits and knowledge of finance, but it all seemed to pale when he considered Mr. Willies and the folks who lived in Runaway Bay. They had wisdom tempered by compassion.
The lesson finished for the time being, their conversation drifted to the truck and the new starter, the weather, and all manner of things that neighbors talk about. Mark invited Mr. Willies in for a cup of coffee, but he said he had to get back home. Mark knew that Mr. Willies could go home now and tell Mrs. Willies that he had been behaving and that, just in case, the proper amount of advice had been given out to keep him on the straight and narrow. When Mr. Willies left, Mark tossed the old starter into the truck to take it back into town.
All in all, it had been a profitable day already, Mark thought as he pulled the truck onto the highway that would take him into town. He had gotten the starter replaced without any more trouble or injury to his body. He had managed to convince Mr. Willies that, while his marriage was still in an awful state, he was still honoring it for the time being. He also knew something else now. He knew what he had to do with the money. Just exactly how he would do it still had to be worked out, but what to do was as firmly settled in his mind as the new starter was to the block of the engine of the old pickup truck.
Chapter Six
Mark returned from his trip to town and parked the newly repaired truck back in the barn. With the issue of the truck repair
behind him and the decision on what to do with the money fixed in his mind, getting down to business on the software would be a much easier task now. Not that he had all the issues surrounding the money worked out yet, but the basic decision was now set. The actual “how’s” and “when’s” were more a problem of timing and logistics—something that he was much more comfortable dealing with. Besides, he really did need to get the software and the documentation done for the meeting by Monday and it was still pretty cold outside. The prospect of sitting inside by the fire and working on the computer for the rest of the day was much more appealing than anything that awaited him outside.
Just as Sandy had suspected, Mark’s first act of “getting to work” on the software was to start a new pot of strong coffee and find a CD for the stereo. The double live album by Lynyrd Skynyrd was in the charger with the volume from the stereo’s amp cranked up to a point that hovered just under the level of pain. The dishes, still in the drain rack from dinner, rattled away as Mark banged out the code and the boys in the band belted out music. He wrote and rewrote line after line of what would appear to most people to be endless gibberish. It went on for hours until finally the need for sleep caught up with him. It was almost two o’clock Sunday morning before he finally committed his final work to his Dropbox account and headed off to bed. Because he had gotten out of bed so early, or that he was mentally tired from the coding, or that issues in his mind were settled to a point where they no longer offered a distraction to him, Mark quickly drifted off to sleep.
Even considering the fact that he had sat up far into the morning, Mark did not really sleep in. He was awake and up only a few hours later than he had been the morning before when Marin was still there. Without much thought, Mark went through his morning ritual of coffee, shower, and clothes. He knew that he could not screw around too long. He still had to make the drive back into Dallas and to the airport. Putting the laptop into his briefcase and placing that by the kitchen door so he would not forget it was his first and most important task, immediately after drinking enough coffee to make sure that he could function. While packing the briefcase he once more reminded himself to put his passport away when he returned to Highland Park. He shrugged to himself. It really didn’t hurt anything to keep it with him.
