Driving around town, I check out various places, getting myself acquainted with the small town of Huttonville, and I like it. After growing up in a small town, I thought that getting married and moving to the city would be refreshing, but now I admit that I always missed small town living. After having a nice dinner at a quaint little restaurant, and receiving several one-off glares for dining alone, I head back to the motel to get started on the job search. The first listing that catches my eye is for a lead hand on a ranch. At first, I lose my nerve, but then I go for it. What have I got to lose? Nothing…literally. The owner invites me for an interview, and I put on a fresh change of clothes and head out the door.
Before going into the house, I check my face in the rearview mirror. The necklace holding my wedding bands is sticking out of my shirt, so I poke it back underneath, and check my breath, making sure that my resumes are still in my breast pocket. Surprising me, my stomach is doing flip-flops. I haven’t been interviewed in so many years that I can’t even remember what it’s like. Luckily, the career counsellor did some role-playing with me, so I’m a little bit more prepared than I would have been had I not visited the Career Center.
I’m invited into the house, which has the interior closed off, except for the study, and just the fresh smell of wood and horses brings me back to my childhood. The owner is accompanied by her brother, and the similarities between them are striking. They both look like they’ve been born and raised on a ranch, with telling farmer’s tans, bright eyes, sun bleached hair, and no-nonsense attitudes. Their twang is slightly more pronounced than mine, seeing as I lived in the city.
We’re not five minutes into the interview when we hear a gunshot, not at close range, but close enough, like, less than a half-mile away. Laura and her brother Will’s instincts match my own, as all three of us run like hell out the door. To my chagrin, a lady’s screaming follows the gunshot. From the sounds of the shot, it’s a hunting rifle, not a handgun, which means that it’s either gone off by accident, since we’re nowhere near hunting grounds, or someone used it for more grim purposes.
The children circling the area are panicked and screaming, but the woman screaming from inside the house trumps them all. Blood-curdling screams come from her mouth, like those you’d hear in a horror movie. Goosebumps form on my arms as we run inside the house. What we find there is horrifying and heartbreaking at the same time.
A man, I’m guessing, has chosen to sit in his armchair beside the fireplace…and shoot himself. Just when you think your day could not be any worse. This man’s day was truly worse than anyone’s.
“Oh, God, Louie!” Laura cries out, running to the deceased’s wife’s side. She embraces her, while the woman practically collapses in Laura’s arms. Looking over at Will, I see that he’s on the phone, and I hear him giving details to the authorities.
“Come on, ladies.” I say, walking towards them, trying to avoid stepping in the puddles of blood and unmentionable biological matter. “Let’s get you both out of here.” Wrapping both arms around them, I support them walking towards the front door, where several neighbors have gathered. I see a lady, about Laura’s age. “Can you please keep the children out? They don’t need to see this.”
The lady nods. Another man with clearly no tact, approaches me. “Louie off himself?”
I don’t answer him, but I say instead. “Can you please help this lady with the children?”
“Sure thing.” He nods, and I hear him yell out that everyone who follows him gets ice cream. A point for him.
Laura is all but holding the deceased’s wife up. “Myrtle,” she says to her. “How’s your back?”
Myrtle nods that it’s okay.
“Do you need to sit?” Laura asks.
There are two chairs on the patio. I grab them and bring them to the girls. “Thank you.” Laura says, as we hear sirens approach. She addresses Myrtle as they both sit down. “You and the kids can stay with me tonight, okay?”
Myrtle nods.
At the sound of the sirens, Will comes out the front door. He speaks to the ambulance driver like they’re pals from school or something, pulling him inside the house. I follow. “Hey, Troy. Yeah, we heard the gunshot and scooted right on over. Found Louie like this.” Will says.
Another paramedic comes into the house, pushing a gurney, and I can see that police have arrived, too. An officer is talking to Myrtle and Laura outside. Will and I stand off to the side, while they put the remains of Louie’s body onto the gurney, into a body bag, and zip it up tight. One of the police officers enters as they’re zipping the bag. “Hey, Will.” The police officer says.
“Hey, Ian. Nice to see you. Sorry for the circumstances.” He shakes Ian’s hand.
Ian gestures with his chin to the paramedics and looks at Will. “You suspect foul play? Think I should get the Chief out here?”
One of the paramedics answers. “I don’t think so, Ian. His head was blown off. He must have put the barrel in his mouth. Myrtle can barely stand up with her back. She isn’t capable of doing that, nor are the kids.”
Ian addresses Will and I. “Nobody else was here?”
“No, sir.” I say. “Just the kids were outside playing. Thank God they didn’t see anything.”
Ian nods. “That right?” he checks with Will.
“Yep. Just Myrtle was standing here next to him, screaming like her husband shot himself.”
Another nod from Ian. “Okay, boys. Take him to the morgue. We’ll get the coroner to do his thing.” He addresses the paramedics. “I’ll need an official statement from you both.” He says to us.
“No problem.” I say and Will nods.
After we give our statements to Ian, he observes the unsightly mess. “I’ll have Pearl and her team come over here and clean this place up. Poor Myrtle isn’t in a state to do that.” A pause. “Myrtle and the kids got a place to stay tonight?”
Will answers. “Laura’s invited them to stay at the ranch.”
“Good.” He frowns. “Take care.”
“Yeah, take care, Ian.” Will says, and then he looks at me. “So, you’re new in town?”
“Yeah,”
“I’ve lived here my whole life, and this is the first suicide I’ve ever seen. It’s a shame it had to happen on your first day here.”
“It happens.” I frown. “And, technically yesterday was my first day. I stayed overnight last night.” I tell him which motel.
“Ah. Still. Don’t let this sway your idea of Huttonville. Really. Aside from the odd nosey and opinionated person, this town’s beautiful. I’d never think of leaving it.”
I smile, since I don’t know how else to respond.
“Come on.” Will says. “Let’s get out of here. It’s starting to smell.”
Walking out of the house, we see that Laura has managed to settle Myrtle down some. Laura sees Will and says. “Would you stay with her for a minute? I’m just going to run into the house and get some things for them for overnight.”
I lift a hand. “Ma’am, you don’t want to go in there. What do you need? Pyjamas? Toiletries for the mother and children?”
“You won’t know where anything is.” Laura states.
“I’m sure I can figure it out.”
“I’ll go with you.” Will offers.
We head back in, avoiding the living room, and just go straight upstairs. The upstairs has four bedrooms and one bathroom. Immaculately clean for having such a large family. Two bedrooms have bunk beds and one bedroom has two cribs. “How many kids do they have?”
“Six. Two set of twins, two and four years old, a six year old and an eight year old.”
Holy crap.
“You grab toothbrushes and things from the bathroom first, and I’ll go find a bag to put all the stuff in. Should be something in the master bedroom for that.”
Thankfully, the toothbrushes are all in cups with holes in them, so I grab both cups, the tube of toothpaste sitting on
the counter, and Will tells me that he found a bag. We both make a team effort of finding pyjamas for the kids, and when we’re done, we head back outside. “We got everything.” Will says. “How about you and Grayson get Myrtle settled and get the place ready for the kids, while I go down to the ice cream parlor and get the kids.”
Laura nods.
As we get back to the ranch, Laura draws a bath for Myrtle, while we go to the guest house out back. “You sure it’s a good idea to leave her alone?” I ask.
“She’s okay. She had her rosary beads out and she was praying. God will take care of her.”
I have visions of Myrtle following in her husband’s footsteps and drowning herself in the lion’s foot tub, but I keep my fears to myself. So, I change the subject as we begin pulling apart the two double beds in the guest bedrooms in the guest house, leaving them on the floor, in various places, to make enough sleeping area for eight people. “Did you know Louie well?”
She gives me a look that I can’t decipher. “Yes, I did.”
“Any idea that he was troubled at all?”
She looks like she’s holding back tears. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I know this is painful. I don’t mean to pry.”
Swallowing, she nods. “It’s okay.” She changes the subject as she goes into a closet in the hallway of the two-bedroom guest house and pulls out a load of bedding. As we make the beds, she asks. “What was that…thing that you did to the horses…to help them settle?”
“When we were running to the house, you mean?”
She nods.
“My first horse was a stallion. He wasn’t broken in when I got him. Just to put a saddle on him took more time than I had patience for as a young boy.” I explain. “I tried so many times to get him to settle, and it wasn’t until I made that noise that he finally learned to calm. It started with a little whistle, but it turned into a kind of whistle-hum-sigh technique that I started using with other horses I was around, too. It doesn’t work with them all, but I always figure it’s worth trying.”
“Did you teach it to anyone?”
I shake my head no. “I’m not sure if it would work. But I could teach you if you like.”
She smiles as we put the bedding on the last bed.
“Did Louie have…an insurance policy or anything?” I ask, suddenly coming back to tonight’s events.
“Not that I’m aware of.” Laura answers. “I know…Louie was having financial problems, so I don’t imagine that he did. He didn’t even have the sense to take out health insurance with six kids and a sick wife.”
I rest my thumbs in the loops on my jeans. “Oh, Jesus. How’s she going to manage?”
“I’ll give her some money.”
“Well…didn’t he have job? I mean, I’m sure he’s got some pay coming his way.”
She looks at me and says something that chills me to my very core.
“Grayson…Louie was my Lead Ranch Hand.”
Chapter 3
Laura
The look on Grayson’s face when I tell him that he’s replacing a man who just committed suicide, I’ll never forget. If he walks out that door right now, I’d give him his blessing. At first, he’s quiet, as we finish tucking in the last of the sheets on the bed. Leaving him alone with his thoughts, I say nothing, and continue with the task at hand.
“Can I ask you something?” He asks after a long silence.
“Sure.”
“What were the circumstances of him leaving, and how long ago was it?”
I frown. “Those are fair questions.” Taking the pyjamas out of the bag, I start to lay a pair on each pillow. “I let him go today. He’d been with me for years. It’s nothing that I’m proud of, but when you’ve run a ranch by yourself for the last ten years, your threshold for trust wanes.”
“He lied to you?”
“Worse. He tried to steal from me.” I lift a hand. “He had noble intentions in doing so, mind you, but he tried all the same. I can’t have a person I can’t trust working for me.”
Grayson nods once. “I would have done the same, ma’am.”
I look at him bluntly. “You would have fired a man for trying to steal your brooch to pay for his wife’s back surgery?”
“You saying you regret it now, given what’s happened?”
“I don’t…I don’t know.”
He draws in a deep breath. “It’s my belief that a man who takes his own life in broad daylight, with his kids and his wife home, is weak, and has been weak for a long time. A man who does that is so weak, he can’t even put enough thought in it to do it discreetly, and at least take his hunting rifle out to a wooded area first.” He clears his throat. “You said yourself that he wasn’t smart enough to get health insurance. He clearly didn’t bother using any birth control. And he kills himself using his rifle, with his kids spitting distance from the front of the door, his wife even closer. Worst of all, he’s so weak, he’s gone and left his sick wife with six kids to care for on her own. Naw, you did the right thing, ma’am. A man like that has no business here.”
Digesting his opinion, I’m silent. “I thought a lot of Louie. Until today, he never did anything to betray me. He was the hardest working hand I had. He went over and above for me and the ranch.” A pause. “I was taken off guard when he stood up and confessed.”
“Well, then that’s the smartest thing he did.” Grayson adds.
I decide to change the subject. “I’m sure you want to head home. Thank you for sticking around to help. I apologize that this happened tonight. I’m sure it’s no way to start your stay here.”
“That’s fine, ma’am. I’m in no rush.”
“All the same, can you leave me with your references? I don’t think they were listed on your resume.”
“They’re at the bottom, actually.” Grayson corrects. “You probably didn’t get that far before we heard the gunshot.”
I nod. “Okay. I’ll call you in a couple of days and let you know.”
“I appreciate that.” He takes a step towards me and shakes my hand. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Mrs. Warner.”
“Laura, please.”
“Laura.” He gives me a little smile before I walk him out.
“Oh, you’re hat. You left it in the study.” I say as we reach the front of the house. “I’ll go get it for you.”
After I bring him his hat, he tips his head to place it on his head, and a necklace with two rings slips out of his shirt. He doesn’t seem to notice, even though my eyes dart to it.
“Good evening, ma’am.” He says. “It was nice meeting you and your brother.”
“I’ll tell him you said so.”
“Thank you.”
A half an hour later, Will has the kids corralled in the guest house, while I give Myrtle one of her sedatives. Within twenty minutes, after a bedtime story from Will, all seven of the Prescotts are asleep in my guest house. Will follows me back into the house, and I open all the pocket doors. One of Louie’s hats is hanging on the back of the bathroom door. He’d left it there when he’d come in to have a look at my clogged toilet the other day.
“Don’t.” Will says to me, seeing me look at it.
“Don’t what.” I say, playing innocent.
“I know what you’re thinking, and don’t go there.” Will says firmly. “The man was a coward, a hard-working coward, but a coward all the same.” He states. “What man leaves his sick wife with six kids all day, anyhow?”
“Myrtle is keen on kids. Always was.” Louie joined me long before the kids were born. He and Myrtle weren’t even married when he came to work here. They stayed in his quarters until the house was ready. It was dumb luck that miserable Miss Kennedy up the street croaked the week that the position came available. Ironic, because it was the same week that I lost Quentin. His obituary was listed in the same edition of the paper as the job posting was.
“You oughta get Miss Bee over there. Give her a hand with all those
kidlets.” Will says, referring to the nanny that we had as children. She was very young when she looked after us, and is still in town. “She’s only in her fifties, isn’t she?”
“Last I heard she was working in the library part-time. I’ll give her a call.”
“Myrtle’s going to need help, and you’re too busy over here. Let’s be real.”
“I know it.” I admit.
Hanging Louie’s hat back up on the door, I walk to the study, and Will follows me.
“So, what do you think of Grayson?” Will asks me.
“He seems to know his way around a hunting rifle.” I snuffle, going for comedic, but failing miserably.
“He sure doesn’t mind sticking his neck out to help.” Will points out. “He could have said sayonara when he heard the gunshot, but he nearly outran me to Louie’s house.
“He did something really neat with the horses. Made some noise with his mouth. Calmed them right down when the gun went off.”
“Oh yeah?” Will says. His interest is piqued. He bends forward and takes a copy of Grayson’s resume in his hand, studying it. “What kind of noise?”
“He said he’d learned it growing up, when his stallion wouldn’t calm. It was kind of a whistle, but even though it was loud enough that the horses and I could hear it over the screaming, it was a quaint enough sound that it soothed them so I wouldn’t have to do any damage control.”
“Knows his way around horses then. There’s proof.” Will takes his phone out of his pocket, and punches something in. “I get a good vibe from him myself. Even before all the hoopla happened.”
“He’s married, or was, anyway.”
Will looks at me. “Why’s that matter?”
No More Tears Page 2
