The Steep and Thorny Way(24)

Joe grabbed my left elbow from behind. “Think of everything you told me last night. Remember what it felt like to see him. What was he wearing?”

I pulled away, but my legs toppled like Joe’s card house, and my knees slammed against dirt. The air thinned. A crow laughed from the roof of the shed. I knelt in the grasses and covered my face while remembering every small detail of my father’s clothing from the night before—his crimson bow tie, the black derby, the ebony trousers and coat with gleaming glass buttons.

“Swear to God, Joe,” I said. “Swear you’re not lying to me.”

“Hanalee”—one of his knees dropped to the ground beside me—“they threw me in the pen not because of your father, but because they wanted to arrest a boy like me without shaming my father and the town.” He laid a hand on my back, right below my left shoulder, and I flinched at first, but then he spoke in a voice that reached deep into my insecurities. “Help me to set things right,” he said, “and then we’ll free ourselves of this godforsaken place. There’s got to be somewhere better out there.”

His hand felt warm against me, and I closed my eyes behind my fingers. I relaxed my muscles and rolled back my shoulders.

“Your father’s dying words were a request to keep you safe,” he said in a voice just a hair above a whisper, “and I intend to honor his wishes. I’m not the depraved sinner people around here make me out to be. I just want a murderer and a liar to get what he deserves—to pay for what he did to me. What he did to you.”

I opened my eyes to the grasses rippling in a breeze. All around me, the wind whispered and murmured through the trees. A black garter snake slithered through the undergrowth no more than two feet away, and I didn’t even wince. Joe stroked my back, and I arched my spine and leaned into his touch like a Siamese cat.

“I want to test him,” I said.

“How?”

“I’ll tell him a story that mirrors what we think might have happened. Observe his reactions.” I rose to my feet and turned to face Joe, my left arm still slack from the comfort of his hand.

Joe scowled and stood up. “I’m not going to wait around while you tell your stepdaddy a damn bedtime story. Didn’t you hear Laurence? He wants me out of here.”

“I’ve got it.” I straightened my posture. “David’s murder of Uriah, to marry Bathsheba.”

Joe squeezed his hands into fists by his sides. “I’m not going to wait while you read Bible passages, either.”

“I need more proof before I do anything else, Joe. I’ll test him tonight.”

He wrapped his arms around his ribs and glanced at the wind rattling through the trees.

“Just give me tonight,” I said, “and I’ll have my decision by tomorrow. If he fails this test, I’ll believe in that vision of my father. I’ll believe you.” I walked two steps toward him and lowered my voice to ensure no one else would hear. “I’ll help you get revenge.”





CHAPTER 9





SEE WHAT I SEE


MAMA FROWNED AT ME OVER A sheet of rolled-out dough when she caught me stealing in through the back kitchen door. Flour covered her hands and apron and made the air taste dry.

“Where were you?” she asked, setting down the rolling pin. “You had me worried sick when you ran off angry after talking about Joe.”

“Is Deputy Fortaine gone?”

“He left shortly after you ran away. Where were you?”

“Just out for fresh air.” I hustled across the kitchen and toward the main hallway.

“Hanalee,” said Mama, stopping me dead in my tracks. Her tone carried a strange calmness that worried me more than if she had shouted. “I know . . .” She tucked her chin against her chest and cleared her throat. “I know I’ve never told you this, but before you came along, your father and I tried for several years to conceive a baby, without success. We even lost two infants, just a few months into the pregnancies.”

My mouth fell open. “Y-y-you did?”

She brushed flour off her palms and leaned the small of her back against the edge of the wooden countertop. “People around me, even well-meaning ones, hinted there might be something unnatural about your father and me having children together.”

I pressed my lips closed.

“But,” she continued, “instead of listening to prejudice and superstition, I educated myself about conception and birth. In fact, Uncle Clyde himself counseled your father and me on this matter. He even provided me with medical textbooks.”

“I don’t see what any of this—”

“I became well versed in the subject, you see.” She wiped her hands on her apron, leaving behind streaks of white. “Science taught me that sometimes—no matter who might make up the members of a couple—it takes a while for a woman to become in the family way. Other times, it happens the moment a woman first lies with a man.”

“Why are you telling me all of this right now?” I asked.

She walked over to the kitchen table and picked up my sketch pad. “I found this drawing in your room.” She turned the pad toward me and showed me the picture I’d drawn of Joe, standing in an indistinct body of water as high as his hip bones.