Near the Bone(34)

Her eye no longer throbbed, but it hurt where William had made and stitched the cut. The lid was slowly peeling back, however, and she could see faint, cloudy shapes again. This was slightly disorienting, as one eye could see clearly and the other couldn’t.

William put on his boots and then took one of the bottles from the table, tucking it in his pocket. “Going to take that trap out and lay it now.”

Mattie glanced at the heavy-looking metal object. “Do you need me to help you carry it?”

He snorted a little laugh. “You’ve got no muscles to carry something like that, Mattie my girl. I bought a sled when I was in town, in any case. How do you think I carried all those things up the mountain by myself?”

She didn’t answer, because that little laugh had made her pause. When was the last time she heard William laugh? Years. It had been years.

He’s never been so happy as he is right now, preparing to go out and kill an animal he’s never seen and doesn’t understand.

He opened the cabin door and pointed out into the snow so Mattie could see the sled he’d bought. Its runners were shiny and clean. William lugged the trap out and placed it on the wooden platform. Then he waved at her and went off, pulling the sledge behind him, whistling as he went.





CHAPTER EIGHT



Mattie watched through the front window until he disappeared into the woods. Then she abandoned the washtub and hurried into the bedroom, kneeling down before the trunk to examine the lock. It looked like an ordinary lock to her, but she couldn’t imagine how she might get it open.

You have to pick the lock.

Pick the lock—a strange phrase. It meant something, something just out of reach, but she couldn’t grasp it. It wasn’t something she’d ever done, she was certain of that. No, it was something she’d seen, but the person she pictured in her mind wasn’t familiar and appeared distant—physically distant, like Mattie was watching the person from a long way away.

In her mind’s eye Mattie saw the person—a woman—inserting a pin from her hair inside the lock. The woman moved the pin around carefully, her ear pressed against the door so that she could hear something.

The pin catching the lock.

Would that work on this trunk? Mattie thought it might, but whether or not she was skilled enough to actually open it was another matter.

She decided to leave the trunk for the moment. William had only gone out to lay the trap and would return soon. She was supposed to be washing the laundry.

Mattie collected the pile of dirty clothes from the corner of the bedroom and carried them out to the washtub. She pushed up the sleeves of her dress and used a cake of soap to scrub one of William’s shirts against the washboard. After she completed washing and rinsing each item, she squeezed out the cloth and then clipped it on the short line of rope that William had strung in front of the fire for her.

She checked the pockets of William’s pants for any forgotten items. He was always leaving things in his pockets and then blaming her when they were ruined by the wash water. She felt a thin roll of paper in one and pulled it out.

It was a roll of money.

Mattie hadn’t seen money for a long time but as soon as she saw the tightly wrapped bills she recognized them for what they were. The bill on the outside had a “100” printed on it.

Her mouth went dry. She should give this to William the moment he came home. She was afraid to unroll the bills and see exactly how much was there but it appeared to be a great deal. He’d surely notice that it was missing. He might even have left it in his pocket to test her.

The idea made her heart gallop in her chest. Could William know—could he suspect that she wanted to leave him? He always seemed to know things about her, secret things that she tried to hide in her heart. Had he looked into her eyes yesterday morning, after she emerged from the outhouse where she’d hidden all night, and known that she was going to escape?

No, no. You’re being ridiculous. You’re crediting him with powers he doesn’t have. If William thought you were going to leave him, he never would have left you alone yesterday.

Mattie took a deep breath to calm herself. She needed to stop panicking, stop acting the way she used to act around William. If she was scared or if she acted like she was guilty, then he would know that she was up to something. It was so important that he not know. It was so important that he was perfectly happy with her right up until the moment she slipped out the door and into the night.

With money I could go far, far away. I could pay someone to take me far from this mountain and William would never find me no matter how hard he looked. I would change my name—

(change it back, change it back to Samantha)

—and he’d be furious but he wouldn’t be able to reach me.

But what to do with the money in the meantime? These were the pants William had worn the day before, so he’d simply forgotten about the roll of bills. But he wouldn’t forget forever.

Mattie’s hands were damp and the water from her fingers was seeping into the top layer. She put the roll down on the kitchen table and wiped her hands dry with a cloth.

What she needed to do was hide the money, but in such a way that it wouldn’t appear to be hidden in case William came across it. It had to look like the roll had accidentally dropped from his pocket.

It would be easier if Mattie knew exactly where he’d walked the night before, but she’d been asleep when he came home.