Chapter 8
Poolesville
Monday, April 7, 1924
“Next stop, Poolesville,” Jake said. “All aboard.” April climbed onto the seat beside him and he flicked the reins. It was six miles into town on quiet roads and Bertie settled into a comfortable rhythm right away, even though Jake couldn’t remember the last time the mule had pulled a cart.
“Well the wheels haven’t fallen off yet,” he said as they rounded the first bend.
“Wait until we hit a rut,” April said.
Jake had spent Sunday afternoon replacing the seat and footrest so the two-wheeled cart could accommodate a driver and passenger. April had repaired the worn traces and sewn new padding onto the breastcollar. They’d set planks from the basement across the lock to form a bridge. Now it was time to test the vehicle he planned to drive back to Sharpsburg on the towpath. Maybe by the time Gladys was healed, the towpath would be in better shape as well. After the visit from Doc Cushing, Jake was feeling more confident that Gladys would be able to make her way home alongside Bertie. He wasn’t so sure about April.
“When are you going to put on your disguise?” he asked.
April snorted. “It’s not a disguise. It’s a shawl.”
“I think it’s just a piece of curtain. But that’s why you brought it, right?”
“I brought it because there’s a breeze today. I might get cold if the sun goes behind a cloud.”
“If you cover your hair, it’s because you don’t want anyone to recognize you.”
“Why should I want that?” April said. “The only person I can sometimes picture is someone I don’t want to see.”
“The man you think is trying to kill you.”
She nodded and wrapped the shawl around her shoulders.
“Who is he, April? Someone you stole from, someone you betrayed?”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to find out.”
“Do you think he’s in Poolesville?”
“He could be.”
“So could your family. Maybe even your husband,” Jake said, though he’d noticed April’s bare fingers showed no signs of having worn a ring. “Isn’t it worth showing yourself to try to find out?”
“I don’t see you rushing off to meet old friends and acquaintances,” April said.
“You didn’t lose everyone’s money,” Jake said.
“How do you know?”
“You don’t look like the type.”
“Neither do you. Maybe that’s why you were so good at it.”
Jake changed the subject. “The man who wants to kill you. You don’t know who he is or where he is. What do you know?”
April gazed up the road and didn’t answer right away. “He’s older,” she said. “With a funny first name. I don’t remember it, but I might if I heard it.”
“My father has a funny first name – Emmert. And he’s older. So maybe your father has a funny name too. And maybe he wants to kill you for running off during the flood and making your whole family worry about you.”
April pulled the shawl over her mouth to hide a smile. “It’s possible. But I don’t think the man I sometimes see when I close my eyes is my father.”
To Jake, the idea sounded not only possible but likely. Maybe April had been in a dispute with her father or uncle or grandfather, and the only way she’d been able to resolve her feelings about it had been to wipe the slate clean and forget everything. If a family quarrel was behind her memory loss, surely the hard feelings would have subsided by now, and her family would be ready to forgive her and welcome her back.
Thinking through it, he acknowledged less hopeful explanations. Maybe April had been married or engaged to an older man who had turned on her – though Jake hadn’t noticed any bruises or scars. Maybe she’d witnessed a criminal act, and what she’d seen made her a threat to the offender. That might have triggered a bone-deep desire to forget. Or maybe April had broken the law herself – robbed or assaulted someone – and the man she envisioned wanted revenge.
Jake fell silent as the notion of revenge made him think about his former employer and mentor Franklin Blyth. Would they ever catch him? Blyth was probably living like a king on a ranch somewhere, maybe in Argentina or Mexico. What would Jake do if he had a chance to confront Blyth some day?
He steered Bertie through an intersection for the last mile of the ride into Poolesville. The center of town was a few tree-lined blocks of stores and houses, and the residential streets that ringed the center were themselves surrounded by farmland. The feed store Doc Cushing had mentioned was just ahead on the right, a tall roadside barn with a clapboard annex on one end. It was a slow morning, and the young clerk standing in the annex doorway smiled in surprise when Jake pulled the cart into the lot and said he needed hay and oats.
The clerk took a long look at April, then pointed to the other end of the barn and said “you ain’t got a truck?”
“No,” Jake said. He didn’t return the smile.
Inside the barn, the clerk helped Jake load six square bales of hay and two fifty-pound bags of oats. That was all he could afford right now. At least it was enough to feed Bertie and Gladys for a week, and the stacked bales would provide Jake and April a back-rest for the remainder of today’s ride. Jake followed the clerk through a door into the annex, watched him tally up the bill, and paid it. Then he gave the clerk half his remaining cash and told him to credit it to Doc Cushing’s bill. What he had left was for April.
“Is there a dry goods store in town?” he asked.
The clerk watched him pocket his remaining bills. “For clothes?”
Jake nodded and jerked his head toward the barn. “For her.”
“Worthington’s is probably your best bet. Go right on Whites Ferry Road when you get into town. Second block on your right.”
“How about a bank?”
“Poolesville National Bank, a quarter-mile past Worthington’s.” Then he smirked and said “I guess you got your Belle Star, but I think you’re going to need a faster getaway car.”
Jake squinted and pressed his lips together. “How’s that?” Was the clerk implying something about April? Did he recognize her?
“Just kidding you,” the clerk said. “Looks like you’re more in need of a truck anyway. Talk to Mr. Phillips and he might be able to get you a loan.”
“I’ve had my fill of auto loans,” Jake muttered, heading back into the barn.
“Stay out of trouble now!” the clerk called out from the doorway as Jake climbed onto the cart and took the reins. Bertie strained against the load and the cart started forward.
“Smart-mouth kid,” Jake said with a glance at April.
“Maybe you should have told him you just got out of prison. That might have got him thinking.”
“Maybe he knew that already. Could be he recognized my name when I signed the receipt on Doc Cushing’s fee.”
“I don’t think you’re that famous.”
“Infamous,” Jake said. “That’s another prison word. Let’s hope not.”
As they drove north into Poolesville, the pastures yielded to houses and cross-streets. Past the school Jake turned east onto Whites Ferry Road, the main artery through town. He drew Bertie to a halt in front of Worthington’s, pulled the folded bills from his pocket, and handed them to April.
“It’s nineteen dollars. I guess we’ll find out if you remember how to shop.”
“If I don’t, I’m sure some helpful store girl will offer to assist me.”
April curled her fingers around the bills and left her closed fist in his hand for a moment. She smiled at him, piled her curtain-shawl on the seat beside him, and stepped down. Jake watched her tentatively approach the store. Even in her faded paisley-print dress, April could catch and hold your eye. It was her wavy, ashwood-colored hair. And curves in her figure that you almost didn’t notice until she moved.
When she disappeared through the doorway, he turned back to the road. There were cars, bicycles, pedest
rians, and an occasional buggy traveling both sides of the street, but the bank’s columned façade still made it easy to spot from a block away. Jake waited for a lull that was long enough to get Bertie across the street, turned around, and hitched to a lamp-post.
Inside the bank he waited again. It was approaching noon on Monday, so he was surprised to see only one teller window open and several customers standing in line. He took the bank draft from his coat pocket and unfolded it. Fifty dollars, drawn on the First Bank of Sharpsburg. His father had given it to him as a precaution, though neither of them had expected Jake would need to cash it. When he finally stepped to the window, he was grateful that the teller accepted it without comment, counted out the money, and placed it in the tray.
Jake folded the bills and turned for the entrance, just as a man wearing a Stetson hat and a brown jacket, cut short and trim at the waist, entered the bank. The man had a light-footed step and an unwhiskered face that looked wind-burned, even though the weather today was cloudy and calm. When he came to a stop at the end of the line, the man turned enough to reveal a patch sewn onto the shoulder of his jacket. It was a sheriff’s star.
Jake remembered Doc Cushing’s advice. You should consider contacting the sheriff’s office. Whoever is looking for her would probably have reported her missing. He paused mid-step, brushed off the thought and kept moving, then halted again. His unsteady motion caught the man’s attention.
Jake stopped when he saw he’d been noticed. He turned to address the man and politely asked if he was the sheriff. The man looked at him as if Jake was one of a hundred or more strangers he sized up on a given day.
“No,” he said. “I work for the sheriff. I’m Deputy Boyer.”
Jake took a half-step away from the line and lowered his voice so only the deputy could hear him.
“I gave a young lady a ride into town,” he said. “I’m concerned about her because she told me she lost her memory. She doesn’t remember who she is or where she lives or anything from her past. I think she’s telling the truth, so I’m worried her family might be trying to find her.”
“Where is she now?” Deputy Boyer said, seemingly unimpressed.
“I dropped her off at Worthington’s.”
“How old did you say she was?”
“She doesn’t know. I’d guess nineteen or so.”
Deputy Boyer nodded, and Jake sensed he was weighing what he’d heard.
“Follow me,” the deputy said, turning to lead Jake out the door.
Deputy Boyer struck Jake as someone who didn’t waste many words, and he led Jake down the street and into the post office without explaining anything. Just past the foyer, two bulletin boards on the wall were filled with tacked notices and offers. Pinned to the wall beyond them was an array of small posters bearing the faces and profiles of wanted men. And past these was a lone poster with a photograph of a young woman leaning against a large rock, with a confusion of waterfalls in the distance behind her. The woman looked blurry, as if the photo had been cropped and expanded, but Jake recognized the subject and setting immediately. It was April, posed against the rocks on Olmsted Island, with part of the Potomac’s Great Falls in the background below. Above the photo a single word was printed in large type. MISSING.
“Is that her?” Deputy Boyer asked, stabbing the photo with his index finger.
“That’s her!” Jake said, unable to take his eyes from April’s image. He guessed from the photo’s tight cropping that one or two others had been posed beside her but excised from the picture. Their identities didn’t interest him. Even blurry, she looked fetching, wearing a snug jacket over a gray dress with thin white stripes. Her hair tumbled onto her neck from beneath a stylish hat that was tilted down toward her eyebrow on one side.
Only after absorbing the image for several seconds did Jake’s eyes continue down the page. Below the photo was a name: KATIE ELGIN.
And on the following lines, in smaller type:
LAST SEEN at SWAINS LOCK on MARCH 29, 1924.
WANTED for QUESTIONING in regards to the DEATH of RUSSELL “LEE” FISHER of SENECA.
FIFTY DOLLAR REWARD for INFORMATION leading to her APPREHENSION.
CONTACT MONTGOMERY COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE.
And the last lines provided a telephone number and address for the Sheriff’s office in Rockville.
“You said you dropped her off at Worthington’s?” Deputy Boyer asked.
Jake nodded, without taking his eyes from the poster. Who was Lee Fisher, and was April somehow responsible for his death? March 29th was what… nine days ago? Saturday. The day the flood began.
“How long ago was that?” Deputy Boyer raised his voice a level and stepped between Jake and the poster.
“Not too long ago,” Jake said, trying to re-focus on the deputy’s question but unable to anticipate where it was leading. “She needs a few things. I told her to wait for me there.”
“But you said you don’t know this girl. You just gave her a ride.”
“Yes. I mean no – I don’t know her… just what she told me on the ride into town. She doesn’t know herself.”
“OK then,” Deputy Boyer said, clapping Jake on the shoulder and leading him out of the post office and back to the entrance to the bank, where he pivoted to face him. “Thanks for helping out with this situation. What did you say your name was?”
“Jake Reed.” His words were almost a whisper.
The deputy scribbled the name in his pocket notebook. “I’ll swing by Worthington’s and pick the girl up, take her somewhere safe. We’ll see if we can get her back where she belongs. If it turns out to be Katie Elgin, I’ll put your name in at the Rockville office. You can stop by later this week for the reward.”
Jake shook hands and forced a smile, even as his stomach fell toward his feet. Was Deputy Boyer going to arrest her – would that be the result of his efforts? The idea that April might have been involved with a suspicious death was jarring, but the thought of betraying her felt worse. He watched the deputy go back into the bank, presumably to wait his turn with the teller. Jake hurried down the sidewalk to the lamp-post where Bertie was tied up. How much of a head-start did he have?
It was only three blocks back to Worthington’s but it felt like miles. Jake stuck to the right side of the lane as half a dozen cars motored past him before he reached the store. Each time he expected to see a painted sheriff’s star on the door, or Deputy Boyer’s Stetson hat above the driver’s seat. He pulled Bertie to a halt across the street from Worthington’s. April was leaning against a waist-high brick planter near the side of the building, with a package wrapped in brown paper and twine beside her. He called her name and waved his hands above his head, and she trotted across the street to meet him.
“I thought it would be you waiting for me,” she said.
“So did I. Hop in and let’s make up for lost time.”
“Don’t you want to see what I bought?”
“You can show me on the ride home.” He urged Bertie forward as April swung onto the seat. Pulling into the traffic lane, Jake glanced over his shoulder to make sure no car or Stetson hat was bearing down on them. He looked back again when the cart was up to speed, and this time he thought he saw a car turn across both lanes and come to a stop near the front of Worthington’s. If it was the deputy, it would take him a minute or two to realize that April had left.
“Put your shawl on,” Jake said. “Put it over your hair.”
April wrinkled her nose at him. “Maybe I found something nicer to wear.”
“Do it anyway. Pretend the man who wants to kill you is following us.”
April’s expression turned serious, and she draped the shawl over her head and shoulders as Jake turned onto the road back to Edwards Ferry. Receding from town in this direction, they should be safe, he thought. The stacked hay bales shielded the rest of her body from view. And Jake hadn’t told the deputy where he’d come from, just that he’d given the girl a ride into town. He hadn’t ment
ioned a mule-drawn cart. How many girls, even if they’d lost their memory, would want that kind of ride?
“How do you know you saw him?” April said. “I never told you what he looked like.”
“The man I saw didn’t want to kill you, but he might want to arrest you. He was a sheriff’s deputy. I was in the post office and he saw me looking at your picture on the wall. Maybe he heard me say something to myself. I thought he might follow me back to Worthington’s.”
“Why would he want to arrest me? Why was my picture on the wall?”
“I was hoping you could explain that. And tell me if your name is Katie Elgin.” He glanced sideways to check her reaction, but she was staring into the distance ahead, jaw set and brows lowered, with wisps of hair straying out from under her shawl. Her expression looked more like concentration than recognition.
“I can’t explain it,” she said, “and I don’t know that name.”
“How about this name. Lee Fisher.”
“No. Why?”
“I guess he’s dead, and the sheriff thinks you might know something about it.”
“If I did, I don’t now.”
“That kind of answer makes it sound like you want to forget something. Probably won’t impress a man wearing a badge. Maybe you need to keep lying low until you get your story straight. First remember what happened. If the truth’s no good, come up with something better.”
“Like you used to do?” For the first time Jake thought he heard a strained note in her voice. Like she was a fox with its back to the river and the hounds approaching. He didn’t want to join the chase.
“It was easy for me,” he said. “I didn’t know I wasn’t telling the truth.”
“Then I can honestly say I don’t know this person – Lee Fisher. Not even if that’s a man or a woman! I don’t know how Lee Fisher died. And if that’s not true, then I’m just like you were – I don’t know I’m not telling the truth!”
Jake kept his eyes on the road ahead and let the clopping of Bertie’s hooves gradually displace the echo of April’s words.
“Let’s just agree on that. You’re telling the truth. You don’t know those names. I took it from the poster that his name was Russell Fisher, and people called him Lee. So I guess even if your name is Katie Elgin, we can still call you April.”
If It Is April Page 6