The Widows

by Jess Montgomery

Hildy drops her head to her hands.

  Lily turns off the engine, shows Hildy all the steps for driving, and restarts the Model T. But by the time Hildy is in the driver’s seat, the engine is rattling like a rat with its tail in a trap.

  “Now what?” Hildy cries.

  Lily, who’s slid over to the passenger side, points to the coil box switch.

  Hand quivering, Hildy turns the switch.

  “Now pull the spark lever up some more—no, no, the one there, on the left. The right one’s the throttle—slowly, that’s it.”

  Hildy does so, and the engine smooths out. She slumps back in the seat.

  Jolene claps. “Aunt Hildy did it!”

  Lily says, “See, that wasn’t so difficult after all.”

  The women fall silent, listening to the hum of the Model T’s engine.

  Then Jolene giggles. Within moments, they’re all laughing, great raucous belly-busting bursts of laughter, laughing until they’re gasping and tears are running down their faces.

  When they stop for breath, Lily nudges Hildy. “Now you know how to start the automobile, don’t you want to know how to drive it?”

  Hildy looks at Lily and grins.

  Lily commands until finally it all falls together in Hildy’s mind and she pulls out on Kinship Road, high gear, tops twenty-five miles an hour, wind blowing over the top of the windshield, and she whoops, and Jolene hollers, “Wheeeeee!” and Lily looks behind to see that Jolene’s hands are thrown high up in the air as if she can catch the wind, and that sorrow, for the moment, is gone from her sweet little face.

  And then Lily hears another voice of laughter. Her own. Guilt at the notion of ever feeling joy again pinches her. But with the next breath, for just a moment she lets go of guilt and anger and sorrow and fear and whoops, too, joyous, carefree.

  * * *

  The next morning, Lily takes Hildy with her to Rossville. Lily trusts Hildy, as much as she does Mama, but there are details she doesn’t want to share in earshot of Mama because they’ll scare her. She fills Hildy in, though, on everything she’s sorted out so far and that she’s written in her notebook: her belief that Daniel was ambushed and shot on the way to Rossville, that Marvena had asked Daniel to find out about Eula’s whereabouts, the box of Eula’s that Daniel got from the boardinghouse, Tom’s insistence that he was not taken from the Rossville holding cell on the morning of Daniel’s murder but earlier that day by a Pinkerton, and her frustrations that two men are missing whom she’d very much like to interview: Rusty Murphy, the farmhand who found Daniel’s body, and Harvey Grayson, the Pinkerton who’d come to their house to tell Daniel about collecting a miner—Tom—from the Rossville holding cell and who was willing to bear witness that Daniel had indeed done so but who is no longer coming to town with Tom’s second disappearance. Hildy gasps with surprise upon hearing Lily share Tom’s claim that Daniel had not only planned to come out for unionization but had also contacted a friend at the Bureau of Mines, and shares Lily’s frustration at not knowing the name of that friend. Finally, Lily even tells her about the extra account Daniel had, about Abe Miller, who worked for George Vogel, Daniel’s former boxing promoter, warning her not to get in the way of George’s business, and the realization that the money in the account was likely for Daniel looking the other way as sheriff as George took moonshine from the county for his “Vogel’s Tonic” pharmaceutical business.

  Through it all, Hildy listens patiently, nodding. The only thing Lily holds back is that though she is relieved Daniel was faithful in the conventional sense, deep down she holds a keening hurt that he’d never told her about Marvena. But then, it doesn’t need to be said aloud for Hildy to understand this.

  “What does this all mean?” Hildy asks quietly as they near Rossville. “For figuring out who killed Daniel and why, if it wasn’t really Tom?”

  “I don’t know,” Lily says. “Yet.”

  At the Widowmaker, just outside of Rossville, they watch from afar as dynamite blasts out underneath the side of the hill with the cemetery where her paternal grandparents are buried. Lily contemplates: the mountains hold the trees up firm and strong; now men use the felled trees to build the supports and shafts inside mines to hold the mountains up firm and strong.

  Lily makes Hildy drive up to Marvena’s cabin, Hildy yelping at every bump even as Lily coaches her on the twists and turns. At the cabin, Lily and Hildy look around carefully, even peering in windows, but they don’t spot either Marvena or Frankie.

  Down in Rossville, Nana says she hasn’t seen Marvena recently. The old lady tries to be casual, but Lily can tell that she’s troubled. When she asks about the reopening of the Widowmaker, Nana says, “All I can do is pray for Jurgis, for all the men. God save us all.” She shakes her head and looks away for a moment. Her eyes are bright with barely masked fear when she turns back to Lily and Hildy. Life is hard. Have tea?

  Back in Kinship, after Hildy goes home, Lily finds Magistrate Whitaker, ask about laws about desecrating burial sites. She even mentions that her father’s parents are buried there. He merely lifts his eyebrows, grunts, “I’ll be sure to look into it,” doffs his hat, turns away.

  That night, in a foul mood from the unsatisfactory answer, Lily puts the children to bed early. Lily looks over the past weeks’ issues of the Kinship Weekly Courier. There’s a small article about her appointment as sheriff, five pages in. She tries to focus on reading the next installments of “The Curious Case of the Whistling Pigeon,” a serialized crime story about a Canadian Mounty, his beloved Lenore, a stolen emerald, and a spooky mansion. Six weeks after the serial started, poor Lenore still needs rescuing.

  Lily jumps. She’s nodded off, and now someone is knocking at her door.

  It’s Martin. He looks grim in the doorway. She gestures for him to come in and he sits on the edge of the settee, after Lily returns to her chair.

  “Lily, I’ve gotten a tip,” he says, “about a still, close in to Rossville.”

  Lily studies Martin, trying to see what she might read in his face. Daniel rarely talked about busting up stills or turning moonshiners over to revenuers. It is a polite pretense in Bronwyn County that whiskey is not a problem here. But occasionally he’d tell her that he’d been to a still and let the moonshiner go, just for now.

  She gives Martin a long look. “How did you get this tip?”

  “Someone left a note at my home today,” Martin says.

  Lily lifts an eyebrow. “A note. For you.”

  “Folks are still getting used to you. And you’re still healing after your—your loss.” Martin blushes at the reference to Lily’s miscarriage. “I can go myself, take a few other men. But I wanted to tell you first.”

  Lily inhales sharply. “Do you really expect I’ll say, ‘Why sure, go on without me’?”

  Martin shakes his head. “No, but what if it’s a setup of some kind?”

  “More like a test,” Lily says. “That note wouldn’t have been postmarked or telegrammed from Cincinnati, would it?”

  Martin frowns his confusion. “Cincinnati? No, it was handwritten.”

  “Do you have it with you?”

  He nods, pulls out the note from his jacket pocket, and hands it to Lily. She unfolds it; it’s in neat handwriting on Kinship Inn stationery, not signed of course. Yet she guesses: Abe Miller. The note states: “Please check up on Coal Creek Rise, about .8 mile up, then 30 degrees northeast into the woods for illegal distilling activity.” Please check up Coal Creek Rise, about .8 mile up, then 30 degrees northeast into the woods for illegal distilling activity.

  Lily looks at Martin. “Coal Creek Rise?”

  “A path up from the creek and near the workers’ cabins,” Martin says.

  The lane that leads to Marvena’s cabin. Lily never knew it had a name.

  She recalls the moonshine Marvena had had her sip during her one visit. “Is this Marvena’s operation we’re busting?”

  Martin looks away as his face flushes. “I don’t know anything a
bout that.”

  “Of course you do,” Lily says. He’d kept from her the knowledge of Marvena—not that she expected her husband’s best friend to tell her of such—but he’d also more than likely held back the truth of how Tom escaped the jailhouse. What else? she wonders.

  Lily picks up her shotgun and revolver. “All right. I’ll have Hildy stay with the children. Then we’ll round up a few men to go with us and see whatever it is we’re supposed to find.”

  CHAPTER 20

  MARVENA

  The stiff night smells like the promise of coming rain, though its scent is doused by the strong odor of corn mash fermenting with yeast. Afar off a coyote howls, then a bit later a screech owl, and in between shivers and sighs of smaller night creatures. Marvena is at ease in the embrace of the young night; the moon is rising, nearly full, its bottom curve appearing to be snagged by the tops of trees. She works alongside the few men—mostly distant Whitcomb cousins—in her employ. The men’s voices are a garble of talk and laughter; Marvena doesn’t bother to sift out distinct words or to tell them to quiet.

  The cave, too, is where her daddy and his before him stowed supplies and tools, in the deep, dark cool, for their operation. Tom, mending well enough to make the trek up the ridge from the cabin, is in there now with Frankie.

  Marvena gauges, just from the scent, that this run is about halfway through distillation. She tends the low fire, mostly embers, under the first large copper kettle. A copper tube coils out of the kettle’s lid into another container, and from there another tube coils to a third container, and then, through a spout at the bottom, liquid slowly drips into a canning jar, just like the ones she uses for preserving fruits and vegetables.

  One man tends the jar. Another guards the edge of the clearing.

  Marvena is about to return her focus to the process when she hears a sharp trill.

  “Woo-hoo.” A woman’s voice.

  The guard startles, looks up.

  Lily steps into the clearing. She’s far too relaxed, her hands behind her back. Setup.

  Before Marvena can say or do anything, the guard steps forward. “Well, look a here. You lost, little lady?”

  “Fool!” Marvena cries. “Don’t let her—”

  The guard starts to lift his shotgun, but Lily whips out her revolver and shoots just above his shoulder.

  “Goddam, who the hell are you?” the guard shouts. “Temperance League bitch!”

  “Shut up, Arlie,” Marvena says. “That there’s the sheriff. Lily, let’s talk—”

  The man by the canning jar reaches for his revolver.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Marvena says. “She ain’t just a lucky shot. She can take out Arlie and you before you remember which is the shooting end of your gun.”

  Marvena looks back at Lily. “Lily, let’s talk. Woman-to-woman, like you said once. You don’t have t’do this.”

  “I’m sorry. But I do. I suspect the tip-off came from Abe Miller.”

  “Who?”

  “He works directly for George Vogel. As … an enforcer, I guess you’d say. I can’t ignore that and expect to be left in peace.”

  “Well, how’n the hell did this Abe fella know where—”

  Lily cocks an eyebrow, ticks her gaze from man to man.

  Of course. Some money and a fear of Vogel would be enough to buy betrayal. But why would Vogel, a world away in the fancy city of Cincinnati, care about Marvena’s little operation?

  As if reading her thoughts, Lily says, “Marvena, you need to understand. I’ve only met George Vogel two times. But I have no doubt that he is a man who demands absolute, full loyalty. He is … uncompromising. I’m being tested.”

  Marvena shudders, understanding. Though she’s never understood why, Marvena knows that George had been the only man with a hold on Daniel. Now that Lily is sheriff, George has a hold on her, too. Not only does she have her children to protect, but she also won’t want to do anything to upset the balance of power in the county, leastways not until she figures out what happened to Daniel. Marvena can’t blame her.

  Four men step out of the woods.

  Marvena glances around, calculating. Somehow, Lily organized them to come up around the camp. She swallows hard. All right. So long as Tom and Frankie stayed in the cave. So long as the cave remained undiscovered.

  But then Martin steps forward. He has Frankie, holding the trembling child by an arm.

  No sign of Tom, though.

  * * *

  A few hours later, in the county jailhouse in Kinship, Marvena stares through the bars of the cell at the plate Lily is offering. She wants to tell her to go to hell, but she’s so hungry that her stomach feels as though it is cutting itself in two.

  “Hey, she don’t want it, I’ll take an extra supper!” says Arlie in the next cell.

  Marvena wants to tell him to shut up, but she presses her lips tightly together. There’s no point, anyhow. They’d already betrayed the whole operation to Lily.

  Marvena snatches the plate through the food slot, carries it back to the cot, sits. She eats a bite of good salted ham. She has to keep herself from moaning with pleasure and relief. Next she takes a bite of apples, fried up with brown sugar and butter and cinnamon. Fancy, rich food. Marvena hates to admit it, but Lily’s a good cook. She clears the plate quickly.

  “There’s more if you’d like—” Lily starts.

  “I’ll take seconds!”

  “Hush up, Arlie!” both Marvena and Lily call.

  A bit of a smile, despite her weariness, plays across Marvena’s lips. But she carries her plate back to the slot. Lily takes it. She crosses her arms, waits for Lily to go away, but Lily just stands there, looking at her with that sorrowful expression.

  “I didn’t have a choice,” Lily says.

  “You apologize to everyone you lock up?” Marvena asks.

  “No, but—”

  “Then stop doing me favors. If’n you want to do something for me, bring me Frankie!”

  Lily puts the plate on her desk, leans on the edge. “She’s been fed. She’s sleeping.”

  “Uh-huh. And what happens tomorrow?”

  Lily shakes her head. “I’m not sure. We’ve never had a situation like this.”

  Marvena grabs the cell bars. “So help me God, if’n you drag her off to the orphanage…”

  Lily looks horrified. “No, she can stay here!”

  “Raised up fine? So’s by the time I’m out—”

  Hurt turns inside out on Lily’s face, but Marvena tells herself that she wouldn’t take back the words if she could.

  “Hello?”

  Both women jump at the deep male voice, then stare as a tall man strides into the jail cell. In the light of the coal-oil lantern he carries, his face darts in and out of shadow.

  He looks at Lily. “Well done.”

  Lily stands. From the sudden tension in her shoulders, the closing of her expression, Marvena thinks Lily is afraid of this man. She starts to speak, but the man holds up a hand to silence her. Then he crosses to the cell.

  “Mr. Miller!” Lily sounds startled.

  Marvena thinks, Ah. Abe Miller. Daniel had told her about him.

  Lily continues, “I’m not releasing Marvena—”

  Marvena starts to protest, then realizes that Lily is trying to protect her from this man.

  He ignores Lily, looks at Marvena. She feels as though, under his gaze, she’s being taken apart, bit by bit. Marvena forces herself to match his cold stare.

  “So you’re Marvena Whitcomb. Daniel put forth a great deal of effort to shelter you, but with him gone, your protection is over.”

  Lily steps forward. “Whatever deal he had for Marvena, I’m willing—”

  She stops as the man snaps his eyes to her. “We’re still sorting out what our arrangements with you will be. We thought you proved yourself quite able tonight.”

  “Dammit, when I get outta here—”

  Marvena’s words wither to a stop when he
looks back at her. Even in the half-light, the coldness of Abe Miller’s eyes is unmistakable. “You will be released tomorrow,” he says.

  “You don’t have the authority—” Lily starts.

  “Arrangements have been made,” says Abe. “However, Miss Whitcomb must now follow the agreement the other producers have with Mr. Vogel, or give up production altogether.”

  Marvena turns over his fancy words until they become something she understands. The meaning hits her, and she gasps. “But I don’t know what the agreement will require of me.”

  Abe shrugs. “It doesn’t matter. The terms will be explained later. Choose.”

  “Mr. Miller, please, she has a young daughter to care for—”

  Abe looks at Lily. “That is not any of my or Mr. Vogel’s business, though we’re aware of her situation. The girl of course can go home tomorrow, when you release her—”

  “I haven’t agreed to that. Charges have to be filed.”

  “It’s been taken care of.” He looks at Lily and Marvena realizes, as Lily flinches, that she’s afraid of this Miller. Of Vogel. Enough to cede her authority to theirs, just as Daniel had.

  Miller looks back at Marvena and it’s all she can do to keep from shrinking back at his thin smile, too. “Now then, Marvena, what’s your choice?”

  Marvena calculates: give a portion of her meager income to Vogel and his operation? It’s not just that she doesn’t want to lose money; she doesn’t want to be beholden to him. Nothing made Daniel look afraid except when he mentioned George Vogel. This representative can’t be any better.

  And once she is in his hooks, will she be free to spend time on organizing the men for unionization? Or would Vogel just want more and more from her?

  Through gritted teeth, she says, “Why, sir, I’ve seen the error of my ways, and I’m giving up the sin of moonshining for good.”

  “Very well.” Abe turns to Lily. “Tomorrow morning, and not before, this woman and her daughter are free to leave. As is—” He looks around the jailhouse. “Which one of you is Arlie?”

  Arlie says quietly, “Here, sir.” The fool. So he’s the turncoat.