“Miss River, wait. Please. Let me explain. Pastor Parry ...”
“That Pastor Parry needs to mind his own business. And so do you!” Wham.
Well, this was fun. I’m standing here in a blizzard arguing with the wicked witch of the east or the southeast or the Chesapeake Bay region—whatever. “I am minding my business, ma’am,” I shouted, “and right now, my business is seeing to it that you don’t freeze to death all by yourself in this house tonight or get crushed when the roof caves in.” I stepped forward and pounded. Time to be assertive. “Come on. Get your coat. You’re coming with me. And I’m telling you right now, if you don’t, you’ll have my wife up here pounding on your door in about five minutes.”
Nothing. Probably mixing up a potion.
“Come on, do me a favor, and don’t make me walk home and then right back here again to get you. Please?”
I must have hit a chink in her armor. She cracked the door and stuck half her face through it. “Your wife the dark-haired woman I’ve seen around there?” She peered at me with one eye. “The scrawny one?”
Look who was talking. She wouldn’t weigh ninety pounds dipped in iron. “Yep, that’s the one. She’s a scrawny little gal, but she’s my woman,” I said in my best John Wayne drawl. Actually, Mel isn’t all that thin. She’s just right as far as I’m concerned. Around 5’8”, just enough meat on her bones to look good in anything she wears, and auburn hair that reaches about halfway to her shoulders. She smiles a lot and when she does, her brown eyes crinkle. Gotta love those crinkles.
“Shut up, young man. I don’t appreciate sarcasm. I’ve got to say from what I’ve seen and heard tonight, she’s a darned sight nicer than you are.”
“Well, ma’am, let’s argue that at my place, okay? It’s getting downright vicious out here, and I don’t think things are going to improve any in the next few hours. Let me in, and I’ll help you gather up some things to take to our place. You might be there for a couple of days.” I looked at her and smiled my best former Air Force chaplain smile. “Come on. We’d be pleased to have you. Mel was putting on some tea when I left.”
Fifteen minutes and about seven arguments later, we were inside the back door of the Inn, stomping snow all over the kitchen floor and peeling off wet coats. I think it’s safe to say we didn’t bond during our journey.
Emma looked at me. “Don’t you have the brains to wear a hat in this weather?”
Good point, ma’am. Next time I venture out into the blizzard of the century to rescue you, I’ll be sure to bring a hat—and maybe a Taser.
Mel figured she’d better get Hugh off the hook. “Let me help you, Miss Rivers.” She took Emma’s coat and unwound the scarf from around her neck. “Here, sit down right here and let me get those boots off. You don’t want to catch a chill.” She looked up at Hugh. “Honey, would you mind hanging up her coat? I’ve got a fire going in the front room. We’ll go in there and have some tea—or would you rather have hot chocolate?”
“Tea is fine, Mrs. Foster,” Emma said. “Please don’t go to any trouble.”
“Trouble? A little pot of tea on a night like this? Good heavens, it’s no trouble at all. In fact, it’s just what we all need. I’m chilled to the bone just thinking about the storm outside and I’ve been in here all this time. I can’t imagine how uncomfortable the two of you must be.” She turned to Hugh, who was rubbing his hands together. “Hugh, are you doing okay? You were gone so long, I was beginning to worry.”
“Just fine, dear. Just fine. I was, uh, helping Miss River get her things together.” He turned to Emma and said, “Can I take your bag up to your room, ma’am? Did you say the Jefferson Room, Mel?”
She nodded. “Uh-huh. It’s at the top of the stairs, Miss Emma, third door to your right. We’ll take you up in a few minutes, but first let’s get the two of you warmed up with some tea in front of the fireplace.” They’d named the corner bedroom on the north side of the house the Jefferson Room because it boasted an alcove bed enclosed on three sides similar to one found at Monticello, Thomas Jefferson’s home in Virginia. “I think you’ll like your room. We wallpapered it in the same pattern Mr. Jefferson used in one of his bedrooms—reproduction, of course. It has a fireplace and if you’d like, Hugh can build you a fire. Might be nice on a nasty night like this.”
Mel took Emma’s hand and led her into the front room. Hugh followed with Emma’s suitcase, an old-fashioned carpet bag. The fire crackled and spit as the flames licked the dry logs; the only other light came from candles on side tables.
“I thought we’d sit here by firelight,” Mel said. “Who knows, with all this wind and snow, we might lose power anyway. Besides, this is cozier.” She led Emma to a comfortable wingback chair near the fireplace and helped her sit down while Hugh headed for the stairs.
Mel had Emma settled in her chair in front of the fire by the time he returned, an afghan wrapped around her knees. “There,” she said. “Ready for some tea now? Do you like sugar, cream? Both? Honey, how about you? Just plain, right?” Hugh nodded and took a seat in one of the other chairs.
“Just a little sugar,” Emma said.
Mel walked into the kitchen and was back in less than a minute with a tray of mugs. “We’re going to be informal tonight, Emma—may I call you Emma? You said one sugar, right?”
“Yes. And please call me Emma. Hardly anyone ever uses my name anymore. It’s always ‘Miz Rivers’ with the hired help and most of the people in town won’t talk to me at all.”
Hugh wrapped his hands around the cup and took a sip. “Won’t talk to you? Why on earth not?”
Emma looked at him for a moment then turned to stare at the fire. “Long story, Mr. Foster. Long story. And I’m sure you wouldn’t be interested.”
Mel gave Hugh a little smile. “Well, Emma, tell us about yourself. You have a beautiful home up there on the hill. It’s quite old, isn’t it?”
“Yes, my great-great-great-great-grandfather built it 1770. Eventually my father inherited it and then forty years later, I came along. I’ve lived in that house all my life,” Emma said, leaning back into the chair. She sighed and shook her head as if shaking loose memories then turned to stare at the fire for a few seconds before her eyelids fluttered and her head bobbed. Mel couldn’t blame her—that trek through the wind and snow had to have been exhausting. A crackling fire with hot tea was no doubt a welcome turn of events.
“It’s a beautiful home, Emma,” Hugh said. “I couldn’t see much in the dark, but it’s certainly the grandest place I’ve seen in a long time.”
“It was grand at one time. Now it’s just getting older, bit by bit, year by year. I no longer have the energy, nor the desire, to keep it up the way my father and grandfathers did before me. I never married, and so I have no children to pass it on to. I’m an only child. There’s nobody left.” She closed her eyes.
Mel stood and reached to take Emma’s mug. “Emma, you must be exhausted. It’s late and here we are gabbing away. Why don’t you let Hugh help you upstairs and build you a nice fire? I’ll be up shortly to be sure you have everything you need.”
Emma looked up at Mel with a faint smile. “Yes, that would be nice. I tire so easily nowadays. Thank you, dear, for the tea.” She glanced toward Hugh. “Well, are you going to escort me upstairs, or do I have to find it all by myself?”
Five minutes later, Hugh was back. Mel was in the kitchen putting the mugs in the dishwasher. “What have I done to make her so cranky?”
“Didn’t you two hit it off?”
“Hit it off? The closest we came to that was her threatening to whack me with that broom of hers. Why does she turn into Witch Woman when she’s around me?”
Mel looked up at her husband and laughed. “You’re a man, my dear. You’re a man.”
Chapter Six
Emma groaned as she lowered herself to the bed and slowly lay back on the mattress. Lately it seemed she was feeling feebler by the minute. She didn’t get out and chop wood anymore, that
was why. She had a good excuse for her aches and pains tonight, though. The trek with Hugh Foster from Rivermanse to The Inn at Road’s End had been grueling.
She had to admit that Mr. Foster, as annoying as he was when he first pounded on her front door, had done his best to keep her warm during the walk down the hill. He kept one arm around her waist and steadied her with the other. Good thing, too. The deepening snow and gusty wind had made the hike tricky, and she would no doubt feel every step of it in the morning. In the end, though, it was worth it. She was loath to admit it to either of the Fosters just yet, especially that pesky pastor man, but she was glad she wasn’t alone in that drafty house.
The pretty wife, Melanie, had done everything she could to make her feel welcome. The hot tea, the afghan, and that snug chair beside the roaring fire were all comforts she desperately needed at the moment. Melanie was right about Emma’s room, as well—the Jefferson Room, she’d called it. Emma could see why. It was appointed beautifully with late eighteenth century furniture—reproductions no doubt, but beautiful nonetheless—and plenty of books that might have been found in Thomas Jefferson’s library at Monticello. The bed was nestled in the wall, giving her further reason to feel protected on this nasty night. Even without a fire in the fireplace, she felt safe and comfortable and warm. And those were three things she never felt anymore at Rivermanse. She hadn’t for a long time.
She lay there, inhaling the scent of lavender on the sheets and pillowcases, luxuriating in the pleasure of being taken care of—a comfort she didn’t have nowadays—and listened to the wind wailing outside. It rattled the old windowpanes as it whipped up and around and over the house, banging loose shingles or shutters and whistling through the bare tree branches.
She’d heard violent wind before but always with a thunderstorm, never accompanied by curtains of snow that hung from dark, low-hanging clouds. The snow was whisked and sifted and scattered to every surface in sight like great gusts of flour on baking day. “Well,” she said aloud, “At least I won’t die without living through a blizzard.”
She remembered only one snowstorm from her childhood, a year after her mother had died. Her father was in Europe, preferring to amass a great fortune rather than tend to the raising of his daughters. Her sister was still alive at that time, and she recalled the two of them watching the snow play tag with the wind in the lacy world of white beyond their bedroom window.
She pulled the covers to her neck, closed her eyes, and thought of that first storm. The snow darted here and there over the mansion grounds. Every inch of the landscape was soon swathed in white as if huge dollops of whipped cream had been spooned across their surroundings by a sweet-toothed giant. The flakes swirled then settled around tree trunks, and eventually crept upward until they clung to the bark like white, glistening moss. For a short while, the world was transformed—death and sadness and loneliness buried deep beneath the purifying blanket of snow—and for just a little while, she could be the child she was when her mother was alive.
A day or so later, after the snow stopped and a bone-cracking cold spell set in, she and her sister sneaked outdoors and stood in the frigid night air, reveling in the magic of the crystalline sparkles that dotted the air around them. Emma called it their snow glitter; Rachel claimed it was angel dust. She hadn’t thought of that in years.
By then they were living with Aunt Louanna and Uncle George who didn’t care what the girls did as long as they stayed out of their sight. Rachel and Emma had only the staff to keep them company. They were friendly folks, but they too were afraid of Aunt’s disparaging remarks and Uncle’s violent temper. Unless they were certain not to be noticed or overheard, the employees kept their distance from the girls.
Their favorites had been Lydia, the housekeeper, and her husband Roy who maintained the grounds, ran errands, and kept the car washed and waxed to an onyx finish. Emma vaguely remembered one other person on the staff—a small Asian woman, she thought, who changed bed linens and tidied up their room. It seemed such a waste to both girls to hire people to do things they knew the two of them, let alone their aunt and uncle, were perfectly capable of handling by themselves. But Aunt Louanna wouldn’t hear of letting them go. It was expected, she told her nieces, that society folks have household help. Besides, times were hard and the jobs they gave to the lower class, as she often referred to them, made their lives all the more comfortable. As if working for Aunt Louanna or Uncle George was the least bit comfortable.
Lydia and Roy and the little Asian lady–Ling, maybe, she couldn’t remember—seemed perfectly content with their responsibilities. After Rachel died, Emma finally accepted her aunt’s pronouncement that her doubts were the ignorant ramblings of a young and inexperienced girl. Besides, Emma needed the company. She no longer had friends; the local children had long since stopped coming up the hill to play with her. And Aunt Louanna, high-class, church-going, society lady that she was, certainly wasn’t about to allow any niece of hers to smudge the family name by traipsing down Rivermanse Lane to play with some lower class-type of child, a child, she ranted, whose only purpose was to get some of Emma’s money. Even at that tender age, Emma realized that Aunt Louanna was a snob.
Emma opened her eyes and shivered. She wasn’t cold, but the wind knocking on the window like some great beast looking for a warm shelter from the storm sent prickles down her spine. She’d never tell Hugh Foster, but she was glad he’d insisted she come to the inn with him. Lying here, even in a strange bed and among people she didn’t know, was better than being alone in that huge house on the bluff with only the memories of loved ones long deceased to keep her company. Even Louanna and George were long gone. The loved and the unloved—all of them dead. She was the only one left.
What difference did it make whether a person lived or died, whether someone was loved or unloved in this world. Eventually, everyone ended up in the same place, anyway. She certainly had enough proof of that.
She reached over and picked up the notebook that lay on the bed beside her. In perfect Palmer Method handwriting, the words “Emma’s Journey” and the year were penned in the rectangular opening of the cardstock cover. She had nearly 150 more just like it at home, filled at the rate of two a year since her sister’s death seventy-two years earlier. She opened it to the latest notation and wrote:
December 18th
Today was a strange day, a day of high winds and blowing snow, hot tea and frigid cold, new faces and old memories …
Chapter Seven
The pounding woke me at 5:00 a.m. Now what? I laid there for a few seconds trying to place the sound. Back door. Someone’s at the back door. Please don’t tell me Emma escaped last night and someone’s bringing her back. I slid out of bed trying not to disturb Mel, but she mumbled, “What’s up?”
“Nothing, honey. Go back to sleep.” I grabbed my robe and slippers and hurried down the stairs to the door. The house was dark, the wind was still howling out there, and I could see nothing out the windows but a swirling mass of white. I unlocked the door and opened it a crack. “Yes? Who’s there?”
“Me, Pastor.”
“Me?”
“Bristol.”
I opened the door wider and motioned him in. Before he could stomp his boots and get inside the door, the floor was littered with snow blown in by the ferocious winds. It glittered on the granite floor before melting seconds later.
“Bristol, what are you doing here in the middle of the night? Why aren’t you home in bed? It’s freezing out there.” I shut the door against the storm and helped him brush the snow from his coat.
He stamped his feet on the throw rug and said, “I know, Pastor. Believe me, I know. Trouble is, we’ve got ourselves a situation.”
I motioned for him to have a seat at the kitchen table. “At five in the morning? Is someone hurt?”
He shook his head at both the chair and my question. “No. Leastways, not that I know of. But someone’s broken into the church, and I think you ought to come over. Th
at is if you don’t mind going out into this mess.” He motioned toward the tempest beyond the window where the panes were rattling and the snow on the sill outside was still a good six inches deep, despite the relentless wind that kept it swept away like a whisk broom dispatching crumbs.
A break-in at the church? On a night like this? “No, no, of course not, Bristol. Let me get my coat.” I turned to leave the kitchen. “Wait. Would you rather have something hot to drink before we go out again? I can make some coffee real quick.”
“Thanks, Pastor. Maybe later. I think we’d better tend to this first.”
Five minutes later, I was ready to go and we set off. If I thought the wind and snow were bad when I went to get Emma, this was ten times worse. Guthrie Jones’s legendary status was set in stone for the rest of his life.
The church and the inn, as well as Emma’s place behind our house, were all on the north side of Gloucester Street. Our property and that of the church are dissected by Rivermanse Lane running northward from Gloucester and both meet Emma’s property line at her southern boundary. I had no idea just where Rivermanse Lane was anymore; even the footsteps Bristol made minutes earlier when he trudged over here from the church were nearly drifted in. If I didn’t know we had a hedge of boxwood that surrounded and intersected portions of our kitchen garden, I’d never have known it by looking out there now.
As far as I could see, which wasn’t all that far considering the pitiful pools of light our village’s two streetlights cast through the storm, the world was clothed in white. The wind blasted us from all directions. Trying to talk was useless, so I just put my head down, shrugged deeper into my coat, and followed Bristol’s footprints.
I’m sure it didn’t take as long as I thought it did to reach the front steps of the church. I could see someone, Bristol, no doubt, had already shoveled them as I could actually tell there were steps. But the snow was already piled a good five inches deep again. I trod up them, grateful to be someplace—anyplace—where I could stamp my cold feet and breathe air that didn’t freeze my sinuses.
Misstep (The Road's End Series Book 1) Page 4