Sadly she saw that the place where her grandparents had lived only displayed a long-abandoned foundation, broken and scattered, and the spot where the well had stood. The cluster of trees under whose shade she’d once played still remained, though the elderly elms her grandfather had planted were scraggly, their shapes tortured by the prevailing winds.
She drove on. Not many people had lived down here when she was little, but fewer were here now. The occasional dwelling was small and basic and rare indeed. At one house two huge German Shepherds ran out to chase her car down the road so that she had to drive carefully to come from running them over.
The deeper she got down in the river country, edging slowly to the west, the more alone she felt. This country felt as though it set somewhere back in the days before the settlers had come, the desperate men and women in their covered wagons who had come to claim land and lived like animals in holes in the ground.
She went back earlier than that even to when nomadic Native American tribes wandered through here, putting up temporary camps along the river and chasing the buffalo that roamed the plains and, even earlier, when the Spanish conquerors had driven their native captives in their quest for gold. For just a flash of time, she saw dark eyes in girl’ face and wondered at the reality of the vision. Somewhere she’d met that girl—or would meet her at some future time.
She wasn’t alone, but in a place populated by the past so that her own pilgrim soul could almost be at home.
Helen had told her back in the ‘40s that the Maxwells had kin down here. Perhaps the two brothers had retreated here, bringing Bobbi and their other captives with them, figuring that few people alive would know this land better than they. They hadn’t counted on her, on Hart who had been Stacia, and her own connection to the river country.
‘I am searching for you, Bobbi. Don’t be afraid ‘cause I’m going to find you in the next few hours.’
No answer came.
He didn’t know how she knew things, but after the evidence of the fingerprints identified from the Mountainside cottage, Alistair was prepared to follow her instincts.
Like a good detective he set out to trail her. In this low population area people recognized strange vehicles and a shiny new Lexus moving through little Mountainside was recalled by several residents. Not only that, but they’d recognized Hart behind the wheel and driving north out of town.
At the convenience store that lay between Mountainside and the river, a clerk remembered the attractive dark-haired woman in the silver car and said she’d purchased coffee and a snack before heading on north.
He didn’t think she was leaving. She had no reason to drive to northern Oklahoma and onward to Kansas. Her instincts were taking her to the river area where the neatly laid out and easily searched farms and towns were left behind. If he was going to hide out, he’d either go there or into the Wichita Mountains to the southwest. It seemed clear to him that for some reason she hadn’t confided Hart believed Bobbi was being held prisoner in the river breaks.
And she hadn’t told him because he’d shown himself so reluctant to listen to what she claimed to know. Guiltily he tried again to call her, but only received a message that the person being called wasn’t available.
Well, he had instincts of his own. He called two of his deputies, Harding and Long, and directed them to take the highway over to the wild area near the town of Sayre. He told Joey Harding that he had a tip that the girl had been taken to a remote riverside setting.
He was already located to take the road from the east. When he reached the graveled road that led down to the little traveled roads that bisected the badlands, he turned off, slowing his car of necessity as he moved through the darkening, rain-drenched afternoon along narrow red-dirt roads covered with drifting river sand.
Chapter Twenty
Bobbi heard the cat so incongruously called Mitten scream from the darkening afternoon outside and guessed that it no more approved of the rain-soaked, depressing day than did she.
The river that she could glimpse through the foggy window that looked out back had changed its nature. This morning it had been a lazy trickle through its sandy bed, but now, she supposed, with heavy rains upstream it roared, a broadening stream that looked blood-tinted and frothed with white as it rushed past. She wondered uneasily if the area around the house ever flooded. It wasn’t as though the little shack had an upstairs where she could flee.
Her companions didn’t seem concerned. Mrs. Harris with Mr. Jeffers help had put together a skimpy lunch of canned stew heated on a wood-burning cook stove so dated that Bobbi wouldn’t have had a clue as how to make it work. Bobbi supposed the woman had brought some supplies from her own home as there seemed to be little of anything in the house.
Bill Maxwell had carried a bucket of drinking water from a well outside, not seeming to fear the cat who came within a few feet of him without showing any sign of attacking. She remembered Terry had boasted that Mitten was tame enough, at least to him and his brother. Bobbi had visions of the big cat chasing fiercely after her if she stepped even one foot outside.
She’d never been allowed pets, though at Granny’s house there was a sweet little cockatiel, but once at a friend’s she’d tried to comfort a cat frightened by a barking dog and found it was like trying to hold onto a bundle of biting, clawing fierceness. She’d required antibiotics and a tetanus shot afterwards.
If that small house cat could do so much damage, what would a big cat like Mitten be capable of committing? She had tried at intervals all day to reach Hart, but without success, and with Bill Maxwell growing hourly more twitchy, she sensed she wasn’t the only one in the household growing fearful.
Mr. Jeffers and Mrs. Harris hovered close to each other, mostly holding hands and even Terry took on a soothing tone when he addressed his older brother.
Bill had muttered aloud, telling stories of his past in a sing-song voice, most of them tales of his bravery, or brutality, Bobbi wasn’t sure which. The last one had been about a hunting trip where he’d shot a deer, the details of which left her feeling sick.
She wasn’t sure who Bill was trying to convince of his courage, but was fairly sure it wasn’t her. He seemed hardly aware of her presence other than grinning when he talked about his pet ‘kitty’ as though he knew how much the big cat scared her.
He’d joked about sending her out to feed Mitten. At least she hoped he was joking.
It was getting close to supper time and Mrs. Harris was looking frail. Bobbi had noticed her limping on her right leg, the side where she’d confided she’d broken her hip and spent most of a year in a nursing home near where family members lived.
In the shabby little kitchen, she found more cans and little else and opened canned chicken, green beans and carrots. Terry came in to add wood to the stove, which provided heat as well as a place to cook, and she found pans in which to heat the food.
He found mismatched plates and a few odd forks and spoons and put them on the table, then made a fresh pot of coffee before calling the others in to the meal. It was a dull meal totally different from the kind of food Bobbi was accustomed to eating at home in California, but she was starving. The canned peaches Terry produced for dessert seemed a real treat.
After the meal, she declined Mrs. Harris’ help and heated water to wash dishes in a little pan, and drying them with a clean cloth she found in one of the kitchen drawers.
The others were in the front room and she supposed she could have escaped out the back door, but considering the cold rain still falling in sheets and the fact that Mitten was out there somewhere, the thought of being alone outside as night deepened was less than inviting.
Reluctantly she went back into the front room, thinking she’d give anything for a hot soapy bath or a clean bed. ‘Hart, help me,’ she sent the message almost automatically, feeling like a girl trying to get through on a phone with dead batteries.
The four adults were concentrating on a domino game they called ‘forty two’
and even Bill seemed to be having a good time.
The fire in the little stove had burned low and the room felt chilly, but the wood box was empty and she’d used the last of the wood in the kitchen to heat the washing water, so she sank into a worn-out chair and listened to the sound of rain falling against the tin roof and the clatter of dominoes.
Even in his absorption, Bill hadn’t forgotten his rifle. It was propped against the wall at his side.
Except for the dreary poverty of the setting, the four domino players could have been long-time friends enjoying an evening together.
Apparently she’d come in to the midst of talk about old days because Terry said, “and remember, Nolan, when we went down to old Medicine Stick right before they flooded the place?”
Nolan nodded. “Yep. I’d heard the talk and was scared the whole time that they’d get off schedule and we’d be drowned. I kept looking to the window, fearing to see water come pouring in.”
“Dopes,” Bill commented drily.
“Well, we was real little, Bill,” his brother defended. “Four or five.”
“Hell, I can’t even remember ever being that young,” Bill retorted, than at a look from Mrs. Harris apologized, “Sorry, B.J.”
“We was visiting some of your family as I recall, Nolan.”
Nolan Jeffers shook his head, looking tired and sad. Mrs. Harris patted his hand. “Not kin,” he said, “the Larkins were some people my mom knew. She and Mrs. Larkin had been friends from the time they started school. When Mom died, Mrs. Larkin sent me a sympathy card all the way from California.”
“All I remember is the two grownup girls. Prettiest things I ever saw, one real red-headed and the other sort of a red brown.”
“Stacia and Helen,” Nolan contributed.
“You two was way ahead of your age, I reckon.” Bill chortled.
Nolan Jeffers smiled at B.J. Harris. “Never was struck dumb ‘til I set eyes on you Bonnie Jo,” he said, the look on his face warm and loving.
Bobbi, who had been caught up in reviewing outrageous possibilities for escape, suddenly took in what they were saying. Helen Larkin was Granny’s mother. Two of these old men had been little boys when they’d visited Granny Helen’s home in Medicine Stick.
Their past and hers were all tied up together somehow. ‘Hart,’ her mind whispered.
‘Coming.’
She tried again and again, but that was all she got. It was enough to hang onto hope.
She guessed the bobcat slept now though she wondered if it might be nocturnal the way her friend’s cat had seemed to be. She remembered sleep-overs where that cat had awakened her and the other girls in the early morning hours by walking across their sleeping bodies. The thought made her shiver.
Or maybe she was only shaking because it was cold inside and colder outside and she needed to go to the bathroom. Trouble was there wasn’t one inside the house. Mrs. Harris had mentioned something she called a chamber pot, but Bobbi couldn’t quite bear that idea. Instead she willed herself to believe Mitten was sleeping safely in the barn and went back to creep out the back door into a whirlwind of cold wind and rain. She managed what was necessary and was quickly back inside, drenched with rain and shaking more fiercely than ever.
Bill stood there, his rifle resting casually in his hands, waiting for her. “Didn’t think you’d go far,” he said with a wicked grin. Mitten screamed from somewhere outside.
The engine of the Lexus roared helplessly as she tried to force it from the ditch into which she’d skidded on this dark, wet evening. Each attempt she made at escaping the muddy clutches, the deeper her tires seemed to dig into the clay bottom of the deep ditch, the front of the car wedged against the side wall of her earthen prison.
“Drat! Damn!” Girls from the 1940s weren’t supposed to use the latter word, but of course, they did. Just not frequently. This was just one of those occasions when she reserved the right to use strong language. She discovered, however, that it didn’t help much when there was no audience to be impressed.
The way she had it figured she only was five or six miles from the old Maxwell homestead. She’d planned to wait until she got there and saw lights before calling Alistair, but now she was more than ready to give up and ask for help.
The trouble was her phone wouldn’t work. Apparently reception down here was hit or miss and right now it was set on miss.
Well, she had no choice but to keep trying to get a call out to someone. She made another attempt, but the only response she got was Bobbi’s voice saying from somewhere in the distance, ‘Hart?’
‘Coming,’ she returned. ‘Oh, Bobbi, I’m coming as fast as I can.’
That word hadn’t come through the phone, but directly into her head. For just a second she and Bobbi had connected, but then the girl was gone again. Still, just hearing that one word, built up her courage. Bobbi was still alive and fighting. Somehow she would get to her.
The Sheriff and his deputies kept regular radio contact as the search of the river area continued. Legitimately this was not part of their territory, not included in the huge, sparsely populated county they patrolled. Alistair was not particularly acquainted with these isolated roads, he’d grown up in the southern mountain area that had once been Kiowa territory.
Still he kept looking, somehow convinced that somewhere down here he would find both Hart and Bobbi. He tried not to think that he could fail to get to them in time.
She heard bottles clinking in her dreams of sitting down to dinner with Stacia’s brothers and sister and the sound of dominoes being shuffled on the table and woke to slowly realize that this was not a nightmare, but reality.
Apparently Terry and Bill Maxwell had maxed out on coffee and turned to something stronger that they drank out of brown bottles. Mrs. Harris looked as though she were tired enough to die and Bobbi wondered that she didn’t get up and find someplace to sleep.
But then she saw the barely disguised fear on Nolan Jeffers face as he looked at her and guessed they were afraid to do anything that might upset the Maxwells. The brothers were being loud and excessively jovial and Bobbi recognized that as far as drinking went they were well over the legal limit. Bill’s gun lay on the table between him and his brother. She laid still and pretended to still be asleep, watching the group through narrow slits of barely opened eyes.
‘Hart, I’m scared!’
Terry got up, went for another couple of bottles, handed one to his brother and popping open one for himself. Bobbi, her stomach rumbling with hunger, thought bitterly that they couldn’t manage to provide adequate food, or even soap to wash with, but they seemed well stocked on whiskey or whatever it was they were drinking.
Harking back to some movies she’d seen, it occurred to her that maybe they made the stuff themselves. Probably not. If it was homemade, they’d likely store the stuff in jars like in the film, not bottles with labels on them.
”Good stuff,” Bill said, “almost as good as Pop used to get from the Rutherfords.”
While she watched it seemed that Bill Maxwell with a last swig of liquor began to top out and overflow. His wrinkled old face reddened and lines like deep angry scars deepened in his forehead. “Come right out and say it, Nolan. You hate us for what we did to you.”
Nolan Jeffers tried and failed to smile. “Never said I hated anybody,” he evaded.
“But you know, don’t you. You know it was us who killed Pop. You knew all along, didn’t you?”
Nolan hesitated, opened his mouth, than closed it again. B.J. Harris looked brittle enough to break and scared to death. The fact that she seemed so frightened made Bobbi’s heart pump harder with fear. This woman knew these men, had apparently known them all her life. If she was worried, then there was reason to worry.
“Why didn’t you tell? Why didn’t you just say the Maxwell boys beat their father to death? Then you would have been let go.”
When Nolan didn’t answer this time, Bill slowly reached for his gun and prodded the other
man’s shoulder. “Why not Nolan?”
Something seemed to break inside Nolan Jeffers, “It’s not that I’m such a good guy, Bill. I told ‘em I thought it was the two of you and you had good reason. But nobody believed me. I’d been found on the ground next to your dad, his blood all over me, and they wouldn’t buy my story that I’d been trying to save him. He died in my arms saying, “My boys done it. I told him he only got what he deserved.”
“Sure enough,” Terry said blearily. “And you know it better than anybody, Nolan. You saw the bruises and cuts he left on me. You knew how I kept breaking bones.”
The rifle wavered in Bill’s hands. “It was bad enough when it was just me, but Terry was a little feller, not built strong like me and Pop beat us both. He stopped when I got so much bigger than him and I got a job and moved away. Then that day, I came back and found him up to the same old thing, trying to beat Terry to death. So, for the first time, we stood up to him. We beat him.”
“We didn’t mean to kill him, but just to hurt him the way he’d hurt us,” Terry spoke up. “It seemed only fair.”
“But it felt so good,” Bill added smugly. “I just kept on pounding him until Terry pulled me off, told me it was over, it was done. And then we heard you coming and we run.”
Mrs. Harris watched Bill with a mouth agape. Then she turned to Nolan, reaching for his hand and not seeming to notice that she knocked dominoes to the floor in the process. “All these years, I thought you did it because he was so cruel to your friend. And you didn’t do it, you were innocent. Nolan.Can you ever forgive me.”
He patted her hand, ignoring the rifle thrust against his shoulder. “It was only what everybody believed.” He glanced across at the man who had been his childhood friend. “And Terry told them he’d seen me going up to the smokehouse where his dad was working. He cried and said he supposed it was his fault in a way ‘cause I was only defending him.” He grinned wryly. “You were so convincing, I almost believed you myself.”
Wakening the Past: A Time Travel Romance (Medicine Stick Series Book 2) Page 13