As quaint as the cabin was, however, it was not built for daily living. C.W. pushed open the door and groaned when he met air as cold as the outdoors. Esther’s warnings came to mind, and he harbored second thoughts over Nora’s invitation to stay at the house. No way, he decided. He’d freeze out here before he put himself in that kind of torture.
C.W. shut the door and crossed the one-room cabin to its sole source of heat: a potbelly stove. He cranked open the cold metal hatch and lit a fire with the logs Esther had neatly laid beside it. Before long, the kindling sparked and burst into flame, emitting a red glow that lit up the small room.
Esther had done a nice job cleaning, he thought as he surveyed his lodgings. Though it lacked a woman’s touch. In the corner was a black iron double bed topped with his faded, avocado green sleeping bag and a worn patchwork quilt. A few paces away stood a small wooden table surrounded by two ladder-back chairs with crooked cane seats that looked like they’d endured years of service. No curtains, no rugs; just the bare necessities.
“Function, not aesthetics,” he murmured, thinking of Nora’s words.
It would take a while before the wood stove warmed up the room, so C.W. pulled one of the chairs close to the stove, sat back on its wobbly seat, and took out a stick of beef jerky from his coat pocket. It was so cold in the room that the plastic wrapper was brittle. He stretched his legs out before the stove, stuck one hand back into his pocket, and with his other ate his dinner.
As he stared through the open grate at the burning embers, the flames reached out like beckoning fingers, luring him inward to the realm of unbidden memories. Reluctantly he succumbed. Here, in the dark woods, in a dark moment, the ghosts of his past rose up to haunt him. He saw again the gun in MacKenzie’s hand, the look of desperation in his eyes…and then blood everywhere. C.W. stopped chewing and cringed at the memory.
For months afterward, C.W. could not see past the blood. It was as though the drops that splattered across his face had left a permanent film across his eyes. Only in drink could he get past the red into black. Into a void so empty that he could lose himself. But never the pain.
That was when he’d really started to lose control. He grew jumpy and irritable. Suspicious of everyone. Nights were no better. His dreams were all nightmares, violent and horrid, and they persisted well into the day. He began to see Mike lurking in his drunken shadows. He started drinking around the clock, desperate to hide from the specter of his guilt. Days became nights then days again, rolling and rolling in a downward spiral. C.W. drank his way to rock bottom, ending up in a Vermont rehab clinic with nerves of shattered glass.
The doctors called it post-traumatic stress disorder. C.W. called it just deserts. After drying out, he followed his doctors’ advice. He left his home, his work, all that he had once deemed important to concentrate on this isolated sheep farm of Michael MacKenzie. Here he did physical work to regain his strength and self-respect, he rethought his goals, and he tried to confront the ghost of Michael MacKenzie.
The doctors had been right and his exile was working. He had come to grips with his drinking, but he had yet to reconcile with Mike’s suicide or his eventual return to New York. Now, after a year, he felt ready. It was time to move forward.
Moving forward, however, did not include turning back. C.W. had discovered, staring at the lifeless form of MacKenzie, that he had a conscience. He knew for certain that no million dollar loan was worth this one man’s life. And knowing this, he was sure, dead sure, that he had to leave the banking business.
But how to leave? Reviewing his past as coldly as a banker would a ledger, he read without emotion that values such as compassion and pity had come up short. In the past months, he had dug deep to find those values long ignored, and once found, he had nourished them. Now, for the first time since assuming the mantle of the bank a decade earlier, C.W. could look at himself and like what he saw. In his cocoon, he had definitely changed.
But again, how to leave? That was the question he had yet to answer. The heir of a financial empire did not simply walk away. Until he figured it out, he had to remain outside the harassments of his family. No one thought to look for him on the farm of Michael MacKenzie. Everyone knew he abhorred MacKenzie’s showy style and underhanded schemes, and after the suicide, it was the last place they’d look. That had been the plan, and it had worked.
He took a deep breath and leaned back. Yet now MacKenzie’s widow was here and the bank was in an uproar.
A seasoned general, C.W. removed his emotion like a discarded coat and proceeded to formulate an attack. This would be his greatest battle. His enemies surrounded him. He was fighting for his life.
Somehow, this fiasco was tied up with MacKenzie. His trail was unmistakable. Somewhere he must have left records of his transactions. Could those records be here—with Nora? How much did she know?
He had always trusted his instincts. His instincts told him that Nora was probably an innocent. A lamb led to the slaughter. That knowledge made the war unsavory. For his instincts also told him that Nora MacKenzie was the key to what he wanted.
C.W. abruptly stood up and looked away from the fire and out the small four-pane window. Across the meadow the lights flicked off, room by room, in the big house. He looked at his watch; it was eleven o’clock. Nora was probably curled up with one of his farm books.
Still in his boots and coat and with arms hanging at his side, he looked awhile longer at the last light flickering in the distance. It shone, he knew, from her bedroom. He wondered if she was tired, if her head ached, and if, alone in that great big bed, she was as cold as he was.
The stars twinkled like tigers’ eyes in the crisp air. The full moon illuminated the meadow between them, revealing the trodden path connecting the two buildings. C.W. sighed a long ragged breath and sat down on his bed. He was bone tired. Tired from fatigue and tired of his inner struggles.
“What the hell,” he muttered, staring at his feet. His course was clear. Fate put him on this farm at this time for a reason. And that reason was to discover the link between the Blair Bank and Michael MacKenzie. To answer at last why MacKenzie felt such hatred against him that he’d take his own life before him.
He knew the link existed—he just needed the proof. And the only one who could lead him to it was Nora. He didn’t want to deceive her; he would try not to involve her in any way.
But keeping himself from getting involved with her—that was the trick. The timing was wrong, he told himself. She wasn’t ready for an involvement, and neither was he. And she wasn’t the kind of woman just to have sex with.
Oh God, he thought to himself with dismay. He had to face it. Even after so short a time, she had worked her way into his heart. Like a worm in a rotten apple, she was devouring him. It wasn’t something he could understand with logic. As Nora grew stronger and more confident, his determination to maintain a distance grew weaker. How was he going to make this work?
He stretched out on the bed and stared at the post-and-beam ceiling. In the distance he could hear the plodding, dragging sound of a porcupine. Lying with his arm beneath his head, his thoughts drifted back to Nora: her soft hair the color of cornsilk and her eyes the same verdant shade of the mountains in summer. His heart softened when he recalled how she’d struggled with the shovel that morning, how she’d sifted through her coupons, how gentle she’d been with the runt.
And how her smile made him realize his loneliness.
14
IT WAS EARLY MORNING. Nora stood on the bluff in the sun, one hand shielding her eyes, surveying her house, her meadow, and her fields. Before her, the morning laundry danced along the clothesline in a gusty wind. Long-sleeved cotton shirts, frayed at the collar; stained jeans worn at the rear, old white socks. Nothing fancy, nothing matched.
Fourteen days she’d been here. Just two weeks and it felt like forever. Now, she had to concentrate to conjure up the hustling pace of New York and the names and faces of old acquaintances.
Nights during the first week had been anything but peaceful. The first night Nora felt something run across her head as she slept. Sure enough, mouse droppings were found under the sheets the next morning. Nora set out scores of traps, hoping in her heart she wouldn’t catch anything. But she did, two fat ones, and managed to carry the heavy rodents out to the brush then lift the metal and shake them off, all without looking once at the trap.
The second night brought nightmares of Mike.
The third night the sound of screeching and snarling hoots had her left her shivering under the covers, convinced some flesh-eating cat was crawling outside her window.
“That’ll be a screech owl,” Seth declared after listening to her careful rendition.
“Not a coyote?”
“Nope.” He wiped the smile off his face. “That’ll be a screech owl.”
The fourth night a bat darted and flapped through her room. The distinct flap, flap, flap of wings batting in the windless room could be heard even with her head tucked under the covers where she remained, sweating, the whole night. Nora was sure the bats would get caught in her hair and scratch her scalp apart, like her mother had told her as a child. She blushed furiously when everyone in the barn burst out laughing at her tale.
By the seventh night she was having a hard time even falling asleep. Sometime around one o’clock she heard a distinct dragging sound on the gravel outside her window. Then came a persistent, rhythmic scraping and clawing against wood that lasted the better part of two hours. Nora had grabbed her flashlight and crept by all the windows, but the night was so black she couldn’t see much in the narrow beam of yellow light. Frustrated, she picked up an old shoe and threw it out the window toward the sound. Silence followed, then the dragging sound resumed, getting fainter and fainter until it disappeared.
In the barn the next morning she started to tell C.W. about the noise but, as though on cue, the Johnston boys and Seth walked in, anxious to hear what the missus heard that night. At first the men didn’t believe she’d heard anything. Frank and Junior jabbed and guffawed and mumbled comments about her crazy imagination and her “being a woman.” At her indignant insistence, C.W. went up to check the house and sure enough, the plywood by the deck had a whole corner chewed right off.
“Porcupines,” declared Seth. Frank and Junior nodded. “Better check your tires. Fuel line too. They like anything with salt on it.”
“That’s just great,” said Nora with a scowl.
That very afternoon, Nora put out a salt lick on the mountain, not fifty yards from the house. She reasoned that if the varmints needed salt, they’d jolly well get it someplace other than her house and car.
After that, Nora was so tired she didn’t give a hoot who or what rustled outside her window. She slept right through it.
Her nights might have been tough, but during the days her life had crystallized. The farm set roots in her heart. Each lamb mattered. Each acre counted. And at some point in the two weeks, the house became a home.
She was glad now that she and Mike had never finished it. The house’s rough state allowed her dreams to soar. While she scrubbed toilets stained by hard well water or swept the uneven plywood and pitted cement floors, Nora hummed and planned what she could do given a little money. She cleaned every inch of the big house, as everyone called it, and polished it with pride. She loved each brick and rafter.
Every morning as she did her chores, Nora found telltale signs that C.W. had been in the house. He was, of course, very discreet. Only his damp towels hanging on a hook in the bathroom, his coffee mug rinsed in the sink, or a sprinkling of laundry soap near the washer, served as reminders of his presence. C.W. was always doing thoughtful things, such as having her coffee ready and stoking up the fire in the morning. But he took pains to avoid her. While she was grateful for his gentlemanly distance, she wondered if it wouldn’t be nice to chat over the coffee once in a while. In fact, it had been weeks since she’d had a simple conversation with anyone and she was starved for one.
From the direction of her road came the high drone of an engine clambering up the mountain. Nora stepped away from the clothesline to move closer to the terrace’s edge. Shielding her eyes with her hand, she spotted a small white van with the name Green Mountain Electric emerging from the tunnel of foliage. It rounded the ledge and came to a slow stop at the house. The gravel made a tremendous racket when anyone or anything crossed it, like a natural alarm.
Nora came around the house to meet the van, cautious as always. A compact man of medium height and build was already opening up the rear of the van and pulling out a red metal workbox.
“Hello?” Nora called.
The stranger didn’t respond right away but took his time to gather a few more tools, close the door, check the contents of the box, then stroll at a leisurely pace to meet her. Before he said hello, he handed her a yellow sheet of paper with the order number and job description clearly stated.
“You’re Zach Belfort,” Nora said, reading the name on the paper.
“Ma’am,” he replied, nodding his head.
Nora briefly scanned the man she knew to be Seth’s ex-son-in-law. Former husband of Sarah. He looked more a lumberjack than an electrician with his red-checked flannel shirt worn buttoned up over long johns and all tucked neatly into dark blue jeans. He wore his pants high, like his work boots, over a full stomach. Whatever his job, he was a mountain man to be sure. All muscle, tan skin, and outdoor gear.
Most remarkable, however, was his full reddish beard. It encircled his face and met up with his full head of hair in a nonstop halo of red. His blue eyes twinkled over the bristly, full mustache, and Nora couldn’t help but think that someday, when the red turned gray, Zach would make the best Santa. His friendly appearance made his silent distance awkward.
“You’re Seth’s relation. Thank you for coming.”
Zach’s face clouded. “You have some electrical work to do.”
“Yes, right this way.”
She led him into the house and pointed out where the circuits were and briefly reviewed what had to be done. Zach’s responses were simple grunts of “sure” and “yep.” It was clear he wanted to get the job done and be out of there. Nora obliged him and stayed out of his way. As the hours passed, however, she couldn’t help but admire his hard work and tenacity. He didn’t want water or coffee but kept to his task. When he was done, Zach brought her the form to sign with politeness and, without chitchat, started loading up.
Fred Zwinger, the pump man, who was also Seth’s cousin, had been equally distant. As was Joe Ball, the pockmarked plumber from Clarendon, and Darryl Weaver, the “man to see about road work,” who also happened to be Seth’s cousin. They were all polite, prompt, did the work for a fair price, and never tried to sell her on another job. Whether it was because they were related to Seth and had got a warning from him, or whether it was just the way of Vermont, Nora didn’t know yet. In any case, none of them was chatty. When they finished, they all hotfooted it out of her way without more than a brief comment on the weather.
Zach, however, was also her neighbor. He lived down the road where most of Seth’s children and relatives had settled. The Johnston family was a tight one, and they generally couldn’t stand to be off the family land. Not many went beyond the state line and only a few stepped foot in a big city. With Zach, Nora decided to try and strike up a conversation.
Nora tried the weather, the house, the new ordinance to expand the quarry, even the new hunting range, but none of them sparked. Only at the eleventh hour, when he was closing up his truck, did she obliquely mention that she was from Wisconsin. Zach’s head bobbed up and his eyes twinkled.
“Wisconsin? Where?”
“Milwaukee.”
“No kidding. I’m from Stevens Point.”
“No kidding! I thought you were a Vermont man.”
Zach crossed his arms akimbo and leaned his spine and left foot against his van. Zach Belfort suddenly appeared in the mood to talk.
He started off explaining how he’d moved to Vermont eight years earlier on a job. He missed his family in Wisconsin, but he preferred the protected wildlife in Vermont to the encroaching development in the country land of Wisconsin. Like most Vermonters, the word development was spoken with contempt.
Once Zach started talking it was impossible to shut him up. Nora thought it was like a floodgate that had been released.
She wasn’t about to interrupt Zach. Even though she got admitted to Zach’s trust only on the merit of having come from Wisconsin, she revelled in her acceptance. Nora also was politic enough to let it be known that yes, she was open to letting a “few friends” hunt her land, and no, she wasn’t some typical out-of-towner who shivered under the sheets at every hoot and snarl heard in the night. Nora figured out that Zach and Seth weren’t on cozy terms these days, or he’d have heard the rampant jokes about her night escapades by now.
When Zach left, he was smiling broadly and promising to lend her a hand whenever she needed it. “If you see C.W., tell him to call me about the turkey shoot. You might want to come too.”
“I will,” Nora called out, waving a wide arc. Plucking up her laundry baskets, she went back into the house just long enough to turn off the lights and appliances, then headed back outdoors. Today was special. She felt social and it was time for a few visits.
With arms full of freshly baked honey wheat bread, Nora managed to knock on the door of May’s trailer. Very gingerly. From the looks of the rusted door, it couldn’t take rough handling. May’s trailer was an aqua, white, and rust-colored sorry affair with a tacked-on, tar-papered addition on the back. Beside it, under a three-sided lean-to, sat the well-polished Buick.
Around the edges of the trailer, along the walkway, and stuck anywhere sun and soil was available were garden beds of all sizes and shapes. As she waited, Nora cast a knowing eye over the garden, noting the rich, humus soil and the vigor of the plants. These were healthy gardens, made so from years of backbreaking labor, tender ministrations and heaps of sheep manure. Yet the garden had seen better days and the season was late. Mildew and mold covered long-dead leaves and the yellowed woody vines needed pruning.
The Long Road Home Page 15