“Today,” Eben answered not looking up from his plate. “Went home, but the cabin’s burned.”
“What?” Burned?
“The cabin’s gone,” Eben repeated. “We come here to find out what happened. That’s when yer wife told us about Ma … and Job.” He shook his head in sorrow, and wiped his eyes with the back of his filthy hand.
Jed Delaney licked his fork slowly. “Yer woman sure is pretty.”
Hick’s stomach tightened and he glanced at the door. “Funny she’s not back.”
Eben finished his beans and pushed the plate back, leaning back in his chair with his legs sprawled in front of him. “Good cook, too. We thank you for the meal.”
“You’re welcome,” Hick said with forced calmness. “I’m really sorry you had to come home to so much heartache.”
“It’s a blow, that’s sure,” Eben agreed. “But Ma’s been sick fer so long. Weren’t much surprise in that.”
“Job didn’t do no wrong,” Jed interjected.
“You’re right,” Hick said. “He didn’t do anything wrong.”
“And he’s dead,” Jed continued.
“Yes. He’s dead.”
“It ain’t right,” Jed said in a flat voice. “No, it’s not—”
“Job weren’t bright,” Eben told Hick, “Mourning in there got the brains between the two of ’em. But he was a good boy to his mama. He done his best.”
“I wish they both would have stayed here and not—” Hick began.
“Job weren’t the kind to live in town,” Eben interrupted. “It weren’t your fault. He just can’t stand eyes on him all the time. Ya’ll got any pie?”
“I don’t know,” Hick answered, surprised by the question. “I haven’t been home …”
Eben straightened the fork by his plate as if he needed to do something to keep his hands busy. “Mourning says you and yer woman been a real help to us. Says you been standin’ up for us. We thank you for that.”
“Yer woman says you don’t think we done no wrong,” Jed added.
Hick looked at the two teenagers across from him. They were coarse and hard, they were dirty and rough, but as he studied them something inside confirmed what he’d believed all along. These two didn’t kill Gladys Kestrel. “I don’t,” he said. “But half the town does.”
“I reckon that’s on account of Pa,” Jed said. “He didn’t do no wrong neither.”
“I know,” Hick said, surprising himself with the force of his conviction.
“Ma says no one never did believe it,” Eben told Hick. “She told all them lawmen how Pa couldn’t even kill the chickens when we had ’em. Pa was a peaceable man.”
“We Delaneys got no luck at all.” Jed shook his head as if accounting for all the sorrow in the world.
Hick well believed that statement. “What happened at the cabin?”
“Can’t tell.” Eben shrugged. “Maybe Mourning forgot to put out the coal oil lamp.”
Hick put out the lamp himself when he and Jake removed Pearl Delaney’s body. “Odd the house would burn like that,” he wondered out loud.
“We Delaneys got no luck at all,” Jed repeated.
“What will you do now?” Hick asked. “You’re welcome to stay here. We don’t have much, but …”
“We thank you for that,” Eben said, watching Hick closely, “but it’s gonna be peach season up to Michigan, and we’ll be headed that way.”
“What about Mourning?”
“She can come along. Mourning’s a right smart picker.”
“She’d be a help with—” Hick began when the door opened and Maggie rushed in followed by Jake.
“Where’s Jimmy?” she said, scanning the room.
Hick waved a hand toward the bathroom. “Mourning’s got him in there.”
Maggie’s eyes widened. “In the bathroom? Why?”
Jake chuckled. “Because she’s Pearl Delaney’s daughter, that’s why. She knows the steam will ease his breathing.”
Hick noticed the change that occurred in the Delaneys when Maggie entered the room. Eben sat up straight and Jed wiped his mouth with his sleeve. It was clear they had been taught to respect women, and Hick was embarrassed by the thoughts that had been running through his head, and grateful he’d not betrayed them.
Jake put a hand on Jed’s shoulder. “Glad to see you’re well, boys. I am sorry about your ma.”
Eben rose from the table and shook the doctor’s hand. “Mourning says you took good care of Ma all the way up to the end. We thank you for that.”
“Your mother was a very good woman.”
“We’d like to see where you have her planted.”
“I’ll be glad to take you,” Jake said. “Let me check on Jimmy and then we’ll be off.” He knocked on the bathroom door.
Hick’s eyes followed Maggie as she and Jake disappeared into the bathroom. As the boys busied themselves removing the dirt from their fingernails with their pocket knives, he followed Maggie into the bathroom. Mourning was sitting on the toilet and Doc had a stethoscope to the baby’s chest. Maggie was seated on the edge of the bathtub, leaning toward them, watching the doctor’s face.
“Mag?” Hick called quietly from the doorway.
She rose to meet him. “Doc says …” but was interrupted by Hick grabbing her face. He kissed her forehead, her eyes, her nose, her cheeks and lastly her mouth. She struggled to get her breath as he smothered her with kisses. “Hickory?”
Mourning giggled. “You sure do love her.”
Hick gazed deeply into Maggie’s eyes. “Yes, I do.” He pulled Maggie close, hugged her tight, unwilling to let her go.
“You’re trembling,” she whispered. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Nothing’s wrong. You’re here, you’re safe.” He kissed her again. Maggie searched his face as if trying to mine the source of this unexpected warmth.
“Well, it’s not croup,” Jake said as he finished his exam and Mourning handed the baby to Maggie. “Just a bad cold.” He turned to the young girl. “You did right sending Maggie to get me. That cough sounds pretty bad. Appears you learned a lot from your mother.”
Mourning blushed with pleasure.
Hick bent and looked into his son’s face. It was flushed and his mouth was parted, but when Jimmy saw his father he wriggled in Maggie’s arms and smiled a lop-sided smile. Hick kissed his forehead. “Get better, Champ,” he told him. He rose and told Maggie, “I gotta go.”
“I know,” she answered. “The fire …”
Hick nodded and impulsively grabbed his wife and son in a bear hug, crushing the baby a little and making him cry out. “Sorry Champ,” he told him and then asked, “You all right with all our guests?”
She nodded but told him, “I don’t think the boys will stay here.”
“Try to figure out a way to make them,” Hick responded. “Feed ’em. I suggest pie.”
18
A rich, oddly pleasant smell of burnt wood perfumed the air. Very little remained of the shack that Abner Delaney had built on the banks of the Little River eighteen years earlier. Heaps of white ash filled the air like choking snowflakes as Hick and Adam sifted through the rubble. Despite the sun, darkness closed in on the cabin from the dense trees that had grown up around it. The rusted pick-up truck was covered in ash, but seemed to have escaped the fire.
“You’re sure you blew out the lamp?” Adam asked as they walked through the charred remains.
“I turned down the wick and blew it out,” Hick replied with certainty. “I know because I remember Doc commenting on how dark it is out here.”
Adam kicked at a pile of ash. “What else could have caused it? Was there a fire in the stove?”
“I put that out, too.”
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
Adam looked around him. “There’s been a lot of storms recently. Reckon it was lightning?”
Hick shrugged. “No way to know. It’s almost all gone.”
T
he cinder blocks that held up the shaky foundation now stood like silent sentries along the footprint of the house. The floor had almost been completely consumed and the wood burning stove had crashed through and stood tilted with the oven door hanging open. Hick stood and looked toward the Little River. He imagined Abner patiently dragging up driftwood, log by log, and planing and hewing it into a shelter for his new wife. He thought of the optimism the couple must have had at the start of their life together, and the tragic way it all turned out.
Hick kicked at the rubble and felt an overwhelming sense of sadness. “Jed wasn’t kidding when he said the Delaneys have no luck,” he told Adam. Pausing a moment, he sniffed the air. “Do you smell that?”
Adam stopped. “What?”
Hick’s stomach churned. Sweat beaded on his forehead and his palms grew moist. “Gasoline. Do you smell it?”
Adam sniffed. “I don’t smell anything.”
Hick’s dinner washed up behind his throat and he swallowed hard and fought back the dizziness. He put his hand on his forehead and closed his eyes trying to force the earth to stop spinning.
Adam came beside him. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” Hick answered quickly. “There’s nothing wrong. Maybe I’ve got the flu.”
Adam looked skeptical. “What all of a sudden?”
Hick shrugged. “I don’t know, maybe. You’re sure you don’t smell gasoline?”
Adam again sniffed at the air. “No. I can’t smell anything.”
Hick closed his eyes against the brightness of the flames that roared up in his memory. He could hear them, like rushing wind, consuming everything … the old farmhouse in Belgium, the bodies within.
“What’s wrong?”
“I said nothing!” Hick snapped. “Jesus Christ! Nothing is wrong. Just back off!”
Adam put his hands up and took a step backward. “Okay, okay. Whatever you say.”
Hick breathed in deeply through his nose and exhaled loudly. “Sorry, Adam.” He rubbed his hand over his eyes. “Sorry. Sometimes smells bring back things I’d just as soon forget.”
“I know,” Adam said, stepping forward and putting a large hand on Hick’s shoulder.
The two men searched the floors, looking for any darkened marks, any traces of an accelerant, but found nothing. “I’m sure I’m just imagining it, or it’s the truck,” Hick finally decided. They sifted through the debris and Adam moved to the perimeter of the house, scouring the ground, looking for something that might be out of place, that didn’t belong. He bent and picked something up. “What do you make of this?” he asked Hick.
Hick joined him and they looked at the object, Adam turning it over in his fingers. Years of caked, sandy mud and a layer of white ash, obscured its purpose, but something glinted beneath the grime.
“I can’t imagine the Delaneys ever owned much that was shiny,” Hick said.
“Here. I’ve got an idea,” Adam said. He went to the squad car and pulled out the Coke he’d been drinking. He poured it over the object and, after scrubbing it against his pants, it finally emerged from the slop.
“It’s a cuff link.” Adam held it out to Hick.
“Why in the hell would the Delaneys need a cuff link?”
“It ain’t the Delaneys,” Adam said slowly. He handed the piece of gold to Hick. On the front of the link a “P” was engraved in elegant script.
“Shit.”
The Pringle Farm had doubled in size since the Jenny Slough had been dammed up. The family had arrived in Cherokee Crossing before the Civil War and had remained in the same place, slowly buying up farm after farm from those who moved on or died. Even before the slough was dammed they had the largest farm in town and the Pringle men, tall, handsome, smart, were plenty capable of managing the land.
But wealth and prosperity had not shielded the family from heartache. Oliver Pringle had died soon after his son Ronnie and most said it was of a broken heart. Matt’s first wife had died in childbirth, and his mother was now an invalid, living her remaining years in a bed set up in what used to be the dining room. In spite of all this, Matt retained an easy-going charm.
His young wife answered the door and smiled. Sissy Pringle was evidently ready to give birth at any moment. She was short and plump with soft, blonde hair and a bright, happy smile. “Good afternoon,” she said politely. “Won’t you come in?”
“Sissy, I told you to stay offen your feet. I’ll answer—” Matt’s laughing voice stopped abruptly when he saw Hick and Adam in the house.
He shook their hands, saying, “Sheriff, Deputy Kinion. Can I get ya’ll some iced tea or coffee?”
“No, thanks,” Hick said. “We were wondering if we might have a minute of your time.”
Matt shrugged. “Sure. You want to sit?”
Hick glanced at Sissy. “How about we go outside?”
Matt’s brows knitted but he followed the men. “What’s this all about, fellas?”
Hick handed Matt the cuff link and asked, “You ever seen this before?”
Looking at it closely, Matt shook his head. “No. I can’t say I have. Where’d it come from?”
“It was under the Delaneys porch. Their cabin burned and we found it. Looks like it’s been there a while,” Adam told him.
“The Delaneys?” Matt’s brow creased in confusion. “You don’t have any idea how it might have got there?”
Matt looked at Hick and Adam. “I don’t know how I would.”
“It’s like this,” Hick said. “There’s several families in Cherokee Crossing with last names that begin with P. There’s the Presleys and the Ponders, the Powers, and the Princes. But, really, ya’ll are the only ones who could have ever afforded gold cufflinks. They had to belong to your kin. I just can’t figure out how the Delaneys might have got hold of ’em.”
Matt took the cufflink back in his hand and studied it. He shook his head and said, “I honestly don’t know.” He thought a moment and added, “It could have been Ronnie’s. He always liked to dress nice. Wouldn’t surprise me if he had cufflinks like this at one time, I just don’t know for sure.”
“Do you know of any reason Ronnie might have been at the Delaney’s?”
“No, but Ronnie was everywhere. He didn’t like to sit at home. And he had friends everywhere.”
“You’ve never seen the other one here, lying around the house?”
“I’ve never seen it,” Matt replied. “You’re welcome to look around if you like. I don’t know what you might find, but I got no call in keepin’ you out of there. I’ll be as helpful as I can.”
“We may take you up on that,” Hick said. “It may or may not be important, but it’s late and there ain’t no point bothering Sissy and your mama with this now.”
Adam and Hick turned to leave, but Matt stopped them. Glancing at the house, he said, “Sheriff, if you have a minute I’d like you to come with me. I want to unburden myself.”
Hick flashed a surprised look toward Adam and the three men strode toward the large red barn that sat near an enormous soybean field. Matt opened the door of the barn and stopped at the entry way. He pointed to a beam.
“You see that?”
Hick nodded and Matt continued. “When I was ten years old, I came out to this barn and found my brother hanging from that beam.”
Hick’s blood ran cold and his heart seized up. “What?”
Matt stifled a sob, his eyes reddened, and he stood silent a moment. Finally, his nostrils flared and he cleared his throat.
“My daddy sent me to get a hoe. It was June and the garden was just sprouting. When Daddy said to get something you got it … fast. I ran to the barn and opened the door and there he was, dangling by his belt.” Matt’s eyes closed. “I can still see his face … the way it looked. It didn’t look like Ronnie. It looked like some kind of monster.”
“I thought Ronnie got kicked in the head,” Adam said.
Matt’s face contorted. “Oliver Pringle would never let the world know h
e had a son so weak as to take his own life.”
“Why’d Ronnie do it?” Hick asked.
“Because there’s only so much tyranny a man can take,” Matt answered, his face tight, his voice bitter.
Matt closed the barn door and the three men walked into the sunshine. Hick lit a cigarette. Adam stuffed his hands in his pockets. Matt looked off into the distance.
Hick took a long drag, blew the smoke out of his nose, and said, “You want to tell us what happened? How it is this was never spoken of until now?”
Matt stood there, tall and handsome, with a beautiful wife and a successful farm and began to weep. “When I told Daddy what I saw in that barn he couldn’t move. It was like he turned to stone. He just stared off in the distance and didn’t say a word.” He wiped his nose on his sleeve. “It was Mama. She was the one who said it was lucky Doc Prescott was in Memphis. She was always thinking. She acted like it was the best thing on earth that if Ronnie had to be dead it was wonderful that Doc wouldn’t be here to see the truth, to see what Ronnie’d done.”
“I can’t say for sure that cufflink was Ronnie’s, but I can tell you he liked to dress nice and be in town. He never wanted to be a farmer and Daddy wouldn’t listen. They used to fight about it. But Susie was always there for Ronnie. She was a good friend to him, and I reckon the only person that ever cared to listen to what Ronnie wanted. I reckon it hurt him real bad when she died. I remember him cryin’ after that funeral. And then there were the whispers that Ronnie done it. Between Susie’s death, Daddy’s pressure, and the town’s gossip, I reckon it all got to be too much. And then Daddy died. People say Daddy died of a broken heart because he lost a son. That ain’t true. He died because he lost control. Ronnie slipped away from him, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it.”
Matt’s eyes trailed toward the house. “Sissy’s fixin’ to have a little one any day. I don’t reckon I care iffen it’s a boy or a girl. It won’t matter ’cause it’ll be loved … no matter what. I don’t care if it wants to be a farmer or a ditch digger. I don’t give a shit what happens to this farm when I’m dead and gone.” Matt glanced at the barn. “Ronnie was a great brother. He protected me and watched over me. I think he’d want the truth to be told. I owe it to him.” Matt turned reddened eyes to Hick. “I miss him to this day.”
Behind Every Door Page 15