by Brian Quest
“Well, it looks like you all haven’t hidden anything up here. Let’s go. We’re going back downstairs. I seem to remember a couple of rooms down there we haven’t really checked too good.”
“Very well.”
“What, are you into fancy talk? You could just say, ‘okay’.”
“No, you haven’t checked VERY WELL.”
“Oh, that’s right, make fun of the uneducated.” He grabbed Debbie’s arm harder than he had up to that point and then pulled her behind him. She snatched up the lantern on their way out of her father’s room and hurried her pace so he wouldn’t yank her to the floor. She stumbled a couple of times, but kept her footing and trailed behind him down the stairs.
“Did you find anything good? You sure did make a racket up there,” the big man asked.
“Nothing. Not a damn thing.”
“Well, I know there’s something around here, so keep looking!”
“Man, you don’t have to shout.”
“I will do what I want. Now, keep looking!”
Andrew looked at Debbie, and he could see the hurt in her eyes. He knew the look meant that something had happened up those stairs, and he just hoped the young man hadn’t laid a hand on his girl. Debbie winked at her dad and nodded her head slightly to let him know she was fine, and he let out a big sigh of relief. He felt as if she had read his mind and tried to put his heart at ease.
The young man didn’t let Debbie stand around very long. He pulled her past the couch and into the kitchen. “Hey! Where you going, Boy? You need to check in here!”
“Man, really? All that’s in there is the couch, a chair and the chest we already went through.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right. You look in every cabinet in that kitchen.”
“I know where to look. I ain’t stupid. It’s not like we haven’t done this before.”
In the kitchen, the guy emptied each cabinet, item by item, shaking every box and can. He looked at the jars of fruit, tipping them side to side and upside down to see if there was anything other than fruit in them. He went through each drawer, and then pulled them out and tipped them over to look at the underside. “You’d be surprised how many people tape money and stuff under the drawers,” he said, as if Debbie really cared why he was doing what he was doing.
Tired of standing there watching him, Debbie sat in a chair that she strategically had pulled over the rug that sat on the door to the cellar. She watched him as he tore apart the one room in the house where everyone came together to share meals and stories and enjoy life. He went to the cabinet by the back door and opened it. Inside he found more dishes and pots and pans that he threw across the room. He turned and looked at Debbie and took a couple of steps in her direction. On his way, he kicked the rug and tripped. After stumbling across the room, he righted himself and looked down at the rug. That’s when he saw the door to the cellar.
“Oh, you thought you were clever, huh?”
Trying to pretend like she didn’t know what he was talking about, she said, “What?”
“The door right there, where does it go?”
“To the root cellar. It’s where we keep our potatoes and carrots in the wintertime.”
“Move.”
“I told you, there’s just some carrots and potatoes down there.”
“I said move!”
Debbie got off the chair and watched as the man went down to the only place in the world where she and her sisters ever felt truly safe. It was no longer the same room, and she would from that point on only see his face there. She followed him, but stopped halfway down the steps to the bottom. She could hear him digging around, throwing and breaking things as he went. She turned away, and went back up to the kitchen and sat at the table, silently crying. When the man came back up, he went right past Debbie and into the living room. He stood there, staring at everyone, not saying a word.
“Don’t just stand there lookin’ like an idiot. What’d you find?”
“They have all kinds of stuff in a cellar. The door is in the floor of the kitchen.”
“What kind of stuff?”
Debbie rushed into the room and said, “I’m sorry, Daddy. I tried to hide it. I didn’t mean for him to find the cellar.”
“It’s okay, Baby. It’s not your fault.”
“Shut up! I knew you were hiding something!” He looked back at the young man, “What did you find?”
“They have everything. They have food for months, they have guns and ammo, they have clothes and books, they have money and jewelry, and they have gold.”
“Gold?” The big man asked. He looked at Andrew and said, “Where did you get gold?”
“It’s from about fifteen years ago. I went panning and found gold. I’ve been keeping it here this whole time; just in case we ever needed it.”
“Well, it looks like you need it now. We’ll take the gold, and everything else. You,” he said, pointing to the small man, “Help him bring the stuff up. Take it all.”
“No! You can’t take it all! We need it!” Beth shouted, surprising everyone in the room; she hadn’t said a word since the men barged into the house.
“Well, little girl, so do we. Now shut up and maybe, just maybe, we won’t take you with us. Better yet, shut your mouth and maybe we will let you stay in this house…alive.”
Beth squirmed down where she sat, trying to make herself invisible. She didn’t like the men. She didn’t like the way they talked to her family. She didn’t like the way they acted. And she definitely didn’t like the way they smelled. She could smell them from across the room and it was obvious to her they didn’t take much to bathing. She covered her face with a throw pillow and hoped that when she looked again they would be gone. They weren’t.
Chapter Fifteen
“Hurry up! Get your butts down there and get everything you can fit into the bags.” The large man picked up the bags they had thrown on the floor by the front door and tossed them at the two younger men. They caught the bags and looked at them, almost as if they had no idea what to do next. “Go on, we don’t have all day!”
The girls could see the panic in their father’s eyes, and Debbie was scared he may try to do something that would get him killed. She knew the men were watching him closely, along with Thomas, Stewart and Keith. She was back on the floor at her father’s feet, and she looked up at him. He looked down into her frightened eyes, and as softly as she could, she whispered, “It’s going to be okay, Dad.” Then she looked down at the bottom of the couch and back up at him.
Until that moment, he hadn’t realized she knew about the gun he kept hidden up underneath the couch. It took a moment for him to realize she was signaling him, and he instantly shook his head slightly. She whispered, “Yes, it’s okay,” and looked away just as the man yelled, “Stop talking!”
She looked back up at her dad and he winked. She knew he was giving her the go ahead to do what she was planning to do. He looked quickly back at the man. He was very close, and Andrew knew his daughter wouldn’t have much time to act. Without even looking back at his daughter, he nodded. Within a fraction of a second, Debbie slid her hand under the couch behind her and grabbed the gun. In one fluid motion, she stood tall and pulled the hammer back, allowing the man to hear the familiar clicking sound.
The man, who appeared almost giant-like, froze in his tracks and almost shrunk into himself as he started to turn in her direction. Before he could completely turn around, Debbie fired the gun. She hadn’t even taken the time to properly aim the weapon, and she definitely didn’t think before doing so; it was an instantaneous reaction…a motion to protect the people she loved.
Everything seemed to move in slow motion for the next moment. The man fell forward, landing right on top of Stewart, his gun still in his hand. Stewart pushed the man to the floor and quickly grabbed the gun from his hand. The man didn’t move. He just laid there, a look of shock on his face. Stewart stood over him, pointing the man’s own gun at him and watched as he took h
is last breaths. The look of fear and shock never left his face, and his eyes never closed.
Amy sat, face still buried in Connie’s hair, her sobs getting louder and louder. Beth had her eyes open so widely that she looked more like a baby deer than a little girl, and Connie tried comforting both of them.
Debbie stood there, arms stretched out in front of her, hands still clutching the revolver. Andrew looked at his daughter and saw the look on her face. She lowered her arms to her sides and her feet remained planted on the floor across the room from the man she had shot. Andrew was shocked at how quickly the whole scene had played out, and was amazed at how Debbie had handled things. He also knew that he had to act swiftly because there were three people still in the house. He looked over at the doorway that led into the kitchen and the third man was gone. He hoped that the man had rushed down to get the others from the cellar, but he didn’t want to take any chances, so he gently took the gun from Debbie’s hand.
“You okay, Sweetie?” he asked.
“I’m fine, Dad. Is he dead?” Her voice didn’t even shake as she asked the question.
“Yes, he is. Now, the others are still here and we have to take care of them. You need to take your sisters upstairs. Put them in the closet. The rifle is tucked up in the rafters of my bedroom. It’s loaded. Get it, and stay there. I’ll get you when it’s safe.”
“No, Dad. I should help you.”
“You already have helped so much. Come on, take your sisters upstairs.”
“But he destroyed it up there. I don’t want them to see it.”
“There isn’t anywhere for you to hide. You need to go up. They will be fine. They just want to feel safe. You can keep them safe.”
“Okay, Dad. Be careful.” Debbie looked at Connie and said, “Come on, help me get them upstairs.” Before she could say anything else to her father, he was gone. He and Stewart took the guns and went into the kitchen. Keith helped the girls upstairs and then stood watch at the top of the steps, the gun he kept hidden in the planter at the top of the steps in his hands.
Thomas stayed in the living room, wanting to make sure nobody got past him. Things seemed to be going in fast forward and slow motion all at the same time, and when Andrew and Stewart went into the kitchen, they had to pause for a moment and catch their breath. Even with all of the commotion, there was still an eerie silence in the house. They could hear the men down in the cellar as they slowly moved closer to the opening, and they hoped the third man was with them.
They stepped closer to the opening and both Andrew and Stewart pointed their guns at the stairs. Halfway down they could see a man standing there and realized that it was the third man. Relieved, they kept their guns pointed in his direction. He was yelling.
“Hurry up! Pete was shot. He’s dead. We have to move!”
As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he turned his head to look up into the kitchen and was surprised to see two guns pointed right at him. Before he even got a chance to warn the others, Andrew fired his gun. The man dropped down to his knees on the steps and then fell to the bottom, hitting the floor hard. Without even thinking, one of the younger men rushed to his side to see if he was okay and this time Stewart fired his gun. It was the small man who went down this time. He fell right on top of his accomplice and both Andrew and Stewart knew there was still one man left, and he was down where all of the other guns were.
In a whisper, Andrew said, “Well, there’s one more left. You ready for this?”
Stewart nodded his head, “I’ll go first,” and started down the steps before Andrew even could answer. He didn’t really have a plan, and had no idea what was in store for him when he reached the bottom of the steps and climbed over the two dead men. He just knew he needed the whole situation to be over. He rounded the corner, gun straight out in front of him and could see the man at the back of the cellar, panicked and unsure about what he was doing.
The man with the long hair raised his gun just as Andrew stepped around the corner. Andrew had no idea who fired the shot, but it rang loud in his ears. He watched as the young man fell to the ground and Stewart turned to look at him.
“Well, that sure was close!” Stewart said, adrenaline coursing through his body. At that moment, he didn’t know if he wanted to collapse to the floor or laugh hysterically.
“Yeah, it was. You good down here? I need to go check on the girls.”
“I’m fine. Go. Make sure they are okay.”
Andrew went back up to the kitchen where he met up with Thomas. “Everything okay, Boss?”
Groaning at the name he seemed to be called on a regular basis, Andrew replied, “Everything is now. Stewart may need your help, though.”
“Is he okay?”
“Oh, yeah, he’s fine. He just has a few things to clean up down in the cellar.”
“Things? That’s a good one.”
Thomas went down to help Stewart. Andrew hurried to the stairs to check on the girls. With lantern in hand, he climbed the steps two at a time and met up with Keith at the top of the steps.
“Where are they?”
“They are right where you told them to be. They’re just fine, Andrew. Where is Stewart? Is he okay?”
“Your brother is just fine. Do me a favor?”
“Whatever you need.”
“I need you to take the guy out of the living room and move him to the kitchen. Let me know when that’s done so I can bring the girls down, okay?”
“Sure thing.”
Andrew hurried to his bedroom and threw open the closet door. There inside he found Debbie, sitting right behind the door, gun in hand. His other three daughters were directly behind her, huddled in the corner of the closet.
“Come here, girls. It’s over now.”
Andrew held his arms out wide and his girls rushed to him, hugging him tight. He lifted Amy up off the ground and the five of them fell backward onto the mattress that had been thrown on the floor. They laughed for just a brief moment and then Debbie sat straight up.
“Stewart…is he okay? What about Thomas and Keith? What happened?”
“Everyone is fine. Don’t worry.”
As if timed out on purpose, Keith stepped into the doorway and nodded at Andrew. Andrew mouthed the words, “Thank you,” and Keith motioned for the girls to follow him.
Together all six of them went down the stairs and into the living room. “Come on, girls, sit. I’ll put some more wood on the fire and then get you guys a snack,” Keith said.
Debbie went over to her father and whispered, “Where is he?”
“Keith moved him to the kitchen. As soon as the others are out of the cellar, we will move them to the shed until we can do something a little more permanent.”
“So, they’re all dead?”
“I’m afraid so, Sweetie.”
“Well, we did what we had to do, right?” She asked, hoping for a little affirmation that she had done the right thing.
“Absolutely. Come on now; let’s not worry your sisters.”
Debbie went and sat with Beth and Amy while Connie got the fire in the fireplace roaring. It was the middle of the night by that point, and the girls were tired. So once the younger two settled down a little bit, Debbie and Connie made them up a bed on the floor in front of the fireplace and then went to find their father. They weren’t expecting to see what was in front of them on the floor when they walked into the kitchen.
“Dad!” Connie exclaimed.
“Shhhh, you’ll wake them up. We just got them to sleep!” Debbie said, putting her hand over her sister’s mouth.
“Sorry, but that’s just horrible!” Connie whispered.
Andrew ushered Connie and Debbie back into the living room and said, “I’m sorry you had to see that. Give me a few minutes to finish up and I will get you a snack from the cellar.”
“Yes, Daddy,” Connie said. It wasn’t often that his older daughters called him Daddy, and that night they had used the term a couple of times.
> Chapter Sixteen
“We need to get them into the shed sooner rather than later, so let’s get this done. The girls really don’t need to see them again,” Andrew said. The four home invaders lay in a heap on the kitchen floor, near the back door. With the blizzard blowing as hard as it was, digging a grave just didn’t seem like a viable option, and neither did taking them off the ranch. So the only other choice was putting them in the shed…at least until the storm was over.
They opened the door to a blast of arctic air. The snow was falling at an alarming rate, and they couldn’t even see the shed that was only 25 feet away. Luckily, the route to the shed was one that all of them had taken a million times and they all could do it with their eyes closed. They moved as fast as they could while each carrying one of the men over their shoulders. They laid them down in the back corner of the shed and threw a blanket over them.
After everything that had happened, Andrew knew there was only one thing to do that made sense if he wanted to keep the family safe. He decided to wait until morning to talk to everyone. When they got inside, he went down to the cellar to grab some snacks for the girls as he had promised. After Connie and Debbie ate their candy bars and drank their soda, they set out some more blankets on the floor and lay down. It didn’t take long for them to fall asleep, and soon the whole house was still and silent. Andrew, Keith and Stewart sat back on the couch, legs stretched out in front of them, and Thomas lounged in his recliner. Only a few hours of darkness were left, but that was just enough for all of them to get some much needed sleep.
The morning came faster than anyone would have liked, and nobody really wanted to get out from under the warm blankets. As usual, Andrew was the first to be up and went immediately to the window to see what the conditions were outside. When he pulled the curtains back, he was shocked. He thought the storm had passed, but he found the snow still was falling at a pretty fast pace. He was relieved, however, that the wind had settled down, keeping the drifts from getting even bigger.