“Have you found them?” she asked, more frightened than Lawrence had ever seen her.
“No,” Lawrence admitted. “We need to start over, retrace our steps.”
“I’m coming with you,” Mother Grace said. She dodged back into the house.
“No, you need to stay here with Marshall’s girls,” Lawrence argued.
A moment later, Mother Grace returned, climbing into her winter coat. Worse still, Elsie dashed out after her, also in her coat.
“No,” Lawrence repeated with more strength. “You can’t come, and Elsie certainly can’t come.”
But his protest was in vain. Elsie shot ahead of them, running to one of the alleys.
“Elsie, stop,” he called, chasing after her.
Within seconds, Lawrence could see that Elsie knew something he didn’t. She tore down the alley as if she knew exactly where she was going. The light from the streetlamps on the main streets barely penetrated the narrow alley, but Elsie dashed straight to a specific point, squatting to pick something up. She then whirled around and ran back to Lawrence, handing him one of Matty’s gloves.
“Goddess preserve us,” Lawrence muttered as Elsie dashed on once more. “How could I miss this?”
It didn’t matter how desperately he wanted to pick Elsie up and carry her back to Marshall’s house for safety, the girl knew where she was going. He could only follow, fighting off the prickly sensation that raced down his back whenever Elsie seemed to know more than anyone else.
“She’s a girl,” Barsali said, catching up with him. “This is not the place for her.”
“She knows things,” Mother Grace said in ominous tones as the three of them jogged along behind Elsie. “Let her do what she knows.”
Barsali muttered something in Romani, and they hurried on.
The search took on a whole new feeling of foreboding as Elsie scurried through side streets and alleys to reach a set of stairs that led down to the lake’s edge. Lawrence didn’t know whether she was blessed with some sort of second sight or if she simply noticed details closer to the ground that he hadn’t. Did she see signs of a struggle? Had Hoag or Matty dropped more items that she didn’t bother to pick up as she rushed on? There wasn’t time to ask.
“Lawrence!”
Lawrence skittered to a stop and whipped around as Jason called his name. He squinted through the darkness and could just make out Jason running toward him, Willy right behind him. The hair on the back of Lawrence’s neck stood up. What was Jason thinking to bring Willy out with him?
There was no time for questions. Elsie tore on, descending the rickety, wooden stairway to the lakeshore.
“I can’t stop,” Lawrence called, hurrying on to follow Elsie.
Barsali came with him, but Mother Grace stopped. “I’ll explain things,” she said, out of breath.
Lawrence hoped she could convince Jason to turn around and take Willy back to the hotel. He had enough on his hands with Elsie. She was far nimbler than him or Barsali and made it to the bottom of the stairs and around the corner faster than them. By the time they reached the damp, dirt path ringing the lake, Elsie had already darted into the dark.
“Careful,” Barsali said as they pursued. “The path is narrow.”
It was dangerously narrow, which seemed to confirm that Elsie was heading in the right direction. It was the perfect sort of place to hide someone who couldn’t walk far. As they edged their way carefully along the path, Lawrence began to notice signs that someone else had been down this path not long ago. Stones were out of place, the cliff wall was scratched, and part of the path had crumbled into the frigid lake water.
It was so dark along the path that Lawrence nearly tripped over Elsie when they caught up with her. She’d stopped dead and sunk into a crouch, and was now shivering and making a low, keening sound.
“What is it?” Lawrence whispered, dropping to a squat behind her.
Elsie couldn’t answer, but as Lawrence squinted into the darkness, he began to see. The path widened as it reached an alcove. Faint flickers of light formed an outline of a door, then a window. As soon as Lawrence realized what he was seeing, the entire shack popped into focus.
He motioned for Barsali to be silent—a pointless exercise as his Romani friend was already more silent than the grave—and strained to listen. His heart dropped to his stomach as he heard a low, pained moan coming from the shack. It was Matty, he was certain. Everything in him wanted to leap to her rescue, but the guttural growl of Hoag stopped him from doing more than standing. He couldn't make out the words, but the tone was more taunting than threatening.
“It’s all right, it’s all right,” Connie’s voice rang out, her words just barely audible. “It won’t come, not now.”
Lawrence frowned in confusion until Matty groaned again. Then his eyes popped open. It wasn’t a groan of fear, it was labor. Matty was giving birth.
He couldn’t stay where he was a moment longer. The path wasn’t wide enough to slip around Elsie, so he stepped right over her, charging toward the shack. Without thinking of anything else, he found the door and threw it open.
“Matty,” he shouted. His eyes adjusted quickly to the pitiful light of a single lantern.
“Lawrence,” Matty shrieked, her eyes wild with fear.
“You,” Hoag growled, stepping between Matty and Lawrence. He held a revolver pointed at Lawrence’s chest. His gaze dropped to Elsie as she darted into the shack and grabbed hold of Lawrence’s leg. Hoag broke into a low, sinister laugh. “Well, well. I’ve got all my girls with me now.”
“Elsie,” Connie shrieked, her dirty face tear-stained. “Get out. Go away, go away.”
Elsie gripped Lawrence’s leg tighter, which stopped him from attacking Hoag. Hoag seemed to know it and laughed harder, still keeping his gun trained on Lawrence.
“That’s a good girl,” he told Elsie. “Keep this bad man from hurting your dear papa.”
Elsie made a guttural noise and shivered.
Lawrence opened his mouth to tell Hoag off, but Matty cried out again. She sat with her back against the wall and her legs held to the side. Even though her skirt covered her lower half, Lawrence could tell she was close to delivering. Sweat matted her hair to her face and as dire as the situation in front of her was, all of her energy seemed focused inward.
“Matty,” Lawrence shouted again. “I’m here. I’ve got you.”
In spite of Elsie clinging to his leg, he tried to move to Matty, but Hoag cocked his revolver.
“Stay right where you are,” he growled. “These girls are mine and I—”
He didn’t have a chance to finish. Like lightning, Barsali dashed into the room. Hoag didn’t have time to react before Barsali grabbed his wrist, wrenching the revolver from his hand. He pushed hard, and Hoag toppled to one side, dropping his gun to the shack’s dirt floor.
A split-second later, Jason darted into the shack, a revolver in one hand. Willy leapt in behind him.
“Stay right where you are,” Jason shouted, aiming at Hoag’s heart, or what there was of it.
“Matty,” Lawrence gasped, peeling away from Elsie and throwing himself down by Matty’s side. “I’m here. You’re all right. Everything will be fine.”
“You bastards,” Hoag shouted. “You’ll never get away with this. I have friends, deadly friends. I got out of prison and I’ll get out of this.”
Lawrence ignored him, lifting Matty’s skirts and gesturing for Connie to bring the lamp so he could see how close Matty was to delivering.
“Be quiet,” Jason shouted.
“She’s almost ready,” Mother Grace said, squatting by Lawrence’s side. Lawrence hadn’t seen her come into the shack, but everything was pandemonium behind him. All he cared about was Matty and their baby.
“Get out of my way,” Hoag shouted.
Lawrence caught the edge of movement from the corner of his eye as Hoag tried to stand. He ignored it, giving Matty his full attention.
“It’s all right,” he said
. “Mother Grace is here.”
“I’ll kill you, you little bastard,” Hoag shouted.
“I’m here now,” Lawrence told Matty. “I’m here.”
“I’ll wring your scrawny little—”
Two gunshots split the air, almost simultaneously. The sound was so loud that for a moment Lawrence went deaf. His ears rang as he cringed. The scent of gunpowder filled his nostrils, acrid and vicious.
Slowly, sound returned, but the sound was silence, shock. The silence was split by Matty’s cries, then by Mother Grace’s soft crooning. “Here he is, love, your baby is here.”
A moment later, the sharp cry of a newborn infant filled the shack. Lawrence’s heart leapt for joy, but plummeted to earth a moment later.
“Dear God,” Jason hissed. There was a thump as he dropped his gun.
At last, Lawrence turned to see what had happened. The sight that met him was as overwhelming as another gunshot. Elsie was sprawled on the floor, her mouth open in a silent scream, Hoag’s revolver in her hand. Willy stood next to her, ghostly pale in the lantern light, a smoking revolver in his hand. Hoag lay, splayed and bloody, at the other side of the shack, a seeping wound in his chest and another in his forehead.
“It’s a boy, dear,” Mother Grace said, cradling the shivering, squalling infant in her arms. “I need something to wrap him in.”
Eyes wide and lips pressed in a tight line, Jason quickly removed his coat. Mother Grace took it and wrapped the baby tightly, handing the entire bulky bundle to a sobbing Matty.
“You have a son, my dear,” Mother Grace continued to coo, moving to sit beside Matty.
Lawrence jerked into action, shoring up Matty’s other side and closing his arms around her as best he could. “It’s all right,” he said, imitating Mother Grace’s calming tone. “Hoag is dead. Our son is born. Everything is going to be all right.”
“No, it’s not,” Willy wailed, throwing down his gun. “I killed him. I killed him and Elsie killed him too.” Willy turned and flung himself against Jason.
Without missing a beat, Jason dropped to his knees and hugged Willy hard. His eyes were still wide, and Lawrence was certain his friend was shaking, but he embraced Willy like a father would. He reached an arm out toward Elsie. She scrambled up and away from the gun she’d been holding, throwing herself against Jason as well. The three of them formed a tight, shivering ball.
Slowly, the truth of the situation impacted Lawrence. Hoag was dead. He’d been shot. Shot by his own children. He didn’t know how Willy or Elsie had armed themselves.
“She took the gun from the floor, pral,” Barsali said, perhaps able to read the confused look on Lawrence’s face. “And the boy took one from Mr. Throckmorton’s pocket.”
“I didn’t want him to hurt my sisters anymore,” Willy wailed against Jason’s neck.
“Ssh, ssh,” Jason comforted him. “He won’t hurt anyone now.”
“But the police will,” Willy wept on. “They’ll know I shot my papa. They’ll hang me.”
“I won’t let them,” Jason said.
Lawrence’s gut twisted. The reality of the situation was far less palatable. Hoag was dead, shot by his own children. Youth wouldn’t protect them, not when men like Mayor Crimpley and Mr. Palmer, the schoolteacher, already thought Willy was a delinquent. Not when it was already believed that Elsie wasn’t right because she wouldn’t talk. The children were in as much danger now as they’d ever been.
“No one can know what has happened,” he said, pushing himself to stand. He glanced to Jason and Barsali. “No one can know that Hoag is dead, even.”
“They’re going to know,” Jason said. “If you leave his body here, it will be found. If you move it to take it into town, everyone will know.”
“Then we don’t leave it here,” Barsali said. “And we don’t take it into town.” Even in the dim light, Lawrence could see the hard resolve in the man’s eyes.
The truth of what had to be done hit Lawrence hard, but he refused to flinch from it. “It’s dark,” he said. “No one will see us take one of the boats.”
“We’ll need to find something to weigh him down,” Barsali agreed with a nod, launching into action.
Lawrence met him at Hoag’s body. They each looped their arms under one of Hoag’s shoulders and yanked him to his feet.
“You don’t mean to dispose of the body in the lake, do you?” Jason asked in a sickly voice.
“They don’t have any other choice,” Mother Grace said. She shifted to a squat, gesturing for Connie to help Matty to her feet the same way Lawrence and Barsali were hoisting Hoag. “I never thought I’d hear myself say this,” she went on, “but we need to get Matty to the hospital.”
“We need to get all of them to the hospital,” Jason said, rising as well. He lifted Elsie into his arms and kept one hand on Willy’s shoulders. “Marshall and Alex are there, maybe Flossie too.”
The comment seemed incongruous, but Lawrence was oddly comforted by the thought of all of their friends being together in that dangerous moment.
“Get them all to the hospital, then,” he said. “We’ll come along as soon as we’ve done what needs to be done.”
They all began to move at once. Jason headed out first with Willy and Elsie, then Mother Grace and Connie with Matty. Lawrence and Barsali waited until they were gone before facing each other.
“There will be anchors and rope in some of the boats,” Lawrence said.
“Then we’d better pick the right one,” Barsali said.
Hoag was as much of a burden in death as he’d been in life. Lawrence and Barsali had to move slowly as they dragged him out of the shack and edged precariously along the narrow path toward the dock. They moved as silently as they could, listening constantly for any sign that they weren’t alone. The night seemed colder and darker than it had just an hour before, but it was also silent. The good people of Brynthwaite were tucked into their beds, not a care in the world.
“There,” Lawrence gestured toward one of the boats moored at the end of the dock. “I can see an anchor in that one.”
They lugged Hoag’s body toward it. With far more noise and effort than Lawrence would have liked, they hauled the body over the side, then climbed in. Lawrence took the oars and rowed out into the blackness of the lake while Barsali worked with only the light of the moon to help him to tie the anchor to Hoag with the rope onboard.
The air seemed even icier out into the water. Patches of thin ice floated over the surface. Every accidental splash of water chilled Lawrence to the bone. He rowed for what felt like an hour, until he was certain they were as close to the deepest part of the lake as possible.
“We have to be careful when we toss him over,” Barsali said, adjusting Hoag’s body to be ready to throw overboard. “The water is too cold for us to survive if we go in.”
Lawrence nodded grimly, and they set to work heaving the body over the side. In the end, Lawrence had to balance the small boat by leaning his full weight over to one side while Barsali pushed the body with its anchor over the other. Hoag made an almighty splash, and the boat rocked dangerously. For a moment, Lawrence thought it would capsize and three men would make their eternal bed together at the bottom of Brynswater.
At last, the boat stabilized. Lawrence sagged against the side as Barsali did the same. They were silent as the ripples left by Hoag’s body dissipated and the water went as still as glass once more.
“We’ll have to burn the boat,” Barsali said at last.
“What?” A shock of guilt hit Lawrence. He’d only meant to borrow the craft.
“It’s soaked in blood,” Barsali said, pointing to the bottom. He was right. They were soaked as well. “The shack will have to go as well.”
“You’re right,” Lawrence sighed. “It all has to be destroyed.”
“Then we’d better get on with it,” Barsali said, picking up the oars.
Lawrence swallowed hard, unhappy about everything that had happened that night and
everything that would happen. He was silent as Barsali rowed them back to shore, searching for the shack so that they could burn it and the boat together. The only thing that kept his heart from feeling as black as the night was the knowledge that he had a son and that Matty and the others were free from Hoag’s menace forever.
* * *
Season Two of The Brynthwaite Boys isn’t over yet! Is Hoag really gone for good or will the consequences of his demise come back to haunt the Brynthwaite crew? Have Marshall and Alex truly ironed out their differences or will Lady Charlotte cause more mischief? Is Lady Arabella truly free from George? Will Colin Armstrong make things better or worse for Jason, Lawrence…and Lady Arabella? And will Jason and Lady E truly go through with the wedding? Not to mention there are two more babies on the way. Find out the answers all of this and more!
If you’d like to read even more about the town of Brynthwaite, but fifteen years earlier than this serial, check out May Mistakes, part of The Silver Foxes of Westminster series, and its accompanying novellas, Brynthwaite Promise and Brynthwaite Summer!
About the Author
I hope you have enjoyed The Brynthwaite Boys: Season Two – Part Two. If you’d like to be the first to learn about when the next books in the series come out and more, please sign up for my newsletter here: http://eepurl.com/RQ-KX And remember, Read it, Review it, Share it!
Merry Farmer is an award-winning novelist who lives in suburban Philadelphia with her two cats, Butterfly and Torpedo. She has been writing since she was ten years old and realized one day that she didn't have to wait for the teacher to assign a creative writing project to write something. It was the best day of her life. She then went on to earn not one but two degrees in History so that she would always have something to write about. Her books have topped the Amazon and iBooks charts and finalled in the prestigious RONE and Rom Com Reader’s Crown awards.
Acknowledgments
Thanks so much to all of my marvelous readers who have encouraged me to write The Brynthwaite Boys. I sometimes feel like I have a very weird imagination, but things like satyriasis and amnesia actually do happen! So why not torture a few characters with them along the way?
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