“A Colt Commander.”
“You always take the Commander with you when you go to pray?”
“I started wearing it when we first began having trouble with Smalldog trespassing.”
“After you exchanged fire, that’s when he ran?”
Hornett nodded. “To the dock, and then he shot off in his cigarette boat.”
Kretsch asked, “Any idea why he was here, Gabe?”
“I don’t pretend to understand how evil thinks.”
A door on one side of the big room opened, and a woman entered. She was stocky, with a single braid of gold hair down her back. She wore khakis and a dark green T-shirt and hiking boots. She reminded Cork of the stout Swedish immigrant women who’d helped their men carve farms out of the wild Minnesota prairie in the 1800s.
“I thought your guests might be hungry, Gabriel,” she said and brought to the table a plate filled with slices of dark bread.
“My wife, Esther,” Hornett said and introduced Cork and the others.
“Abigail is coming with tea,” Esther said.
As if on cue, the door opened again and a second woman appeared. She was older, maybe late fifties, hair gone gray. She was lean and fit like Hornett and with many of the same sharp features in her face. She wore jeans and a short-sleeved denim shirt and sneakers. There was a fluidity to her movement that made Cork think of an athlete. She carried a tray that held a white ceramic pot and several mugs. She swept across the hall toward the table.
“The tea, Gabriel.”
“Thank you, Abigail,” Hornett replied.
The woman slid the tray from her hand. “Hello, Seth, Tom.” She turned a gracious smile on Cork. “And hello to you. Welcome to Stump Island.”
“Cork O’Connor,” Bascombe said in introduction. “This is Abigail Hornett.”
Cork wouldn’t have needed to know she had the same last name as Gabriel and Joshua. It was clear all three shared the same genes.
“How do you do?” Cork stood up and offered his hand. Her palm and the pads of her fingers were callused. A woman used to hard physical labor, Cork thought. There was something in her face as well, something hard and solid, that spoke of an acceptance of travail and an abundance of grit to face it.
“You would be Gabriel and Josh’s mother?”
“I am. I hope you gentlemen are okay with tea. It’s herbal, my own creation, a little sweet. I think you’ll find it energizing. Most folks do.” She glanced around the great hall. “I thought there was a young man with you.”
“My son,” Cork said. “He’s using your restroom.”
“Ah,” she said with a smile, as if she understood perfectly.
The door opened yet again, and a third woman appeared and shuffled toward the table. She was bent, as if from age, though Cork thought she couldn’t have been more than a few years past twenty. She had mouse brown hair cut very short and wore a plain yellow dress and white sandals. If there’d been any life in her face, she might have been pretty.
“Mary,” Abigail said with a little surprise and a lot of irritation.
The shuffling woman looked up and seemed astonished to see them all there.
“They killed my son,” she said.
The hall fell silent. Cork heard the high whine of a saw cutting metal outside. It came from the direction of the radio tower and reminded him of the sound of cicadas.
“Joshua,” Abigail snapped. “Come and take care of your wife.”
Before the younger Hornett could move, his wife said again, “They killed my son.”
“Yes, we know, Mary,” Gabriel Hornett said gently. “They crucified him. But remember, he died for our sins. Josh?”
The younger Hornett leaned his rifle against the wall and walked stiffly to Mary. Without a word, he turned her roughly and, with a firm grip on her arm, urged her back into the kitchen.
Abigail said to the men, “Will you excuse us? Esther, we still have work to do. Come along.”
The two women vanished into the kitchen, where Mary and her husband had gone.
A moment later, Joshua Hornett returned, drifted back to his place near the front door, and took up his rifle again.
Stephen came from using the restroom and sat down and looked at the bread and tea on the table, which had appeared in his absence.
“You should try some of Esther’s date nut bread,” Gabriel Hornett said. “She’s rather well known for it.” He picked up a slice for himself, took a bite, then spoke to Cork and Kretsch. “Josh’s wife has suffered for years from the delusion that she’s the Virgin Mary. We tolerate her delusion and pray daily for her to be cured. In the meantime, we all help Josh care for her.”
Cork said, “You took in Lily Smalldog and took care of her, too, is that right?”
“We tried. She was really a sweet girl. But we couldn’t watch her every minute of every day, and her brother and that other Indian, they . . .” He paused and shook his head as if he couldn’t find exactly the right words for what the two men had done.
“Took advantage of her?”
Hornett looked at Stephen and seemed to decide that Cork’s delicate characterization was appropriate. “Exactly.”
“Did you ever actually see them?”
“We caught sight of them on occasion, but we never actually caught them.”
“They sneaked onto the island?”
“It’s a big island, Cork. We can’t watch every inch.”
“Why did they have to sneak onto the island? Didn’t you allow Lily visitors?”
“This isn’t a prison. She wasn’t a prisoner. At first, we welcomed Smalldog and Chickaway. But when we found out what they were doing to that poor, sweet thing, we banned them absolutely from coming here.”
“How did you find out what they were doing?”
“Lily told us.”
“She just came right out with it?”
“Not in so many words. She didn’t really understand what they were doing, what sexual relations were about. They brought her little gifts and filled her head with stories, and she told us the stories. It wasn’t hard to understand what the visits from those two men were really about.”
“How old was Lily?”
“She’d just turned eighteen when she disappeared.”
“So she was a minor, or at least a vulnerable adult, when these men were abusing her. Did you call Tom?”
“We complained, of course.”
“Tom, did you investigate?”
“I talked to Lily, but she wouldn’t say anything to me,” Kretsch said.
“And nobody had her examined to confirm that she’d been abused?”
“We knew,” Hornett said. “We didn’t need to have her examined.”
“What I’m saying here, Gabriel,” Cork said evenly, “is that if you could substantiate a claim of sexual abuse of a minor or a vulnerable adult, a warrant could have been sworn out for the two men. The law could have stopped them.”
“The law would have had to catch them first,” Hornett replied. “Not an easy thing.”
“All right,” Cork said, “let’s move on. When Lily Smalldog disappeared, did you know that she was pregnant?”
“We didn’t suspect it at all. She said nothing to us, and she wore such loose-fitting clothing all the time. Only after we heard about the boxes of formula that Chickaway had carted off across the lake did we put two and two together.”
“When she disappeared, you notified Tom immediately?”
“Of course.”
“What did you think had happened to her?”
“She didn’t leave the island on her own, we knew that much. We’ve got only two launches here, so they’re easy to monitor. We figured one of the Indians had come and taken her. Then, when we found her sweater, we thought she’d gone into the lake, same as her mother. Both women suffered from periods of darkness you can’t imagine.”
“Depression?”
“I’m no doctor, so I couldn’t really diagnose it.”
“Were they being treated?”
“We treated them with prayer, Cork. It’s our way.”
“I understand Lily and her mother had their own cabin.”
“Yes.”
“Could we see it?”
“Now?”
“As good a time as any,” Cork said.
Hornett stood up and led them to the door. “You stay here, Josh. And mind Mary,” he said with a note of chastisement.
His younger brother glared at him but said nothing and obeyed.
The cabin was several hundred yards east of the peninsula where the other buildings of the camp stood. They reached it by walking a narrow path, almost overgrown now, that ran among the birches along the shoreline. It was a small, isolated little structure built of logs, without electricity and with an outhouse off to one side. The great restless blue of the big water was visible through a wide break in the trees at its back. In the wind off the lake, the sound of the birch leaves rustling was like fast-running water. Cork thought it was a lovely spot.
“It’s pretty rustic, but Vivian and Lily seemed to be just fine with what they had,” Hornett said as they approached the place. “We were planning at some point to run electricity out here and put in indoor plumbing, but all our efforts for quite a while have been focused on our larger projects.”
The door was padlocked, but Hornett brought out a set of keys, undid the lock, and shoved the door open. He stepped inside, and the others followed.
The windows were closed and clouded with dust. Judging from the stuffiness of the room, they hadn’t been opened in a great while. There was a table, and there were two chairs and two small bunks. There was a cast-iron stove for heating. That was all. Nothing personal remained in the cabin, nothing that would have spoken to the nature of the two women, mother and daughter, who’d lived there.
“What happened to Lily’s belongings?” Cork asked.
“We’ve got them boxed and stored up at the camp, should anyone ever want to claim them. There’s nothing much, though. Clothing, a few pictures. Vivian and Lily lived a pretty simple existence. Took their food with the rest of us, washed their clothes in our laundry, bathed in our showers. They didn’t need much here.”
Cork recalled the cabin on the isolated island where Jenny had found the body of Lily Smalldog. It was a simple affair, too. Lily had been used to isolation, to making do by herself. As far as Cork could see, she hadn’t had much in her life, but what little she did have was apparently enough.
“Dad,” Stephen said.
He’d wandered away from the men and stood looking at the wall of the cabin above one of the bunks. Cork joined him and saw what he’d found.
“What is it?” Hornett asked.
“A word carved into the wood,” Cork said.
Hornett came and looked, too. “I can’t make it out. Looks like gibberish. But Lily wasn’t good with reading or spelling.”
“It’s an Ojibwe word,” Stephen said. “Gizaagin.”
“What does it mean?”
“I love you.”
Stephen stepped closer and looked down, then slid the bunk out a foot and pulled a folded paper from where it had been caught between the bunk frame and the wall. He unfolded it, studied it, then handed it to his father.
It was a drawing, simple pen and ink but really quite lovely, of a deer and fawn in a meadow. It was signed “Sonny.”
Cork handed it to Tom Kretsch. Bascombe and Hornett looked at it over his shoulder.
Hornett said, “One of those little gifts I was telling you about. It didn’t take much to get that poor girl to spread her legs.”
Not much, Cork thought. Just love.
THIRTY
He stared up at Jenny with an intensity that would have been unnerving in someone grown, but he was only a baby and understood nothing except the nearness of her face, the scent of her body, the beat of her heart, the comfort of her presence, the electricity of her love. What had his mother been to him but these same things? Did he understand that, although Jenny offered him all of this, she was not his mother?
His left hand, so tiny, reached for her mouth, took her lower lip between his fingers, squeezed. He was strong, and it must have hurt her, but she made no move to stop him.
“Do you know what love is?” Rose asked.
They sat together in the dining room of Bascombe’s lodge. Lynn Belgea had come with Babs Larson and had offered to take someone back to the houseboat to get suitcases so that everyone would have clean clothing. Mal and Aaron and Anne had gone with them, and Rose and Jenny were left alone. The lodge smelled of the baking meat loaf, of herbs and hot meat juices.
Jenny carefully removed the baby’s fingers from her lip. “I used to think I did.”
“I believe it’s a life tied to another life in a way that feels inseparable. We care about a lot of people, but we choose to love a very few.”
“Choose?” Jenny looked down at the baby. “I didn’t choose this.”
“Ask your sister, and she might tell you that God chose for you. Are you unhappy with the choice?”
“Aunt Rose, do you believe, really believe, that I could love this baby? I’ve only known him for a little more than a day.”
“I believe what I see. And, Jenny, all I see in your face when you look at him is love.”
“Aaron thinks I’m crazy.”
“I think he’s just afraid.”
“Of what?”
“Of what’s in your face when you look at this child. Because it’s not what’s in your face when you look at him.”
“What I feel for Aaron is different.”
“I don’t think he understands that.”
“Come on, Aunt Rose. He’s a grown man. This is a baby.”
“A baby you’ve fallen in love with in just one day. How long did it take you to fall in love with Aaron?” When Jenny didn’t answer, Rose asked, “Are you in love with him?”
“I thought so. I don’t know now.”
Rose smiled gently. “And you wonder why he’s afraid?”
She ran her hand down her niece’s hair, smoothing wild strands in the way Jenny’s mother might have had she been alive and a part of this conversation.
“Are you afraid?” Rose asked.
“Of what?”
“Losing him.” She nodded at the little face staring up at Jenny. “He has family somewhere who have a legal right to him.”
“I know.”
The words sounded like acceptance, but what Rose heard in her niece’s voice was something more like a faint trumpet of defiance.
The baby was asleep again when they heard the cut of an engine over the sound of the wind outside. Rose went to the window and saw Babs Larson’s boat drawing up to Bascombe’s dock. Everyone piled out and walked to the lodge. They were talking in loud voices as they approached.
Rose stepped to the door and put a finger to her lips. “The baby’s asleep,” she told them.
“We’ll just stay out here then,” Larson said. “Everyone give a hand, and we’ll get these things to the cabins.”
The others headed away carrying duffel bags, but Lynn Belgea came in. Her dog was with her. He went to the basket and sniffed at the baby.
“Careful, Teddy,” Belgea said.
The dog backed away and lay down in an alert pose.
“He looks like a watchdog,” Rose said.
“He’s a good boy.” Belgea petted him fondly. “I just stepped in to check on the baby. How’s he doing?”
“He’s fine,” Jenny answered. “I wish I knew his name, though. It’s getting awkward always calling him ‘the baby’ or just ‘him.’ ”
“Maybe he doesn’t have a name yet,” Belgea said. “Did I tell you how Ted got his name?”
Jenny and Rose both shook their heads.
“I’d been alone for quite a while, and everyone on the Angle knew I was thinking of getting a dog. It was a pretty popular topic of conversation. Everyone began referring to the pet I’d get as Th
e Eventual Dog. TED. I got so used to thinking of him that way that, when I finally brought him home, that was his name.”
Jenny said, “Wouldn’t work for this little guy. Two days ago, I had no idea I’d have a baby on my hands.”
Belgea looked at her and at the child, and she smiled gently and said, “Could have fooled me. If there’s anything you need for him or for yourself, you be sure to let me know.”
“I will.”
Outside the others returned. Belgea said good-bye, and the good women of the Angle went back to Larson’s boat and headed away.
“Clean duds,” Anne said, as she came into the lodge. She held up a folded stack of clothing for Jenny.
Jenny still wore the things she’d had on when the storm threw her onto the island. The idea of cleaning herself up was wonderful. She said, “Would someone watch him while I shower and change?”
Rose and Anne replied almost in unison, “We’d be happy to.”
“You’ll let me know if he cries or if he needs me.”
“Go,” Rose said. “He’ll be fine with us.”
Jenny took her clothing and started to leave but at the door turned back and glanced at the basket with concern.
“Go!” Anne ordered.
Jenny left.
Mal, when he’d come in, had sat at the table, and now he gingerly rubbed his damaged ankle. “If she has trouble leaving him for a few minutes, it’s going to be hell on her when she has to give him up for good.”
They all looked at the baby, and then at the empty doorway through which Jenny had disappeared, and no one had a thing to say.
When Cork and the others returned, the sun was behind the trees on Oak Island, and Bascombe’s lodge lay deep in the shadows of evening. As they approached the lodge, Cork’s mouth began to water at the aromas drifting outside. When they stepped in, he saw that the table was set, and he could hear the clatter of activity in the kitchen.
“We’re back,” he called.
Anne came out and said, “Wash up. I’ll call the others.”
Over the best meat loaf Cork swore he’d ever tasted, he recounted the events on Stump Island.
“What did you think of them?” Rose asked.
“They were friendly enough,” Cork replied.
The William Kent Krueger Collection #4 Page 50