Dead of Winter (8 page)

Hysmith shook his head. “No, it’s too risky with these frequent storms and that killer out there. Let Lamothe come to us.”

“What if he doesn’t know we have Zoé?” Tom asked. “He could be searching the woods for her. Notifying Master Lamothe seems the noble thing to do.”

Pendleton leaned back in his chair, smoking his pipe. His deep-set eyes gazed at the painting above the fireplace. “Inspector, I’ll approve the mission under one condition. You deliver the message to Master Lamothe that he needs to come retrieve his daughter, then head straight back before nightfall.”

22

Willow Pendleton paid a late-night visit to Hospital House. Doc Riley was still awake, tending to the needs of Zoé Lamothe. The sick girl was sleeping. Her malnourished body, so thin she looked skeletal, was a dreadful sight. Both wrists were bound to the bed, now more securely by rope. Willow hated seeing a little girl tied down, but Doc Riley said she was prone to violent outbursts.

“Never seen such animal behavior before…” Doc listened to Zoé’s heartbeat. “Must be the heathen in her. And take a look at this.” He lifted up one of her eyelids. Zoé’s iris was covered in a gray membrane that looked like cataracts. “She may have gone blind from the blizzard. I won’t know till she wakes up. I gave her enough laudanum to keep her down till morning.” The old man sighed and looked across at Willow. “So, you’ve been having trouble sleeping?”

She nodded, doing her best not to burst into tears. “Each night I toss and turn and wake up perspiring from a fever.” She didn’t mention her dreams about Tom Hatcher.

Doc felt her forehead. “You don’t have a fever now. Worrying too much about the upcoming Christmas ball, lassie?”

“I suppose.” She touched his wrist. “Doc, I was hoping you could fix me up with another cocktail. Something to give me sweet dreams.”

The Irish doctor smiled. “I reckon I got something in me cabinet to bring peace to such a lovely lady.” As he left the room, Willow noticed a small doll sitting on a chair. It was a sad little thing—torn Indian dress, face covered in soot, half bald with a single tuft of black hair. Willow picked up the doll. Its reddish brown skin was made of leather so smooth it felt like human skin. The only remarkable quality was the doll’s single fiery green eye, like a cat’s. Willow cradled it. Dolls had a way of calming her nerves. Humming, she worked a knot out of the hair. She felt a strange sensation and realized Zoe’s pale eyes were half-open and staring blankly in her direction.

“Zoé, are you awake?”

The girl gave a slow nod.

“It’s me, Willow. We met at the rendezvous party last summer, remember?”

“I remember your perfume,” she said in a French accent. “You’re the lady who kissed my father.”

“I beg your pardon?” Willow thought back to that night in July. Pierre Lamothe had pulled Willow into an empty bedchamber. The intoxicated French commander had been all hands and lips. Had the girl witnessed this?

“You’re holding my doll, aren’t you?”

Willow waved a hand in front of Zoé’s gaze. “Can you see me?”

“No, but I know what you’re up to.”

“I was just straightening her hair. She’s very pretty. What’s her name?”

“Noël.”

“That’s a lovely name. It’s the French word for ‘Christmas’”, isn’t it?”

Zoé nodded. Those dull eyes staring through slits gave Willow the shivers. “You know, Zoé, I have a whole collection of dolls in my boudoir. Maybe after you get better, you can come over and see them.”

“I’ve already seen them. Your favorite doll is named Maggie.”

“How did you know that?”

“I have a friend who talks to me when I dream. He calls me, ‘The Secret Keeper.’” The girl smiled. “He told me all your sinful little secrets.”

Willow’s heart skipped. “What in heaven’s name are you talking about?”

“The wicked thing you did last summer. The man you dream about. Don’t worry, Willow, you’ll be with him soon.”

Feeling goose bumps sprout up her arms, Willow backed out of the room and bumped into Doc Riley.

“Whoa, hold up there, lassie. Everything okay?”

“I need to get home.”

“Don’t forget this.” Riley held up a vial of liquid. “I mixed you up a special concoction I give Myrna. Sends her right into dreamland.”

She grabbed the vial. “Thank you, Doc.” She kissed his cheek.

He blushed. “Now, don’t go letting Myrna see you do that. She’ll think we’re up to something.” He winked then looked into Zoé’s room. “I heard you talking. Did the girl wake up?” Her eyes were fully closed. Her bony wrists hung limp in the ropes that bound her to the bed.

“No, that was just me talking to her doll.” As Willow left Hospital House, once again embraced by the bitter cold, she felt tormented by what Zoé said.

Maggie talks to me when I sleep. She tells me your sinful little secrets.

Willow wondered how the girl could possibly know about the face-changing man who visited Willow in her dreams.

23

Shortly after midnight, Chris sat at Anika’s kitchen table, his head warm and fuzzy with rum. He refilled his glass from her canteen.

She sat next to him, whittling a stick into a raccoon face. Chris liked that she let him drink. Unlike his father, she treated Chris like an adult. As she worked her blade into the wood, he studied her face. Of all the Indian women he had seen, Anika was by far the prettiest. Especially when her face softened and she smiled, which was rare. Her face remained hard and taut most of the time. She could be silent for long stretches.

Chris picked up his unfinished flute and knife and started shaving off the wood. Whittling helped take his mind off missing his mum. He worked at the holes, hollowing out the flute. He blew splinters out the end, making a funny sound.

Anika glanced at him sideways and smiled.

Chris held up the flute. “What do you think?”

“You’re learning much faster than I did.”

He put the flute down. “This one takes too long. Show me how to whittle something else, like a bear.”

Anika picked up the instrument. “Whittling a flute takes time and patience. It’s more than just about carving out the wood with a blade. You are merging with spirits of the tree that made the branch. They are teaching you wisdom about yourself. When the flute is finished, you and Great Spirit can make sweet music together.”

As she handed him back the flute, someone knocked at her door. When she answered, Chris’ father entered, his eyes tense with anger. “Christopher Orson Hatcher, you’re supposed to be home in bed!”

Chris stiffened. “I-I couldn’t sleep.”

“That’s no excuse to disobey me. Now, get on home. Anika and I have an early ride tomorrow.”

“Where are we going?” Anika asked.

“Manitou Outpost.”

Her eyes sparked with fire. “Whose foolish idea was this?”

“Mine,” Tom said. “Zoé’s sick and her family will be looking for her.”

“I’m not taking my dogs,” Anika said. “I’ll only go if we take horses.”

“That’s a matter between you and Master Pendleton.” Tom pointed out the doorway. “Chris, let’s go.”

Chris stood. “Let me go with you tomorrow.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Please, Father. I can shoot a gun now. I’m ready. Please, let me help.”

“I said, ‘no.’ Now go on home.”

Chris seethed. He hated being scolded in front of Anika. He started to argue back, but his father had that crazy look in his eyes. “Goodnight, Anika.” Chris hugged the native woman, wishing she could stay back at the fort with him tomorrow.

“’Night, Chris. Thanks again for the gift.”

He grabbed his flute and whittling tools. Then, without looking at his father, Chris started the walk back to their cabin.

24

Tom remained behind with Anika, furious that the native woman was constantly spending time with Chris. She packed her tracking gear, tossing her snowshoes, stuffing arrows into a quill. “You’re too hard on him, Tom.”

“It’s none of your concern how I handle my son. And I don’t want you giving him any more rum. He’s too young to be drinking.”

“He’s trying to become a man. You treat him like a child.”

“He just turned fourteen.”

“Ha! At that age the men around here are married and voyaging in a fur brigade.”

“Well, he comes from a different world than yours.”

Anika gripped a tomahawk and shoved it into her pack. “You think we’re all savages here, don’t you?”

“I’m not in the mood to argue.” He opened the door and stepped out onto her porch. “I’ll be knocking on your door before sunrise. I need you to be alert tomorrow, so go get some sleep.”

“I’m a grown woman, Inspector. I’ll sleep when I’m damned well ready.” She slammed the door in his face.

25

Tom’s cabin was dark when he arrived. The door to his son’s bedchamber was closed.

I’ll deal with him in the morning
. Tom lit an oil lamp on the dining table. He felt an itch at the back of his throat. His hands were shaking, and he was now too riled up to sleep. With insomnia threatening to keep him up another night, there was only one course of action to take. Tom grabbed a crowbar and opened the lid to a large crate. It was full of brown bottles of whiskey. Pulling out a bottle, he popped the cork, filled a glass, and downed the drink in two gulps. He squinted as the hot alcohol sent fire to the back of his eyes. He pressed the glass to his forehead and sighed. As he walked toward his bedroom, he thought he saw shadow shapes moving outside the windows. Mere tricks of the eyes, he decided. His imagination running wild again. An image of the mutilated woman half-submerged in the ice flashed in his mind. Shredded face, severed torso, exposed ribcage, disemboweled. That vision stirred the murky waters as skeletons of a dozen other slain women bubbled up from the dark recesses of his mind. Then came the whispering voices.

His waking nightmare was interrupted by a single light emanating from the crack beneath his son’s door.

Tom entered the room. “I said, ‘lights out.’”

“I can’t sleep.” Chris was sitting on his bed, slicing bark off a foot-long stick. His face was red and damp. He sniffled.

“Son, your constant disobedience has got to end. You say you want to be treated like a man. Well, you’ve first got to stop behaving like a child. When I say do something, you do it. A man abides by his father’s rules, and he doesn’t break curfew.”

Chris rolled his eyes as he cut at the stick with hard strokes. His cheeks, covered with patches of blond whiskers, turned a deep red. Tom hated this awkward stage. As a parent he struggled between letting Chris think for himself and disciplining him. If his son would only make better decisions. Part of Tom was ready to teach him to be a detective like Orson Hatcher had taught Tom. But another part wished he’d sent Chris off to prep school in England, where he wouldn’t be influenced by the unruly wilderness people and their backwoods thinking.

Every day Tom worried about what Chris might do next. If the rift between them widened, he might run away with some Indian girl. Tom pictured his son living like a savage among a tribe of Indians, and it sickened him.
If I let Chris follow the Indian way, he’ll never be respected in the white man’s world.

He watched Chris etching his blade into the stick. “What’s that you’re whittling?”

“It’s a flute.” Chris blew at the mouthpiece, and an awkward, high-pitched shrill sounded from it. “Holes ain’t quite right yet.”

“
Aren’t
quite right. We don’t say ‘ain’t’ in this family.”

“It’s hard to remember when the villagers say ‘ain’t’ all the time.”

“Well, none of them finished their schooling. That’s why they have such hard lives. You keep reading your books, and one day you can become an inspector like me, or maybe a police chief.”

“I’d rather be a fur trapper. They go on lots of adventures.”

Tom smirked. “Your grandfather would roll over in his grave. Hatcher men are born to be lawmen. You come from three generations…”

Chris rolled his eyes again. Tom tightened his fist, containing his temper. “May I see your flute?” Tom spun the whittled instrument between his fingers. Across the shaft were carvings of a buffalo locking horns with the antlers of an elk. “This is fine work. How did you come up with the design?”

The boy beamed. “Great Spirit showed me. See, the wood has a spirit inside it. So does the knife.” He held up a blade with an antler handle. “I just ask for the totems inside the wood to reveal themselves, and Great Spirit guides my hand with the blade.”

Tom’s face tightened. “Who taught you such rubbish?”

“Uh…Anika.”

“Chris, I don’t like you spending time with her. Rumor is she practices witchcraft.”

“People are wrong about her. They just don’t like her because she doesn’t go to church.”

“Well, from now on stay away from her. She’s nothing but a crazy drunkard.”

“She doesn’t get drunk any more than you do.”

Tom backhanded him.

Chris gave his father a stunned look and dumped his whittling supplies on the floor. Tom stood at the edge of the bed, his arms shaking. “As soon as I get back tomorrow night, you and I are going to discuss how Hatcher men behave, and your disrespecting me will end once and for all. Now get to sleep.” Tom blew out the oil lamp.

As he closed the door, his son yelled, “I hate being a Hatcher! And I hate
you
!”

Tom aimed a fist at the door, tempted to punch his hand through it. Ever since Chris’ mother died, the boy was always walking his own line. Since they had arrived at Fort Pendleton, he had taken an interest in everything Tom was against. His arms wouldn’t stop shaking. The back of his hand still stung from striking his son’s face. Tom looked into an oval mirror hanging on the wall. His haggard face was mostly hidden by shadow.

What kind of father am I becoming?

In the reflection flashed the face of a madman.

Tom refilled his glass to the rim. Whiskey seemed to be the only remedy to dilute the memories that haunted his mind. Now, as he downed another glass, the visions of slain women returned. If he didn’t drink himself to sleep, his dreams would be haunted by the maniacal face of Gustave Meraux.