The Long Road Home (4 page)

She was beautiful. It was one of those futile thoughts that pop into one’s mind at the wrong time. Shaking his head, he reached to pick up her wrist. It was thin and fragile, like the wing of a wounded sparrow. He laid his own large, callused fingers upon her pulse. Nothing had ever felt so good as that steady beat. The stranger was now a real person.

“Just hang on, little bird,” he murmured. “I’ll get you out of here.” But how? Advice he had once heard nagged him:
Never move an accident victim—something about broken bones. Well, he thought as he shifted his weight, there was only one way to find out. Carefully lifting her head, he cradled her against his shoulder. Her blond hair felt soft against his bare chest, making him uncomfortable touching her. His hands clenched and unclenched in indecision.

“This is ridiculous,” he said aloud. There was nothing to do but be professional and quick. He gingerly lifted her suede jacket and slipped his hand under the fabric. His fingers palpated her neck, shoulders, and traveled down her spine. Then, being exceedingly careful not to touch her breasts, he slipped his hand across her ribs. She really was like a sparrow, all bones and feathers. And as far as he could tell, the bones were unbroken.

His whistle of relief filled the crushed compartment. The rest he could handle. He carried the woman to his Jeep as gently as he would a handful of fresh raspberries. Resting her head on his lap, he frowned when he saw the purple swelling of the bruise on her head. He’d have to get her to a doctor, but her crashed-up Volvo blocked his path down the road. He’d better call Seth.

The Jeep’s gears screamed as he backed up the mountain in reverse, but still she didn’t awaken. He carried the petite woman into the house, thinking as he did that he’d carried sacks of grain that weighed more than she did. Without a second thought, he took her up to the master bedroom. It was quiet, private, and somehow appropriate. Balancing her against his knee, he pushed back the piles of quilts and blankets, releasing a heavy scent of mothballs. Carefully, he laid her upon the clean sheets, then as carefully, removed her fine leather shoes and covered her with a thick down coverlet.

The air was getting crisp as night set in and her hands were cold in his warmer ones. As he dialed the farm’s caretaker, his
free hand rubbed hers softly, noting that her delicate fingers were void of the large, vulgar rings he despised. In fact, there was no wedding ring. That struck him as odd. She looked like the type a man would marry. How old could she be, he wondered? Twenty-five, thirty? Probably divorced—then again, maybe not.

He shook the idle thoughts from his head as Seth Johnston answered the phone. In few words the old man agreed to have the Volvo moved and help sent to the house. Talk was cheap and time expensive on the farm, and Seth liked to economize. They both preferred it that way.

After laying down the phone, he covered the woman with another blanket and tucked it under her softly rounded chin. His hand moved to her cheek and patted it, then brushed a few hairs from the purple lump on her forehead.

Staring at her face he was once again struck by her waiflike beauty. Hers was not a voluptuous appeal. Her face and golden hair were delicate, like an angel’s, making the ugly bruise swelling on her forehead menacing. There lay the truth of it, he thought with a frown. Her business here made her more a devil than an angel. A skinny runt of a devil.

The woman’s clothes, though of fine quality, were baggy and hung loose on her bony frame. Her cheeks were gaunt and her skin color was more pale than fair. She looked as if she needed a good meal.

He sighed. He had expected a Philip Marlowe type to track him down. Leave it to Agatha to send a woman.

“Lady, lady, lady,” he whispered. “Just look how your snooping has hurt us both.”

He ran his hand through his hair. The evidence was clear: New York plates, expensive clothes, patrician features. He recognized the style, he could almost give the address. And her money and status made it a sure bet she knew who he was.

“Karma,” he said with resignation. He could only accept it and pack. As soon as she was in good hands, he’d slip away.

From outside, the sound of whining engines and crunching gravel alerted him to Seth’s arrival. He reluctantly left the woman’s side to throw on a sweater and greet his boss.

Seth squeezed his great girth out from behind the wheel of his pickup truck. He looked as weathered by time and mileage as the Ford and about as rusty. In the cab sat two children, grandchildren from a marriage gone bad. Following as usual, his sons drive up in the old green Impala. He expected the whole family. This was exciting business up here in the mountains.

Seth stretched out a well-callused hand. “You be havin’ friends up at the big house now, Charley?” he asked with a grin that revealed many missing teeth.

C.W. knew it was more than a friendly inquiry. Seth shared the flock and used MacKenzie’s land in exchange for keeping an eye on it and the house.

“No, sir, I am not,” he answered firmly. “I’ve never laid eyes on her before. I was in the shower when I heard the car pull up. When I tried to talk to her she sped down the mountain like a demon. Her plates are from New York.”

Seth’s eyes narrowed. “New York, you say?” He turned to his son. “That right, Frank?”

“Yeh-up. The city all right. Saw the plates when we moved the car. Never saw that one before, though. You thinkin’ it might be one of MacKenzie’s?”

“Could be. Come on, Charley, show us where she is. You two young’uns stay out here and out o’ trouble. Frank, Junior, Esther, come on.”

The two tall and lanky men strode with a gait so loose and close their shoulders bumped in a brotherly camaraderie. Even in their mid-twenties, they resembled lion cubs, swiping and
jabbing with a youthful exuberance. They approached the house as they did everything—together.

C.W. smiled a brief greeting, then turned to Seth’s eldest daughter. Esther, one of Vermont’s persistent flower children, covered her long, lean body with patched jeans and a flowered shirt. At her side she carried a large straw bag. Knowing Esther, he imagined it carried a practical, well-thought-out first-aid kit.

As she passed, Esther smiled from under her floppy straw hat. As always, C.W. had to search for signs of her twenty-six years. The soft lines at the corners of her eyes accentuated her sharp mind; the thin frown lines at her mouth revealed the degree of her discontent.

He led them to the master bedroom, then stepped aside while Seth and his family filled the room. In a moment he heard them utter as one, “It’s Nora!”

C.W. stood straighter and walked closer. “You know her?”

Seth turned to face him, his eyes serious. “You did right by putting her in here. This be her room…her house.”

C.W.’s eyes widened. She wasn’t an investigator? He looked at the woman again. Mrs. MacKenzie? She seemed too young and innocent to be the flamboyant Michael MacKenzie’s wife. Realization set in.

“I thought you said they never came up here.”

“They don’t. Her not once in three years,” Seth responded.

C.W. held his arms akimbo and his chin low to conceal his shocked expression. The Big Mac’s widow. Here. He felt like he’d been punched. He studied the thin, pitiful-looking woman in the bed and hardened his heart. What the bloody hell?

He searched Nora’s pale white profile. No doubt she was as cold-hearted and fast-fisted as her husband. What other kind of woman would marry Mike MacKenzie?

“SHE’S COMING AROUND, PA,” called Esther from Nora’s bedside.

Nora blinked once, lazily, then again as her eyes grew accustomed to the dim light. Through the lifting fog, she saw a woman’s face peer into her own.

“Esther?” Nora asked in a feeble voice.

“That’s me, Mrs. MacKenzie,” Esther replied in the clipped, practical voice that Nora remembered. “You got yourself a nasty bump. Here, let’s put some ice on it.”

Nora winced as a bag of ice was plopped on her head and a thermometer was stuck in her mouth. “Seth? Seth Johnston, is that you?” she asked, removing the thermometer and holding out a hand.

“Yeh-up,” he drawled as he ambled to her bedside with a rocking gait.

Nora was disturbed to see him so fat now that he panted with the effort. The only things thin about Seth were his hair and his clothes, and the latter were faded as well.

“Nice to have you back again, missus,” he said, taking her hand. “Long time.”

“Too long,” she responded with a weak smile.

“Yeh-up.” He nodded, releasing her hand. “Long time.” He nodded again and shifted his eyes.

Stepping forward, Esther returned the thermometer to Nora’s mouth with authority. “What the blazes sent you tearing down the mountain that way?”

“I believe I did,” came a reply from the corner.

Startled, Nora followed the bass voice to the far corner of the room. A tall broad silhouette was outlined in the shadows. She slowly raised herself to her elbows, squinting in the poor light.

“And who are you?” she mumbled with as much authority as she could muster with a thermometer in her mouth.

He slowly straightened, and after a palpable pause, strode into the light. Her hand rose to her throat. It was the stranger from the deck.

“You!” she whispered.

He didn’t respond, but his mouth set in a grim line. He stood before the bed, watching her every reaction in tense silence, before quietly asking, “You don’t know me, Mrs. MacKenzie?”

The question was more of a challenge. She narrowed her eyes and searched the tall man in tight jeans and a plaid shirt. With his dark blond hair and hard, chiseled features, he had the kind of masculine good looks that a woman would remember. Yet standing next to Junior and Frank, he did not emit the conceit or pride that she found so offensive in attractive men. In fact, he appeared distinctly uncomfortable with her study.

“No,” she replied, firmly removing the dread thermometer
and returning it to Esther. “I’m quite sure we’ve never met. Should we have?”

He stepped back a pace, shaking his head no. But not before she detected a distinct smile of relief. A shiver of suspicion ran down her spine. Nora quickly straightened, but the room spun, forcing her back on her pillows with a groan.

The man was suddenly at Nora’s side.

“The lady needs to see a doctor. No offense, Es.”

“None taken, C.W. But
there’s
no doc to call.”

“Well, now,” interrupted Seth. “There’s that New York doctor what stays in Middleton Springs. Comes up every fall for the hunting season. Redman…Red somethin’ or other.”

“Redden,” Nora responded softly behind closed lids. “I know him. His number should be by the phone.”

“A New York doctor?” C.W. asked. “Isn’t there anyone local we can call?”

“No,” Nora said cautiously, surprised by his antagonism. “He’s our physician of choice. He’ll come.” She didn’t add that he’d better come. Mike had given Dr. Redden full rein of their four hundred acres to hunt every fall for years, and it was time to call in a favor.

At a nod from her father, Esther headed out of the room.

“I’ll give him a call, C.W.”

C.W. stood abruptly, his face clouded.

“Do you have objections to calling a New York doctor?” Nora asked. His stance, the authority in his voice, the angle at which he held his head—all held an indefinable air of breeding. Strange in a farmhand, if that was what he was.

“No, why should I?” he replied, his face suddenly impassive. “Call who you like—as long as you call.”

“Better watch how you throw your weight around, Charley,” said Seth, laughing, “now that it’s hunting season. Big bucks are a prime target.”

Nora witnessed the affection in C.W.’s glance at Seth. Who was this man, she wondered, who wore his sophistication as comfortably as his work clothes?

“Just who are you and what is your name, anyway?” she asked. “C.W. or Charley?”

His smile revealed deep dimples that stretched from the corners of his mouth to the curve of his chiseled chin. “Only Seth gets away with calling me Charley.”

“Never could take to calling a man by letters,” Seth muttered.

“Very well, C.W.,” she continued, her smile disappearing. “Would you mind telling me what your full name is and what you were doing showering in my house?”

Rather than being put off by her tone, he seemed pleased by it. He smiled wryly and put his hands on his hips. “My name is Walker, Charles Walker. I work here as an extra hand. Part of my arrangement was to stay in this house. I’m sorry if I frightened you. You see, I didn’t expect you.”

Nora sought confirmation from Seth, who nodded and stepped forward. “That’s right. Hired him back in January to help with the sugaring and the lambing.”

She returned her gaze to the tall man, then self-consciously realized it was he who was covertly assessing her every reaction.

“I’m sorry about the confusion, Mrs. MacKenzie,” C.W. said, looking down at his feet. When he raised his eyes again, they held a teasing light. “I didn’t mean to send you careening down the mountain.”

Nora flushed and her voice rose a note. “Mr. Walker, I’m not accustomed to half-naked men running out of my house and trying to bully me out of my car!”

He made no reply. Now she read remorse, and perhaps even guilt, in his eyes. This fencing was getting her nowhere.

“It wasn’t entirely your fault, Mr. Walker,” she admitted with an exhausted wave of her hand. “I didn’t expect you either. It was a comedy of errors.”

“With a near tragic ending. Nonetheless, I apologize.”

Something in his tone, sincerity perhaps, caused her to look back his way. With his hands in his hip pockets and his head tucked low, she wondered how she’d ever been afraid of him. He almost smiled at her, and she returned a half smile.

“I assume you’ll be staying here for a while,” he said, straightening his shoulders. “I’ll get my things together immediately and find another place to stay.”

“Wait, Mr. Walker. Things are going too fast.” She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. He saw the wariness slip from her face like a mask removed.

“Such confusion,” she said, letting her hands fall on the bed. “I should have called—I usually do. Things have been a bit…hurried. I didn’t have you down on my guest calendar and assumed the house would be empty.”

“Right peculiar it is,” said Seth. “I wrote them lawyers about it. But I never did hear nothing back from them.” He didn’t bother to conceal his smile as he scratched his belly. “I figure them fellas didn’t put Charley here on that guest calendar of yours.”

Nora sat still in the bed. They were laughing at her, lying there with a ridiculous lump on her head. Ralph Bellows had failed her again. Worse thing was, nothing she could say could alter their opinion. Only actions counted for much up here.

“Seth,” she began, “from now on nothing, absolutely nothing, goes to the lawyers. Everything goes straight to me.” The skepticism in Seth’s eyes hurt.

He ambled up to her bed and removed his green cap with
John Deere
emblazoned across it. His oil-stained fingerprints were visible on the visor as he held the cap before him.

“You aim to keep the farm?” he asked with characteristic bluntness.

“But of course,” she replied with emphasis. “I plan to live here. Permanently.” She ventured a small smile. “I guess that eliminates my guest calendar.”

No one laughed. Seth shifted his weight and shook his head.

“Don’t know but you’re up to it here alone,” he began slowly. “Snow comes and you’ll get stuck up here for days before we can dig you out. Power quits too, every bad storm.” Rubbing his chin he muttered, “Nope. This house is just too high up for real living. Leastwhiles in Vermont winters.” He snapped his cap back on his head. “You best know what you’re getting into.”

“I agree with Seth,” C.W. added. “This is no place for you to live alone. It’s brutal. Nobody has the time to keep checking up on you.”

“I wasn’t aware that I asked,” she snapped back.

While outwardly she knew she appeared hard-boiled, inwardly she was thin-shelled. With no family to fall back on, Nora was truly alone. Only her optimism and blind faith spurred her hope that she could form new roots here on the farm.

“I’ll manage, Seth,” she said, bolstering herself up on the pillows and forcing a smile. “I know I can count on you for advice on how to winterize this place. And if Frank and Junior need the work, I’d like to hire them and get started right away. And of course, Esther,” she added as Esther returned to the room.

Nora pushed higher in the bed.

“This is no longer a vacation home. It is home. My home.” Nora’s chest swelled. At that moment, she felt she could really do it.

“Well,” Seth answered with a grunt. “It won’t be any vacation, that’s for sure. But it’s plain you got your mind set. The boys and I will look around and see what’s got to get done before snow sets in. But it won’t be cheap. It’s a big house.”

Nora paled. “I understand. But do keep a tight rein on the budget. Nothing fancy.”

C.W. looked at her askance.

Nora turned to face him squarely. “And you, Mr. Walker. What are your plans?” Her voice was as cool as the autumn air.

C.W. shook his head. It seemed to her he would laugh out loud.

“My plan, Mrs. MacKenzie,” he replied in a controlled voice, “is to honor my contract and finish out this lambing. Then I’ll pack and be out of here by October’s end.” He glanced at Seth for confirmation.

C.W.’s eyes took her measure and she felt she had come up lacking.

“My contract does not stipulate that I work on your house for this…urge of yours to live off the fat of the land. If you get a chill, you can always pack up and jet down to Palm Beach.”

Nora dug her nails into her palms. She wanted to scream at him that she wasn’t that type at all. That she was scared out of her mind.

Pride held her tongue. She knew that to them, she was a pitiful figure. To them, a woman without a man was sad enough, but one trying to make a life for herself alone in the mountains was an object of ridicule.

Nora took a long breath and willed her hands to relax at her sides. “I see,” she replied with a patronizing tone. “Whatever is more convenient for you.”

His blue eyes steamed, and by the way he cleared his throat she sensed that he, too, was swallowing his frustration.

“It’s clear I can’t stay in this house,” he continued in a decidedly polite manner. “I’d appreciate being able to sleep in the cabin.”

A sound of disbelief came from the corner. Esther was whispering furiously in her father’s ear. Seth shrugged and looked away.

“There’s not but a potbelly stove in there,” Esther cried. “No water, no facilities. You’ll freeze your you-know-what off.”

“It’ll do,” he replied, still looking at Nora, “if you’ll agree to let me eat breakfast here, do some laundry, and take a shower or two. I’ll be discreet.”

“Yes, I think that would be fine, Mr. Walker. Until October’s end, that is.”

“I think you’re crazy,” said Esther. “Or just muleheaded.” She scowled. “Shoot, I’ll fix up the cabin for you. But when that frost hits, you’ll be checking to see just what Jack nipped.”

Esther blushed as the men snickered.

“You quit it, you guys,” Esther barked.

C.W. reached out and gave her back a friendly pat. “Thanks, Es. I do believe your temper will keep us all warm this fall.”

Nora was quick to notice the commiserating glance Esther offered him. Once again, C.W. caught Nora staring at him, and a veil of distrust cloaked his features.

“I’ll check on the car,” C.W. called over his shoulder as he headed for the door.

Nora watched his retreating back in silence then glanced from the empty doorway to Seth, to Esther, then back to Seth with her eyebrows raised in question.

“That Charley don’t jaw much,” said Seth. “Keeps to himself. But he’s a good man. Best I ever hired.”

“Where’s he from?” Nora asked.

“The east. Got references from some horse farm. Did some managing, not much handling of sheep. He’s a quick learner, though.”

“It’s true. He’s always got his nose in some sheep or farm book,” added Esther. “I like him. So do Frank and Junior. Thought they’d be jealous, the way C.W.’s taking over and all, but I guess it’s all in the way it’s done.” The look she gave Nora spoke plainly of how poor a showing she’d offered so far.

Seth’s persistent nods and occasional “yeh-ups” confirmed that Mr. Charles Walker had passed the stringent acceptance test of Vermonters. Nora was impressed.

“Seth,” Nora began, looking into the caretaker’s wizened face, “I have to get a handle on the finances of this farm right away. Budgets, expenses, and the lot. When can we meet?”

Seth scratched his head. “Any time, as long as you meet with Charley.”

“Mr. Walker?”

“Yep. Charley’s the man for the numbers.” He jawed his gums a moment then added, “Sure helps me out, I can tell you. Truth is, he’s so good I just let him handle the whole job now. And he’s teachin’ my Frank the tricks, too.” He hitched his pants. “If you got any questions about budget, missus, Charley’s the man to ask.”

Nora did not respond. She faced the unpleasant prospect of having to work closely with the stone-faced, dispassionate, opinionated Mr. Walker.

“Nothin’ worth doin’ around here,” Seth concluded, tugging at his visor. “I’ll be joining C.W. at the barn. Esther, you wait till this Doc Redman shows up.”

“Sure, Pa,” Esther muttered.

Seth left, leaving the two women in an awkward silence. Nora had never known Esther very well. Unlike the other Johnstons, she had always kept her distance. Esther was tall, angular, and with her penetrating green eyes, striking. She wasn’t a big woman, just strong boned, and Esther never hunched her shoulders, as so many other tall women did. The effect was one of confidence, and it was imposing. Nora remembered stories about Esther, the way she’d venture off into the mountains alone.