Into the Light (14 page)

“He rents rooms for people, not dogs.”

“Well, you think he’d take a bribe. They’ll be gone in a day or two.”

Jamie snorted. “Sure they will. You need to be worrying about who’s trying to kill you, and taking more care to see they fail than you did last night.”

“No one could have known where I’d be and when to set that up.”

“What about that Lenny fellow. From what you said, he must be feeling murderous.”

“He should be in town, but I can’t believe he’d be up to driving a team last night. And he’s not the only one of the ranch hands who resented the boss’s son showing up after years away and acting like the boss’s son, but how could anyone know where I’d be?”

“Follow you.”

That was an ugly possibility Trey rejected every time the thought popped up. “No one followed me to town.”

“You were sure to leave the horse at the stables. He could follow you from there.”

Trey cut into his beefsteak with more vigor than required. “It could be an accident. Some crazy drunk risking his neck and his horses.”

“How soon are you leaving town?”

“As soon as I work out the details of my investment in automobiles and find homes for three dogs.”

“The sooner the better,” Jamie muttered over his coffee cup.

“So you don’t think a killer will stalk me wherever I go?” Trey said, smiling at the thought.

“I hope not,” Jamie answered, his expression serious. “Stealing away quietly in the middle of a dark night and using a different name for a year or two might be a good idea. Maybe I’m glad I was born poor.”

“He’s getting a lawyer out there right now to change his will, so if anyone’s trying to cut off my branch of the family tree, they don’t need to any longer.”

“Are you sure?”

Trey sighed. “No. Maybe if Alice has a son. He’s a stubborn old coot.”

“Then you take after him in at least one way.”

“Absolutely not. There are stubborn people in my mother’s family. It’s all from there.”

“Sure. That must be it. Now do these dogs of yours need to go to snobby heathen homes, or shall I try to peddle them to some good Catholic families?”

Trey saluted with his coffee cup. “Those puppies look like Catholics to me. Find them homes, and I’ll finance an extra automobile.”

O
VER THE NEXT
few days, Jamie sweet talked families of men he worked with into taking the two male puppies. Neither sweet talk nor bribes got anyone to take the female.

“You can’t blame people for not wanting the bother of locking her up for weeks every year or dealing with puppies,” Jamie said philosophically. “You’ll have to take her with you when you leave. Or shoot her.”

Trey glared at Jamie through eyes more than a little gritty after another sleepless night. He should be making plans for where he’d go after he left here. Instead every exchange in every conversation he’d had with Deborah Sutton kept running through his mind.

So did the memory of the sight of her in the green dress and the look of pleasure on her face as she sucked ice cream off her spoon. Not to mention the way she looked in her plain gray Sunday best as she placed her smaller gloved hand in his.

By the time he got to where she sat beside him in the buggy, bringing a singing awareness to every nerve in his body, he gave up on sleep and worked on cleaning mud out of his rifle, polishing boots, or trying to drown himself in cold water.

Trey never doubted the report of his father’s spy. Someone at the church had seen him with Deborah that Sunday, told her family, and she’d had to confess. Of course she could have explained his presence with something less than the whole truth, but her family knew she had spent time with him. Cal Sutton knew.

All of which was why a truly insane idea came to him. “Don’t worry,” he told Jamie. “I know someone who needs a dog.”

The next morning, Trey put the last puppy back in the crate, tied it on the buggy seat again, and sent Irene trotting along the road toward Cal Sutton’s place.

T
REY STOPPED THE
buggy in the road twice and actually turned back toward town once. By the time he reached the long drive from the road to the Sutton farm, he had rejected all thoughts of retreat as cowardly. Or maybe he was too tired to care.

He passed between a pair of old soddys and pulled up at a hitch rail at the front of a two-story house, the cream color glowing close to yellow in the late afternoon sun. Judging by the porch swing and chairs on this veranda, it was well used.

At least no new dog barked at him. Spending a day driving out here with a night drive back to town to come was bad enough. Finding out the slim chance he was taking was no chance would be too much. Behind the house acres of wheat and corn stubble stretched as far as the eye could see, harvested but not yet plowed under in preparation for next year’s crop.

Nothing moved in the quiet yard. Trey eyed the big barn, painted traditional red, and turned toward the house. Mrs. Sutton would be starting work on the family supper about now. Seeing her would be easier than facing Cal Sutton first.

The barn door slammed and two women emerged. At the sight of him, the shorter one raced back inside. Trey could hear her yelling, “Pa, Pa!”

Norah Sutton walked toward him, no sign of her daughter’s excitement in her face. “Good afternoon, Mr. Van Cleve. I suppose you know you’re a surprise, and I suppose you’re here to talk to my husband.”

Trey tipped his hat and returned the greeting, unsure where to start. “Actually I’m about to ask a favor of both of you.”

“Well, then, let’s wait until Caleb gets here. Would you like to come in and have a cup of coffee?”

A small howl rose from the box on the buggy seat as Trey shook his head. “Thank you, but I think the favor needs out of there.”

Before he had the puppy on the ground, he heard the barn door again and looked over his shoulder to see Cal Sutton coming across the yard in long strides, his son and daughter following at a jog.

Trey put the puppy down with a muttered, “This is your chance. Be charming.”

She ran in a few frantic circles and squatted in the grass near the porch steps.

“What are you doing here, and why come with your dog?” Cal Sutton said, stopping beside his wife.

“I’m....” Trey cleared his throat. “It’s not my dog. It’s no one’s dog and needs a home. Deborah told me, that is Miss Sutton said something that made me think you might need, er, want a dog. You wouldn’t be so surprised to see me if you had a dog to bark when someone drove up.”

Sutton scowled down at the little animal, which was still ignoring Trey’s order to be charming and now scratching an ear. “It looks like the ranch dogs I knew on the V Bar C years ago.”

In for a penny. “We had an accidental litter.”

“Somebody got careless?”

“Lazy.”

Sutton frowned as if he knew the rest of the story. He scooped the puppy up and held her dangling out in front of him. “It’s female.”

“Yes, and that’s why no one will take her. Mill workers took the males. I know it’s extra trouble, locking her up during her time and all.”

Sutton put the puppy down and looked at his wife. “There’s no way to name a female.”

Mrs. Sutton explained this strange statement with a smile. “All our animals are named after Confederate generals. It’s a family tradition.”

Trey stared at the puppy. She couldn’t stay here because there were no female generals? “How about a spy?” he said at last. “Didn’t Jefferson Davis think Rose Greenhow was as good as a general?”

Sutton exchanged a glance with his wife, and Trey saw the wink. “Rose it is then. Let’s hope she’s a better watch dog than her great, great grandparents.”

The girl, who gave her name as Ginny, was already dragging one of the ropes Trey had used on the crate along the ground for the puppy to play with.

Mrs. Sutton renewed her previous invitation. “How about that cup of coffee now?”

Trey refused regretfully. He could use a cup of hot coffee before starting back. It might help him stay awake on the long drive ahead. “Thank you, but no, it’s late already, and Hubbell’s a long way.”

“Hubbell? Aren’t you going back to the ranch?”

“I’m not going back to the ranch.” As the words came out of his mouth, Trey heard the bitterness in his voice and knew he’d given away more than he’d meant to.

“Driving all that way at night alone when you’re tired is dangerous,” Mrs. Sutton said, concern in her blue eyes. “Stay for supper with us and stay the night. We have room, and after all, the way you sneaked up on us proves we needed a new dog.”

Astonished beyond words, Trey looked to Sutton, who gave a curt nod. He should refuse. Trey knew he should refuse, but the temptation to put off the long drive until morning won out. When he found his voice what came out was, “Thank you. Rose and I are both in your debt.”

After taking care of Irene and helping the Suttons with a few evening chores, Trey trooped into the house behind Sutton and his son, introduced as Jason but called Jacey. And Trey fell in love. In love with the big kitchen painted in soft yellow and bright blue, with the scarred table in the middle of the room, with the soft light from oil lamps, and most of all with Cal Sutton’s wife, who curved a hand over her husband’s shoulder every time she leaned over him to place a dish on the table.

“I need to warn you,” she said, setting a glass of milk at Trey’s place. All we have here is goat’s milk, and it has a slightly different flavor.”

Trey didn’t care if it tasted of boiled cabbage. He’d drink every drop. “I saw the goats in their pens,” he said. “Don’t tell me those goats are named for Confederate generals.”

She laughed, and Sutton and the children grinned. “You caught us out. The nannies are exceptions, and Rose could have been too, but your suggestion was so inspired I’m glad we didn’t miss it. The billy goat is Braxton, however.”

“General Bragg may be whirling in his grave.”

“He’s a very handsome billy goat.”

Grace here was not a travesty, and the meal was exceptional, well worth giving thanks for. As he ate, Trey added thanks for Rose’s new home and his own easy acceptance by people his father had wronged.

Knowing farmers started their day before dawn, Trey half-expected to be shown to his bed before the dishes were done. No one showed the slightest inclination to turn in that early, though. Sutton picked up a book and eyeglasses from the sideboard, perched the glasses on his nose, and opened the book to a place marked by a ribbon.

“I’m sorry if this bores you,” he said to Trey. “We’re already at the halfway mark, so it won’t make much sense to you.”

Trey listened in wonder to a familiar section of
The Red Badge of Courage
. He pictured Deborah, reading the same book when Sutton was done and had passed it on. What would she think of a novel of war written so eloquently by a man who had never been a soldier? For that matter, what did Sutton, who had been in different kinds of wars, think of the story?

Mrs. Sutton and Ginny washed up and put dishes away as quietly as possible. Jacey listened as he punched holes in a length of leather that could be a new belt. Sutton cradled the book in scarred hands, head bent forward, reading out loud to his family. He didn’t stop until after the last of the women’s work was done.

Trey lay awake on the narrow bed in the blue and white room Mrs. Sutton showed him to and listened as Sutton came in from taking the puppy for a last walk. Murmurs sounded, a door closed. Quiet descended over the house. Trey tried not to think of Sutton, in bed with a woman who loved him so much it showed in every expression and gesture. He turned his thoughts instead to Deborah, as he had every night since the dance.

These people were her family. Cal Sutton was the cousin who gave her books, but he also had to be the one who had killed her father. How could a killer who had earned his living with a gun create a family like this?

Did Deborah’s home with her aunt and uncle have this quiet warmth? If so, small wonder she didn’t want to marry and leave.

Trey fell asleep without answers to his questions and slept as he hadn’t for weeks.

S
CENTS OF BACON
and coffee woke Trey the next morning. He was the last one to the breakfast table and perhaps the most appreciative of the food.

After all, the others were used to Mrs. Sutton’s cooking. Eggs with goat cheese mixed in? Chefs should take lessons from her.

His hand was on the door, his thanks and goodbyes said, when she handed him a packet of sandwiches. “I hope we see you again sometime,” she said.

“I’ll be looking for excuses. Thank you for everything.”

Trey had Irene half-harnessed when Sutton materialized from inside the barn and helped him put her to the buggy. When they finished, Trey couldn’t help but say, “I envy you.”

“I’d expect an educated man like you to choose a different way of life. Farming’s not the easiest.”

Trey shook his head. “You’re right. I’m no farmer. What I envy is your family. I’m going to leave Hubbell as soon as I take care of some unfinished business, but you give me a strong urge to marry and settle down.”

“If you want what I have, choose your woman carefully. It all comes down to a woman who can — give.” Sutton hesitated a moment looking off at the house, then went on. “I know there’s something between you and Deborah. Norah and I have a strong affection for her and her sisters, but if you want what I have, she can’t give it to you. She’s....”

This time the pause lasted long enough for Trey to bet with himself on which word was coming — not
odd
or
strange
this time. Sutton would say
different.

“...damaged.”

Damn it. That was just too much. “She told me she saw you kill her father.”

“Did she? So far as I know, she’s never mentioned her father to anyone since that day.”

“Well, she told me what you did. It would damage anyone. So why? Why did you do it?”

Unperturbed by Trey’s anger, Sutton said, “If she wanted you to know, she’d have told you, wouldn’t she?”