Page 14

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

EVERYONE SEEMED TO ENJOY LUNCH . Little food was left, afterward. I had correctly guessed that Stonebrunch would have an appetite to match his stature, and Hirom could always be counted upon to take seconds and, often, thirds. I cleaned up and reset the kitchen.

A natural lull occurred in my daily grind, just after lunch. I could, if I wanted, relax for an hour. It meant that some small tasks would be pushed into tomorrow, so I didn’t often take the time, but today I felt as though I deserved it. Besides, my head was thudding. I would drink lots of water this afternoon to offset it.

And I wanted to check in with the locals, too. Harper had been grilled all morning by Axel King. She might have picked up a tidbit or two we didn’t already know about the case.

I settled on the only stool in the bar, which lived by the bar itself, where the old fashioned landline phone with a rotary dial was located, and massaged my temples. “Just water, please,” I told Hirom when he came over to see what he could get me.

The locals – nearly all of them, today, including Harper – were at their usual table. King and his people were grouped around a single table on the far side from the windows, which put them as far as they could get from the locals table and the fireplace. Judging by the way they had their heads close together, they were discussing business.

Orrin Stonebrunch sat at a table by himself, right in the middle of the bar. That explained why King, et al , had settled well to one side. Being alone didn’t seem to bother Stonebrunch. He was, I realized with a touch of amusement, drinking beer straight out of a pitcher, which looked like a pint glass in his big hand.

Hirom saw who I was watching as he settled the water in front of me. “That’s his third pitcher.” He leaned heavily against the edge of the bar. “He likes my beer.”

I studied Hirom. “You’re sweating. Is everything okay? You’ve handled this many drinkers before.”

Hirom shook his head and straightened. “I’m fine,” he said firmly. It sounded to me as though he was convincing himself of that. Worry touched me. What would I do if Hirom couldn’t work? He’d always just been here. As reliable as the sun.

“Uh-oh,” Hirom added under his breath and nodded at something behind me.

I swiveled on the stool to see Percy Finch paused just inside the bar room doorway. He slowly scanned the room, taking it all in.

“He’s being brave,” I murmured. “All the germs you can find in a bar…”

Hirom grinned, showing his big white teeth. “Maybe he wants straight alcohol to kill them all?”

“Finch!” The call came from the locals’ table. Broch was standing and waving Percy over.

Percy didn’t immediately react. He studied Broch and the others, and his shoulders hunched in a little. He pushed his glasses up his nose. His eyes were narrowed. Suspicion? Wariness?

Broch moved around the table out to the open space beside it and waved Percy over once more. “Come and have a drink. Let us get to know you a bit.” His voice was loud enough to carry.

Percy straightened his shoulders and walked over to Broch. Broch thrust out his hand to shake Percy’s.

“He’ll refuse…” I said softly.

Percy kept his hands by his sides.

“Now, you don’t want us to think you don’t like us, do you?” Broch was speaking so everyone could hear.

Percy reached for Broch’s hand, surprising me. Broch gripped his hand, and I hoped fervently that Broch wasn’t using his unnatural strength in an unspoken pissing match to prove who had the biggest gonads.

Broch looked puzzled. Then he broke the handshake and lifted his palm up to study it. “Hello. That’s not sap, is it?”

Percy lifted his own hand, his fingers splayed. From my position at the bar, I could see his palm was glistening with a glutinous clear gel.

Percy shrieked.

The sound he made came up from his toes. It reminded me of kettles whistling on the stove. Jet engines winding up. It was a strained outcry of horror, climbing in pitch as Percy’s dread grew.

He turned and stumbled toward the bar, gripping his wrist. “Water!” he screamed. “Water! Now!”

Hirom glanced at me, and I nodded. He bent and picked up the big plastic tray that was half-filled with soapy water, where he dumped glasses as they were emptied. Only a single beer pitcher sat in the suds, upside down.

Hirom put the sloshing tray on the counter and stepped away.

Percy thrust his hand into the suds as though it was on fire and he needed to douse it.

Over by the fireplace, everyone at the locals table was laughing. Softly, at least.

Broch remained where he had been standing, watching Percy scrub at his palm. He wore a smile that held a touch of disgust.

Percy pulled his hand out of the water and examined the palm. The pale flesh was covered in red blisters. He shrieked again and pushed his hand back into the water.

I went over to Broch. “What the hell did you do to him? What was that gel? His palm is burned .”

Broch’s smile faded. “That’s not possible.” He held up his own palm, which glistened the way Percy’s had. “It’s just aloe vera gel.” He pointed his other hand over his shoulder toward the plant sitting on the mantelshelf over the fireplace. One of the big, spear-shaped leaves had been broken off.

“Then it was too concentrated. He has blisters, Broch.”

“Aloe vera is one of the most benign compounds in the world,” Trevalyan said. “If he has blisters, he talked himself into them.” He spoke with such conviction that I wondered if he was right. Percy seemed like the type of person who could terrify himself into psychosomatic symptoms.

“I need sanitizer,” Percy said, behind me. “I need medical attention!”

I looked at Ben.

He nodded and got to his feet, heading for the bar.

Then I heard a tired sigh and a heavy thud, and whirled.

Hirom had disappeared. Percy leaned over the bar to look behind it. “He fainted!” he squeaked.

Ben ran.

●

Even Stonebrunch wanted to help carry Hirom to his cot in the basement, but as I suspected Stonebrunch was the reason why Hirom had passed out from a raging fever, I explained as diplomatically as I could that we’d take care of Hirom. In a moment of inspiration, I told Stonebrunch that he wouldn’t fit inside the stairs down to the basement.

“I big,” Stonebrunch observed, nodding. He went back to his beer, while Broch, Ben, Wim and Harper carried Hirom out of the bar.

When they returned, I told Broch he was deputized, so get behind the bar and pour drinks.

Broch accepted the assignment calmly, which told me he regretted the prank he’d played on Percy. Percy had headed upstairs with Ben following, to see to his palm.

I returned to the stool to finish my water. My head was thumping heavily, now.

King, I saw, was sitting with his back to the wall, sideways on his chair. He was watching the room with a thoughtful expression.

Broch moved behind the narrow platform that Hirom used to put himself at the same height as his customers, scanning the shelves, and familiarizing himself with where everything was.

The room settled down. Low conversations began.

A hand settled on my shoulder. I took my elbows off the bar and straightened.

Ben gave me a sour smile. “Finch will be fine,” he told me. “The blisters were fading when I left.”

“Then they were psychosomatic?” I asked.

“Aloe vera can’t harm anyone. Not even undiluted sap,” Ben said.

“That would be a yes, then,” I concluded. “The poor man. Everyone must leave him alone, Ben. Hazing is cruel. It doesn’t matter that you intended it to be harmless. It wasn’t.”

Ben rubbed the back of his neck and nodded. He dropped his hand. “I sent Frida to bed.”

My insides sank. “She’s sick, too?”

“Fever and chills. I came down to find a hot water bottle for her feet.”

“We have some in the closet on the first floor, I think.” Then I realized what Frida’s illness meant. “I’m going to have to clean rooms, too…” I got to my feet.

My head gave out a series of hard, heavy knocks that made my vision swim. “Oh…”

Hands gripped my arms, and I was returned to the stool. “Stay still,” Ben told me quietly. His hand rested against my forehead. “No fever.”

“Headache,” I whispered. “Bad one.”

“Anything I can do?” Broch asked, from close by.

“My medical kit. It’s at home, on the kitchen counter,” Ben said.

“I’ll get it,” Broch said, his voice already moving away.

I was afraid to open my eyes. I suspected it would hurt too much.

Ben gripped my arms once more. “Come on. I’m taking you up to your room. You need to lie down.”

“I can’t,” I protested. “I have dinner to make for seventeen people!”

“You can’t do anything but sleep,” Ben said.

“I must.”

“Okay, stand up on your own.”

I fought to open my eyes. I winced and waited for the thudding to stop. Then I got to my feet.

I sat down fast, hissing, and rubbed my temples.

Ben smiled and helped me up once more. “A step at a time,” he told me. “Rest every step, if you want. Or…I could carry you up.” His eyes glittered with amusement.

“I’ll walk,” I said quickly.

I was still on the first flight of the staircase when Broch returned with the big, battered bag that Ben used as his medical kit. He handed it to Ben, then picked me up off my feet and strode up the stairs. I didn’t seem to be a burden to him at all. I shut up, because it was good to not have to walk anymore.

Broch laid me on the purple sofa. “Gotta go pour beer,” he murmured and left.

Ben knelt on the rug beside the sofa and delved into his bag. “I have some basic Tylenol, and an ointment to put on your temples and the back of your neck. Then you can set your phone to wake you in forty minutes. By then, you’ll be able to stand once more.”

I took the Tylenol he handed to me and stayed still while he smoothed the cool gel into my temples, then carefully lifted my hair out of the way and rubbed it into the back of my neck. I watched his face as he worked. He was concentrating, in full healer mode, and probably oblivious to my scrutiny.

He had a face that was neither young nor old. Anyone meeting him for the first time, who was unaware of his true nature, would probably guess he was in his late thirties or early forties. I knew he was much older than that. He had high cheekbones, and a straight nose, full lips outlined by a well-trimmed mustache and beard. Olive skin that was a product of his heritage; he was a direct descendant of Roman royalty; a Patrician family that counted emperors among them.

A lock of his rich dark brown hair laid against his forehead, and I itched to push it back with the rest of the waves.

Ben sat back. “Lie down,” he told me. “Let everything work as it should.”

I wanted it to work, so I laid down as directed, and set my phone for forty minutes from now.

“You need to find a little time in your day to relax,” Ben added, as he pulled the afghan off the back of the sofa and spread it over me. “You haven’t been sleeping, have you?”

“Bad dreams,” I murmured.

“Hmm. You’re not the only one in Haigton to have them, right now. But in forty minutes you won’t sink deep enough to dream. Relax.”

That did help. I reached for his sleeve as he moved to stand up. “In the kitchen…”

Ben shook his head. “Remember what I said about trust?”

“No,” I said frankly.

He smiled. “Trust in time. I was wrong to force it.” His smile faded. “But I needed to know.”

“You’re two thousand years old, and you get impatient?”

He rolled his eyes. “I’m not that old. And just because one has lived a long while doesn’t automatically infer wisdom. I still make mistakes. I still guess wrong.” He paused. “I still feel .” Then he got to his feet. “See you in a while.”

I didn’t want to nod, because it would hurt to move. I tried to pull together the energy to agree with him or thank him or something. But already, sleep was sliding over me, making every muscle relax.

●

Ben lied. I did dream.

It wasn’t the same dream that I had been suffering through for weeks. I was in a town, with streets of stores and a park in the middle, and bizarrely, a giant packet of Life Savers floating over the grass. I didn’t know the town at all.

People were walking through the park, using concrete paths that crisscrossed it. They didn’t look at me.

Harper stood beside me, her hands on her hips, looking around with a moue of disappointment. “Well, it’s not New York, is it?”

I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out.

“Come on, then,” Harper said. “That’s a diner. We can get a coffee there.” But she stayed where she was. Instead, she looked down at her boots, scowling. “I can’t move.” She looked at me. “You did this.”

I still couldn’t speak, but I could move. I stepped forward, ahead of Harper. And like a shadow, she followed me. “Hurry!” she yelled.

I woke up with a shudder and blew out my breath as I realized I had been dreaming after all. My phone was buzzing like a demented bee. I turned it off and got to my feet.

My head felt thick, and mildly foggy. I felt that way whenever I slept during the day. But my head was not thudding, and I didn’t feel sick.

Amazing.

●

Instead of heading directly to the kitchen to start dinner, I stopped at the bar first. I had a hazy notion about thanking Ben. I wanted to check in and make sure everything was okay.

Broch was still behind the bar, leaning with one arm against the top of one of the beer barrels sitting at the other end of the bar. He straightened when he saw me and came over. “You’ve got color back in your cheeks.”

“I feel a lot better,” I admitted. I nodded to the back end of the room, where King and his people were still sitting. They had drinks and bowls of nuts and pretzels in front of them now. “Why are they not in the dining room, grilling Harper?”

“King isn’t saying,” Broch said softly. “And I don’t think the others know. They’re not talking about anything important. The two women wondered if King was hanging around town to hook up with you, but he’s apparently never done anything like that, so they’re uncertain.” He shrugged, the corner of his mouth turning up. “I think he was flummoxed by the town turning him back the first time. Now he’s building the courage to try to leave again. Finding himself turning the car around for no reason that makes sense…it takes the pith out of a decisive man like him.”

“That works for me,” I said, glancing at Harper, who was sitting in the sunlight slanting through the front windows, drinking whisky. She was reading a magazine and sitting by herself. “Broch, if I wanted to get some Life Savers, where would I go?”

“Anywhere?” Broch said, puzzled. Then, “Although there’s a big monument to Life Savers in Gouverneur. A man called Noble who owned the company was born there. Though I wouldn’t recommend eating the monument.”

I stared at him. Gouverneur . “Now I know what I have to do.”

Broch considered me. “And that would be…?”

“I have to take Harper to the diner in Gouverneur, where Calloway was last seen. We have to find the woman he was having coffee with.”

Broch frowned. “You won’t be able to leave town.”

“I will.”

“Not with Harper.”

“Yes, with Harper.”

“What makes you sure?” He wasn’t challenging me. He was simply asking.

“I don’t know. A dream. A gut feeling. I just know.”

Broch considered me for a long moment. “Okay,” he said at last.

“Okay?”

He nodded. “That tone you just used. When you said ‘yes, with Harper’…that is the same tone Trevalyan uses and Juda used to use, when they were sure of themselves and their power.”

I shivered. “Well, I’m not that certain,” I said quickly.

“Yes, you are.” Broch’s tone was firm. “It’s coming from somewhere other than you. Trust it.” Then he smiled. “Who gets to tell Harper she’s going on a road trip?”

“It’s not Harper I’m worried about. I’m going to have to use Olivia’s beast of a car, and it’s got a manual transmission. I’m worried about what Olivia will do to me if I ding it.”