Shadows Have Gone (15 page)

“I went out early this morning to patrol and saw something interesting.”

Carly went over to the stove to check the oatmeal. It was bubbling nicely. Dagny, seated in her chair, slapped her tray with impatience. “Yum!” she demanded.

“I’m almost afraid to ask,” Carly said to Pearl before she turned to the baby. “Just a minute, sweetie.”

She cracked the last two eggs into the skillet with a dab of oil. Miz Marson’s stove was a blessing. She thought for a moment of all the delicious things Miz Marson used to be able to whip up using what seemed to be an impossibly scant amount of ingredients. But Miz Marson had grown up in the Depression, an era in which people made do with next to nothing. She had been far more prepared than any of the younger people to survive this hardship. Carly’s eyes stung a little, thinking about how much she would miss Miz Marson and her bits of wisdom dispersed in that terse tone of hers.

“Nothing bad,” Pearl said. She got down glasses from the cabinet and began to fill them with water. “You remember you said that we just hadn’t been
looking
for signs of animals, that they could be out there and just hiding from people?”

“Yeah.”

“I found a set of dog tracks this morning. Fresh ones. Outside of town.”

Carly ginned. “That’s cool! I knew there had to be something in the area when Marcus brought us the pregnant dog, but it’s nice to know for sure. They must have followed us here.”

“What did?” Justin had come in, followed by Kaden. They greeted Pearl and went over to wash up in the sink. Pearl set out the glasses of water she’d poured and filled them in on finding the dog tracks.

Justin groaned. “Carly . . . drawing every animal in a hundred-mile radius.”

“Maybe we can put out food for them somehow,” Carly said, “providing we can keep it away from the gators.”

“Why?” Justin took a deep swill of the water.

“Because . . .” She blinked at him in surprise. “So we can lure them in.”

“Why would we want to? Do you think we need dogs here in Colby? What benefit would they provide?”

“Having pets is kind of a luxury, Carly,” Pearl said. “It’s enough to know that they’re out there and they’re surviving on their own. Which means that other animals may be able to do the same.”

“They could provide protection,” Carly said. “They would alert us if there was a perimeter breach.”

“Enough of a benefit to justify the expense in food and labor in their care and training?” Justin gave Carly a small smile. “I know you have this temptation to make our community something of a Noah’s Ark, preserving animals for the future, but that’s not entirely practical in our situation. We have Buttercup. Maybe she and Sam will mate in the future and give us puppies, and maybe by then we’ll have more of a margin that allows us to keep more animals, but we can’t see ourselves as having the role of an animal sanctuary.”

“I understand,” Carly said. “I guess, if anything, we should be looking for cows and other livestock.”

“Goats.” Justin stirred the oatmeal with a sigh. “What I wouldn’t give for a little herd of goats. Hardy, easy to feed, providing both milk and meat. It’s the livestock of choice for people living at subsistence level all over the world.”

Carly wrinkled her nose. “Goat milk?”

“It’s delicious,” Justin said. “Not as bland as cow’s milk, especially that commercially produced stuff you used to get from the grocery store. The cheese is awesome. This old Afghani woman once made me something called
mantu
—these little onion and beef dumplings—covered in
qoroot
sauce made of garlic and goat cheese. Best thing I’ve ever eaten.”

“I’ll take your word for it. And I’ll keep my eye out for goats.”

“If anything is thriving, it would be them.” Justin scooped out some of the oatmeal and handed a plate to Pearl.

He ladled out portions for all of them while Carly scooped up the eggs and put a little bit on everyone’s plate. Now that she wasn’t breastfeeding, it seemed only right to share it with everyone.

“How’s the new kid?” Kaden asked Pearl. He didn’t look up as he spoke, stirring his oatmeal.

Pearl paused with the spoon halfway to her mouth. “He’s fine, I guess. Kind of quiet. Hasn’t caused any trouble, if that’s what you mean.”

“I thought I’d take him with me to weed the north potato field,” Kaden said.

Carly blinked. She started cutting up Dagny’s egg. “Why did you want to do that?”

“Keep an eye on him, I suppose,” Kaden said. “Pearl probably has stuff to do, right?”

“Laundry.”

“Oh, I forgot. Well, I guess we could—”

“No, I think you had a good idea,” Justin said. “You might be able to get a good read on him, just the two of you working. Holler out for Sam if you need anything. He’ll hear you.”

Sam had also served as “messenger wolf” on occasion. Calling him and attaching a note to his collar with the instruction to “go back” saved them all a lot of legwork, and Sam seemed to think it was a game.

“I’ll be fine,” Kaden said. His gaze was still intent on his oatmeal.

“Yum yum,” Dagny demanded, and Carly remembered her eggs. She spread them out on Dagny’s colorful plate and handed her the fork. Dagny gazed at it for a moment and tossed it on the floor before scooping up a handful of egg and stuffing it in her mouth.

“Efficient, but not nice table manners,” Justin said. He picked up the fork, took it to the sink to wash, and returned it to her. “Eat nicely.”

Chastened, Dagny jabbed at the bits of egg with the tines and huffed with impatience as they fell off. She pushed a piece of egg onto the fork with her fingers and carefully transferred it to her mouth. She looked at Justin as she chewed.

“Close enough,” he said. “Carly, do you need my help today with the laundry?”

“I guess not. Why?”

“I’m going to go scout around and—”

Carly scowled. “Justin, come on! We talked about this.”

“Just nearby to see if anyone else has been sniffing around.”

Dagny copied her mother’s scowl and threw her fork onto the high chair tray. When no one seemed to notice, she reached for the egg with her hand again. Pearl reached over and tapped the handle of the fork. Dagny sighed like a martyr and picked it back up.

“I think it’s smart, Carly,” Pearl said. “Looking for fresh tracks, litter, broken vegetation. Just to see if anyone has been nearby.”

Carly supposed ignoring the potential didn’t make it go away. “Okay. I agree.”

“You coming?” Justin asked Pearl.

She shook her head. “We all can’t duck out on laundry duty.”

After breakfast, Carly gathered all their dirty clothes into net bags and set out for the firehouse, where the rest of the town was gathering. She found Mindy working on getting the fire started below the large kettle while Stan filled it with water from one of the hoses. Carly noticed he was watching the pressure carefully and kept glancing toward the water tower. Once it was empty, they’d have to use their irrigation system to supply water for the laundry. The network of pipes, fed by an old-fashioned ram pump, would supply their needs for a while, but how much longer?

She shook her head. She already had too many worries on her plate to fret over the future at this point.

She glanced around at her community and smiled. It was nice to see them going about the everyday tasks of life, enjoying the normalcy the battle at Clayton had been meant to protect. She saw Mrs. Davis beneath a tree, the town’s few small children seated on a blanket in front of her as she read them a story. Mrs. Davis was now the oldest person in Colby, and Carly wondered if she’d step into Miz Marson’s matriarchal shoes. She doubted it. No one could replace Miz Marson. Mrs. Davis, despite her age, didn’t have the skills and knowledge of Miz Marson, such as preserving food or crafting. Nor did she have Miz Marson’s natural leadership abilities.

But there was one thing she could do. It occurred to Carly suddenly, and she strolled over to where Mrs. Davis was reading. She waited until the story had finished and then gestured to her. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Certainly.” Mrs. Davis stood and nudged over a box of toys to keep the little ones occupied for a moment. Dagny dove in with glee, flinging things right and left as she pulled them out.

“As I was watching you read to them, it occurred to me that we might be missing a valuable opportunity. Maybe we should open a school for the little ones.”

“A school? But . . .” It was obvious Mrs. Davis wanted to protest, but wasn’t even sure where to start.

“Their parents are so busy, it’s going to be hard for them to teach the kids.”

“But I’m not a teacher. I don’t remember half of what I learned in high school myself.”

Carly shook her head. “I’m not talking physics and such. I mean reading and basic mathematics. The skills they’ll need today. I guess it will be like the 1880s all over again, like when Laura Ingalls Wilder was a teacher. Most kids will be needed to work once they reach their teens and probably won’t be able to regularly attend school, but the little ones can. We’ll need to retain those literacy and basic math skills in the future, but we can’t unless we devise some kind of educational system.”

“Well, I suppose I can try . . .” Mrs. Davis looked uncomfortable, but she squared her shoulders. “I suppose I’m the only one who
can
try at the moment.”

Carly stood behind Mindy as she folded the last T-shirt and dropped it in the basket. When Mindy turned, Carly raised an eyebrow, crossed her arms, and tapped her foot. “You promised, remember.”

Mindy sighed. “How about tomorrow, Carly? I’m worn out.”

“No, you said today, and I’m making you stick to it.” Carly stacked Mindy’s basket on top of her own after moving them over near the fire station wall, out of the way. “Come on, Mindy. You need to get checked out. You know that.”

“I know.” Mindy bit her lower lip. “And I know it’s stupid of me, but I have this terrible fear that she’s going to find something wrong, and as long as I don’t know about it, it isn’t real, you know?”

Carly nodded. “I know. Trust me, I know. I had the same fear when it was just Justin and me in that farm house in the Dakotas. Neither one of us knew anything about pregnancy or babies. All we had were books, and every time we read them, we would be confronted with all of these horrible things that could go wrong. Things we had no way of preparing for or dealing with if they did happen. Once, I didn’t feel the baby move for a few days, and I was absolutely sick with fear that the baby had—I can’t even say it. I didn’t tell Justin. I tried to hide it from him because I didn’t want to scare him, but of course, he could tell something was wrong.”

Mindy laughed. “I know you, Carly. You can’t hide anything you’re thinking. And it gets worse the harder you try. Of course he knew.”

“It was awful. I lay on the sofa and concentrated, trying to feel anything, anything at all to let me know my baby was still there. I kept thinking we’d have to induce labor and . . . it was terrible. And then I woke up in the middle of the night with the baby kicking the heck out of my liver, and I sat there and cried because I was so happy. I cried so hard I shook the bed and woke Justin up, and then I had to tell him what had been worrying me.”

“Was he mad?”

“Dire threats of what he’d do to me, between kisses, if I ever tried to hide anything like that from him again.” Carly smiled and took Mindy’s hand in her own. “More than anyone, Mindy, I understand how afraid you are. But you’re in a much better place than I was. Stacy is much better equipped. She’s actually helped deliver babies before.”

“You think there will be others?”

Carly nodded. “I’m certain of it. I’m just the first one that we know of. There could be others out there. Now you’re the second. It makes me certain that the infertility was just a . . . glitch. Our bodies had to recover from being exposed to the Infection. It makes me hopeful that other creatures can recover, too. We just need to give the world a little time.”

She led Mindy down the asphalt drive in front of the fire station toward the street, veering around a decorative planter overflowing with weeds. “Now, it’s time for you to go in for a checkup. Come on. Not taking no for an answer.”

“Bully,” Mindy said, but she smiled. Carly adjusted Dagny’s baby carrier on her back to rest more comfortably, and they headed out across the commons toward Stacy’s clinic.