Saving Grace (The Grace Series Book 2) (10 page)

Herlin fidgeted. “Miss Jessica, dis be a very bad idea. Da cap’n’ll be furious.”

“He won’t know if we don’t tell him. I have to do this. I won’t be able to live with myself if I don’t. Ditter says the captain won’t be back until later this evening. If I go now, I’ll be home long before he returns. It’s the perfect time.”

“I guess I’s comin’ witchya then,” Herlin said.

“It’s not necessary. I don’t want you to get into trouble.”

“I’s comin’ witchya,” Herlin repeated.

Jessica did have another option. She could go to Sebastian. She’d thought of this earlier, but going to the parsonage wouldn’t work. He wouldn’t be there. He would be with Reverend Amos. The problem was that she didn’t know where Reverend Amos’s church was exactly. All she knew was that it was fairly close to Shanty Town. Her plan was to head toward Shanty Town and then travel south along the railroad tracks. If she happened to pass a church along the way, she would stop there first.

But Herlin made it impossible for Jessica to stick to her plan. He insisted they veer around Shanty Town entirely. The snowy path they took, however, was close enough to the dismal place for Jessica to see part of it. It was the closest she’d ever been. The fires and lanterns, along with the moonlight reflecting on the snow, illuminated the area well enough that she could make out people coming and going. There were skinny, bedraggled children running around the frozen ground without coats or outerwear of any kind. There were women as well, thin, stooped and utterly worn down.

While Herlin led her south along the railroad tracks, Jessica thought of Sebastian’s charity drive. He was doing the best he could to help these people, but the donations he’d collected weren’t enough. She was determined to figure out another way to help. She became so preoccupied filtering ideas, she forgot to look for Reverend Amos’s church. She didn’t even notice the isolated house they came upon until Herlin stopped in front of it.

Jessica was sure the place was on the verge of collapse. The roof sagged horribly and there was a jagged hole in the flooring on the porch, as if someone’s foot had gone right through. There was no light coming from any of the windows, but that didn’t necessarily indicate no one was inside. It could simply mean Weber’s family was too poor to have lamps and candles.

Jessica didn’t wait for Herlin to help her down from Jasmine. Quickly, but carefully, she trekked through the snow and up onto the porch to wrap at the door.

No one answered. She knocked again, this time calling out Weber’s name, and still there was no response. After her fourth series of unanswered knocks, she said to Herlin, “Perhaps this is the wrong house. Let’s continue a little farther down the tracks. Maybe there is another place.”

Herlin was not pleased with her suggestion, but he followed along without complaint. The next house they came to, however, was more than a half mile away and the family living in it was white.

On their return journey, Jessica asked, “Will you take me past Reverend Amos’s church?”

“It be da other way. We cain’t go dere. Not now.” Then he said, “Ya tried, Miss Jessica. Dat’s all ya kin do.”

They rode on, retracing the path they’d forged in the fluffy white snow, but Jessica kept glancing over her shoulder. She supposed Herlin noticed, because he said, “I’s gonna spread rumors fer ya. If’n I do, dat spook’ll catch wind o’ it. Den ya won’t hafta worry no mo’. Dat spook knows what he’s doin’ and he’s perty darn good at it.”

* * *

Despite Herlin’s assurances, Jessica’s restlessness would not go away. It wasn’t that she didn’t believe Herlin would spread rumors as promised, or even that the spook wouldn’t eventually find out. She was certain he would. The issue was the Klan’s coded days of the week. It didn’t help either, that Jon came in briefly, but then went out again. This meant he was with the Klan, and that didn’t bode well for Weber and his family. Jessica’s gut was telling her, even though it was Wednesday, not Thursday, this was the very night of the attack.

In the mirror above her vanity, she smoothed her dress over her protruding stomach, then turned for a profile view. More and more she found herself doing this. She was in her fifth month. The little life inside her was getting bigger every day. Again she was reminded of the very special moment she’d shared her baby’s movements with Sebastian. Smiling, she said aloud, “Hello, baby. I’m sorry if I woke you up, but I have to do this.”

It was well past nine o’clock when she saddled Jasmine and sneaked out. And this time no one saw her. Even so, as she trudged through the snow on Jasmine, she began to wish she’d asked Herlin to come with her. Not because she was afraid of getting lost, but because being outside at night, all alone, was eerie. No matter how often she told herself there was nothing to be afraid of, the hackles on the back of her neck wouldn’t lie down. At least, however, it wasn’t pitch dark. The moonlight reflecting off the snow provided plenty of light.

She was almost to Shanty Town, keeping to the same path she’d taken earlier with Herlin, when she heard the rattle of wagon wheels coming up behind her. Quickly she veered off the road. There was a copse of trees nearby, and she hid there, praying all the while that whoever was steering the wagon wouldn’t spot her.

They didn’t. As soon as she saw the wagon move on past, she let out the breath she held. After that, she kept glancing over her shoulder, but she wouldn’t have needed to. For the remainder of her journey she saw no one.

She saw no one, that is, until Weber’s rundown house was just ahead. The heavy snort of a horse alerted her to the presence first. Jessica slowed Jasmine. Carefully, and as quietly as she could, she veered around bushes near the side of the house.

Not more than twenty feet from her, standing near the porch, with the moonlight glistening off its sweaty coat, stood a huge, black stallion. The bridle, the saddle, every piece of equipment on the horse was black. The great animal wasn’t tied either, but merely left to wait. He nodded his big head and his eyes, staring right at her, seemed to be daring her to come closer.

Then she heard voices.

Jessica backed Jasmine up to secure her hiding place in the foliage. Whoever it was, was still talking, but all she could hear were muffled words. The door of the house creaked on its hinges.

A deep voice with a heavy, northern accent said, “Good luck to you, ma’am.”

A woman replied, “Tank ya, suh. Tank ya.”

“You’re welcome,” he said. “God be with you.”

The bushes prevented Jessica from seeing him fully, but she heard the thud of his boot heels on the rickety porch stairs. This was followed by the crackle of saddle leather. And then, a second later, he moved.

Like lightning, he soared past. His long cloak and the ends of his scarf flew out behind him like the wings of an eagle. The spray kicked up by the mighty stallion left flecks of white mist trailing after him. In the whole of her life, Jessica had never seen anything so magnificent.

It took less than a second for her to decide what to do. She followed him. He stayed along the railroad tracks heading straight toward Shanty Town. But he was too fast. There was no way Jasmine could keep up. The distance between them grew. Even so, the white background created by the snow made it easy to catch glimpses of his dark silhouette.

He went right into Shanty Town and there, in the glow of a fire, she could see him better. He dismounted and disappeared. Fear trickled through Jessica as she brought Jasmine to a halt. She didn’t know what to do. For years she’d listened to her father’s incessant warnings of the danger in Shanty Town. She knew her father was wrong, but she couldn’t bring herself to move any closer. For what felt like a very long time, but was probably less than a minute she waited. What she needed to do was go home. And she was ready to, but then, in that distant firelight the spook appeared.

He was carrying a child in his arms. Another was beside him holding his hand. A third, just tall enough so his little head was level with the spook’s thigh, had his arms clamped around the spook’s leg. Still others surrounded him. They were all talking at once, vying for his attention. From the distance, Jessica couldn’t hear what they were saying, but she heard the muffled chatter and the laughter that came with it. At one point he squatted down to their level. When he stood back up, the little boy grabbed onto his leg again, and he gently dragged him along for a step before reaching down to pick him up. Then, as before, he disappeared between the shacks.

Up until then, Jessica was too filled with adrenalin to feel the cold, but now it seeped into her bones. She shivered uncontrollably. Once more she decided to head home, and she would have, except the spook was there again. In one swift move, he mounted the patiently waiting stallion. She couldn’t go home now!

He didn’t go east, back toward town. He went left across the tracks, and he was moving rapidly, turning right, then left, then right again, going up steep hills. He didn’t keep to the roads either. He sped off through a field, and turned into another. At one point she followed him across a stream, and later into and out of a rocky gorge. They ended up in the woods.

Keeping up with him was difficult enough but his odd directions and the darkness, especially under the blanket of tree limbs, made it impossible. Soon enough she lost him completely.

Just outside of the tree line, she stopped to get her bearings. She looked about her, but nothing was familiar. Normally she had a fairly decent sense of direction, but tonight, because of the constant turns, she wasn’t sure anymore which direction she faced, and that made it difficult to decide which way to go next. She needed to travel east, that much she knew. Hoping she was facing north, she turned right. If her assumption was correct, eventually she would run into the railroad tracks. From there, she would be able to find her way.

She rode for a while and again found herself in an unfamiliar, open field. She hadn’t run into any roads or pathways. She hadn’t seen one house either. And she was sure she should have come to the tracks by then. Her fear mounted and she shivered, although this time the tremors weren’t caused by the cold.

Out of nowhere, a horse galloped up behind her. She kicked at Jasmine trying to get her to run, but Jasmine seemed as disturbed by the rapidly approaching animal as she was, and instead of obeying her command, Jasmine spun sideways.

With her heart in her throat, Jessica watched the immense black beast stop instantly from its run. He was no more than twenty feet away. She heard the click of a revolver hammer. In the moonlight, behind the fog created by the horse’s breath, she saw the glint of the silver barrel, and it was pointed directly at her.

“I don’t appreciate being followed,” he said.

He spoke fast, almost curtly. His voice was deep. His Yankee accent was unmistakable. The only part of his skin she could see was the very narrow strip of it between the kerchief so low on his forehead his eyebrows were hidden and the one just beneath his eyes that covered the rest of his face. Jessica stared at him, but she couldn’t make a sound. Her heart was hammering too loudly for her to speak.

“Go home,” he said as he holstered his revolver. “It’s not safe for you out here.”

Jessica opened her mouth but the only sound that came out of it was a barely audible squeak.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

Shakily she managed, “Which way to the railroad tracks?”

He pointed. “That way.”

She’d been going the right direction all along. As she turned Jasmine, she looked back over her shoulder and said, “What you do out here is right.”

He didn’t answer her.

But he followed her. And, he was good at it. She couldn’t see him at all. Still, she knew he was there. Every so often she heard the faint sound of a twig breaking. Every so often she heard the barely discernable whinny of his mighty horse. He followed her until she reached the turn off to Bent Oak Manor.

She didn’t hear him after that, but the raised hackles on her neck told her he was still there. Even after she unsaddled Jasmine and ran across the lawn to the house, she felt his presence.

Warm and cozy in her bed, Jessica’s limbs tingled and she couldn’t stop smiling. In her gut she’d known all along who he was. Tonight, however, his identity was unquestionably solidified. She recognized his horse. It was definitely Apostle. But even that wasn’t the indisputable proof. The proof was in what he wore. She’d given it to him as a Christmas gift. She’d made it herself—the black, knitted scarf.

From where they were hidden in the trees, ten men in full costume waited for their target to appear. It was late afternoon, still light outside, an usual time for Klansmen to make an appearance, but this particular stretch of road was isolated. It was the perfect place.

They had been watching from the same position for quite some time. They saw their target earlier, surrounded by a group of nappy-headed monkeys from Shanty Town. He was giving them rides on his brute of a horse and they were guffawing and hollering, “Ma turn! Ma turn!” It was all the Klan leader could do to keep his men from attacking then and there.

By the time their target appeared alone, riding his stallion straight toward them, dusk was falling. The time to strike was upon them. Arnold Whistler held up his arm—the long awaited signal. As soon as the man on horseback was just beyond them, he swung.

The ghostlike figures lunged out from the trees. Rebel yells pierced the air as they surrounded their target. In seconds they had him off the horse. In seconds he was on the ground. One of them wrested a concealed revolver from him. Another whipped the stallion. The giant horse screamed as it took off.

“We’ve warned you, Reverend,” Arnold Whistler sneered. “Every week we’ve warned you but you don’t listen. Perhaps this will change your mind!”

The punishing onslaught that followed came from every direction. Clubs wielded, metal-tipped boots cuffed. No matter how he ducked or tried to dodge the blows, now matter how he shielded his head with his arms, they weren’t going to miss. It wasn’t long before Sebastian Nash’s body began to jar limply from each strike.

But the Klansmen weren’t finished. They stripped his coat from his back, tied his wrists, strung him up behind a horse and dragged him into the woods. There, they secured him, stretched out, face down.

Icy water from Arnold Whistler’s canteen was poured over his head. Jolted back to consciousness, the reverend began to struggle against his bindings. With horse whip in hand, Arnold snarled, “Get out of our town, nigger lover!”

They took turns whipping their much hated victim until all that was left of his shirt were a few narrow, threadlike shards, until the bottom halves of their white robes were splattered in red.

Standing over the bloody, unconscious figure, Arnold Whistler announced proudly, “Last time didn’t deter him. I guarantee this will. Let’s go men!”

* * *

Jon Kinsley found Apostle first. He didn’t know what the Klansmen had done to Sebastian Nash until late in the evening, after he participated in the lynching of a colored man, and after a pack of Klansmen met up at the tavern.

It was a cloudy night and difficult to see. Leading Apostle, Jon continued along on Webster to the section of roadway where, based upon Arnold Whistler’s accounting, the beating occurred. From there he veered off into the trees, hoping eventually to come upon the reverend’s trussed up form. He got lucky.

Even in the darkness Jon could tell Nash was in bad shape. His face was battered. His hair was matted with dirt and blood. His knuckles were swollen and raw, evidence that he’d fought back while he could. It was the reverend’s back, however, that drew most of Jon’s scrutiny. Whistler’s description didn’t do this justice. Jon had never seen flesh so severely flayed in his life. Dropping to his knees beside the prone figure, he felt for a pulse, and was surprised to find one.

“Nash!” Working swiftly, Jon cut through the binding ropes. “Wake up, Nash. Wake up!”

Nash groaned and muttered something. Jon wasn’t sure what. The holy man should have been shivering from lying out in the cold for hours, but he wasn’t. Jon stripped his cloak and covered Nash with it anyway.

“Nash! Wake up!” Jon hollered again. “It’s Jon Kinsley. I’m going to take you home.” He reached under the reverend’s chest and tried to lift him, but he stopped when Nash duly cried out.

“Okay, okay,” Jon whispered. He wasn’t sure how he was going to pull this off. It was doubtful Nash would be able to sit a horse. He could bring a wagon, but that would take too long. Nash may not have perished from his ghastly wounds yet, but he was near to freezing to death. Getting him to warm shelter was critical. He would have to lay Nash across the saddle on his stomach. Nash, of course, was not a small man. Just hoisting him up onto the horse, regardless of what position, would be difficult.

“Come on, Nash, help me out here,” Jon said. “You have to get up.” He tried to lift him again and this time the reverend fainted dead away.

It was better this way, Jon thought, as he labored to get the reverend up and over his shoulder. From there, he struggled to stand, but in the slippery mud, his boot slid and he fell hard to his knee.

“God damn it!” The whispered curse flew out of his mouth. For a moment he remained still, waiting for the pain in his leg to subside. “Sorry, Reverend,” he murmured. Then he took a deep breath, and with a loud growl, attempted to rise again. This time he made it.

On his feet, with Nash still over his shoulder, Jon limped to Apostle. With another loud grunt, he heaved Nash up and over the horse. As he secured the reverend to the animal, Jon hoped Nash wouldn’t awaken until after they reached the parsonage. Fortunately, he didn’t.

At the parsonage, getting Nash to his bed posed another difficulty. The stairs were steep and narrow. Jon worried his badly hurting knee would give out each time he put weight on it. As he went, one hesitant step at a time, he imagined them both tumbling to the bottom and all his efforts thus far being for naught. It took an extraordinarily long time, but eventually they made it.

Later, after he’d gone for the doctor, after he helped the doctor clean and dress the reverend’s wounds, after he made broth and spoon fed it to the big man, after the reverend finally fell into an alcohol-induced sleep, Jon sat down in the parlor, amongst the stacks of Nash’s many books. In one hand he held a glass of whiskey. With the other he absently rubbed his aching knee.

While seated, he replayed the threats he’d made to the doctor. He could only pray the good doctor was deterred enough to say nothing of his involvement. Should his fellow Klansmen catch wind of what he’d done for Nash, they would not be pleased.

He picked up a book from the nearest stack, looked at it briefly and set it back on the pile. Then he downed the remaining contents from his glass. His throat felt raw and there was a spot in the center of his forehead that had been pounding relentlessly for days. The doctor said the reverend’s wounds were severe, but superficial. In time Nash would be fine.

Jon wondered, as he stared at the empty glass dangling from his fingertips, whether he could say the same for himself.

* * *

Jessica couldn’t get her encounter with the spook out of her mind. She remembered him clearly, his body lithe in the saddle with the black cloak waving behind him, his eyes, piercing in the darkness, his deep voice, the heavy accent, his gentle kindness to the children in Shanty Town, the way she felt completely safe knowing he was following her.

Even though Sebastian had changed his accent, which for him would be easy to do, the deep timbre of his voice was similar. The children in Shanty Town would have known him, of course, because he was so involved in their lives. And he would have known her as soon as he realized who was following him. He would have cared enough to ensure she made it home safely. The reason Sebastian couldn’t reveal his secret to her was because of her husband’s relationship to the Klan. Any true knowledge of the spook would put
her
in grave danger.

And his ministerial home visits… Jessica couldn’t believe it had taken her so long to figure it out! During his visits people confided in him. They were forthcoming with all sorts of vital and privileged information, and gossip in this part of the world ran rampant. This was how he learned of the Klan’s plans, how he was able to determine when and where they were conducting their raids. She couldn’t believe she’d so selfishly taken up so much of his time. The Klan raids he hadn’t known about were her fault!

She thought about Stephanie’s claim that he wasn’t a real minister. He’d admitted to Jessica that he didn’t think he was a very good one, that most of his lessons were copies of his father’s. Stephanie was probably right. Sebastian wasn’t a real minister, but emulating his own father would be an easy role for him to play.

The whole plan was so simple, it was brilliant.

It was ironic that at one time she’d suspected Harry Simpson. Thinking of Harry now, there was no interest whatsoever. She could even go as far as saying she despised him, but not nearly as much as she did her husband. Harry was a murderer, but at least he wasn’t a rapist. Jessica wondered how in the world she could be such a terrible judge of character. In her lifetime there were three men she liked. Two of them were crude, disgusting, inhuman monsters, and the third, the one she should have loved from the beginning, she had thought of only as a friend, until more recently.

Although Sebastian’s confession about what happened between him and Stephanie was troubling, Jessica knew there was more to the story, and she knew somehow he was not to blame. It certainly didn’t change her admiration for him. If anything, her conviction that he was the spook caused her feelings to intensify. Often she thought of their one, tender kiss.

She’d spent the last two Sunday afternoons with him at the parsonage. While their conversations were as enjoyable and as filled with laughter and teasing, there was no mistaking an underlying hesitancy in him. This she attributed to his deep remorse over whatever it was that happened with Stephanie. She could only hope time would help him to realize she didn’t hold it against him, and they could, eventually return to the comfortable relationship they had in the past. She was determined to see it through.

Yet, even if their friendship did become what it once had been, and even if they both wanted more, she was the one who would hold them back. She wasn’t free to pursue another relationship with anyone, no matter how desperately she might want to. Because these thoughts only infuriated her, she chose to set them aside, and concentrate on something else.

What she’d seen of Shanty Town that February night still haunted her. Whenever she wasn’t thinking of Sebastian, she was trying to come up with ways to help those poor people. She had several ideas, but what she needed to make any of them work was money.

Jon and she never discussed finances, but she knew things were going well. New horses appeared weekly. Others disappeared. Five were almost ready to foal. He spent inordinate amounts of money on clothes and gifts for her, which meant he had plenty. All she needed to do was figure out how to get it.

Jessica donned her robe and tiptoed down the stairway to her husband’s study, the place he kept all of his important papers. Somewhere she would find bank statements with account numbers. From these, she was sure she could figure out a way to pilfer funds. And it was only right to give his money to those he and his Klan were raining such terror upon. The irony made her smile. Jon deserved to have his money stolen. If she succeeded, so long as he didn’t catch her, the whole process would be extremely gratifying.

For hours she fingered through the papers she found in his desk. From them she was able to decipher three things. The first was he was trading horses with the army, but this was not new information. She was already aware he had a contract with the army. What she didn’t know was how much revenue he made from that contract. It was quite substantial. The second thing she discovered was how much he’d spent on repairs to the manor house and the stable. The amount was staggering. The third was how much he was paying each of the servants. The salary figures on the paper were mere pittance, not nearly enough for someone to survive on, let alone support a family. As she read through the list, her blood began to boil. Her disgusting husband might as well have been paying them nothing at all!

There was not one drawer she didn’t go through and not one page she didn’t touch, and yet she found nothing related to bank accounts. She did, however, find a key. It was hidden in a crevice underneath the center drawer, wedged between the base and side. She picked at it until it was loose enough to retrieve. It was similar in size and shape to the key to her father’s safe. She knew Jon had a safe, and she knew it was somewhere in the study, but she didn’t know exactly where. She’d never asked either. Obviously it was hidden, because it wasn’t readily visible. Jessica resolved to find it. She peeked inside cabinets, under furniture, around drapes, behind paintings, between books on the shelves…

She was so engrossed in her search, at first the sound of the front door didn’t register. When it did, she realized someone was in the foyer—someone limping, which meant it was Jon—and he was moving toward the study. Quickly, she shoved the handful of books she’d removed back into place and spun around. She was just in time. The door opened.

It was evident he wasn’t expecting to see her, because as soon as he did, he stopped short. He made a visible effort to stand up straight and said, “Hello, Jessica. Is there something I can help you with?”

Jessica was dumbstruck. She’d never seen him so dirty and unkempt. There were stains on his coat, and on his shirt, which was askew and not tucked in. There were spatters of mud on his trousers. His knees were both solidly covered and his boots were no better. His barely-open eyes were bloodshot, and his hair was messed as if he’d run his fingers through it repeatedly. She’d never seen him so haggard. Or perhaps he was just drunk. Again.