The Book of James (43 page)

“How?” I whispered. “How?”

“Lured him into the woods. Just like his mother told him

to. Out to the old swimming hole. Long since been filled in, but

it wasn’t too far from here.” He gestured vaguely. “Then tried

to drown him. A bit of a struggle.” He looked toward the grave.

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“Buried him hours later. He’s still in his bathing suit. You can look if you want.”

I stepped back and bent at the waist. I thought I might

vomit. Not Nick. “Cain and Abel? How biblical. But why the

burial in secret? Why not just say it was an accident? Everything aboveboard?”

“That was the plan. An accident. Only Nicholas, Cora, and I

would know the truth. But it didn’t work that way.” He clenched

the bars of the gate. “See, your loving husband killed his brother a little too enthusiastical y. I don’t know exactly what happened in those woods. Nicholas would never talk about how he did it—not

to me or to his mother—but James was not just drowned. He was

beaten, his skull smashed right open. He was covered in blood. It could never have been an accident.” His voice was strangled. “The whole plan was ruined. Cora and I did what we had to do. We covered it up. For all this time.”

I looked around, shaking my head. “I don’t believe you. I don’t.

Why did Nick keep that old picture? Why?”

Harrison shrugged. “Strange how the human mind works.

Guilt? A small remembrance? A tie to hold over Cora’s head?

Who knows? Cora would never let him talk about James. Got so

angry when Nick rebelled against her. She wanted to wipe James’s

memory from everyone’s mind. He’d bring it up sometimes to talk

about it . . . To make us all remember. She’d lock him up as a punishment. To make
him
remember that we are family and that we stick together.”

“Cora forced him to do it?”

“Not forced. Coached—yes, coached. It took care of two prob-

lems at once. James was gone, and Nick was bound forever to this

family.”

My mind swam. In a flash, all my memories of Nick came

flooding forward. Was there anything about him that would have

given away this awful secret? Anything? Did he cry in his sleep?

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Did he shy away from water, or children? He’d never been physi-

cal y violent with me.

“She didn’t want to be like her mother,” Harrison went on,

“forced into a pregnancy. And then her father tried to ruin everything with his wil . Leaving most of his money to James. Edward

didn’t realize that he had done the one thing that would jeopardize his grandson’s life. I don’t think he thought Cora would real y be able to kill her own flesh and blood, but he didn’t consider what the child’s brother was capable of, did he?”

I felt sick. “But you destroyed both children at once, don’t you

see that? Look at this,” I said, gesturing around me in a half circle.

“What did this get you? You have no children left. You’ve com-

mitted murder. All of you. Your plan—no, your life—has been for

nothing.”

I could only see the top of his hood because he was looking

down. “Perhaps it turned out badly. Once the boy was dead, Cora

was remorseful. But she’s a survivor. Put it all behind her, erased all evidence of it and pretended he was never there in the first place.”

We both said nothing, a moment of almost-reverence at the

little boy’s grave.

“But,” Harrison said suddenly, “Nick broke the cardinal rule.

He talked. He told Bradford the truth. Years later. I have no idea why. And Bradford couldn’t handle it. Had another heart attack.

Nick should have known that he couldn’t handle the stress. Then

Nick disappeared. After all that, he just left. And then you got in the way.”

“Me?”

“Nick should never have gotten married. He knew that even-

tual y Cora would find him. He put you between them. Why?” He

wasn’t real y asking the question. He was just thinking out loud.

“To think he could just forget . . . everything. And”—his voice got louder—“we did it all
for
him. And then you come here,” he pointed at me, “and start poking into things.” My breath caught

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ELLEN J. GREEN

in my throat. “Asking questions. Cora went off into a tailspin. She hasn’t been like that in years. She had to put you in your place. I couldn’t stop her. So,” he put his head down, his voice lowered, “she hit your friend. On one of her drives.”

“Why? Why Samantha?”

He shrugged. “To make you suffer. To retrieve the property

you stole from Nick’s room. And because you didn’t seem over-

whelmed with grief at losing your husband. She wanted you to feel what she’s feeling.”

Rage welled in my gut. “But you created all this. Cora set the

dominoes in motion by hounding Nick. You act like
I
killed him.

You sick bastard. You and Cora deserve each other.”

His fingers wrapped around the bars; he stared in at me. The

rain was coming down hard, beating against his hood. I tried to

figure out my options. He was probably much stronger than I was.

If he got his hands on me, it would be all over. The only thing I had in the way of protection was my rusted shovel.

Slowly, he shook his head back and forth, as if I were nothing

more than an inconvenience. As soon as one of his hands moved

toward the handle on the gate, I reacted without thinking. I swung that old shovel as hard as I could and aimed directly at his fingers.

Harrison howled with pain and backed up, almost doubled

over. In that split second I sprinted to the far side of the cemetery and grabbed the bars with both hands. The fence was difficult enough to climb when it was dry out, but this was my only chance.

The property on the other side didn’t belong to Cora. The only way for Harrison to get to me would be to climb the fence after me or go all the way to the front gate and around to the adjoining property. He had the advantage of having grown up here and probably

knew the surroundings like the back of his hand.

It was then that I noticed a separation in the bars. A small

separation—but then, I was smal , and getting smaller every day.

I squatted and pushed my shoulder through. It was a tight fit, and THE BOOK
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JAMES

357

it hurt, but I had no time to think about pain or scrapes. My body moved through next, though the bars felt like they were squeezing the life force out of me. My head went through last. I bruised and scraped my already-throbbing nose. My shoulder almost dislocated, but I was on the other side. I refused to turn and look back to see where Harrison was, but I could feel his presence behind

me. His fingers touched mine briefly but slipped away as I made

the last push through safely to the other side. He wasn’t attempting to get through the opening. We stood for a moment looking at

each other, mirroring the scene from just moments before, only

this time I was outside the cemetery and he was inside.

“Why are you making this so difficult, Mackenzie? You don’t

even know where you are. I can find you in no time.”

“Find me, then,” I said between wheezes. Squeezing through

the bars had taken the wind out of me. “And when you do, I’ll kill you. Worthless old man.” I was angry.

But I would have done better keeping my words to myself,

because they seemed to spark him on. He muttered an obscen-

ity and darted quickly into the darkness. I real y didn’t have any idea where I was, where these woods led or in which direction to

head. Common sense told me to move away from Cora’s house. I

swore to myself that if I made it through this, I would never look at another tree again. I pulled out the little penlight and ran blindly ahead.

I jumped at every tiny sound, sure that Harrison Cooper would

appear before me at any minute. Rain dripped through the leaves,

spattering my filthy head and body. Every so often I stopped and

sat with my back to a tree and turned off my light. My strength was giving out. I marveled at what I had been through over the past

few days. But I had survived. I’d managed to get myself out of that room. I found James’s body. I fought off Harrison Cooper and got

through the fence.

My mind wandered to Dylan and Samantha. Did they believe

that I’d taken the train to Harrisburg? Were they looking for me?

I thought about how my life had changed so much over the past

several months. Would I live to see my little house in Portland

again? My eyes drooped. I opened them and forced myself to my

feet. If I fell asleep, I was a sitting duck. I turned on my light and started walking. It was cold and wet; my teeth knocked together as I moved. The woods had to end somewhere.

At first I thought I was hal ucinating when I saw lights through

the trees. I stared, afraid to move. The lights were accompanied by THE BOOK
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JAMES

359

noise. Voices, the rustling of leaves. I stepped back and dropped down behind a tree, hugging my knees. I couldn’t take any more.

I thought about leaping out and announcing myself and just

getting it over with. How long can you go on fighting? The rosary was still in my pocket. I wrapped my fingers around it and held on.

Any talisman in a pinch.

The sounds got louder. I refused to open my eyes. I wasn’t sure

I could. I was so weary. Even though I’d barely had any liquids for the last two days, my body found enough water to form a few tears.

I bit my lower lip and tasted the saltiness. Footsteps were near me.

They couldn’t be more than a few yards away. I recited some words over and over—I think it was,
Please God, please God
. Then I felt hands landing heavily on my shoulders.

“Ma’am?” said the voice. “Are you okay?”

The rocking chair in Nick’s room squeaked against the hard wood

floors. Back and forth, back and forth. Cora held Nick’s worn

blue blanket in her arms. Her head rested against the back of the chair; her eyes were closed. Harrison had gone into the woods

after Mackenzie. Cora knew where the girl was headed. She was

stubborn and headstrong. She probably could have made a clean

escape, but Cora knew that she would head to the cemetery.

She pushed against the floor with her foot to rock the chair.

The motion was hypnotic. Nick, it seemed, had not betrayed their

secret to his precious wife after al . Cora had won. In the end, all might be revealed, but she had won. Nick had been thinking of his mother, good or bad, when he drew his last breath. This thought

alone was enough to make her smile, just a little.

Harrison was the only man on earth, other than Nick, that

Cora had ever loved and trusted. He had taught her what she

needed to know about the world and God and love over the years.

He had saved her time and time again. Though their relationship

had been hidden away, existing only in those woods, maybe it had

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been more perfect because of that. It had become, always was,

everything to her. Embodied in Nick.

She hugged Nick’s fleece blanket tightly to her, feeling a slight nausea rise in her stomach. She stood and walked to the window.

Inky blackness filled the other side of the glass. The day was ending.

The sun had never real y come out from behind the black clouds,

but when it had gone down over the horizon, those woods would

be treacherous. That was good, she reasoned. Harrison would have

the upper hand. The woods were his home.

He just had to do this one thing. Just one more time. And she

would be free forever.

The past five years had been so peaceful. She and Harrison had

been together within the wal s of her fortress. She was able, for a short time, to make peace with her son being gone. Out there in

the world without her. Then the news had come to her of his wife.

A wife. Her mind was in turmoil.

Harrison tried the best he could to calm her. He reassured

her constantly, but it was for nothing. Her son had taken a wife.

He’d replaced her. She had to find a way to remedy the situation, to make him remember. They were, and always would be, bound

together forever in their secret.

The idea had come to her twenty-seven years ago, on a brutal y

hot Sunday morning during prayer. The idea was so perfect, she’d

gasped as all the angles came together in her mind. This one simple act would bind all of them together forever—Cora, Harrison, and

Nick. Her son, of the union with Harrison, would inherit every-

thing. Her father would be defeated. Final y.

That morning she woke him early, and they prayed together.

Nick was patient with her prayers. He listened without interrup-

tion. His eyes were closed. After that, she held him to her for a long time and told him what she wanted him to do. She’d nurtured his

hatred for his brother. The same hatred she felt for her father. It would have been a difficult thing to explain to an outsider, but just 362

ELLEN J. GREEN

like she knew that Nick was part of her, she knew that James was

her father. They were one and the same.

James was already in his swim trunks out on the terrace. He

went willingly when his older brother called him. The two walked

together across the large clearing to the woods. It was still all so vivid in Cora’s mind. The grass, a dark, luscious green, had just been cut. She counted their footsteps. The ground must have been

wet, because blades of grass were sticking to the bottoms of their sandals as they walked. Counting, but it was all taking so long. Her mind was fuzzy, and it almost looked like they were surrounded