“No.”
Even though she wasn’t surprised, hearing him admit it caused her to see red. “How could you do this to me, Derby? To Pearl? To all of us? Why in the world did you bring us here?”
“I had to do something with you first.”
“First?”
“You’ll thank me later.”
He produced a pistol from the pocket of his coat, put it beneath his chin, and pulled the trigger.
Two
Laurel’s father-in-law waited until daylight and the worst of the storm had blown itself out to notify the authorities. Before leaving for town, he made her swear that she would stay inside the shack while he was gone. Listlessly, she agreed to remain inside, having no desire to subject herself to see in the dreary, gray daylight what she had beheld in darkness.
She hadn’t even known that Derby owned a pistol.
In Irv’s absence, she sat on the mattress near the potbellied stove, where she had endured the long night, benumbed by what Derby had done. She’d held Pearl to her the entire time, her infant being the only thing that seemed real, the one thing she could cling to in this ongoing nightmare.
She couldn’t even take comfort in fond memories of Derby. Those she’d cherished had died with him. They’d been obliterated by what would be her final memory of him.
She resented him for that.
Irv returned, followed by the sheriff and the justice of the peace. They came into the shack and spoke to her briefly, but there was little she could say that would make the circumstances any clearer than the gore they’d seen splashed onto the door of the outhouse.
After Derby’s body had been removed and taken to the funeral parlor, Irv dismantled the outhouse and burned it. By the early dusk, he had built another enclosure. He probably wouldn’t have been so industrious on the day after his son’s suicide if it hadn’t been for the privacy Laurel required.
Now, less than twenty-four hours after meeting her father-in-law, they were alone in the shack, except for Pearl. He was at the cookstove, preparing food she didn’t think she could eat, but knew she must in order to sustain Pearl.
“Thank you for replacing the outhouse.”
“Easier to start over than try to clean the old one. He’d made a goddamn mess.”
Softly she said, “He wasn’t right in his mind.”
He turned away from the stove and looked over at her. “Shell shock?”
“I suppose. A light had gone out inside him, and it never came back on. I thought he would get better as time passed. I tried to help him, but he wouldn’t even talk about it.”
Irv dragged one hand down his creased face. “He was like that after his mama died. Shut down, like. He ever tell you about that?”
“No.”
“TB got her. Derby was seven, eight. Had to watch her decline, then die. That’s tough on a kid.” He paused, lost in thought, then cleared his throat. “After she passed, I couldn’t earn a living and look after him at the same time. I had no choice but to put him in a home. For what it was, it was a nice place. Subsidized by the railroad. I’d go see him whenever I could, but…”
He raised his shoulders. “He never forgave me for leaving him. Soon as he was old enough, he went his own way. I’d hear from him off and on. Mostly off. But it seemed to me like he’d found himself again and was doing all right. Then the war came along. If it was as bad as they say, it’s a wonder any one of them who survived it haven’t done what he did.”
He heaved a sigh that invoked Laurel’s pity. The wretched memory of Derby’s death would stay with Irv until his own final breath.
“Can I help you there?” she asked.
“No thanks. I’m just making some gravy for that rabbit we didn’t eat last night. It’s almost ready.”
Pearl was sleeping peacefully on the mattress. She probably needed to be changed, but in the process, she would wake up. Right now, it was better for Laurel, as well as for the baby, that she remain asleep. Because Laurel needed time to think.
She was viewing her life as a spool of ribbon that had gotten away from her, rolling out of her reach, unwinding rapidly and haphazardly, and she was powerless to stop it.
She shivered, as much from despair as from the cold air that seeped through the cracks in the walls of the shack. She hadn’t removed her coat since she arrived. Shoving her hands deep into its pockets, she said, “Right before he…did it…Derby admitted that he hadn’t told you about me and Pearl.”