Understory Read online

  He didn’t whistle now. His feet sweated inside his heavy, insulated boots, and if he hadn’t been wearing gloves, his hands would slip on the rungs. There were a lot of things a person could do to a child to make him behave. Things Art’s real father had done to him. Art hadn’t thought about those things in a long time, but now he must consider them for this little piece of work. Behavior must be taught, Dad told him. Knowing right from wrong was not a natural instinct. All children were born bad. Every single one of them. They all needed to be punished.

  Art reached the top of the ladder and blinked through stinging snow while clinging to the platform. An empty coat, red with a black stripe, mocked him.

  * * *

  Cam lugged pans of water to heat on both woodstoves as he considered how much of his supply of gauze he’d have to use between her toes and fingers. The dry heat of the woodstove would cause problems. Damp would be better. She’d probably go nuts when the pain set in. Cam didn’t wish that on anyone and hoped the woman could understand that she shouldn’t thrash. In an hour the first part would be over. She’d thaw.

  The blisters would come later. They shouldn’t be drained, he recalled. Hopefully, she’d be at a hospital by then. Gangrene was the big fear. He hoped it wouldn’t come to that. The water for soaking needed to be pretty warm. Her nose and cheeks looked a little suspicious, but not serious.

  On his next trip to the living room to check the water, he noticed her eyes were open. They looked cloudy. Iago whined a high, plaintive sound.

  “You’re safe, ma’am. I don’t know how long you’ve been out there, but it looks to me like you’ve got a pretty serious case of frostbite. I’m going to get you warmed up, but it’s going to hurt.”

  She blinked, the only sign she’d heard, and let her eyelids droop.

  “What’s your name?”

  Cam tested the water on the stove. Getting close—no more than one hundred ten degrees. He glanced at the woman. “Can you tell me where you were going?”

  Her lips pressed briefly and relaxed, as if that small motion exhausted her.

  Moving close, he knelt, but at her intake and slight retraction, he kept his place. “Ma’am, did someone hurt you?” There wasn’t any sign of bruising or wounds, but he didn’t check that close.

  “Was there anyone with you?”

  The green irises flecked with gold and bronze focused. She slowly shook her head.

  “No? You were alone?”

  Her face scrunched as the first pain wave must have hit her. Lear turned his head around and snuffled.

  “Okay, boys…”

  He was about to call them off the woman, but it seemed her expression pled for them to stay. “You want them by you?” He shook his head and got to his feet. “I’ve never seen them act this way, I have to tell you.”

  Lear and Iago huddled closer. Iago even put his right front paw on her arm, as if protecting her. They did not cozen up to strangers.

  Cam grunted under his breath. Maybe she had a dog at home.

  “Were you in a car? Where? How long have you been out there?”

  The water must be warm enough by now.

  “I’m sorry,” he told her. “We need to warm your hands and feet quickly, and it’s not going to feel good.”

  SIX

  She was in a cabin, obviously, but it wasn’t Kingston’s. His place was big and dark with a set of steps to the second story tucked in a corner. Oh man, oh man, oh man. What was going on? Stop the pain…please…

  Her hands were on fire. Her cheeks were going to melt. Her feet were great blocks of wood.

  The guy who picked her up…who was he? Where had he taken her? Kidnapped? What had he done to her?

  Everything hurt. Thinking hurt.

  She leaned against her knees, not sure if sitting up was better than lying flat. Nice doggies, nice warm…please don’t beg me to pet you.

  Was this the guy everyone was talking about last summer? That black professor who’d been fired over a rape charge? The one who showed up in Barter Valley, doing some work for Matt at the Freeman. Art said he was trouble, but her brother carried around his own set of prejudices.

  Oh, her hands hurt. But she wasn’t going to give this man the satisfaction of knowing how bad. There was no reason to trust him. In fact, she was just going to keep her mouth shut and figure out how to get out of here as soon as possible and get to Kingston’s.

  She bit her lips against a moan.

  How could she figure out where she was? The thought of pressing buttons on a phone when her fingers felt like they were embedded with glass shards made her breathe shallowly.

  The man loomed over her now. She looked up at him, sideways, through her hair.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “We need to warm your hands and feet quickly, and I’m afraid it’s not going to feel good.”

  Before she could back away, he picked up her left hand and plunged it into a pot of water and held it there.

  She knew it was the right thing to do, but she struggled and bit her lips. Freak, freak, freak—the words echoed in her brain. The girls in the locker room never saw, but they were aware there was something weird about her being allowed to change for gym class in a bathroom stall…why would this guy help a freak like her? Or was he going to burn her?

  “I’m sorry,” he repeated. “Please, struggling will only damage your skin more. I can’t get you out of here until the storm is over. Might be a couple of days.” He held on. “If you want to use your hands again, let—me—help you.”

  She heaved in a breath and held it, trying to pretend the mass of pain that was her hand belonged to someone else. He couldn’t do anything worse to her than what God had already done.

  This was like being tied up inside a fire anthill. She closed her eyes and raised the other hand, letting the breath leak out, along with tears. No sobbing! Maybe a few tears...

  “That’s right,” the man crooned. “It’ll all be over soon. Try not to rub the skin any. That’ll make the most damage. Got to feel awful, I know. I’ve never had frostbite, but I’ve been burned. Got too close to the action in Afghanistan, burned my leg. Just a bit.”

  His voice was soothing, lulling the pain to a dull roar. “The water’s going to cool off, and I’ll change it soon. Now for your feet.” He moved away. She raised her cheek from her knee and watched, trying to detach from the situation as he uncovered a frozen, numb lump of foot and gently lowered it into what looked like a cake pan of steaming water.

  She’d been to a spa once with her best friend, Cindy. They’d had a Swedish massage, which hurt like crazy, then a Finnish sauna, and a roll in the snow. Later, they’d relaxed in a hot tub with cherry cheese Danishes. She’d worn the padded swimsuit, and not even Cindy had seen her when they changed clothes. All they’d needed was…

  She’d never walk again…not with every bone pulverized and the skin slowly stripped away…cut my foot off! Cut them both off!

  Please, please…

  The dog on her right side raised itself into a crouch and crooned in her ear. Concentrate on him. What breed was it….owwww…

  “I’m changing the water for your hands now.” The guy hunkered next to the dog. “Iago, down, boy. Thata way. Doing fine.”

  He was staring at her face, studying her like something from outer space. “I think your nose will be okay.”

  Nose? Oh man, oh man. She hadn’t considered damage to her face.

  “Cheeks have a couple of nips, but the blanket and your hood saved you there.”

  Her stomach heaved.

  “Whoa…hold on there.” He stretched to his feet and returned with a metal bin—garbage can probably—and held it under her chin.

  She pulled away and shook her head.

  “You’re sure? If you throw up, I’d rather you do it in here.”

  Through her ire, she realized the firestorm of pain was starting to lessen. Not much, but enough she could almost bear it.

  “They’ll hurt for a while,” he said.
“I have some aspirin, but I wanted to make sure you weren’t allergic to anything first. Are you?”

  Her turn to examine him. If this guy was some sort of creep, he probably would have done weird things to her by now, especially when she was out of it. He wasn’t acting like a rapist. At least, she didn’t think so. How did he know what to do about frostbite?

  Hmm, he didn’t look that black, not like Chubby in her office in Minneapolis, who was almost purple in the sunlight and proud of his afro. This guy could be Mediterranean with dark eyes, not sure what color they were and not getting close enough to find out, and skin that might be a deep tan. It wasn’t summer. She wasn’t sure how tall he was, and he wasn’t chunky or skinny, but he wouldn’t exactly blend in with the locals who were mostly bearded blonds with Santa cheeks and lips and wore extra-large checked lumberjack flannels.

  “Are you?”

  No. She shook her head. When he left and came back with some white pills and a glass of water, she looked at the tablets before letting him feed them to her. He held the glass with strong, pale-palmed, squarish hands with a white scar along the thumb of his left hand.

  “What’s your name?” he asked. “What were you doing out there?”

  * * *

  The woman began to shiver. Cam thought it was a good sign, but he wasn’t sure. The dogs went out so they weren’t lending their warmth. He’d carried her to the sofa after he determined her flesh had thawed. Gently, he’d separated her fingers and toes with gauze and wrapped them loosely in sheets of it so nothing would accidentally rub and ruin the fragile skin. Already a blister appeared on the back of her left hand. She wasn’t wearing any jewelry—ring or something that he’d have to remove—or earrings that might have caused more damage to her lobes. The tip of her nose was pink but otherwise all right.

  She’d never cried out, hadn’t answered him, or whimpered…nothing. Cam didn’t know sign language, although he was certain she wasn’t deaf since she turned when he spoke and reacted to the dog noises. Traumatized? Obviously, to be wandering the woods in the middle of a storm. The whole procedure must have been incredibly painful. How did she keep from screaming? She’d cried silently, not seeming to notice when he blotted her tears and her nose.

  An unzipped sleeping bag in his arms for an offering wasn’t much. “The dogs will come back in soon, help keep you warm.” She stared at him with those huge eyes, not exactly frightened. Maybe a little curious. Hunched, as if protecting her left side.

  “Were you hurt? Did you fall out there?”

  She looked away.

  “No? Okay. Just tell me. You have a broken rib or something, you could be in deeper trouble.”

  Cam pursed his lips, deciding whether to pursue the matter. He had chosen not to undress her completely and wondered now if he should have checked her more carefully. She leaned back, defiant, determined to relax. Or not show fear. Understandable.

  “You’re a quiet one.” He settled the bag over her and stepped back. “Thing is, I don’t know if you can’t speak or won’t.”

  The woman puckered her mouth.

  “Can you write?” As soon as he said the words, he laughed. “Sorry about that. Maybe tomorrow you could try to hold a pencil. Do you have folks who are worried about you? My phone still has a couple of bars, but it’s never been very good out here. My dynamo-powered lamp charges it. When I’m not driving anywhere and using the truck battery. Did you bring a phone?”

  She shook her head slightly once again. It seemed that was what she was best at—saying no. She shrank back when he crossed in front of her to put another hunk of wood in the stove.

  “I’m not about to hurt you.” He dusted his hands and stood, facing her. “Name’s Cam. Cameron Aaron Taylor. My Uncle Wally used to own this place. Passed it on to me when he died last year. And you might be?”

  A flicker of recognition came and went in a blink. So she’d heard of him. A local. Cam didn’t recall seeing her around Barter Valley, at least not the grocery store or the newspaper office or the library, the few public places he’d visited. He’d tried a church once, too, a group that met in a mobile home on a wooded lot at the edge of town and called themselves the Friendly Fellowship. “All Are Welcome Here.” They weren’t mean, and they weren’t rude, but neither were they all that welcoming as if openly befriending him, a subtle vibe said, would cause them trouble. She hadn’t been there at the time.

  The woman turned her face away and closed her eyes. Cam bowed with the weight of loneliness and sadness enveloping her. He couldn’t fault her. Things obviously weren’t working out the way she’d planned when she’d started out on her journey. She stared at the woodstove after he packed it with another quarter round of cherry.

  “I’m heating some soup. That will help warm you.”

  She continued to stare at the flames. Not hungry, then. Never mind. “I used to teach literature up at Northern Central College,” he said. “Five years. Before that, I was in the army. A medic. Served a couple of tours in the Middle East.”

  The woman was obviously not in the mood to be social. He went to the window and stared out…lines from a James Russell Lowell poem came unbidden.

  The snow had begun in the gloaming,

  And busily all the night

  Had been heaping field and highway

  With a silence deep and white.

  Pacing across the room, he stood in front of the stove, holding his hands to its warmth. The truth was, he’d been blind to reality when he came here to stay. The most segregated city in the US, Milwaukee, had nothing on the north woods. Many of the good folks of Barter Valley made sure he was unwelcome and refused to give him the time of day for the freelance articles Matt Heuer hired him to write for the—believe it—Barter Valley Freeman. How could he pass up that one? In the end, he would have made better headlines himself: Rednecks Turn on Black Man. The Holy Trinity of the north: the truck, the rifle, and the dog, made the Great North Woods a universe of its own. It was more of a sin to be an outsider in this country, and an even worse one to be impure. Uncle Wally hadn’t ever tried to pass for white, though he never ran around in a sandwich board declaring “beware–black man,” either.

  This woman probably didn’t think any differently from the rest.

  She lifted her face then, the innocent eyes questioning. She inhaled and appeared to notice the pan on top of the woodstove.

  So, she was hungry after all.

  SEVEN

  Helpless. This was what it felt like, to be so helpless she couldn’t feed herself. And she needed to use the facilities. If there were any. Hopefully, there were. Small mercies included not wetting herself while unconscious. Crossing her legs for the next couple of days was not an option. Cameron’s soup tasted great. Her feet and hands were numb and tingled like they’d been asleep but no longer made her want to die.

  Instead, embarrassment at having to be fed like an advanced Alzheimer’s patient made her curl up inside. When he sat next to her on the couch, she forced herself to remain still. So what if this was the man everyone said got off for raping a woman?

  If he was a rapist, she was the easiest target ever. She eyed the dogs, who’d been allowed to lie nearby, ostensibly to keep her warm. Would they protect her? They seemed to like her, but they were his dogs. She’d loved Bonzo, her black lab she gave up when she moved back in with Art. Art refused her one request to let her bring the dog, and without an income she couldn’t afford to feed and keep him healthy.

  What kind were these monsters, anyway? Short-haired, sort of Retriever-ish, maybe. They’d brought her gloves the last time Cameron let them in. She didn’t even remember pulling them off. The black one, Iago, was bigger than the other and drooled, which was sort of gross but not disgusting. Part Shepherd, probably.

  Cameron lit an oil lamp at some point. Its flame was mesmerizing, but she still needed to…she searched the room, wondering if she could put any weight on her feet. She shifted again, huddling to her left as an inbred habit. He didn�
��t act like he’d seen it when he talked to her earlier. Why would she care?

  She looked at the three doors that led off the main room. Which one led to the bathroom?

  He must have noticed. “Pardon me, but are you needing a toilet?”

  She raised a brow at his bluntness.

  “When I can’t get to the outhouse, I use a thunder bucket.”

  Great, just great. Was he kidding? What was he, like, Amish? Nah, Amish didn’t go to war.

  She questioned his body language, the rigid arms and spine, not making eye contact with her but nevertheless waiting for her response. He was actually blushing. That solved one of her questions. Rapists didn’t blush.

  She pulled back the blankets and slowly lifted her legs.

  “Wait!” Cameron swiftly settled a faded quilt on the floor. “To cushion your feet. Um, unless we can figure something for a…a bedpan.”

  It wasn’t a question and she wasn’t going to answer. She drew her lips in a universal no.

  “Uh, okay, then, I’ll bring the bucket. Don’t worry, it has a seat, and, uh, you can use it here while I wait in the bedroom.”

  After that embarrassing episode, she decided she’d never get old. Her hands better heal fast.

  Cameron sat in a chair under a battery-powered reading lamp, face buried in a thick book, black-framed glasses perched on his nose. The woodstove threw a little light and a lot of heat. She wanted to stay alert in case he tried anything, but she wasn’t going to win that battle. She’d gotten no sleep last night. Had it really been only two days since she’d left the house, knowing she was desperate to get to Kingston and make him understand she was being set up? Not only that, Kenny was in trouble. A quick, whispered phone call from her nephew when the storm started, begging her to let him come and stay over, made her heart break. She’d promised to get him as soon as she convinced Kingston to help them.

  Barter Valley’s fresh-painted face was a surprise when she came home last summer. Talk was all over town about the big HQ of Securities Unlimited bringing in more money, providing hush-hush jobs for proud parents of a very select amount of daughters and sons. When Art said he’d arranged an interview for her, she checked out the website. Surprise! Nothing of substance and certainly no reason they’d hire someone like her. Everyone she asked about the company professed ignorance. And when Mr. and Mrs. Holcolm were given a free trip to visit their daughter in Arizona after they complained about her lack of contact, she didn’t believe for one second they decided to retire down there. Who retired at fifty-one? That was like doing nineteen years in the army.