Prentiss stared at her vacantly.
“You can have the socks if you wish,” she said. “A way to remember him.”
He shook his head.
“If he went and knitted you some socks, then they belong to you.”
He reached down to retrieve the bucket and continued weeding.
Isabelle stood for a time, wondering if they might continue talking, until she realized the moment was gone.
“Perhaps it’s best I go back inside. Feel free to join us if you wish. Our home is open to you.”
“He told me once about a field,” Prentiss said, stopping her. “It took him just about a whole morning to get the words out his mouth, but he told me. Said he went out in the woods and found a field of dandelions, so many together that the ground was white as snow, and he sat there for a time thinking, and in the time it takes your heart to beat, a gust of wind poured through that field and every single seed shot up into the air, ain’t a single one left on the ground, and the whole sky was bright with their travels, and then they were gone.”
Isabelle stood there frozen, contemplating the image.
“My brother seen more in the past few weeks in them woods than a common man might see in a lifetime.”
His eyes sought her own and he looked at her with a curiosity she’d never seen in him before.
“Do you know it?” he asked. “That’s where I’d like to have him rest. I think he’d like that.”
She didn’t know it, she said, but she would ask George. A plaintive smile flickered on Prentiss’s face and disappeared, and he turned his attention back to his weeding There was nothing further she could do, or say, to comfort him. What had passed was all there was.
She walked back to the house, which was still at peace, and sat alone in the parlor with her knitting. It was a pleasant surprise when George appeared and asked what she’d like for breakfast, a mild shock that was exceeded when she heard galloping upon the lane. She opened the door to a halo of dust rolling toward them. The sheriff’s horse burst through it with his deputy in tow.
George had her brew some more coffee as he went to get dressed, and both were prepared when the knock sounded upon the door and the two men came inside. Although her husband was familiar with Osborne Clay, she had seen him only once, from a distance in town, walking off-duty with a gang of other men. For this reason, it took her a moment to realize how large he had become, and still she gleaned nothing more from his appearance than the star on his chest before she retrieved his coffee from the kitchen. Only when George followed her over and whispered into her ear did she learn that Osborne Clay hadn’t gotten any larger. No. The man before them wasn’t Osborne Clay at all.
CHAPTER 17
The news regarding Sheriff Clay was unexpected. He’d come home one night after a meeting with one of his consorts, a woman of uncertain reputation, only to find his wife with a pistol in hand. She shot straight through his gut and watched him bleed out until his screams and profanations turned to apologies—at which point she called for a doctor. Clay managed to hang on for several days, but his body gave in by the end. His handpicked successor, Lamar Hackstedde, now sat at the kitchen table, sipping coffee and regaling George and Isabelle with the story.
As to Mrs. Clay’s freedom, Hackstedde explained that the former sheriff demanded that no charges be pressed against his wife.
“He made it quite clear that his crime of philandering, and the extraordinary number of counts committed, was enough to warrant his punishment. His wife dabbed his forehead as he expired, and he seemed to depart this world on the best of terms with her.”
George stirred his coffee.
“And you have replaced him.”
Hackstedde pointed at the star upon his shirt.
“You see the bronze,” he said. “Rightly anointed by Osborne the day before he passed. He wasn’t willing to pass the job on to Tim, him being thickheaded and what have you.”
Tim, his deputy, either oblivious or indifferent, was guarding the door as they spoke, watching the desolate lane as if a horde of barbarians might stampede toward them at any moment.
“Now you sent word you have a dead body on your hands.”
George could only nod.
“Then we have some work to do. What I’m about to say is in strict confidence, and ma’am”—he eyed Isabelle, who stood behind George—“this does stay at the table, don’t go running off and gossiping with your lady friends.” He cut his eyes back at George. “I got a telegram from a colleague upstate to the effect that government officials will be arriving in a week’s time. Now Arnold Glass been on good behavior, keeping his nose out of folks’ business, mine included, but these boys coming, well, they aim to lay down the law. I hear they put a nigger in command of the police force out in Cooksville when they seen the officers in charge weren’t up to their standard. I can’t even imagine. Look at that! Hairs standing up on my arm just at the thought. So I made myself a vow that this county won’t be reaching that same end. We’ll show them we keep things peaceful around these parts. So we get this matter settled quickly.”