Mad Cow Nightmare (11 page)

He was holding her tight again, making her put down the gun, turning her around, pulling her into his arms. It felt good, it felt secure. But did it keep out the plague?

He was sipping at her lips again, then pressing down hard, and she pressed back. “I love you,” he murmured, and she felt herself nodding, murmuring back, holding on as though if he let go, the claws would get her, and she’d be lost.

* * * *

This time for Nola there was no getting away. It was the sheep man. He’d walked right into the spare white-walled dining room where the eight women were just finishing lunch—a good lunch, too: cheese, tomato and bacon sandwiches, fruit salad. Nola felt rested, nourished. For three nights now, since she’d stumbled up on the porch, she’d had a bed of her own. Well, in a room with two other women, but what the hell. To be alone in bed was the joy.

But this man. Why was he here—was he looking for her? Had he brought the police? There was something about the way he’d looked at her the morning she fled the farm, the way his eyes roamed her body. She lowered her chin and ate quickly. She had different clothes on today, a blue-striped skirt and white blouse— he might not notice her.

But when she’d finished the plateful of salad and looked up, their eyes met. He stared, talking all the while to the director in her wheelchair, something about a woman who needed a place to stay, to hide from her husband. He was here on business then? All the same she didn’t trust him. He’d locked her out when she needed his help; she couldn’t understand that after he’d given her food and a dress.

The director, a big-breasted woman with blazing eyes and thin legs that dropped, useless, onto the metal footrests, wheeled into an adjoining room and the man followed. Nola saw her chance, excused herself from the table—no one knew her story, a woman had the right to privacy here, to keep her life to herself if she chose. Upstairs, Nola tucked her rosary beads into a pocket of the white blouse, piled the green print dress, toothbrush, underclothes, and pajamas they’d given her into a cloth sack, and tiptoed down the back stairs. She’d leave before he asked about her, gave her story to the director, frightened the woman. She was probably infected, they’d said; she’d heard the newscast, the women talking about it. One of them had glanced at her when they heard the missing woman was from the South. She’d told a lie, of course: “I’ve been living north of here. My man got to me, he gave me a concussion. I came here to get away from him.” She’d given a false name—Peg; embroidered a little, half believed the lie when she told it.

But the prying woman didn’t believe her, that was obvious from the smirk—a comment about Nola’s southern accent. And the director—Mother, they called her—had lifted her chin up out of the wheelchair, exchanged a sharp-eyed glance with the smirking female. Nola didn’t know her well enough to figure whose side she’d be on.

And this man, who’d seen her only in a nightgown, would speak to the director, tell her the truth. Because he knew, all right. He knew.

“You’re leaving, Peg?” The voice startled. It was Ellen in the doorway, a chunky, sweet-faced woman in her forties who slept in the next bed. Ellen had nightmares; Nola had heard her moan in her sleep. Now and then she’d give a shout, a warning to someone she called Sweetie. A daughter maybe, warning against an abusive father? Ellen didn’t say. Nola was sorry to leave Ellen; she needed a friend.

“Don’t tell,” Nola said. “I have to go. I have a daughter who needs me.” She didn’t have a daughter at all, though she wished she had. Sometimes she fantasized about a daughter, a sister for shy Keeley. Keeley needed someone else to love—who loved him. God, but she worried about that boy! And more than ever, since that frightening letter from Penny.

“You have a daughter? I didn’t know. How old? She sick?” Ellen looked sympathetic. Nola wished she could bring Ellen with her. But she had to travel alone; with a companion, she’d be easy to catch. It would be comforting, though, to have Maggie with her. She touched the gold cross that she never took off her neck—this would be her companion. She’d already sent a note to Maggie to tell her where she was—got a stamp and envelope from the director. She’d mailed it to the Willmarth farm—hoped Ritchie hadn’t seen it. She thought of going back to the Willmarths’ to talk to her cousin. But then she might run into Ritchie. She didn’t know if he was still on the farm or if he’d gone on to Tonawanda. Or if he was still looking for her . . . She hadn’t even looked back when she ran off, to tell the truth. Just kept running, heading across the main road, barely avoiding a milk truck. Then across a cornfield and through a hole in the fence into the back of the sheep farm on the next road, twisting her ankle.

That had been the wrong move!

“Sick, yeah,” she told Ellen, who was taking up the whole doorway with her wide girth. “She had pneumonia and I got to get back to her.” She pushed past Ellen, kept moving. She heard a male voice downstairs in the hallway, she had to get out.

“You’ll be back? You can’t stay with them, you know,” Ellen shouted, meaning an abuser. “They tell you they love you, then they hit you the next time you look at them the wrong way or feed ‘em something they don’t like the taste of.”

“Yeah, I’ll be back,” Nola called over her shoulder, though she knew she wouldn’t, and she slipped down the back steps and out the rear door. There was a vegetable garden behind the house, two large maples, and a stand of papery white birches. Beyond, it was all woods, and then swamp, someone had said—they weren’t far from Otter Creek.

She couldn’t see a path through the wood except the way she’d come by. She couldn’t go down the main road, either, the sheep man would see her, call the police. He’d probably already called, they’d be looking for her. She didn’t want any clues that might lead back to the farm where Keeley was still living. She didn’t want the boy tangled up in this. Keeley had a problem, he lived in his own world half the time. Not autistic, no, not that bad, her neighbor Penny said. But he needed help. He needed it bad. He needed
her.

She’d take Keeley away, she would! They’d make a life for themselves someplace where nobody knew them.

She threw the sack over her shoulder, slowly made her way into the woods, through the underbrush and furze. It was a little past one, she figured. The sun shredded through the brush here and there but was mostly obscured by the taller pines, their thick trunks travelling up, and up, spreading canopies of prickly leaves that kept out the heat. It was a strange feeling, like she was travelling through another time, another life, where any minute she might run into an oxcart, an Indian, another traveller like herself—for hadn’t her forebears been on the road for centuries? If not here, then in Ireland. She’d only twice seen a real Indian: when a woman came to the uncle’s farm selling baskets and didn’t say a word, just thrust the baskets under Uncle’s nose, and when Uncle sent her away, the woman stuck up her chin like she didn’t care and went off with her man. They’d reminded Nola of her own life. Her father letting her mother sell the trinkets while he spent the money in the local bar. Nola had wanted to run and hug that Indian woman, but she didn’t. She was always slow to act on her impulses. Till now.

After a half hour’s trudge she came on a trail that looped both ways. She hesitated a minute, deciding which way. Then, hearing voices to the left, she turned right. The angle of the sun told her she was heading north. She had to find a main road, take a chance, get a ride west toward Lake Champlain, cross the bridge she and Ritchie had come over four days ago, then head west again. Walking and hitching, she’d make her way back to the Tonawanda farm and Keeley. It might take days, maybe weeks, but she’d get there. Her ankle was better anyway, she hardly limped. She reached for her rosary beads—she needed help from above. “Hail, Mary, Mother of God,” she began ....

She heard a horse whinny and she halted. The vegetation was thinning out to a snaggle of vines and berry bushes; she was approaching a clearing. She moved cautiously ahead. A clearing meant she was near a road, but a human might be there and want to know what she was doing—if she was trespassing. In the South a traveller might be shot if a farmer found her on his land. Folk called travellers wild animals, crafty beggars. All that hate took away a traveller’s freedom. Maybe that was another reason she and Keeley went north with Darren and Maggie. North, they said, meant freedom.

Freedom, yeah, till she settled on the uncle’s farm and was no better than a servant. But things would change. She’d make them change—for herself and Keeley. There was no room for Ritchie in any future she wanted. She’d have to make him realize that if he caught up with her again. This time she’d tell him good-bye. Just—good-bye.

* * * *

James wanted to get away from the director but she kept him talking. He wondered if she’d seen that woman leaving the table. The director was a tough old bird—never mind those lame legs. He’d seen her kind before. The old maid who could throw you over her shoulder if she got a mad on. He’d never liked that sort, always trying to manipulate men. A lesbian maybe. No sign of a man in this house! Their eyes threw daggers when
he
walked in. They turned their faces away. Of course, that’s why he’d brought his client here from the counseling service. Some guy stalking her, getting on her back.

He’d seen the traveller woman through the office window, trotting on her small feet through a vegetable garden, into the woods, a coarse white sack over her shoulder. While the damned director kept on talking, never let him get a word in. Finally made him look at papers she’d drawn up for his client. When he finished signing papers and looked out again, the yard was empty.

“You like our view? Our stand of birches? Our women planted them,” the director said, wheeling up after him. He could hear the irritating
click-click
of the chair.

“Yes, very nice,” he said, deciding not to tell her about the runaway. If she didn’t already know, let her find out for herself. “Nice woods. Creek down there, they say. The way it winds, you never know where you’re going to come out on it.”

“But you don’t want to go back too far, you’ll run into the Branbury swamp. Nasty place, that swamp. One of our people died in there once, running away from her husband.”

“Oh?”

“Yes.” The woman was beside him now, her eyes bulging up into his face as if she’d fix him here, dare him to take off after the damn gypsy. “He barged in. We’d told her it was a safe house, we’d call nine-one-one if he persisted. But she bolted back into the woods. And—” The woman’s voice faltered.

“And?” he said softly, still looking out the window at the red maples, the stand of birches.

“He got her. Strangled her, left her body in the swamp. Of course, we called the police but too late. They found her.”

“Oh Lord,” he said—what else could he say? He turned away from the window, saw her looking hard at him. Did she know something? His stomach made a noise, he had gas. He was uncomfortable, he didn’t want to talk anymore, or hear her talk. He turned back to the window, wondering how he’d get away without making her more suspicious. Though it was foolish, he told himself; what could this disabled woman know of his past? He supposed she could have a client here from upstate New York. . .  Your past follows you, he thought. It’s like a dark shadow.

He squinted. He saw what looked like a figure snaking into the woods from the east—a tall broad figure. He caught a flash of red and black on the back of the man’s shirt. Then the bushes closed in on the figure and the landscape was empty again.

“Excuse me,” he said to the wheelchair, “I have to go. I have an appointment at”—he glanced at his watch—”eleven o’clock? I’d almost forgot. I have to run.”

He picked up the briefcase he’d left on the floor, and pasting on a smile, nodding at the shiny blur of wheelchair, he walked out. She called something after him and he replied, but had no idea what either had said.

* * * *

Nola came out into the clearing and there was the horse. It was the most beautiful creature she’d ever seen: a sleek glossy brown, like velvet, with a white star on its sleek head. It stared at her out of a rich brown intelligent eye, made a move toward her as if it knew her, knew she had oats for it, an apple. And she did, she had an apple in her sack, she’d taken it from the lunch table to eat later. She wanted to share the apple with this beautiful horse.

It took the apple from the palm of her hand, gazed at her through starry eyes as it munched. She leaned into the warm furry body, felt the breath heaving out of its lungs. She blew her own breath into its nostrils, and it nickered softly. She wanted to ride off on it, ride to the freedom she longed for. She was proud to be a traveller, her mother had been proud. No one was going to tell her what to do, where to go, where to live. “No one,” she told the horse. “I’m free. I’m a free woman.”

The horse snorted and its whole body quivered. She pushed herself upright, away from the warm belly. Someone was coming out of the brush. She ran back toward the wood but was yanked back, like she’d run into a wide elastic band. An arm grabbed hers, pinched hard and deep, till she cried out. He smelled of sweat and tobacco and drink. He swung her around to look at him.

“I didn’t like it,” he said raising a fist, “you running off like that.”

Chapter Nine

Colm had turned into a CNN news addict, and though she’d rather not hear the news at two in the afternoon, Ruth gave in and they sat on the sofa with the lunch Sharon had dropped off. The
MUTE
button was on, shutting out a commercial for bladder control—it always made Ruth want to pee, and how could she with a lap full of Chinese? Colm had his arm around her, he was eating with his right hand only, an art he’d perfected through numerous meals together in the four years since Pete had left. Every third or fourth bite he’d lean over to give her a Moo Shu Pancake kiss on the cheek—or lips, if he happened to aim right. She’d laugh, then swallow the wrong way, then cough until the news came back on.

The news
was
back on. Colm turned up the sound. The stock market was still down. That only depressed her, so she interrupted to ask about the latest news from the police department. Colm had a habit of checking in twice each day, in between his real estate and his mortuary dealings. It had been four days since the feds had come with their warnings of quarantine, but no results from the samples they and the police had taken. And, praise be, no quarantine. With each passing day she drew a breath of fresh hope.