0544409914 by Amy Stewart

Author:Amy Stewart [Stewart, Amy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

29

NIGHT CLOUDS OBSCURED THE MOON over our house. We maneuvered down the drive in total darkness. Fleurette had fallen asleep on the ride home and slumped over against me, warm and heavy. Norma brought Dolley to a stop and was about to jump out and check on her birds when I saw it.

Our front door was open.

We both reached for Fleurette at the same time, which made her squeal.

“Shhhhh.” I felt around under her feet for the picnic basket, where I’d hidden the revolvers. Fleurette caught a glimpse of them and gasped.

“What are those?”

I backed out of the buggy and took her chin in my hand. Her eyes were wide open now and frantic. “Be very quiet,” I whispered. “If anything happens, go straight for the dairy and pound on the door until they let you in.” She nodded. I pressed Dolley’s reins into her hands.

Norma had stepped out on the other side of the buggy. I tilted my head in the direction of the open door. We advanced toward it and she took a gun from me. We were almost to the porch when, from the other side of the house, the kitchen door burst open and half a dozen men scrambled out into the black night.

I chased after them, stopping just long enough to get them in my sights and fire.

The shot exploded across the meadow and sent a flock of crows screeching into the sky. By now the men had reached a bank of trees along the road and I could hardly see them. I took up my skirts and ran, but then came the kick of an automobile starting and the sound of tires grinding in the dirt.

By the time I reached the road, the black bulk had sputtered and motored away. I fired again and again into the darkness it left behind.

Gunpowder smoke and dust drifted around me in a cloud. It took a minute to clear, but once it did I took a deep breath and willed my hands to stop shaking. Only then did I turn to look back at our darkened house, and the dim figure of our horse in front. I couldn’t see Norma or Fleurette.

I’d left them alone.

I ran back down the drive and Norma met me at the buggy. Both of us reached for Fleurette at once, as if we needed to feel her pulse.

“I didn’t dare shoot once you started to run,” Norma said.

“That’s fine,” I said. “I think they’re gone.”

We started to lift Fleurette out of the buggy, but she shook her head and stayed planted on her seat.

“We can’t go in,” she whispered. “What if he’s waiting for us?”

“Who?” I asked.

“H-Henry Kaufman.”

Norma and I both laughed at once, but it was a nervous, trembling laugh. “He never goes anywhere without that gang of his,” I said. “If he was here, he ran out with the rest of them.”

I turned to the open front door and shouted. “Did you hear that, Henry Kaufman? If you were here, you’re gone now!” I fired my gun in the air, high over the house, to make my point.

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