The Darkness Surrounds Us by Gail Lukasik

Author:Gail Lukasik [Lukasik, Gail]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: CamCat Publishing

31

From William’s aggressive stare, my summoning to his office had nothing to do with an injured logger and everything to do with me.

Sensing William’s displeasure, the logger stood sheepishly by the door.

“Put the basket on the table in the other room,” William barked at him. “Then head back to the camp. I’ll see to Miss Lester.”

I didn’t like the way he spoke. Nor did I like the nearly empty whiskey bottle on his desk and the smudged glass beside it.

Once the logger left, I sat down in one of the bank chairs, holding the medical bag on my lap. Something was different. No grinding noise, no high-pitched saw. The sawmill was quiet and there was a faint burning smell.

“Is someone hurt?” I asked. “I noticed the sawmill isn’t running.”

He put his elbows on the desk and lurched forward. “I’d sack you right now, if it wasn’t for this damn baptism.”

I wasn’t sure what I’d done to garner firing. I thought we’d settled our differences.

“Sack me? I don’t understand,” I answered, my eyes drawn to the small portrait of Henry Thiery that hung on the wall behind William. It was impossible to escape the man’s image. Did William feel his beady eyes judging him every day?

The last time I was here, I’d been unconscious in the adjacent room and had little memory of William’s office. A crowded, smoky place littered with William’s possessions—tin coffeepot, enamel cups, ashtray, pipe, file cabinets, newspapers, charts, ledgers, and a rifle standing in the corner.

“You don’t understand? You must think I’m an idiot. Is that what you think, Miss Lester. That I’m an idiot? I asked you to examine Irene’s body and report back to me. Not go shooting off your mouth to Wilkins about your murder theories. And what the hell were you doing snooping around the logging site? You could have been killed.”

His usual self-control was gone, most likely attributable to the whiskey. Not the first of the day judging by his nasty flush, unsteady hand, and blurry eyes. William didn’t strike me as a heavy drinker. Something had set him off. I hoped that something wasn’t me.

I bit my lip so hard I tasted blood. Then I said what was on my mind anyway. “Theo agrees with me,” I told him, purposely not mentioning my discovery of Irene’s locket.

“I should send him packing too. That meddling weasel—always sniffing around Catherine with his potions.”

Never argue with a drunk. Matron’s words came back to me.

“I admit it was wrong of me not to come to you first.” I shooed away matron’s words. I had to make William see reason. “But you can’t argue with the facts. Irene’s body was intact. For that to be the case, she had to have been buried. Whoever buried her killed her.”

He was holding the glass so tightly his knuckles were white. “Wilkins thinks that’s hogwash. Did you find anything else in your examination of her body?”

So, Wilkins had dismissed my theory. “No, but it was a cursory examination. An autopsy might reveal more.

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