A Stranger in the Kingdom by Howard Frank Mosher

Author:Howard Frank Mosher
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Now that the misunderstanding of Claire’s nocturnal visit to my brother’s trailer had been cleared up, Charlie and Athena Allen were on good terms again. They were even talking about getting married in the fall, though Athena said she wouldn’t live in a trailer, especially one papered with cutouts of Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield and smelling like a baseball clubhouse, and Charlie would have to get a place in the village first.

As for Claire, after Ida LaMott came to work at the parsonage, she began taking long afternoon walks out into the countryside. One day when she passed our place I trailed along behind her, partly out of curiosity to find out where she went on these solitary excursions and partly to have an opportunity to see her alone and warn her about Frenchy’s designs.

Instead of continuing along the gool and crossing back over the river by way of the covered bridge, she headed up the twisty woods road into the gore. For a minute I actually thought she might be returning to Resolvèd’s place. But she passed his lane with a single apprehensive glance toward the dilapidated old house and kept climbing up the mountain.

About halfway to the top, she ducked off the gore road and struck out along the burn toward the abandoned quarry. I was surprised to see that there was a pretty well beaten path here. Apparently she’d been coming this way regularly.

If Claire was going skinny-dipping, I didn’t want to startle her when she was in the water. So as soon as she reached the quarry, where I’d discovered her the first morning she went to Resolvèd’s, I hurried out of the woods and called her name.

“Nathan?”

“No, Claire, it’s Jimmy Kinneson. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Oh, by no means. You did not scare me, James.”

Claire waded out into the brook and began to wash her hair in the little falls that dropped over the lip of the quarry.

When she was through we sat together under the yellow birch tree at the corner of the granite ledge above the pool.

“So, James. You are having a pleasant summer holiday from school?”

“Yeah, it’s been okay. How about you? You doing all right over at the Andrews’?”

“Oh, yes, I like it there very much, though of course now that Monsieur Andrews has hire Madame LaMott to keep house for him, there is really very little for me to do.”

“That reminds me of something, Claire. You know Frenchy LaMott? Ida’s boy? You’ve got to watch out for him. The other day he offered to pay me two dollars to get you down under the old railroad trestle out of town, where he could . . . you know, attack you. If I were you I wouldn’t go out on any more walks alone.”

“Bah! This Frenchy. Who is he that I should fear him? A dirty butcher’s boy. He is the least of my worries. If he attempts an offense, he will wish he never heard the name Claire LaRiviere, daughter of Etienne.

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