Home Grown (The Salt Mine, #18) by Browning Joseph & Yee Suzi

Author:Browning, Joseph & Yee, Suzi
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Expeditious Retreat Press
Published: 2022-11-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

Cranmal Hollow, Pennsylvania

1st of September, 9:10 p.m. (GMT-4)

When the heat of the day had finally broken, a cool breeze ran down the mountains into the valley below. Soon, summer would pass and the wind would herald wintry cold, but tonight, it was a welcomed relief, especially to the six people standing near the shallow open grave. They were still dressed in black wool and white cotton from the service, but each had donned a red silk ribbon around their neck as the reverend had instructed them.

They, along with Balthazar, were the worthies: the civic pillars of Cranmal Hollow. The three men and three women waited for the seventh to arrive so they could conduct their business. Sheriff Osmond was there at nine as he was told. To either side of him was Dr. Nehemiah Byer, the town’s only doctor, and Joseph Evert, owner of Pennsyltucky Fine Furniture, the main employer in Cranmal Hollow.

Jerusha Rhode, the school’s principal, held the lone light source to which the others flocked in the darkening night. Hester Moledord, nurse to Dr. Byer, checked her watch again. As far as she was concerned, five minutes early was late, but she kept her punctilious criticism of the good reverend to herself.

Merab Ward, the town’s librarian, adjusted her glasses and squinted into the distance. “I see him,” she announced to the group as she made out a lone figure walking down the wooded trail they had all traveled to get here. It was the only way to the secluded graveyard surrounded by thick forest. As church-owned land, it was spared the woodsman’s axe generation after generation, and no one considered exploiting the trees as a resource, not even Evert. They were sacred.

“About time,” Evert muttered, glancing at his own watch. “I have things to take care of at the factory.”

“Nothing is more important than this,” Dr. Byer reminded him. Evert huffed at the correction but said no more.

“He’s getting old,” Ward said neutrally. Some took the comment as an excuse while others interpreted it as a condemnation, but everyone heard what they wanted. It was a gift she had: she’d never found it difficult to say different things to different people without changing a single syllable.

“As do we all,” Rhode stated sympathetically, siding with the first group.

Moledord looked into the grave. It had yet to receive its stone, but there was no doubt it was Emma Godlee’s. She was present when the coffin had been closed and lowered into the ground. This time, she couldn’t still her contrary tongue. “Well, not all of us.”

Byer gave his nurse a sharp look and quoted Proverbs. “The house of the wicked will be destroyed, but the tent of the upright will flourish.” With that, the sextet fell silent as the frail frame of Balthazar trudged up the last part of the trail leading to the high graveyard, as the residents of Cranmal Hollow called it.

“My apologies for the tardiness,” Balthazar said between labored breaths. “I misremembered the difficulty of the trail.

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