MB01 - Unending Devotion (31 page)

When her gaze landed upon him, her spoon slipped from her fingers and fell to the floor with a clatter. Tears pooled in her eyes. “Connell. Oh, thank goodness you’re alive.”

He crossed the room toward her. “I’m just fine. What about you and Mr. Heller?”

“We’re scared. But mostly for you boys.”

He stopped in front of her, examining her for any signs of injury.

Her cheeks were as red as always, and frizzy tendrils of her speckled hair framed her face. Her grayish apron was splattered with the day’s work. Only her eyes were different—filled with sadness instead of the merriment he’d come to expect.

“I’ve been so worried about you.” She reached for his cheeks and squeezed them between her palms. “Looks like they beat you up too.” She frowned first at the cut on his lip and then at the puffy discolored skin surrounding his eye.

“I got in a fight with Tierney. That’s all. I’m okay—”

The cold butt of a rifle pressed into the back of his head.

“You won’t be okay when I’m done with you.”

Vera slapped her hands on her hips. “Now, you put that old thing away, Oren.”

The barrel dug into Connell’s scalp.

“I should have blown your brains out the first day I saw you,” the gruff voice of Oren came from behind him.

“The boy is cold and hungry,” Vera huffed. “Just you leave him alone.”

“I’ll leave him alone as soon as I’m done pounding lead into his head.”

“Don’t mind him.” Vera reached up and patted Connell’s cheek again. “He’s been worried near sick about Lily. That’s all.”

“Where in the hairy hound did you take her?” Oren demanded.

“She’s safe.”

“Where?”

“I can’t tell you here. Not out in the open.” They couldn’t take any chances on Carr finding out where Lily and Daisy were.

The pressure of the metal slackened but only slightly.

“She and Daisy are being well taken care of. They have everything they need and want.” It had been only ten hours and thirty-five minutes since he’d left Lily, but it felt like ten years.

He pictured her again standing before him in the parlor. She’d been so beautiful and so passionate and so bent on saving the world, as always. And he adored her for who she was.

Leaving her and riding away from his parents’ home had wrenched his heart in two pieces. And he felt like he’d left the bigger half with her and now carried only a sliver of what remained in his chest.

He tried not to think about the finality in Lily’s voice when she’d walked away. But the fact was, he couldn’t just leave everything—his job, his family’s business, and all that he’d worked so hard to accomplish. She had to know that he couldn’t walk away. And he couldn’t ask her to join him in Harrison or any of the lumber towns—not now. Maybe not ever.

His shoulders slumped and defeat mocked him again as it had the entire ride back. They were just too different.

“You sure she’s someplace where Carr can’t get her?” Oren’s voice was gentler.

“It’s not the moon. But hopefully Carr will stay away.”

Oren didn’t say anything for a long moment.

The barrel trembled. But Connell wasn’t afraid of the old man. He could only imagine Oren’s worry over the past days and didn’t blame him for needing someone upon whom to take out his frustration.

“If anything happens to her, I’ll hunt you down like a buck, shoot you, and skin you.”

“You don’t have to worry,” Connell said, turning to face the old man and pushing aside the rifle.

Oren’s shoulders were stooped more than usual, if that were possible. And under his bushy gray eyebrows, his eyes were bloodshot, as if he hadn’t slept in the two days Lily had been gone.

“If anything happens to her,” Connell said, “I’ll come straight to you and
let
you shoot me.”

Oren’s sad eyes locked with his and seemed to peer deep into Connell’s soul.

He wanted to tell Oren he cared about Lily just as much as he did. But the words stuck in his throat. He hoped Oren could see the truth. Even if he and Lily could never be together, he’d still do everything he could for her. He didn’t want anything to happen to her either.

“Ah,” Oren finally muttered. With a shaking hand, he reached for the edge of the table and slowly lowered himself onto the nearest bench.

Vera bent over and picked up her wooden spoon. She stuck it in her apron pocket and then patted Connell’s arm. “Give me a minute, and I’ll rustle up some dinner.”

“What happened to Stuart?”

She shook her head, clucked her tongue, and then started toward the kitchen.

Fresh dread battered Connell’s gut. “He isn’t—”

“Of course he’s not dead.” Vera disappeared into the other room. “Not with me doctoring him.”

Connell wasn’t sure whether he should feel relief or worry. “How bad is he hurt?” He trailed after Vera.

She lifted a long iron fork from a hook on the grease-splattered wall near the stove. “He’s plenty bruised up and has a few broken bones, but he’ll live.”

Anger once again sizzled through Connell like salt pork in a frypan.

Vera lifted the lid off a large pot on the back burner. The earthy odor of simmering beans made his stomach gurgle, reminding him he hadn’t eaten since the breakfast he’d shared with Mam early that morning.

“He won’t have the use of his arm for a while, and his ribs are cracked.” Vera stabbed the fork into the pot and emerged with a thick piece of pork dripping in bean juice. She flopped it onto the closest plate still covered with a film of dishpan water from the after-dinner dunking. Then she poked the fork into the pot again.

“Where is he?”

She nodded toward the closed door of her bedroom. “He’s asleep for the night. You can visit him tomorrow.”

“Think he’s safe here?”

“Not any safer than you’ll be.” She slapped another piece of pork onto the plate.

“What about you? Has Carr threatened you or Mr. Heller?”

“A couple of his men came in this morning and said that any man who stays at the Northern isn’t welcome at the Stockade anymore.”

“He has no right to intimidate your boarders like that.”

“Well, it worked. Now we’ve only got a handful of men left.” She reached into the bread box and pulled out a couple of slices of crumbly bread.

“I’m sorry for bringing all this trouble on you.”

She added a fistful of cookies to his plate and handed it to him. “I’m not sorry.” She wiped her hands on her apron. “I’m glad that we’re finally starting to do something to oppose that evil man.”

Were they really opposing him? Or were they merely stirring up a hornet’s nest?

Connell bit into the bread. It stuck at the back of his throat.

No matter what might happen, one thing was certain.

He was in the thick of the hornets now. And it was only a matter of time before he got stung.

Chapter
24

“H
ow many boys are gone?” Connell asked his foreman, bracing himself for the bad news.

“At least twenty.”

Connell jabbed the end of one of the logs already loaded onto the flat sleigh at the skidway and bit back an oath aimed at Carr.

Twenty was one-fifth of the crew at Camp 1.

“And there’s more talking about leaving.” Herb Nolan spoke quietly, his focus unswerving from the growing pyramid of logs on the sleigh.

The experienced loader at the top of the pile used his cant hook to maneuver another log up a pair of slanting poles. He straddled the logs already in place, the spikes in his caulk boots giving him traction. The snorts of the big workhorses, the grunts of men, and the jangle of chains filled the air around them.

“Not our best workers?” Connell didn’t want to ask, but he had to take stock. He had to see how much damage he’d brought to McCormick Lumber.

“So far it’s been the boys more partial to fat pork and sundown.”

“Good.” He couldn’t afford to lose anyone, but he’d much rather lose his swampers and road monkeys. If he lost his best loaders, sawyers, or teamsters, he’d be ruined for sure. He had to find a way to shut the door on Carr’s scare tactics and stop the exodus from his camps. And he had to do it fast.

Connell cupped his gloved hands around the tin cup of coffee he’d picked up from Duff in the cookshack when he’d arrived. Steam rose from the dark liquid, and the wind twirled it away, giving him only a lingering waft of the freshly ground aroma.

He took a swig and already it was lukewarm.

A winter storm was blowing in and would bring fresh snow.

At least the weather was cooperating—although with spring only five weeks away, there was no guarantee they’d have much time left to get the largest share of the logs out of the forest to the banking grounds.

“The fact is,” Herb said, “that devil Carr is scaring the stink out of everyone.”

“Well, you can let the men know that anyone who stays with me through the river drive will get double the bonus.” He had the sick feeling that not only would McCormick Lumber fail to come out on top in lumber production at the end of the winter, but they might actually go into the red.

“And you can let them know I’ll be sending out Charlie from Camp 2 to do some hunting for all the camps. Hopefully, you’ll have fresh meat more often.”

The foreman pinched at one of the little icicles hanging from his mustache. “The boys have been lookin’ funny at Duff’s porkers. I know they’ve got a hankering for something besides the usual.”

Connell took another slurp of his coffee. He’d slept a grand total of fifty-one minutes the previous night. His body had been too keyed up, anticipating Carr’s men barging into the room he’d taken at the Northern. And his mind had been too full of plans for how to save the business from complete devastation.

He’d been more than a little surprised he’d made it through the night without a confrontation. And he’d been even more surprised that he’d made it out the door and all the way to Camp 1 without an altercation.

He knew it was only a matter of time before Carr came after him, especially since Carr had already battered Stuart. In the dark hours of the morning, Connell had slipped in to visit his friend. The low light couldn’t conceal the deep bruises and lacerations on Stu’s face.

As prominent as Stuart was in the community, they hadn’t dared to kill him. But Stuart wasn’t so sure about Bass, his assistant. They hoped Bass’s disappearance meant he’d fled town. But they both knew if Carr had gotten hold of him, they’d never hear from Bass again.

According to Stuart, Carr had figured out every detail of how they’d helped Lily and Daisy and was now determined to ruin McCormick Lumber, to set an example of what would happen to anyone who defied him.

Connell gulped the rest of the coffee, draining the cup.

“Tell the men I plan to reward everyone who’s loyal to McCormick Lumber.”

He quickly calculated the diameters of each of the logs already in place on the sleigh awaiting transportation to the camp decking ground near the narrow-gauge train. Most were cut in twenty-foot lengths and weighed six tons. He could see that his sawyers were working hard.

And the icers were too. From the deep icy ruts in the road, it was obvious they were still making several tours each night. Their diligence was allowing the horses to transport the heavy sleighs of logs with more ease and speed.

They were moving out prime lumber. But they couldn’t keep it up if they lost any more men. Would the lure of a bonus and fresh meat be enough to keep the rest of the men from leaving? What reason had McCormick Lumber ever given their men to remain loyal to the company?

Shouts and the clomping of horse hooves on the iced roads echoed through the brittleness of the clearing. The frantic pounding was not the usual even pace of the team returning on a go-back road for another load of logs.

Connell’s muscles tensed. He tossed aside his tin cup and grabbed the foreman’s ax from a resting spot against a Norway maple—one of the trees in the stand not worth cutting. At the same time he unsheathed his knife.

An instant later, the cookee came careening around the bend in the road on one of the blacksmith’s horses. Clouds of vapor billowed from the beast’s nostrils.

Cookee’s eyes were wild and his face red. “Carr’s men are here!”

“Where?” Connell asked.

“They’re tearing apart the van!”

“My office?” the foreman roared.

Cookee nodded. “And the store.”

Connell’s mind flashed to the needless destruction he’d witnessed at the newspaper office and at Stuart’s home. Heated anger spurted through his blood at the picture of Carr’s men tearing through the small building where the foreman and scaler worked and slept, where they also kept a small inventory of store goods—mittens, socks, tobacco, and medicines.

“How many men, Cookee?” Connell’s grip on his knife tightened.

“Three.”

Herb had already started forward.

Connell threw him his ax, which he caught by the handle and wielded like a weapon. The hardness of the man’s face confirmed he’d fight alongside Connell. He was angry at the destruction and intimidation too.

“Anyone care to loan me his hunting knife?” Connell glanced around to the others. “I think I’ll have need of one or two more.”

The men had paused their work and were staring at him. What did they think? Would they support him or not?

“I won’t put up with Carr bullying any of my men or my camps.”

When several of the men nodded and a few others muttered oaths about Carr, the tightness in Connell’s chest eased. And when two of the send-up men handed him their knives, a jolt of confidence propelled him forward.

He nodded his thanks and then took off at a sprint after Herb.

After running at top speed the half mile back to the camp, they arrived in front of the van with their breaths puffing into the air like bursts of steam engine smoke.

The blacksmith, waiting in the doorway of his log shop, joined them, a hammer in one hand and a sledge in the other. His shiny black apron pulled taut across his wide girth. He lifted his hammer. “Some of us around here are fed up with how James Carr can do whatever he wants and get away with it.”