All Bedlam Courses Past (part one hundred forty-one)

All Bedlam Courses Past

Chapter Six

Short Days

(part one hundred forty-one)

She was perched on her gig, the fine black horse Dancer showing true to his name, her restraining hand light on the reins. Lawrence dismounted and hauled Samuel by the collar to take those of Eddie the cob.

“Sanderson says the whole thing’s to sell papers.”

“Well, it’s good to blame Sanderson. Otherwise, I’d put that remark down to you.”

Arch…and he was, in fact, not sure of her meaning.

“Now, Lawrence, don’t you believe in the afterlife? You don’t imagine anyone wants buried unknown and forgotten?”

The sportive way she made a place of the afterlife, the Gremot smile, aimed to draw in even Samuel, made Lawrence think devilment her sole cause for catching him here.

“Who told the story first?” he asked.

“Andrew.” A moment, and a laugh.

“Then why didn’t Rutherford print that?”

“That’s a good question.” She gave him a tap on the shoulder with the butt of her whip. “And how is the orchard? And how are the rabbits? And…”

Possibly a sobering thought. “And how is your wife?”

“Mary’s a little poorly.”

“My sister’s living in town now, with the McClurkins.”

He nodded; he had heard it from Sanderson. While Lawrence stood loath to say so, she gave him a piece of Sanderson-worthy gossip. “They had someone at Hopper’s fall right off his stool. The county has Hopper quarantined.”

“Nobody important in Cookesville, though.”

A comedic look. “Fingers crossed.”

He knew no other woman who joked like Miss Gremot…it was outside the bounds. It was affectionate and arm’s-length; it was comradely and the most threatening of shots across the bow.

“Samuel, what are you learning these days?”

Samuel, addressed by this figure of his adoration, pitched his answer high, for the ears of the street. “Two of em dead in Dominionville. Johnsons!” He was loud when he ought to be soft-spoken, dull for schooling, but bright about anything with mortality in it. Had Johnson been only a scarce-seen neighbor, Samuel (Mary too) might recall him Jackson or Jones. Lawrence held the hat he’d doffed; for Miss Gremot’s sake, he did not go with it upside Samuel’s head.

152

Bedlam

All Bedlam Courses Past (part one hundred forty-two)

(2024, Stephanie Foster)