Chapter 2 - The House That Did Not Want Her
Cora did not sleep.
Wyatt showed her to a room at the end of the upstairs hall, opposite his own and two doors away from the boys.
It was larger than the entire apartment she had rented above Amos Pierce’s shop.
A real bed stood beneath a quilt stitched in faded blue squares. A small iron stove sat in one corner. Someone—probably Wyatt—had stacked firewood beside it before leaving for town that morning.
There was even a washstand with an uncracked pitcher.
Luxury, Cora thought bitterly, was apparently anything poverty had taught you to stop expecting.
Yet she barely noticed.
Her thoughts remained downstairs.
I saw who burned your school.
Wyatt had tried questioning Seth immediately.
The boy shut down.
Not gradually.
Completely.
His mouth became a straight line.
Caleb stepped between his father and brother.
“He’s tired.”
“Seth made an accusation.”
“He didn’t accuse anybody.”
“He said men burned the school.”
“Then maybe he imagined it.”
Seth’s face had changed when Caleb said that.
Cora saw it.
Pain.
Not anger.
Caleb was lying.
She had taught children too long not to recognize it.
Wyatt apparently recognized it too.
But instead of pushing, he told both boys to go upstairs.
Seth escaped immediately.
Caleb lingered.
He looked at Cora.
Not with hatred this time.
With warning.
“Leave it alone.”
Then he followed his brother.
Now Cora stood beside her bedroom window looking down toward moonlit pasture.
Snow had stopped.
The world looked clean.
It offended her.
Somewhere below the mountain, the ruins of her school remained black against snow.
Forty-three children had lost their classroom.
She had lost her livelihood.
And if Seth was telling the truth, none of it had been an accident.
A knock came shortly after midnight.
Cora turned.
“Come in.”
Wyatt opened the door but remained in the hallway.
He had removed his coat and hat. Without them he looked less like a mountain carved into human form and slightly more like an ordinary exhausted man.
“I thought you might need another blanket.”
He held one.
Cora almost smiled.
“Is that your way of asking whether I’m awake?”
“I can see the lamp beneath your door.”
He handed her the blanket.
Their fingers did not touch.
Wyatt glanced toward her window.
“You believe Seth.”
“Yes.”
“You barely know him.”
“I know children.”
“He tells stories.”
“Does he?”
“Sometimes.”
“About what?”
Wyatt hesitated.
“His mother.”
Cora’s irritation vanished.
“What kind of stories?”
“That she is coming back.”
The words settled heavily between them.
Wyatt looked toward the boys’ rooms.
“For almost two years after Mary died, Seth left food beneath his bed because he said she might be hungry when she returned.”
Cora closed her eyes briefly.
Seven years old now.
Three when he lost her.
“That is not the same as lying.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
“You implied it.”
“I’m trying not to decide anything before I know what happened.”
“That is reasonable.”
Wyatt looked mildly surprised.
“You expected me to argue?”
“I’m beginning to suspect you enjoy it.”
Cora almost laughed.
Almost.
Then she remembered the school.
“Where were the boys the night of the fire?”
“At home.”
“You are certain?”
“I came in after midnight. Caleb was in bed. Seth was—”
Wyatt stopped.
Cora watched him.
“Seth was what?”
“I assumed he was asleep.”
“You didn’t check?”
“My sons are ten and seven, Cora. I don’t inspect their beds every hour.”
“No. Of course not.”
But they were both thinking the same thing.
If Seth had seen the school burn, then he had been miles from home in the middle of the night.
Wyatt rubbed his jaw.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“Three mornings ago Seth came down limping.”
Cora turned fully toward him.
“You asked why?”
“He said he fell near the barn.”
“And you believed him?”
“He falls near the barn twice a week.”
“May I see the injury tomorrow?”
Wyatt’s expression changed.
“He won’t like it.”
“I didn’t marry him.”
For the first time, Wyatt smiled.
It was small.
Gone almost immediately.
But Cora saw it.
The man was capable of one.
“I suppose you didn’t.”
He turned to leave.
“Wyatt?”
He stopped.
“What happens if Seth is telling the truth?”
His back remained toward her.
For several seconds he said nothing.
Then, quietly:
“We find out who did it.”
“And then?”
Wyatt glanced over his shoulder.
“We make sure they cannot do it again.”
The next morning, Cora discovered the Mercer household functioned through controlled chaos.
Wyatt rose before dawn.
Caleb fed chickens but forgot to collect eggs.
Seth was supposed to carry kindling but instead attempted to slide down the icy roof of the woodshed using a grain sack.
Cora caught him before he reached the edge.
“Get down.”
“No.”
“You are currently standing on a roof.”
“Yes.”
“Which makes my request relatively simple.”
Seth crossed his arms.
“You’re not my mother.”
“I am beginning to wonder whether you know any other sentence.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Father said I don’t have to obey you.”
From the barnyard Wyatt shouted, “I said no such thing.”
Seth looked betrayed.
Cora folded her arms.
“Down.”
The boy slid off the low roof.
When his boots struck the ground, pain flashed across his face.
Cora saw it.
His right leg buckled.
Seth recovered quickly, but not quickly enough.
“Sit.”
“I’m fine.”
“That was not a question.”
Caleb emerged from the barn.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
Cora pointed toward the porch bench.
“Seth.”
Something in her teacher’s voice still worked.
He sat.
Cora knelt and gently lifted his trouser leg.
A deep bruise covered the outside of his ankle.
Not fresh.
Three or four days old.
Wyatt approached.
His face darkened.
“Seth.”
The boy looked away.
Cora touched carefully around the swelling.
“When did this happen?”
“Barn.”
“Try again.”
Silence.
Caleb moved closer.
“Leave him alone.”
Cora looked up.
“You know.”
Caleb froze.
“You know where he hurt himself.”
“I don’t.”
“You are an awful liar.”
“I am not!”
“You blink before every false sentence.”
Caleb immediately stopped blinking, which almost made Cora smile.
Instead she returned her attention to Seth.
“I’m not angry.”
Seth’s small jaw tightened.
“I am worried.”
Nothing.
“If you were near the school that night, tell me.”
Caleb stepped forward.
“Don’t.”
Wyatt caught his shoulder.
“Enough.”
Caleb turned.
“Pa—”
“If your brother was eleven miles from this house after midnight, I need to know.”
Caleb’s face crumpled briefly.
Not like a guilty child.
Like a frightened one.
That frightened Cora more.
Seth whispered, “We went together.”
Wyatt went completely still.
“We?”
Caleb stared at the snow.
Seth continued.
“Caleb said Miss Whitmore was leaving.”
Cora blinked.
“What?”
Caleb finally looked up.
“The railroad families said they were getting another teacher next spring.”
“That was never decided.”
“That’s what they said.”
Seth rubbed his sleeve across his nose.
“Caleb wanted to put something in your desk.”
Cora looked at Caleb.
“What?”
The ten-year-old’s face flushed bright red.
“Nothing.”
“Caleb.”
“A book.”
“What book?”
“The one you lent me.”
Cora remembered.
Robinson Crusoe.
Old, worn, missing several pages.
Caleb had borrowed it six months earlier.
“You could have returned it during daylight.”
Caleb’s voice became defensive.
“I didn’t want anybody seeing.”
“Why?”
Because reading slowly still embarrassed him, she realized.
Cora’s anger disappeared.
“You rode eleven miles at night to return a book?”
“We took the lower trail.”
Wyatt looked as though he could not decide whether to shout or embrace both boys.
“You could have died.”
“We didn’t.”
“You might still after I finish deciding.”
“Wyatt,” Cora warned softly.
He exhaled.
“Continue.”
Seth looked toward the mountains.
“We tied the pony behind the church.”
Cora’s pulse quickened.
“And then?”
“We saw a light inside the school.”
“At what time?”
“Late.”
“Lantern light?”
He nodded.
“We thought it was you.”
Caleb finally spoke.
“It wasn’t.”
Cora turned.
“Who was it?”
Caleb looked at Seth.
Seth looked at Wyatt.
Neither answered.
Then Cora noticed Caleb’s right hand.
He was holding something tightly.
“Open your hand.”
“No.”
“Caleb.”
“No.”
Wyatt reached toward him.
Caleb stepped back.
Cora spoke gently.
“You kept something from that night.”
The boy’s eyes widened.
That was answer enough.
“What?”
His fist remained closed.
Then Seth said quietly, “Show her.”
Caleb looked furious.
“You promised.”
“She already knows.”
“She doesn’t know everything.”
Cora’s heartbeat changed.
“Everything about what?”
Caleb slowly opened his hand.
A small brass object rested in his palm.
Round.
Blackened on one edge.
Stamped with letters.
Cora picked it up.
E.C.R.R.
Elk Crossing Railroad.
On the reverse side was a number.
17.
Wyatt’s expression became unreadable.
Cora had seen tokens like it before.
Railroad supervisors carried them as identification when entering freight yards and depots.
“Where did you find this?”
Caleb’s voice dropped almost to nothing.
“Beside the school.”
“Before the fire?”
“After it started.”
Cora looked at Wyatt.
“Who carries number seventeen?”
Wyatt knew.
She could see it in his face.
“Who?”
His eyes moved toward the road leading down the mountain.
“Silas Vale.”
Cora knew the name.
Everyone did.
Vale was not merely employed by the railroad.
He controlled nearly every freight contract between Elk Crossing and the eastern lines.
He owned the lumber mill.
Loaned money to half the shopkeepers in town.
And sat directly beside Mayor Bell at every council meeting.
Cora looked back at the token.
“Why would Silas Vale burn a school?”
Seth whispered, “Because of what was underneath it.”
Every adult in the yard stared at him.
Cora’s skin went cold.
“Underneath what?”
“The floor.”
Caleb grabbed Seth’s arm.
“Stop.”
But it was too late.
Seth looked directly at Cora.
“There was a box.”
“What box?”
“The men pulled it out before they poured the oil.”
Wyatt’s voice became very quiet.
“What was inside?”
Seth shook his head.
“I couldn’t see.”
Caleb could.
Cora turned toward him.
The boy looked trapped.
“Caleb?”
He swallowed.
“Books.”
“What kind of books?”
“Not school books.”
Cora felt something shift inside her memory.
A week before the fire, she had found a loose board beneath the old records cabinet.
Under it had been dust.
Nothing more.
Or so she had believed.
But two months earlier, former council treasurer Henry Lyle had visited her classroom.
He had asked strangely specific questions.
Did the old school still have storage beneath the floor?
Had anyone repaired the eastern wall?
Were town ledgers from the first settlement years still stored there?
Cora had thought him confused.
Henry Lyle was seventy-six.
He died three weeks later.
She looked down at the brass token.
Then toward the road.
“Wyatt.”
“Yes.”
“I think the fire may have had nothing to do with the school.”
His eyes narrowed.
“What are you saying?”
“I think someone burned it because they were searching for something hidden inside.”
Caleb whispered:
“They found it.”
Cora turned sharply.
“What?”
The boy’s face had gone white.
“They found the box.”
“Then why burn the building?”
Caleb looked at his brother.
Seth was crying silently now.
And when Caleb answered, the fear in his voice transformed the mystery into something far worse.
May you like
“Because Seth saw their faces.”
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