Eleanor Tatum

Chapter 4, page 39

Egad! With Trevor’s help, Catherine escapes a nightmare. Her question remains; how to stay safe?

The rough tree bark massaged her back as she slid to the ground, allowing fear to liquify into relief. Catherine stared at the assailant dying in front of her. She couldn’t command her eyelids to close on the blood and pain, on the horror and gruesome joy. He had tormented her since Charleston and she reasoned evil thoughts into objective debate. Her limbs shook, but then subsided when Trevor started rubbing her arms during his directions for her to stand. Far too slowly she understood he wanted her to hurry away from the now dead body and bloody scene.

Several shouts came dangerously close. “Hide, quickly Catherine!” The use of her first name snapped through her haze of horror. “They mustn’t find you. Hide over here.” He encouraged her to race across the road toward the lake and down the slippery bluff. She appreciated the tree roots enfolding her decent and the thick cover the brush provided. She hoped she was the only living animal under the cover of vegetation.

“Coffman! Are you all right?” The sounds of a concerned male crashing through the thick growth on the opposite side of the main road wove through the vegetation to Catherine’s terrorized hearing. “We’ve told Mercer time and again to move his target range further back from the lodge.” He had stopped talking with an abruptness that it told Catherine the speaker had found the body.

“Dear God! Who is that? Is he dead? Is that who we heard yell? Dear Lord! What has Cranfield done now?”

“Sir,” Trevor snapped, “do you mean Edgar Cranfield let a shot go wild?”

The hesitation told much, “Wild? Well, Lord Coffman, the only wildness I saw was in his eyes, but I doubt if he meant to hit whoever this is.”

Catherine’s foot slipped from a wet limb. Swallowing her scream, she tightened her grip on the roots protruding above her head. If she fell it would gain unwanted attention from above as well as from the scrambling noise and splashing in the shallow water below. She dug her toes into the moist soil found between the limbs and roots.

“What do you mean? Who do you think he meant to kill?” Catherine winced at the hurt and anger she heard in Trevor’s voice. She had warned him earlier, after the picnic. He shouldn’t have been surprised.

“Look, Coffman, I’m sure he didn’t mean it. It was an accident. Ask him. Here he comes.”

Catherine bit the inside of her cheek and listened to what was being said, confirmed and denied, but guessed there were several men pontificating their own style of witnessing and justice. With that much noise she chanced an escape. Slowly she put her feet into the shallow water at the bottom of the bluff and began edging away from the scene above.

It took several minutes and even more prayers to safely progress forward, trying not to guess what lurked in the tall grasses and weeds. With her eyes closed, she froze every time the sandy lake bottom felt squishier and she listened for the lack of human noise. Hearing none, she scrambled out of the water and up the muddy bank.

The road led to a fork and the turn led to the backdoor of the lodge. Not thinking too terribly much, she scooted inside. Ignoring the few Mercer ladies hanging about, she made it to the back stairs without causing any undue commotion. Thankfully most of the guests and employees were on the front porch watching Trevor and the hunters surround the dead body.

Running up the servants’ stairs, she raced down the long second floor hallway to Trevor’s room. Placing both hands on the door, she spent an expensive moment catching her breath and planning her next move. Reaching for a hairpin, she untwisted it into a straight line and tried to play with the door lock’s mechanics. Sometimes some things work out. She opened his door and closed it. It would not relock so she jammed a straight back chair under the knob, as she had had to do to stop her step-father.

Maybe it would work this time.

Sitting on his single bed, she fought to gather breath and wits. Praying for Trevor, she worried for his safety. Would he even want her here? Testing his pillow with her head, she struggled off her wet shoes and allowed the approaching night’s darkness to calm her bones for just a few minutes.

Enough! (Until next time)