Excerpt There was nothing I could do. I finally left Jake with Ella and went back to the desk in the lobby. The register showed only twelve guests. Not many people came in November, in the middle of the week, in the rain. I turned on the phones again.
Across the lobby the glass doors to the dining room were dark. It was after nine now and there was no one to keep it open for. There was no one to keep the desk open for either. Tall Trees wasnt on the highway like a motel.
I wandered away and curled up on the soft pillows of a couch. The wind was rising, whistling through cracks around the front doors, moaning about the windows, dashing branches against stone walls. In spite of my proclivity toward solitude, I thought that this was a night better shared with someone else. And it was chilly. I shivered and got up to go sit on the stone seat inside the chimney. As I rose the wind shrieked in frenzy. As if on cue, the big front door whipped open and slammed against the wall with a bang which reverberated in the hard-surfaced lobby. And for the second time in one night I was faced with an apparition.
A gnome of a man stood on the thresholdabout five-seven, lank grey hair to his shoulders, snarled grisly beard, fringed buckskin jacket, faded jeans over bowed legs, and ancient hiking boots. He bit on an upside-down pipe with bared teeth. His dark eyes blazed at me.
He was dripping on the floorwater and blood. Wheres Charlie? he snarled.
Old Irish proverb: It is better to be a coward for a minute than dead for the rest of your life. So I wasnt about to make any fast moves here. I stood very still and gave the little man in the doorway some careful attention. He didnt seem to have weapons of any kind. He wasnt moving toward me. And he was hurtdripping blood down his jacket from someplace on his head.
I walked over, reached out, and pulled him into the lobby, ignoring his black glare. I closed the door and said, Wait here. Ill get something to wipe you off. Just inside the dining room was a pile of napkins. I hoped someone could get them clean when I was through.
When I returned he was hopping mad, literally jigging on his feet. What the ding-dong do you think yer doin?
I located the injury, not too bad, and handed him a cloth. Press this on the cut. I put his hand in the right spot. He started to protest and I snapped, Do it! I pushed his fingers down firmly. How did you get this cut anyway?
The question took his mind off me and he started muttering, eyes focused on some distant event. He sent me a note but I got it late. I was sposed to meet him at Jakes, and he said come alone. Not to tell anybody. Said somebody was getting dangerous.
Who sent him a note? Charlie? Charlie said someone was getting dangerous?
The little man paused, obviously thinking hard. Hed taken the pipe from his bearded mouth and was twisting it round and round in one gnarled, spotted hand. Then he gave a little hop. People all over the place when I got there. Crawlin with cops. How could I meet him alone? Looked in all the windows. No Charlie. Now he turned and faced me. Somebody musta seen me peekin in, he said fiercely. They yelled and I ran. Stumbled and hit my head on a rock by the creek. So wheres Charlie? Hes not at Jakes cabin, so is he here?
It was a reasonable question. If he wasnt at Jakes cottage, was he at Jakes lodge? Reasonable or not, I didnt answer it. I pretended I hadnt heard and finished wiping his clothes as dry and clean as I could get them. Its going to cost money to get the stain out of this leather jacket.
Im not poor, he retorted.
Hurrah for you, I thought. Im Maren OConnor.
Titus Jones, he growled.
I stared. Sothis was Tituslooking for Charlie, and in no good mood. I leaned down and wiped the floor, wondering if I was going to tell him where Charlie had been found. Then I pushed him, protesting, toward the fireplace where he could rest and warm up on a stone bench. I tossed more logs onto the fire.
Whats all this coddlin yer doin to me? Im no sissy, ya know. Im a prospector. Live outside in weather like this.
I decided to give as good as I got. Yes, and look at you. Skinny as a pencil, youre dirty, and your beards got burrs in it.
For a moment he looked as if he would explode. Then his face relaxed, crinkled, and he grinned. In fifteen seconds he was slapping his knees and chortling. He looked at me, laughing, and jammed the pipe back into his mouth. A woman after my own heart. A lady with spunk. A broad with a sense of humor. If I wasnt seventy-five Id ask you to marry me. Want to marry me for my money? Be a rich widow in a few years?
I grinned back. Ill think about it. Was he really rich, this unlikely looking character?
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