“No.” She rose to her full height. “Miss Nancy. She's been sick all day and fearing your return, just burning up.”
Slinging the rifle to his shoulder, he followed, and as they neared the cabin, the aroma from the kitchen stove filled the air with carrots and herbs, rendered chicken fat, egg noodles on the boil. The soup flowed like a stream through the pines and deepened his hunger, for he had been all day in the woods, chasing after the phantom car, without a scrap of nourishment. In a dark corner of the porch he braced the guns, and took three bounds to reach the kitchen, wrenched the heel from a loaf of fresh bread, and dipped it into the soup, stuffing half the mess into his mouth. Wiley was still chewing when he heard Erica clear her throat, and turning, saw her swaddled in the rocking chair, hair lank against her scalp, her eyes vanishing into sockets dark as bruises. After dunking the other half crust into the broth, he went to her, mouth full, and knelt at her side, laying the back of his hand against her hot skin. “You look awful. What happened to you?”
She licked her dry lips and waited till he choked down his swallow of bread. “You're back. I was beginning to think you had abandoned me.”
“I wouldn't leave you.” Like a young boy, he threw his arms around her and buried his head against her breast.
With grave difficulty, she raised her free hand and stroked his long hair. “Why were you gone so long?”
“I lost the car. I went back to the place where we left it, but someone took it, or it rolled off on its own into the lake. I looked all day but couldn't find a trace.”
Clamping her fingers on his skull, she lifted his head to look into his eyes. “Someone stole our car?”
Mrs. Gavin, who had been eavesdropping by the bookcase, emerged from behind them. “We'll have to call the police—”
“No,” they said in unison. Wiley offered up an explanation. “It wasn't our car, but a friend's. I don't have any papers, don't even know the license plate number.”
“But your friend, he will be angry if—”
“We traded cars,” Wiley said. “His Duster for my Pinto, because we were going so far. So you can't call the police.”
“I'd get in trouble,” Erica said. “I'm only seventeen. But we're off to be married. We're headed west to elope, but I'm underage back home. Please don't call the police.”
From the other side of the room, Una spun the globe with a slap of her hand. “Married?” She skipped over to them and smiled at Erica. “Mee-Maw, did you hear? That's the most romantic thing I've ever heard. Like Romeo and Juliet. Are you two madly in love?”
The question went unanswered, but the notion satisfied Mrs. Gavin, for the matter of notifying the police never arose again. Erica joined them at table for the blessing of the soup, though she could manage only a few spoonfuls of broth.
Rather than subject Erica to the climb to the loft, the Gavins rearranged their sleeping habits, Una bunking in with her grandmother, and the invalid moving to the child's small bed in the far corner of the house. Though he objected to being alone, Wiley reconsidered and withdrew to the loft, collapsing on the bed. The buzz of his snoring overhead made them all giggle with disbelief. Una fixed another dose of the sleeping potion and brought in the warm mug, tucked the covers round her charge, and sat at the foot of the bed. Together, they stared at the stars streaming in the black sky painted across the window. Away from the city lights, their luminosity increased. As a lifelong habitant of the room, Una knew the names of the fleeting constellations and enjoyed pointing out the more definitive ones for her, then waited for Erica to finish her spiced milk before turning out the nightlight and bidding her sweet dreams.
The darkness encouraged Erica to whisper. “I was just wondering what you might think, lying here every night, the whole of creation right outside your windows.”
“The heavens above, the earth below.”
“Do you miss your parents? When are they coming back?” Erica asked.
The girl rose and stood in the doorway. “I never did say.”
“I miss everything,” Erica said, and then rolled over by a quarter turn into the balm of sleep.
20