Chapter Sixty-Three: Pies, Cellars, Visions and an Unwelcome Guest
Evangeline sat in the sitting room, scrubbing clothes on the washboard. Colt had laughed when she had asked him to bring in enough pails of water for her to wash. He had insisted that by washing the clothes they'd been wearing for the last few weeks she was doing nothing more than putting lipstick on a pig. She had stuck her tongue out at him and sent him out to the stables to see to the horses hooves. Washing their worn out and stained clothing might be a waste of time but Evangeline wasn't willing to simply leave them dirty. She didn't mind stains and tears just so long as they smelled decent again.
Last night had been tense but uneventful. Everyone had been so worried that something terrible was going to happen the moment they closed their eyes but nothing had. It had been quiet and peaceful—two things that none of them were used to. Even in the towns they'd stayed in before the moans of rabid on the streets around them had managed to come through the walls and windows at times. To hear nothing but silence outside had been more unnerving than the sound of any monster had ever been.
Evangeline was lost in her thoughts when a quiet rapping came upon the wall and her head flew up as her hand released its hold on the wet blouse and grabbed her knife from her leg.
"I did not mean to startle you, miss." Doctor Harris said quickly as he raised one hand in peaceful surrender and smiled.
"I apologize," Evangeline gasped as she put her knife away and rose to her feet. She dried her hands on her trouser legs and glanced at the pie the doctor held in his hands that smelled suspiciously like delicious apples and cinnamon. Evangeline's mouth began to water and her stomach rumbled at the thought of eating something so sinfully good after nothing but beans, potatoes and fire charred meat for so long.
"It was completely my fault. I should have spoken sooner and not been so quiet. I didn't mean to seem as if I was sneaking," the doctor assured her.
Evangeline shook her head. "It's a different world outside of this town, doctor, so you'll have to excuse my friends and I if we seem a bit paranoid at times. We have had to learn to view everything as a threat in order to survive."
Doctor Harris laid his free hand over his impressive belly and tilted his head. "Have you lost members to your group out there?"
Evangeline felt the sting of the pain as if it were fresh and new. She nodded and swallowed hard. "Yes we have."
The Doctor gave her a comforting smile. "I am sorry for you losses, miss. I also want to apologize for how I treated all of you last night. Please know that it is not in my nature to be so rude. Judith, my wife, baked this pie and informed me that I was to come and offer it to you all as a token of peace."
"You have a wife?" Evangeline asked, with interest. She craved contact with another woman. Now that Katherine and Charlotte were both gone, Evangeline had no other woman to bond with. She and her aunt would never again be as close as Evangeline had hoped they would become—too many harsh words and too much bad blood existed between them.
"Yes," the doctor shifted his feet and averted his gaze. "But I'm afraid she isn't feeling very well today or else she would have come and greeted you herself."
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that." Evangeline offered, though inside she was growing just as suspicious and apprehensive about this man as Colt and Comanche both seemed to be. "Tell her thank you for the pie. She didn't have to trouble herself with making it if she didn't feel well."
"It wasn't any trouble." Doctor Harris assured her, his gaze once again meeting hers. "Can I take this in the kitchen?"
"Oh I'll get it," Evangeline said as she walked around her tub of suds filled wash water and held out her hand. "I'm sure you have things to be getting back to." She wasn't sure why but something inside of her knew that Colt wouldn't want the doctor roaming around the hotel. They had no good or logical reason not to trust the man but that didn't seem to matter to her gut. Her gut was telling her that something about him was off.
"Okay then," Doctor Harris smiled as he handed her the pie. "Remember if you all find yourselves needing anything, feel free to come down to the house and knock, I'm sure I'll be able to help. And before I forget, Judith wanted me to invite you all to dinner tonight around seven."
"I thought she wasn't feeling well?" Evangeline reminded him and he waved his hand.
"She'll be just fine. Entertaining folks makes her feel better."
Evangeline doubted that Colt would say okay to the dinner offer but she nodded politely. "I'll be sure to tell the group about dinner."
"Alright then, miss--?" his gaze became questioning.
"Evangeline."
"Alright then, Evangeline—that's a real pretty name by the way. I'll be on my way now."
Evangeline watched the doctor leave and then closed the door and secured the board across it with her free hand. She wasn't sure how it had gotten left unlocked but knew she'd have to remind everyone to be more careful about locking it. She didn't like knowing that the doctor had snuck right in so easily.
Evangeline made her way to the kitchen and sat the pie on the counter. "Where is that from?" Rachel asked with hungry eyes as she took in the sight of the pie.
"Doctor Harris said his wife baked it for us. They also invited us to dinner tonight."
"He seems like such a nice man." Rachel stated with a smile. "I can't understand why Colt doesn't trust him."
"I don't trust him completely either, Aunt Rachel. There is something off about him."
"You're just so used to running around with savages, colored men and outlaws that you've forgotten what a gentleman is." Rachel assured her with a snort.
Evangeline felt her fists clench and she took several deep breaths through her nose and counted to ten to calm her temper. "You'll do well to watch what you say and who you say it about," Evangeline warned. Tears pricked behind her eyes, "Silas was a damned good man and one that I respected and loved very much."
Rachel seemed taken aback and she quickly grabbed a knife and began to cut the pie into seven wedges. "Of course. I apologize," she whispered.
"I'm going to get back to my laundry. Doctor Harris did say that if we needed anything we could go down to his house and he should be able to help. Since you're so fond of him I thought perhaps you'd want to go have tea and biscuits or something."
Before her aunt could reply, Evangeline made her way quickly out of the kitchen and to her wash basin. She picked up the shirt she'd been scrubbing away at and began to scrub again with renewed gusto.
"What did that shirt ever do to you?" Colt's amused voice asked from behind her. Evangeline turned her head and forced the sweetest smile she could manage as she batted her lashes.
"I'm picturing my aunt's face on it. Better the shirt than her actual head against this washboard."
Colt rubbed at his scruffy chin and studied the washboard for several long moments. "I think you might just be wrong about that."
Evangeline laughed lightly and stood up, drying her hands once again on her trousers before walking to him. She rose on her toes and threw her arms around his neck. Bringing her lips to his, she paused just before they touched, "I don't think you are every supposed to tell your wife that she is wrong, Colt McGreer."
Colt grinned as his arms snaked their way around her waist, "Is that right?"
"Yes," Evangeline nodded and bit at his lip causing his grip on her waist to tighten and a growl to escape his throat. "I'm quite sure it is written somewhere."
Colt chuckled quietly and then pressed his lips to hers, devouring her mouth in a hungry assault that caused Evangeline's toes to curl and her heart to race. When he pulled his lips away, Evangeline was left panting and breathless. "I trust that made up for my slight oversight in the rules?" Colt asked with an arrogant smirk on his face.
As badly as Evangeline wanted to put him in his place she couldn't. The best she could manage was a small nod as her heart thudded violently against her ribs. "Good," Colt pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead.
"What are you doing in here? I thought you were busy with the horses." Evangeline managed to speak after several seconds of standing in her husband's embrace.
"I am. I saw the doctor leave and wanted to know what he wanted so I climbed to the second floor and slipped in."
"Have you slipped into many second story windows in your time, outlaw?"
Colt shrugged, "A man does what he must."
Evangeline found herself laughing. "He brought an apology and a pie that his wife baked. He also invited us to dinner at his home at seven tonight."
"What do you think about this dinner?" Colt asked her and Evangeline still felt that little wave of surprise about a man asking her opinion on something. And she knew Colt wasn't just asking out of politeness. She knew that he would truly listen to what she said and take it to heart.
"I'm not sure. Part of me yearns to trust him and find decent people still left and a safe haven we can rest in—but then there is another part of me that has been hardened by this new world and it says that some things are simply too good to be true and this doctor, this town, they fit into that category perfectly."
Colt sighed and rested his brow against hers as his eyes slid closed. "I don't trust it either." Colt glanced at the washbasin. "I'll let you get back to scrubbing away your stress while I go finish with those horses. Ox is on the roof, Comanche is out scouting the town and I reckon Jedidiah and Susette are upstairs so you should have some quiet time for a while."
"Alright then, outlaw. Are you going to use the door or slip back out the window?"
Colt grinned as he headed for the stairs. "The window," he replied. "What fun is there in using a door?"
Evangeline smiled as she watched him go and smiled. Colt was truly a blessing in this world. While she knew the chances of them having forever were very slim and one of them would eventually fall victim to this cruel new world, Evangeline was determined to love him with a fierce passion and soak up every moment she could with him until that time came.
***
Comanche did not trust this town. It was far too quiet and peaceful for his tastes. He let his hand rest on the head of the hatchet on his hip as he walked down a back street, staying alert for any sign of motion or the sounds of movement. Comanche let his thoughts drift to Frankie as he touched the hatchet she'd been so fond of. Comanche would keep this weapon always; it was as if he carried a piece of his pale face with him just so long as he had it.
A thud to his left jerked him from his sentimental thoughts and had his head whipping around. There was nothing in that direction except for a tiny shack that looked to be a woodshed and a cellar door beside it.
Comanche walked to the door and tilted his head at the sight of the chains and lock around the metal handles. With hatchet in hand, he crouched down and tugged at the chains. As they rattled, a loud moaning and groaning chorus picked up from under the doors and his feet. The sound was faint and insulated by the ground but Comanche heard it.
He grabbed the handle and opened the cellar door a crack, just as far as it would go with these chains around the handles. As he held open the door the moans and hungry groans were louder. A hand was suddenly thrust through the crack. It was gray, rotting and covered in dirt. Comanche looked down through the crack and saw the dead faces, the lifeless eyes, the gnashing jaws.....Flesh eaters. This was a cellar full of hundreds of flesh eaters. Their bodies were crammed together and the smell seeping through the cracked cellar door was strong enough to take down a buffalo.
Comanche let the cellar door fall closed, the fingers of the rabid becoming pinned between the slabs of wood. Comanche stared down at the gray appendages and spit on them in disgust. He hated these flesh eating monsters.
Rising back to his full height Comanche put the hatchet back in the holster and glanced around. He knew he had to continue his search. The question about where the flesh eaters were had been answered but Comanche suspected where there was one cellar full of rabid, there were probably more.
***
Jedidiah smiled at Susette as the girl sat cross legged on the floor with her eyes closed and her brow all furrowed up in concentration.
"You have to relax, Susette. Allow all the tension to go." Jedidiah urged. He reached out and rubbed at the wrinkles in her forehead and she giggled.
"I'm sorry," she sighed with defeat. "I'm just not good at this."
Jedidiah smiled comfortingly. "It takes practice. But if you can learn to meditate it might help your visions come more regularly."
"Does it work for you?" Susette asked.
"Not anymore. It used to though when I was younger." Jedidiah replied. Now that he was older, his body seemed to rebel against the visions. They had such a violent impact on his system when they came that he feared they could possibly take his life away from him as he grew older.
"Alright now, Susette, why don't you lay down on your back, stretch out your legs and just relax." Jedidiah whispered. Susette did as he said and he smiled. "Breath deep through your nose. Relax your face, your arms your shoulders.....Now I need you to think about the group. Think about where we are supposed to go—Open your mind...."
Jedidiah's eyes widened when Susette began to whimper and moan. Her body tensed and then she began to convulse on fancy rug. He quickly put his hands on her shoulders to restrain her though he remained silent and said nothing. He knew she would snap out of it when the vision was complete.
The instant his hands touched her, Jedidiah felt light headed. His eyes rolled back and he too began to shake violently as a vision of the future thrust its way into his mind and then his world went black.
Jedidiah had no way of knowing how long he had been out as he felt the world return around him and blinked several times up at the ceiling. He thought back on the vision he had just seen and felt tears fill his eyes.
Slowly, he pushed his old bones up to sit and glanced around for Susette. He saw her on the bed with her knees in her chest as she stared at him with shock, fear and disbelief.
"Did you see it too?" JEdidiah asked quietly.
Tears ran in rivers down Susette's pale cheeks. "There is nothing left...." Her breath hitched in a sob. "We're all going to...." She seemed unable to finish the statement and Jedidiah felt his old heart breaking.
"We gotta keep that between us," he warned the girl, rubbing at his aching left arm. "We can't let anyone know."
"I thought we had to go to California.. I swear I did. I thought we'd be safe there—" Susette's balled her hands into fists and rubbed at her eyes.
"It's okay. The quest to California gave them all purpose and we're gonna pretend like that's still the plan, okay?"
"You want me to lie?"
"Yes, my dear." Jedidiah put his hand over his tight chest. "Better to believe a beautiful lie than to be dragged down by the terrible truth."
"That's not what Colt says."
Jedidiah grimaced in pain. He must have convulsed harder than usual because the pain in his chest and arm were quite terrible. He looked at the girl and forced a sad smile. "Colt doesn't know what we know."
***
Rachel searched the kitchen for herbs but could find none. She wanted to make a good meal for the group for dinner; something that would be flavorful and hopefully encourage them to stay in this town instead of returning to an endless journey to nowhere with nothing but beans and potatoes.
She remembered Evangeline's statement from earlier about the doctor saying to ask him if there was anything they needed. Rachel smiled to herself. His wife certainly seemed to be a good cook if the looks of that pie were any indicated; surely she would have some herbs.
Rachel untied the apron and slid out of it before tossing it up onto the counter. She walked out through the sitting room and Evangeline looked up from the clothes she was scrubbing and blew several loose strands of hair from her face.
"Where are you going?"
"To see about finding some herbs."
"You're not supposed to go out alone.' Evangeline reminded her.
Rachel sighed and crossed her arms over her chest. "I am a grown woman, Evangeline, not some girl. If you are worried that your outlaw husband will be upset then you are welcome to come with me to Doctor Harris's house."
"I'm busy. Just be careful." With that Evangeline's focus returned to her clothes.
Rachel adjusted the gun belt on her hips and headed out the door. She hated this group. The only person who treated her like a human being was Jedidiah. Rachel knew that at times she could be judgmental and harsh but she had been raised with certain beliefs and those beliefs were not going to change simply because one outlaw, one savage and one colored man said they should.
Rachel walked down the road, knowing that the doctor lived in a yellow house with flower beds. She came upon the cheerful house and smiled. She simply could not understand why no one trusted this place. Hadn't they all been traveling to a land that they hoped was sickness-free? Now that they had found one, the group acted as if it were pure evil.
Rachel climbed the steps onto the quant and tidy porch. She knocked on the door and waited for several long moments but there was no answer. She tested the hand and the door opened freely.
"Hello?" she called out. She knew it was rude to enter but she entered anyway. "Doctor Harris?"
Rachel's feet carried her into the tidy home. It was small but clean, bright and airy with red checked curtains and polished wooden floors.
"Is anyone home?" Her voice echoed in the small room and still there was no response. She was about to leave when she heard a thud on the other side of a door across the room. "Doctor Harris? Mrs. Harris?" The thud sounded again and Rachel frowned. Was something wrong?
Quickly she walked to that door and knocked. "Is everything okay in there?" There was no answer.
Rachel once again tested the handle and the door opened. She took a deep breath and then swung open the door.
The sight she was met with rendered her unable to speak. Tied with ropes to the bed, her ankles and wrists fastened to the bedposts, was a woman..... A rabid woman. She was wearing a stained nightdress and her skin was rotting and covered in sores. It was clear she'd been rabid a long while judging by the flaky quality of her skin.
The woman's eyes were gray lifeless orbs, staring with a desperate hunger at Rachel. The rabid fought against the ropes holding her and her jaw moved beneath the gag and bindings that covered her mouth.
It was with a sickening twist of dread deep in her gut that Rachel realized Comanche, Colt and Evangeline had been right about the doctor and this town. Rachel felt bile rise in her throat as she pulled her knife.
She couldn't leave this woman to suffer this way. Rachel walked to the bed, holding her free hand over her nose and mouth to try to block out the horrible cloying scent of the rabid's rotting flesh. Her eyes watered as it assaulted them and she raised her knife.
The rabid fought against the ropes holding her, desperate to reach Rachel and the meal she would provide. "I'm sorry he did this to you." Rachel whispered.
Just before she could bring the knife down into the rabid's head, a bang sounded behind her and Rachel froze. Fear washed over her spine and chill bumps dotted her flesh. She turned slowly and the doctor's huge, hulking form stood in the doorway, his face a twisted mask of rage.
He took a step forward and shook his head. "You should not be here."