He was staggering now, his breath ragged as he shuffled his way across the field. The cursed field, where nothing would ever grow. Year after year, he’d plowed, manured, and carefully planted crops that never flourished, despite all his efforts. All the ground produced was stones, broken dinner plates, old tin cups, and, once, that beautiful ring carved from bone.
He looked at the house coming into view, remembered carrying Sara through the doorway when they were newly married. How in love with her he’d been. Sara, with her wild red hair and sparkling eyes. Sara, who could see the future. He remembered her as a little girl in the schoolyard, telling him, “Martin Shea, you are the one I shall marry.” How he’d handed her that silly glass marble. She still had it in a little box with Gertie’s baby teeth and a silver thimble that had belonged to her mother.
Flashes of their life together filled his head and heart: the Christmases they’d had; the time they went dancing at the hall over in Barre and the wagon wheel broke on the way home so they had to spend the night in the wagon, huddled together under their coats, happy. There were painful memories, too. The loss of the babies Sara carried inside her. The death of little Charles; how Sara held him in her arms, refusing to let go, refusing to accept that he was gone. And, of course, the loss of their darling Gertie.
“Sara,” Martin moaned as he passed the barn, feet crunching through the snow. “My Sara.” He fell, and struggled back up to his feet, leaving the white ground smeared with red, like a wounded snow angel. Maybe she’d be there in the doorway, waiting for him with the gun. Maybe that’s what he deserved.
Almost there, Martin, he told himself.
Yes, he was almost home. He wanted, more than anything, to go inside, climb the stairs one last time, and get into bed. He wanted Sara to cover him with quilts, to lie beside him, stroke his hair.
Impossible wishes.
Tell me a story, he would say.An adventure story—the story of our lives together.
As he came across the yard, he saw a figure out back, near the little graveyard. The person saw him and slipped behind the old maple tree.
He moved closer.
“Hello?” he called weakly. “Sara?”
But no one was there.
He must have imagined it.
Such an imaginative boy he’d been once. A boy with the heart of a hero. A boy who’d been sure great adventures awaited him.
He heard the front door bang open behind him, and turned to see Sara stumbling down the steps. Sara, his Sara. Ever radiant.
But something was different. Something was wrong. She moved awkwardly, and her face was stricken with terror.
Behind her, an old woman came through the doorway. She was holding Martin’s rifle, pushing the barrel into Sara’s back.
“Sara?” Martin called, turning toward them. “What’s happening? Who is this?”
Sara lifted her head. “The woman who killed our little girl,” she said. She looked at him with such agony on her face. “Oh, Martin, I’m so sorry,” she said. “For ever thinking it could be you.”
And I for being sure it was you, he thought.
He saw the way the wicked old woman’s face twisted into a hideous grin and knew he had to do something. Even if it was his last act here on earth, he had to save his wife. His beautiful Sara. How could he have thought she would hurt Gertie? He’d been wrong. So wrong.
Using the last of his strength, Martin ran and leapt forward, hands reaching for the gun. But somehow he missed.
How could he have missed?
He’d failed Sara again. Probably for the last time.
The old woman laughed, turned the gun around, and swung it like a club so the butt end hit him right in the chest, right in the place where he was bleeding.
He dropped to the ground with a howl and tried to catch his breath, tried to move his thoughts beyond the pain that echoed through every inch of his body. Though he tried to get up on his knees, he just melted back down. The old woman lifted the gun and brought it down on his chest again. He felt himself going under, sinking down to someplace dark and warm.
To bed. Into their bed, deep under the covers, with Sara in his arms.
“Please,” Sara sobbed. “Stop.”
“Not until I am done,” the old woman snarled. “Not until everything you have is gone.”
Sara…He tried to speak her name. To tell her it was all right, really. He deserved this. And she, she had deserved better than him.He wanted to say all this to her. To tell her how sorry he was. He managed to lift his head, open his eyes, and saw, coming across the yard, someone else. Someone small, moving forward in a slow, determined shuffle.
