She left in a hurry.Didn’t check the knots.Didn’t close the door.Didn’t do any of the things Marin always does because Marin is thorough and careful and never leaves a loose end.
She just left a loose end.
I work the left wrist.Same weak point as before.Fast knots leave gaps.Takes me eight minutes.The rope drops.
I stand.Rub my wrists.Walk up the stairs.
The kitchen is empty.The front door didn’t close all the way.The porch light is on across the road.
I could leave.Get in the truck.Drive home.Be done with all of it.
I sit down at the table.
Whatever is happening—whatever I set in motion when I loosened that column—Marin is going to come back through that door and need someone to be here.Or she’s going to come back through that door and kill me.At this point, either one is possible.
I wait.
64
Marin
On the coffee table: a plate with banana bread.Half eaten.A cup of tea, gone cold.
“I made him comfortable,” Mrs.Mather says.“Fed him.Gave him tea.Read to him from Psalms until he settled.”
She’s folding a dish towel.Smoothing the creases out with her palm the way you smooth a bedsheet.
“How long has he been sleeping?”I say.
She doesn’t answer right away.She sets the dish towel on the counter.Lines the edge up with the tile.Straightens it.
“Mrs.Mather.How long has he been sleeping?”
“He’s not sleeping, dear.”
The room tilts.Not much.Just enough.
“What do you mean he’s not sleeping?”
She turns to face me.Her eyes are clear.Her hands are still.Not a tremor.
“He was suffering, Marin.You saw it.I saw it.The whole town saw it.The wandering.The confusion.The pain.A person shouldn’t have to live like that.Not when it’s clear the Lord is ready for them.”
I look at Charles on the couch.The quilt.The folded hands.The closed eyes.
My eyes widen.“What did you do?”
“What anyone would do.”
She says it simply.The way she’d sayI watered the garden.“Out here, we don’t let things suffer.That’s not mercy.That’s cruelty.When a horse breaks its leg, you don’t let it scream in a field.When a dog can’t walk, you don’t let it drag itself across the floor.You do what’s right.You do what’s kind.And then you make your peace with God and you move on.”
“He wasn’t a horse, Helen.”
“No.He was worse off than a horse.A horse doesn’t know it’s dying.Charles knew.I could see it in his eyes.”She picks up the kettle.“The tea helped.Calmed him right down.And the bread—he ate half the loaf.Poor thing was starving.After that, he just...went quiet.Peaceful.The way it should be.”
I stare at her.She pours hot water into a cup like she’s making tea for a neighbor who popped in for a chat.
“You killed him.”
