There was no answer. Both boys dropped their bags, then John reached under his jacket and pulled out his pistol. Jerry’s was still packed. He was so tired of guns.
He gestured to John and shook his head. “Put it away.”
John ignored him and slid silently inside the house. Jerry followed close behind, his pulse accelerating as if he was back on the battlefield. They turned left into the living room and stopped short.
Sunshine poured through the big front window and filled the wide space of the room, illuminating millions of tiny dust motes as they coasted through the air. There was no heat in the house, and from the stillness of the air, no fires had been lit for a while. Jerry ran his finger along the mantelpiece, and it came back grey with dust. The sober faces in the framed photographs said nothing.
John led the way into the kitchen, usually the busiest room in the house. It felt abandoned. Jerry’s stomach rolled with apprehension as they headed upstairs to check the bedrooms, but there was no sign of their parents there, either.
“The cellar,” John said.
They returned to the kitchen and opened the little door leading underground. Jerry’s chest tightened as they climbed down the stairs, the cellar’s clammy air closing in around him as if he was back in a tunnel. The only thing he didn’t mind about being down there was the familiar, heady stink of alcohol that invaded his senses. Their father had stored his whisky in the cellar their whole lives. Jerry would always associate that smell with him.
But their father wasn’t there, and neither was his liquor. Something was wrong. Nerves coiled inside Jerry like a snake.
“Let’s get outta here,” he said.
“The barn,” John said, his foot already on the stairs.
Jerry caught up to his brother just as he flung open the barn door, spilling the last rays of sunlight through crisscrossing cobwebs and onto the dusty black surface of a brand-new Ford.
John let out an admiring whistle, running his palm over the sloped hood, clearing a swath of dust. “Oh, Pa. Nice car.”
Jerry lifted the hood, also distracted. “Nineteen seventeen Ford Model T Touring Sedan Roadster,” he murmured, ogling the inner workings.
“It’s like new. The leather’s perfect.” The car tilted as John stepped onto the running board then slid onto the front seat. “He must have just got it. What would he have paid for it?”
“Around four hundred and fifty dollars.” Jerry had read up on everything he could on that long train ride home, including advertisements. There was a lot they didn’t tell a man when he was a hundred feet underground. “Fifteen to twenty miles to the gallon, top speed around forty miles per hour.” He closed the hood then crouched so he could see underneath. “Electric lights. She’s gotta ride so smooth with these springs.”
“Springs feel good in the seats, too.”
Jerry frowned through the windshield at his brother, whose fingers were curled around the polished wood steering wheel. “Why would Pa leave a new car to get dusty in the barn?”
For once, John didn’t have an answer.
Heart pounding, Jerry climbed in the passenger side. “Uncle Henry will know where they are. Drive.”
Their mother’s sister’s family had a hog farm west of Windsor between Sandwich and Petite Côte, just a short drive away. Growing up, the brothers had spent a great deal of time there, hanging around with their cousins Walter and Charlie. Enough time that the farm almost felt like a second home. Leaning back against the Ford’s soft leather, Jerry glancedat his brother, his dark hair ruffling in the wind, and all at once it was ten years earlier, except instead of grabbing their bicycles or running on foot through the trees, they were driving their father’s Ford.
It wasn’t right. Pa should be behind the wheel. Or else sitting in the back, coaching John on how not to crash the car. It made no sense that Pa wasn’t here.
His concern didn’t ease as the idyllic sight of their uncle’s farm came into sight, with the pigs snuffling in their pen and chickens scratching in the grass, looking like nothing in the world was out of place. But before John had even shut off the engine, Aunt Judy came running out of the house toward them, her face a mess of emotions. Jerry had to brace himself against the onslaught of feelings as she came closer. Her flyaway curls and pale grey eyes looked exactly like those of his mother, her twin sister.
“Oh, aren’t you two a sight for sore eyes!” she cried, meeting them between the two big oaks in front of the house.
Aunt Judy was swallowed up by John’s wide embrace, and from over his brother’s shoulder, Jerry saw her face was flushed and shiny with tears. He was used to the red tinge of his aunt’s skin when she was emotional, but the colour was more pronounced now that her curly hair had gone almost entirely white. Had his mother’s hair gone white, too?
She reached for Jerry next, squeezing him tight. In the woolly fibres of her dark green sweater he smelled the barn, her sweat, and much of his childhood, along with a tired hint of Lifebuoy soap. When she released him, her expression softened, and her calloused thumb reached for the pink scars that held his face together. He drew back. He didn’t like to be touched.
“I’m so happy to see you both,” she said, her voice catching. She let her hand fall away. “But what a welcome this must be.”
Apprehension gnawed at Jerry’s gut. What did she mean?
“Where are they?” John asked.
Her hand flew to her mouth. “Did you not get my letter?”
Jerry exchanged a glance with his brother. “We’ve been travelling. We haven’t had mail for a while. What’s going on, Aunt Judy?”
