“Who, Jack—”
He lifted a finger to his lips.
I tucked the coat tighter to my chin, twisted slightly toward the sidewalk.
“Chester,” Jackson called out, extending an arm and turning him away from the display.
“Well, Jackson Lovett, as I live and breathe.” He shookJackson’s hand. “Why, just in October, I met up with some other Kentucky folks. They were visiting the old soldiers’ burial ground. Every year I see more of our people trekking this way to visit kinsmen lost in the battle.” Chester pulled him into a hug and thumped his back.
“I heard they’d been in town.” Jackson grinned, returning the friendly slap.
“It’s always good to run into an old pal.” Chester shared gossip about the Kentucky visitors for a few more minutes while Jackson smiled, enjoying the chatter. Then: “Hey, Jackson, a couple years back, a feller from your neck of the woods made the trip up here to the burial grounds looking for his kin. You might know him.” He scratched his wool cap. “He was a tall, older feller named Davies, uh… Can’t recall the full name right now, but maybe you’ll know it.” Chester rooted again in his mind. “Oh, yeah, I ’member something else. He said he’d been the sheriff of Troublesome for a bit and he’d be back soon enough. I looked for him this year, and I found out…”
The rest of his words were interrupted by noisy passersby. But I heard enough to realize it was Ken Davies, the very same sheriff who had torn up our marriage license and made it his moral duty to keep Jackson banned from Kentucky. That he had traveled here, walked these same streets, knocked the soft blue from my skin.
Jackson shifted his stance but remained quiet while Chester rambled on.
“Now, last I heard you were going to settle back down in Troublesome Creek? That must have been ten or more years ago. Myself, I haven’t been back to Hyden for at least two decades.”
“I stayed a while but had to move on,” Jackson said.
“I sure do miss it sometimes,” Chester said wistfully. “We had us a traveling Methodist preacher come through a few years back. I’ll never forget when he found himself failing to describeheaven to the congregation, he simply exclaimed,O my dear Honeys, Heaven is a Kentucky of a place.”
The men grew somber, each seeming to reflect on home.
Then Chester asked, “Did you ever get hitched?”
“I did.” Jackson dipped his head and said, “But I lost her not long ago.”
Chester spilled kind condolences. Then he asked, “Are you here for a while?”
I tugged the coat down a bit, stretching an ear toward the men’s conversation.
“Visiting, but heading to Toledo to see a man about a job,” Jackson fibbed.
“I’ve been here now for seven years. There’s plenty of good work in Defiance, pal. The town’s been building on the canals and—”
“I’ve already set my sights on Toledo, but I’ll keep it in mind should plans change.” Jackson snuck a peek at me, jingled the coins in his pants pockets.
“It would be nice working together again. Better working conditions too. They got themselves some decent camp houses here.” Chester quieted. “Say, what are they paying there in Toledo?”
“About to find out.” He patted Chester’s shoulder and moved away slightly. “I’m fixin’ to head back to my room. I’ve got business to wrap up before I leave town. Merry Christmas.”
When Chester crossed the street and turned a corner, Jackson stole over to me.
“Who was that, Jackson? What did he say he found out about the sheriff? Jackson?”
He stared after him, lost in thought. “Chester’s just a Kentucky fella I worked with long ago on the Boulder Dam project. We had another buddy who was a high scaler, repelling down the giant canyon walls. We lost him after a rope broke. I was able to help Chester when the same thing happened to him a week later.”
Jackson rarely talked about his work on Boulder Dam or, as most called it now, Hoover Dam. But I’d read that over one hundred men lost their lives building it and that the one job requirement called only formen of strength, and cowards need not apply.
I followed Jackson’s eyes to where his friend had rounded the corner. “Are you concerned about the sheriff? Chester talking? Why did you tell him Toledo? I’m not ready to move Elijah Jack just yet.”
“Don’t you fret now. It’s Christmas. Come on, let’s have us a lil cheer.” He pulled me under the shop’s alcove and reached inside his coat and handed me a small box with a festive ribbon.
“But I didn’t get you—”
He pressed a finger to my lips. “I have you. I don’t need one more thing.”
