Page 113 of The Giver of Stars
‘Hello?’
A voice broke into the silence: ‘You all can git and leave us alone!’
Alice turned on her heel to find two barrels of a gun visible through the gap in the door.
She swallowed and was about to speak again, when Kathleen appeared on foot beside her. She put a hand on Alice’s arm. ‘Verna? Is that you? I don’t know if you remember me but it’s Kathleen Hannigan, now Bligh. I used to play with your sister down at Split Creek? We made corn dollies with my ma one harvest time and I think she made one for you. With a spotted ribbon? Would you remember that?’
The dog was eyeing Kathleen now, its lips pulled back over its teeth.
‘We’re not here to cause no trouble,’ she said, her palms up. ‘We’re just in something of a fix with our good friend and we’d be real grateful for the chance to speak with you for a moment or two about it.’
‘We got nothing to say to any of youse!’
Nobody moved. The dog stopped growling briefly, its nose pointing towards the door. The two barrels didn’t budge.
‘I ain’t coming to town,’ said the voice from inside. ‘I … I’m not coming. I told the sheriff what day our pa disappeared and that’s that. You ain’t getting nothing else.’
Kathleen took a step closer. ‘We understand, Verna. We would just really welcome a couple minutes of your time to talk. Just to help our friend. Please?’
There was a long silence.
‘What happened to her?’
They looked at each other.
‘You don’t know?’ said Kathleen.
‘Sheriff just said they found my pa’s body. And the murderer to go with it.’
Alice spoke up. ‘That’s pretty much it. Except, Miss Verna, it’s our friend who is standing trial and we would swear on the Bible that she is not a murderer.’
‘Miss Verna, you may know of Margery O’Hare. You know her daddy’s name travels before her.’ Kathleen’s voice had lowered, as if they were in some casual conversation. ‘But she’s a good woman, a little … unconventional, but not a cold-blooded killer. And her baby faces growing up without a mother because of gossip and rumour.’
‘Margery O’Hare had a baby?’ The gun lowered an inch. ‘Who’d she marry?’
They exchanged awkward glances.
‘Well, she ain’t exactly married.’
‘But that doesn’t mean nothing,’ Izzy called hurriedly. ‘Doesn’t mean she isn’t a good person.’
Beth brought her horse a few steps closer towards the house, and held up a saddlebag. ‘You want some books, Miss McCullough? For you or your sister? We got recipe books, storybooks, all kinds of books. Lots of families up in the mountains happy to take them. You don’t have to pay, and we’ll bring you new ones when you like.’
Kathleen shook her head at Beth and mouthed,I don’t think she can read.
Alice, anxious, tried to talk over them: ‘Miss McCullough, we’re truly, truly sorry about your father. You must have loved him very much. And we’re really sorry to trouble you with this matter. We wouldn’t be here unless we were desperate to help our friend –’
‘I ain’t sorry,’ the girl said.
Alice swallowed the rest of her sentence. Her shoulders slumped a little. Beth’s mouth closed in dismay.
‘Well, I appreciate it’s natural you would harbour ill-feelings towards Margery but I would beg you just to hear –’
‘Not her.’ Verna’s voice hardened. ‘I ain’t sorry about what happened to my pa.’
The women looked at each other, confused. The gun lowered slowly another inch, and then disappeared.
‘You the Kathleen used to have braids pinned upside your head?’
