Page 51 of The Girl on Hallow's Eve

I find Elias Carver sitting on the wide wrap-around porch of a boarding house in Sherwood. It feels strange walking up to him, knowing he’s been here this whole time and I had no idea. I probably passed by him, maybe even waved, and it never occurred to me that he would play a role in such a massive and intense case. There would be no reason for it to.

He’s a man who looks like his name. In his seventies, but still strongly built, if a little heavy after the years of farm work dwindled and his body didn’t know what to do with itself. He’s drinking a mug of hot cider and if I should venture a guess, there’s a healthy dose of bourbon in there. Warm his bones and loosen his joints, my grandfather used to say.

“I know what you want to talk about,” he says before I get all the way up to him. I pause and he looks over at me with big, dark eyes that hold every single day of his life still in them. “You’re Emma Griffin, aren’t you?”

He’s not asking it with the same admiring, excited inflection I hear regularly. Instead, it’s almost a challenge. Like he’s asking me to live up to that, to confirm who I am rather than my name.

“Yes,” I nod.

“Jackson’s girl,” he says.

It’s been a long time since I heard that name and it makes my heart flutter a little.

“You knew my grandfather?”

He chuckles softly and nods. “I knew you. Your grandparents used to bring you out to my farm to pick pumpkins. You liked to sit on old Bentley, that big paint horse who couldn’t be bothered with anything but peppermint and lazy walks. Do you remember that?”

I shake my head. “No. I’m sorry.”

“No need to be sorry. That was a long time ago. And I hear you’ve been through a thing or two since then.”

“I have.”

He lets out a breath. “So have I. So maybe out of everybody, you’ll understand why I did what I did.”

“Do you mean selling your land?” I ask.

“That’s right.”

“I don’t understand. That’s why I’m here. It was your whole farm. Everything. And unless something very different happened for you than for the other people who sold land to the developers, you got a really bad deal for it. Far less than that land is worth even just in basic value. Not to mention what it must mean to you sentimentally. Generations of your family have been on that land.”

“I know that. It used to be something really special. But I had to get off of that. I didn’t mind the deal they gave me. They could have given me less and I would have taken it. I needed to be away from there. Too many bad memories. No real benefit for a long time,” he says.

“Are you talking about Briar Hill?”

He nods, a veil of pain coming over his eyes.

“Haven’t heard that name in a long time.”

“Not a lot of people still remember that you own it. Everybody says it’s just abandoned. Did you even know there was a fire out there a few days ago?” I ask.

“I haven’t set foot on that land in almost thirty years. I have two sons buried out there. Too much sadness.”

“Two sons?” I ask.

“My son Colby was killed when his horse kicked him in the head. His girlfriend left right after with their little one and I haven’t heard a word from them since. Not too long after that, his younger brother died of a heart attack. My oldest boy was all I had left. The rest of my family splintered a long time ago.”

“Where’s your oldest son?”

“He stayed on the land for a while. It was too much for me and eventually I guess it became too much for him. He went on and built a new life. I don’t see him much, but he’s doing what he should be doing. Thriving. I remember what that was like. I remember having something to be proud of. Before I knew.” He stops. “Money isn’t all that matters, little girl. Remember that. It isn’t what you have in your pocket. It’s how you get it there. And what you do with it when you take it out.”

“Mr. Carver, do you have any old pictures of the land? From when you were younger, when your sons were around? Something I could take with me if I promised to bring it back?”

He laughs a little. “If you have to bring it back, that means you have to visit with me awhile. Talk to me about your grandpa.”

“I would have happily done that anyway,” I smile.

“Keilan Smith, please,” I say into the phone as I tug off my sweater and stretch my phone cord to its absolute limit going down the hall to toss it into the laundry. “Emma Griffin calling.”

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