Chapter 29
jack
The small town was as pretty as a Christmas card, the sunshine dazzling off the snow like diamonds. The roads had been plowed, but they weren’t bare, so Jack drove carefully down Elliot Street to the other end of town and the Bean There.
The small parking lot was full, which meant Jack had to park along a side street, then help Morgan across the drifts and curls that the plow had left behind.
Just as they reached the sidewalk, three people came out of the café, and Jack let go of Morgan’s elbow to grab the door. But when Jack ushered Morgan inside, instead of being irritated about needing help, about being seen to need help, Morgan nodded at him and said, “Thank you.”
“You bet.”
Not that being handy to have around was going to stop Morgan from telling him it was time for him to go—though it was odd that although Morgan had deposited a can of quarters at the bank, he’d not actually withdrawn any money.
Not that Jack had seen, anyway. He’d been pretty busy toward the end with Mister Rocket in his arms and Mabel fussing and fluttering around them both like a mother hen.
“You see anywhere to sit?” Jack asked, scanning the room.
The coffee shop was busy, as the bank had been, on account of the weather was finally nice. So it made sense that Morgan should try to find them a table while Jack went up and ordered.
Sitting down with Morgan to have a coffee would be painful. But maybe this was the last time he was ever going to get the chance to be with Morgan, and he wanted to make the most of it. It would probably be best if he left on the midnight train that very night.
“I—” Morgan looked like he was going to suggest they get the coffees to go. Which was the opposite of making the most of the day, plus the drinks would be cold by the time they got back to the feed and grain.
“Table,” Jack said, pointing at a happy family of five who were getting to their feet in the back, near a glass-fronted display case. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Morgan said, his shoulders slumping as though he’d been defeated by some unspoken logic. He reached for his wallet and handed it to Jack, the whole thing, rather than pulling out a credit card or a ten-dollar bill.
“No mochas,” he said, pointing at Jack, as if that was the argument they were having, rather than the unspoken and as yet unresolved issue of Jack’s departure. “Get me—” Morgan paused. “Get me whatever you’re having. It looked good last time.”
“You got it,” Jack said. Holding the wallet gingerly, he stepped to the back of the line. Which, to his pleasure and relief, moved briskly.
When he got to the front, Julian, in a neatly tied apron, his artistic beard nicely coiffed, was there to assist him. Jack showed him the wallet, raised his eyebrows, and waved in Morgan’s direction.
“This is his.” When Julian nodded, Jack said, “Could I get two pour-overs, please? Medium, and two scones? Whatever you’ve got.”
“Certainly, sir.” Julian took the credit card Jack handed him. “Can I toast those for you?”
“Yes, please,” Jack said, using his best manners. He put the credit card back in Morgan’s wallet once Julian had run it, then looked to see where he might wait for the coffees.
Julian shook his head. “Go sit down. I’ll bring them. I need to make rounds, anyway.”
“Thanks,” Jack said. He wove among the tables to where Morgan was sitting with his back to the wall and held out the wallet. “I bought a crate of diamonds, some gold bullion, and a Rolls-Royce.”
“What about the meth?” Morgan asked without skipping a beat. “Why do you always forget the meth?”
Jack laughed under his breath, and Morgan scowled as he shifted his hip to put the wallet in his pocket. Making it seem like he wanted to be irritated but simply could not be.
When Jack sat down in one of the metal chairs with the heart-shaped backs, Morgan looked at him, his eyes asking where the coffee was.
“He’ll bring it,” Jack said. Then, to distract himself from Morgan’s closeness, the soft sigh he made as he relaxed in his chair, Jack asked, “What do you think about that ledger, huh?”
Morgan laid the ledger on the table and opened it. The table was big enough so there was plenty of room.
“Let me call Gus,” he said, pulling out his phone, though Jack hoped he wasn’t going to have a phone conversation in a crowded coffee shop. Gus didn’t answer, thankfully, and Morgan ended the call without leaving a message.
“There’s all these names,” Morgan said, pointing at a page, his finger underlining the cursive writing. “But except for Gus, I don’t know any of these people.”
He flipped through the pages, reading the top of each one.
“Isaac McGinlay, Sun. Leroy Svenson, Pot. Felix Steinberg, Bar. Herbert Winfield, Ho. What does that mean? And these amounts. In one column, that’s money out.
Some kind of credit extended. The other column is money in, to record what people paid against what they borrowed, but all the spaces are blank.
And I don’t have any way of contacting these people.
Unless I start asking around town, demanding payment like an October version of Ebenezer Scrooge. ”
“You’re not that,” Jack said, a great deal more gently than he should have.
He should be detached, driving Morgan all over town in a businesslike fashion while he got mentally ready for the final blow. He should not be behaving like this. Not talking softly, like he cared. Because he couldn’t care. Shouldn’t. But he did, and it would hurt so bad when he left.
“I guess not,” Morgan said. He pushed the ledger to the side when he saw Julian coming their way, carrying a tray laden with tall white mugs of coffee, packets of sugar, plastic tubs of cream, and, best of all, sugar-speckled scones on white china plates.
If Morgan wondered why he was getting such top-tier service, being waited on at a table while everyone else in the place had to stand in line, he didn’t ask.
“Thank you,” Jack said, dumping two sugar packets and two tubs of cream into his mug. “We appreciate it.”
They drank their coffee and munched on the scones in relative silence. The coffee was sweet and smooth, and Jack sighed as the warmth and the caffeine and the sugar hit his belly.
All the while, customers cycled through, stomping their feet as they came in from the cold, bundling up as though for a trek through the Arctic as they went out into it. Jack and Morgan were seated at the back, so they weren’t in any line of traffic.
“Mabel!” Morgan said suddenly, gesturing with a chunk of scone.
“What?” Jack asked, startled. “What about her? She wasn't in the ledger.”
Morgan nodded to himself as he bit into the scone, sending crumbs everywhere. Dipping his chin, he brushed his coat clean, then looked at Jack.
“She might know why Aunt Oralee paid fifty bucks a year for a safe-deposit box, simply to keep a ledger in there that she could just as easily have kept at home,” Morgan said.
“And she would know who those people are. Even if she doesn’t know what the ledger is for, surely she knows who Isaac McGinlay, Sun is, and all the rest of them. ”
“We should go see her,” Jack said. “Except she’s mad at you.” And then wished he’d kept his mouth shut both times. This wasn’t his town, these weren’t his friends, and this wasn’t his conversation.
Mabel was angry with Morgan, yes, and once Jack left, Morgan could take care of that situation. Or not. It had nothing to do with Jack. Right?
“She is.” Morgan finished his coffee and made an attempt at wiping the crumbs off the table into the palm of his hand, but the crumbs went where they wanted to go. Then he went still, dusting his hands as he let out a long, slow breath. “And with good reason.”
“Good reason?” Jack asked, wondering why they weren’t getting up to go back to the feed and grain so Jack could start packing what little he intended to take with him.
“I haven’t done right by you,” Morgan said. His eyes looked dull, like he’d been carrying around a lot more than Jack had been aware of.
“Huh?” It wasn’t very articulate, but it was all Jack could manage.
“I’ve been treating you—” Morgan stopped to scrub at his mouth with the palm of his hand. “I’ve had you running and fetching and carrying, acting like you’re my personal nursemaid. And you wanted that peach cobbler. You wanted it. But instead of saying we could scrape out the truck and go get it—”
“We couldn’t have,” Jack said. “The sheriff said to stay off the roads.”
“True,” Morgan said. “But we could have discussed that together, instead of me dismissing what you wanted because my only goal was to make you earn that thousand bucks and see you on your way.”
“If you want to pay me,” Jack said carefully, hearing the iciness in his voice, “we can go to the bank right now. Though I’m not sure why you didn’t pick up the money when we were just there.”
“I’m not sure, either.” Morgan’s voice was flat.
Jack got up, his fists balled at his sides, his mouth opening to defend himself. He didn’t deserve the way Morgan kept blowing hot and cold, but Jack wasn’t standing on any ground that belonged to him. The town was Morgan’s, and the feed and grain was, too.
Jack had no place here, so he had to go soon. He knew that. But if Morgan kept on with that sad face and those I-can’t-make-up-my-mind statements, Jack was going to lose his shit and stomp off and hitch a ride or hop a train that very minute, regardless of the weather or the train’s schedule.
Morgan stood up. “Another day,” he said. “I can’t deal with her today.”
And with that, he was back to business.
Jack could only blink at him. Morgan appeared to be completely unaware of how Jack felt. But then he always had been.
It was only about Morgan. About what was going on with him. About getting the feed and grain ready to sell so that he could move on from all of this. From Jack. From his memories of Jack.
They got a pound of fragrant, freshly roasted coffee to go. Morgan carried the bag and led the way outside, then let Jack catch up and help him over the low drifts.
“She was so pissed,” Morgan said, almost as an aside. Like he was talking to himself.
“Not at me,” Jack said, waiting until Morgan was in the truck before closing the door behind him. Then he went to the driver’s side and got in. After starting the engine, he blew on his hands and inhaled the scent of ground coffee, floating in the air like a promise.
“No, she wasn’t mad at you.” Morgan spoke almost too quietly to be heard as Jack pulled out into the street, his hands steady on the wheel when the tires sank into frozen ruts. “She was pissed at me. Never even gave me a chance to explain.”
That was how Morgan was going to remember him: A problem to be solved. A reason Mabel had yelled at him. Well, that was Morgan’s choice. Jack would soon be gone, continuing his journey how it had begun. Jumping on a freight train headed to parts unknown, to find a place where he could stay.
It was getting near dinnertime. It was easier to focus on getting out another round of chicken pot pies and not the fact that Morgan wasn’t talking to him. He’d been busy in the office since they got back, ruffling papers. Tapping keys.
Jack had brewed some coffee using the fresh bag but retreated back to the kitchen after placing a mug on the desk in front of Morgan.
He could just walk. His knife and his jacket and his boots were all in the parlor.
Sure, he could wait by the tracks for the train to come, but it’d be hours before that happened. He didn’t want to take the coat or the boots or anything Morgan had bought him, anyway. It would remind him of Hysham. Of Mabel and Mister Rocket. Of Morgan.
He would leave without any of that stuff, wear his old boots, walk out into the cold twilight, and freeze to death before he got very far.
Or maybe some kind person would pick him up and give him a lift to Billings, where he could steal a thicker coat, and then he’d make his way to the coast from there.
But he wanted to wait. Not for the money Morgan had promised him, but so he could talk to Morgan.
He’d walked out on his old life, left his family behind, without an explanation. His fury and his hurt had driven him, or maybe guided him, to the train tracks, the old station up those concrete stairs. That seemed so long ago. He felt different now, and making a silent exit wasn’t right.
He would say goodbye to Morgan before going. He wouldn’t accept the money, because it was bullshit. The things he’d done for Morgan, he’d done with his heart.
Maybe at the beginning, the offer of a thousand dollars had seemed fair—generous, even, especially when a place to sleep and three meals a day had been thrown into the bargain.
That was then.
That was before he’d gotten to know Morgan.
Before they’d worked together on plans to clean up the feed and grain so it could be sold.
Before Mister Rocket and Mabel. Before that trip to Billings, when they’d been rescued just in time, saved by a little white-haired lady and a snowplow and a taciturn sheriff.
The town of Hysham had sunk its hooks into him, and the only time they hurt was now.
He needed to clarify with Morgan what he was going to do, and then he needed to tuck his heart away and head out. If Morgan insisted on giving him a ride to Billings in the morning, fine. But Jack wouldn’t take the money. Or the coat, or even the boots.
He’d be better off bringing nothing with him to remind him of this little place in the middle of nowhere. It’d be a memory encased in glass, like a soap bubble blown in the cold with curved flakes of frost decorating it.
By the time Morgan came into the kitchen, gripping his cell phone in one hand and leaning heavily on his cane, he looked pale and tired. Jack started to ask the last time he had taken his meds, but then he stopped.
Soon that wouldn’t be his problem. So instead he asked, “You want dinner?”
Morgan sank into the nearest chair. “Sure, thanks.” Then he sighed like the weight of the world was on his shoulders and Jack was just there to cook and clean. “I can’t make heads or tails of those numbers.”
“That’s too bad,” Jack said. He didn’t care about the numbers, and he shouldn't care about Morgan. But now, looking at Morgan struggling and exhausted, Jack wanted to stay and help him, even though he knew that would be a mistake.