Chapter 26
26
When they reached the edge of the clearing where the longhouse was located—her home for the first twenty-seven years of her life—Ruth caught her breath in shock. Gone was the usual assortment of rusty work vehicles. Instead, a fleet of camouflage trucks and high-powered ATVs took their place. Not a single kid was running around the yard, as usually happened when someone new arrived. Not even a dog came running out to bark at them. A strange, tense atmosphere hung over the entire place.
“It doesn’t feel like a family anymore,” she said softly. “It feels like…”
“An armed camp?”
She nodded sadly. Even though everything had changed after the FBI raid, the farm had still felt like home. Not anymore.
“I don’t see anyone around,” said Gunnar as he scanned the clearing with his binoculars.
“Neither do I. Come on, stay close behind me, and stay low.”
They silently scurried the short distance to the chicken coop. To Ruth’s eye, it looked neglected. Eggs still hadn’t been collected, and no one had refreshed the straw in the laying boxes. Maisie’s tail feathers look bedraggled, poor thing. That eerie quiet didn’t quite extend to the hens. They squawked at the sight of her, then quieted down when she tossed them some feed from the container near the door.
“I wonder what’s in those trucks?” Gunnar murmured as he crouched under the window of the coop, binoculars aimed at the vehicles. “Where are all the men?”
Ruth checked the position of the sun in the sky. “They’re never here this time of day. At this hour, it’s just my aunts working on the midday meal.”
“And the kids?”
“I don’t know.” It worried her that the kids were nowhere to be seen. Maybe they were all inside the longhouse?
“I’m going inside,” Ruth said suddenly.
“What? No!”
“It’s just my aunts, and they won’t hurt me. They might even tell me something helpful.”
“Ruth—”
“It’ll be fine. I’ll keep them distracted and you can check the trucks.”
Before Gunnar could argue any more, Ruth dipped out of the coop and dashed across the clearing into the longhouse. It almost felt like traveling back in time, or like a dream she’d nearly forgotten. For a moment, she was seven again, or eleven, running across the grass toward home.
But any hopes of a happy reunion were dashed as soon as she stepped into the kitchen. She found all three of them—Magda, Carrie, and Saffron—there, as she’d expected, although it looked as if they were cooking for three times as many people as usual.
None of them were aunts by blood. All three women had joined the Chilkoot community along with their husbands, and taken on child-rearing tasks, kitchen duty, and whatever other specialties they’d brought with them. Aunt Magda had been a nurse, so she tended to all medical crises. Aunt Carrie had grown up on a farm herself, so she was an expert at raising and butchering livestock. Aunt Saffron had taught Ruth how to make clothing; she’d always been Ruth’s favorite auntie.
But not even Saffron spared Ruth a smile as she hovered in the doorway of the kitchen. No one greeted her. No one said a word. Complete freeze-out.
What now? How to explain her presence?
She cleared her throat. “Hello, everyone. I’m…uh, here to see Luke, does anyone know where he is?”
“No,” Auntie Magda said shortly, which told Ruth that she did know, but wasn’t supposed to say. “You shouldn’t be here. You made your choice. You should get out of here before he knows you’re here. You’re dead to him.”
Aunt Magda’s choice of words sent a chill down Ruth’s spine. Dead to him? That seemed extreme. She was still his daughter, wasn’t she? “I came to get his permission to marry.”
Thank goodness for that backup cover story.
“No need, since you’re not part of the family anymore.” Aunt Carrie brushed past Ruth carrying a bowl of peeled potatoes. Despite herself, Ruth felt tears rise to her eyes. Could she really just be booted out of a family she’d spent twenty-seven years with? How callous could they be?
“He’s still my father.”
Carrie shrugged. She’d always been slender, but now she was downright gaunt. What had been going on here this summer? “Argue with him, then. He says you’re dead to him.”
“If you tell me where he is, I will.”
None of them answered. Ruth blinked the tears out of her eyes. “You’ve all known me since I was a baby. You were nicer to me than my own mother! Are you really going to treat me like this?” she cried out.
Saffron turned from the meat stew she was stirring and jabbed a finger at her. “ You’re the one who turned your back on us. You know what the rules are here. Your first loyalty was supposed to be to us, to the family. You chose to break that rule. Everything else is a consequence of that. Go on. Go back to the town. It’s where you belong now.”
Ruth’s breath caught in her throat. Maybe Aunt Saffron was right. Maybe she did belong in Firelight Ridge now.
You’re not here for a reunion , she reminded herself. She straightened her spine. It didn’t matter what they thought of her. All she wanted was information.
“What about Sarah? Is she dead to Luke too?”
“Sarah?” Magda looked blank, as if she hadn’t heard that name in a while. “That’s different. She’s only sixteen. You probably coerced her to leave.”
“I didn’t coerce her, I was just trying to keep her safe. With all these new men around here, I was worried for her. I don’t even know where they’re from or who they are. Or what they’re doing here. Do you know?”
No one answered. Ruth couldn’t tell if that was because they didn’t know anything, or if they’d been ordered not to speak.
“I mean, there’s kids around here,” she continued. “Shouldn’t their safety come first?”
“All the kids are exactly where they need to be,” Aunt Magda snapped. “Now get on out. Go back to where you belong now.”
Ruth bit her lip. She wasn’t going to make any progress here in this kitchen, where tension bubbled, ready to boil over faster than the potatoes.
She walked through the mudroom, her heart catching at the sight of all the little pegs for the children’s winter coats, and boots of all sizes lined up on floor mats. She paused, listening for the sound of young voices. Where were the kids?
The front door swung open and there was Miller.
“Miller!” she exclaimed softly.
“Auntie Ruth!” For the first time, someone seemed happy to see her. She could have cried with relief.
She looked behind her, making sure no one else was listening, and lowered her voice. “I’m so happy to see you. Where are the others?”
Miller shrugged, as if he had better things to think about.
“What’s been going on here? Who are all these new people?”
“They’re going to help us,” he said eagerly.
“Help you what?”
“Be rich,” he declared. “We’re all going to be rich. We’re all going to be like kings.” His freckled face glowed with excitement.
“Miller, that sounds like a fantasy. You didn’t even know what ‘rich’ meant a year ago. What is going on here? This is me, Auntie Ruth. You can tell me.”
But she saw the little kid she’d watch grow up recede behind a sneering mask. “It’s not a fantasy. It’s real and you were stupid to leave when you did. Anyway, it’s man’s work. You don’t even belong here anymore.” He stuck out his tongue and loped into the house.
Wow. She stood, stunned. Miller could be temperamental, but she’d never seen him be so rude. With a giant lump in her throat, she stepped out of the longhouse, realizing as she did so that it might very well be the last time.
A bittersweet moment. But there was no love for her at this compound—except maybe from the hens.
Inside the chicken coop, there was no sign of Gunnar yet. He must still be scoping out the trucks. Ruth crouched next to Maisie and stroked the delicate orange feathers on her neck. It broke her heart to think of the day that neck would get snapped because Maisie had stopped laying.
At least she wouldn’t have to do the deed. She’d be far away, in Firelight Ridge, unable to do anything for Maisie.
All the kids are right where they need to be.
Aunt Magda’s comment flashed through her mind. What did she mean by that? She’d phrased it so oddly. And where were all the kids—besides Miller?
She jumped when Gunnar’s voice interrupted her speculations. “Let’s go,” he said softly as he stepped back into the coop. “I’m ready to get the hell away from this place.”
“Me too.” She dropped a kiss on Maisie’s feathers, and rose to her feet. The hen gave a soft cluck and went back to pecking at the ground.
“You aren’t going to leave her behind, are you?”
“Um…of course? We’re buddies, but she doesn’t belong to me.”
“Pffft.” Gunnar bent down and swept Maisie under his arm in one swift gesture. He tucked her under his jacket and adjusted it so she was completely undetectable.
“Are you serious?”
“Unless she starts pecking my ribs, yup. Want to grab your books, too?”
She cast a longing glance at the hole in the wall where they were stashed. It would take some time to retrieve them, too much time. “It’s okay. I have them practically memorized.”
“Come on, then.”
They quick-strolled out of the chicken coop and across the grassy field toward the clearing. As they walked, voices caught their attention. A man was shouting instructions to someone else, and his words wafted through the air, loud and clear.
“Airstrip first, without that it won’t work.” This man had a strong accent.
“How we gonna do that?” That sounded like Uncle Ted.
The first man’s answer was too jumbled to understand.
“Let’s run it by the big guy. The five-foot-eight big guy.” They both laughed and the conversation shifted to weightlifting, as their voices got louder and louder.
Without a word, both Gunnar and Ruth picked up the pace. Those two men were coming toward them, and Ruth, for one, didn’t want to confront them. These newcomers were very different from the Chilkoots she was used to. Cocky, sure of themselves, laughing at their boss? It unnerved her.
Ruth didn’t take an easy breath until they were back in the shelter of the woods. They walked quickly back to the truck, not saying a word in case their voices carried.
Once they were safely in Gunnar’s truck, he carefully extracted Maisie from under his coat. She settled the hen on her lap and put her own sweater over Maisie’s plump feathered body. Would Maisie be okay away from the Chilkoot chicken coop? Hens were attached to their own flocks, but Maisie had always been an outlier, at times even an outcast.
Maybe Martha’s chickens would accept her the way Firelight Ridge had accepted Ruth.