“Don’t move him!” Jenny shouted. “Call for an ambulance. Hurry.”

Trying to avoid Baron’s body, she kneeled beside Joe, her hand smoothing his forehead, wiping the blood from his eyes, pressing against the gaping tear near his hairline. Men came running from the fields. She could hear the sounds of a woman sobbing. Maude Ekers. “Joey, Joey.”

“Maw…”

“Joey.”

The ambulance arrived. Efficient white-clad attendants ordered everyone back. Then Joe was on the stretcher, his eyes closed, his face ashen. An attendant’s low voice whispered, “I think he’s going.”

There was a shriek from Maude Ekers.

Joe’s eyes opened, fastening on Jenny. His voice was bewildered, amazingly clear. “I’d never a told anyone I saw you get in the car that night, honest I wouldn’t,” he said.

Maude turned on Jenny, as she climbed in the ambulance after her son. “If my boy dies, it’s your fault, Jenny Krueger,” she screamed. “I curse the day you came here! God damn you Krueger women for what you’ve done to my family! God damn the baby you’re carrying, whoever it belongs to!”

The ambulance sped away, the wail of its siren shattering the peace of the summer morning.

Erich arrived home a few hours later. He chartered a plane to fly a chest surgeon down from the Mayo Clinic, and phoned for private nurses. Then he walked into the stable and crouched beside Baron, his hand patting the sleek, beautiful head of the dead animal.

Mark had already analyzed the bucket of oats. The report: strychnine mixed with oats.

Later Sheriff Gunderson showed up at the front door with his now familiar car. “Mrs. Krueger, a half-dozen people heard Joe say he wouldn’t have told that he saw you get in the car that night. What did he mean by that?”

“I don’t understand what he meant.”

“Mrs. Krueger, you were present a short time ago when Dr. Garrett admonished Joe for leaving the rat poison near the oats. You knew what effect it would have on Baron. You heard Dr. Garrett warn Joe that strychnine would drive Baron wild.”

“Did Dr. Garrett tell you that?”

“He told me that Joe had been careless with the rat poison and that you and Erich were present when he dressed Joe down.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“Nothing I can say, Mrs. Krueger. Joe claims he got the boxes mixed up. I don’t believe him. No one does.”

“Will Joe live?”

“Too soon to tell. Even if he does, he’ll be a mighty sick boy for a long time. If he makes it through the next three days, they’re moving him up to Mayo.” The sheriff turned to go. “Like his maw said, at least he’ll be safe up there.”

28

Caught up in the rhythm of her pregnancy, Jenny began counting days and weeks until the baby was due. In twelve weeks, in eleven weeks, in ten weeks, Erich would have a son. He would move back into their room. She would be well again. The talk in town would die out for lack of fresh fuel. The baby would look exactly like Erich.

The operation on Joe’s chest had been successful, though he would not leave Mayo Clinic until the end of August. Maude was staying in a furnished apartment near the hospital. Jenny knew that Erich was paying all the bills.

Now Erich rode Fire Maid when he took the girls riding. He never mentioned Baron to her. She did hear from Mark that Joe had persisted in his story that he must have mixed the poison in with the oats himself and that he had no idea what he’d meant when he talked about seeing Jenny that night.

She didn’t need Mark to tell her that no one believed him.

Erich was working less at the cabin and more on the farm with Clyde and the men. When she asked him about that he said, “I can’t quite get in the mood for painting.”

He was kind to her but remote. Always she felt that he was watching her. In the evenings they’d sit in the parlor and read. He rarely spoke to her, but when she glanced up, she’d see his eyes drop as though he didn’t want to be caught studying her.

About once a week Sheriff Gunderson would drop by, seemingly just to chat. “Let’s go over the night Kevin MacPartland came here, Mrs. Krueger.” Or he would speculate: “Joe has a real big crush on you, don’t he? Enough to make him pretty protective. Anything you feel like talking about, Mrs. Krueger?”

The sensation of someone being in the room with her at night was constant. Always the pattern was the same. She would start dreaming of being in the woods; something would come toward her, hover over her; she’d push out her hand and feel long hair, a woman’s hair. The sighing sound came next. She would fumble for the light and when she turned it on she’d be alone in the room.

Finally she told Dr. Elmendorf about the dream.

“How do you explain it?” he asked.

“I don’t know.” She hesitated. “No, that’s not quite true. I always think it has something to do with Caroline.” She told him about Caroline, told him that everyone close to her seemed to have a sense of her presence.

“I’d guess that your imagination is playing tricks on you. Would you like me to arrange counseling?”

“No. I’m sure you’re right.”

She started to sleep with the light on in the room, then determinedly snapped it off. The bed was to the right of the door. The massive headboard was against the north wall. One side of the bed was close to the east wall of the room. She wondered if Erich would move the bed for her so that it was between the windows on the south wall. There would be more moonlight there. She’d be able to look out when she wasn’t sleeping. The corner where the bed was placed was terribly dark.

She knew better than to make the request.

One morning Beth asked, “Mommy, why didn’t you talk to me when you came into my room last night?”

“I didn’t come to you, Mouse.”

“Yes, you did!”

Was she sleepwalking?

The tiny flutters of life inside her seemed unlike the sturdy kicks she’d known from Beth and Tina. Let the baby be healthy, she pleaded in silent prayer. Let me give Erich his son.

The hot August afternoons dissolved into cool evenings. The woods held the first touches of gold. “It will be an early fall,” Rooney commented. “And by the time the leaves are all turned, your quilt will be finished. You can hang it in the dining room too.”

Jenny avoided Mark as much as possible, staying in the house whenever she glimpsed his station wagon parked near the office. Did he too believe she might have deliberately put poison in Baron’s feed? She felt she could not stand it if she sensed accusation from him too.

In early September, Erich invited Mark and Luke Garrett for dinner. He told her about it casually. “Luke’s going back to Florida until the holidays. I haven’t seen enough of him. Emily’s coming too. I can have Elsa stay and cook.”

“No, that’s the one thing I get to do around here.”

The first dinner party since the night Sheriff Gunderson had come to tell her Kevin was missing. She found herself looking forward to seeing Luke again. She knew Erich went over to the Garrett farm regularly. He’d taken Tina and Beth with him. He never cleared the outings with her anymore. He’d simply announce, “I’ll keep the girls out of your hair for the afternoon. Get a good rest, Jen.”

It wasn’t that she wanted to go. She didn’t want to run the risk of seeing any of the townspeople. How would they treat her? Smile to her face and gossip about her as she passed?

When Erich was away with the girls, she would take long walks on the farm. She would wander along the river and try not to think that Kevin’s car plunged over the bank just around that bend. She walked past the cemetery. Caroline’s grave was planted with summer flowers.

She found herself longing to slip into the woods, to find Erich’s cabin. Once she went fifty yards into them. The thick branches blotted out the sun. A fox passed her, brushing her legs, in pursuit of a rabbit. Startled, she’d turned back. Birds nesting in the trees sent up a flutter of protest as she passed.