Chapter 14: Ole

Emlyn woke at dusk the way he always did, all at once, with his eyes open.

"Vinnie," he said. "Are you well?"

"I slept like a baby. Get dressed."

He touched his own mouth, and then my ribs, and found the pink mark already fading.

"It's true," he said. "It's all true."

"It's true, and Ole's gone."

He was dressed in moments and his hands had stopped shaking.

For the first time since I'd met him, he looked like a man who knew where he was going.

Dewey was waiting in the lot with the engine running.

"I brought nine," he said. "Fourteen's back at the depot."

"Nine?"

"Truck Nine." He jerked his thumb at the road.

A city plow sat across two parking spaces with its beacon dark and its blade raised.

"You came in a plow," I said.

"You said Ole was in trouble. I figured we might need to knock something down."

Emlyn almost smiled.

"Mr. Pelto, you are a remarkable man."

"Nope. I'm a Finn." Dewey climbed into the cab. "Follow me, kid."

I rode in Nine with him.

Emlyn followed in Dewey's pickup, driving fast and well.

We came up the hill to the Hall at ten to eight, with the steeple black against the stars.

A tall iron gate closed the lane.

"Are you going to ask nicely?" I said.

"Nope," said Dewey, and put the blade down.

It hit the gate at twenty miles an hour.

The iron screamed and folded, and one leaf of it went skating across the snow.

The Hall's front lights came on.

A man in a black coat stepped out onto the steps.

I knew him at once, by the way he stood.

He was the driver of the black car, the one who had been parked at the bottom of every hill I had ever driven.

Emlyn got out of the pickup and walked up through the headlights.

"Mr. Trask," the man in the black coat said. He had a flat, tired voice. "You aren't permitted on the grounds."

"Where is he?"

"The Chair's arranged for Mr. Haugen to rest."

"Rest where?"

The man didn't answer.

"In the cellar," Emlyn said. "She calls it resting. She calls a lock a courtesy."

"Mr. Trask."

"How many years have you driven her to supper?" Emlyn said quietly.

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