Hunter's Prize (24 page)

“Ah, dear lady, you ask this of a minister? Everything and everyone is worth saving.” Smiling, he handed off the bowl to his right. “I can tell you this much, our project supervisor is worthy of his hire.” He winked at Theo. “With this young man at the helm, we’ll build a structure you can be proud of.”

The tips of Theo’s ears turned bright red. “Thank you, Reverend.”

Until that second, Addie hadn’t taken Theo very seriously. Seated across the table from her, he squirmed beneath the attention, chewing on his bottom lip to keep from smiling. The humble gesture touched her heart.

Upon closer inspection, he was actually a nice-looking fellow. Some would even say handsome. His dark clownish curls and peculiar manner of speech drew attention from the delicate arch of his brows and the pleasing shape of his mouth. His wheat-colored skin and brown eyes. His—

A heaping platter jutted in front of her face. “Pork?”

Pearson, anger etched on his face, held the tray of ham. Something besides rage flashed in his eyes. He’d caught her staring at Theo and didn’t like it. Did he find her unworthy of his best friend?

She shook her head. “I don’t partake of unclean beasts, Mr. Foster.” She tucked her chin and lowered her voice. “Or pork.”

Deliberately crowding her, he leaned to offer the meat to the man at her left.

She lightly shoved him.

He jabbed her with his elbow.

Furious, she twisted in the chair, offering him her back. “Priscilla, tell your guests the story of the grandfather clock.”

Giving encouragement, the clock struck the ninth hour.

Priscilla smiled and launched into the charming tale, complete with the song at the end.

While she spoke, Pearson gradually inched closer until she could feel his warm breath on her neck.

Flustered, she swatted the swirling, tickly hairs.

He laughed, low and throaty.

She imagined the satisfaction of dumping her plate in his lap.

“Miss Priscilla?” Delilah whispered from the threshold.

Priscilla glanced up from buttering her flapjacks. “What is it, Lilah? You’re interrupting breakfast.”

Her eyes were wide. “Little Man need Miss Addie.”

Priscilla glanced at Addie and back. “Something you can’t handle?”

She shook her head. “Not this I cain’t.”

Addie pushed back her chair, the harsh bump it gave Pearson’s leg bringing warm satisfaction. Served the gangly rogue right for scooting improperly close. “I don’t mind, Priscilla. I’ll go see what he needs.”

She followed Delilah up the stairs, curious questions pressing at her lips. Before she had time to voice them, Delilah pushed open the door and stood aside.

Ceddy sat in his usual place, his favorite box of rocks on his lap.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

Addie shot Delilah a puzzled frown. “What’s the urgent problem? He seems fine.”

“Oh, he fine enough.” Her brows rose, wrinkling her forehead. “Only your special necklace ain’t.”

At Addie’s openmouthed stare, she nodded. “Go on. See for yourself.”

Dread crowding her throat, Addie hurried over and dropped to her knees beside the boy. Her darting gaze scanned the box in Ceddy’s lap, and her heart pitched to her throat. “Oh Ceddy,” she breathed, tears blurring the terrible sight, “what have you done?”

The small jasper stone he once kept in the box was gone. Grandmother’s polished pendant jutted from its place. The clasp and beads were gone.

P
earson rubbed his throbbing shin beneath the table. Blast that infernal female! He’d never met a more vexing woman. Each time he gained the upper hand in their curious game, she played a marked card.

Blistering under the heat of another’s stare, he looked up.

Theo watched him, a teasing grin on his face.

In no mood for his taunting, Pearson challenged him with a raised brow.

Still smiling, Theo shook his head and tucked into his scrambled eggs.

“So, Pearson,” the reverend said, “tell me more about your drowsy hired hands.”

Pearson folded his napkin and laid it beside his plate. “There’s not much to tell. They’re an odd pair, I know that much. Aimless drifters, I think. Full of questions, but fairly closemouthed about themselves.”

The reverend bit off a corner of his biscuit. “Most drifters are.”

“They’re foreigners,” Theo said. “Fresh off the boat from South Africa.” He held up his spoon. “With accents as thick as these grits.”

Knives and forks stilled their clinking, followed by shared laughter.

A wrinkle creased Theo’s forehead. “What’s the joke?”

Pearson chuckled again. “That’s a funny observation, coming from you.”

“What are you saying? I speak plain enough.”

Pointing at the white mound in Theo’s spoon, Pearson grinned. “Not that bad, but close.”

Theo thumped his chest. “Now you hurt my feelings.”

“Mercy sakes, we’re out of syrup.” Miss Whitfield added the last thick drops to her skillet cakes. Peering into the hall, she heaved a sigh. “I suppose Delilah’s still upstairs.” Pushing back her chair, she plunked her napkin on the table and stood. “Excuse me, gentlemen. I’m a little shorthanded this morning. I’ll have to run out and fetch it myself.” She waved at their plates. “Carry on. I won’t be a minute.”

As though anyone would have waited.

She slipped into the hallway leading to the kitchen.

The reverend turned to Pearson. “I didn’t want to say anything in front of Priscilla. She’s so easily flustered.”

Dread settled in Pearson’s stomach. By the look on the man’s face, his next words weren’t good news. “Go on, sir.”

“It’s probably nothing to worry about, but there’s a lot of talk around the church about a series of petty crimes taking place in town. Folks are getting nervous and starting to point the finger.” His gaze flitted to the window then returned, his stare direct. “You and Theo are the only strangers living in town. People have noticed, and they talk.”

Theo’s fist came down on the table. “What?”

Incensed, Pearson half rose in his chair, but the reverend waved him down. “A conclusion I promptly squashed.” He forked another flapjack and idly spread it with jam. “Your workmen never crossed my mind until just now. They’re recent additions to our fair town as well.”

Theo sat forward in his chair. “It’s true, they are. They must be the ones who—”

Reverend Stroud held up his hand. “Careful, son. You didn’t appreciate the finger pointed in your direction without cause. You don’t want to be guilty of the same.” He shrugged. “I’m only suggesting you keep a watchful eye on them.” A small frown creased his brow. “Unless you have reason to trust them, of course.”

Pearson shook his head. “There’s nothing about their conduct so far to encourage trust.”

He gripped Pearson’s shoulder. “Then I repeat my caution. Be careful.”

Addie sat on the floor with her hands clenched in her lap, tears coursing unchecked down her cheeks. Mother had entrusted her with a precious possession. Two weeks in her care, and it existed only in scattered pieces. Finding those pieces had become the most important task in Addie’s life.

A frantic search of her jewelry case, the floor in her room, Ceddy’s room, and the hallway in between had revealed nothing. With Delilah’s help, they looked in every likely place inside the house—with no luck.

She turned to her young charge and dropped to his level. “Ceddy?” she whispered. “Please show Addie where you left the beads.”

Moaning softly, he spread his fingers over the collection box and shrank away.

Delilah slumped on the side of the bed. “He feel your anger. You won’t get nothin’ out of him while he do.”

Addie swiveled to look at her. “Anger?” Spinning to Ceddy, she held out her hands. “Oh honey, I’m not angry with you.” But was she?

He offered her his shoulder.

“I only want to make it right again.” She nodded at the top of his unresponsive head. “To fix the pretty necklace.” She sniffled. “It doesn’t belong to me, you see. It’s my mother’s, and it’s very, very dear to her.” Her voice broke, and she turned away, unable to fight the sobs shaking her.

Delilah drew in sharply. “Don’t you cry, Miss Addie. We gon’ find it somehow.”

Addie covered her face and let the bitter tears fall.

A timid little hand ventured into her lap and closed around her finger. Ceddy tugged, grunted, and tugged again, trying to pull her to her feet.

Amazement penetrated Addie’s heartbreak. Gathering her legs beneath her, she pushed off the floor and followed him from the room.

They descended the stairs. Addie shot a questioning look over her shoulder at Delilah.

Eyes wide, Delilah shrugged.

At the base of the staircase, Ceddy veered right instead of left toward the main rooms of the house. A hallway Addie only vaguely knew existed led to a single door.

Ceddy opened it and pushed into the room, hauling her with him.

A large, inviting space drew her in, filled with high shelves and wall-to-wall cases lined with books in various bindings and muted colors. A massive desk, framed by floor-to-ceiling windows, dominated the room. The heavy brocade drapes were open, and beams of dusty sunlight slanted to the floor.

Addie raised her brows at Delilah.

“This be Masta Whitfield’s den before he passed,” she whispered. “Miss Priscilla’s brother. Nobody come in here no more except me, for to dust, and Little Man on occasion.” She nodded at the walls. “He like to study inside these books.”

Ceddy pulled a tall, rolling ladder from the corner and climbed to a shelf over Addie’s head. Panting from the strain, he pulled out a large book and struggled to tuck it snugly against his chest.

Addie crowded close to the ladder, her arms lifted to catch Ceddy if he fell. When he struggled down the last rung to the floor, she stepped back and sighed with relief. “Oh my, Delilah. Should he be allowed to do that? It seems dangerous.”

Delilah wagged her head. “Ain’t no stopping him. We done tried.”

Running across the room, he heaved the book on the desk, opened the cover, and thumbed through the pages.

Addie peered over his shoulder. “Oh look. It’s a Bible.”

Delilah grunted. “Yes’m, the family Bible. He love the old pictures. ‘Specially David and Goliath.”

Ceddy stopped flipping and stepped aside, scrambling into the high-backed leather chair.

Addie’s heart leapt. Mother’s beads lay tucked inside the worn pages. She picked them up with trembling fingers, cupping them in her palm. The clasp that held the pendant was undone but thankfully still attached.

Delilah nudged her. Smiling, she opened her hand and gave Addie a peek at the pendant, evidently plucked from the collection box before leaving Ceddy’s room.

With all the parts in one place again, the burden lifted from Addie’s shoulders. She hugged Delilah, this time fighting happy tears.

Ceddy bounced several times in the chair then sprang to the floor. Closing the Bible, he lifted it and scurried for the door.

“No, Little Man. You ain’t supposed to be carrying books out from here.”

Paying Delilah no mind, he rounded the corner and disappeared.

Her shoulders slumped. “He determined to keep us busy today.” She patted Addie’s arm. “I’m glad you found your necklace, Miss Addie.”

Addie gave her a trembling smile. “So am I. I prayed so hard.”

At the top of the stairs, Delilah followed Ceddy while Addie rushed to her room. Pulling a chair around, she climbed onto the seat and took her canvas bag from the top of the tall wardrobe. Slipping the button free from the loop, she opened the bag and shoved the beads and pendant to the bottom. There they would stay until she saw her mother again. It wouldn’t do to let Ceddy see them anymore. Her heart several pounds lighter, she returned to his room.

He lay on his stomach on the floor, his raised feet crossed behind him and the family Bible propped open in front. Taking stones from his collection box, he carefully placed them, one at a time, on the page.

Intrigued, Addie knelt beside him. “What’s he doing?”

Delilah turned from emptying Ceddy’s basin into her mop bucket. “He do that all the time.” She pointed with her chin. “Matches up his rocks with the picture there.”

On one side of the book, the page header read E
XODUS
C
HAPTER
28 over twin columns of text. On the facing page, the picture Delilah indicated was a muted lithograph of the high priest’s chest adorned in his breastplate.
Aaron
, Addie’s memory supplied.

A wiggly tongue tucked in the corner of his mouth, Ceddy worked diligently, lining up colorful stones to match those in the Bible.

“Come and see, Delilah. They’re all here. Topaz, sapphire, emerald, amethyst …” She gazed up in wonder. “Surely these stones aren’t actual gems?”

Delilah tilted her head. “Cain’t say, Miss Addie. I reckon most of them are. For years, folks been helping Little Man collect rocks for that old picture. Old Masta Whitfield took uncommon pleasure in it.”

Pointing, she laughed. “I see the old one is back in its place ‘stead of your pretty pendant, and he ain’t even squawked. Seem like he don’t care to see you cry no mo’.”