SleepyHollow2BookBundle (18 page)

Brom nodded, still frowning. “No, we can’t. I’ll pay the Smits a visit myself, and see if they can recall anything else about the culprit.”

“I wish you luck,” Mrs. Jansen said, “though you know how Martha is – she never leaves out a single detail, if she can help it.”

“We’ll see,” Brom said. “Perhaps her husband will have noticed something she missed. Meanwhile…” He picked up a hot bun, and as he broke it open, the frown disappeared from his face. “We came here to borrow a hammer to repair the schoolhouse roof with. Do you mind, Mrs. Jansen?”

“Of course not. Let me just fetch it…” Within moments she’d returned with the appropriate tool. While she’d been gone, Brom had devoured four rolls without batting an eyelash. John envied his lover’s ability to put matters – even highly disconcerting ones – so completely out of his mind. Doubtlessly, he’d return to it later and analyze every last little bit of Martha Smit’s tale, but for now, it was as far away as summertime. Unfortunately, John couldn’t stop thinking about the reputedly headless horseman for even a moment.

* * * * *

“I told you the crows were a bad omen,” John said, removing a crooked shingle and wedging a new one in its place.

Brom grunted, his lips closed tightly around several nails.

John took that as a question and waved a hand toward the horizon, where the sky met the forest. “It’s going to rain.”

Brom peered over one broad shoulder, and his eyes widened a little at the sight of the encroaching storm clouds. Taking the nails from his mouth and pinching them carefully between his fingers, he sighed. “Rain isn’t a bad thing if you’ve got a solid roof over your head.”

John reached out and took the borrowed hammer from Brom, neatly driving the nail he’d been holding into the overlapping joint of two shingles. “Yes, that’s the problem.” He gazed appraisingly around at the roof, which he and Brom were perched precariously on top of, not so unlike two crows themselves. “We’ve still got half an hour’s work ahead of us, and we must finish, or the roof will leak.”

“Here,” Brom said, holding a nail in place and motioning toward the hammer.

John raised the tool and pounded the nail down, careful not to smash Brom’s thick fingers.

“A little rain never hurt anyone,” Brom said, pulling his hand away.

“Ha,” John said austerely, “tell that to Mrs. Jansen. A thorough soaking will be nothing compared to her reaction. She’ll hold me prisoner in front of the kitchen fire for the rest of the day.”

Brom flashed John a hint of a wry smile. “There are worse fates than being coddled by a farmwife.”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right.” A twinge of regret assailed John, causing him to grip a nail a little too tightly, piercing the pad of his thumb with the tip. As he dropped the nail, he chanced a glance at Brom’s face. It was an impassive mask, lightly lined in concentration as Brom lined up another shingle. Brom’s lack of reaction did little to quell John’s guilt over his careless complaint, though – surely, being fussed over by Mrs. Jansen
was
vastly preferable to returning home to an empty house and a cold bed, as Brom must. “It’s only that I’d much rather go home with you.” The words tumbled out of John’s mouth before he had a chance to stop them.

Brom paused, looking up from his work to meet John’s eyes. “I’d rather you did too.”

Heat suffused John at the idea of keeping Brom warm the whole night through, their bodies close together in a single bed. The sensation was accompanied by a pang of desperate longing, and then regret – regret that it couldn’t be so. “If only,” he murmured, tearing his gaze away from Brom’s dark eyes to scan the roof for any other cracked and crooked shingles in need of attention.

Brom grunted his agreement, several nails caught between his lips again.
 

They both worked in silence for a while longer, and the dark rainclouds stretched overhead, spilling their contents. When the first volley of raindrops hit John’s back, he looked over his shoulder at Brom. The other man was still working, doggedly nailing another shingle in place. There was only one hammer between the two of them, and Brom showed no signs of relinquishing it, but John stayed with him on the roof until the job was done, helping where he could. By the time they climbed down and their feet touched solid ground again, they were both soaked.

“I feel badly for Torben,” Brom said as he and John ducked through the door and into the schoolhouse. “I’ve left him tethered at the hitching post long enough – I’ll have to leave soon.”

John nodded as he strode around the schoolhouse, examining the floors for dampness and listening for the sound of dripping water. He found neither.

“I’ll see you again tonight though,” Brom said, “if you can manage to escape Mrs. Jansen’s clutches.”

John couldn’t help but perk up at this mysterious promise. “Oh? What’s the occasion, then?”

Brom’s mouth curved in a grimace of determination. “Tonight we start our search for this supposedly headless horseman.”

A shiver that had nothing to do with the cold wracked John. Distracted by the discomfort of his soaking and the glorious sight of Brom gleaming with rainwater, his clothing clinging to his muscular frame, John had managed to temporarily forget Martha Smit’s frightful tale and his own promise to help Brom set things straight.

“Unless you’d rather not?” Brom asked, arching a dark brow.

The faintly amused tone of Brom’s voice sealed John’s determination. “Absolutely I’ll go with you.”

* * * * *

The best seamstress in Tarrytown had promised to finish Katrina’s gown in time for the wedding, and Katrina’s father had spoken with the local minister, who’d readily agreed to perform the ceremony. Katrina should have been pleased with the day’s events, and in a way she was, but as she settled beneath the blankets and sank into the mattress, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on hindered her happiness.
 

She smoothed the quilt over her middle, staring out the window at the moon. A day’s passage had shaved a sliver from the silver half-sphere, leaving it a little less full than it had been the night before. Consequently, the world was a little darker, including the inside of Katrina’s bedroom. Shadows stretched across the floorboards and loomed over her bed, undeniably gloomy. If only she still had John’s favorite volume of poetry – she could have comforted herself by reading a few verses by candlelight before bed. A pang of regret struck her as she imagined the feel of pages between her fingers, but returning the book had been worth it – seeing John safe and well had been an immense relief.

He’d seemed stable in Brom’s company, if not completely at ease, and there was no question that he’d enjoyed her pie. She lapsed automatically into a smile at the memory of how his face had looked when he’d first smelled the gooseberries. Surely morbid thoughts couldn’t coexist with the anticipation and enjoyment of a freshly baked pie. She’d felt satisfied when she’d left the schoolhouse, confident in John’s safety – it had been on the way home from Tarrytown that this melancholy feeling had first assailed her.

She’d ridden in the carriage with her father, and they’d been caught off guard by rain that had been as fierce as it had been unexpected. It had blown beneath the carriage’s top, driven by the wind, and dampened her skin and clothing. Each drop had felt like a tiny needle, driving cold deep into her bones. As she’d shivered against the carriage seat, she’d seen a pair of crows roosting in a barren tree, heads tucked against the rain.
 

She’d instantly thought of John, who, ever-superstitious, regarded the somber birds as worthy of suspicion at best, and often, harbingers of bad fortune. But she’d heard other, happier things about them – namely, that a pair of crows foretold a wedding. The sight of them might have heartened her, if it hadn’t been for the fact that her and Brom’s wedding
would
be bad fortune for John, in a way. She wasn’t a fool – she was fully aware that John harbored feelings for her that went beyond mere friendship. And she returned his affection, though her fondness for Brom was no weaker for it.

So she’d ridden back to the farm, a prisoner of her own contradicting emotions, and had passed the afternoon in a whirlwind of domestic industry, baking and cleaning the daylight hours away. Now she was tired, but sleep eluded her. Instead, her worries and hopes about the next two weeks’ events burst forth like sudden rain.
 

It wasn’t only her impending marriage and the fact that it might isolate her from her good friend John that worried her, but a chilling tale that a neighbor had related to her father that afternoon. Katrina had heard every word. Even now, despite the fact that her body heat had thoroughly warmed the blankets, she shivered as she imagined the headless specter the Smits claimed to have encountered two nights before, on the way home from the harvest celebration.

 
Although the story was harrowing enough on its own, it hadn’t escaped her that it had occurred directly after John’s attempted suicide. There was no direct or definite connection she could point to, but it was disconcerting to hear of death riding among the living when someone she loved had so recently cheated it. Doing her best to cleanse her mind of spectral images and morbid fancies, she let herself dwell instead on the two very alive men who had dominated her thoughts of late.

Rain began to fall again, and the steady beating of it against the roof lulled her into a sleepy, if not quite restful state. As she slipped into the world of slumber, Brom and John stayed with her. In the peculiar way of dreams, she hovered somewhere in the distance, and saw herself standing before a minister with a man dressed in his Sunday best.
 

He, the groom, was Brom, of course, except…sometimes he wasn’t. Sometimes he was John, and then, the next moment, Brom again. By the time the ceremony was over, she wasn’t sure who she’d married, but her heart swelled with joy beneath the pale blue fabric of her wedding gown regardless. The fantasy sped forward, and by the time she arrived home with her bridegroom, she was experiencing the dream from within her own body. When she reached her marriage bed, she distinctly felt two sets of hands descend on her body, slipping beneath her gown and causing her breath to catch in her chest and then escape her in a rush as her nipples pricked against the fine fabric of her shift.

CHAPTER 4

The last sliver of daylight had disappeared nearly an hour ago, slipping behind the tree line, a scenic view of which was afforded by the Jansens’ kitchen window. John had watched the light go, and it hadn’t so much faded as simply vanished, abruptly darkening the countryside. It had been an unsettling moment, but each minute that had stretched by afterward had been more so. Where was Brom? He’d said he’d arrive at the Jansens’ around sunset. John had waited faithfully at the table across from the window, keeping an uneventful watch. He tried not to think about what might have happened if Brom had encountered the headless phantom on his way
to
the Jansens’ farm – after all, he did have to ride through the forest to get there.

But that was nonsense. Another man, John might have truly worried about, but it was next to impossible to imagine a man as solidly made as Brom Bones being bested by a specter. So where was he?

Footsteps sounded on the hallway floorboards, padding softly toward the kitchen. John turned in his chair, tearing his gaze away from the window for the first time since he’d sat down. Could it be Mrs. Jansen, come to ply him with more food? A half-full plate still sat in front of him, bearing thick slices of bread generously slathered with butter and berry preserves, and a hunk of cheese half the size of a man’s fist. Apparently, she thought the victuals a must if John was to successfully hunt down the headless horseman; it hadn’t mattered a bit to her that he’d already eaten a large dinner.

It wasn’t Mrs. Jansen, but her youngest son, Joshua.

“What are you doing out of bed?” John asked, suppressing a smile of amusement. The boy normally sounded like a bull stampeding through a china cabinet when he walked even the shortest distance through the house. That he’d managed to creep so quietly from his room was a mark of the fact that he knew very well that he should be in bed, and what the consequences would be if his mother or father found him wandering about.

“I’ve been up working,” Joshua said, his face remarkably sober. “On this.” He raised one small fist, and something dangled from it, swinging to and fro like a pendulum.

“Ah, what have we here?” John leaned forward on the edge of his seat, donning what was hopefully his most scholarly expression of interest out of deference to Joshua’s somber demeanor.

“A crucifix. For you.”
 

John reached out and cupped the dangling object. It was indeed a small crucifix, roughly made of two slender sticks that had been whittled down to their smooth white cores and bound together with what looked like horsehair. It hung from a rough leather cord, long enough to be draped around a man’s neck.

“You’ll need it for protection against the headless horseman,” Joshua said, blinking earnestly up at John with large brown eyes. “A demon can’t touch you if you wear this – it’s the second best thing to holy water. Bartholomew Damkot says so.”
 

Bartholomew Damkot was another of John’s pupils, a boy a year or so older than Joshua. “Bartholomew Damkot is very wise for his age,” John said, “but you heard Mr. Van Brunt this morning – he supposes that the specter is only a prankster.” The idea of Joshua and Bartholomew – seven and eight, respectively – holding a schoolboys’ council over how best to protect their teacher against evil spirits was endearingly amusing, but John didn’t dare smile.