The Virgin of Small Plains (46 page)

Rex flipped on his siren and his lights and left them on until they were close enough to be heard from the ranch. At that point, he turned them off again, but he continued to speed toward his parents’ property, driving faster than any car Abby had ever been in before. He did it all with one hand, because his other hand never left his cell phone and his cell phone never left his ear.

When he got to the front gate, he heard his mother say in a calmer voice, “It’s all right now, Rex. Your father has things under control.”

Under control
meant that Nathan Shellenberger had his own rifle leveled at Mitch Newquist’s face as the four of them—Nathan, Mitch, Jeff, Verna—stood on the side porch by the kitchen.

When Rex and Abby walked up, Abby’s heart betrayed her and lurched at the sight of the man she realized in that moment she would always love, whether she ought to or not, whether it was right or not, whether he had done the worst possible thing he could do to her family or not. She loved him, she had always loved him, she would always love him,
God help me,
Abby thought as she stopped in the driveway, exactly where Rex told her to.

“Rex, tell your dad to put his gun down!” Mitch yelled. And then to Nathan he yelled, “What is wrong with you? I’m Mitch! Remember? Mrs. Shellenberger, you know me, or you used to, and I know you know Jeff—”

“Where is your gun, Mitch?” Rex asked him, drawing nearer.

He did not tell his father to put the rifle down.

“Rex, my
gun,
” Mitch said in a tone of deep sarcasm, “is over there on the ground where I dropped it when your father came charging out of the house with his gun.” To Nathan again, he said, “What do you think? That we’re here to rob you? Or is this how far you’ll go to keep me from telling what I know?”

“You show up with a gun at my house,” the old sheriff said gruffly.

“After you’ve shot Quentin Reynolds,” Rex said. “What do you mean, what Dad—”

Mitch turned so fast to stare at him that Nathan tightened his grip on his rifle, causing Verna to cry out, “Nathan!” Mitch interrupted, “
What?
What are you talking about, Rex? I haven’t done anything to anybody. I haven’t shot anybody. Are you telling me that somebody shot Abby’s dad?” He looked at her. “Abby—”

“Do
not
move,” Rex told him. “Jeff, are you all right?”

“Well,
yeah,
” the teenager said in sarcastic tones to match his brother’s. “What are you talking about, Mitch shooting Doc? We were just over there, dude. Nobody shot Doc. Okay, they yelled at each other. I don’t know what
that
was all about. But nobody fucking shot anybody.” Belatedly, he realized Verna was standing there. “Sorry,” he mumbled, with a glance at her. “But I mean, I was there the whole time, Mitch and me, we walked out of the house at the same time, and I’m telling you, Doc was just fine.”

“Abby?” Mitch said, looking concerned and worried. “Your father?”

“My son told you not to move,” Nathan warned him. “If you didn’t shoot anybody then what the hell were you doing walking up to my house with a gun?”

Mitch ignored Nathan and talked directly to Rex. “It’s Dad’s old pistol, Rex. Remember the one he kept in the bed stand at the ranch house?” Then he remembered its history and turned back to look at Nathan. “You gave it to him, Sheriff. You and Doc, for one of his birthdays, remember?”

“I don’t care who gave it to him, what are you doing with it here?” Nathan demanded.

“I had it,” Jeff said, stepping forward. “Mitch made me give it back.”

“
You
had it?” Rex asked.

“Okay, I took it. The other night, from the ranch house.”

“We were arguing…talking…about it in the car on the way over here,” Mitch said, “after we left Doc’s house. Just now, when we got out of my car, I made Jeff give it to me. That’s what your mom and dad saw.” He looked at the older couple. “Verna. Nathan, that’s what you saw, that’s all it was. Now will somebody please tell me what’s going on? Did something happen to Abby’s dad after we left there?”

In spite of the arm that Rex put out to hold her back, Abby came walking up until she stood within a few feet of them. She looked at Mitch first and then at all of them and she began to cry again.

“Dad’s dead,” Abby confirmed for them. “Somebody shot him in the house.”

“Abby,” Mitch said for the third time, and started to move toward her.

“Stop!” Nathan barked, but then his arthritic arms gave way and he lowered the rifle.

“Will somebody tell us what the hell is going on?” Jeff said to all of them.

For the first time, Verna stepped forward and took charge. “We’re going inside,” she informed them. “You are going to clean up your language, young man,” she said to Jeff, though her tone held affection as well as disapproval. “Come here, Abby.” Abby ran forward into the older woman’s embrace. With Abby enveloped in her arms and crying on her shoulder, Verna Shellenberger looked at her husband and then at each of the others in turn, and she said in tones that brooked no argument, “We’re going inside.”

The old sheriff gave her a wary look, but then something in his spirit seemed to collapse in the way his arms had, because he nodded, turned, and was the first to go into the house. All of them, looking at him, understood that that was the moment when Nathan Shellenberger really grasped that his lifelong friend was gone.

Rex remained outside for a few moments, warily telling Mitch and Jeff what was known about Quentin Reynolds’s murder, and then the three of them went inside, too. “Can I pick up the gun?” Jeff asked, still sarcastic.

“I’ll get it,” Rex told him. “Go inside with your brother.”

Then he sent his wide-eyed deputies back to the Reynoldses’ home to continue dealing with the aftermath of homicide.

They gathered in the living room, taking seats on couches and in armchairs, with Nathan holding court from his leather lounger in the center of the room, opposite the television set. Nathan’s hunting rifle was propped against his chair. The judge’s pistol was in the kitchen, on the table. Rex’s own gun was still holstered at his hip, and he kept his hand on it, just in case he needed it.

Abby sat as far away from Mitch as she could get, curling herself up against Verna on one of the two long couches where Rex and Mitch had used to laze and watch Sunday football when they were kids.

His father may have been center stage, but Rex took charge.

“All right. Mitch. What did you mean out there?”

“Yeah,” his dad said in a voice that was still gruff from emotion. “What is it you think I’m supposed to know?”

Mitch shook his head. “Doc denied it, too.”

“Denied
what
?” Rex said.

“The night Sarah died,” Mitch said, still looking at Nathan, “I was in Doc’s office, hiding. I saw you and Patrick bring her in, Nathan. I saw what Doc did to her body. I know the two of you covered up her identity.”

Nathan Shellenberger couldn’t have looked more shocked than he did.

Verna stared at her husband, while Abby stared at Mitch.

“My God,” Mitch said, looked nearly as shocked himself. “You really didn’t know that? What Doc told me, it’s true? Neither of you has ever known? You didn’t know I was there and I saw you?”

The old sheriff shook his head, seeming incapable of speech.

“Covered up her identity?” Rex said, taking a step forward. “Dad? What’s he talking about?”

On the couch, still hugging Abby, Verna Shellenberger remembered the promise she had made to the Virgin…to Sarah Francis…to return the favor if Sarah could help Nathan with his pain. He was in a different kind of pain now, and Verna knew it was time to relieve that, too, and there was only one way to do it.

“Nathan,” she said in the same firm voice she had used to corral them when they were all standing outside. “No more secrets. It’s time for all of us to talk about it. Starting with you.” In a quieter voice that was suddenly tear-choked, she added, “Do it for Sarah. Please, Nathan, for Sarah.”

Slowly, and as if the effort hurt him more than arthritis ever had, Nathan began to talk to them. First he told them everything he remembered from the night when he and his sons had found the girl’s body. And then he told them what he knew only from hearing it from Quentin Reynolds seventeen years ago.

Chapter Forty

January 23, 1987

In the late afternoon of January 23, 1987,
Doc was in the middle of medicating old Ron Buck for an inner ear infection when his nurse stuck her head in the door and said, “Judge Newquist is on the phone, Doctor. He says it’s an emergency.”

Getting up quickly from his swivel stool, Quentin said, “Don’t go away,” to his patient.

The elderly man with his head bent over to allow liquid medicine to drain down into his ear canal, snorted with phlegmy laughter, and said from his bent position, “You pretty well made sure of that, Doc.”

Quentin picked up the extension in his examining room.

“What’s the emergency?” he said, right off the bat.

The deep voice of his oldest childhood friend filled his ear. “You need to come out here to the ranch, Quentin, you have to come out right now.”

“What’s the problem, Tom?”

“I can’t tell you. Just bring your doctoring stuff and get out here as fast as you can.”

Quentin started to snap, “It would help to know whether to bring a portable EKG or a Band-Aid, Tom,” but the judge hung up before he could get the words out. Quentin glanced over at his patient, who still had his scrawny old neck cocked obediently. “You can put your head back on straight now, Ron. Slowly! Don’t go all dizzy and faint on me.” Then, as he glanced out a window at the weather—still clear, in spite of a forecast for what might turn out to be a doozy of a winter storm—he said, “I’m sorry, but I have to leave. Keep taking those antibiotics. Call me if the pain gets worse, or you get a stiff neck, or you develop a fever.”

“Already got all those, Doc,” the old man said as Quentin headed for the door.

Quentin turned around to give his patient a last moment of full attention. “I’ll check in on you tomorrow.”

Quentin Reynolds still made house calls, as he was about to do for Tom Newquist. He didn’t even have to gather any supplies, since he kept a full medical bag in his car at all times, ready to go. All he had to do was let his nursing assistant know he was leaving. It would have been nice, however, to know if he needed any extras of anything, or anything special and unusual. Damn Tom Newquist for being such a goddamn judge sometimes, thinking he could order anybody—even his best friends, even a doctor—around like court reporters.