Patrick runs across the wildflower meadow and up to the orchard, moving as fast as he can through the crowds of apples, only starting to slow when he reaches his car.
After driving the short distance, he backs up until the trunk of the car is within a few feet of the barn doors. He gets out and looks around. With the car where it is, no one can see inside the barn, not even if they look carefully, blowing by at fifty-five.
He opens one of the barn doors and peers inside, Matthew still in the same spot where he fell, half sunlight, half shade, the heavy rock beside him. Patrick opens the trunk, takes out the rope and duct tape and tosses them onto the sunlit floorboards. He picks up the shotgun, carrying it inside and leaning it against the closed door. And then he stops and listens as an engine sound comes closer, but passes, and he goes back to the trunk, taking out the kitchen knife, the box of shotgun shells and a picnic blanket, quickly putting the shells in the backseat and covering them with the blanket, before heading back into the barn with the knife.
He walks over to Matthew and kicks his foot. Nothing. Patrick bends down, putting the back of his fingers to Matthew’s nose. Breathing. And the blood has stopped running from his head.
After uncoiling some of the rope, he cuts it into several six-foot lengths. First he ties Matthew’s hands behind him, next his legs and finally his hands again.
And then he sits down, leaning back against the wall next to the barn doors.
Perhaps it would be better to do it now, with Matthew unconscious. But how hard would it be to lift his body into the trunk? And probably impossible to drag him all the way to the spot where he wants them to find him.
Will I remember the right tree? he wonders.
Blades of sunlight slip inside the barn through one of its tumbledown sides. Elsewhere the light is gray, a smell like sawdust in the air.
Was it all just an act? Everything Matthew just said, was it really nothing but part of some revenge plot? Act innocent, fake some honesty. I know that you and Hannah are married—but I promise you I had no idea when I first contacted you. If Matthew’s plan is to come for Hannah, wouldn’t he deliberately try to confuse him? Wouldn’t he make out as if telling Patrick the truth, offering up a confession? The police never worked out who killed Randy. But I know who killed him. And speaking so openly about investing with Idos as well, was this just another one of his tricks? Apart from having to deal with an asshole called Don Trevino, I have nothing but good things to say about them.
But what does it matter? Whether everything Matthew has said and done was some kind of an act or not, Patrick knows he has to burn these thoughts from his mind. Hannah has left him, there is only one way.
He takes out his phone and writes her a message, telling his wife how much he loves her, telling her what he is going to do, that he is doing it for her, because he loves her. After he presses SEND, Patrick closes his eyes and covers his face with his hands, sitting like this for a few moments, the darkness behind his eyelids interrupted only by an afterimage of the sunlight in the barn. And then, as that old light fades, Patrick’s mind begins to slide as if from one world to another.
When he opens his eyes and drags his hands from his face, the sunlight in the barn seems to burn twice as bright. And that’s when he can see it starting to form, the first shape appearing slowly in an empty spot close to where Matthew is lying unconscious. It is a wooden pulpit salvaged from an old church, the place where the diners are greeted in Red Moose Barn. He glances around as he begins to hear the sort of sounds that rattle through a happy restaurant. Cutlery, crockery, chatter. Now Patrick can see the bar forming, running down the far wall where the sunlight pours through, a stained glass window casting its red and green leaf-light on tobacco-colored floorboards. And there’s the barman in blue chambray shirt and leather half-apron, pouring cocktails from a shaker into vintage glasses etched with cherries and leaf scrolls. The retired professors who live in the converted schoolhouse nearby pick up their Barnstormer cocktails, clink glasses, take a sip and nod with approval.
From somewhere at the other end of the darkness, music is playing. A live band, perhaps.
And look, table seven has ordered the cowboy steak for two. It arrives sizzling in a cast-iron skillet, earning a round of applause from table seven’s diners, a young couple who look like they’ve come up from Brooklyn for a day of apple picking and cider donuts.
There is such a buzz in the place, motes of dust dappling the late-afternoon sunlight, the air full of laughter, an immense sense of good cheer.
And now, better than any of this, he starts to hear a voice, a woman’s voice saying the same thing over and over as the guests wander up to the pulpit. Welcome to Red Moose Barn, she says. Welcome, welcome. And it makes him so happy to hear Hannah’s voice in this place, Hannah who has quit her job at the newspaper and moved up here to support him. What a fine life they have together, living in the old farmhouse they fell in love with as soon as the real estate agent showed them around. At night, when their day at the barn is over, they sit together on their porch swing, sipping red wine, gazing up at the madly bright stars.
Welcome to Red Moose Barn, she says. Welcome, welcome. So good to see you again.
* * *
WHEN MATTHEW STARTS TO MOVE, Patrick looks down at his watch, a little after four o’clock, still plenty of light left in the day.
He picks up the duct tape and rolls Matthew onto his side, Matthew’s eyes flickering, his body making small efforts to move as he tries to say something.
Shh shh, not yet, says Patrick. He tears a strip of tape and moves it close to Matthew’s face, Matthew trying hard to turn his head away, Patrick pressing the tape to his mouth. And then he sits there on his haunches while Matthew slowly comes to.
The blades of sunlight have slipped all the way across the barn now, falling over an old sign that reads, U-PICK APPLES HERE.
A few minutes later, Matthew starts fighting the ropes.
There’s no point, says Patrick. You never were any good at that game anyway.
But Matthew carries on fighting, knees bending and straightening, his arms struggling behind him.
Patrick heads over to the barn door, picks up the shotgun and moves back around to where Matthew can see him. Stop! he says. But Matthew keeps moving a few more seconds until Patrick cocks the hammer on the gun.
Good, says Patrick. Now listen, I’ll make you a deal, Matthew. If you do what I say, go where I say, walk where I tell you to walk, if you do everything I say, then when we get where we’re going, I’ll take away the tape and you can tell me anything you want. Agreed?
Matthew doesn’t move, just stares fiercely up at him, as if he imagines he might disarm a man with the strength of his gaze, snap rope with the power of thought.
Patrick waves the shotgun up and down. Move your head like this, he says, or else move it like this, he adds, waving the gun side to side. It has to be one or the other, Matthew, he says.
Matthew glares at him a moment longer and then nods.
Good, says Patrick. First I’m going to cut the rope at your legs. Your arms stay tied at all times. Then you’re going to climb into the trunk of my car. Agreed?
Matthew nods.
Very good, says Patrick, picking up the knife. And don’t worry, it won’t be long now, he says. I’m really looking forward to hearing everything you have to say.