Chapter 12

 

A few minutes later Elaine emerged from the small tent and stepped into the bright sunshine. Talking to her kids had cheered her up and, for unknown reasons, made her feel more positive and confident. She could get through this, there weren’t many steps left now—everything was going to be okay.

Stan was sitting in the small wedge of shade the tent cast onto the dirt, smiling at her. It was the first pleasant expression she’d seen on his face since they’d set out for the mine yesterday. In fact, the smile seemed plastered to his face.

“What?” she said self-consciously. She knew he had heard every word of the conversation.

“So you do have children after all.”

“Yes I do.” Elaine could not help feeling proud, or keeping herself from smiling a little. “Two of them.”

“And a husband?”

The smile faded. It was impossible for her to mask the disgust she felt for Nick right now, even from Stanley Ketchum. “Yes.”

Stan raised an eyebrow at her tone, again looking intrigued, but did not say anything else. He reached into his pocket, shook out another pain killer, and dry-swallowed it.

There was another low rumble of thunder, this one a little louder.

They both looked in the direction of the approaching storm—Stan seemed to have almost forgotten about it. The sky had darkened considerably but the clouds still seemed to be a long way off.

“We better get going,” Stan said, grabbing his crutch and struggling to his feet. “If we scramble, we can probably make it to Zalingei before all hell breaks loose.”