D orothy did not sleep Wednesday night. She tried lying down, but despite the last week of events serving to exhaust her and her already broken rest, the incidents of the day refused to let her close her eyes.
Her promise, the follower, the screams…She tossed and turned, sat up for a while, then lay down again. Nothing worked. She tried to pray, but she hardly knew what she wanted besides rest.
At last, as the sun began flooding the desert with light, Dorothy drifted off. She couldn’t have slept two hours, before sounds inside the shack startled her awake. Reaching for her knife, she limped out of bed. Creeping to look around the corner, she nearly dropped her knife in relief at the sight of her father putting his things away.
He caught sight of her, grunting. “You’re in bed late, I reckon. Are you ill?”
Dorothy hid the knife in the folds of her nightgown. “No, Father. J-just a difficult night.”
His only response being another grunt, the daughter didn’t say anymore.
By the afternoon, Dorothy’s ankle had improved. She had wrapped it well, staying off it as much as she could, reading most of the morning away when she could focus on the words.
She jumped up too quickly when someone knocked on the door, a jab of pain causing a momentary limp. She had expected to see the sheriff again. She paused in uncertainty when it proved otherwise.
“M-Mr. Sinclair.”
She remembered the note and couldn’t help wondering if he had come to follow up on it.
Artie smiled, though he seemed sad or concerned. “Miss Dorothy.” He waited for a moment, but when she didn’t speak or move, he pulled off his hat. “How are you doing?”
Unsure how to answer when she considered the last several days, Dorothy swallowed at the ever-present lump in her throat. She stepped aside to let the man enter. “Did you come to see Father?”
“No, actually.” He nodded toward the older man, but the action would have been missed. Joseph Hodges didn’t even look up at him. “I came to see you.”
She tried to still her shaking. She didn’t think she had been without trembling since sometime the morning before. She walked toward the hearth out of habit, but it had been too warm to need a fire and no flame offered to help calm her.
Artie followed her, his voice worried when he spoke. “Are you doing all right?”
She tried to answer that she was well, but knowing the lie it would be, she said nothing instead. She stared at the cold logs of wood in the fireplace, wrapping her arms around her waist. She wanted him to leave, but she also wanted him to stay, yet she couldn’t think of anything to answer him. The result left her confused and exhausted.
Artie stepped closer, touching her arm to make her look at him. “Dorothy, what is the matter? Is it your follower?”
He asked gently—almost too gently—and the lump in her throat grew. “Him and…and other things.”
He doesn’t want to hear it. He’s just being polite. Why would he want to worry about me?
Artie frowned. “Other things? What other things?”
She tightened her hold on herself. Her father paid no heed to either of them. Artie’s face showed he waited for an answer, whatever her previous assumption. She took a deep breath to steady her voice.
“I-is your father back home?”
Artie frowned. “No. No, he’s not.”
She nodded. Artie still waited for an answer to his question. “Y-yes, whoever it is, still follows me. I know he’s been outside my window. I-I heard him every day until last night. And with Father away…”
“Wait.” Here Artie glanced toward the older man at the table, then back. “You mean that your father left? When?”
“He left on Sunday until this morning.” Her voice began to shake again, and she tried to stabilize it to little avail. “I’ve been afraid to go anywhere—I don’t know who it is or what they want. I simply can’t imagine! Then the note—can I give you the gold now? And the screaming last night.”
Artie shook his head. “The gold? Screaming?”
She just noticed his interjection enough to clarify. Once she had started, the words kept tumbling along, coming faster and faster as she went. “The note on the door. Isn’t that why you’re here? Though if you know what is in the note, it’s cruel. Why couldn’t you just come ask in person? I thought that he was breaking in, but then I heard him at my window later—and he followed me all day yesterday. I can’t sleep for listening for him! Then, those awful screams last night—they sounded so dreadful out in the desert! I just ran. I-I don’t know who he was or why he screamed. I don’t even know where he screamed from. I just ran scared, hoping I didn’t run into anyone.” She spoke nearly too fast to be understood, barely making sense to anyone but herself, but she couldn’t seem to slow down or explain anything with any more coherency.
Dorothy didn’t know what to do when Artie stepped closer, wrapping his arms around her. She certainly didn’t know why. After weeks of avoiding it, she stopped talking and cried instead. She didn’t remember the last time anyone held her while she cried, but after a few seconds, she forgot to try remembering. The exhaustion and strain she had been under had their way in a flood of tears that must have startled Artie, if she had thought to ask him.
By the time she calmed enough to step back from the man, she felt better, but wondered how she had managed to lose control of herself. She saw Artie send a look toward her father, but when she followed suit, the carver didn’t appear to have looked up from his work. Something like disgust crossed Artie’s expression just before he fully faced her again. He sighed.
“Are you all right?”
It seemed an absurd question considering, but she nodded. “I will be.”
Artie sighed. “You have to tell Sheriff Wright about the man following you, Dorothy.”
She shook her head. “He won’t believe me.”
“You don’t know that!” He gently took hold of her shoulders. “Dorothy, it’s his job to take care of this type of thing. It is not all right for someone to be following you around day and night, no matter their reason.”
When she didn’t come up with an answer, she heard him sigh again.
“Either you need to tell him, or I will.”
“I don’t know what good it will do.”
“Hopefully, he will find whoever it is and deal with him.” He watched her for several seconds. “Please, Dorothy, you have to tell him.”
“I don’t know when I’ll see him again.” She shrank from the idea. Why would the sheriff believe her anyhow?
“I’ll bring him out here to see you if I can. If he says he’s too busy, I’m sure I can get him to stop at the Pavilion on Saturday. I’ll even come fetch you. Just promise me you’ll talk to him.”
She wasn’t sure she saw the point, but Artie asked so earnestly that she nodded. “I-I’ll talk to him.”
He looked relieved, finally letting go of her. “Now then, you said something about a note?”
Dorothy shivered at the memory. “I-I thought that you might have come because of the note. I found it on the door two nights ago telling me to bring payment on Saturday.”
Artie gave her an odd look. “I know nothing about a note. I came to see how you were doing. You’re supposed to bring a payment this Saturday?”
She nodded. “That’s what the note said. Eight bags of gold.”
“Eight!”
Her father finally glanced at them, but only briefly.
Artie lowered his voice again. “You have that much gold?”
His incredulity combined with the sudden memory of her promise made her hesitate. “I-I have it.”
Artie watched her for a long moment, then watched her father for another. She couldn’t read his thoughts, but she could tell he didn’t like something. At last, he turned back to her.
“How much do you trust me?”
The question seemed abrupt. Dorothy couldn’t decide if she was actually prepared to answer it.
“Why?”
Artie pushed his hands into his pockets. “Because what I’m about to suggest is going to require you to trust me.”
“Perhaps…” Dorothy hesitated, shifting to put less weight on her injured ankle. “Perhaps you should tell me the suggestion first.”
He nodded. “See here, I don’t know anything about the note, except what you told me, but if you can trust me enough to let me take the gold back with me now, I’ll put it in the safe. I’ll let my father’s secretary know it’s there and that it has been delivered ahead of schedule. That way, you don’t have it here with you. It also prevents any possibility whatsoever of you carrying it across the desert again on your own, though as I said before, I’m willing to walk with you on Saturday.”
“Why…” Dorothy tilted her head. “Why would I need to trust you to give you the gold? I usually give the payment to you.”
He smiled slightly. “You give it to me, at an appointed time, when other folks are anticipating my delivery. I’ve never actually been the one receiving payment. I’ve just been the messenger boy.”
Dorothy shifted again. “I suppose that is right. Y-you’re suggesting that I would need to trust you not to steal it, instead of delivering it.”
“Yes.”
She studied his face for several seconds. “I suppose that I trust you then, because I can’t imagine you stealing it. I’d rather give it to you now than later, assuming…” She thought of the note and voice trailed off. She looked down.
“Assuming?”
She raised her eyes to his face. Her voice dropped low. She couldn’t help it. “Assuming there are no consequences, and it doesn’t have to be Saturday?”
He wanted to ask about the consequences. She could see it on his face, but he changed his mind. “Do you still have the note, Miss Dorothy?”
She nodded with a frown.
“Could I see it, please?”
“I’ll get it and the gold.”
In her room, Dorothy pulled the sack of gold from underneath her mattress. Taking the note along with it, she turned to rejoin Artie when she heard his voice and stopped. He spoke low, but she could catch everything he said.
“How much of what she just told me has your daughter told you before this?”
Her father answered in a steady tone as always. “That’s not your business, I reckon.”
A deeper note of anger tinged Artie’s voice. “Do you care about her at all?”
“That’s not your business either, I reckon.”
Dorothy’s heart sank.
“You left her. Alone. When you knew that someone had been following her. I know that you knew that. You must have known that she’s frightened. I could see she was frightened before she said anything! How could you leave your daughter alone, and for days, under such circumstances?”
“She seems alive and well to me.”
“How can you put no effort into protecting your own daughter, Mr. Hodges? How can you ignore your God-given duty like that?”
“You seem to be doing a swell enough job protecting her, as you say. Maybe you should stick to it and stop fussing at me like an old woman.”
The words stabbed Dorothy. She caught her breath, swallowing back the tears that threatened. She didn’t hear anything else. If Artie answered her father, she couldn’t hear the words.
The sack in her hands reminded the girl of her errand. She forced herself to reenter the room. Artie stood near the hearth, watching her father with an expression of baffled anger. When he saw her, his face softened.
“You can use the sack.” She held it toward him. “It won’t all fit in your coat this time.”
He nodded his thanks, slinging it over one shoulder.
Dorothy caught sight of the eagle emerging under her father’s knife and the lump returned to her throat.
“Dorothy?”
She shook herself, holding the note toward Artie instead of answering him. She dared not look at his face. “You wanted to see this.”
His silence on reading the note unnerved her, but the anger in his voice when he finally spoke banished her determination not to look at him.
“Can I keep this for now?” His eyes flashed, and he clenched his jaw after the words were out.
Dorothy nodded. “If you want to.”
“Thank you.” He put the note in his pocket. He looked toward her father again, then nodded for her to follow him outside. A few steps from the house, he turned to face her. “Will you be all right?”
She tried to sound more confident than she felt. “It’s better when he’s here. I’m not alone.”
Artie looked doubtful.
“Don’t you think the Lord can protect me, even…” She faltered but decided to finish. “Even if my father might not?”
His frown softened. “Certainly, He can. He will take care of you, because He promises to.”
“I’ll have to trust that then.”
“So, will I.” She barely heard him; she didn’t think she was supposed to hear him at all. He sighed. “I am praying for you, Miss Dorothy.”
She smiled. “Thank you, Mr. Sinclair.”
Artie put on his hat. “I’ll talk to Sheriff Wright, and I’ll come check on you tomorrow either way.”
“You don’t have to. If you don’t have the time…” She realized rather suddenly that she didn’t care for her own argument.
“I’ll make time.” He touched her shoulder lightly. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Dorothy returned inside, taking her seat by the hearth with Ben Hur in her lap. She stared into the empty fire until long after Artie had probably disappeared from view of the shack.
When…When did I decide that I’m not afraid of him anymore?