Storming

Forty-Three

HITCH STAGGERED THROUGH the doorway into the cellblock. They were way up on the fourth floor of the brand new courthouse the county had built for Campbell. Rain rattled against the roof. Griff’s hand against his shoulder guided him toward a cell.

Another deputy pushed a handcuffed Jael to keep her walking on by.

As she passed Hitch, she reached out and brushed her fingers against his.

His body reacted on instinct, his head moving in her direction.

She looked straight at him, her eyebrows furrowed hard at that crossroads somewhere between outrage and concern.

Her look pierced him. He snapped awake, out of the chaos of his jumbled thoughts, and drew a shuddered breath.

“You are not all right?” she said.

Who cared if he was all right? At this moment, the only thing he needed to figure out was how all this had happened. How could it be true? He had a son? And that son was Walter—who had probably fallen to his death only a few hours ago? Dear God in heaven.

“Did you know?” he asked her.

She shook her head. Her bedraggled, wind-whipped hair flailed against her cheeks. “No. I would have told you.” She gave Griff a sidelong glare. “They should have told you.”

The deputy assigned to her pushed her forward. “Come along.”

She turned her glare on him instead. “And what am I in custody for?”

“Sheriff says you’re an accomplice.”

Like enough she didn’t know what an accomplice was, but she tossed her hair back. “Your sheriff is criminal.”

Still, she let him herd her away. She was limping again, whether from the storm or her bare feet or something she’d pulled during her aerobatics earlier in the evening.

Griff touched Hitch’s elbow and guided him down the corridor. “This way.”

Almost every cell was packed with the Schturming refugees who had been left behind when Zlo’s men had broken him out.

Hitch let himself be guided. His mind churned in a nauseating blur of exhaustion and new adrenaline. He had a son. He was a father. Celia’d had a son. He and Celia had had a son together… and nobody’d ever told him.

He clamped his eyes shut as he walked. The past week scrolled through his head like a moving picture. Walter running through the cornfield as the Jenny zipped overhead. Walter peeking underneath the fuselage the day they met, when he’d wanted so bad to bum a ride. Walter playing with Taos. Walter holding that sign advertising rides. Walter sitting in Hitch’s lap during his first flight, his hands clamped tight on the stick. Walter turning somersaults afterwards.

Of course the kid was his son. Whose else? He’d even thought how, if he’d had a son, one like Walter wouldn’t have been too far off the mark.

And then there was Walter saying the first words he’d said in years—and saying them to him. And Hitch had sent him running like a whipped pup, as if Taos could have mattered more than him.

A groan tore up his chest.

Tonight, for the first time, he was a father.

No, scratch that, he’d been a father all along. For eight years. Tonight was maybe the first time in all those years he wasn’t a father anymore.

If he’d been faster tonight—if he and Jael had gone for Walter first, instead of Aurelia—if he hadn’t lost his temper with Walter after Zlo had taken Taos—if he hadn’t come back home—if he hadn’t left. All these useless ifs. At the end of every single one of them, Walter was still unaccounted for and probably dead.

He stopped short of his cell, yanked his elbow out of Griff’s grip, and turned to the wall. He smashed his hand into it once, then again. His knuckle split open and streaked blood across the wall.

Griff grabbed at him. “Hitch. Hitch—stop it. This isn’t doing anybody any good.”

Hitch spun on him, fist still clenched. He nearly swung at Griff’s head.

But what good would that do at this point? Another fight. One more for the history books. What good had any of those fights done? What had they proven? That he was right and his brother was wrong? What good would a fight do Walter now?

He dropped his fist and stepped backwards, into the open cell. He watched Griff the whole way. “Why didn’t anybody tell me?”

Griff watched him right back, but his expression wasn’t so certain anymore.

“You didn’t think I had a right to know something like that?” Hitch said.

Griff reached for the cell door. His hand trembled. “You left. You left your family. You lost your rights when you did that.”

“You think I wouldn’t have come back if I knew?”

Griff’s gaze charted Hitch’s face. Slowly, he shook his head. “We thought it was best for the boy.”

“That he never knew his father?”

“He thinks Byron’s his father.” He wouldn’t look Hitch in the eye. “Are you really going to tell me you’d have come back, settled down, given him a home? You’re telling me the life he would have had, getting dragged around the country, living hand to mouth would have been a better upbringing than what he’s getting with Nan?”

Yes! The boy was his son.

But the words caught in his throat.

He would have come back, picked up his swaddled infant, and flown right back out. Griff was right about that.

So then what?

He’d spent the last nine years chasing freedom through the skies. A baby would have chained him down as sure as a farm. Walter was nobody’s fool. He’d have figured that out. He would have realized a long time since that his father was no hero. Hitch Hitchcock was just a no-account wanderer. He had no roots, no responsibilities, no convictions.

Griff inhaled. “I’m not saying what we decided was right. I’m just saying…” He watched the floor.

Then he clanked the door shut. “What you said back there about Campbell being the one we should arrest… That true?” His mouth stayed hard, but something in his face was vulnerable, searching.

Hitch looked him in the eye. “What do you think?”

Griff opened his mouth, then closed it and nodded. “You’re stuck here for now—probably until a hearing. But I’ll see what I can do.” He left. His footsteps thudded down the corridor.

Hitch backed up, one step after the other, until the low bunk hit his legs. He sank down on it. His hands bumped into the thin mattress beside his thighs, and he left them there, limp. He leaned back until his head hit the wall. Overhead, rain hammered against the ceiling. Shadows shifted in the corners.

Walter was out there somewhere, either up with Zlo or dead on the ground.

Please let it be Zlo. His throat cramped, and he closed his eyes. Never thought he’d pray for that. But please let it be.

Because, God help him, he didn’t know what he’d do if it was otherwise.

He had a son, and hadn’t something in him known it all along? He loved the kid already. He’d loved him from the first time he’d met him. Taos had known. Somehow the dog had seemed to see it all before Hitch had even gotten a clue.

If things had gone the way he—and Griff and Nan—had wanted them to, he’d be on his way out of the state right now. He’d have left without even knowing.

That wasn’t even close to being all his fault. They’d had no right to keep this from him. They’d misjudged him every step of the way, never even tried to understand where he’d been coming from, what kind of wrath he’d been trying to stay clear of.

But they were right about one thing: he had been that close to leaving his family one more time. Dear God. Just like he’d done before. He’d given it all up without a second thought, because it was hard, because he was afraid, selfish, too downright blind stupid to see.

He raised his head and let it fall back against the wall. Pain splashed through his skull.

And now it was too late.

He thumped his head against the wall again—and again.

*

Hitch must have slept, because after what seemed an ageless wandering through gray and frantic dreams, he woke up and peeled open his sticky eyelids. He was still hunched against the wall. Cramped muscles held his spine in a curve. He raised an arm, and pain jagged through his shoulders. He let the arm fall.

The rain still pounded on the roof; it had pounded all the way through his nightmares. A trickle of light spilled down the corridor and cast a man’s shadow slantways across the cell’s floor.

Hitch looked up and up, until he found the craggy face, shadowed under a fedora, a toothpick in the corner of the mouth.

Campbell. Come to twist the knife, no doubt.

Anger heated Hitch’s stomach. He let the heat growl up into his throat. But he stayed slouched against the wall. No more games. Campbell always won those.

This wasn’t a game anymore anyway. Somewhere along the line—maybe as long ago as the beginning—this had become a war.

Campbell pulled the toothpick from his mouth. He looked old, the lines around his eyes strained, as if he hadn’t slept all night. But his jaw was granite.

“I reckon you know why you’re here,” he said.

“Because you let Zlo take your town right back from you. Can’t hardly lock yourself up, can you?”

If possible, the set of Campbell’s jaw got harder. “You’d best not climb on a high horse. There ain’t a sheriff in this country’d say you’re a model citizen.”

“What do you call a model citizen?”

“A man who abides by the rules.”

“You mean your rules.”

“That’s what I mean.”

Hitch shoved himself away from the wall. Pain slashed through his cramped back, and he stifled a wince. “What do you want?”

Campbell tapped the toothpick against the crossbar. He rasped a whisper, even though few of the men in the surrounding cells spoke English. “I want you to know that if you finish telling your brother what you started to last night, it makes no matter to me.”

“What?”

“Who do you think the judges around here are going to believe?” But a flicker in his eye said he wasn’t as sure as all that. Maybe.

Hitch stood up from the bunk and took a couple steps toward the bars. “You don’t really think I’m going to sit in here and take the rap?”

“I don’t see that you have a choice.” Campbell investigated the chewed tip of his toothpick. “But you could earn one.”

“How’s that?”

“I still got a job opening for an enterprising flyer. I’ll get you out of jail. Give you back your wings.”

“You don’t say?” Hitch took another step toward the bars. Less than a foot separated him from Campbell. “From threats to bribes. Seems like maybe you haven’t got this town as sewn up as you’d like me to think. If that’s the case, I don’t need your help to get out of here, do I?”

“Either you stay locked up in jail for the rest of your life—or you get one chance to go back out there.” Campbell pointed down the corridor, toward the door. “Under the sky and in the wind, with your plane in one hand and your life in the other. Leave town, fly anywhere in this country. That’s what you want. We both know it. Locked up here in a jail cell, sitting in one place every day for the rest of your life, that ain’t your style.”

Freedom. Sweat itched in Hitch’s palms. He could be back in the air and out of this mess in the space of one word. That’s what Campbell was offering.

No. That’s what Campbell wanted him to think he was offering. That road was a whole lot of familiar by this point. That road had led him here.

“You think I’d leave?” His throat tightened around the words. “Now that I know about Walter?”

“The boy’s dead. It’s a shame, but there it is.”

“No.” He rubbed his hands against his pants. “They haven’t found him yet, and until they do, he’s not dead and I’m not leaving.”

Campbell narrowed his eyes. “You make the call to stay in here, and I guarantee you’re going to stay for the rest of your sorry life.”

Hitch let out another laugh, just to taunt him. It was about the only weapon he had right now. “If I get out of here, the first thing I’m going to do is find my son. The second thing I’m going to do—the second thing is to come back here and find you.”

The crags of Campbell’s face went rock hard. He lowered the toothpick. “Now, that’d be a mistake.”

“I didn’t do it a long time ago. That was the mistake.”

Campbell’s mouth worked. Finally, he drew in a deep breath and bellowed over his shoulder, “Milton, bring the keys!”

A young deputy hurried down the corridor.

Campbell stepped back. “Let him out.”

Hitch frowned. “What?”

“They’re burying your sister-in-law today—before the rain turns the ground too soft.” Campbell glowered. “Reckon you ought to be there, see a little of your handiwork, don’t you think? And maybe the citizens ought to see what I do to folks who don’t play by the rules.”

Aurelia. His stomach panged. He’d almost forgotten she was gone. All the words drained out of him.

Deputy Milton opened the door and cuffed his wrists.

At the door, Campbell stopped Hitch, one broad hand against his chest. “Enjoy your outing.” His whisper sounded like gravel underfoot. “And you be thinking about all this. Else it’ll be the last time you’ll see the sky for a long, long while.”

*

The wooden coffin bumped into the bottom of the grave with a splash audible even twenty feet back, where Hitch stood with his deputy guard.

Campbell had sent Jael out too, just for the spectacle of it, no doubt. She stood another twenty feet away from Hitch, still in her now-ragged party dress. She hunched her shoulders against the rain. Her bare feet moved restlessly in the mud, like it hurt her to stay still.

Rain poured down on them out of a sky thick with clouds. All the graveyards around here were built on high ground, since the water level was only three feet under in most places. But the way this rain was bucketing down, it wouldn’t be long before even the hilltops were flooded.

Behind Hitch, motorcars packed the road, chugging out of the valley. Folks were leaving in droves. They were under siege for real now, and this time there was no one left to stop Zlo.

Overhead, a few patched-up planes flew low, staying beneath the overcast. They were headed out as fast as they could fly.

Yesterday, he would have been flying with them.

For all the good his staying was doing anyone now. His gut tightened, and he flexed his wrists against his manacles.

He had to get out of here. The only way to help Walter, or Jael—or anyone—was to get in a plane and fly. Finding Zlo again was a chance in a million, but the only way to win this was to somehow take the fight to him.

The preacher was saying words now—fast words probably, since every minute the grave was open was another pail of water on top of the coffin. Nan and her family stood around the hole, slickers belted over their black clothes. They bowed their heads and hung onto each other.

Nan kept glancing up at him. Probably, she wished she’d kept her mouth shut last night.

He looked around. One crooked row of headstones away from him, his father’s name was visible on a granite stone: Robert Hitchcock, 1864-1915. Beside him would be Hitch’s mother. Elsie Griffith Hitchcock, 1869-1900. Beside her: Celia Smith Hitchcock, 1890-1912.

Why folks wanted to come out and stand over their loved ones’ graves and talk to them had never made any kind of sense. The spirits were long flown. The bodies were gone to corruption. Might as well speak into the stars, for all practicality’s sake.

But standing here, with the rain dripping down the back of his coat collar and plastering his trousers around his knees, the urge hit him like a sledgehammer between the eyes.

He stared at his father’s headstone—the one he hadn’t been here to help plant.

This time he was going to see things made right—for them, for Walter and Jael, for Griff and Nan, for himself. They had his word on it. Somehow, God willing, he would find a way. Let Zlo flood the valley. Let Campbell lock him away. Let days and months and years pass. Didn’t matter. Everything that had happened—everything that had been done—everything he had done—it did not end here today.

Movement caught the corner of his eye, and he turned back.

Nan walked through the mud, straight toward him. Her eyes were dark pits in her pale face. She’d clamped her mouth in a hard line, but tear tracks still scarletted her cheeks. Wet wisps of hair escaped the black kerchief tied under her chin. She stopped in front of him.

He braced himself. “Nan. I’m sorry. Aurelia didn’t deserve this. I’m sorry for whatever part I played in her getting caught up in it last night. Her and”—he made himself hold her gaze—“Walter.”

She pulled her mouth a little to the side and nodded. Then she looked at Deputy Milton. “Would you give me a few minutes’ speech with my brother-in-law?”

Milton touched the brim of his hat. “I don’t know about that, ma’am. Sheriff Campbell didn’t think it was right to have him talking to—”

“My sister has just died. He’s family. I need to talk to him. I know the sheriff wouldn’t deny me that right now.”

“Well… Of course, ma’am.” Milton backed off about ten feet, out of hearing.

Nan glanced down the row of headstones, toward Celia’s, then back at Hitch. “I… I don’t think she even knew she was carrying Walter yet, when you left. She’d surely have told you, if only to try to get you to stay.”

Nan was giving him an explanation, as easy as that? He’d half-expected to have to pry it out of her.

“Why didn’t she write me afterwards?” he asked.

“I don’t know. To punish you, I suppose. She took sick not long after Walter was born. She was gone before we even thought about death being a possibility.” She stared at the ground. “Even I didn’t take her serious. She was always complaining about something being wrong with her health. You know how she was.”

Yeah, he knew. But his heart still twisted.

“After she was gone, you still weren’t back.” She took a deep breath and raised her head. “So Byron and I took in the boy. He was just a baby, so he never knew the difference. Even Molly was too young to really understand he wasn’t her brother.”

The flash of anger burned again. They’d had no right to rob Hitch of eight years of his son’s life. Maybe, as things had turned out, all of his son’s life.

She met his gaze, slowly. Tears welled. “I am sorry, Hitch.”

“It’s done now.” He swallowed. Griff had been right. “It wasn’t the right decision, but I can’t say it was the wrong one either.”

The corner of her mouth trembled. She bit her lip. “I—I judged you right harshly all these years. But it wasn’t all your fault.” Her eyes grew huge, luminous with more tears. The tears finally welled over, streaking down her cheeks. “It was mine too. You weren’t here, but I was. I saw her every day, and I should have known. I should have known—when you had no way of knowing—that something was wrong, that she was dying.”

He shifted in the mud. “That was not your fault. That wasn’t truly anybody’s fault. It was just something that happens.”

“I tried to be a good mother to Walter, for her sake.”

“You were a good mother.”

She shook her head. “I wanted to love him like he was one of my own. But I looked at him, and I didn’t see Celia.” She closed her eyes. “I saw you.” She opened them again. “That’s why he doesn’t talk, you know.”

Ah, that. He’d wanted to know, of course. But before now, he’d never had a right to ask. He waited.

She stared down at where she’d clenched her hands together. “He hasn’t talked since he was five. My twins—they were just babies then, just barely walking—and he’d taken them down to the creek. They fell in—Evvy nearly drowned.” She looked up. “I was scared out of my mind, and I said things to him. Things I didn’t mean. Things I really meant to say to you.” Her mouth pulled down, her chin trembling harder than ever. “And he never talked again.”

“Nan…”

“I’ve hated you all these years. Maybe it was so I wouldn’t have to hate myself.”

He stepped toward her and raised his manacled hands, wanting to comfort her somehow. “God knows we all make mistakes. But you did things for him I never could. That much is gospel truth, and we both know it.”

She licked her lips, trying to keep back the tears. “You asked me to forgive you before. Well.” For the first time since he’d come back, the look she gave him was an honest one, open all the way down to the bottom of her soul. “If there’s any way you could go up there and find Walter, bring him back—” One more tear spilled over and mingled with the raindrops. “Then I will forgive you. And what’s more, I will beg your forgiveness.”

He reached out with his cuffed hands and snagged her fingers. “You get me free, and I’ll find a way. I promise you.”

Milton’s footsteps started slogging toward them.

Time to go then.

He kept hold of her hand. “Tonight.”

She nodded. “Tonight.”

Milton reached them. “Sorry, ma’am. But I really do got to take him back now.”

“I understand.” She pulled her hand free. “Goodbye, Hitch.”

“Goodbye, Nan.” He watched her leave. His throat tightened, but for the first time since yesterday afternoon, he was able to draw a full, cold breath into his lungs.

Milton took his elbow and turned him toward the car.

Another batch of planes roared overhead. The sound reverberated in his chest, and the old longing stirred. He could still fly away. Tell Campbell yes, get out, and never come back. Once he was gone, Campbell’d never find him.

On the other hand, if he stayed, and especially if this escape tonight worked, Campbell would prosecute him to the full extent he was capable. Like enough, Hitch would spend the rest of his life in jail.

That’s what logic said.

But when you came right down to it, he’d never lived much of his life by logic.