Chapter 12

Jean was awoken by the bright sunlight streaming through the window. The fan, whizzing away, felt wonderful on her face.

Perhaps she had died and without realizing it, she was in heaven.

A heavy knock on the door jolted her back to reality. Pauline barged in, holding a tray.

“Here’s some oatmeal and some toast.” She set it down on the bedside table with a bang and picked up the tray from the night before. “Mr. Matthew says you should get ready. My father will drive you wherever it is you want to go in about an hour. Good riddance.”

She closed the door behind her with a snap.

Jean wondered why Pauline was so angry when she had so much and Jean had so little. It didn’t matter. She probably wouldn’t be seeing Pauline again anyway. Although if Pauline was nicer Jean might have asked Matthew if there was something she could do around the house, scrub floors, wash clothes. Pauline made sure that wasn’t an option.

Jean bit into the buttery toast but didn’t swallow it right away. She savored every bite. Who knew when she’d eat like this again?

In the bright daylight, she took a look at her surroundings. The small dresser in front of her held a number of pretty perfume bottles. Some of them even looked like the crystal ones that had been in the ladies’ room at the hotel where her mother worked. Jean knew that they very valuable. Would anyone know if she hid one in her shorts?

She couldn’t do it. They had been kind to her.

She looked up and released a small gasp of surprise. A boy was standing at the door, watching her closely.

“Hello,” Jean said. “And who are you?”

“William. Marie is my sister. She got lost when I was playing with her. It’s a good thing you found her, otherwise I’d be in big trouble.” His dark eyes widened. “I was supposed to watch her.”

Jean was thinking that she knew what could happen when you didn’t watch children carefully enough.

He sank down on the bed. “I guess I just got tired.”

The little boy was about the same age as Jimmy. Another fortunate child, Jean thought, who didn’t realize how well he had it. Jean wondered about the unfairness of it all. But, of course, she didn’t say any of that. Instead she asked William if he played by the river a lot.

“We’re not supposed to drink the water or swim there. Mama says it’s diseased.”

“She’s right. But do you ever play down there?”

William shrugged. “Sometimes.”

“Listen,” Jean leaned forward, “I lost something down by the river. Something important.”

“If you lost it in the river, it’s gone,” William said rather simply.

“No, I think it was on the bank of the river.”

“And you want me to go find it for you?” William guessed.

Jean shook her head and finished her oatmeal. “No, I just want to know if anyone else found it.”

William’s face crunched up in confusion.

“They were rocks. But not ordinary rocks. They were heavier and blacker, like little coffee beans.”

William didn’t even have to answer. His face brightened. “Were they all shiny like?” he asked.

Jean’s heart quickened.

“Yeah, a boy found it. His name is Ignatius. I almost win them in a game of jacks but I lost by one lousy point.”

Jean sprang forward. “Where does he live?”

“Around the corner. But he’s not going to give it to you. Not just like that. He’s really mean. Once he boxed my ears for no reason at all. Just because I looked at him funny. Papa doesn’t even want me to play with him.”

Jean chewed the last of her toast thoughtfully. The rocks really didn’t matter now. Not when she was finally heading towards safety. But what if they were worth something?

Telling Ignatius and his family, though, would probably be a huge mistake.

And as kind as Matthew was, how well did Jean know him?

She decided quickly what she would do. She would wait until she got to the refuge and then she would tell Sister Mary Jude the entire story. Sister would no doubt have connections. If the rocks were valuable, Sister Jude could get them back from Ignatius and his family and return them to their true owners.

Either way Jean would no longer be responsible.

Jean finished the last of her breakfast while William watched her. Except for the horrible pain in her foot, Jean felt good, alive and hopeful.

And then she met the chauffeur.

Jean knew the moment she walked down the staircase and saw the tall, thin man standing in the doorway that she was in trouble.

He was talking to Matthew.

“So where am I supposed to go?” he asked in an impatient voice.

The voice Jean had heard the day that Peter was shot, the day she escaped from Pastor Francis’ prison. The day the man was determined to track her down. The thief was standing there in the hall, in a slick gray uniform, looking spiffy and polite and wasn’t it all just too much of a coincidence that after everything Jean had gone through to escape her fate, there he was –

A few feet in front of her. As though it was all predestined and there was nothing Jean could have done to change her destiny.

And she had agreed to get in a car with him.

Jean drew a deep breath and then remembered that he didn’t know who she was. All he knew was that he was supposed to take her into Stonage. There was nothing to connect her to the girl who had run away with the rocks. The girl who had lost the rocks.

He had never seen face.

“Oh there you are.” Matthew looked up at the staircase. “Victor is ready to take you to Stonage.”

Jean hobbled down the stairs.

“What’s your name?” Victor smiled at her in a creepy sort of way. Maybe it was because he was missing several teeth.

“Her name is Jean. She has an uncle in Stonage, which is why she is going there. She says that she is supposed to meet up with him,” Matthew said in a breezy sort of way.

Not realizing that he had just signed her death certificate.

Because Jean saw Victor’s expression change. His mouth opened and his eyes popped and though he was suddenly startled. Then Jean realized that Victor knew exactly who she was. Somehow Peter must have told Victor about the hitchhiker he had picked up. Or maybe Pastor Francis had given him the information. It really didn’t matter how he found out. He knew.

But the surprise which flickered was gone in seconds and he smiled again.

“Happy to meet you,” he said sincerely and Jean had no doubt that he was ecstatic that their paths had crossed. “So are we ready to go?”

Jean was thinking desperately of how to get out of this.

A then like a miracle, Matthew spoke. “She’s not ready to go,” he said. “Look at her clothes. They’re filthy. I can’t let her meet her uncle like that.”

Victor looked confused, but only for a moment. “Does she have other clothes?”

he asked quite innocently.

“Go upstairs,” Matthew said. “I’ll have Pauline bring in one of my wife’s dresses.”

“Thank you, sir.” Jean said as she hobbled up the stairs. You probably saved my life, she thought.

Then she heard Matthew talking to Victor about her injured foot. “If she doesn’t get treatment soon, she might lose it. She’s a young girl to be a cripple.”

A pain shot through Jean’s heart unequal to any ache in her foot. A cripple? She couldn’t be a cripple. How could she be a cripple when she was going to be a runner?

She had to get to a doctor. She had to get to the refuge. But not in Victor’s car.

First she had to get away.

She returned to the guest room where she had slept. Pauline had already made the bed. Jean walked over to the window. The fan was rammed in the bottom pane, making it impossible to open the window without dislodging it. Jean wasn’t sure that she had the strength to do it, even if she had time.

Besides, it would make too much noise. And looking out the window, she saw a sleek black car in the driveway. Victor’s car.

What good would it be to climb out the window, throw herself on the ground (injured foot and all) only to land on top of Victor’s car?

She’d have to take the back staircase. Maybe it led to the kitchen. Maybe she could sneak out of the rear of the house—

Too late. She heard a loud rap on the door. Pauline stormed in and threw a bright pink sleeveless dress at her. “Here,” she said. “Put it on. I’ll wait for you right outside.”

“You don’t need to. I—”

“My father told me to.”

It’s a done deal, Jean thought as her broken heart sank down to her broken foot. There was no escape.

As Jean looked at the pretty pink dress, she knew that she was dead in the water. How could she run away wearing this, even if she could escape? The dress was very fitted. Walking in it would be trouble enough. She was tempted to leave her shorts on under the dress but she realized that the garment wouldn’t lay flat, instead there would be a large lump.

She left her shorts on, anyway. She had to because she was wearing no underwear, although the dress wrapped around her like a straight jacket.

She took as long as possible, trying to think of a way out of this hopeless situation. But there was none.

Pauline finally threw the door open. “Come on,” she ordered. “My father has to go.” Then she frowned at Jean. Jean didn’t know if she saw the outline of her shorts or Pauline resented the fact that Jean was wearing an expensive dress.

Jean almost laughed out loud at the idea that Pauline could be jealous of her—even for a few seconds—when Jean probably had mere minutes to live.

Jean took her time coming down the stairs and saying goodbye to Matthew and walking towards the car, where Victor so gallantly held the door open for her.

Then she saw the glimmer of a small revolver in his back pocket. And she knew. She could not get into that car. In a spilt second, she made a decision and sealed her fate.

She turned around and quickly made her way to the house. The door was open and Matthew was standing there, looking bewildered.

“Did you forget something?”

“Please, sir. I can’t go with him. He’s going to kill me.”

Matthew and Victor exchanged dark looks.

“I’ll tell you exactly what happened. I am looking for my uncle. I was walking along and I stumbled and hurt my foot—”

“We’re wasting time,” Victor said.

“And this nice man, at least I thought he was nice, I guess he really was nice, anyway, he said he’d give me a ride to Stonage. But he had to make a stop first. He went into this house and there was this argument. I could hear it in the car. It was awful. Then there was a gun shot. They were fighting over something called coltan. Not that I even know what coltan is—”

Jean paused and looked at Matthew’s face. He was listening intently.

“I didn’t want to stay in the car. I was afraid. So I left.” She stopped again, wondering whether or not to tell Matthew the truth and then she decided she’d better. If she was caught lying once (if his son told him, for instance, that she had asked about the stones) she would lose all credibility.

And maybe her life.

“I was so thirsty and there was a thermos in the back seat. I grabbed it and took it with me. I grabbed it and took it with me because I thought it was water. But it some sort of rocks, but I didn’t find that out that until much later. I didn’t mean to take them, honestly I didn’t. I just wanted the thermos because if it rained, maybe I could catch some water—”

Matthew stepped toward Jean, his face taking on an odd expression, a mingle of anger and confusion. And then he spoke.

“And where, Miss Jean Marcato, are those rocks now?”