The Soldier's Promise

Not very much, from his point of view. Flaking paint, missing and broken appliances and rotting floors. The area in back was knee-high in weeds. But then he hadn’t expected much. He’d mostly lived in on-base bachelor quarters or tents or slept on the ground these past seventeen years.

He had gone through the cabin, trying to decide what to do. It had good bones. Maybe he could fix it up. He didn’t have anything else to do, and he’d learned a lot in the military about fixing things. When he finished, maybe he could sell the cabin. Find some someplace else to go.

He hoped it would be someplace without, God help him, curious neighbors.

His gaze caught the cheerfully painted tin on the cabinet. Now he did feel...chagrined.

Despite himself, he found himself taking off the lid. An enticing scent filled the room as he stared at rich, dark brownies that looked as if they’d just come from the oven. How long since he’d had homemade brownies? Not since some guy in the unit received some from his wife. They’d been stale and broken, but they’d been like manna from heaven.

He succumbed.

* * *

“THAT...MAN IN the Hannity cabin. June went over there to welcome him. He was practically naked, and he scared her to death.”

Covenant Falls mayor Eve Douglas tried to pacify the caller. Marilyn Evans wasn’t the first one in the past few days. Others had expressed concerns about the newest resident of their small community. Some were genuinely frightened. Others were offended at his rebuff of any welcoming overtures.

Marilyn ranted on for several minutes before Eve interrupted. “Has he done anything other than be rude?” Marilyn lived next to June Byars on Lake Road, three houses down from the Hannity cabin.

“Well, no,” she admitted, then added ominously, “Not yet.”

“You’ve complained many times that the Hannity cabin is an eyesore. If the owner is here, maybe he’ll fix it.”

“Fiddlesticks. Do you know he has a motorcycle?” Marilyn suddenly asked. “Maybe he’s one of ‘them.’”

Eve’s body tightened and for a moment she couldn’t breathe. Her father, then police chief, had been killed by a biker gang three years ago, and Marilyn knew that well. Eve knew she couldn’t condemn everyone who rode a motorcycle, but still...the sight of two or more riders still sent shivers down her back.

“And he drinks,” Marilyn continued in a lower tone. “Some bottles fell out of his garbage can when the truck came by.”

Eve doubted they’d fallen out. More likely Marilyn had checked the trash herself. Marilyn contributed a weekly column to the Covenant Falls Herald and considered herself the town watchdog. “You haven’t met him?” Eve asked, surprised that Marilyn hadn’t shouldered her way inside.

“I tried,” Marilyn said with a long-suffering sniff. “He didn’t answer the door.”

“Maybe he wasn’t there.”

“He was,” Marilyn insisted. “The motorcycle and Jeep were there. Someone who really belonged here would answer the door. What if he’s a serial killer?”

Aha. Therein was the problem, Eve thought. Marilyn was usually a good-natured, if overly inquisitive soul, but she took dismissal poorly. There was a silence, then Marilyn added stiffly, “I just thought you should know what’s going on in your town.”

“I appreciate that,” Eve said. “But we can’t send out officers without any reason.”

“If anything happens...just don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Eve sighed. “I’ll see what I can find out.”

“And you’ll let me know?”

“Yes,” Eve said patiently, knowing she would also be telling the Covenant Falls Herald. “Thanks for calling, but I have a meeting, and I’m late. I’ll talk to you later.”

Although she hadn’t met the newcomer, she understood both the curiosity and apprehension. No one had lived in the cabin permanently since Michael Hannity had drowned in the lake and his nephew had been under suspicion of murder. Nothing was proved, however, and it was finally ruled an accident. David Hannity had left and hadn’t returned. The property had been rented on and off for four years until some renters practically destroyed it, then it had been empty the past twelve years, although the taxes had been paid.

Rumors had started several days ago when the power was turned on. Then talk accelerated when several residents of Lake Road reported seeing a man in a Jeep turn into the driveway and enter the house. It rankled Eve that the new resident was so abrasive. Her town was friendly and welcomed newcomers with open hearts and hands full of goodies. She hated to see them hurt even if, she admitted, they could be rather aggressive in their attempted neighborliness.

There was also a dog. A big one, according to reports. And it wasn’t on a leash. No one could describe it exactly because apparently the man and dog walked only in the middle of the night. And that in itself spurred more talk. Sometimes her small, eccentric town reminded her of a game she used to play when a child. Someone would whisper to the person next to her, and the secret would go around a circle, being embellished all along the way until a mouse turned into bigfoot.

As the beleaguered mayor of Covenant Falls, she didn’t need this nonsense today. Not when this afternoon there was an informal council meeting. The council planned to discuss hiring a new police chief within the month. The council wanted to name one of the current officers, Sam Clark.

Over her dead body.

She looked at her watch. She had a few more minutes. She called down to Merry, who served as both city clerk and bookkeeper. “Have you heard anything from the county about a change in ownership on the Hannity property?”

“Not yet,” Merry said, “but a Mr. Manning was in here around noon, asking about building permits for a porch. I told him we needed proof of ownership first, and he said he would provide it. He also wanted a copy of the property survey. I was so busy with the tax bills, I asked if it would be okay if I got it later in the day. He said yes, and he would be back tomorrow afternoon.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?’

“You were at lunch, then I was swamped with those bills.”

“How was he?”

“Polite enough, although he didn’t talk much. Looked a bit rough, but I liked him.”

Eve had to smile. She had yet to find someone Merry didn’t like.

She would probably like Genghis Khan. But it made Eve feel better. Obviously he was no squatter if he wanted a building permit and a land survey.

Ordinarily, she would have asked Tom MacGuire to quietly check out the newcomer.

He had been police chief for the three years since her father had been killed, and had been with the county sheriff’s department as head of detectives before that. He was genuinely kind as well as efficient. But he was at home today, and she really didn’t trust his officers to handle the matter with any finesse.

That drew her back to her immediate problem. Tom planned to resign because of heart problems. Finding someone to replace him was daunting, especially when small-town politics entered into the equation. There were less than three thousand permanent residents, and policing usually involved speeders, bar brawls and domestic conflicts. But there was the occasional fatal accident, lost child or robbery. She needed officers with diplomacy for domestic problems, and experience and judgment for the others. Tom had all that, and the affection and respect of the community. But he’d had a second heart attack, and his wife insisted he retire.

The problem was the city couldn’t pay enough to attract someone like Tom. He’d served because he loved Covenant Falls. He was also a second father to Eve and honorary grandfather to her son, and she wasn’t going to risk his life by trying to keep him.

She picked up her iPad and made her way to the small council chamber. Maybe she would visit the stranger in the morning. Quiet the rumor mill.

* * *

JOSH WORKED ALL morning on the interior of the cabin, and was just finishing cleaning the last room. The needed repairs were endless; the more he cleaned, the more problems he found. But he welcomed the work.

He’d temporarily fixed the roof and scraped most of the paint from the walls of the main room. He had to patch holes and sand rough spots, then prime the walls before painting.

He’d cleaned the windows, although he wasn’t sure that had been a good idea. Blinds were a necessity since the community was so interested in his affairs, but the local hardware store had none that fit.

He also needed furniture. All he had now was a folding bed, a cheap chest of drawers, the cooler and an old sofa that had somehow survived years of neglect in the cabin. Probably only the fact that it was alligator ugly kept it from disappearing with the other stuff.

But even as it was now, the cabin suited him. It was as broken as him and Amos, and the work kept him from thinking. Remembering.

He quit at midnight. The cabin was hot, but nothing close to the brain-searing heat in Iraq and Afghanistan. His T-shirt was drenched with sweat, some from the heat, some from work and the rest from the pain that never left him.