Page 133 of The River We Remember

“Supper in a few minutes,” Colleen said. “We’ll set an extra place.”

Marta and Charlie walked outside, and J.P. followed with a knitted afghan that, once his mother was seated, he placed around her shoulders.

“Iced tea, Miss Bauer?” he offered. “Or lemonade?”

“I’m just fine, J.P. Thanks.”

“I’ll call when supper’s ready.” He vanished into the house.

“He’s a good son. You have wonderful children, Marta. So much to be proud of.”

“Thank you.”

“Was it difficult?”

“Difficult?”

“Raising them in the shadow of a man like Jimmy. I’m sorry if that sounds like I’m speaking ill of the dead.”

Marta didn’t appear to be offended. “We had an understanding, James and me. I never interfered with the farm and his business, and he let me run the house. The children had their farmwork. My husband oversaw that. They also had chores they did for me. James had his way of doing things. I tried to show them something different, kinder.”

“It’s no secret that a lot of people in Black Earth County were afraid of your husband. Were you, Marta?”

“Despite what people say, he never raised a hand to me.”

Which didn’t exactly answer the question, but Charlie let it go.

“The children, were they afraid of him?”

“I never allowed him to raise his hand to them either.”

Which again was an evasion.

“This isn’t exactly the conversation I’d anticipated,” Marta said, but not unpleasantly.

In the distance, the slope of Fordham Ridge lay in late afternoon shadow, but the sunlight along the crown gave everything there a soft look as if it were dusted with yellow pollen. It was such a pleasant, pastoral scene and so completely at odds with the subject Charlie needed to broach.

“I’ve just come from speaking with Fiona McCarthy,” Charlie said. “There are some things I need to ask you. Difficult things.”

Marta waited, her eyes steady on Charlie’s face.

“I know what Jimmy did to his daughter when she was a girl Colleen’s age, Marta. I’m guessing you know, too.”

Marta blinked, looked down at her hands on her lap, took a deep breath. “It is a large house, but not so large that secrets are easily kept.”

“Are there more recent secrets?”

The woman didn’t look up from her hands.

“Who killed your husband?”

Charlie could hear from the kitchen the low murmur of the children talking as they worked on the evening meal. The cattle in the fenced yard behind the barn lowed now and again, sounds like notes from a tuba. The sun seemed nailed to the same place in the sky and the shadows it cast seemed permanently embedded in the ground.

“It is a long story,” Marta said, finally lifting her eyes.

“I’m a patient woman.”

“And a kind one. I have seen this. So I will tell you, and I will rely on your kindness.” She seemed chilled and drew the afghan more tightly around her. “I came from Germany,” she began, “in a terrible time. My parents saw what was happening to those who opposed the Nazis, and they didn’t want me to be caught up in that. James’s wife was a cousin to my mother. The two made an arrangement. I didn’t want to come here. I didn’t want to leave my family. But my parents insisted, and so I obeyed.