* * * * *
They hadn’t run like this since they were children.
Sunlight painted vivid splashes of gold on the forest floor. She leapt over the smaller ones as she sprinted, laughingly glancing over her shoulder at him as she wove through the trees. They moved with the grace of dreams – almost flying rather than touching the ground.
He finally caught up to her on the riverbank. She splashed into the shallows up to her ankles; he flopped down on the cool earth under a tree. They laughed to each other, at each other, but said nothing.
When she sat down next to him after a bit, he tossed her a flower the same brilliant purple-blue as her eyes, and which was her namesake as well. He felt his smile soften as she pressed the tiny blossom to her nose. His eyes went wide, though, when she then leaned over and gave him an impulsive peck on the cheek.
Time, the breeze rustling the leaves overhead, the gurgles of the river along the bank – all these seemed to slow as their eyes met and held. The laughter faded and a serious sort of anticipation budded in its place.
He reached out to brush away a stray, windblown chocolate lock curling down the side of her face, and couldn’t help but lean toward her. Their lips would meet in the middle; the idea filled him with joy and nervousness and boldness and shyness all at once.
An inch apart, he closed his eyes…
…and opened them again in the dim morning light of the clay dusted cell.
“A pleasant dream, I gather?”
Hearing that dry rasp, David Powell sat up in surprise.
There, not an arm’s reach away, sat his friend: awake, alive, breathing easily – alive.
“Lew!”
The other man smiled slightly at the priest’s obvious delight.
“A surgeon came?” Lewis gestured to the neat row of a dozen or so stitches on his side, pasted over with some yellowish ointment. The Chinaman hadn’t bandaged his work.
“A medicine man from the Orient. That gang leader – the fighter – brought him.”
“Ah.”
“Old fellow bled you like a stuck pig and plucked your ribs like a harp.”
The policeman grunted and poked at the surgeon’s handiwork for a moment, then looked back at the priest with a concerned frown.
“A good bit of work – I can barely feel a thing…but at what cost to you?”
“If you’re referring to the lovely state of my complexion—” David touched his bruised face gingerly, “—attribute it to my own wisdom and good fortune. I was rather angry last night and thought it only fair to spread the wrath around.”
“How poorly are you?”
“Compared to you? I’m rather well off: merely lumps and bruises. My head is harder than yours, I think.”
Lewis looked for a moment as though he weren’t sure whether David spoke in bravado or truth, but only asked, “Who’s that other fellow?”
The priest looked around and saw Innocent sleeping in a huddled heap not too far away, his back to them.
“Another soul caught up in this mess, picked up by the same chaps who nabbed us, though his lot seems different from ours.” David licked his cracked lips and looked back at his old friend. “Decent young fellow who saved me from the worst of their attentions last night. He’s been helping me tend to you. He also says you know each other. Name is Innocent.”
Lewis frowned and shook his head once.
“Doesn’t ring a bell.” He coughed briefly, the sound harsh but nowhere near as dreadful as it had been earlier. “Is there any water?”
In answer, David lurched to his feet. He’d been able to ignore last night’s abuse just sitting still; standing and walking, however, were a far different story. His stomach shrieked the worst echoes of last night’s attentions. Compounded with a gnawing hunger, straightening made him gasp involuntarily.
Lew raised an eyebrow at him; however, David only shrugged and smiled and limped to the water bucket.
It hadn’t been refilled since the day before, but the little left at the bottom would do.
“Though you look wretched this morning,” Lew murmured as David offered him the tin cup (the policeman made the priest drink first), “it seems as if a weight’s been lifted from your shoulders.”
The clergyman sat down next to his friend with a comically loud groan.
“Honestly? Perhaps it has.”
“You were even smiling in your sleep.”
“Was I?” David recalled his dream and smiled again. “No wonder: it was a pleasant memory. I dreamt of Violet Carew.”
“Violet,” Lewis repeated with a brief chuckle. “That’s a name I’ve not heard in years.”
His smile faded, and he turned a strangely intense gaze on the priest.
“Is she also why you’ve been out of sorts recently?” the sergeant asked softly. “Regrets?”
“Not of that nature, no,” David shook his head and then snorted. “Though sometimes I miss how simple it all was half a lifetime ago. My only worry seemed to be whether I should’ve kissed her or not…or kissed her again. Or more proficiently.”
Lewis tipped his head back and actually laughed – though that ended quickly enough as he clutched his ribs.
“We were such romantics back then,” the sergeant said.
“We’ve aged like fine wine…or maybe a smelly cheese – but not changed much in essentials,” David returned with a smile.
“True,” Lewis shook his head ruefully, and then his expression became thoughtful. “It’s Sunday: surely we’ve been missed by now. You, most certainly.”
David nodded slowly. “Do you suppose someone is looking for us?”
There was no hesitation in the policeman’s answer. “Yes.” A pause. “Though I can’t think how anyone would know where to look.”
The priest wondered if Innocent might be able to shed any light on that, given his absence Saturday afternoon.
As if on cue, the young man stirred and sat up yawning and rubbing his eyes with both hands. Likely, their conversation had wakened him.
“‘llo,” he said around a second yawn, twisting to face them.
“Good morning. Innocent, this is my friend, Lewis Todd – though I suppose you already know him,” the priest began as the young man stood and stretched. “Lewis—oh!”
The policeman’s face had twisted into a snarl.
With a ferocious, wordless cry, Lewis hoisted himself to his feet and crossed the ground to the young man in three quick strides.
Then, seizing Innocent by the shirt collar, he swiped the boy’s legs out from under him with a sweeping kick and slammed Innocent on his back to the floor.
“Lew! What—?!”
David staggered to his feet as quickly as he could to intervene. The bobby was down on one knee nearly throttling the young fellow.
“This man should be in prison for murder!” Sergeant Todd spat. “He’s Nicholas Harker.”