These Honored Dead (A Lincoln and Speed Mystery #1) - Jonathan F. Putnam Page 0,73

carriage an hour later.

“Much better,” Gustorf said, giving me an exuberant slap on the back. “Do you want to hear all about it?”

“Not particularly.” I gave the reins a shake and Hickory dutifully began pulling us toward Springfield.

“It was an experience the likes of which I’ve never had,” Gustorf continued as if I had not spoken. “What did she call them—the exotic pleasures of Salt Creek? The crumbling inn, the reeking taproom, the exotic pleasures. It was all so perfect. A delicious witch’s brew. You must sample it yourself sometime.”

“Perhaps,” I returned doubtfully.

“Did you find what you were looking for?” he asked after we’d bumped along the trail for a few minutes.

“I did.” I tapped the ledger, which I balanced in my lap.

“Then why the long face? It’s a glorious day to be alive.” He swept his arms toward the horizon, taking in the florid prairie.

“My thoughts are on someone who’s not alive to enjoy the day.”

“But life is for the living, my friend,” he said. “Look at the beauty of God’s creation all around us. Do you think the dead want us to dwell on them, when we could dwell instead on this? I don’t.”

A few miles along, Gustorf added: “You truly don’t have any curiosity about how we managed things, with my lower half imprisoned in Dr. Patterson’s contraption?”

“I suppose I do.”

“Aha!” he exclaimed with a laugh. “It’s an amazing tale, a stupendous feat of dexterity.”

But when I leaned back toward him to hear he added, “And to learn of it you’ll have to buy my book.”

Gustorf shouted with laughter. I focused on the trail. A little later, I turned back and saw him slumped against the side of the jangling carriage, a wide grin spread on his face. He was snoring loudly.

CHAPTER 28

I awoke the next morning to bright sunlight streaming into our bedroom through the small window. I lay there for a minute without moving until a church bell began to strike the hour. Eight bells, if I counted them correctly in my somnolent state. Eight o’clock: I was late. We were late, I corrected myself, as I felt Lincoln’s inert leg jutting out toward me.

I thrust myself up onto my elbows and moved to rouse Lincoln when I saw he was already awake and lying on his back. His forehead was wrinkled, his jaw clenched, and his eyes were wide and expressionless. I’d seen him like this once or twice before, and I knew it would require serious effort to get him moving.

“Lincoln, you’ve got to rise,” I shouted, shaking him with both arms. “Court’s starting within the hour. The doctor’s case is first on the docket. Don’t you remember?”

My friend did not move, nor did his countenance register that he had heard me. His eyelids fluttered once; but for this movement, I would have feared he had turned to stone.

“Lincoln. Now. Get up!” I tried again, shaking him still more vigorously. “Don’t tell me your hypos have returned. You don’t have time for them, not today you don’t.”

At last he spoke, although nothing but his lips moved, the words coming out of his mouth with an agonizing slowness. “I am awake, Joshua. You can see that perfectly well.”

“You need to get out of bed. Patterson’s in the dock. And it won’t reflect well on you if poor little Hay is the one who stands up to defend him.”

“Yes, I think I will,” he replied, still speaking with an unnatural cadence. “I have been contemplating, these past few hours, whether it wouldn’t be better to spend the whole day lying in bed. I think it would be better, most probably. But I think you may be right as well and I should get up and go to court.”

I sprang into action, with great effort dragging Lincoln out of the bed and starting to feed his hands and legs through his clothes, which I picked up off the floor. His body remained limp at first, but gradually he began animating his limbs. When he was encased in his courtroom attire, and I had quickly thrown on clothes of my own, I turned to look at him.

“Is it safe to take you out into the company of society?”

He smiled, the first display of emotion I’d seen that morning, and when he spoke his voice was almost back to normal. “Good old Speed. I’m not sure how I’d manage without you. Yes, let’s be off.”

As we took the stairs two at a time, I asked if he had