Diane Chamberlain - The Courage Tree

“It’ll be all right,” he said, his hand on her shoulder.

She turned to him. The light from the street lamp lit her hazel eyes and settled in one tear that slipped down her cheek. “I’m sorry, Joe,” she said. “I’m so sorry I sent her.”

He bit his tongue against an angry retort. “You couldn’t have known this would happen,” he managed to say instead. He reached over and pulled her into his arms, felt her melt there in the comfort of his touch, and he knew without a doubt that he wanted her to be his wife again.

Lucas turned his head from his computer and listened. Far below the tree house, something was moving. It was not unusual to hear sounds at night on this deeply wooded lot. There was the steady June buzz of cicadas and crickets, and the leaf rustling of raccoons and possums and an occasional deer. But this was the unmistakable heavy crunching footsteps of a man. Lucas held very still, listening.

“Mr. Trowell?” A male voice called to him from somewhere below.

Lucas quickly logged off the Internet. He left his small study, reaching in his pocket for the key to the room, and he carefully locked the door and pocketed the key before walking through the living room to the front door. Opening the door, he stepped onto the deck and leaned over the railing, slipping into the blinding glare from a flashlight.

“Yes?” he called, lifting his hand to block the glare.

The flashlight was instantly turned off. “Sorry,” the man said. He was now illuminated by the deck light, which fell in a soft glow over the trees and cast shadows through the woods. The light bounced off the badge on the man’s uniform, sending an icicle of fear up Lucas’s spine.

Damn.

“Are you Lucas Trowell?” the man asked.

“Yes,” Lucas said, wondering if the county would send a policeman on a Sunday evening to tell him his house was out of code in yet another way. The county was never quite sure what to do about his tree house.

“Can I come up there for a minute?” the officer asked.

“Sure.” Lucas leaned over the railing again to point to the broad trunk of the oak tree beneath his house. “Can you see the steps? They’re around the back of the oak.”

“Right. I see them.”

Lucas listened as the man climbed the stairs, cringing at the squeaking sound a couple of them made. They were not rotted or anything like that, but he knew he should fix them, anyway. He had so little time these days to get work done on the house, though.

He didn’t like the anxiety he felt as the policeman neared the top of the stairs. Did everyone feel a pang of guilt when a cop wanted to see them? Did everyone’s mind race, searching for the reason for the visit? Or did that happen only to a person with something to hide?

The policeman joined Lucas on the deck. He was a young guy—very young—blond and blue-eyed, and he was grinning. Lucas’s anxiety dropped a notch.

“Totally cool,” the cop said. “I’ve always wanted to see this place. Everyone talks about it, but I don’t know anyone who’s seen it up close.”

“What can I do for you?” Lucas asked.

“Do you actually live up here?” The cop was not ready to get down to business, and Lucas wondered if his banter was intentional. Was he trying to throw him off guard? “Or do you just come up to get away from the house every once in while?” He looked toward the small, nondescript brick rambler, dark at the edge of the woods.

“I live up here as much as is reasonable,” Lucas said. “I store things in the house, and I cook in the house. I don’t like to keep food up here. I think I’d have a bug problem. The trees go through the house, and I have a steady stream of ants and spiders as it is. We’re living harmoniously at the moment, but I wouldn’t want to encourage any more of them to visit.”

“Any chance I can see inside?” the officer asked.

“In a minute,” Lucas said. He’d had enough of the game playing. “First, though, tell me why you’re here.”

“Yes. Sure.” The young man looked embarrassed, and Lucas relaxed to see that the cop’s interest had, in all likelihood, been genuine and not some ruse to get him to open up. He’d been seduced by the trees. It was usually that way. People lost themselves up here. They forgot about everything else in the world, at least for a moment. “I’m Officer Russo,” he said. “You work over at the Ayr Creek estate, right?”

“That’s right.”

“Well, the little girl who lives there…”

“Sophie.” He felt his heartbeat quicken, but carefully kept his face impassive.

“Sophie. Right. She was away at a camp this weekend and she was due back at Meadowlark Gardens at three, but she and one of the other girls and their leader never showed up. So I’m talking to people who know her to see if they might have any information.”

“I don’t understand,” he said. “Are you saying the rest of the girls are back?”

“Right. They showed up on time, but they were riding in a separate vehicle.”

“Maybe Sophie’s ride got a late start?” Lucas offered.

“No. The other leader saw them take off ahead of her.”

He felt a sort of panic rise up in his chest. “Could they have been in an accident or—”

“We’re checking on all of that,” Russo said. “So far, they’ve just fallen off the map.”

“Well, I was aware that Sophie was going away for the weekend,” Lucas said. “I don’t know any more than that. I’m not even sure where she went.” That was a lie—and probably an unnecessary one—but he felt the need to play dumb to this cop when it came to Sophie.

“Have you been here all day?” Russo asked.

“Most of it,” he said.

“And when you weren’t here, where were you?”

“What are you getting at?” Lucas asked.

“Just routine questions,” Russo assured him.

“I took a drive to Great Falls to see a friend around one or so. I was back here by three-thirty.”

“Could your friend verify that information for me?”

Lucas sighed. He should have lied. “Do you think I have something to do with this?” he asked. “With Sophie being late?”

“We’re just checking out everyone who has any relationship to Ayr Creek,” Russo said easily.

Everyone with a relationship to Ayr Creek, Lucas wondered, or just the gardener Frank and Donna Snyder distrusted around their granddaughter?

“My friend could verify it, but I’d rather not put him in that position,” he said. That would make things very messy.

“All right, I think we can hold off on that for the moment,” Russo said. “Now can I have that tour?” He looked up at the second tier of the house. “How many trees is this thing resting on?” he asked.

“It’s built between four, actually,” Lucas said. “This one’s a white oak.” He pointed to the tree supporting the deck. “That second level is built on a shag bark hickory, and, it’s hard to see from here, but there’s another oak and a tulip poplar doing the rest of the work.”

Russo stomped his foot on the deck. “Feels sturdy enough,” he observed.

“Oh, sure,” Lucas said, as he opened the front door and led the officer inside. “On a really windy day, though, the whole contraption sways in the wind, and I start to wonder if I’m out of my mind to live up here. Other than that, it’s pretty secure.”

“Holy…” Russo exclaimed, as they walked into the living room.

It was the usual reaction Lucas got when he brought someone inside. The trunk of the hickory cut through the room. The floor was tongue-and-groove fir, the walls, shiplap paneling. Huge windows and healthy houseplants were everywhere. A sofa was built in along one side of the room, and three captain’s chairs provided the rest of the seating.