Chapter Sixteen
As it was, she wasn't useful for more than keeping him company. He knew what he was looking for, and tore through the leather-bound volumes and loose papers rapidly. The rain fell to beat the Dutch, rattling the rafters and windows. She answered questions geographic and atmospheric when asked. He asked for a Farmer's Almanac, which she was thankfully able to provide, and looked up dates and moon phases. He muttered under his breath, sometimes in strange cadence and a language that caused her to sit closer the stove.
He didn't explain, she didn't ask, though she wished he would, no matter how much she didn't want to know. Whatever had happened, whatever he had seen, it weighed on him. The clocked ticked, and she gave him branch water instead of more whiskey, and wanted in the worst way to just stand behind him and rub his shoulders, but he didn't seem the sort to take to that familiarity.
Then he stopped at a page, looked rapidly back and forth between it and his scratched notes, and exhaled a sigh filled with relief.
"We have till sundown tomorrow. We have to get to Divinity Falls."
"Divinity Falls? Boy, there's nothing there but bad memories. Been deserted nigh on two years."
"That's where we… We have to get back there."
Marie-Rose nodded. "Fair distance. Have to be up with the sun and ride hard. The weather may not be clement."
Sam nodded in return, and turned to listen to the storm. The wind's whine whistled over the clatter of the shutters, at first sounding like a mournful wail, then like something else.
Marie-Rose put her hand over her mouth as Sam came to understand that the wailing he was hearing wasn't the wind. His expression of consternation was beyond price. He stared at the book in front of him so intently it was a wonder it didn't leap under the table to hide. Lisabet was in full voice. He grabbed for his whiskey glass.
"I should let you get to bed, Miss Rose." He fumbled the books back into the satchel.
"Now here we were enjoying each other's company."
"I can go downstairs, if there's…" He was fighting a fit, either of nerves or laughter, and was attempting to look scandalized, though Marie-Rose could not fathom why he should attempt that for her benefit.
"Sounds like they're having a high old time."
Sam guttered and stood. Lisabet's voice was powerful, but now Clara's could be heard as well.
"I must say, I am right impressed. Now why should you be discomfited by your brother's clearly exceptional fandangoing?"
Sam looked at her with some trepidation. He shoved the books back into the satchel with dispatch. "Thanks for everything, Miss Rose. Really."
"Just returning the favor, Mister Winchester. Perhaps it is Lisabet's enthusiasm causing you agitation?"
The rattling of the wind resolved to a steady, drumbeat thumping against the wall, in time with the voices. It put Marie-Rose in mind of an Indian powwow, the chanting and the drums, primitive and sacred and calling up the magic of the earth.
"G'night, Miss Rose. No, don't get up, Miss Rose, just tell me what room…"
She stood nonetheless, and led him out into the hall, lamp in hand. He had his satchel of books, picked up his bag with his clothes from beside the door. She took him to the room at the end of the hall across from Clara's. It was small, just the bed, a table, and chair, not even a dresser. The window looked out to the south, over the blacksmith's roof and the trail south to Kansas. Black with the night and the storm now.
He set his bags down. The lamp on the table had been set to gutter, the bed was turned down. Must have been thoughtful Clara. The minx.
"Good night, Miss Rose. You've been incredible."
She stood just outside, her with her arms crossed, he with his hand on the door. They looked at one another. He looked away first; she reached over and pulled the door closed.
"Good night, Mister Sam Winchester."
She returned to her own room.
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