Chapter 9

Audra may not have known where she was going, but her horse did. The mare headed straight for home and her barn, and without even knowing it, Audra was there. When she saw the house and the barn and Ciego came to take care of her mount, her head began to clear. She began to see what was really in front of her, not the vision from the past that had been with her since she saw the rifle at the chuck wagon.

She hurried into the house. Her mother was in the living room, sitting on the settee, sewing. Jarrod was at the desk in the corner, working on some papers. Audra stopped dead in the foyer, staring at them.

Victoria looked up first. "Audra?"

Jarrod looked up, and got up. Both he and Victoria came to her quickly.

"I remembered," Audra said blankly, not crying, not even visibly upset. Just blank.

"Come over here, sit down," Jarrod said, took her by the arms and sat her down on the settee. Victoria sat beside her, and Jarrod sat on the coffee table in front of her.

Audra was still almost alarmingly calm. "What were you doing when you remembered?" Victoria asked.

Audra said, "I was at the chuck wagon. Someone had left a rifle propped against it. All of a sudden, I saw the Lee house and the rifle and the chair."

Audra took a very deep breath, but she still did not cry. She still looked like she was back in that house in 1862, watching everything unfold again, watching Martha die again, but she didn't cry.

That was frightening her mother and brother more than anything. She wasn't crying.

Jarrod took her hands. "Audra – talk to me. What are you thinking about?"

Audra shook her head. "Nothing. I'm just remembering, but – I'm not thinking anything. I'm not crying. Why aren't I crying?"

Victoria put her arms around her. "You'll cry if it seems right to you, Audra. Don't worry about not crying right now. It'll come when it wants to come."

"Sure it will," Jarrod consoled her. "You've never been through anything like this before. There's no right way to be, and no wrong way to be."

Audra looked Jarrod straight in the eye. "Jarrod, what did Mr. Lee say about me yesterday? I want to know. You said he just associates me with what's happened to him, but that's not everything, is it? He's angry with me, isn't he? He told you how angry he was with me, didn't he?"

Jarrod took a deep breath and let it out. "Yes, Honey, he is angry. He does blame you, but he's wrong. He blames you because Martha and Michael and Margaret are gone, but it's not your fault. None of it is your fault."

"Yes, it is, some of it is," Audra said, calmly. "Mrs. Lee had told us not to run in the house, but Martha started chasing me and I ran, and when Mrs. Lee tried to grab me, I tried to get away from her and that's when I knocked over the rifle. That's exactly the way it happened, isn't it?"

Victoria nodded. "Yes."

"So it was my fault. At least part of it is my fault."

Jarrod said, "Sweetheart, you were only five years old."

"I know," Audra said. "I understand what you're trying to tell me, that it's Michael's fault for leaving the rifle loaded and leaning against the wall, but it's only partly his fault, and maybe it's partly Martha's fault for chasing me, but it's partly my fault too. Mr. Lee is right to blame me."

"Not as much as he's blaming you, he isn't," Jarrod said, determined to be honest, even brutally honest, if he had to be. Audra was opening up. He had to help her all the way through the opening. "Michael and Mrs. Lee were responsible for their own deaths. You had nothing at all to do with them, nothing at all. Michael knew he was partly responsible for Martha's death, and he couldn't live with it. Mrs. Lee may have taken her own life, but if she did, she's responsible for that. You are not responsible for either of them, and Mr. Lee is wrong to take them out on you."

Victoria wasn't sure about the way Jarrod was handling this, but she looked at Audra, and Audra was taking it, without tears, without even trembling. She could see Audra sorting out everything Jarrod was saying to her. Victoria let it keep going.

Audra said, "I don't feel responsible for them, Jarrod. I just feel horrible for Mr. Lee. I feel horrible for what I did."

Jarrod raised a hand to her cheek. "You can't undo it, Sweetheart. It was a terrible accident, but that's what it was, a terrible accident that happened when two five-year-old girls were playing like two five-year-old girls do, and a rifle left carelessly loaded and standing around got in the way."

Audra raised her hand to Jarrod's cheek, and then she leaned forward into his arms. She cried, but only a little.

Nick and Heath came in the front door, worried as they could be. Audra heard them and straightened up as they came into the living room.

"Old Jube sent for us when you left the chuck wagon, Audra," Nick said.

"You all right, Sis?" Heath asked.

Audra shook her head. "No, I'm not. I'm remembering, and I don't know how to feel. I know I was only five years old, but it was partly my fault that Martha died. Mr. Lee is angry with me, and he has a right to be."

"No, he doesn't," Nick said quickly and came closer.

"Yes, he does," Audra said. "Don't sugarcoat things for me, any of you. Now that I know what happened, I have to understand all of it, and I was responsible for at least a part of it. I have to understand that and accept that I have to live with that."

Jarrod pulled her close again as Victoria turned away and began to cry. Nick and Heath looked at each other, and for a long time no one knew what to say.

Then Audra sat up straight again. "I'm not five years old anymore. You don't have to protect me anymore. Jarrod, I want to write to Mr. Lee."

"I don't think that's a good idea for either one of you, Honey," Jarrod said.

"I don't care if he throws it away without reading it. I don't care if he writes back and tears me apart. I have to write the letter, and you have to promise to send it for me."

"Audra, think again about this – " Victoria said.

"I have thought," Audra said. "What I'm going to do is go upstairs and write that letter, and then, Mother, I want you to read it, and Jarrod, I want you to promise to mail it for me when you go back into town. Please, it's really important to me to own up to what happened. Don't you understand?"

"I understand," Heath said. "Even if you were only five years old, you made a mistake, and you have to admit the mistake."

"Yes!" Audra cried.

"Admitting it to yourself and admitting it to Mr. Lee are two different things," Jarrod said.

"No, they're not, not to me," Audra said. "Haven't you ever made a terrible mistake that you were never forgiven for? Wasn't it still important that you apologize for that mistake, even if you weren't forgiven?"

Jarrod had to admit to himself that it had happened to him, and he did apologize, even if there was no forgiveness. He nodded. "All right, Honey. Write the letter, but let me read it. I'm the one who spoke with Mr. Lee yesterday. I'll have the best opinion as to whether sending that letter would help or hurt HIM. If you're going to do this, you don't want to make things worse for HIM."

Audra nodded. "All right, Jarrod. I'm going to go work on that letter now."

Her brothers let her through when she stood up and headed for the stairs. She was resolute about what she was doing, no hesitation in her step at all. They watched her go.

"Jarrod, promise me you'll be very careful when you tell her whether or not to send the letter," Victoria said.

Jarrod nodded. "I will. I'm going to make sure it's the right thing for both of them. If it's not right for David Lee, it won't be right for Audra."

"But you can't guarantee he'll accept her letter with any forgiveness in him," Nick said.

"No," Jarrod said, "and I'll make sure she knows that before I send it. And don't tell her, but I'm gonna hold it for a day or two before I send it, in case she changes her mind."

"Don't lie to her about that if she asks, Jarrod," Heath said. "She was really right about one thing she said. She's not five years old anymore. She deserves our honesty."

Jarrod understood and nodded.

"I think we could all use a little coffee," Victoria said and started to get up.

"I'll get it," Nick said, and he went into the kitchen.

Jarrod saw his mother was getting rid of her tears, and he smiled. "We'll get through, Mother. Just hang in there."