Alafair Tucker 01 - The Old Buzzard Had It Coming

the front door.
    A shuffle from the entrance froze Alafair as still as a rabbit. She held her breath as she listened to footsteps move away from the door of the soddie and the figure of John Lee appear just within her line of vision at the corner of the soddie. Alafair didn’t panic. She knew if she stayed still, he probably wouldn’t see her in the dark shadows. He walked out into the field about twenty paces and proceeded to relieve himself.
    Alafair studied his compact figure with interest as he did his business. It didn’t occur to her to be embarrassed. She had lived her life too close to nature to be bothered by a little pee.
    The moon was bright and she could make out considerable detail about the boy, even if it was too dark to see his features. He was not a tall youngster, maybe five feet eight, but at nineteen, likely to add an inch before he was done. He was pretty broad in the back already, and narrow hipped, with lanky limbs and an untrimmed shag of hair. Years ago, he had been just one of the flocks of kids who had hung around when all the offspring were little. He hadn’t been a brat, she remembered that. He said, “Yes, ma’am,” and all. Usually barefoot, even when Alafair thought it too cold.
    John Lee finished his task and put himself back together, then stood for a few minutes gazing up at the full moon before he visibly shuddered with the cold and turned with some reluctance and returned to his den in the hay bales.
    Alafair felt a twinge of compassion for the fugitive. Maybe he was guilty and maybe not, but he was young, probably scared, and definitely cold, dressed as he was in nothing but a long-sleeved shirt and overalls. At least he was shod. She hoped Phoebe would have the sense to smuggle some old quilts or blankets to him.
    She thought about Phoebe disappearing with Naomi earlier that day, and wondered if Phoebe was telling Naomi about John Lee’s hiding place, or if it had been the other way around.
    She could hear him scuffling around inside the soddie as he resettled into his lair. He emitted a sigh loud enough for Alafair to hear, and then silence. Alafair glanced at the moon. She stood up slowly, stiff and frozen-toed, and made her way home.
    ***
    Alafair figured that the longer she waited to make her move, the more likelihood there was that John Lee would escape or be caught. She decided to do it early, while Shaw was taking the kids to their various pursuits and she was alone on the farm for an hour or so. The idea that she might be in danger from John Lee never occurred to her.
    It was a miserable morning, still dark long after it should have been because of the heavy overcast. The wind was like a knife, freezing cold and full of little stinging bits of sleet. Alafair wrapped herself up like a mummy and filled a lard pail with some biscuits and bacon and hot coffee in a jar. She practically ran the quarter-mile to the soddie, partially because she was in a hurry and partly because it was so cold she feared that if she slowed down she would freeze solid in her tracks. She slowed a little as she neared the shack, and approached warily, not wanting to startle John Lee if he was watching. She stood before the door for a couple of seconds, took a deep breath, and ducked inside.
    She saw nothing, except the u-shaped wall of hay bales that Shaw and the boys had piled floor to ceiling. Alafair stood still and studied the wall, her gaze sweeping slowly from side to side, top to bottom, trying to find the hay equivalent of a secret panel. She knew that in the fall, Shaw and his hired day-laborers had packed the soddie cram-full of baled hay, and as winter progressed, he had pulled out bales by the half-dozens, through windows and doors, until little packets of emptiness existed around the shack, like the anteroom she was standing in.
    She was reasonably certain that the boy didn’t have to remove a bale to reach his hiding place, since a bale of hay is heavy, and Phoebe certainly wouldn’t be able to maneuver one with any ease. The bales were stacked in a flat, straight wall to within six inches of the ceiling. Climbing over would be so difficult that it was practically impossible.
    Her eye followed the six-inch opening along the top. The bales were flush with the east wall, but stood out from the west wall about eight inches. Not enough to allow a human body to pass through. Not at first sight, anyway. Alafair stepped up and examined the opening, passing her hand around the hay