Faye Longchamp 01 - Artifacts

because when I went to heat the flatiron back up, I heard her talking to him.
    “Really, dear, I wish you would go with me. How could I enjoy myself properly without my husband?”
    The tears ran down my face. It surprised me. It’d been a long time since I took the trouble to cry.
    I prayed a lot the whole rest of that day. Don’t let the Master go with us to Last Isle, I prayed while I brushed the Missus’s everyday poplin, and while I swept off the sun porch, and when I lay in my bed that night. Don’t let him go.
    I thought I’d hear those words all night— Don’t let him go!—but I didn’t. I slept a good sleep and I had a good dream and I woke up singing, because I knew the Master was going to die.
    I didn’t rightly see how it would happen. My dreams don’t always come clear. All I could see was gray water and foamy waves, and somehow I knew I was on Last Isle, not on Joyeuse Island. The Missus was whinkering in my dream, because the Master was dead and I did it. And I wasn’t afraid, no, I wasn’t afraid any more. I wasn’t afraid of being slapped to the ground. I wasn’t afraid of a fist in my belly. I wasn’t even afraid of hanging for murder. I was glad he was dead, glad I killed him. And I had a notion I wouldn’t hang. I didn’t know how, but I was thinking I might kill my master and walk free.

Chapter 21
    If Joe Wolf Mantooth had been the kind of man who was in touch with his feelings, consulting them constantly in the self-conscious New Age manner, he would have known that, on this lovely morning, he was at peace in the world. This did not mean that everything in his world was perfect. He was troubled over the deaths of Faye’s two friends and his soul hurt for the woman whose lonely rest he and Faye had disturbed. He didn’t understand all of Faye’s problems, but he was well versed in the turmoil associated with money and its lack. If he’d had a cent to his name, he would have given it to Faye, although he suspected that money might ease her troubles but would not solve them.
    These concerns frequently occupied Joe’s mind, but they didn’t disturb the peace at his core. As long as he could be alive in a place where he could feel the gentle morning sun on his face and enjoy watching it blaze overhead before it fell cool again into the sea, then he would be whole.
    He stood on the seaward side of Joyeuse Island, watching the cartwheeling dives of the sea birds catching their fishy breakfast. His ears hissed with the noise of a stiff breeze or he might have heard the interlopers’ approach sooner, but instead an irate songbird was the one to tell the tale. At the unexpected sound, Joe wheeled around and saw what was bothering the tufted titmouse.
    Two speedboats approached, hardly slowing to navigate the shallow waters ringing the island. Seven, eight, maybe nine teenagers hopped out in an area wholly unsuitable for landing boats and carelessly tied their crafts to some handy trees. Then they stomped into the marsh that dominated this side of the island, oblivious to lurking water moccasins, although they were making enough drunken noise to scare away any sensible predator.
    “I been hearing about the Wild Man all my life and I’m ready to lay my eyes on him,” said the boy in the lead.
    “Sharon said she saw him right here, right on this island. Do you think he’s really eighty years old, like they say?” said a younger boy, taking swig of his beer.
    “Doubt it. Sharon said he was cute,” said the only girl in the group.
    Joe the Wild Man, who was indeed cute, could travel through deep woods without making a sound. While his hunters were busy thrashing around in the swamp, he had retreated inland to his camp with a clear idea of what must happen. They must not find him. They must not find this camp. They must, under no circumstances, stumble upon Faye’s house.
    His hands closed on his bow, laboriously crafted over a period of weeks out of wood he had gathered and bent and shaped. It was held together with sinew and glue made from the bodies of animals he killed himself. He fitted an arrow to the string, its arrowhead made of rock he’d chipped, held to its shaft with the same sinew and glue. He believed in fighting his own battles, using weapons that were integral parts of himself.
    He watched the kids stumble forward. It had taken them a full night of drinking to get up the nerve for this sightseeing trip and the results were obvious. In this terrain, their