Chapter 2

Joshua Barker trotted over the open land, shovel thrown across his shoulders following a night of digging. There wasn’t much more than a coin in his pocket but he’d been looking forward to his bath in the barn for hours, and baths were always best right before bed. But then suddenly he stopped, frozen like a photograph; his head tilted like a curious dog, listening for anything which sliced through the silent night.

He heard it again, somewhere too close to ignore, someone was screaming. A woman. He bent over, tightening the laces of his boots, and took off running towards the disturbance, shovel gripped tightly within his right hand. It couldn’t have been a minute later when, in the sudden emergence of moonlight, he saw two men doing their very best to assault a woman beneath them.

Between the woman’s cries, not one of the three heard Joshua approaching quickly. Within striking distance, he took a second hand over the shovel and cocked it back like a bat and swung with all of his strength. Clunk. The man on top of Ms. Irons keeled over beside her, face in the dirt, and the second sprung to his feet without even pulling his pants up.

Joshua adjusted his grip on the shovel as his hands had grown wet. The wouldbe assaulter balled up his fists and lunged forward, an attack which was all too easy to avoid considering his near-blackout drunken status. Joshua sidestepped him and swung the shovel into his ribs, sending an immediate cry of pain into the air as the man dropped to his knees.

Joshua leaned back, gathering a great deal of power from his back leg, and threw a kick forward into the kneeling man’s face. A dull thud, like a muffled cannon blast, echoed out as he dumped to the cold ground like a sack of bricks. He ran to Ivory and offered a trembling hand, one she studied a moment, spotting numerous blisters and dried blood for decor. Once their fingers were locked, Joshua hoisted her up to her feet.

Joshua was panting, but only for a moment. “Are you okay? Did–did they hurt you?”

Ivory studied the wide eyes which stared into hers, just how blue they were and in contrast to the dark mustache and goatee of her savior’s face. “No, no, I’m fine,” she said, “they hit me a couple of times, but nothing more.”

Joshua glanced up and down her thin frame, even in formal attire it was obvious how tiny she was. She clearly wasn’t a woman of the night, not with that dialect and modesty. “Are you from here, around here?” In the pause between them he checked on the two men who’d still yet to move an inch since the fight.

“Not too far.” What a relief to meet someone who doesn’t know who I am. “My name is Ivory. Ivory Irons. I live in the estate with my father not but a couple of miles back that way,” she pointed into the darkness behind her.

“Well, we better get you back home,” Joshua tossed the shovel back over his shoulder. “I’ll walk you to the edge of the line and then watch the rest of the way to make sure you get in, okay?”

Ivory stepped forward. “No-no-no, you must come in to receive your reward from my father! You musn’t not take credit for what is rightfully yours!” She watched as he remained silent, head bowed slightly like a child who’s just caught a smack in the mouth. “Please, sir, at least give me your name.”

Joshua got real quiet for a moment. A throat clearing. “My name, uh…Joshua. Joshua Barker. And as well as your intentions are, Ms. Irons, you being from an estate I’d rather stick to your silent tour guide. You could tell your father I saved you from some flying demons with pitchforks and he’d still string me up as these two pieces of shit here.”

Ivory stared, dumbstruck at what she’d just been told. My father would never do that. But before she could protest in any sort any longer, Joshua politely excused them from the area and they began to walk back in silence, a silence which was not meant to last as Ivory would not allow it.

Ivory watched her savior march forward, glancing back every few moments, but he didn’t seem affected by any of the night’s events, like it wasn’t something worth mentioning ever again. She cleared her throat and spoke softly, letting him know that he had indeed at the very least saved her womanhood, possibly even her life, and she was indebted to him. She watched on with bright eyes as he collected himself to speak.

“Hold on now, Ms. Irons,” Joshua said, walking and talking, “I ain’t no savior, Jesus Christ-type, okay? I was coming home from a night of digging ditches and I heard you screaming, so I ran over and did what I could. I’m sure if it was any other guy he woulda done the same thing.”

Ivory smiled. “But it wasn’t ‘any other guy’, it was you and you’re the one who has to live with the consequences of your good deeds.”

Joshua stopped on a dime, turning his attention to Ivory. “And these are the consequences: we have a nice conversation, I drop you off at your big ol house before I get to walk three miles back that way so I can sleep in a barn and wake up to break my back again doin who knows what.”

Ivory got real hopeful all of a sudden. “My father has a factory.”

“Okay?”

“So maybe as a reward he could get you a nice job with steady hours and pay, maybe you wouldn’t have to sleep in a barn anymore. Can’t be the easiest work I imagine, he’s always talking about all the heat and iron, but at least it could help”

“No, thank you. If at all possible, don’t tell anyone about this. Now, please.” Once again, Joshua pushed them along politely, only stopping for Ivory to collect her heels that she’d kicked off earlier.

Joshua froze upon spotting the massive outline of the mansion in the night sky, Ivory noticed and turned to him with a concerned look on her face. She wanted to ask him if he was hungry or wanted a drink, but couldn’t find the strength to push the words beyond her teeth. Instead they nodded to each other, Joshua smiled back to be polite, and went in opposite directions. Only Ivory turned to look back.

Every few steps she would glance behind her, hoping to see him willing to take her up on the offer she hated herself for not making, but it was not meant to be. Right up until she reached the vine-covered wall which led right into her bedroom, she kept looking to see only the black horizon waiting.

Being twenty-three-years old she’d climbed that wall many times and had learned to scale it within moments, but more importantly she’d learned to do it quietly so as to not wake the dragon in the next room. The routine had been set so long ago: go out, father does not see her so he assumes she’s gone to bed, and she sneaks in much later than she should have. Even as an adult, her father insisted on a bedtime.

Ivory tiptoed across the floor and into the connected bathroom where she undressed and slipped into a warm bath. As she sat in the water she thought of that night, looking over where she could to see if there were any bruises to lie about the next morning, but there were none that would be noticed, or at the very least asked about. Luckily for her the worst attacks had occurred where they wouldn’t be seen; there’d been a persistent pounding sensation in her head since the attack from where she was struck repeatedly.

And then she thought of him, Mr. Joshua Barker of who-knows-where. What is he doing? What is he up to? Is he thinking of me and what a fine gentleman he’d been in the face of grave danger? She smiled, hoping that he was thinking of her the same way she was thinking of him. Could it be so? Will I ever see him again?

Such thoughts and desires went into a little diary she kept, one of many she’d gone through over the years. There wasn’t a single page in the ten or twelve years she’d been writing which wasn’t in the drawer beside her bed.

Mr. Joshua Barker of who-knows-where wasn’t thinking much of anyone or anything, there in his barn with thehay and the lantern burning bright, working his way through a bottle of booze. He stuffed the bottle into his mouth and had a long pull, smiling at the pair of sleeping horses who shared the shed with him every night, snoring like little babies.

His eyes dropped to his hands and the wounds on his palms from digging with that goddamn shovel all day, there wasn’t a chance they’d be scabbed over by the time he had to work the next morning and the wounds would surely open right back up on the first go. The pain made him take a drink from the bottle, this one longer than the last and half as satisfying.

When he closed his eyes they burnt as if someone had thrown salt in them, so he kept them open until he no longer could. Another drink from the bottle and it was empty, not a single drop remained. Before long he was sawing logs, snoring away like a child in the arms of his mother. But surely, the final thought which ran through his mind was of that angel named Ivory.