Free Blue Willow by Deborah Smith Page A

bleed to death.”
    “Don’t be a fucking sissy,” Father retorted. Jabbing a fresh cigar into his mouth, he stalked back to his chair.
    Artemas turned toward the butler and took the rifle. “I’m going to find it.”
    Mother sighed. “Go on, if you want to be silly. But take the others with you. They need to see what life’s all about.”
    “They’re too young, Mother.”
    “I was only five when I went on my first fox hunt. Either you take your brothers and sisters, or you don’t go.”
    Artemas flipped the safety catch on the rifle and handed it to James. “Come on.” Carrying Julia on his back,leading Michael, who led Elizabeth, with Cass waddling along behind, they left the terrace via a flight of marble stairs, went through a formal garden, then followed the lawn’s edge under the long shadows of the trees.
    When they reached the edge of the lawn and turned toward the woods, where they were out of sight of their parents and the Schulhorns, Artemas put Julia down and gathered the others around him. “Stay here.”
    “Shit, no,” Cassandra blurted. He turned to her sternly, scowling, all big brother, his nerves frayed. One look like that and she was reduced to tears. “Don’t kill the deer, Artie. Don’t be like Father and Mother.”
    “I’m not like them.” He squatted down and looked at her apologetically. “It’s hurt and probably dying. It would be wrong to let it suffer.”
    She sobbed. Julia jumped from one foot to another in a manic little dance. Michael and Elizabeth started to cry too. James stood by, the gun weighing him down, his mouth set in a hard line but his chin quivering. “Kill it,” he said. “It’s us against them.” Artemas took the rifle. “You make sure the others stay right here.”
    “I will.” James turned toward the others and spit, “Shut up, you stupid crybabies.”
    His throat burning, Artemas walked into the woods. He found the trail of blood easily. A hundred yards into the forest he discovered the doe, collapsed in the underbrush, blood bubbling from her mouth and nose. He knelt beside her, then carefully stroked her hot, delicate neck. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, and tears slid down his face.
    He stood abruptly, knowing that sentiment wouldn’t get the job done. He put the rifle’s muzzle in the soft hollow behind her trembling ear. His hands shook. I’m better than this. My family’s better than this . The trigger was slick and smooth against his sweating finger. Bitterness soured his stomach. He pulled the trigger.
    When he returned to the others, he tried to be calm for their sake. Every muscle in his face strained to hold back his tears. But Michael shrieked when he saw the gorespattered on Artemas’s bare legs beneath his walking snorts. “You killed Bambi’s mother!”
    “Shut up, you little turd,” James growled. “Father made him do it.”
    Artemas handed the rifle back to James, then cleared his throat and sat down in the center of his huddled, crying siblings. “I don’t get to do what I want. None of us do, okay? But we have to stick together, no matter what. We have to take care of each other. All right? Be quiet. We’re not going to let anybody see us cry. We’re going to be better than they are.”
    Elizabeth, Cassandra, and Michael snuffled and nodded. Julia jerked at a tuft of her ragged blond hair. James saluted. Artemas led them back to the house. He vowed to be the best, the strongest, the most powerful, and the most noble. He would eclipse his parents’ dark legacy until there was only a faint outline of their ugliness around him and his brothers and sisters.
    Mama and Daddy had more money now; there was a shiny black wall phone on the kitchen wall, and they’d bought a special glass cabinet to display Artemas’s teapot. Grandma had died a year ago, and now the room she and Lily had shared was Lily’s alone, with a bright white bedstead and matching dresser and desk, and bookcases filled with books on one wall. The