Charles Bannon did not remember killing the baby. But there she was, next to her mother and sister, lying on the ground. Her father and her two brothers were in the barn. Charles remembered killing the rest of the family.

He slid his boot along the ground and nudged the baby in the ribs, just to check.

A gust of wind pressed against his back. He shivered, turned up his collar, and swore at the sky.

It’s for the better, Charles thought, as he jabbed the pitchfork into the stack of straw next to the bodies. Better for the baby not to be alone. Better for all of them. What work is there in being dead? What worries?

He pulled hay over their bodies and was glad to cover them, especially the mother, Lulia. Why had she asked him that question? Right before he brought the butt of the rifle down on the back of her head, she had turned to ask, “Do you pray?” That was it. She had come running from the house to the barn, and after one shot to the shoulder—he had tried to hit her in the chest—she spun around and fell to the ground, then started crawling away. It was pitiful. But he admired her courage for not begging. She’d had one chance to say something, anything, and she had addressed him with a question like that. How odd. How strong. He’d never cared for her, but even so.

Charles was exhausted. Lugging the large woman to the haystack had tired and disgusted him. The two boys had been killed in the barn, and the father had been shot as he hobbled toward the barn door, his arthritic hips clearly firing pain down his legs and up his back with every step. It had been like shooting a wounded animal.

Charles had lined up the father and the two boys along the wall behind the cattle. They were covered with manure and hay, which would mask the stink. Death and shit—all one and the same. But there wasn’t room for the mother in the small barn, so he had dragged her body to an open space next to the haystack. Then he had gone back into the house to collect the girls, and found the baby on the couch.

At first Charles had thought that the baby was sleeping, and that he still had to kill her. But she was already dead. Her older sister had been lying next to her on the floor. He remembered killing her. The girl had crumpled to the floor, slowly, like a young bird fluttering down from a tree. He had needed to clutch her throat only briefly. How easy it was to die.

Charles finished covering the mother and daughters with hay from the side of the stack, forming a heap on the bodies and then rearranging the stack to make it appear natural. He couldn’t leave them there forever, of course, but he didn’t have the energy just then to put them in a more permanent place. Eventually, he would move all the bodies down to the creek and tuck them into the wolf caves.

His work done, he set his mind on breakfast. The morning’s disturbance had delayed his usual eating time, and the exertion of hiding the bodies had fired his hunger. Plus, he still had chores to do; his father would arrive soon with a load of lumber meant for fence repair. What would he tell his father? The truth, or some version of it. His father would figure out the rest.

As Charles walked toward the house, he noticed moist splotches on the ground, as if a puddle had suddenly drained into the earth and left only a dark reminder of its presence. The mother’s blood. He squatted to get a closer look, careful where he stepped. The earth seemed to be holding onto the blood, pulling it down. How thick the blood must be, how heavy. Not like water at all.

He sighed. One more job before breakfast. He returned to the barn for a garden rake and spade, then went to work, throwing some dirt on the spot and pushing it around with the rake, mixing it like concrete. Dirt and blood, he thought as he stirred. Dirt and blood. He wondered if there were nutrients in blood, or was it like poison to the earth? Probably not. Nature to nature and dust to dust. Bloody dust. How far down would the blood go? How long would it stay there? How bloody the earth must be.

When he’d finished, he paused to look at his work. Hardly a trace. Soon the Chinook winds and the sun would complete the job, drying the dirt on top and sealing the blood below. There was also blood on the floor of the barn, but that had been easily masked by hay. Besides, blood in a barn is no matter to anyone; it would soon dry and become worked into the floor with the shit and the piss and the dirt and the straw that time would bring. Time would bury all.

Charles scraped his boots on the rug in the mudroom. He hated to drag dirt into the house. He took off his jacket and noticed the blood on the front and the sleeves. He looked down at his coveralls. More blood. He hung up his jacket and rubbed the splattered stains of his coveralls. Dry blood is just a blemish. Stains are everywhere on a farmhand’s clothes; they don’t mean a thing. Who would notice or care that his clothes were dirty?

He rolled up his sleeves, grabbed the hunk of soap on the washstand, and began scrubbing his hands and arms, then his face. Suddenly he wanted to take a bath. Nothing better than rising from a hot bath, remade for the world. When had his last bath been?

Regina Klemm leaned into the heavy, thick body that was sleeping against hers in the westbound train. She pushed gently, trying to give the man the impression that he was waking on his own. He breathed with his mouth open, and his sour, whiskey-laced breath was familiar to her from other men she had known. This one was a banker, he had told her before dropping off to sleep. A cut above the usual, but so what? Right now he was just like the unemployed mill-workers back in Minneapolis, the truck drivers—all the boys and older men who had nothing better to do with their last dollar than buy her a meal and a beer for the comfort of falling asleep in her arms. At times like this, they were all the same, almost baby-like in their simple, desperate vulnerability. It was so easy to take something, if you didn’t mind giving up something else.

Regina looked out the window as the train began to slow. Almost there. Watford City, North Dakota, just a few miles west of the farm and the little town of Schafer. For the first time in months, she was actually looking forward to something, which was akin to happiness. Another summer on the farm with her aunt and uncle and cousins—she could hardly wait. Mile by mile, the train had left the forested lands of Minnesota and moved west across the Red River Valley, rumbling toward the rolling prairie of western Dakota. The land’s horizon diminished, and the sky rose up in majestic splendor as if to say, I am pitiless; lift your eyes to me and gape in awe, and know thy place on earth.

Regina pressed her forehead against the window, eagerly scanning the landscape. Maybe she would see her Uncle Albert and cousin Daniel approaching the town in their horse-drawn wagon. But no, they would already be at the station, waiting for her. Uncle Albert was never late for anything. She was so grateful that he and Aunt Lulia had agreed to let her spend another summer on the farm. Their letters had been clear about how difficult things were for them, but Regina didn’t care. At least farming was an honest life. You reap what you sow. She loved the hard work and the exhaustion she had felt every evening when she’d stayed with them last summer.

Maybe this time she wouldn’t leave. Why go back to the city? The papers said that the country was in a “great” depression, though a lesser depression seemed bad enough. Either way, what hope was there for a girl with a high-school diploma and no real skills, in a city that couldn’t even employ its men? She was one of “the girls that God forgot,” the growing number of young women who moved to the city and sat in job shops for hours every day, hunger gnawing at their hopes.

Regina knew the city well enough, and she had been able to find an occasional job while trading her body for a place to stay, a meal to eat, and a way to keep some distance between her and her mother. For Regina, who was picky about the men with whom she spent the night, such liaisons involved a kind of transactional domesticity. It was not just business. She felt a kinship with every down-on-his-luck man she encountered. Were they not all in the same boat?

But that was not how her mother viewed the situation. “I know what you’re doing,” her mother had said, “and it’s nothing but whoring.”

“I’m just doing what you did for dad,” Regina had replied, “except I’m getting something better in return.”

Whatever Regina was doing, it was not an endgame, only a rickety bridge to something else. But what? A decent job? Those went to the men first. Marriage? Whom could she marry? Why would she marry? What had marriage ever given to her mother, or to any other woman she knew? Only more worries, more fears. Shared poverty is not less bitter. And then the man leaves anyway. The one who can afford to leave is the one who has the power.

So she wanted to stay on the farm this time, and not go back to Minneapolis. Regina loved her Uncle Albert and her Aunt Lulia in ways that she had never loved her own mother. Lulia treated Regina like an equal, like a friend. Besides, Regina felt Lulia needed her, needed someone beside her husband, who was a nice man but preoccupied with the farm. It’s true that Lulia was nervous, always fearful of something, or “a bit high-strung,” as her mother said, but that made her all the more appealing to Regina.

One thing was certain: Lulia was unwavering in her commitment to her family. She adored her children, and Regina loved living in the warmth of that maternal glow. The four kids included the baby, Sarah, who was now over a year old, and then Ruth, who would turn thirteen this summer, and Mark, fifteen, and Daniel, who would be eighteen soon. How much bigger and stronger would Daniel be since the last time she’d seen him? Regina smiled as she considered the answer. He would go to Fargo in the fall, to study at the Ag School and bring new knowledge back to the farm, which would eventually be his to manage. A shame, really, considering how well he could write. He was proud of his work, and Regina had encouraged him to continue. The world needed Farmer Poets.

The train slowed in jerks as it rolled to a stop. Still the man on her shoulder slept, heavy dreams holding him back. Regina put her hand on his, which lay on her right knee. She moved it further up her thigh, then squeezed it to wake him, knowing it would please him to think that his hand had lain there for so long, so close.

The banker awoke to find himself snuggled up to a young woman. He squeezed her leg and took a long breath, knowing that the best part of his day had already happened, and trying to make it last.

“Say, Mr. Banker,” Regina said, reaching inside her dress and removing a bill. “I wonder if you could give some company to this little Abraham? He’s so lonely all by himself.”

The banker smiled, then sat up in his seat. “I like an honest thief,” he said, opening his wallet and considering the cash inside.

“It takes one to know one, Mr. Banker,” she said, smiling.

He laughed. “The people you meet on trains,” he exclaimed. “Here, some company for Ol’ Abe.”

He handed her five one-dollar bills, and she leaned in and kissed his cheek. “Thank you very much. Seems I have a knack for the financial business.”

“You’ve got a knack all right,” the banker said.

“And I thank you on behalf of my aunt and uncle. I’m sure the contribution will be of good use to them.”

“Who’s your uncle again?”

“Albert Bauer.”

“That’s right, the Bauers. Good people. They’ve had a rough year, like most folks around here, but they should be all right. If you start poor, you often finish poor, and the same goes for stupidity. Albert Bauer did not start poor, and he is not stupid. He’ll make it.”

“Bankers sure know a lot about people,” Regina said.

“You can tell an awful lot about someone by looking at their money.”

“How did you get a chance to look at Uncle Albert’s money?” She was genuinely curious now.

“His loan was transferred to us—the First National in Williston. The bank in Schafer didn’t make it.”

“What a shame,” Regina said wryly. “All those good bankers going out of business.”

“It takes more than goodness to survive these days.”

“Well said, Mr. Banker. Does that make you bad?”

He smiled and gave her a good look. “I think we all need a little badness in us these days, don’t you…uh, Regina?”

“Yes, that’s right. Regina Klemm. Friend of farmers and bad bankers everywhere.”

He smiled.

She stood and moved past him into the aisle. “This is my stop. It’s been a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Banker.” She held out her hand.

“The pleasure was mine,” he said, bringing her hand to his lips.

“Say hello to your wife for me,” Regina added with a wink.

“Oh, I will, Miss Klemm.”

She waved at him, then turned to step off the train.

The banker bent his head and watched her through the window. She walked back and forth across the station platform, looking for someone. As the train pulled away, he saw a man approaching her.

Based on a true story, WHAT COMES UNDONE is a story of murder, deceit, and revenge in Depression-Era America. I was initially drawn to the tale by the elaborate ruse that the murderer and his enabling father carry out to fool their neighbors and fellow townsfolk. People’s willful disregard for the truth, if the fiction fits their selfish narratives, intrigued me.

Briefly, WHAT COMES UNDONE tells of a desperate young woman who escapes a seedy street life, where her body is her only means of survival, by traveling to what she believes is a rural idyll in the Great Plains. Once there, she not only discovers the extremes of Depression-Era farm life but falls into a perilous love triangle that includes a brutal murderer, whom she ultimately exposes, thus inciting a mob’s revenge. While that may sound like a breathless novel of passion and suspense, the story also has powerful political parallels that resonate today. WHAT COMES UNDONE holds up a mirror to the reader and to our times (please excuse the cliché), asking us to consider the root causes of both personal and political violence.

I stumbled upon this story many years ago, when I met an elderly gentleman manning a card table at a small-town event in North Dakota. He was selling books and pamphlets on local history, including a brief, stapled account of “The Last Lynching in North Dakota.” I purchased it with the vague intention of writing about the event someday.

Years later, I found the pamphlet after a move and began thinking about the story in earnest. There were so many blanks in the narrative. I visited the North Dakota Historical Society library and then the county museum in the region where the events had occurred. I also talked with locals who had some knowledge, if not memories, of what had happened. I even visited the only remaining building from the old prairie town in question—the thick-walled stone jail where Charles Brannon had been sprung and lynched.

I invented many of the characters in this novel, including the female protagonist, Regina, but I kept the broad outlines of the original murder and revenge. I come from Great Plains farm stock myself, and I often think of those gruesome events. Life was hard back then, and I have tried to capture the unforgiving, haunting, yet beautiful nature of those times.