‘Thank you—I love it,’ he said.
‘It was your dad’s favourite bird,’ Alice revealed.
‘Really?’
‘Yeah, he used to feed them his lunch in the cemetery he worked in,’ Alice remarked with a smile.
‘Wow, thanks.’
The door closed behind them and Morton threaded his arm through Juliette’s, as they made their way back down Commercial Street to their hire car. ‘I’m sure she knows where he is,’ Morton declared.
‘Yes,’ Juliette agreed.
‘You think so, too?’ He had expected her to challenge him on it—needing some kind of proof that he didn’t have, it was just his gut instinct. ‘Some of the things they said just didn’t add up. And Alice slipped into the present tense a couple of times. After what happened I understand that he wants to be left alone.’
‘Yeah, I noticed that.’
‘Did you pick up on anything else? Or is it just your policewoman’s hunch?’
‘This,’ Juliette said, holding her mobile phone in front of his face. It was a close-up picture of a man and a woman grinning at the camera. The man was undoubtedly his father. It was a truly bizarre moment—seeing his biological father having aged in front of his eyes. His hair had flashes of grey and his nose was fractionally off-set.
‘God…’ Morton breathed.
‘How old does he look there? Fifty? Sixty?’
‘Which means it was taken sometime in the last ten years…’ Morton said excitedly. ‘That woman—is she famous…there’s something familiar about her.’
‘Not that I recognise, no.’
‘Where did you find it?’ Morton asked.
‘When Jan went off to see what you and Alice were up to, I took a quick peek at their photos. It was on a bookshelf with some others but was the only one lying face down.’
‘Really?’
‘Yep—they clearly didn’t want us to see it. He’s alive, Morton.’
‘Yes, but does he want to be found?’
Chapter Thirteen
4th December 1950, Cow Hollow, San Francisco, California, USA
Life couldn’t get any more perfect. A winter sun shone through Velda’s bedroom window, engulfing her in a halo of light. She was sitting at her table applying a light dusting of blue eyeshadow. She was no longer taking any medication and she felt amazing. Alive. She smiled at her reflection and headed for the door.
‘Another new dress? Where are you going, all dolled up?’ Beatrice asked when she arrived downstairs.
Velda did a twirl. ‘This old thing?’ she replied coyly. ‘Do you like it?’
Beatrice raised an eyebrow. ‘I’m guessing you’re going to see him?’
Velda flounced. ‘When are you going to start actually using his name?’
‘Okay: I’m guessing you’re going to see Mr Joseph Jacklin, Audrey’s husband?’ Beatrice corrected.
‘Not for much longer—he’s sorted out all the divorce paperwork. His attorney thinks it will all be done and dusted in the New Year. Then he’ll be free to marry again.’
‘I just hope you know what you’re doing, Velda.’
‘I do! I do!’ Velda chimed as she waltzed out of the front door.
‘Well, hi there, Velda,’ Joseph’s father greeted. ‘Come on in. Joseph! You’ve got a visitor.’
‘Thank you, George,’ Velda said, entering the house.
Joseph, with a wide grin on his face, hobbled out from the dining room, which had been converted into his recovery room. He was walking unaided now, but still couldn’t manage steps owing to the pieces of shrapnel lodged in his hip. ‘My, don’t you look swell.’
‘You’re looking better each day, too,’ Velda commented.
Joseph leant in and kissed her on the cheek. ‘Want to go for a walk?’
‘Sure—if you’re up to it?’
‘It’ll do me good,’ Joseph said. He took his jacket from the coat-stand and opened the door for Velda. ‘After you, ma’am.’
Velda curtseyed. ‘Why thank you, kind sir.’
‘Do you have anywhere you want to walk to?’ he asked.
With Joseph at her side, she didn’t care where she was in the world. ‘I don’t mind,’ she replied, linking her arm through his.
They ambled slowly down the cold street. It was several seconds before either of them spoke.
‘So, I should hear back from my attorney any day now. Audrey was given the divorce papers yesterday.’
Velda nodded but said nothing.
‘Can you believe it—she’s moved Dwight Kalinski into the house—my house—the house I’m paying for. I mean, of all the things. Can you believe it?’
Velda could believe it. It was Audrey Fuller they were talking about, after all. ‘Expect the unexpected as far as she’s concerned.’
‘The woman just has no moral decency,’ Joseph seethed.
‘She’ll get what’s coming to her, one day,’ Velda said.
‘One thing’s for certain—she hasn’t got a legal leg to stand on—I’ve got a whole truck-load of witnesses who’ll say she was carrying on with him behind my back, while I was out there fighting for my country—her country.’
‘Almost dying for your country,’ Velda corrected, gently stroking his arm. ‘But I must say, you’re recovering real well, Joseph. You’ll be running around the block again in no time.’
‘Just walking’s good enough for me.’
‘You’re a tough one.’
‘I think me being still alive is more to do with the accuracy of the gooks. Six bullets—all of them missing major organs and arteries—that’s got to be some kind of record.’ He took a long, appreciative breath and squeezed Velda’s arm. ‘Jeez, I’m glad to be back here. There are a whole bunch of guys out there who won’t be so damn lucky.’
They walked without aim, ending up in a small café on Fillmore Street. Velda kept their conversation light, despite her yearning to discuss the future. People close to Joseph had implied that once divorced, he would likely waste no time in proposing to Velda. Her friends had begun to discuss the wedding. At first they had talked in loose, general terms, then specific dates, styles, floral arrangements and venues had been mooted. They had debated where the couple might live and how long they would wait before trying for their first child. Velda now found herself with a clear image of her wedding to Joseph in her head, despite his having never uttered a single word about it. Whenever they were alone together, a small part of her was anxiously anticipating his proposal.
‘What do you say we go catch a movie?’ Joseph suggested as they drank the last inches of their sodas.
‘Sure—I’m in no hurry to get home.’
‘Great—let’s go.’
They left the Grand Theater on Mission Street just under two hours later, having watched Destination Murder.
‘Well, I’m sure glad you didn’t get any ideas from that movie,’ Joseph chuckled.
Velda playfully slapped his arm. ‘And what do you mean by that?’
Joseph shrugged and laughed. ‘Woman ducks out from a movie theatre in the intermission, goes and murders someone then returns with her alibi intact.’
Velda’s face scrunched into pretend thought. ‘Hmm…could I get up to Twenty-Fifth Avenue and back in five minutes?’
They both laughed and began to stroll away from the theatre.
‘Why did you do it, Joseph?’ Velda asked, finally finding the courage to voice a question that had been bothering her since he had returned home. ‘Why did you risk your life like that in Korea? You could so easily have been killed.’
Joseph took a moment to answer. ‘You know what? The reason I joined up in the first place was to escape the mess at home—with Audrey, I mean. Out there I was free of it—didn’t have to think. Do you know, Velda, she wrote me just once in the whole time I was out there? Once. So it was okay not to think about home—easy, even. Then the letters started coming—folk telling me what she was up to.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Vel
da said, a bubble of deep anger welling inside her. She had been one of those letter-writers.
‘Anyway, things started playing on my mind all the time and there was nothing I could do about it, you know? That day…the day that it happened…I wasn’t myself…I wasn’t concentrating. Me and the other guys got ourselves pinned into a corner and I was shot in the arm,’ he said, touching his right bicep. ‘We were like sitting ducks—waiting to be killed. I knew the only thing that could save us was one of us making it to the machinegun emplacement and I just couldn’t ask it of the other guys. At that moment I just saw clarity—complete clarity: if I made it to the gun me and the other guys would live; if I died then I got myself a way out of the mess at home.’ He emitted an ironic kind of laugh. ‘It’s funny—I get a medal for bravery but actually it was driven by cowardice.’
Velda squeezed his arm. ‘Of course it’s not cowardice—you wanted to save the men around you and you did. You made it to the machinegun.’
‘And received another five bullets in the process and had to kill three men.’
‘That must have been hard…’
‘It was like nothing else. It sure is a strange quirk of humanity—there’s nothing—no amount of money—nothing—that could make me take someone’s life.’ He gestured to the people wandering the sidewalk in his view. ‘I just couldn’t do it. And yet out there, in a war when it’s kill or be killed, I didn’t have a problem. A bullet in each of their heads and bayonet through the chest of the third one. I saw the life leave their eyes and felt nothing but relief…I don’t know what kind of a man that makes me, Velda, I really don’t.’
‘It makes you just a man, Joseph. Normal in many ways, exceptional in others. My Joseph Jacklin.’
Joseph smiled. ‘And that was it. The guys survived and I blacked out. Next thing I know, I’m in an army hospital being prepared to return home.’
‘My hero,’ Velda said.
They had reached his house. ‘Well, do you want to come in for some dinner?’
Velda nodded. ‘I’d love that.’ She followed Joseph inside his house.
‘What say we put some records on and I try some dancing?’ he suggested, moving his arms and legs in a stiff, robotic way.
Velda laughed.
‘Joseph.’ It was his father, appearing from the sitting room door, his face grave. ‘Mr Segghetti’s here,’ he whispered.
‘Okay.’
Velda could see that it wasn’t the good news they had been expecting. Joseph faced Velda. ‘We’ll take a rain check on dinner and dancing. I’ll see you later.’ He walked alongside his father towards the sitting room.
‘Let me come in, too,’ Velda pleaded.
Joseph shot a look to his father and thought for a second. ‘Okay.’
Mr Segghetti, a rotund man with an ill-fitting black suit, stood to shake Joseph’s hand as they entered the sitting room. Despite his dubious appearance, he was apparently one of the best divorce attorneys in the city.
‘Mr Segghetti—this is my good friend, Velda,’ Joseph introduced.
‘Ah,’ Mr Segghetti said, taking Velda’s hand in his. ‘It’s a pleasure.’
Velda smiled and retracted her hand from his sweaty grip. Was she reading into it, or had there been some trace of recognition in his voice? Had Joseph told him of his intention to marry again? Or had her name cropped up somehow in the divorce paperwork? She kept her composure and stood primly on the outskirts of the conversation.
‘She won’t accept the terms,’ Mr Segghetti said.
Joseph nodded. It was what he had anticipated. It was what they had all anticipated. ‘Okay, up the offer.’
‘I did—several times.’
‘Up it some more, then,’ Joseph yelled.
‘Mr Jacklin—I’ve presented terms to her attorney that I have never offered before in my career—she won’t take it.’
Joseph blew out a puff of air. ‘Then ask what her terms are.’
‘Mr Jacklin—you’re not understanding me—she has no terms; she won’t divorce you. If you have plans for the future—’ he glanced quickly at Velda ‘—then you’re going to have to rethink them.’
The bubble of anger inside Velda erupted uncontrollably. ‘Damn Audrey!’ she ranted, picking up a cup from the table and launching it at the wall. Dark coffee tears streamed down the flowery silk wallpaper, meeting the shards of bone china on the carpet below.
‘Velda!’ Joseph stammered, stretching out to grab her hand, as she reached for another cup to launch. ‘Stop! Can’t you see, this is what she wants?’
But Velda couldn’t see anything but that evil bitch’s face smirking; that she once again held the upper hand. The rage ravaged her body like a fever. She felt a tight grip on her wrists. She was being pushed down into a chair. Held there while a tirade of curses and invectives spewed from her mouth.
Her eyes were playing tricks on her. The room was dark but a slice of light cut through—found its way through what? A curtain? The window was in the wrong place, though. Velda sat up, her eyes wide, as she demanded more from her cobwebbed mind than it was prepared to give. She had a sagging feeling inside, but she didn’t know what or why. Her mouth was exceptionally dry. She felt across to her bedside table for a glass of water but there was no water and there was no table. Where was she?
Swinging her legs down to the floor, she silently crossed the room, moving towards the light. Yes, it was a curtain. She tugged it wide and was momentarily blinded by the brightness from outside.
The realisation of where she was and the cause of the sagging feeling inside slammed into her brain like a baseball bat. She was in one of the Jacklin guestrooms. God only knew how long she had been there. She remembered flashes of what had taken place, her thoughts having been filtered and sieved through the pall of strong barbiturates.
She was calm now, her thoughts as placid as a glassy lake. She knew what had to be done.
Velda strode over to the door and turned the handle. It was locked. They had locked her in, imprisoned her.
‘Hello?’ Velda shouted, knocking loudly. She repeated her call, ensuring that her voice sounded as normal as possible.
She heard movement outside the room.
‘Hello? Can you open the door, please?’
It was Joseph who unlocked it. Concern and anxiety marked his face. ‘Are you okay, Velda?’
She nodded. ‘Sorry about earlier—but I know what we’ve got to do about her now—’
‘Fight her!’ Joseph interrupted. ‘Get another attorney. Get a whole bunch of attorneys—she’s not going to know what’s hit her.’
‘No,’ Velda said quietly. She took his hand. ‘Come and sit down here.’ She led him to the bed and he sat beside her. ‘What does Audrey want?’
Joseph shrugged. ‘My money?’
‘No, that’s not it.’
‘To make me look dumb?’
‘Nope, that’s not it either.’
‘I don’t know, Velda,’ he answered impatiently. ‘I give up—what does she want?’
‘She wants a game,’ she explained. ‘It’s as simple as that. She wants you to throw money at a whole bunch of attorneys and get whipped up in a big court battle but she doesn’t really care if she wins or loses. Her whole life has been a game, a drama.’
‘So, what? Do nothing—never divorce her?’
‘Play the game back. Do what she would least expect.’
‘And that is what exactly?’ Joseph asked.
‘Leave town. You and me. Pack up and go. We tell nobody where we’re going—at least not for a while and we live someplace else, somewhere she can’t find us.’
Joseph took her hand in his and met her gaze. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’
Velda nodded.
‘I’m guessing by that glint in your eyes that you’ve got some ideas of where you want to go?’
‘Massachusetts—eventually.’
‘Massachusetts? Jesus, Velda. Why not somewhere a little closer, like the moon?�
��
At that moment, Velda no longer needed a proposal. Her fanciful wedding ideas vanished. It was going to be just the two of them alone. A new state. A new start.
Chapter Fourteen
27th June 1976, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
It felt good to finally be able to tell someone everything. Every last detail that he had discovered. Last week he had escaped his parents’ house with blood running from his nose and his ears echoing with his dad’s brutal words. He had driven himself to the local hospital to be told that his nose was broken and there was nothing they could do to fix it. He had left the hospital and driven home, where he had found himself the main character in a fictitious story created by his dad. Jack, so the story went, had been attacked by masked assailants as he had left the school. His mom saw the story as factual and played the doting mother role to perfection. His dad’s concern reached only to the moments when he was in the company of both his wife and son; the remainder of the time his and Jack’s interactions were non-existent.
Today, after work, Jack couldn’t face the prospect of another weekend at home. Having no destination in mind, he had driven across the Sagamore Bridge that linked the Cape to mainland Massachusetts. Route Six had flowed into Route Three. Signs for Boston had appeared and the idea of having someone to talk things over with had taken a hold, guiding him into the city.
‘I just can’t believe this,’ Alice declared when he had finished his story. They had been sitting for some time, side by side, on her bed in her small dormitory. She stood up with her hands on her hips. ‘Why would they fabricate an entire life like this? What are they hiding?’
Jack shrugged. ‘Damned if I know.’
‘But you’re going to find out, right?’ Alice asked. ‘You must—you can’t just leave it like this.’
‘There’s nothing more that can be done, Ali. Mr Chipman’s friend has found all this out,’ Jack said, pointing to the pile of paperwork on the floor in front of them, ‘but he doesn’t seem to think there’s much more he can do.’
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