A nurse entered the room silently. She wore solid brown and was of Janet and Ellen’s generation. Reading glasses hung from a chain around her neck. Janet glanced at her and thought the woman looked familiar—Ruth, the nurse who had been with Keith also.
“She was combative when the crew brought her in. We tubed her and sent her for a CT scan.” She spoke to Janet as she checked the drip in the IV, glanced at the blood pressure cuff and oxygen level clip, and held the catheter line up to empty. “Closed head trauma. Burr holes last night. Vitals finally stabilized early this morning. Now we wait.” She frowned toward the others. “You can stand there, but leave us enough room to get in and out quickly.”
Janet caught her by the arm. “What do you mean?”
“We monitor her vitals to know what the brain is doing. She can hear you.” Ruth felt her pockets. “Here.” She handed Janet a pad of paper and a drug company pen. “She may…may…be able to write. I wouldn’t count on it making much sense.”
Janet looked down at her friend. Beth stared at her. Janet leaned on the side rail to have her face as close to her as possible. “Hey, sweetie. Can you hear me? Blink.”
Beth’s eyes closed and opened.
“Very good. Well, you’ve really gotten yourself into a fine mess this time.” Janet struggled not to give in to the sobs she felt inside. She looked for a place to touch and let her hand rest lightly on Beth’s shoulder. She stared into the hazel eyes, trying to gauge how much thought was taking place in the mind she so admired. She looked across the room. “This happened when?”
“We think mid-morning yesterday.” Will would not meet her gaze.
Janet watched the looks between Lou and Patti. Something here was not right.
“Where were all of you, by the way?” Janet looked at them and saw a flash of collective guilt pass over each. “Why in the hell didn’t you call me yesterday?”
“I was in the basement, shooting pool, with John Prine cranked up. Didn’t hear or see a thing until Patti came to get me.” Will looked away from Janet.
“And downing shots, as usual, no matter the time of day,” Lou added.
“We were on the sofa in the living room watching a movie. I finally convinced Lou that the Lifetime Network is not trashy.” Patti evenly met Janet’s gaze.
“I thought she was at Keith’s. She didn’t come to the house for lunch, but that’s not unusual these days.” Lou’s hands could not be still as she tried to decide what to do with them. “I didn’t know she was getting the tractor out. I didn’t know.” She hit her hips with her fists. “The pastures didn’t need mowing yet. I had the tractor ready, blade off the front end, oil changed, bush hog blades sharpened. I had to have something to do last weekend when you were at your parents.” Lou reverted to her maintenance checklist and looked at Patti. “I didn’t know. Why did she do it? It wasn’t time yet. The timing was all wrong.”
“You need to sit down and take deep breaths.” Patti stared at Lou until she complied. “Get a fucking grip.” Patti said the words slowly as a command.
“We…we waited to see how she was before we called anyone.” Lou’s face turned red. “There was so much going on. We had to make decisions to allow the surgery last night. They still don’t know if she…if she’s going to make it.”
“Don’t say that where she can hear you. Damn the three of you. Have you been talking to her or just staying in a group pity hug?” Janet was totally disgusted with the lot of them. She made herself calm down. She looked at Beth but could not read her eyes. “Honey, I want you to listen carefully and give this a try.” Janet placed the pen in Beth’s right hand and closed her fingers around the barrel. She held the pad beneath the pen. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
Beth’s hand moved falteringly.
“I can’t read that. Can you try once more?” Janet patted her front pocket and felt no reading glasses.
Beth frowned. Her hand moved again. The letters were large, irregular, and required some imagination to read.
“Rolled.” Janet held the paper at arm’s length. “That’s right. You were on the tractor.” Janet tore off the sheet of paper and positioned the pad again.
“Burd know.” Beth began writing and lost the thought.
Janet frowned. “Bird?”
Beth’s frustration was clear if her writing was not.
“Burden of knowledge?” Janet thought of the phrase Beth had used so often.
Beth blinked.
Janet held the pad for her again.
Beth pointed to Ellen before she wrote.
“Arcanum?” Janet spelled the word aloud as she looked to Ellen for understanding.
“Is that really a word? You’re the puzzle person.” Ellen shrugged but jotted the word on her BlackBerry notepad.
Beth moved the pen again. It took all the concentration she could muster to write two words.
“Victor Victoria?” Janet stared at the paper.
Andy spoke from the doorway. He and Greg were dressed for tennis complete with sweaters tied around their shoulders. “Her favorite movie. Victor/Victoria, with Julie Andrews and Robert Preston. A woman pretending to be a man pretending to be a woman. She used to say she felt as though she had spent half her life pretending to be something she wasn’t. I first thought she meant being a cut and dried accountant.”
Beth’s hand would no longer grip the pen. She was done writing.
Janet looked at Andy and Greg. “Thank goodness you two are here.”
Ruth spoke from the laptop on the rolling cart in the hallway. “There’s an empty family room just down the hall. There really should be no more than one or two of you with her at a time. We have to be able to maneuver, and this is getting out of hand.”
“You boys go first. I want to talk to Will.” Janet rested her hand on Beth’s shoulder before leaving. She stopped beside Ruth. “Thank you so much for being here with her. She trusts you.”
“I take an extra shift on the weekends, house payments.” She shook her head. “Sweetie, it’s not good. Be prepared.”
Janet stared at the woman.
“The docs won’t tell you. We missed the golden hour, the trauma team didn’t see her until several hours after the accident. There’s not much in her that’s not broken or crushed. You can always pray for a miracle. Dr. Meadows is good. He’s had two consults on her already. The team will put her back together, provided the brain swelling is under control. The next few hours will tell.” She squeezed Janet’s arm and closed the curtain behind her.
Janet caught up with the others. She closed the door of the small, comfortable room filled with overstuffed chairs and stared at them. “You may as well tell me what happened.”
“Why did she run the tractor there? She knows damn well that I’ve been working on those downspouts.” Lou paced the room. “Why now? Why?”
“Wasn’t she just going around the house from back pasture to front?” Will scratched his head.
“It’s as though she ran through that soft spot on purpose.” Patti curled her legs under her in the largest chair in the room. “Will, I need coffee.”
Will and Lou started toward the vending machines lining the short wall of the room.
“Wait a minute. What in the hell did you just say?” Janet stood directly in front of Patti.
Patti shrugged her shoulders. “She’s been depressed ever since her mother died and worse since the blowup at the beach. You saw how she was in the restaurant that day. She was deteriorating mentally and physically and wouldn’t let anyone help her. I think she deliberately ran the tractor through the soft spot in the ground, where she knew Lou had been digging, and intentionally flipped that tractor. Will, coffee.”
Will walked over to stand beside Janet. “What? Lou, did you tell her you were digging there last weekend before the rains?”
“I don’t remember.” Lou was on the verge of a full panic attack. “I’m sure I told her, but she doesn’t listen to anything I say anymore.”
> “Are you trying to tell me it wasn’t an accident?” Janet stared from Patti to Lou and back.
“She wouldn’t harm herself.” Will folded his arms across his chest. “Of course it was a freak accident.”
“Do you really care? Any of you? I don’t believe…I don’t want to believe what I’m seeing here. What in the hell was going on with the four of you?” Janet felt as though she was losing her mind. Ellen put her arms around her and held on tightly.
Will, Patti, and Lou stared at the couple wordlessly.
“Go home, go somewhere. You don’t belong here. She only needs the people around her who love her. This isn’t over.” Janet opened the door and walked toward Beth’s room. Andy and Greg looked pale as Ruth escorted them out. Greg held his arms out to comfort Janet.
“Her blood pressure is falling. You don’t need to be in there. Wait where you just were. I’ll let you know everything that’s happening.” Ruth turned Janet and guided the two couples back toward the family room. She hugged Janet. “I’m not saying this to you. Do you understand?”
Janet nodded.
“I think her brain is herniating. If that’s true, there’s nothing anyone can do for her.”
Janet numbly returned to the waiting room. Will, Patti, and Lou stopped their conversation when Janet and Ellen walked in with Andy and Greg. It was as though a line divided the room diagonally with opposing factions in opposite corners.
Ruth proved right.
Chapter Seventeen
There was no stopping Janet from leaving the house a good thirty minutes before they really needed to. She insisted on driving since she didn’t have the patience to be a passenger. “What are you doing with that thing?” She stared at Ellen using her BlackBerry.
“This ‘thing’ comes in very handy as you’ll soon see. I was giving my e-mail a quick check and letting the boys know we were leaving, and I remembered…” Ellen waited a moment, then held the small screen toward Janet.
“Yeah, right, like I could see that even if I wasn’t doing sixty miles an hour and had it in front of me.”
“It’s not my fault you won’t wear glasses except when you’re doing paperwork.”
“I can see fine at a distance.” Janet shook off the bickering. “So what does that say?”
Ellen angled her head so her bifocals were right. “Arcanum. It’s a noun, meaning ‘1. A deep secret; a mystery. 2. Specialized knowledge or detail that is mysterious to the average person. 3. A secret essence or remedy; an elixir.’ I looked it up on the The American Heritage Dictionary site.”
Janet nodded. “From the Latin arcanus, meaning secret. I remember it now from school.”
“Well, you have one hell of a memory if you can still recall high school Latin classes.”
“It’s a curse. I don’t forget a damn thing even when I want to.”
They were the first to enter the church. The dark walnut casket at the front of the sanctuary was closed. Janet and Ellen sat midway along the row of pews on the right side of the church in the middle of the seat to allow those arriving late a place without having to move.
“I can’t believe she’s gone,” Janet leaned over and whispered to Ellen as she removed a handkerchief from her pocket. It didn’t seem fitting to bring tissues.
“I can’t believe I’m dressed up again so soon,” Ellen whispered back and added because of Janet’s expression, “You know what I mean.”
They were in the small Baptist church that had embraced Keith when she moved to the country with her girls, as she had referred to Beth and Lou. People had listened to Keith’s explanation and not asked questions; most of them understood the situation.
Will had wanted the funeral held at the large city church he and Patti joined after their return to Virginia. Surprisingly, Beth had attached to her will written instructions for her funeral. She made her own arrangements at the funeral home when she did the same for Keith. Janet remembered Beth telling her that the two of them actually giggled through pre-planning. The service would be held in the country Baptist church that had accepted Keith as though a lifelong member. The burial would be in the private cemetery on the original Candler farm.
Janet’s mind wandered as the church filled to capacity. Beth’s co-workers and colleagues mixed with the church members who came out of respect for Keith. Janet could hear folding metal chairs being opened in the vestibule.
“Damn.” Ellen looked about at the packed sanctuary and received a frown from the woman beside her. “Pardon me.”
The pallbearers were the last to file in and fill the front pew on the opposite side of Janet and Ellen. Andy and Greg held hands. Jerry and two of Beth’s co-workers paid the gay men no mind. Will separated from the other pallbearers and sat with Patti and Lou on the front right pew.
The preacher had talked with Lou, Will, Patti, and Janet beforehand. Janet nodded as she listened to his comments.
“Crisis shows the measure of each of us. I came to know Beth Candler during her mother’s illness. I came to respect her during her mother’s last days on this Earth.” His hands gripped either side of the pulpit as he wove his thoughts into the comments from the others.
Janet watched the front rows, glancing from the pallbearers to the family. Beth’s first and second cousins, who Janet didn’t know, filled the second rows of pews. Lou’s shoulders shook with her tears. Will kept wiping his eyes and nose with his handkerchief. Patti kept glancing at her nails.
The service was brief and closed with the playing of “Blessed Assurance” as had been done for Keith. The cortege formed and was led by the white hearse and the family car. Most of the attendees stayed in line with their headlights and flashers on. The cemetery was on the way back to the side of town where most of Beth’s associates lived.
The cemetery was just off the hard surfaced secondary road. Cars belonging to those already standing and waiting for the graveside service to begin lined the shoulders on both sides of the road.
Andy and Greg led the pallbearers in carrying Beth from the hearse to the family plot. They wore lavender shirts and ties in Beth’s honor.
Beth’s childhood pastor—retired from the Presbyterian Church near the farm—started the graveside service, gathering the crowd as close as possible to the grave so all would hear.
“Beth came to see me not long ago. As she was leaving, she teased me that if I should have this opportunity, I was not to take unfair advantage of it. It would be acceptable to speak of the softball games and all her questions during communicant’s class, but not to mention that I caught them all smoking in the furnace room. Some of the parents still might not know. The last thing she wanted was to betray her old friends. Beth strove during her lifetime to serve her friends, and later her clients, well and to never betray anyone as she found out the details of their lives and businesses.”
Janet glanced around the small clearing. She felt as though she was burying Melody and shivered. She had watched Beth grow with her career, with finding acceptance in the community, with coming out, and with caring for Keith. There should have been so much more ahead for her.
The service ended with a prayer and the reading of “What A Friend We Have in Jesus,” the favorite of Beth’s father. The crowd milled about, catching up with one another and repeating their shock over Beth’s death.
Lou’s friends were present but not sure what to make of Patti. Will’s friends from work introduced spouses. Patti kept a close watch on Lou.
Janet saw Andy and Greg approaching and waved them over to join her and Ellen. “You two look so distinguished. You did her proud.”
Andy looked as though he had not slept since the hospital. He finally met Janet’s gaze. Tears rolled down his cheeks.
“Bless your heart.” Janet held out her arms to him. He leaned down and sobbed onto her shoulder.
“I think my heart is broken. She was my first love. She was all that was good about my youth.” He struggled to collect himself. “I should have done something. I shou
ld have made her move in with Greg and me while she sorted things out after the beach. I shouldn’t have trusted them near her.” He wiped his cheeks with his handkerchief.
In an unheard-of breech of country etiquette, Patti, Will, and Lou left the grave before all mourners had expressed condolences. They walked toward the family car, forced to pass Janet and Ellen, Greg and Andy. Patti caught Janet’s stare.
“Lou tried to tell you. Beth was clinically depressed. How surprised can any of us be that she did this to herself?” Patti waited for any of them to respond. “Come on, you two.” She herded Will and Lou toward the funeral home’s limousine. “Lou’s staying with us for a few days. It’s too difficult for her to be on the farm by herself.”
Lou pulled away from Patti’s touch and would make eye contact with no one. She walked away from the rest of them but toward the limo.
Ellen physically restrained Janet, knowing she was ready to let words, or worse, fly. Greg held on to Andy. “Think of Keith. Think how small this community truly is. This is neither the time nor place.”
“This isn’t over,” Janet called just so they would hear.
None of the three paused or looked back.
“I’d say it’s time for copious adult beverages, Auntie.” Greg eased his hold on Andy as the doors to the car closed.
“I’m not going anywhere until they’re done here,” Andy said as he loosened his tie, always the engineer as he watched the backhoe.
“I don’t want to see that,” Janet said to Ellen. She shivered and had to remind herself that it was the second day of May.
Ellen looked at Greg. “We’ll be waiting at Tudorville.” She used her name for their house that usually brought a response of chuckles.
Greg only nodded. “You’re welcome to stay the night.”
The Arcanum of Beth Page 12
