by R.P. Burnham
Last summer Donna remembered saying to Virgie, “Aren’t we a pair.” She was talking about their lack of ambition in contrast to Patti, Chris and Alex, and when she said it she meant it to be a starting point to communication so that she could get Virgie out of her funk over Chris. Now over six months later and in February of a new year, the more accurate pairing turned out to be Virgie and Patti. They were both in a bad way while she, Alex, and probably Chris were doing fine. Ordinarily the steadiest and most levelheaded of all of them, Patti was now more or less in a permanent state of depression because Chris had left and had not called or written. Every time there was a noise in the basement she saw Patti’s face grow intense even though it was only the furnace kicking in or wet leaves slapping against the window well. Only a few weeks ago they had accidentally found out where Chris was. Alex ran into his friend Ted Autello on the campus of the University of Southern Maine and learned that Chris was in a town in northern Maine where a factory that pulped wood for the paper trade was polluting the local river. He was staying with a forest ranger who was a friend from college. The news hurt Patti, for they knew that that particular friend was female, and it didn’t take much clairvoyance to know what the sleeping arrangements were at her place. She pretended to be unconcerned, of course, but whenever Donna saw her looking into space while she was washing dishes or sitting on the living room couch she knew she was thinking about Chris. She had almost no social life. A male nurse in the program with her was showing obvious interest. He called two or three times with fairly transparent questions about their course work that really were a shy person’s way of approaching a potential lover. Donna saw him once when she and Patti were downtown and thought he was adorable, but Patti, though aware of his interest in her, did not return it. She wasn’t ready and was mostly content to stay at home. She went to a baby shower for one of the nurses with Lexi, but came home early. One night Donna talked her into going to a rock club with her, but she was quiet and subdued during the evening and politely refused a couple of invitations to dance. Another time she and Donna attended a folk singer’s concert, which she did enjoy, though a faraway look came into her eyes whenever a sad song about frustrated love was sung. Otherwise she tried to lose herself in her studies at the nursing program. She had even taken an extra course for the spring semester over the usual course load. She claimed that it was not going to be offered in the fall, her final semester before becoming a registered nurse, but Donna knew that was just a weak excuse. She was trying to forget her troubles by being so busy she couldn’t think about them.
The only time she became alive was when she got involved in convinc-ing her father that he was the man to handle the civil suit on behalf of the Kimball family and their little boy, poisoned by the mercury Ridlon Recycling had dumped into the pond. In October Natalie Feldman, a Boston lawyer, called asking for Chris. When Patti learned Natalie was looking for a local lawyer to handle the case, she suggested her father. Within a week she had convinced him not only to do the case, but to do it pro bono. It was the connection to Chris that motivated Patti; soon after the thing was settled and it made no difference to Chris (at that time they did not even know where he was), quickly she became morose and inward again, living mechanically and a stranger to joy.
But if Patti was bad off, Virgie was worse than worst. She was desperately in trouble. Physically she looked terrible, and mentally she was unbalanced—conclusions that Donna drew from a chance meeting with Virgie at a rock club. Tim Longo had swallowed her up—or maybe more accurately kidnapped her, abducted her, made her, with the aid of crack cocaine, his slave and totally dominated her. She was thin, very thin. Her eyes were sallow and lifeless. One of them in the dim night of the rock club looked blackened, so that it was likely he beat her. She was both nervous and listless at the same time. And afraid. She was clearly afraid to talk to Donna and even said, without any sense of what a ridiculous confession she was implicitly making, that Tim didn’t think she and Patti were a good influence on her. This she said in the same rock club where Donna had seen her high on cocaine last summer. She wasn’t high this time, but the moment she saw Longo coming from the bathroom, she shrank in terror and rushed toward him so that he wouldn’t see she had been talking to her friend. Fear too is a drug, Donna thought.
She was angry for the rest of the evening. Even some good rock music by Leon’s band could not silence the imaginary conversation she had with Virgie. “We’re a bad influence on you, are we? Are we the ones who give you black eyes, who ruin your health and destroy your self-image? He only cares for himself, the creep. He manipulates and uses women. He actually hates us, I’m sure. That type do, you know. You’ve got to realize he’s only using you. I’ll tell you what I think. You’re like a member of a cult. It’s just that instead of following an asshole like Rev. Moon, you’re the brainwashed mannequin for another kind of asshole, a sexual predator and controlling creep.” In this scenario Virgie never spoke. She just listened and hung her head in shame. It made Donna feel good, but she knew that such a conversation should never become real. It would just alienate Virgie, not win her over, not bring her back to herself.
She was now sure that Virgie’s problems were close to pathological. Something was seriously wrong when a lifelong friend was too scared to talk to you. She decided that she had to find out more about Tim Longo and questioned two women at the soup kitchen who had been entrapped by Longo in the past to learn about his modus operandi. She had spoken to them before, but they had been reluctant to tell her all they knew because they were still scared of Longo. But when she wanted to be, Donna could be very persuasive. She told them she thought Virgie was suicidal (which was very likely true though she had no evidence) and that she had to find out all she could about Tim Longo to help her friend. The women, both in their early twenties, began hesitantly but then began feeling good about unburdening themselves and talked at such great length that Donna learned everything there was to know about Virgie’s tormenter. She already knew he was totally self-absorbed, that he didn’t relate, only manipulated, and that because he was so good-looking women easily became his slave. Now she learned he was positively evil. He demanded total submission and used physical violence to ensure that he got it. Both women, neither as pretty as Virgie but with voluptuous bodies, explained that once they fell under his sway, it was actually as if he resided in their minds. He didn’t have to be with them to make them do what he wanted. They became unwilling willing accomplices. Like all controlling men, he always carefully kept his women separated from family and friends and any influence that would lessen their gravitational orbit around his sun. The women told her that very likely Virgie stayed home when he went out and was actually afraid to leave. The reason they saw so little of her was no accident; Virgie was actively avoiding them. That explained why she had never come home to get her clothes and things. He probably bought her new clothes when he first got her under his control, the women said. He had done that with both of them. At the time, it seemed like a fun and generous thing to go shopping with him, though he never let women choose their own clothes, only clothes that he liked. They also told her that Longo had a weird sexual preference for sex with two or more women at the same time. It was very probable, they said, that Virgie was not alone in his apartment.
One thing they both implied but never stated was that the only way they became free of Longo was because he grew tired of them. Donna thought that if Virgie was ever going to rebuild her shattered self-image that Chris first began to destroy and Longo was completing, it would be much better that she break away before she was thrown away. But how? How get Virgie free from her psychological enslavement?
She had as yet no answer, but the next time she saw Virgie something happened that showed her escape was possible. One late afternoon a little before Thanksgiving she saw Virgie near Monument Square waiting with a woman with long black and shiny hair, an olive complexion and high cheekbones that suggested she was an Indian. They both kept looking down Congress
Street for a car or bus and didn’t see Donna until she was next to them. While she greeted Virgie and tried to engage her in conversation, something, either the Indian woman or more likely the fear that Longo would suddenly show up, inhibited her. She spoke guardedly and mostly in one-syllable responses to questions Donna asked. “Are you doing okay?” “Do you need anything?” “Do you want any of your clothes?” In the daylight she looked even worse than she had in the rock club. Her complexion was pale and her hooded eyes under the ridge of her forehead were darkened from lack of sleep. When her companion, who had scowled at Donna from the moment she arrived, took Virgie’s arm and began pulling her away, her eyes made a silent appeal to Donna. “I’ve gotta go,” she said flatly with her voice, but her eyes said “Help me!”
It was the sign Donna was waiting for. To her retreating back, she called, “Virgie, remember the time you sprained your ankle and couldn’t walk? Remember whose shoulder you leaned on to get to the car? And remember all the things we did for you that week? Remember that you said you were being treated like a princess?”
She knew Virgie heard her, but she saw the hand of the Indian woman dig into her arm.
When Virgie looked back with her eyes still appealing for help, Donna left with a final thought: “Remember you’ve always got a home waiting for you.”
When she told Patti about this interesting development, she was surprised to find that Patti seemed resentful of Virgie. She guessed it was because Patti associated her with Chris’s betrayal.
But Patti’s attitude made her see a connection between her two friends and the way to liberate both. Their troubles were similar. Both were the victim of unfeeling men. One was a longtime friend, the other a snake in the grass who had bitten Virgie in an unguarded and vulnerable moment. So they were victims both, but at the same time neither was blameless. They had foolishly entered into relationships that were bound to go bad if only because they lacked the perspective that would allow them to soberly assess the character of their tormenters. In this regard she was especially angry with Chris. In one way or another he was the cause of both of her friends’ troubles. It was Virgie’s foolish love for him that led her to Longo. Patti should have known better than anyone that Chris was commitment-phobic. She was fair enough to know that Tim Longo was different from Chris, but it was a question of degree. They both showed no respect for the rights and feelings of women and both were self-absorbed.
Seeing through Chris did not make her feel superior to Virgie and Patti since her insight was gained at the price of her woman’s pride. It was because Chris had never shown any interest in her as a woman that she could see his shortcomings with glaring clarity. But there was something else that was true, independent of the mere wish to soothe her pride, and it led her to another conclusion that concerned Patti just as much as Virgie. Man troubles were a symptom, not a cause. She was sure the reason she was levelheaded enough to never be in danger of becoming blindly devoted to Leon Margrave and able to easily break off the relationship when it suited her (and in a civilized way too—they remained friends) was because helping other people at the soup kitchen had freed her from the narrowness of her own mind and given her self-confidence. She had gotten outside herself. She had made a difference. She had gained perspective. She still felt the warm glow of pride thinking about Dennis Pelletier, a drug addict she had helped save. For months she worked with him at the soup kitchen, sitting at his table and talking to him as often as she could, offering suggestions and support, wheedling when it felt right, chastising when she felt he needed it, and finally arranging for his escape by making the appointments for him to join group therapy and drug rehabilitation. Now he had a good job and was engaged to be married. He had already called her and asked her to come to the wedding in the spring.
She helped many others, but he was her prize pupil, the one who gave her the confidence to believe she could rescue Patti and Virgie by getting them involved in life. What worked for her could work for them. Patti’s momentary recovery from depression when she became animated getting her father to take the Kimball civil suit verified her gut feeling, but her plan was still embryonic, though in outline she knew that it would entail Patti helping Virgie to come back to herself and somehow finding something that would concentrate Virgie’s mind on others. So she had the basic idea for a plan but not the situation to put it into practice. Winter came, Christmas and the New Year passed and the dreary, dark and frigid winter wore on into February and nothing changed, nothing happened.
Then, suddenly and unexpectedly, everything she needed to launch her rescue mission came to her. On Thursday at the soup kitchen Leighton Kimball casually let drop that Tim Longo was at sea fishing and would not be back until Monday. Friday night while Alex was cooking early dinner before he went out for the evening, he told Patti he’d talked to their father during the day and had been given some paperwork for the Kimballs’ civil suit that they would need to sign.
Donna, listening from the living room couch in the open and small house, had an idea. “Who’s going to bring the papers to the Kimballs?” she asked.
Alex, busy sautéing some jumbo shrimp, didn’t answer for a while as he concentrated on picking up the sizzling shrimp with tongs and flipping them over. “I am. I thought I’d try to talk Fred into taking a winter drive to beautiful Waska.”
“Is there anything else, or is it just a matter of getting the papers signed?”
He turned and regarded her suspiciously. “No, just signing.”
Donna jumped up from the couch and strode into the kitchen. “Let me and Patti do it,” she said.
Alex, still turning the shrimp in the large frying pan, now seemed bemused. “Why? What have you got up your sleeve?”
She grinned broadly. “It will give us an excuse to snatch Virgie out of that apartment. Leighton Kimball—their son, I’m pretty sure—told me Longo was at sea this weekend. What do you think, Patti?”
Patti looked up from the newspaper she was reading and pursed her lips. “Why is it a good time now? I don’t understand.”
Donna sat down across from Patti and with arms splayed leaned towards her. “Well, Longo’s gone for the weekend. That makes it possible. But now we have a reason—I mean a reason we can tell Virgie she’s needed. Leighton Kimball hangs out with Longo—runs his drugs I think—so we can tell Virgie she has information Mrs. Kimball desperately needs…”
Patti looked doubtful, but Donna already had a better idea. “Yeah, maybe that’s too dangerous. It would be asking too much of her to make her betray Longo right off. But didn’t you say the Kimball woman seemed to like Virgie?”
“That’s what Chris thought.”
“Okay, then. We’ll say this is a very important mission absolutely vital if the little boy is to get the help he needs, and we’ll tell Virgie how much Mrs. Kimball liked and trusted her. Without her they might back out—something like that. Remember how we had to convince Suzy again in December that the civil suit was the way to go? We’ll tell Virgie that’s why we need her. Remember how disturbed Virgie was about that boy? For days she talked about that little boy. Her kind heart is what we can bank on. And once we get her out of Longo’s clutches we can get her healthy again—I mean mentally healthy and free of drugs. See? The idea is perfect.”
“That’s quite a plan,” Alex said.
“Are you okay with it?”
“Sure. I don’t think Fred would be very enthusiastic about seeing those people. He hates dirt and clutter.”
She turned to Patti. “Well?”
Patti stared at her so long she started to feel self-conscious about her complexion, but that concern melted away when she saw Patti’s face break into a broad grin. “I didn’t realize until now how devious your mind could be,” she said.
“So you think it might work?”
“It just might.”
After Alex left they did some planning. Patti phoned the Kimballs’ parents to tell them they were coming in the morning.
Granny Kimball told her to come to the farmhouse since Suzy would be doing her laundry there in the morning. That settled, they discussed Virgie’s psychological state as they understood it and decided that it would be important to speak to Virgie in the voice of authority—not to ask her to come with them but rather tell her she had to come. If they were right that she had surrendered her will to Longo, this tone would have the best chance of succeeding. They wouldn’t forget Virgie’s soft heart, though. They were prepared to lay it on thick in describing the boy’s state of health if she still hesitated. Then while each of them had a beer they watched a movie on television and retired early.
In the morning at breakfast and continuing on the drive through the snow-lined streets to the other side of the city, they discussed Virgie and, to a lesser extent, Leighton Kimball. Though he was not part of their plan to liberate Virgie, his mother would want to know about him. Because of the troubles that had visited their enclave, he had been lost sight of and no one had ever informed the Kimballs of his presence in Portland.
Donna had long known where Longo lived and had in fact often driven by in the vain hope of seeing Virgie. The apartment was in a tenement building constructed in the early part of last century to house workers in the boatbuilding and allied trades. It was covered with ugly gray tarpaper shingling, with peeling white paint and bare wood on the trim and railings. The porch stairs and deck were similarly worn to bare wood where thousands of feet had trodden. Beside the door were four black mailboxes, one of which had the name Longo and the number 3 written in pencil on a piece of glued-on paper.
Going up the dark and narrow stairs, Patti whispered, “This place gives me the creeps.”
Donna nodded. The faint but pungent odor of cat piss struck her nostrils at the second-story landing where two doors confronted them, one at the head of the stairs and one to their left. Neither had a number to identify it. They stood and listened for a moment, unsure what to do. “Maybe they’re out,” Patti said. She sounded hopeful, suggesting she was losing her nerve, but before Donna could think of an answer they heard a noise from behind the door on the left. It was muffled, suggesting it came from an inner room.
Donna looked at Patti. “Well, here goes,” she said and walked determinedly to the left-hand door and gave it three sharp raps.
The sounds of creaking furniture was followed by tentative steps that stopped right in front of the door.
Donna waited another few seconds, then rapped again.
The Indian woman opened the door and scowled at them. Behind her was Virgie, who looked frightened when she recognized them.
Donna didn’t waste time with indirection. In what she hoped was the voice of authority, she said, “Virgie, you’re needed. We’ve come to get you.”
“She can’t see you,” the Indian woman said, starting to close the door.
Donna stepped forward into the room and gave the woman a stern look, banking on her also having a skeletal self-image. “Suppose you let her answer for herself,” she said, almost shouting.
It worked. The woman backed up as if afraid. Her face was still sullen, but it suddenly looked like the sullenness of a petulant child.
Now inside and with Patti right behind her, Donna surveyed the kitchen. Longo was always decked out splendidly as if he lived in a half-million-dollar condo, but the reality was far different. Their place was a dump. A single naked light bulb hung from the middle of the ceiling on a frayed cord. The linoleum on the floor was dirty and faded, and like the front porch foot-worn, in this case with bare floor from the door to the sink. The faucet looked to be a hundred years old, with tiny metal levers for the hot and cold water. There were dirty dishes in the stained and discolored sink and a pile of clutter on the kitchen table, which had three chairs, one of which had a board across the seat. Through the door into the inner room she could see a worn sofa with tears through which stuffing emerged. Briefly she wondered what Longo did with all the money he made, but it was food for future thought, and she stepped around the Indian woman to face Virgie.
“We’ve got to bring some legal papers to those people, the Kimballs, whose son was poisoned by mercury. It’s very important, and their other son told us that the only one of us the mother trusts and feels comfortable with is the nice blond woman who came with Chris the first time. That would be you. If they don’t win this suit against Ridlon Recycling they’ll have no money and their son will never get well. So, you see, you have to come with us.”
It was a beautiful lie, told so convincingly and with such conviction that Donna half believed it herself, and it was said in a way that didn’t allow Virgie to say no. She was aware of a dangerous feeling, that of being pleased with herself. She hoped it wasn’t obvious.
Apparently not. Virgie didn’t say no, though she didn’t say yes either. She looked panicked, incapable of making a decision on her own. Donna eyed the Indian woman. If she started to speak, she would cut her off. But she too seemed at a loss for words. Their theory was right. Neither knew how to respond to authority—unless to yield to it.
“You can also tell Mrs. Kimball about Leighton. Did you know that he’s her son? He ran away from home four years ago.”
Virgie continued staring at Donna as if mesmerized. Then, blinking and shaking her head, she said, “I remember you thought so.” Her clear voice was a good sign. It wasn’t listless and dead, as it had been the last several times they had talked. She spoke almost like the old Virgie, and she was clearly remembering a lot more.
It was a good sign. Confident that her authoritarian mode was effective, she said, “Get your coat, Virgie.”
“You’ve got to stay here,” the Indian woman said in a tone that betrayed her desperation as she stepped in front of Virgie.
“Who says so? I say she’s needed. Who are you to say otherwise?”
She saw the Indian woman’s lip quiver. She was afraid, even panicky, and Donna thought she understood why. She would be alone and have to face Longo’s wrath. “Why don’t you leave too?” she asked in a gentle, soothing voice.
The woman shook her head.
“This is Mary’s apartment,” Virgie explained.
Surprised, Donna asked, “Doesn’t Longo live here?”
Neither spoke. The answer was supposed to be obvious.
It wasn’t, but Donna didn’t want to pursue it. Remembering again the look of yearning in Virgie’s eyes when she last saw her on the street, she repeated, “Get your coat, Virgie. It’s very cold out.”
For a long moment nobody moved; then Virgie glanced at Mary, who slightly nodded her head. Donna understood she was being brave and making a sacrifice.
“Your mother?” Donna asked but didn’t finish the thought.
But Mary understood her. “She lives in Old Town.” She spoke in a flat, unemotional tone beyond despair.
In the meantime Patti had picked up the coat she guessed was Virgie’s and was helping her put it on.
Pulling her hat and mittens from the pockets, she turned to Mary. They exchanged a nod that seemed to contain worlds of shared experience.
“Do you need money for bus fare?” Donna asked Mary.
She shook her head bitterly. Going home was out of the question. She had no home, no friends to rescue her.
Patti put her hand on Virgie’s shoulder. “Virgie,” she whispered, her voice husky with emotion.
Virgie smiled at her her sweetest smile, then exchanged another silent glance with Mary. Then they were gone.
Once outside the door and in the street Virgie became very nervous. At the bottom of the stairs she hesitated, but Donna put her hand firmly on her back and guided her to the car, where she shrank into the backseat and kept her head low.
She stayed in this position until they got onto I295 South, then relaxed enough to sit up straight. Donna, concentrating on driving on the busy road with cars exiting and entering every half mile or so, was glad Patti took on the burden of talking to Virgie. She explained the status of the civil suit a
nd its desired outcome, told her that her father was doing the case pro bono and was confident that the case was very strong. His only worry was the Kimballs, she said and added (in a lie that Donna appreciated) that they had been getting some contrary advice from cracker-barrel lawyers so that he wouldn’t feel at ease about the case until the documents they were carrying to the Kimballs were signed.
When Patti had talked herself out, they drove on in silence until it started bothering Donna. She saw Virgie’s face in the rearview mirror growing pensive and her eyes betraying a distant terror. “You remember that little boy, don’t you, Virgie?”
“I never did see him. He was inside. I remember it was an awful place.”
“They’re very poor,” Patti said.
“And they need help,” Donna added, appealing to Virgie’s soft heart. “This suit is the most important thing in their life. They’ll need a lot of money to take care of that little boy.”
A long uncomfortable silence passed and then Virgie asked, “Isn’t he going to get better?”
Her tone scared Donna. She saw exactly what Virgie was thinking: some conditions never get better. His, mine.
“He’ll get somewhat better, but he was so small the mercury really did a number on him. They’ll need a lot of money for treatment that will make him better.” She hoped Virgie didn’t notice she was speaking as if to a child. But when Virgie didn’t seem to notice, that worried her even more.
“Where’s Chris?” Virgie asked.
Donna should have been ready for this question, but she wasn’t. Her mind raced trying to find an answer that wouldn’t distress Patti as well as Virgie.
But Patti handled it well and didn’t give away anything when she said, “He’s in northern Maine working on a pollution case at a paper mill. No one’s heard from him in months. You know how he is.”
Virgie accepted the explanation without comment. She even seemed indifferent. She closed her eyes and seemed to doze. Patti too became quiet and remained so until they exited the interstate in Waska where she took the documents out of the manila envelope and went through them, compulsively making sure everything was in order.
After driving several miles on the country road, they started looking for landmarks, a fork in the road, a horse farm, and an abandoned dairy. Granny Kimball had given Donna directions to the farmhouse, telling her the driveway was about a quarter of a mile before the road that led to her son’s and Suzy’s place, but she managed to miss it and had to turn around in the rutted dirt road where a man scowled at them fiercely as Donna nervously maneuvered the car in the ruts and ice of the dirt road. Virgie said the same man was just as unpleasant when they came last spring.
At the farmhouse an elderly but spry old man was walking into the barn as they drove up. In an understated Yankee way he greeted them with a barely perceptible nod. With everyone feeling nervous, Donna’s remark about the man’s effusive and friendly greeting was welcome. Their laughter released their tension, and they were smiling as they went up to the door. They had been seen, and before they could knock Jenny, an elderly lady with a deeply lined Yankee face, opened the door and invited them in. “We’ve been expectin’ you,” she said.
The kitchen was shabby but neat and clean. An old washing machine was noisily whirling through the spin cycle in the corner. A wooden shelf and two wall-mounted shelves contained numerous knickknacks of animals and children, most of them sentimental and tawdry. The kitchen table had an extra chair brought in from the dining room to accommodate the extra bodies. They must have hurriedly done that when they saw three people in the car. In a high chair and so quiet and still that Donna hadn’t noticed him at first was Mark. He looked normal, though perhaps a little bit dull. While she looked at him she also perceived he still suffered from the slight tremor in his right arm that she’d seen when they brought gifts for him two months ago before Christmas.
Suzy, seeing her observing Mark, said, “He still loves that teddy bear and sleeps with it every night. It’s his favorite toy.”
She had liked Suzy from the moment she met her. The woman had a quiet dignity and her bearing suggested that though she might have suffered much she was strong and unbowed. “I’m glad,” she said. “He deserves all the best—and that’s why we’re going to win this case.”
“You remember Virgie, of course.”
To Donna’s relief Suzy actually smiled with pleasure and said, “Oh, yes.”
So she had guessed right, but then everyone liked Virgie, sweet thing that she was and would be again.
Now Mark looked different, worse. Perhaps he had been asleep and was now waking up. He picked up a half-eaten banana and started mindlessly squeezing it while he eyed the newcomers with a look of apprehension. Donna had seen that look on many a little one at the daycare center and knew it was dangerous. If he started crying and fussing, it might upset Virgie. “Is Mark afraid of strangers? We don’t want to upset him.”
Suzy nodded and turned to Mark. “Don’t worry, honey. These women are friends. They’re the ones that brought you your teddy bear.”
“Teddy bear,” he repeated in a strange tone, a cross between a squeal of delight and grave seriousness. It was hard to say how much he comprehended and how much was an animal-like response to his mother’s soothing tone, but he did calm down. Suzy cleaned him up with a wet towel and then brought him a coloring book and some crayons.
“I have some tea water boilin’,” Jenny said. “Would everyone like a cup of tea?”
Donna would have preferred coffee, but she assented along with Virgie and Patti, who did like tea.
Patti got the documents out of the manila envelope she carried and explained a few things about them. Luckily Suzy asked no questions that would require a lawyer’s knowledge. She also made an effort to integrate Virgie into the discussion. “My father is very thorough, isn’t he, Virgie?” What do you think ‘the aforementioned’ document means?”
Suzy seemed anxious to sign everything as quickly as possible. She was obviously intelligent, Donna could tell, and was once quite pretty—and could be again if her burdens were lessened. When the last document was signed, she asked what would happen next.
“You mean about the trial?”
Suzy watched Mark, who had made a sudden sound. “I was just wondering if there is anything else we have to do?”
“I think the rest of the work is for my father.”
“I didn’t see a money amount. Is that a bad thing?”
Patti shook her head. “These documents aren’t the actual suit. That names a million dollars for the damages.”
“That’s a lot of money,” Suzy said. She spoke abstractly. The money wasn’t real to her yet.
Donna liked her behavior. She wasn’t greedy in any way that was obvious. Her main concern was that her son be healthy. “You deserve it. You can get the best care for Mark’s physical therapy and special education.”
“And you’ll still have a lot left over,” Patti said as she returned the signed documents to the manila envelope.
“We know. Mr. Ryan, your father, he explained that. My husband thinks we should build a house.”
“I think you should too.”
“I wouldn’t be countin’ my chickens quite yet, Suzy,” Jenny said. “That Ridlon fella is a slippery customer from all I can gather.”
Suzy reddened, and Donna saw Virgie redden in sympathy. She recognized something about dreams being bigger than reality. But it was there, palpable and real: she was outside herself, thinking of another, not herself.
She was about to speak, but Patti said, very emphatically, “My dad is cleverer. He says we have a very powerful case. We’re going to win.”
Jenny, who seemed to be the type who didn’t like to be contradicted, retorted, “Maybe so, maybe so, but the law takes its own sweet time. I ’member a lawsuit a farmer up in these parts, David Hill’s his name, had with a neighbor over disputed boundaries that took seven godforsaken years to settle. And the lawyers ende
d up with most of the money.”
“Her father’s working pro bono,” Donna said.
“We know,” Jenny said. “That means free except for expenses.”
“And we’re going to get an early court date,” Patti added. “The discovery period is just about complete. My father is going to fly to New Jersey to interview some people there, and then all preparation is done. My father thinks the case is so clear-cut that a settlement will be made to avoid a trial. We could win it this summer. He thinks they’ll offer a half million dollars.”
Suzy, whom Donna suspected had long been listening to the doubting Jenny, appeared shocked that it could be that close. It was quite possible Jenny didn’t have to work too hard to convince her it was unwise to hope. The thought that an unimaginable amount of money could come to them in four or five months was a shock. But Jenny, who had seen the dangerous look in Suzy’s eyes, began talking at length about the poor farmer and his boundary squabble, which occasioned much to and fro commentary and contradiction.
Donna noticed during this lengthy conversation that Virgie was not paying attention. Instead she was making eyes at Mark and he was staring back, not afraid now but curious and intrigued. At one point their gazes locked and held, and then Virgie whispered something that caused him to climb down from his chair and bring his coloring book to her. They whispered some more and then he ripped out the page and gave it to her. Virgie smiled sweetly.
Jenny saw them too. She watched Virgie closely, recognizing as did Donna an affinity between the two.
But time was passing and there was some unfinished business. When a pause came in the conversation, Donna addressed Suzy. “There’s something else we’ve found out. You have a son who’s run away—is that right?”
Suzy’s answer was to turn pale. Agitated, she stood and walked to the clothes dryer. No sooner had she opened the door than she abruptly closed it. “Do you know something?”
“I think so. Does he have a scar on his chin?”
Suzy gasped. “He cut himself skinning a rabbit when he was twelve.”
“And his name’s Leighton, right?”
“So you’ve seen him!”
“He’s in Portland. I’m afraid he’s mixed up with a bad group. But I’ve seen him at the soup kitchen where I volunteer. He’s healthy but…well, he seems to have a chip on his shoulder. I asked him if he was from Waska, and he denied it. He didn’t like the question. I think he doesn’t want to be found. Virgie has seen him too. Maybe she can tell you more.”
Virgie didn’t like to be questioned either. She frowned and said, “I don’t know him very well. I can’t tell you anything.” Nervously she began chewing her lip.
Donna turned back to Suzy. “Do you know why he ran away?”
She shook her head, her tear-rimmed eyes filled with an infinite and motherly sadness. “He was always a contrary boy. I think it was that we were very poor. The town kids can be very cruel, you know. I know they made fun of him. But I always gave him love. I don’t know why that wasn’t enough. I only know that he hated his life here.”
“Shall I tell him next time I see him at the soup kitchen that you still love him?”
Tears still glistened in her eyes. “Yes, and tell him I want to see him.”
Patti caught Donna’s eye. She frowned slightly and tilted her head, saying plainly that the conversation was too painful not only for Suzy but for Virgie too. But it was their human duty to tell a mother of her lost son. There was nothing she was sorry for.
Patti stood and gathered all the signed documents into the manila envelope. Everyone else followed suit and began moving towards the door. While Patti said a few more words about the case to Suzy, Donna listened to Jenny, who had taken Virgie’s arm and was speaking to her in a quiet voice.
“You’ve been quiet as a church mouse. It looks to me like you’re troubled about somethin’. At your age I’m suspectin’ a man is behind it. Let me pass on some advice my momma gave me. Things are never as bad as they seem or as good as they seem. I’ve been in both states, mind you, and I know. When I was engaged I had dreams of livin’ happily ever after and didn’t imagine that a shadow would ever fall across my path. My momma told me then to get my feet on the ground. Marriage is great, but it’s still cookin’ and cleanin’ and payin’ bills. It’s still work. And she was right. We were poor, you see, farmin’ back then and just gettin’ by. So by and by I got myself in a funk the other way. I thought life was nothin’ but strugglin’ and havin’ troubles. And momma was there to point out that there’d be days when the kids would make breakfast for you on your birthday, and somehow it all seemed worth it. So whatever is troublin’ you will pass, you mark my words and think of me when you do. You’ve got a good heart, anyone can see that. You’ll be all right.”
Donna could have hugged her. Had she been writing a script she couldn’t have asked for that old woman to say more.
Virgie was smiling in an embarrassed way, but her eyes had the sparkle of hope in them. In her hand she clutched the coloring Mark had given her.
Once they were in the car and driving between the high banks of snow on each side of the road, Donna said, “Virgie, Jenny was right. Things are going to get better. Tonight I’m going to cook your favorite meal, spaghetti. We’ve got all the ingredients.”
“We’ll have to thaw the hamburger,” Patti said.
“We can do that in the microwave. How’s that sound, Virgie?”
“Okay.” She spoke flatly, without conviction.
Playfully, and hoping that was the tone that would work, Donna said, “I heard that tone, Virgie. So, okay, it won’t happen overnight, but it will happen. You’re safe now.”
A long silence followed. Donna could see her in the rearview mirror. Chris always said her hooded eyes made her look sleepy all the time, while she thought her eyes made her look sexy and was the prettiest part of her pretty face. But now she really did look sleepy. Donna, who was sure she hadn’t been sleeping well, pictured her in that ratty apartment and subject to night terrors. She would listen tonight, and if she heard Virgie tossing and turning, she promised herself that she would get up to comfort her, maybe make some tea for her and talk and help her get through the night. Maybe—for this was scenario-building and there were no rules—Patti would join her in giving support to Virgie. Then they, the women, could feed off the solidarity.
But from the backseat came another statement spoken in a deadened tone. “I don’t feel safe now.”
“You will,” Patti and Donna said in unison. Then Donna alone said, “We’ll make you safe.”
There was no answer. Patti began talking about the suit and the difference it was going to make in the Kimballs’ lives. Donna said she liked both Jenny and Suzy, and added, hoping Virgie was listening, “They’ve both had hard lives but are strong women. Sometimes you hear about the dignity of poor people and it doesn’t sound right, but those two have it.”
Patti nodded, and they drove on in silence. By the time they were on the interstate, Virgie was asleep.
“I think that’s a good sign,” Donna whispered.
“Maybe,” Patti said. She sounded doubtful.
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