“How could you believe lies like that? How could you not question it, resist it?”
Dolly shook her head. “You don’t understand. You don’t hear the worst lies at first. It’s gradual. One lie builds on another. That’s why people like Billy Ray have to be stopped, their evil mouths shut for all time. It could happen again, Stella. The human heart doesn’t change.”
Suddenly, too tired to stand, Stella sank to her knees again beside the sofa. But this time she couldn’t take Dolly’s hand in hers.
The pictures in the books she’d seen. The medical experiments. Doctors and nurses who weren’t healers but torturers. The gas chambers. The endless stacks of emaciated bodies. The crematoriums.
No. She couldn’t find it in her heart to offer compassion and comfort to someone who had participated in that hell.
“Billy Ray was a horrible guy,” Stella told her, “but you murdered him. Just like you killed all those people in that concentration camp. I don’t know how we’re supposed to stop people like Billy Ray and his lies. But murder? No, Dolly. There has to be a better answer.”
When Dolly didn’t respond, Stella reached down, picked up the envelope from the floor and looked at the black-and-red typing. “That letter, the one you brought into the police station, you wrote it and stuck it in your own mailbox to throw us off,” she said.
Dolly nodded.
“How did you know Billy Ray would be at Mabel’s Motel?”
“At the garage, when they heard me coming, Billy Ray said to them, ‘Meet me later at Mabel’s.’ I knew that meant the old motel, because I lived there when I first came to McGill, while I was buying the house. But I was so rattled when I talked to you and the sheriff there in the restaurant, I forgot all about that. It wasn’t until Sheriff Gilford came by later and told me Billy Ray had escaped that I remembered about Mabel’s.”
“So, you went out there, figuring they’d show up?”
“I did. I parked down the road from the motel among some trees. I was waiting for them, behind the building, hiding in the bushes, when they got there. Deacon and Billy Ray pulled up in Deacon’s old jalopy. A minute later, Earle arrived, driving that hideous pickup with the swastikas on its doors. He handed Billy Ray a big, brown bag. Then he and Deacon took off in Deacon’s car. They left Billy Ray the pickup.”
“The bag would’ve had his clothes and pistol in it,” Stella said.
“It did and some beer,” Dolly replied. “I watched through the window as Billy Ray made himself at home there in one of the rooms. He was filthy. I figured he’d take a shower sooner or later. I’d brought the chemicals and tape in case I had a chance to use them.”
“You already had them?”
Dolly nodded. “I keep duct tape in my car at all times. It comes in handy.”
Stella asked, “But the chemicals? Why would you keep such a thing around your house?”
Dolly toyed with the crystal-studded lace on her bodice, and her face registered extreme sadness as she said, “There have been times I felt I should end myself, Stella. It was the least I could do, considering what I did. And I figured, if I killed myself, I should die the way they did. So, I got the stuff to do it. But I didn’t have the courage. To my shame, I wasn’t that brave.”
Dolly smiled, still sad, but somehow satisfied. “I was brave enough to end him though. I was.”
Stella still couldn’t imagine this tiny woman doing what Manny had described as a chore that was difficult for him to perform.
“How did you make your way across those beams in the attic?” she asked.
“It wasn’t all that hard. I’m spry for my age, and I was careful.”
“And you hung that bag of poison from the bathroom ceiling?”
“I certainly did, and I lay there on my belly and watched him die. He was looking up at me, and I was looking down on him when he drew his last breath. That was one of the best moments of my life. That and saving your Alma. I’m proud of both.”
Dolly closed her eyes, and Stella heard her whisper, “It won’t be long now.”
“What? What won’t be long?”
“It’s working. The pill I took when you got here. It’s working. But I need to ask you for one more thing.”
Stella’s realized with horrible clarity exactly what was happening. “No! Dolly, what did you take? We have to get you to a hospital!”
“It’s too late. I’ll be gone in just a few minutes. I have to ask you . . . I need . . .”
Stella could tell she was having a hard time breathing. “What do you need, Dolly?”
“Forgiveness. Just in case there really is something over there, on the other side of this, I can’t go there without forgiveness.”
“Dolly, please let me call an ambulance.”
Dolly grabbed Stella’s hand and held it so tightly Stella couldn’t pull away. “I chose you because you’re the best person I know. If anyone can forgive me, it would be you. Please, Stella, forgive me for what I did to those women. I saved some of them. I was a good nurse, too. Like when I saved your girl. But there were others, so many others.” She gasped. “Those poor women. Their eyes. Oh, no! Stella, I see them! I see them now!”
Stella tried again to remove her hand from the other’s grasp but couldn’t. Dolly’s eyes, bright with terror, stared into hers.
Desperately, Stella wanted to get away from her, the clawing hand, the piercing eyes, the crushing guilt, and terrible regret for atrocities that could never be undone.
No wonder this woman had lived her life afraid, terrified of unseen enemies.
“I can’t forgive you, Dolly,” she said. “I just can’t.”
“I understand. It’s too much. What I did. It was too bad.”
“It’s not just that,” Stella told her. “We’ve all sinned. But the things you did, you didn’t do them to me. I wasn’t your victim. I didn’t suffer at your hand. How can I take it upon myself to forgive another person’s suffering? So many people? So much suffering?”
For a long time, Dolly stared up at the ceiling and seemed to be considering what Stella had just said. Then she whispered, “I tried to go home again today. It isn’t my home. There’s no going back. There’s no hope. No hope.”
“As long as you’re breathing, there’s hope. I can’t wipe it all away and give you a clean heart, Dolly. I’m just a human. Maybe God can. You could ask Him.”
Stella watched as Dolly’s lips moved in a silent attempt to say something. But Stella had no idea what her friend, the former concentration camp Nazi, healer, and murderer, was saying, if anything.
Stella would never know. Because gradually, the hand that had grasped hers so tightly relinquished its hold, and the lips that may, or may not, have begged for forgiveness stopped moving.
Nearby, Stella heard a movement and a small whimper. She turned and saw that it was Valentine, sniffing his mistress’s ankle and then licking it.
Stella felt a hand on her shoulder, a large, warm, strong hand that imparted the comfort she so badly needed at that moment.
Somehow, she knew he had been there, just out of sight but nearby, all along.
“Come with me, Stella,” she heard Manny saying, as though from far away. “There’s nothing more you can do for her. She’s gone.”
“I know,” Stella said, looking up at him with eyes filled with tears. “But where is she? In the arms of God?”
Manny was quiet for a long time, looking down at Dolly’s body, now so curiously empty, the vital, mysterious woman having left it behind.
“I don’t know where she is, darlin’,” he said at last. “I reckon that’s between her and Him.”
Chapter 32
Stella sat beneath the magnolia tree in her backyard and watched the people she loved most in the world enjoy the party she had prepared for them. It had been a lot of work, cooking the food, cleaning the house, getting the yard and her garden up to her personal standard. All with a new baby to take care of. But it was worth it.
Now
she could rest, at least for a little while, as the tree offered much needed shade from the August sun, both for her and the tiny infant in her arms.
This was what she had been looking forward to for months. Holding her latest grandchild in her arms, enjoying the peace that emanated from a sleeping child, so new to the world that he had no problems to worry about.
In a moment, she would need to get up and mingle, entertain the many friends and neighbors whom she had invited to share this occasion with her and the grandchildren.
But for now, it was just her and the baby, and that was all Stella wanted or needed in the world.
She brushed her pinky across his tiny fist and delighted in how his fingers curled around hers. She ducked her head to kiss his soft, downy hair and breathed in his sweet baby smell.
How could she ever have doubted this blessing or whether or not she would be capable of fully embracing her new responsibilities?
“I’ve got you,” she told him. “Don’t you fret about nothin’, little Macon Junior. Your granny’s got you, and she ain’t never lettin’ you go.”
She looked across the lawn at her younger grandchildren, who were playing freeze tag. Even Alma was fully enjoying herself, running like a maniac when being pursued and “freezing” in the most ridiculous and comical poses when nabbed.
The older ones were embroiled in a highly competitive contest of Twister, which involved a lot of bending, stretching, and shrieking when someone stumbled and fell, taking the others down with them in a human domino–falling crescendo.
The adults were gathered around the barbecue grill, where Manny was flipping burgers and grilling hot dogs. Elsie was giving him tips, and because he was a smart man who knew her reputation as a chef, he was listening attentively.
At the far end of the yard, Raul and Yolanda, and Pastor O’Reilly and Connie were tossing horseshoes with Stella’s lifelong friend Magi Red Crow. Stella couldn’t help laughing as she watched. Little did the first four know what they were getting into. Magi was a master at tossing horseshoes. They didn’t realize the game was over before it had begun.
Stella noticed that the only one who wasn’t occupied was Waycross. He, alone, was sitting at the edge of the garden, watching her hold his new baby brother. It was so unusual for the boy to simply sit still that she got concerned.
She crooked one finger, beckoning him to join her. Instantly, he perked up, jumped to his feet, and ran across the yard to the tree.
“Whatcha doin’ over there by the garden, grandson of mine?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Nothin’. Just sittin’ there with my teeth in my mouth,” was his standard reply.
“Don’t feel like playin’ with the others?”
“Naw. Freeze tag’s silly, and I don’t wanna get all tangled up with my sisters. A guy can get Girl Cooties doin’ stuff like that.”
“Hm-m. Wouldn’t wanna risk catchin’ awful critters like Girl Cooties. I don’t even know what you’d have to do to get rid of ’em.”
“Steel wool and bleach, I reckon.”
“If you’re lucky.”
Stella saw him glance down at the baby in her arms, and she thought she detected both affection and a bit of jealousy.
Poor boy, she thought. He waits his whole life for a brother, and now that he has one, he finds out it ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.
“How’s the, um, baby doin’?” Waycross asked, giving the infant a nod and the briefest of glances.
“Just layin’ here,” Stella said in her best “no-big-deal” voice.
“No teeth in his mouth,” Waycross supplied.
“Nary a one. Not a lotta hair either.”
Stella watched as the boy’s curiosity got the better of his resentment. He knelt beside her chair in the grass, and gently pulled the receiving blanket back a bit to get a better look at his new brother’s face.
“Do you think he looks like me?” Waycross asked. “The sheriff said he can see a family resemblance. Whatever that means.”
Stella pretended to study the baby’s tiny pink features. Then she pronounced her judgment. “He’s not as handsome as you. Won’t be for quite a while, ’cause he’s gotta learn how. But yes, I think he favors his big brother quite a bit.”
Waycross seemed to like the answer, and he brightened a little. “I wish he was big enough to play with. There’s not much point to having a brother if they don’t do nothin’ but lay around.”
“That’s what all babies do at first. He’ll learn stuff though. In fact, you can teach him things, like how to throw a baseball and ride a skateboard and put frogs in your sisters’ drawers.”
His eyes opened wide. “Really?!”
“Only if you don’t tell them I said you could.”
“Okay. It’ll be our secret. I won’t even tell him that you said it. It’ll be our secret, just you and me.”
Stella reached down and smoothed his copper curls. “You know, Waycross . . . before Macon here was born, you were my only boy. Now, you’re my first grandson, the oldest male in my household, and this little guy’s older brother. Those are all three very important roles, but I’m sure you’re up to the task.”
“What kinda things do I have to do now that I’m all those things?”
“Well, you have to be ready to protect the family in any way you can. You need to be strong when a strong guy is needed and a gentle one the rest of the time.”
“I can do that stuff.”
“I know you can.”
“You’ll have to look out for this little guy, ’cause he’ll probably get in trouble from time to time and you’ll have to help him get outta it.”
“I’m good at that.”
“You certainly are. But right now, there’s something very important you can do for him and for me.”
“What’s that?”
“Feed him.”
Waycross seemed shocked at the very possibility. “Really? I can do that?”
“You most certainly can.” Stella reached down into the bag sitting next to her chair and took out a bottle. Then she stood and motioned for Waycross to sit there instead.
She could tell he was nervous when she carefully placed the baby in his arms.
“Look at you!” she said. “You’re very good at this. You’re supporting his little head exactly the way you’re supposed to.”
For the next ten minutes, she showed her eager student how to give his brother a bottle. In no time, all signs of jealousy were gone, as well as his disappointment at not being able to play ball with the new arrival.
Stella walked a few feet away to give Waycross the illusion of control, while keeping a close eye on the little one for any signs of choking or spitting up.
“Looks like your little man there’s got the situation in hand,” Manny said as he walked up to her and looked down at the two brothers, who were getting to know each other.
“He’s a natural, that Waycross,” she said. “A kind heart and a steady hand’s all it takes.”
Manny moved a bit closer to her and took her hand in his. “This is a nice party you gave to welcome the little guy, Stella,” he said. “Everybody’s enjoying themselves.”
“I hope so. I haven’t had much chance to mingle and be a good hostess.”
“This gang’s capable of entertaining themselves. Look at Raul and Yolanda over there.” He nodded toward the horseshoe pit. “That little group’s become good friends, it seems.”
Stella nodded. “Connie’s been spending a lot of time with Yolanda lately. I think it’s good for them both.”
“I couldn’t believe how well Yolanda sang in church this morning,” Manny said. “Her voice is beautiful. Strong, too. It filled the sanctuary. I thought she might cause one of the stained-glass windows to shatter.”
“I was surprised, too. I remember Raul said she could sing like her momma used to. I swear she’s even better.”
Stella watched the girl throw a shoe and laugh when she missed by a mile. She seemed to have
recovered some of her joy, and her spirit appeared to be much lighter than it had right after the attack. Her new, shorter hairstyle was becoming on her, and at the rate her hair was growing, it would soon be long and beautiful again.
“Have you heard from Macon?” Manny asked.
“No.” Stella felt the old, familiar ache in her heart. “Reckon he didn’t have a change of heart after all.”
“People don’t change,” Manny said. “Not really. Just in books and movies.”
“I think Macon wishes he could. I figure he gets credit for that.”
“You’re a generous woman, Stella. Most forgiving.”
The very word “forgive” brought it all back for Stella, the events of April, and Dolly Browning.
She looked up at Manny and knew he was thinking the same thing.
“I used to think I was a forgiving person,” she said. “Now I’m not so sure.”
“You are. Take my word for it.” He slipped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against his side. “You honored her, more than she deserved, by not telling anybody what you knew about her past.”
“What’d be the point? It wouldn’t have made anybody feel better or heal any faster,” she said. “It was bad enough that we had to tell folks it was her who killed Billy Ray. Now she’s the crazy old woman who lived in the haunted house by the cemetery with all those cats, who killed that bald-headed Nazi guy with the ugly tattoos.”
“I’m glad we didn’t have to put all that on her tombstone,” Manny said.
Stella just laughed and shook her head.
She looked over at her grandson, who was smiling down at his baby brother, his freckled face glowing with pride and affection.
New beginnings. That was the best thing about life, she decided. If you looked for them, you could always find new beginnings.
And just for a moment, Stella could have sworn she saw little Macon Jr. smile back.
Murder at Mabel's Motel Page 24
