The Lavender Hour

by Anne Leclaire

  “You heard my client say how attached she had grown to Luke and his family. Why would she give him an overdose? What possible motive could she have had?

  “Earlier, you heard Paige Ryder testify that she believes that Jessie is responsible for her father's death. I sympathize with Paige, as I am sure most of you do. She has lost her father. Jessie Long sympathizes with this girl. As you heard during Jessie's testimony, her own father died when she was fourteen. She has only compassion and sympathy for Paige. She understands that, in her anger and grief, Paige wants to find someone to blame. But that person should not be my client.

  “Luke Ryder was trying to spare his family further pain. That was his single objective. He knew he was dying. Why didn't he tell his mother or daughter of his plans? Again, he wanted to save them from pain. Just as Jessie wanted to save them from pain when she didn't tell them what Luke confided in her.

  “Luke Ryder did not know there would be an investigation. He had no reason to believe there would be an autopsy or a toxicology screen. He intended to slip away, having seen to the care of his dog. He intended to take control of his own death. Jessie Long had absolutely nothing to do with his death. She is an innocent and unintended victim of Luke's final decision. Jessie Long is innocent.”

  NELSON LOOKED rested, confident, as he stood to present his closing argument.

  “Thank you, Your Honor. Madam Clerk, Counsel, good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. I want to take this opportunity to thank you for the attention that you've paid to this case and to the testimony and evidence presented over the past few days.

  “I know you don't remember word for word the testimonies you have heard, and no one expects you to. What we do expect you to do, what you are charged to do, is to render your decision based not on passion, prejudice, or personal beliefs but on the facts.

  “Mr. Fisk has asked that you look at the facts. Here are the facts.

  “Luke Ryder was dying. As defense counsel pointed out, there is no argument about that. But even in his last days, surrounded by his beloved family and his dog, he still found enjoyment in life. You have heard from several witnesses that Luke found meaning in life's simple pleasures, just as you or I might. Baseball games, a good joke, the birds that flocked to the feeders in his yard.

  “I want you to picture for a moment the daily life of Luke Ryder, a healthy fisherman in the prime of his life who suddenly learned he was dying of cancer. Into his family, hit with the worst tragedy a family can withstand, came the defendant. At this vulnerable time in their lives, they opened their home and their hearts to her. They trusted her.

  “How did she repay that trust?

  “She stole from the dying man. Took his shirt. A painting. She took a piece of his hair. And ultimately she took his life.

  “Now, the defense will have you believe that Luke Ryder died by his own hand, with an overdose he himself took. But did he ever mention this intention to his beloved daughter or mother or his friend of twenty-three years? Did he mention it to any of the people charged with his care? No. The fact is that he didn't say one word of this to the people closest to him. Are we to believe he told it to a woman he had known only weeks? A woman who has lied? Because, despite what opposing counsel will have you believe, Jessie Long lies. This fact is not in dispute. You heard Lieutenant Moody testify that Jessie Long told him on the day after Luke Ryder died that Luke never once mentioned suicide. When Lieutenant Moody interviewed her weeks later, he again asked her that question, and again Jessie Long told him that Luke had never mentioned the possibility of taking his own life. Yet on the stand, with her own future at stake, the defendant now tells us that Luke did tell her he intended to take his own life. So the question, ladies and gentlemen, is not if the defendant is a liar. She has given two conflicting statements, only one of which can be true. The other has to be a lie. The question for you is, which story do you believe? The one she told to the investigating officer shortly after Luke's death or the one she told here in this courtroom when she was on trial?

  “You have heard testimony from Dr. Wilber about the toxicology results. Luke Ryder did not die of cancer. His death was caused by acute narcotic intoxication. A fatal dose of barbiturates. Five times the lethal dose.

  “You heard testimony that the defendant's fingerprints were on a medicine vial in Luke Ryder's home. You heard testimony that, in her training, she had specifically been told that volunteers were not to dispense medications, and yet she herself said that she gave Luke narcotics. You have heard testimony that her fingerprints were on a plastic bag found in the trash at Mr. Ryder's house.

  “Jessie Long had opportunity. She herself testified that she had been prescribed Seconal. She testified that, on the final day of Luke Ryder's life, she spent the afternoon with him while his mother slept upstairs. She alone was the last person to see him alive before his mother went to him later that night and found that he was dead.

  “The opposing counsel has asked what Jessie Long's motive could possibly be. Why would this woman, who entered the deceased's home promising to help—why would she give Luke Ryder a lethal dose of Seconal?”

  Nelson shrugged. “I do not know. We cannot know. Only she can know. Perhaps she believed it was an act of mercy. Perhaps, in fact, it was merciful. But it was not her decision to make, and I will not talk about the morality of this decision. That is not the question we are here today to debate, and, regardless of your personal beliefs, it should play no role in your deliberations. We will stick to the letter of the law, and in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, it is against the law to cause the death of another person or to assist that person in his death. Clear and simple, it is manslaughter. In a few minutes, you are going to be receiving instructions from Judge Savage regarding the law.

  “And then you will begin your deliberations, and you will return with a verdict. The word verdict comes from the Latin and means 'to speak the truth.' The search for truth is now in your hands. And I suggest to you that, when you find the truth in this case, you will find the defendant guilty. Guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.”

  thirty-one

  WORD SPREAD THAT the jury had gone into deliberation, and the crowd outside the courthouse grew. Reporters milled around, cameras trained on the protesters and on a second, smaller group who had gathered in support of me. As I left the courthouse flanked by Gage and Lily, the crowd surged toward me. Gage waved aside the microphones thrust at us. “We'll have a statement later,” he said, as he hustled me toward the car.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “Lunch,” he said. “I've reserved a table at Abbicci.”

  “I can't eat,” I said.

  “Relax,” Gage said. “There's no way the jury can find you guilty.”

  I wished I could share his confidence. Nelson's closing had seemed frighteningly persuasive.

  “How long do you think it will take to reach a verdict?” Lily asked.

  “Juries are hard to predict,” Gage said. “Some of them come right back in an hour, and others like to go over every bit of the testimony. Depends on whether we've got a nitpicker in there.”

  “What's your sense?” Lily asked.

  “I think they'll come back today.”

  “Today?” I said.

  “Before five.”

  I clutched Lily's hand. “Please,” I said to Gage. “I need to go home.”

  Lily's brow creased with concern. “Are you all right, Jess?”

  “No. I don't think so.”

  “You probably need food,” Gage said.

  I felt the air closing in. My voice was suddenly frantic. “No. I need to get out of here. I need to go home.”

  “Okay,” Lily said, her tone calm, soothing. “Take it easy, Jess. We'll get you home.”

  “Stay with her,” I heard Gage say to Lily. “And stay by the phone. I'll call you as soon as the jury returns.”

  GAGE WAS mistaken. It was another two days before the jury reached a decision.

&nb
sp; As they filed into the courtroom, they did not look over at the defense table. I couldn't remember what I had heard. Did the jury avoid looking at me if they thought I was innocent, or was it the other way around?

  The foreperson, the mother who had lost a forty-six-year-old son, handed the verdict to the clerk, who passed it up to Judge Savage, who read it, her face impassive, and then handed it back to the clerk. She asked me to stand. Before the verdict was read, I dared one glance at the jurors. I was surprised to see that several of them were crying.

  epilogue

  OFTEN, THESE DAYS, I think about the conversations I had with Lily as we walked along the bay side shore each day during the trial. There is one thing in particular she said that stays in my mind.

  What we forget is as important as what we remember.

  I can't know with certainty if this is true, but I believe it to be. I believe that one day I will no longer be haunted by the torment of the trial. I believe that the intensity of my grief will dim and I will remember the joy that love can bring. I believe what will stay with me is the power of connection and friendship.

  I recall what Luke told me on the day that he died—You care this much now, and you will care this much again—and I pray that this is so. I hope that eventually I will remember not the pain of his death but the many lessons I was taught from his dying, the hard ones that crack your heart wide open in the learning.

  After the trial was over, I received calls from several national organizations offering help if I decided to appeal. Lily thought I should fight. And Gage told me there were certainly grounds for appeal. Only Faye seemed to understand my willingness to accept both the verdict and Judge Savage's ruling. I was given a one-year suspended sentence, fifty hours of community service, and forbidden to ever again work for hospice.

  When I refused to appeal, Lily thought it was because I was tired and didn't have the stomach for a fight. The truth is, I thought the verdict just. I was not guilt-free.

  I had made foolish choices and had not taken responsibility for them. I had not been honest with Faye. I had broken rules. I had been lost in my own need to find love, believing it possible to enter someone's life and take what you needed without considering what it cost them. I had loved not too much but too wrongly.

  Although I had taken the plastic bag from the desk and given it to Luke, had opened the capsules when he couldn't manage the task, had dissolved them in ginger ale, I had not given him the fatal dose of Seconal. I stayed with him that afternoon until he fell asleep, sat with him through the very final moments, something I would not have believed I was capable of doing, but as I sat there, I kept hearing Faye. No one should have to die alone, she had told me that spring. We are stronger than we think, she had said.

  But I had been weak, too. I know now I should not have left Nona alone with Luke that afternoon, knowing that he was gone. I should have woken her earlier and told her what Luke intended, made her a part of his death, as she had been of his birth. She was his mother and deserved that. I really believe she would have understood what he wanted to do and would have supported his choice. If I had found the courage to wake her and bring her to Luke's room, everything that followed would have been different.

  Faye told me once that regret was a futile emotion, but I will forever regret not telling Nona.

  “You were afraid,” Faye said, when I finally confessed to her.

  Looking back now, I see that, for most of my life, I have been clenched in the steely jaws of fear. Afraid to commit, to fight for a job, to take chances, to stand with the man I had grown to care so deeply about.

  As I look back, I am grateful for where I am now. I am living my second chance. I have been changed by the things that transform us all: Love, incalculable loss. And death, that most eloquent of teachers. Most of all, I have been altered by Luke.

  DURING THE trial, Gage asked me what I had learned from Luke. Courage, I told him. I meant, of course, courage for the hard work that dying requires. But I also meant I had learned not that the cost of bravery is high but that the price we pay for weakness is much greater.

  I learned that it takes strength to love and that love is as indestructible as the hair on ancient mummies and can lead us to strange places. To grief, joy, and loss. To deception, betrayal, and redemption. It can bring us to our knees. Strand us in the shallows or lead us across an ocean. I learned that the very thing that breaks our hearts can be the necessary thing that heals us.

  I LEARNED, too, from Paige. After the trial, others asked me if I harbored resentment toward her, for her actions. At first, I did, and then I realized that we were not so dissimilar, Paige and I. She, too, had lost a father and had felt abandoned by her mother. She was fighting to hold on in the only way she knew how. How could I blame her for that? How could I not love her for that?

  WHEN THE year of my sentence was over, I stayed on the Cape. I am teaching again, a new beginning in a small private school with students I adore. Lily maintains that I am living in a state of radical hope.

  I continue to rise early, as I did those mornings at the Harwich Port cottage. At dawn, I walk outside with my coffee, and I listen to the calls and songs of the birds. I remember when Luke told me that they sing out of joy, and as I listen to them, I wonder: If they can sing out of one emotion, why not more? And who is to say they don't? There is so much else to give voice to. Grief. Envy. Regret. Longing and loss.

  Even in the lavender hour of sorrow, there is song.

  THE

  LAVENDER

  HOUR

  Anne LeClaire

  A Reader's Guide

  A CONVERSATION WITH ANNE LECLAIRE

  N. M. Kelby(Nicole Mary Kelby) is a former print and television journalist and the author of three novels: In the Company of Angels, Theater of the Stars, and most recently, Whale Season. She met Anne LeClaire while in residence at the Ragdale Foundation in Lake Forest, Illinois, where both have been named Distinguished Fellows.

  NMK: The Lavender Hour strikes me as a book that puts death in its place in the cycle of life—it allows readers to embrace it as a part of life, to overcome their fear of it, and allow for the lessons it brings.

  AL: I don't know if most of us ever actually overcome our fear of death. I sense we are hardwired with that fear, but by witnessing it, in fiction as well as in fact, we are cracked open to the gift of its significant lessons.

  NMK: I find that most writers write from a dark place in their heart. Much of my work, including my comedic novel Whale Season, has been influenced by the death of my daughter. I write out of the need to find hope in darkness. Your work feels crafted along a similar path. Does writing provide you a way to own your private sorrow and to re-create it?

  AL: Writing provides me with a way to try to make sense of things. And to delve into issues like loss and grief and disconnection as well as to explore the role these things play in our lives. I am not re-creating a specific personal sorrow but draw on my experiences to inform the sorrows of the characters. The one step removed gives me just the distance I need to explore. I don't think of the writing as coming from a dark place in my heart but from a center of hope. As Flannery O'Connor once responded to a reader who accused her of being a pessimist that only an optimist dares look life fully in the face. And her answer to people who complained that the novelist painted a picture of a world that is unbearable was “People without hope do not write novels.”

  I do know that experiencing grief and exploring it through my stories has made me passionate about finding and celebrating joy. And life.

  NMK: What inspired you to write this particular story?

  AL: One sentence in a novel I was reading. I don't remember the name of the book or much about it except that a minor character in it was a hospice volunteer, and when I read that, I had the “solar plexus hit” I get when the germ of a story strikes. I thought about how people often envision hospice work as being about endings, but it can be about beginnings, too. I also recalled a sentence I he
ard during a lecture by Dr. Bernie Siegel: “We learn how to live from the dying.” That seemed a wonderful premise for a book about a hospice volunteer, and eventually it landed in Jessie's narrative. What can we learn? What are the costs of the lessons? How do we heal?

  NMK: Jessie, your heroine, is an amazing creation. As a reader, I felt both great sympathy and great antipathy toward her—and at times, she really made me mad. As a writer, I admire your skill in drawing such a flawed creature and applaud the choice. But what I really want to know is, do you like her? Would you take her out for girl talk, a glass of wine, and some steamers?

  AL: Oh, I just love Jessie. I feel such compassion for her. She is the part of all of us that urgently wants to connect—and isn't that exactly all we ever long for?—and then keeps messing it up. This is the question I wanted to spend time with and in fact have been playing with for the last three books (Entering Normal, Leaving Eden, and The Law of Bound Hearts). If we long for connection, why do we keep messing it up? Of course, the answer is fear. I recently read somewhere that fear and longing are the two predominant emotions and motivating forces. In Jessie, they are in conflict with each other. And conflict in the human heart is always worth writing about.

  As to hanging with her, I've just spent nearly two years with her and wouldn't mind some more, especially now that she has a lot of hard-earned wisdom to share.

  A perfect day with Jessie would be to go for a long walk in the dunes at the National Seashore, then have those steamers, and cap the day by dancing at the Squire. And I'd love a piece of her jewelry.

  NMK: Just between you and me, why do you really think Jessie was attracted to Luke? Did it have something to do with her cancer?

  AL: Oh my, yes. At first, she was attracted to his looks and that sense she had of “I know you.” And then she fell in love with the person. It was such a daring thing for her to fall in love with someone who was going to leave her. Loving is always courting the possibility of loss, and with Luke, it was a sure thing.