In the Shadow of Revenge

by Patricia Hale

  I decided to start at Edgewater High School. In the third week of August, students weren’t yet lining the halls, but teachers and office staff were getting their respective rooms ready. It had been more than ten years since I’d been a high school student, but the smell was the same: chalk and institutional floor cleaner. In a couple of weeks that would be joined by the musky scent of teenage boys and the cornucopia of fragrances on the necks of teenage girls, and I could sit on the cold linoleum floor, lean against a metal locker and believe that I was eighteen again.

  In the main office, I introduced myself to a smiling, pear-shaped woman wearing a yellow track suit and explained that I was working on a case and looking for information on a former student.

  “I’ve been here for twenty-two years,” she said. “Known them all, loved most.” She winked, apparently letting me know there’d been a few bad apples.

  “What can you tell me about J.D. Dobbs?” I asked.

  Her face clouded over and I could tell he wasn’t among her chosen ones.

  “Now that boy had some issues. Not that I ever knew exactly what they were, but when a child is that defiant, you have to look at where he comes from.”

  I didn’t know much about Dobbs’s past, so instead of schmoozing, I raised my eyebrows, hoping the gesture would keep her talking.

  “He had no father, you know. Well, of course he had one, but you know what I mean.”

  I nodded.

  “At least he was never in the picture. His mother was barely there herself. Drank. Never participated in parent conferences or holiday celebrations. Once she showed up reeking of booze for the Christmas tree lighting. Principal Edwards drove her home. I guess you can’t expect a child to turn out any different than that boy did.”

  “And how’s that?”

  “Quit after his junior year. Of course he might not have actually graduated anyway. He only showed up when he felt like it and then spent most of his time right there.” She pointed to a wooden bench that ran along the wall outside the principal’s office. “But he got into even more trouble outside of school, legal trouble.”

  I wondered why Nick hadn’t turned any of that up and made a mental note to see if Dobbs’s juvenile records had been expunged.

  “Did he have any friends?”

  “A few. The girls liked him.”

  She turned and walked to a high standing walnut bookshelf in the corner of the office, shuffled through its contents and came back with an old yearbook.

  “This one’s from his junior year, his picture should be in here.”

  She strummed the pages and then laid the book open flat in front of me. A sixteen—or seventeen-year-old Dobbs looked up from the page. He hadn’t changed. The blond hair, the same steely eyes that had held us captive. Put a kerchief over his nose and a baseball hat on his head and I was back in the railcar. I looked away.

  “He was a handsome boy. Never had any trouble with the girls. Some of the boys looked up to him. I suppose most of the kids would have called him cool.”

  “Do you remember the names of the boys he hung around with?”

  She thought for a moment, her eyes fixed on the fluorescent overheads. “What did you say your last name was?”

  “Minos.”

  “Are you Marilyn Minos’s daughter?”

  I nodded hesitantly, not sure what was coming.

  “Why don’t you just ask your mother?”

  I stared at her while the words registered in my head. “My mother?”

  “She was the Dobbs boy’s secondary contact on his student profile. She picked him up a couple of times when he’d been suspended for one thing or another and we couldn’t reach his mother.” She dropped her voice and leaned across the counter that separated us. “Probably passed out,” she said and rolled her eyes.

  The air in the attendance office was suddenly so thick I couldn’t breathe. I thanked the woman for her time and walked past the double doors held wide by rubber stoppers, past the janitor and his bucket, and finally reaching the outside, I took a breath. He’d known us all along. The day in the railcar, the night at Gritty’s and at the store in Millers Falls. He needed us. Probably thought we could lead him to the money, or the third person Wainwright referred to on the tape. But what was my mother’s connection and why had she kept him a secret?

  I called Amelia on my way home, and she was waiting in front of my apartment building when I got there. I tossed my satchel onto the couch. Amelia followed me into the kitchen. While I went for the wine, she went for my watering can and gave the wilted plants on my balcony a much-needed drink.

  “You gotta take care of the kids,” she said, nodding to the three-tiered shelf that ran along the perimeter of my wrought-iron railing housing a variety of greens she’d bestowed on me to mark various occasions. I still couldn’t remember their names.

  “Wine?” I asked.

  “That bad?”

  “I went to the high school today to see what I could find out about Dobbs.”

  “And?”

  “Guess who the second name was on his emergency contact list.”

  “Didn’t think anyone would volunteer for that job.”

  “My mother.”

  “What?” Amelia stared at me, her eyes wide. “Your mother. What the hell?”

  “I’d never seen him before. Not until the day in the railcar and I really didn’t see him then. I mean I didn’t recognize him at Gritty’s. But he knows exactly who we are.”

  “Jesus.” Amelia took a large swallow of the wine I set in front of her. “But why would he risk us recognizing him?”

  “He probably figured we were too young to remember and we never did see his face.”

  “We saw his butt.”

  “He probably didn’t think of that. He was focused on getting his share of the money.”

  “And Wainwright wouldn’t give it to him so he killed him?”

  I nodded.

  “But what about the part on the tape that says he doesn’t have it, but Dobbs knows who does? If Wainwright didn’t have the money, Dobbs had no reason to kill him.”

  “Maybe Wainwright was lying. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “How’re you going to figure out who the third person is?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said, feeling a half-developed theory bouncing around in my head. “But I think I know where to start.”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  “And I thought this visit was to apologize for betraying your brother.”

  I sat across from my mother at her kitchen table, a mug of hazelnut coffee in front of me. She shoved the half and half container at me with enough force to upend the carton. I caught it, righted it and crossed the room for a paper towel to clean up the spill without making a comment. No easy feat.

  “I thought you might be concerned for my safety because someone is trying to set me up.”

  “I read the papers. It sounds like they have a strong case against you.”

  I looked at her a little incredulous. “You think I killed Hilary’s father?”

  She shrugged.

  “I need information on the robbery at The Cave.” I watched her face for a response.

  “That was years ago.”

  “I went to the high school yesterday to inquire about J.D. Dobbs. They said you were listed as a contact on his student profile.”

  “I don’t know anything about a J.D. Dobbs. Whoever you spoke to at the high school made a mistake,” she said.

  “I don’t think so. You’re covering something up and I want to know what it is.”

  “I told you. There’s nothing to say.”

  I bit my tongue. Now was not the time for a confrontation. She had something I needed. “Mom,” I said. “Tell me about Dobbs.�
��

  She studied the tablecloth for a long time. I waited. Finally, she spoke.

  “My parents were mixed. That’s why my skin is light.”

  “I know that.”

  “My brother, whom you’ve never met and never will, was even lighter. Everyone always teased him that he could claim to be black or white, whichever fit the occasion.”

  “I never knew you had a brother.”

  “I know. I made sure of that. He wasn’t worth knowing.” She took a deep breath and a sip of her coffee, twirled the spoon around inside the cup and then set it on her napkin. “But growing up, he was my closest ally. He watched out for me in the way all big brothers watch out for a little sister.”

  I cringed.

  “And then after my mother died, he lost interest in everything. He barely graduated high school. He started working as a bus boy at a local bar with a questionable reputation. My dad and Daniel had nightly rows. He started not coming home. Sometimes a whole week would go by. I had loved him and I was crushed at first, then I began to hate him. Anger was easier. He spent time with a white woman, hair the color of milkweed and skin like Ivory soap. The two of them drank more than any two people can hold and then fought loudly enough and violently enough that they’d both end up in jail to sleep it off, sometimes longer. Finally he left her, just disappeared. I never heard from him again. But she had a baby shortly after he left and moved from New York to Millers Falls, Maine. I couldn’t let my brother’s son be raised by her. She was drinking and drugging and God knows what else. And even though I hated my brother for leaving me and I hated the woman, Lacy, who bore his child, I felt responsible for the boy. I was the only other blood he had. Your father had lost his job and we’d been talking about leaving the city and so when Lacy moved with J.D., we followed. Your father could get a fresh start and I could keep my eye on the boy.”

  I sat without moving, digesting the full meaning of her words. Hilary’s rapist was my cousin. I wanted to crawl out of my skin. I’d already done enough, or not done enough depending on how you looked at it. Now I was related to Dobbs. She’d never be able to look at me again without thinking of him. Our friendship had withstood more than I’d ever thought it would, but it would never withstand this.

  “Why was his name Dobbs and not Eldridge like your maiden name?” I asked once I could get my mouth to work.

  “The boy never knew his father. He went by Dobbs, same as Lacy.”

  “But why was he such a secret?”

  “The boy was no good from the minute he took his first breath.”

  “What a surprise in this family,” I said. “But I still don’t understand why he was a secret. Did Jarod know him?”

  She nodded. “I told him he was not allowed near my family, but he and your brother ignored me, did what they wanted.”

  “The school said you used to pick him up.”

  “Someone had to keep an eye on him. He was stealing bicycles, vandalizing property, you name it, he did it. He even killed the McKenzies’ dog.”

  “I always thought that was Jarod,” I said.

  She looked down at the tablecloth, crushed a crumb with the tip of her finger, but didn’t respond. “Your brother was no angel, but as far as I know, he never killed anything.”

  “There’s a lot you don’t know,” I said.

  “Don’t you badmouth Jarod, we’re talking about J.D. here. Leave your brother out of it.”

  “Why doesn’t J.D. have a record? There’s no history of arrests.”

  “You’ve looked for one?”

  “Just answer me.”

  “After he left, I petitioned to have his record sealed.”

  “And they granted it?”

  “He was still under eighteen and I’m his next of kin. There was no history of violent crimes, mostly misdemeanors. It took some time, but after a while they allowed it.”

  Of course they did, I thought, because he hadn’t been nabbed for the robbery yet, or the rape. “Why’d you do it?” I asked.

  “Like I said, he spent a lot of time with Jarod and I didn’t want any connections made between the two of them.”

  As the words left her mouth things took shape in my head. J.D. and Jarod, always together, stealing bikes, vandalizing cars and robbing The Cave. My hunch was that Jarod was the third party and it’d be a safe bet to say my mother knew it too. Dobbs was the one who ended up with a record, while my mother must have lied through her teeth to keep Jarod full of alibis. The nail in the coffin was to have Dobbs’s records sealed, eliminating any connection between the two, but confronting her with that would only get me thrown out of the house. I needed more answers.

  “When was the last time you saw J.D.?”

  “It’s been eighteen years.”

  “That summer?” She knew the one I meant.

  “The same day. He came asking for money. He said he was going away. I was more than happy to hear that.” She started to raise the cup in front of her to her mouth, but her hand was shaking so badly she set it back on the table.

  Oxygen had left the room. I was frozen to my chair, waiting for what I knew was coming.

  “About an hour later you came tearing through the house saying that Hilary had been hurt.”

  “And you knew it was him.”

  She hesitated, picking at a loose thread in the tablecloth and I knew she knew. She knew what he’d done and she’d protected him.

  “I suspected.”

  “Did you give him money?” My voice came out in a squeak.

  “A hundred dollars.” She kept her eyes lowered and dropped her hands into her lap, fumbling with her apron.

  I heard the cry, but didn’t realize it had come from me until I was on my feet upending the table. The coffee and cups splashed and clattered onto the tile floor. “You knew,” I screamed at the top of her head, which was bent as if in prayer. She wouldn’t look at me.

  “You knew and you let him get away with it, same as Wainwright. Were there any fucking parents back then?”

  “Don’t you speak to me that way, he was my nephew. He was blood.” She was on her feet now, wringing her hands and twisting the apron between them.

  “You protected a rapist instead of a little girl.” My body felt numb and hollow. It was hard to stay on my feet. “You’re a pitiful excuse for a mother. I wish you’d left instead of Dad.”

  “Get out of this house.” She banged her fists against the counter top. “Don’t you ever come through that door again.”

  She looked at me, her eyes slits in her head, her face hard as stone. The tone in her voice turned my skin cold and I backed away from her until I was out of the kitchen. Then I turned and made my way down the hallway past her religious paraphernalia, paintings and statues she confused with devotion. As with mothering, she missed the point. When I reached the front door I glanced back, taking a last look at my childhood home. I didn’t yearn for what I was leaving, only for what I’d never had.

  * * *

  The frothy remains of a wave rolled over the sand and caught the edge of my brown leather flip-flop. I kicked them off and tossed them higher onto the beach, then turned and waded in ankle deep. I had no recollection of driving to Scarborough Beach or walking this far along the sand, but here I was. Funny how the mind shuts down when it reaches its breaking point and the body takes over, promising physical survival if nothing else.

  I’d watched Hilary get raped by my own cousin. My mother had known and done nothing. I had to keep repeating the words, forcing myself to ingest them as truth. How could one family betray a person on so many levels?

  It was too late to set things right for Hilary. But I was far from washing my hands. I reached to the sand for a few tiny stones and rolled them together between my palms. Then I threw each one as far as I could into the surf and ordered
emotion to take a back seat. I started back up the beach, determined. Loose ends needed tying up, like proving to DeLonge that I hadn’t killed Wainwright, but Dobbs or my brother had and I was pretty sure that the cassette that had been in Wainwright’s garage was the proof I needed.

  I took out my cell phone and called Nick. After relaying the conversation I’d just had with my mother I started to cry, hating myself for showing weakness.

  “Take a break, Cecily,” he said. “Don’t do anything until I get back.”

  “When’s that?”

  “Sometime tonight. You stay put until then.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “Cecily...” he started to say something else, but I hung up. I couldn’t make any promises.

  When I got home, I locked the door behind me and went straight for the bedroom. I took down the box, went into the bathroom and set up the candles, then reached for the razor. My hands trembled like a junkie needing a fix as I dragged the blade along the outside of my torso, armpit to waist. I lit the candles and closed my eyes. Immediately Hilary came into focus—her eyes black, her chest blood red. I screamed and lashed out, knocking the silver candleholders into the sink. There was a pounding in my head that wouldn’t stop and finally, opening my eyes, I realized that there was someone knocking at my apartment door. I gathered the razor, the candles and their holders and threw everything into the box, then stuffed it back onto the shelf in my closet and grabbed a sweatshirt, pulling it on as I went for the door.

  “Hi,” Hilary said. “I’m out.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  I stood in the shower unsettled by the fact that Hilary had appeared in my head again and this time moments later at my door, wishing she were still safely in rehab. I took a deep breath and let the water run over my neck. The tightness between my shoulders began to relax. Maybe Nick was right. Maybe I did need a break. Pizza and a chick flick sounded pretty good. I toweled off, pulled on jeans and a T-shirt and opened the bathroom door. Steam rushed into the room ahead of me.

  “Hil?” I called coming into the hallway. The living room was empty. I went to the kitchen and checked my miniscule balcony, then back down the hall to the guest room. No sign of her.