Roses

by Leila Meacham

  “Your son,” she began, “is deliberately and systematically inflicting injuries upon Matthew DuMont. I am afraid if somebody doesn’t stop Wyatt, he’ll do serious harm to that little boy.”

  Percy’s chair protested as he snapped forward, his pleasure in her beauty forgotten. “Explain what you mean, Miss Thompson.”

  “I mean, Mr. Warwick, that every day during school hours, Wyatt manages to hurt Matthew DuMont in some way. It can be anything from tripping him in the hall to deliberately throwing a ball in his face. I can’t tell you the number of nosebleeds the child has endured because Wyatt has hit him. I’ve seen him… I’ve seen him…” Her cheeks reddened, as much from anger, Percy thought, as embarrassment.

  “Go on,” he urged tensely.

  “I’ve seen him knee Matthew in the groin many times.”

  Percy felt his face grow hot. “Why in God’s name did you wait until now to tell me? Why didn’t you go to the school authorities?”

  “I did, Mr. Warwick. I went to the principal, but he refused to listen. I tried to enlist the aid of the other teachers, but they refused to help me, also. They’re all afraid of you… of your power. They fear for their jobs. The children, too. Their fathers work for you.”

  “Good God,” Percy said.

  “Today was the last straw,” Sara Thompson continued, visibly gaining confidence now that she perceived she was making headway.

  “What happened today?”

  “Wyatt slashed Matthew’s prized baseball glove, then threw it into the cesspool at the rear of the school. When Matthew waded out to get it, Wyatt threw a rock and hit him on the temple. It knocked the child nearly senseless and left a deep cut that bled freely. He lost his footing—”

  Sara bit her lip, as if the description of the smaller Matthew falling into the muck of the waste pit, blood flowing from a temple wound, were too much to describe, but Percy clearly perceived the picture. He stood abruptly, fingers working angrily to button his suit coat. He knew the glove in question. It had been a present from him last Christmas.

  “And does Matthew ask for these beatings?”

  “Absolutely not!” Sara’s defense was emphatic. “I know Matthew DuMont only as a member of my debate class and from playground duty, but I have observed him to be the nicest student I know. He tries to defend himself, but, though he’s a class older, his size is no match for your son’s. The other boys… they want to help, but they’re afraid of Wyatt… of you.”

  “I see…. How did you get here, Miss Thompson?”

  “Why, I…” Sara grappled with the relevancy of the question. “I walked here from the school.”

  “That’s over two miles.”

  “The importance of my mission made the distance no consequence.”

  “So it would seem.” Percy threw open the door of his office. “Sally, have Booker bring the car around. I want him to drive Miss Thompson home.”

  Sara stood up, looking uncertain now and a trifle flustered. “That’s very kind of you, Mr. Warwick. I can’t thank you enough for hearing me out.”

  “Why didn’t you go to the DuMonts with this?” Percy asked.

  “Because of Matthew. From what I know of him, I am certain he would rather die than tattle on Wyatt to his parents or ask for their interference or help. I could not have appealed to them… before I tried you. It would have been a kind of betrayal. I would have gone to Mr. and Mrs. DuMont next, however.”

  “You admire Matthew, don’t you.”

  “He has a great deal of character.”

  “And Wyatt?”

  Sara hesitated, then met his gaze directly. “He has a mean streak in him, Mr. Warwick, but only toward Matthew, I’ve noticed. If it weren’t for his… obvious jealousy of the boy, I suspect they’d be buddies. Your son’s lonely, Mr. Warwick. He has few friends.”

  “His fault, I fear.”

  His chauffeur appeared in the doorway. He’d been on call today at the office rather than at the Warwick residence. Visitors from California had arrived to tour the mills. “You’re to drive Miss Thompson to her residence, Booker. Then come back and pick up our guests. My car is here. I’ll drive myself to the house.” He held out his hand to Sara. “Thank you for coming to me. Booker will see that you get home.”

  Sara accepted his hand, her look slightly fearful of the mood that had come over him. His secretary and chauffeur seemed to sense it, too. “Mr. Warwick,” she said uneasily, “if you’ll forgive my asking, what do you plan to do?”

  “If what you say is true, I plan to make certain that Wyatt never lays another finger on Matthew DuMont. And you do not have to ask my forgiveness for anything. It is I who should ask it of you.”

  Percy left his office through a door that provided access to a private garage. Murder foamed in his heart, but reason ruled his brain. He forced himself to remain calm as he drove toward Houston Avenue. He didn’t know anything about Miss Thompson. She could be exaggerating accounts of typical schoolboy pranks as a ploy to bring herself to his attention. Such stunts had been tried on him before. These were desperate times, when women as well as men tried all kinds of ruses to ensure job protection and favors.

  But he couldn’t believe Miss Thompson the kind to play that game. If she was, he’d lost his considerable ability to spot rot in an otherwise sound piece of wood. He judged Miss Thompson to be one of those rarest of human beings—incorruptible. It had taken guts to come into his office bearing those tales. She’d put her job on the line. In not going to Ollie and Mary first, she’d shown sensitivity and an understanding of Matthew, who’d have been humiliated by his parents stepping in to fight his battles for him. Miss Thompson could not have known the other reason Matthew would never have tattled on Wyatt. Wyatt was the son of his godfather, whom he worshipped. He would never say anything about Wyatt that would hurt Uncle Percy. It was the kind of integrity that made Percy’s heart break with love and pride, a feeling he’d never had for Wyatt.

  He supposed—given the way his life had gone—that it had been too much to hope the boys would become friends. Matthew was willing, but Wyatt had disliked him from the start. There was nine months’ difference in their ages. On Wyatt’s part, there had been squabbles in the playpen, unfriendly horseplay in the sandbox, and, later, cold indifference at picnic tables as the two families met for outings to which other families were invited to ease the tension between Lucy and Mary.

  As Miss Thompson had stated, the cause of Wyatt’s hostility was obvious and simply explained. He was jealous of Matthew. Matthew was smarter, better looking, and more likable. Percy took pains to betray no favoritism when the boys were together, but it showed. Lucy often lamented that she wished he’d treat Wyatt with the same warmth he did “the DuMont boy.”

  But even Lucy liked Matthew, seeing in him all the endearing traits she appreciated in Ollie, and she wasn’t above cuffing Wyatt’s ear when he played too roughly with the smaller boy. In a strange reversal of her initial threats, she wanted Percy and Wyatt to be close and encouraged them to spend time together. It was a worry to her that from the outset, father and son had not appeared drawn to each other.

  Try as he might, his heart went cold at Wyatt’s clumsy attempts to win his affections. The boy had no Warwick in him. He was pure Trenton Gentry, Lucy’s deceased father, in manner, looks, and attitude… a sullen, bull-necked, barrel-chested browbeater who mistook a kindly nature in the male for weakness. Not a drop of Lucy’s humor and gaiety and animation was in him.

  Hands tight on the wheel, Percy felt the slow building of the cold, controlled rage that few had witnessed or borne. God help Wyatt if he’d hurt Matthew. God help him if Miss Thompson was telling the truth. He parked at the rear of the Toliver mansion and entered the grounds by the wrought-iron gate. Sassie heard its squeak and was waiting for him at the back kitchen door.

  “Why, Mister Percy, what you doin’ here this time of day? Mister Ollie, he still be at the store, and Miss Mary, she out at Somerset.”

  Isn�
��t she always? Percy thought with banked resentment. “It’s not them I’ve come to see. My godson home?”

  “He sure is. He up in his room. Got into a li’l trouble at school today, or rather, trouble come to him. Somebody throwed a rock at him and cut him bad. And you shoulda seen his clothes!”

  “Has he had this kind of trouble before, Sassie? Ever come home with a black eye or bleeding nose?”

  Sassie’s troubled face bunched further. “Yessir, Mister Percy, he has, and this time, I’m goin’ to say somethin’ about it to Mister Ollie. I just don’t believe that child is that clumsy. Says he falls down a lot. I never seen him fall down round here.”

  “How bad was the cut?”

  “Any deeper and I’d had to call Doc Tanner.”

  “Call him anyway, Sassie, and tell him to get here as fast as he can. I’m going up to check on him.”

  “He’ll be glad to see you, Mister Percy. Take up this tray of hot chocolate I fixed him, and I’m addin’ another cup for you. That boy like chocolate more’n his papa.”

  When Percy knocked, Matthew called, “Come in,” in a boyish tenor that never failed to pull at his heartstrings. He opened the door to find him looking freshly scrubbed and sitting on his bed, oiling his baseball glove with some kind of putrid-smelling ointment. Apparently he was expecting Sassie. His eyes grew round when Percy entered carrying the tray of chocolate. “Uncle Percy!” he cried in surprise and alarm, quickly stashing the glove behind him. “What are you doing here?”

  “I heard what happened at school today,” he said, making room for the tray on a nearby table. He sat beside him on the bed and gently turned the boy’s chin to study the bandage. “Wyatt do that?”

  “It was an accident.”

  “And this?” Percy slipped the slashed glove from around him and held it up.

  Matthew refused to answer or look at him.

  “A friend told me what happened. Said Wyatt tossed your glove into the cesspool, then threw a rock responsible for that cut. Is that true?”

  “Yessir, but it’s okay now,” Matthew said.

  Percy examined the glove. It was ruined. Last Christmas, he’d given both boys the same kind of baseball mitt, and going to no small trouble, he’d had the gloves autographed by Babe Ruth. Percy had seen a rare smile on Wyatt’s face when he opened the box containing the glove on Christmas morning. “Thank you, Dad. It’s terrific,” he’d said, flushing with joy at the unexpected surprise. Percy had not foreseen that Wyatt’s pride and pleasure in his glove would be diminished when he learned that Matthew had been given the same gift. He should have anticipated his younger son’s jealousy, but that did not excuse Wyatt’s unconscionable meanness.

  “I know where you can get another one just like it,” Percy said. “A little larger, but your hand will grow into it.”

  “Oh, no, sir,” Matthew protested. “I couldn’t take Wyatt’s. I wouldn’t want Wyatt’s glove. It’s his. You gave it to him.” He fell silent, a small vertical frown between his brows.

  “What is it, son?” Percy asked, absorbing the details of his finely chiseled features that were so like his mother’s. It was rare for him to have the opportunity to study his older son this closely, unobserved, and he never called him “son” in Ollie’s presence. He’d noticed that Ollie didn’t in his. It was always “my boy” or “my lad.”

  “I… don’t know why Wyatt hates me,” he said. “I’ve tried to be his friend. I want to be his friend, but I think… I think he believes that you like me better than you do him, and… he gets hurt by that, Uncle Percy.”

  An almost unbearable rush of love for this child he could not claim forced him to stand. From what genetic well did this capacity for understanding, tolerance, and forgiveness spring? Not from him, and not from Mary. He poured a cup of chocolate and handed it to Matthew. “Is that why you’ve never said anything to anybody about the bruises you’ve brought home, the scrapes Wyatt has instigated? You know how he feels?”

  “Yes, sir,” Matthew said, his eyes on the cup he cradled in his slender, developing hands.

  “Well,” he said, rumpling the boy’s black hair, yearning to kiss the top of his head, “perhaps Wyatt and I can come to an understanding of that. Doc Tanner is on the way to see after that cut, and I apologize for your—for my son’s cruelty. It won’t happen again.” He picked up the glove. “I’ll see this gets repaired.”

  In the hall, he telephoned Ollie at the department store and told him what had happened and that he was on his way to deal with the situation. “I believe you need to come home,” he said. “Matthew could use your company. Mary needs to be here, too.”

  “I’ll leave immediately. I don’t know if I can reach Mary.”

  The carefully controlled fires of Percy’s resentment leaped. “Why the hell isn’t she here this time of day? School’s been out a couple of hours.”

  There was a pause. Though never expressed, Percy’s view on Mary’s absence from home was no secret between them. Ollie tacitly understood that his chagrin was only out of concern for him and Matthew. “Because she’s Mary,” he said quietly.

  Leaving through the kitchen, Percy told Sassie she needn’t worry. There would be no more unexplained cuts and bruises on Matthew. Then he was on his way to Warwick Hall, fury burning within him like glacial fire.

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Lucy was in the dining room with the housekeeper, examining a magnificently laid table, when Percy strode through the front door and down the massive hall to the staircase. He never used the front entrance, and she saw his car parked under the portico outside. Breaking off from her inspection, she hurried to the door of the dining room. “Where are you going? Why are you home this early?”

  Without breaking stride, Percy called back, “To see Wyatt. Is he in his room?”

  “He’s doing his homework. What do you want with him?”

  Percy made no answer as he hit the wide staircase in a manner that sent Lucy scurrying after him. “Our guests will be here in a little over an hour, Percy. Do you want to change?”

  In the two years since his mother’s death—which had followed his father’s in less than three years—Lucy had become a model hostess, enjoying her life as the wife of one of the most important men in Texas. Having always been cowed by her mother-in-law, she took over as mistress of Warwick Hall with a vengeance, ordering new furniture and carpets, repapering walls, and installing the latest in kitchen appliances. Her maids and housekeeper now wore frilly white aprons over crisp gray uniforms to replace the pinafores and black dresses of Beatrice’s day. Her public duties as Percy’s wife and her private life as Wyatt’s mother seemed fulfilling enough. There were even times when Percy suspected that in spite of everything, Lucy was grateful for the life he had provided her. At least she’d been spared the worry of where the next dime would come from, since he had foreseen the stock market crash and taken precautions against it. They had not shared the same bedroom since her pregnancy, nor—to her often expressed regret—did they share their son.

  It was for that reason that Lucy followed her tall, powerfully built husband up the stairs to her son’s door. “Percy, what in the world is the matter?”

  “Nothing to concern yourself with, my dear. This is between us men.”

  “Since when have you thought of your son in the same category as yourself?” she demanded, her blue eyes sparked with anxiety.

  Percy threw open his son’s door without answer and locked it behind him. True to his mother’s word, Wyatt was lying on the bed, studying. School was a struggle for him, but apparently he persevered. He looked up at his father’s abrupt entrance, his eyes growing wide.

  “Get up,” he ordered. “You and I are going for a ride.”

  “All right,” Wyatt said, swinging off the bed. For a kid built like a bull, he had the grace of a cat. Percy watched as Wyatt swept his books off the bed into a school satchel, then smoothed the bedspread. A tidy little bugger in the bargain. “Okay, I’m ready,”
he said.

  Lucy was hammering on the door. “Percy, what are you doing to Wyatt? Open this door!”

  “Be quiet, Maw,” Wyatt called. “I’m all right. Dad and I are just going for a ride.”

  But when Percy opened the door and Lucy saw his face, she perceived why he had come and what he planned to do. “Percy, for God’s sake,” she pleaded. “He’s only eleven years old.”

  Percy pushed by her. “Then he ought to know better.”

  “Percy!… Percy!” Lucy called after him, snatching futilely at his arm as he marched down the stairs, a straight-backed Wyatt in front of him. “I’ll never forgive you if you hurt him. Not ever! Percy, did you hear me—no matter what you do, I’ll never forgive you!”

  “Well, you never liked white roses anyway,” he said, and followed Wyatt out the door.

  They drove to the cabin in the woods without a word passing between them. The sun was setting as they arrived, striking ablaze the cypresses at the lake’s edge. Percy led the way, opening the door with a key rusting in the dirt of a flower pot that Mary had once planted with geraniums.

  Removing his jacket, he spoke for the first time. “Miss Thompson came to see me today. She said you slashed Matthew’s glove and threw it into the cesspool. When he retrieved it, you threw a rock at him and cut his head. He lost his balance and fell into all that filth. Why did you do that, Wyatt?”

  Wyatt stood his ground in the center of the strange cabin he’d never known existed, his thickset body tense, waiting. His expression was impassive, stolid. When he made no effort to speak, his father thundered, “Answer me!”

  “Because I hate him.”

  “Why do you hate him?”

  “That’s my business.”

  Percy’s brows rose at the defiant tone. Eleven years old and already as hard as a Paris street fighter. He had Trenton Gentry’s eyes. They were his mother’s blue, but smaller and closer set, like those of the man Percy had despised. They did not waver when Percy began to roll up a shirtsleeve. One thing he had to give him, he thought grudgingly, he was no coward. A bully, but no coward.