Equal Access

by A. E. Branson

  “Isn’t this illegal?” Pap asked him that evening when they realized what Shad was doing.

  Shad was scared they were going to take the computer away from him, but he was more concerned about the consequences that naturally came from a lie. “Well ... yeah.” He quickly added, “I’m not messing with anything, though. I’m just looking.”

  “It’s an invasion of people’s privacy.” Pap frowned. “I know you wouldn’t want your privacy invaded.”

  The discussion continued for at least an hour, and Shad became more convinced his parents were going to shut off their internet access. Pap had Shad show him how he managed to get past the security on the sites, then Pap sat in silence for what seemed like an eternity to Shad as the man stared at the monitor and absently stroked his beard.

  “Tell me this,” Pap finally said. “When you become a programmer, you’re gonna use your knowledge about this stuff to come up with technology that will stop people like you.”

  Shad agreed. His parents allowed him to continue, and Shad sometimes wondered if this was Pap’s way of encouraging him to keep up the Delaney notoriety. When Pap went into the hospital the following year, however, it started the chain of events that turned Shad away from the technology profession to actually consider law.

  Ironically his questionable talent was an asset to Shad in his work as an attorney. Although illegally obtained information wasn’t admissible in court, for Shad just having the knowledge was a powerful advantage. Research was one aspect to his job Shad actually liked, so he had a tendency to overindulge in it.

  Right now he needed all the information he could get on Walden Palmer.

  It was easy enough to start with the website Shad had learned was associated with Wally’s business. From there he began delving into information that wasn’t normally available without paying a fee or hiring a detective. He already knew Wally was still living in the St. Louis area, and before very long Shad had his mailing address and phone number. Then he discovered Wally owned the property with his wife.

  Wife? Had Wally merely altered his modus operandi to actually marry a woman instead of simply move in with her to gain access to a young son? Was the marriage a better front for the public persona that would make people believe Wally would never do such a thing to a child? Was it possible the wife belonged to the ranks of those few women who were also molesters? Such females were a minority, but they often got started by pleasing male molesters they became attached to.

  Shad did a background check on the wife, Lynette. She had been formerly married and given birth to two sons ... but both were legal adults now. A search on the sons revealed that neither was married, so Wally apparently wasn’t preying on any grandkids. And Lynette’s record was clean in regard to any run-ins with the law.

  Could Wally be putting together a personal harem from boys drawn to the business? Shad’s research on the history of the chain revealed Wally opened the original store eight years ago, five years before his marriage to Lynette.

  Further focus on Wally gave Shad his political party affiliation, former addresses, when and where he was born, what vehicles he owned and even some banking information. Shad also confirmed this was Wally’s first marriage.

  Most frustrating, but unsurprising, was the fact Wally’s record was clean.

  Shad leaned back in his chair and stared at the screen of latest information on the laptop. Wally had been a rather young man when he had access to Shad, perhaps barely in his twenties. He’d probably starting molesting boys back in his teens. The best case scenario was that Wally managed to find a woman with a four-year-old son whom he would live with until the son was seven, then Wally would move on to a new hunting ground. That could possibly reduce the number of Wally’s victims to around twelve to fifteen.

  The numbers were of no comfort to Shad. He was convinced Wally was a molester because first he was a pedophile – someone who was physically attracted to children, usually of a specific age and gender. And Shad had no guarantee that even while he was such an easy target for Wally the man didn’t turn his affection toward a few boys on the side. Odds were Wally had molested more than fifteen boys. At least Shad was also convinced that Wally wasn’t simply an opportunist who took advantage of any child just because he or she became accessible to him. Those types of molesters usually turned out to be the really dangerous ones because their motivation wasn’t based on attraction. They committed the act because those children were simply there and convenient to victimize.

  He wasn’t going to think about Brody.

  The one thing the different types had in common was their ability to continue their lives in relative peace and security while upsetting the lives of victims. They were able to keep the children silent by abuse of power. The control might be as blatant as threatening to hurt or kill the child or a family member or a pet if the victim told anyone. It might be as subtle as Wally’s technique of convincing the child this was normal behavior, and also by keeping the boy’s trust with attention and gifts. Children were commonly told that nobody would believe them if they said anything, and unfortunately this could easily be the case if the molester were a friend or part of the family ... and many of them were.

  There was, however, another possibility for Shad to consider.

  Often when these predators were caught they were sent into counseling. Statistically the counseling didn’t seem to help much because the majority of perpetrators would commit the same offense again. Occasionally counseling did seem to help when certain individuals voluntarily entered therapy even though they weren’t caught. But those people genuinely wanted to stop that activity. Regardless, as far as pedophilia went, nobody knew what caused it and therefore nobody had figured out how to eradicate it.

  There was no such thing as coincidence. Shad figured there had to be a reason he discovered Wally now, only weeks after he could no longer press criminal charges. Maybe Wally had changed his ways ... but if that were the case, why did Shad have to stumble upon that article at all? Was this some kind of trial to determine if Shad was becoming the kind of lawyer his parents should have been able to get seventeen years ago? Was he being challenged to think outside the boundaries of the law in order to secure justice?

  Wasn’t he getting enough of that already with Charissa’s case?

  Because Shad wound up adopted into a branch of faith that proclaimed God was still an active participant in humanity’s affairs, and it was the responsibility of humanity to respond to His calling, Shad became a lawyer. As much as that sounded like an oxymoronic statement, it was still the result of Shad’s first discernment that he was actually receiving divine inspiration. Although the Society of Friends affirmed that everyone had equal access to God, Shad often doubted he shared that much potential. Certainly he had benefited from the inspiration received by others, but his personal experience demonstrated more “quality” than quantity. Begrudgingly he became an attorney. At least his marriage to Dulsie seemed like a celestial reward. But now he had to struggle with what to do about Wally.

  And the very fact he harbored reluctance about investigating the man produced evidence Shad had been assigned the obligation to do exactly that. For many reasons it would be easier to turn his back on this discovery and convince himself that Wally was no longer a threat, rather than contend with such a difficult assignment.

  But children’s lives could be at stake. And if Shad became an attorney because he was supposed to defend the rights of the disadvantaged, then he had to fulfill his responsibility. Giving up this challenge would only be an act of cowardice and a mockery to his family.

  Chapter Five

  See, I refine you, but not as silver; I test you in the furnace of affliction.

  --Isaiah 48:10

  The meeting house for the local congregation of the Society of Friends, better known to most of the world as Quakers (when they weren’t being confused with Amish or Mennonite), was a simple, white, rectangular building that stood amidst trees along the rural highway.
There wasn’t any kind of signage to designate the structure’s purpose, and this was mostly because no name had ever been assigned to it. The Friends of Osage County didn’t need to differentiate themselves from any other groups of Friends in the area because there were none. In a county where the Catholics outnumbered every other variety of denomination, the Osage Friends congregation was the smallest of the small.

  Comprised of never more than a dozen families, mostly farmers, they were one of the groups that continued clinging to many of the old traditions while other Friends churches across the country had changed. These people still revered silence. Naturally there had been a few changes over the years. The men and the women no longer sat on opposite sides of the room. Family and friends stopped referring to each other as “Thee” long ago. And nobody dressed like the dude on the oatmeal box, although simple, “classic” clothing was preferred.

  Once upon a time the group eschewed wedding bands with all other jewelry, but Margaret Leeds had been the first to break that tradition in this congregation. Her argument was that marriage was a sacred state of union instituted by God from the beginning to bring humanity closer to Him. For a husband and a wife to make and keep a promise to each other was a reflection of the promise God makes and keeps with His people. The Church was, after all, the bride of Christ. Therefore married people should have an outward “sign of the covenant” to silently proclaim God’s promise.

  Margaret Leeds showed up in the congregation shortly after war broke out between the states. She was still only a fourteen-year-old girl. Margaret was from Kentucky, the daughter of a “mixed-blood” Cherokee mother and a slave trader father. Unfortunately for her father’s profession, Margaret had become an abolitionist and even helped some slaves to escape. When her father discovered Margaret’s “treachery,” he threw her out of the house.

  Margaret stayed only briefly with some Friends she had come to know while helping with their “line” of the Underground Railroad. She feared if she lingered too long, her father would cause them harm. The Friends told her they had some relatives who lived in Missouri, in a town near that state’s capital, which was surely far away enough to keep everybody safe. While en route to her destination, Margaret received divine inspiration that she should become a member of the Society of Friends. Thus convinced, she entered the congregation and eventually gained such renown locally that Margaret continued to be referred to as “Leeds” even when she got married shortly after the war ended.

  Shad couldn’t imagine belonging to any other denomination, or, for that matter, to the “programmed” Friends who had preachers and sang hymns and pretty much looked like any other protestant flock. He had a little experience with other expressions of faith thanks to his participation in Boy Scouts, where Shad was exposed to ecumenical meetings and occasionally a few services at “steeple houses” where other members of his troop worshipped. He once attended a Catholic Mass when Dulsie’s Grandma Wekenheiser passed away a few months before their wedding. Although his acceptance of his family’s faith – of faith in general – hadn’t come easily, he finally embraced the quiet gathering of the unprogrammed Friends.

  Even though it was only country roads between their home and the meeting house, Dulsie drove because that was their habit. She wore a light maroon dress and Shad was attired in tan chinos and the usual button-down shirt, this time teal in color. When Dulsie parked the Buick in the gravel parking lot there were eight other vehicles present, two of which belonged to her parents and Shad’s.

  As they exited the car and strolled toward the building, Shad found his attention drawn to the small cemetery maintained in a clearing behind the church. With its low tombstones it was easily overlooked, but the wood fence surrounding the graveyard had been repainted in the last few days so it was a more gleaming white than usual. The cemetery was a topic of current debate among the members of the congregation.

  Dulsie smiled as she shook her head. “They just had to go and get uppity.”

  “The fence?” Shad turned his attention toward her. “Roscoe and his people used their own time and money to paint it. No reason for the rest of us to stand in the way.”

  Although their congregation had always been small, enough members had passed away in the last one hundred fifty years plus that people realized the cemetery at its current size could accommodate only a few more graves. One group wanted to begin felling trees to enlarge the graveyard, which would also mean dismantling and rebuilding part of the fence. The fence as a whole already needed a paint job, however, but it was a task the first group decided should wait until after clearing more land for the cemetery.

  The second group didn’t want a larger cemetery. They believed it should be retired and when members passed away in the future they could be interred in any of the public graveyards in the area. So they believed the fence should be painted immediately.

  Of course nobody received any divine revelation about the best way to handle this matter, and true to tradition the Osage Friends didn’t simply take a vote.

  “Do you think they’re gonna hold their tongues when we start dismantling the fence this fall?” Dulsie’s brow furrowed slightly.

  “They did what they want and we’ll do what we want,” Shad reminded her.

  “Have they forgotten that people are just dying to get in there? Promise me you’ll see to it I get buried with my ancestors.”

  “You forgot I’m the one who’s going first.”

  “Let’s agree to go at the same time, and that way they can just stick us in the same box,” Dulsie said as they reached the two concrete steps that led to the door.

  Shad realized her statement reminded him of one of the many attorney jokes he’d memorized, so as he opened the door for her Shad responded, “But then when the tombstone reads Here lies a lawyer and an honest person, there really will be two people in the grave.”

  Dulsie laughed as she stepped through the doorway.

  Her laughter announced their entrance. There were roughly four clustered groups of people scattered around the large but plain room. The walls were also painted white, and except for the windows, a door on the back wall, and in one corner a bulletin board pinned with a few postings, remained unadorned. The hardwood floor was the naturally buff color of well-worn oak, and the forty seats were a mix of antique wooden folding chairs and modern steel folding chairs arranged in a circle around the room.

  Several people glanced toward their direction and smiled, some nodding their heads in greeting. Shad’s and Dulsie’s parents were in a smaller group at the other end of the room, and their mothers waved but their fathers seemed too engaged in conversation with a third person to have noticed the couple’s arrival.

  Dulsie seemed to chatter in endless greetings to people they passed as they walked toward their parents. Shad mostly nodded. When they reached the moms, who were standing beside each other, Shad habitually stepped out of Jill’s line of sight to stand on the other side of Mam. Jill as always ignored him while she started talking to Dulsie.

  Mam smiled at Shad, exchanged a “Good morning” with Dulsie, and redirected her attention to him. Shad glanced over at Pap and Karl, who were still occupied with their conversation. Karl, as usual, was doing most of the talking, but all three men were smiling and laughing.

  At five-foot-four Karl Wekenheiser was three inches shorter than his wife Jill. Although he was a bit stocky in build compared to Dulsie’s petite frame, they had the same large, dark blue eyes and sandy brown hair. Dulsie’s hair was thick and wavy like her mother’s, while Karl’s hair was straighter and short cropped. Even in his sixties he still had no gray in it, and most people would have guessed that Karl was in his forties. He claimed that the older he got, the younger he looked. Karl was wearing his “Sunday best” – clean blue jeans and a pressed, short-sleeved, button down shirt that was white with thin blue stripes.

  “Ken’s got a clear path,” Shad murmured to Mam about the third fellow in the group, a middle-aged cattleman. “W
hy doesn’t he make a break for it?”

  Mam chuckled. “He’s probably too confused by now to know which direction to run.”

  Mam was an attractive woman. Her once light brown hair was now well streaked with gray and today was pinned in a braided bun. She and her sister Jill had the same green eyes, fairly tall height and slender build. True to her family’s tradition Mam wore a simple skirt and blouse to First Day meeting, and every day wore no jewelry other than her wedding band.

  Dulsie looked past her mom toward the men. “What are those guys carrying on about, anyway?”

  There was slyness to Jill’s smile that reminded Shad of Dulsie. “Things that go bump in the night.”

  Jill appeared to be taller than she really was, and not just when she stood next to Karl. She carried herself with a dignity that prevailed through any emotion. Her brown hair was also streaked with gray and combed into a flattering upsweep. Jill was often immaculately groomed and well dressed, but she also wasn’t afraid to get dirt under her fingernails. The lavender dress she wore was simple but also complimentary. Jill also actually wore a little makeup, just enough to accentuate her already natural beauty.

  Pap happened to glance toward their direction and seemed a little startled to see Shad and Dulsie. He stepped away from Karl and Ken and gave Shad a pat on the back.

  “Mornin’.” He grinned at Dulsie before looking at Shad. “You two sleep in today?”

  “Dulsie was putting finishing touches on a squash casserole.” Shad leaned toward Pap and lowered his voice slightly. “Are you tired of squash yet?”

  Pap’s grin broadened. “Love the stuff.” He fixed his gaze on Shad. “And so do you.”

  Pap had all the characteristics of a Delaney except for his lack of brawniness; his lighter build was inherited from his mother. But at six-foot-four Pap still carried the Delaney height. At sixty-five his once dark hair had lightened considerably and thinned just enough in the back to make Pap admit he was bald, while his beard was completely gray and trimmed neatly along his jaw. His brown eyes often sparkled with a mischievousness that probably explained why Pap got along so well with his brother-in-law Karl. He also wore blue jeans and a short-sleeved shirt, which was light blue.