by Liza Bennett
The rain began to ease by the time she turned off the highway. When she finally drove through Red River, Meg allowed herself a moment of wild disbelief. The town looked the same; it had all been a bad dream. Ethan would be waiting at the house—clomping across the front hall as he flung open the front door. Lark and the girls would be behind him, laughing and welcoming. Lucinda would be skulking somewhere close by, unable to suppress her welcoming smile. But the illusion lasted only as long as it took her to turn into the McGowan’s drive and see how many people had already come to console the bereaved family.
Meg recognized Francine’s Chevy pickup, parked at the top of the hill by the house behind Abe’s black Saab; a dozen or so other cars and trucks were pulled off along the driveway. Meg had to park near the studio, which, flanked now by police cruisers, was lit up against the slowly clearing sky. The rain had finally stopped, but Meg had to slog through mud to reach the front steps to the porch.
The house felt empty and cold—as if no one had bothered to turn the heat up that morning. Meg added her dripping boots to the jumble outside the front door, her parka to the pile of coats on the chair in the front hall. Generally, when Lark was entertaining, she cleared the downstairs coat closet for the guests. She liked to give the house at least a semblance of order, a center of gravity amidst the pandemonium created by the children. Meg had once seen Lark carefully align a pile of magazines on the coffee table when the entire living room looked like an uncharted sea of Barbies, Scrabble pieces, and abandoned homework assignments.
Meg followed the murmur of voices down the long hallway past the living room to the sun porch that ran the length of the house at the back and overlooked the river below. Though Ethan and Lark had wanted to keep the nineteenth-century farmhouse essentially true to its original function and design, they’d both felt that the downstairs rooms were dark and the low ceilings claustrophobic, especially during the long winter months. The sun porch had been Lark’s idea, but it had quickly turned into one of Ethan’s elaborate projects. The room was his design. It was two stories high and almost all windows; facing the river was a wall of diamond-shaped panes of the palest green cast that he had handmade in his studio. Many panes contained stained-glass murals of a flower, leaf, hummingbird, or frog. When the sun streamed through the bare trees as it did that afternoon, the room swirled with pinpoints of brilliant refracted color. Meg stopped at the door, her view slightly blocked by the broad shoulders of a man she didn’t know.
Lark, her face blotchy from crying, sat next to Francine on the low-slung red corduroy couch. Phoebe was nestled next to Lark and sucking noisily on her thumb. Brook was perched beside Phoebe, her back very straight; her red-rimmed eyes traveled from adult to adult with the conversation.
Janine rocked in the wicker rocker kitty-corner to the couch, sniffling into a wad of tissues. Abe stood next to a man Meg recognized as the town’s retired postmaster, nodding emphatically to something the older man was saying. Though Meg didn’t know all their names, she recognized most of the other dozen or so adults, neighbors and friends, whose casseroles, breads, and cookies cluttered the long French picnic table. An aluminum twenty-four-cup electric coffee urn—Meg thought she recognized it from Francine’s chicken roasts and bake sales—stood in the middle of the table. Hot paper cups and matching napkins printed with smiling teddy bears were stacked next to it.
“Well, as far as I’m concerned you went above and beyond,” Meg heard Paula Yoder say as she entered the room. Paula who, with her husband Mike, ran the general store, knew everybody’s business and possessed a wide-ranging and frequently enumerated inventory of opinions. Her dislike for Lucinda, who had twice been caught stealing cartons of Marlboros from the storeroom, was well-known. “Way, way beyond.”
“I think we all agree on that,” Francine added with finality. In the past, Paula had not been above declaring that Lark let Lucinda run wild, that she didn’t know how to discipline the teenager. After the second petty theft incident, Paula had filed a formal complaint with Tom Huddleson and refused to allow Lucinda in the store.
“Some people are just … sometimes there’s just nothing…” Ivar Dyson, who ran a goat farm that abutted Ethan and Lark’s property to the north, had been a longtime friend of Ethan’s. The two men could not have been less alike: Ivar was terse and politically conservative, a card-carrying member of the NRA. Though Ethan often poked fun at the straitlaced dairyman, it was obvious that he also respected Ivar. And the girls loved the rolling pastures of Dyson Farms and its ever-growing herd. When Ivar was shorthanded, Ethan would help with the milking. Afterward, under the fluorescent lights in the milking shed, the two men would play chess. They were an evenly matched pair and sometimes the games would go on for hours.
“We know, we know,” Francine said comfortingly when it was clear that Ivar was choking up. “It’s unfair. It appears to be unjust, terribly so. But we’ll never fully comprehend why things happen as they must, what makes people turn out the way they do.”
A sudden wave of dislike for the minister swept over Meg; Francine, Meg thought, was definitely in her element. Her arm draped protectively around Lark’s shoulders, her more-than-ample body weighing down the lumpy couch, she was the stolid center of the situation. Death, misery—this was her business, her longsuffering expression seemed to say. Francine Werling was the expert, dispensing advice and comfort as needed to the poor, stunned amateurs in her midst. What bothered Meg was the sense—and today was not the first time she’d felt it—that Francine secretly enjoyed these times of tragedy. She gloried in her power to comfort, her ability to be articulate and wise when those around her were struck dumb with grief.
“Meg, when did you get here?” Abe saw her hesitating at the door and called to her over the hubbub.
Lark called to her. “Meggie …” Meg walked across the room and knelt in front of the couch as Lark leaned forward to embrace her. “Oh, Meggie… What will become of us?” Lark whispered as Meg tried to pull her closer. Though it looked as though the two sisters were holding each other warmly, Meg could feel the resistance in Lark’s body. Her muscles were so taut they seemed to vibrate with tension. After a few moments, Meg tried to look her younger sister in the eye, tried to gauge the depths of what she knew, but Lark’s gaze kept skittering away. Her eyes had an overexcited glitter, darting around the room, not focusing, and her smile was fixed.
“Meg, dear, could you check to see who might like some more coffee?” she asked in her best hostess’s voice.
“Actually, perhaps Meg might be more useful taking care of Brook and Phoebe,” Francine suggested. “The weather’s finally cleared, and they haven’t been out of the house all day.”
“I’d be happy to,” Meg replied, though she hardly needed Francine to tell her that the girls needed some attention. Phoebe hadn’t taken her thumb out of her mouth since Meg had arrived and Brook had the stunned look of a wounded animal.
“Hey, guys, let’s go for a walk,” Meg said, her voice falsely cheerful even to her own ears. But the girls nevertheless followed her obediently to the mud room beyond the kitchen where she helped them pull on boots and jackets. Outside, though the temperature had dropped at least ten degrees, the sky had lightened, and to the west the last of the sun streamed dramatically thought the departing banks of cloud. The trees dripped with leftover rain, and the swollen river roared between its banks. A family of chickadees swooped and chattered around the elaborate array of handcrafted feeders that Ethan had constructed in the backyard. It felt wrong to Meg that the afternoon had suddenly turned so calm, so normal. She wanted everything to stop. To be silent. To feel as damaged and different as she did.
The three of them walked along the bank of the river, the mud sucking at their boots with each step. Meg tried to think of something comforting to say, something to stave off the confusion and pain in their young hearts. Without any warning, Phoebe suddenly raised the stick she’d been trailing and slashed it into a large pile of soggy leaves.
/>
“That’s what Lucie did to Daddy, right?” Phoebe said, turning to Meg for confirmation. She looked so like Lark as a child—the heart-shaped face, bright blue eyes, a sweetness that either a child was born with, or wasn’t. Brook, on the other hand, didn’t have Phoebe’s sunlit nature; neither had Meg at her age. Brook was more cautious, more curious, demanding proofs and answers. Phoebe had always jumped right into life, laughing, ready for anything, come what may. That’s, why, Meg thought, it hurt so much more to have Phoebe ask the question rather than Brook.
“We don’t really know for sure,” Meg began, looking from Phoebe’s wide eyes to Brook’s lowered gaze. She could not lie to them. “But it looks like that’s what happened.”
12
By Sunday evening, Meg was beginning to think that the guests would never leave. She hadn’t slept much the night before—nobody in the household had—and she’d spent most of the day on her feet. She was trying her best to handle the kinds of household things that Lark would usually have attended to. Francine had made an announcement from the pulpit that morning about Ethan’s death, asking the congregation to pray for peace and forgiveness and suggesting that neighbors offer whatever help they could to the bereaved family. It seemed to Meg that the help consisted primarily of casseroles and sweets that only the visitors themselves had the appetites to consume.
Over the course of the afternoon, the flow of guests increased dramatically. Each new arrival brought yet another covered dish or cookie tin and Meg had to see to it that everything was properly heated, set out on the long planked table on the sun porch, and, when necessary, the empty dishes removed, to make room for the new ones waiting in the kitchen. Even the smallest task seemed to take an enormous amount of effort on her part. It didn’t help that Lark was doing her best to ignore her, turning to Francine, Janine—anyone but her sister—for the emotional support Meg would have so gladly supplied.
Later on, Abe drove Lark into town to meet with the police. Janine helped Meg attempt to feed the girls in the kitchen. No one ate much of anything. Francine became the de facto hostess, welcoming new visitors with a serenity Meg found particularly grating. And something about the milling, chattering group began to take on the feel of rubberneckers crowding around the scene of an accident. As she stacked yet another load of dishes in the washer, she overheard snippets of conversations taking place in the hallway:
“There was blood all over the place, I hear.”
“Poor old Tom. He’s never had to handle more ‘n’ a traffic ticket before in this town.”
“Deputy Voberg told me Tom called up the state police so fast his head was spinning.”
“Yeah, I saw the cruisers down by the studio.”
Lark and Abe came back a little past eight-thirty, and Lark went up to see the girls, while Abe sought Meg out in the kitchen.
“I don’t know how Lark’s managing to hold herself together,” he said, helping himself to a cup of coffee. He looked as tired as Meg felt, the skin under his eyes smudged with fatigue. “Huddleson was nice enough, but those state detectives are all business. They’re already all set up in the clerk’s spare office above the police station.”
“To do what?” Meg asked. “Everybody knows Lucinda killed Ethan.”
“But it’s a homicide case, Meg,” Abe explained. “There has to be an investigation no matter what the circumstances. And a town this size just isn’t equipped to handle that kind of thing. That’s what this state crime unit does. The detectives come in with all the latest forensic training and equipment. They’ve sealed off the studio.”
“Yes, I know.” Meg said. Wearily, she turned back to the sink. Though the question weighed heavily on her mind, she asked with forced lightness, “Did you see Lucinda? Has anyone spoken to her … since it happened?”
“They took her to the medical center over in Montville,” Abe said, setting his coffee mug down on the counter and picking up a towel to help her with the dishes. “She’s still in pretty bad shape, I understand. Bad burns on her hands. And hungover as hell from whatever she was on. Tom told me she was really out of it when they took her in.”
“Oh God, Abe.” Meg sighed, leaning on the sink for support. “I just feel so … so …” When Abe put his arms around her, Meg finally found the permission she needed to give in to the distress that had been building within her all day. She wept. Abe guided her over to the kitchen table and pulled out a chair, taking a seat beside her. In the middle of the round wooden table, Ethan and Lark had years ago carved their initials in a big heart and, when the girls were old enough to spell, they’d been allowed to add their names to the battered oak surface. Reaching for the tissue Abe held out to her, Meg saw the uncertain spidery letters spelling brook chiseled into the wood and she felt another wave of sorrow break within her. Ethan’s murder was more than a loss of one life; it signaled the end of innocence for his daughters, as well. Today’s events would forever change the carefree little girl who’d carved her name. Just as it had destroyed all immediate hope for Lucinda to find the love and acceptance she needed.
“You okay?” Abe asked, tucking a strand of Meg’s hair behind her ear and leaning in to look at her.
“Not really,” Meg answered. She found herself longing to confide in Abe, to pour out her feelings of guilt and regret. He had always been a good listener, fair-minded and realistic. She sat across from him now, trying to think of the right way to begin. “Everyone’s so furious with Lucinda. I hear such hate in their voices. Am I the only one who feels sorry for her at all?”
“Well, this town’s pretty upset right now,” Abe said. “They’re thinking about themselves—the danger Lucinda represents in their minds. It’ll calm down eventually.”
“I hope so. I’ve been listening to Francine all day, preaching tolerance and forgiveness. The whole time I’ve had this sneaking suspicion that she’s … I hate to say this. She seems perfectly okay with the idea that Ethan’s dead—and that Lucinda killed him.”
Abe sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. Even in his faded flannel shirt and jeans it was evident he wasn’t a local. His hair was fashionably cut. His skin had the smooth pallor of someone who worked indoors. He carried himself with the confidence of a man who knows his place and value in the wider world. “Not everybody in this town felt the way you did about Lucinda and Ethan.”
“Meaning?”
“A lot goes on in a small town like this that you—visiting every few weeks or so—never see. It looks like a place Norman Rockwell would have painted, doesn’t it? Everyone’s so friendly. So different from the city. You begin to think that the people are genuinely nicer, and somehow better here than in other places. Don’t kid yourself, Meg. Human nature doesn’t change with location.”
“People were jealous of Ethan? His success with the studio?”
“Jealous, maybe … but…” Abe thought better of what he was going to say. “Listen, it’s late. We’re all tired. I’ll try to roust that crowd out of there so you and Lark can get to bed.”
“Wait, Abe.” She touched his arm. She hesitated a moment, examining the face before her, etched with exhaustion. Her own problems could wait. “Are you trying to tell me something that I’m not getting?”
“Maybe just to watch your step the next few days… and watch your temper, as well. Things might be said … you may hear some things that you won’t like. Remember, this isn’t your town, Meg. Or Lucinda’s. And, in many ways, it was never Ethan’s. When all is said and done, he was just visiting, too.” Abe rose. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
Not surprisingly, Francine was the last to leave. Lark walked her to the front door and Meg saw them embrace. Francine whispered something urgently in Lark’s ear and gave her one last hug.
“Goodnight, Meg,” Francine called over her shoulder as she zipped up her jacket. “You’ve been a tremendous source of strength.” Lark closed the door behind her. The night before, Lark gone to bed with a tranquilizer. Today she had
been busy with her children, visitors, endless phone calls, and the police.
Now, for the first time since Ethan’s murder, Lark and Meg were alone together.
They sat by the fire—now just a pile of smoldering embers—in the living room, Lark curled up in a corner of the couch, Meg in the wooden rocker nearby. Lark appeared strangely composed, until she lifted her hand to brush back her hair and Meg saw that she was trembling.
“Long day,” Meg said.
“Yes. Horrible. And weirdly wonderful at the same time. Everyone has been so loving. Open. There for me. Us. And these aren’t people who show their emotions often. Francine says it was cathartic. For everyone.”
“Cathartic? Ethan’s murder} I can’t believe you really feel that way.”
“Don’t tell me how to feel.” Though Lark’s words were stinging, her tone was controlled and emphatic, as though she were reciting from memory. “I’m trying to cope with this … this evil… with love. I’m desperately trying not to wallow in anger. To stay above the horror of what has been inflicted on me. My family. I know precisely what we’re talking about.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Oh, I’m sure you are,” Lark said. “I can only imagine how terrible you must feel. But I don’t want to hear about it. Your feelings. Or what happened between you and Ethan.”
“So Ethan told you,” Meg said, confirming what she had suspected from the moment she’d seen Lark the day before—when she’d resisted Meg’s embrace. Lark turned away from her now, pulling the afghan throw off the back of the couch and drawing it over her shoulders.
“Ethan told you that nothing happened, right?” Meg went on, trying to help her sister deal with the pain and humiliation of her husband’s emotional betrayal. “I still don’t understand what he was going through, exactly. I think it was some kind of midlife crisis—some kind of fixation.”
