by Luanne Rice
“But nothing on the Connecticut shoreline,” John said.
“No.”
“No credit card use, no phone calls originating from the area.”
“Nothing.”
“Then,” John said, turning to gaze into Kate's eyes, “what makes you say what you did? That my client killed Willa?”
“Because she was here,” Kate whispered, the word “killed” like a knife in the wind. She would never get used to it, “killed” in the same sentence as “Willa.” Fumbling in her pocket, she pulled out the postcard. “She sent me this.”
Passing it across the seat, she saw John hold it up, braced against the steering wheel. They sped along the Shore Road, and he looked at the picture—of the scene just to their right—the rocks and lighthouse of Silver Bay—and read Willa's writing by the streetlights overhead. Closing her eyes, Kate went over the message she now knew by heart.
Hi, Katy,
I'm okay . . . are you? It's all been too much, and it's gone on for too long. I'm so sorry about everything, and especially, now, about making you worry, making you wait to talk. I hate what I did to you . . . I'll be on my way home soon . . . Bonnie likes it here—there's a long beach, and she runs along the tide line . . . It reminds me of home—of Chincoteague. I wish you could be here—maybe someday, when things are better . . .
I love you.
Willa
“She mailed this on April sixth,” John said, turning on the car's inside light to peer at the postmark, noting the date. “Six months ago.”
“I know.”
“Then why . . . why didn't I hear about her? That was right in the heat . . .”
“Of Merrill being active,” Kate said. “I know. But I didn't receive her postcard until last month.”
“Why did it take so long? Why didn't you receive it for five months?”
“It went to my old address,” Kate said. “Because it was just a postcard, it wasn't forwarded by the post office. It was sitting in a pile of old catalogues and circulars.”
“Did you take it to the police?”
“Yes,” Kate said, thinking of her visit to local police stations over the last few days. “But they all point to the fact that Willa's credit cards were used in Massachusetts and Rhode Island after the card was sent. Meaning, this wasn't her last stop.”
“The police looked at all women reported missing,” John said carefully, his tone letting her know he wasn't breaching any ethical code.
“I know, but because we hadn't tracked her to Connecticut, I guess her name never registered in the Merrill investigation . . .”
“What about Bonnie?” John said, glancing into the rearview mirror. The small black dog, tired from her romp along the bluff, lay beside Brainer, chin resting on his golden back.
“Felicity remembered her,” Kate said, “as soon as I checked in—but she didn't so much remember Willa. I saw her signature in the guest book, though.” Her stomach churned, recalling that moment when she'd seen her sister's handwriting, home address printed neatly on the next line.
“I mean, what happened to Bonnie? If she wasn't with your sister, where did you find her? And when?”
“Five and a half months ago . . . right after I reported Willa missing. Using the credit card information, we checked with animal control departments in those areas. Bonnie was in a dog pound, in a small town south of Providence. Her collar and tags were missing. She'd been found in a rest area off I-95, begging for food.” Kate's throat constricted, remembering. “She was so happy to see me.”
“So, Bonnie wasn't left in this area,” John said.
“I know. Leading you to believe that Willa wasn't last here, right?”
John shrugged, frowning at the road.
“Well, I think you're wrong. I have this postcard,” Kate said, tapping it on the dashboard, “that makes me think she was.”
“Who had it all this time? Sitting in that pile of catalogues for the five months since she sent it?”
“My ex-husband,” Kate said.
“Your . . .” John asked, surprise on his face.
“Andrew,” Kate said.
“But I thought you said that was the name—”
“Of the man my sister had a bad love affair with,” Kate said quietly, looking out the window at the tidal flats, black and shining in the night, at the row of white waves breaking over the sandbar. “My husband, Andrew Wells.”
“You . . . your husband had an affair with your sister?”
“Yes.”
“I'm so sorry. That must have been terrible for you.”
Kate couldn't quite reply.
Silence filled the car as John turned it around. Kate could hear the soft muffled thud of her own heart beating in her ears. Her mother had always been a private person, teaching her children to keep their family secrets hidden. Since April, Kate had become willing to tell it all: anything to get Willa back. But it struck her as strange that John should be focused on the affair itself—not her sister's disappearance.
They drove back the way they had come. The scenery rushed by; the ride home seemed much shorter than the ride out. Kate's breath was shallow and hurt her chest. She had been heartbroken for so long; sometimes she thought all she really wanted was for her mind to rest, a respite from all the terrible thoughts.
When they had about a mile left to drive, just as the road curved past the picturesque, floodlit white church, John turned his head. Their eyes met and held; Kate was so struck by the depth of feeling—the hurt shimmering just below the surface, filling his entire being—that suddenly she knew. She could feel it, as if he had taken her hand and told her the whole story: He knew betrayal, because it had happened to him.
“It was terrible for me,” she said, finally.
“As . . .” he searched for the right words. “As unbelievably painful as being cheated on is under any circumstances, it must have been much worse, being your sister and your husband.”
“I think so. Yes. It wasn't her fault—”
“What do you mean?”
“She was only twenty-two. My husband went after her . . . as, I found out later—or,” she paused, correcting herself, “admitted to myself later, he'd gone after many others. We live in Washington. There are so many hopeful young women . . . Don't you remember from being in law school there? . . . it was so easy to seduce them.”
“Is he a politician?”
“He works for one. He has power.” She closed her eyes, picturing Andrew's easy smile and laughing eyes, his wavy hair, and his forward-leaning way of fooling people into imagining instant intimacy.
“Are you still married?”
“Why? What does that have to do with Willa?”
He paused, taken aback. She looked over, and in the dim light, she saw his eyes staring ahead, as if he were haunted by private doubts and demons. “I just wonder . . . whether any marriage can survive adultery. Or whether you'd have to end it—by choice.”
“By choice?” She laughed nervously. “What other way is there to end a marriage except by . . .” The word was so obvious, and so was the reason he'd been asking: death. The death of his wife . . .
He didn't reply, but just kept staring ahead, toward the lighthouse, as if it might illuminate his life, answer his unanswerable question.
“My divorce just became final. When I went over to clean out the rest of my things, I found the postcard,” she said.
His eyes had been clouded with something like sorrow and compassion, but suddenly the mention of the postcard jolted him back to the present. Kate wanted to go back—to hold on to their connection. She had felt it, strong and true.
“What do you want from me?” he asked.
“I'm not sure.”
“There must be something; you came a long way . . .”
“I did,” Kate said, feeling a homesick flash—not for the alabaster buildings and monuments of the capital, but for the salt hay and oyster beds, the dunes and ponies of Chincoteague. Willa would never willin
gly stay away from their island home this long.
“So tell me,” John persisted. “Why did you come to see me?”
“To ask you,” Kate said, barely trusting her voice, “to ask him.”
“Him?”
“I know you can't tell me anything now, but please, John—ask your client. Willa fits right into his pattern—she was small, she had brown hair, she was only twenty-two.”
Glancing over, she saw that John's jaw was tight. He hit the gas, making the car go faster. They turned off the main road, bouncing down the rutted driveway, between two long rows of tall spruce trees, into the clearing where the East Wind perched on the high bluff. Kate knew he couldn't wait to get her out of the car. She was threatening his code of ethics, and—she knew, from his questions—he had been where she was once. He had been hurt by infidelity.
Reaching into her pocket, she brought out the photo of Willa. She had intended to leave it for him that morning, when she'd been at his house. Whether he'd even look at it or not, she had no idea. With one last glimpse of her sister's easy smile and shining green eyes, feeling her heart kick, Kate passed the photo across the seat.
“Please take it,” she said. “Show it to your client. Please?”
“No,” John said, both hands on the wheel. He stopped the car at the East Wind's brightly lit front door. The lights were out in the front parlor, but Kate saw Felicity's omnipresent shadow hovering just behind the curtain.
“Thank you for listening to me,” Kate said, turning back to John. She made no move to take Willa's picture, and although John didn't pick it up, he didn't push it back either.
“The police are still your best bet,” John said, staring straight ahead.
“No, John. You are.”
“If that's true, you're in trouble.”
“Really?” she asked.
The shifting light caught his face. Although bandaged, his temple was bruised. A track of dry blood ran into his graying brown sideburn. Kate thought of the mayhem she had witnessed at his house that morning; although frustrated, she felt grudging admiration for his devotion to his client.
“Do you ever,” she began slowly, thinking about her big office filled with scientific treatises, salinity reports, seismic records, fishing quota information, “just want to chuck the rules and the evidence, and go by your gut?”
“Excuse me?”
She closed her eyes, thinking of her brother's and island neighbors' wrath, the hate mail she'd received after her office at the National Academy of Sciences had issued their oyster and crab fishery guidelines and quotas last year. If only she could have ignored the facts—a growing shortage, depletion of current stocks—she could have made everyone happy.
“Yeah,” John said, a slow and ruminative smile coming to his face, as if he understood exactly what she was talking about. “Like, a hundred times a day. But I'm in the wrong business for that.”
“So am I,” Kate said, the scientist in her coming out. But then—as it always did—the sister in her won. “I'm going to ask you anyway: Show Merrill the picture.”
John just tensed his shoulders and shook his head, as if he'd just gotten stung and hadn't seen it coming.
Not wanting to give him the chance to say anything or force her to take the picture with her, Kate jumped out of the car. She opened the back door, grabbed Bonnie's leash, gave Brainer a good-bye pet, and ran up the East Wind's front steps.
Her heart was pounding. Sitting next to John O'Rourke, she had known that he knew her. He had been there. A person he trusted had wounded him in the deepest way possible.
Bonnie barked once, and Kate turned to wave good-bye, but she doubted that John O'Rourke saw: His taillights were already blazing into the twisting allée of spruce trees, driving away from her as fast as he could go.
chapter 6
Judge Patrick O'Rourke had been retired for ten years, but still wore a shirt and tie every day. Even now, taking out the garbage, he was dressed as if he were about to go into court: starched broadcloth shirt, Yale club tie tied in a full Windsor knot, flannel slacks. Everyone in town—with four exceptions—called him “Judge” or “Your Honor”—and not only, he suspected, because of the iron hand with which he had ruled his court, but also for Leila's sculpture that had graced his garden since his first days on the bench, of Lady Justice herself.
School was out for the day, and the bus stopped at the curb, discharging Maggie. She came flying up the driveway, a tropical storm in sneakers. Arms flying, book bag thumping on her back, she reminded the Judge of her father at that age: filled with purpose and enthusiasm. Dropping the plastic bag into the trash, the Judge opened his arms to hug his granddaughter.
“How's my girl?” he asked.
“Good, Gramps. What're you doing?”
“Just taking out the trash.”
“Why isn't Maeve doing that?”
“Well,” he said, trying to come up with a good lie. “She fixed you a nice after-school snack, and she was in there washing up the dishes. Couldn't have her doing everything, right?”
Maggie shook her head, looking worried. “We're a lot of extra work, aren't we?”
“You and Teddy?” Justice asked, snorting. He pitched in, taking care of the kids after school when John was working too hard and the latest baby-sitter had quit. The whole family had moved in temporarily—as they had done before—and the Judge was happier than a clam at high tide. “You're not a bit of work.”
“Really?” she asked, worried.
“One thing you can always count on, Margaret Rose,” he said. “That's me telling the truth about things that matter. Now, what've you got in your book bag—rocks?”
“No, Gramps.” She giggled. “Books.”
“Well, they must make 'em extra heavy these days,” he said, helping her hoist the heavy knapsack.
“No, I just have a lot of homework. I missed school yesterday because of what happened. The brick coming through our window and hitting Dad . . .” she trailed off, an embarrassed look on her face as if the attack had been her fault.
“Damned hooligans,” he said. “Driving around, making trouble. Let's just hope our fine policemen catch them.”
“They won't,” Maggie said. “They didn't leave any clues.”
The Judge had been on the business end of many threats in his day, but to subject his beloved granddaughter to it: That was too much. Good thing the family was here, away from danger. He was just gearing up to reassure Maggie, tell her everything would be okay and she shouldn't worry about her dad, when she ran ahead of him—into the kitchen.
Maeve had set the plate of brownies out on the counter. Maggie went straight for the milk. She poured a glass, then helped herself to a brownie. The Judge hoped she wouldn't notice the dirty bowl and pan piled in the sink and know he'd lied about Maeve.
“We almost had a good one, Gramps,” Maggie said, sitting at the kitchen table.
“A good what?”
“A good baby-sitter. One we liked.”
“Really? What happened?” the Judge said, sitting in his place at the table, getting ready to pump his granddaughter for information. Life was circular; as a young man, the Judge had often been too busy to talk to his son. Now Johnny was too busy to tell his father what was going on.
“Well, Dad didn't like her. Or, maybe he did, but he didn't appreciate her taking me in the car without asking. Only, Gramps—how was she supposed to ask, when Dad was at the hospital getting stitches? All she wanted to do was help.”
“Help how?”
“By running Brainer through the car wash. It was . . .” Closing her eyes, chomping on her brownie, Maggie sought the perfect word. “Magical,” she finished.
“Magical,” the Judge scoffed. “That mangy old hound in a car wash?”
“Yeah. Kate—that's her name—said all animals thrive on showers. She said that where she comes from, the ponies take baths in the sea, dogs go swimming in the creek—anything for a shower. She said it's true for people, t
oo. That water makes us feel better. And you know what, Gramps?”
“What?” the Judge asked, reaching over to wipe the chocolate crumbs off her mouth.
“It does make people feel better. Me, anyway. I gave myself a bath and a shampoo after she left last night, and I'm gonna give myself another one tonight.”
The Judge narrowed his eyes. Was John crazy? The new baby-sitter had washed the dog, gotten Maggie into the bath on her own, and he was grousing about technicalities? Although the Judge knew that people—especially parents—couldn't be too careful, he also understood the difficulties of John's life. Good help was hard to find, and unfortunately, both O'Rourke men needed it.
Take Maeve.
That morning she had gone out to the garden for a heart-to-heart talk with her sister Brigid—and Brigid had been dead for the last fifteen years. Sometimes Maeve talked to her children, too—only, she'd never been married, never, to the Judge's knowledge, had any progeny. She even had names for them: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
The practice alarmed the Judge. Not only because his housekeeper was on the fast track for losing her marbles, but because occasionally—not as often as Maeve, but often enough—he found himself doing similar things.
Twice he'd found himself sitting at his desk, delivering instructions to the jury—only there was no jury. Last week, in the middle of the night, he'd opened his eyes and discovered himself standing in the middle of his bedroom wearing, not his tattered plaid bathrobe, but the judicial robe he had worn on the bench for so many years. As if, by letting him put it on, his subconscious was restoring to him a bit of the dignity and self-respect he felt slipping away by inches.
Same thing for Maeve. A great cook for the twenty years she'd served him, she still went to the kitchen, assembled all the copper and stainless steel pans, and whipped up batches of deliciously seasoned water. People, even in their dotage, gravitated toward what they had always loved, practices that had always told them who they were.
“Where's Daddy?” Maggie asked, refilling her glass of milk. “At his office?”
“I think he said something about a meeting out of town,” the Judge said.
