Secrecy

by Belva Plain

  “You can go up. It’s on the left.”

  She was almost out of breath when she reached the top. But straightening her posture, she walked in to where, in what must have been either Bill’s or Cliff’s private office, Joey V. was seated behind a large, finely carved desk, chipped raw in spots and covered with a disorderly pile of papers.

  “Well, well,” he said, not rising. “Claudia Marple. Long time no see.”

  “And no doubt you never expected to see me again.”

  “I wondered where you went.”

  His twisted, humorless smile hid his teeth; incongruously in that dour face a dimple formed in each cheek.

  “Well, I went as far as I could without ending in the Atlantic Ocean. You could have found me easily enough.”

  “Who needed you? It wasn’t worth the effort.”

  Although she had not been invited to sit down, she sat. After more than twenty-five years since their last brief encounter, it was natural for these two people to appraise each other. What Claudia saw was a man still easily recognizable. He was thicker, and his hairline had receded halfway across his skull; his diamond cuff links indicated that he had risen in life, but his almond-shaped eyes were unforgettable, without luster, alert, and cold.

  No, he—or rather, they—had definitely not needed her. After Marple’s death—ever since then she had come to think of her husband as “Marple”—when, to her unspeakable horror, she learned for the first time what his business had really been and who his associates really were, the only thing these people had most needed from her was her silence. Oh, wouldn’t it have been highly inconvenient for them, to say the least, if she had stood up in the courtroom and testified that she, walking down the back street on her way to Marple’s office that late afternoon, had seen who it was who had come running out of the building and fled down the alley!

  She believed that she really would have stood up in that courtroom and spoken the truth if there had been no child to care for. She would have taken her very slim chance, yes, she would, not because she was so extraordinarily brave—she was not—or because she was suicidal. She was not that either. She had just been so outraged at having been deceived, as a wife, by Marple, and as a citizen, by men like Joey V., that she would have been prepared to take any risk that would bring them to punishment. But she had been the mother of Ted, her rascally, bright little boy, her Ted. And they, who had been well aware of what she knew—although she had been careful not to reveal to them that knowledge—had also been aware that she would keep silent.

  “There was a thing in some rag I read at the barber’s about a kid named Marple that they’re looking for. I kind of wondered whether he might be yours.”

  “He is.”

  “Tough,” said Joey V. He nodded, contemplating Claudia with an expression almost sympathetic. “Yeah. Very tough. Just took a powder. Left the country?”

  “They think—they’re pretty sure—he’s someplace in Southeast Asia.”

  He took a cigar, bit the end, and frowned. He was interested. “Who’s ‘they’?” he demanded.

  “The FBI.”

  “FBI, for Chrissake! There are people—say, you want me to see what I can do?”

  “How? Have you gotten as big as all that?”

  “Yeah, I’m big. I run a lot of things, and the world’s a small place. Haven’t you heard?” He made a little flourish with his cigar.

  She had read, had felt a compulsion to read, and learned a good deal over the years about Marple’s “business.” You had only to read the newspapers. It was quite clear to her that the rescue of Ted must come from legitimate agencies.

  “Thanks,” she said. “I’ll let things stay as they are. But there is something else you can do for me, if you will.”

  “Yeah? What?” he said, glancing at a letter in front of him. He had lost interest. “What do you want?”

  “It’s not exactly for me. It’s my husband, Cliff Dawes.”

  “Dawes? That’s you? You married Dawes? You did pretty well for yourself,” he said, regaining interest.

  “Not at all, if it’s money that you mean. But if you mean the man, yes, I couldn’t have done better. I’d go on my knees from here to Timbuktu for him. I love him.” And feeling a sharp catch in her throat, or perhaps it was in her chest, she stopped.

  “I was talking about when you married him. They’re on the skids, now. I know that.”

  Hesitating until the catch should go, she replied, “Yes, and they don’t deserve to be.”

  “ ‘Deserve,’ ” he mocked. “Who deserves? You get what you can grab.”

  “People don’t always grab what’s available to them,” she said.

  His quick eyes shot toward Claudia’s. The astonishing computer inside his head had read another sense, a possibility, in her words. It was never too late, after all, to reopen a murder case.

  “Hey, Claudia, are you threatening me maybe?”

  Meeting his eyes without blinking, she replied with a question. “Do I look that stupid?”

  She had a chilling thought: Possibly he thinks that because we so desperately need money, I plan to make some bumbling threat, some inept attempt at blackmail. It is never too late to reopen a criminal case. If that is what he is thinking, he will make his prompt response right here, right now.…

  And so, with an appealing smile, she repeated her question. “Do I look that stupid?”

  Joey V. considered. His hard scrutiny went slowly from her patent leather pumps to the top of her head. “Nah,” he said. “What you look like is a Sunday school teacher. Yeah, Marple always went for broads like you.”

  “I still am a Sunday school teacher.”

  “Marple used to show off about you. You two were a queer pair, a crazy match, only you never knew it.”

  “Not until I went through his papers after he—died. But that’s over with. I don’t know anything, and if I ever did, I don’t remember it.”

  “That’s good, that’s very good.”

  The room was stuffy, her hands were sweating, and it seemed hard to breathe. So she took a deep breath and raised her voice.

  “I never expected to be asking you for anything. Could I have dreamed that we would ever come in contact? But here we are, and I don’t need to tell you what’s going on in this town because you know it better than I do.”

  “What do you want? Get to the point. I don’t have time for gabble.”

  “I want you to stop any more dumping on this property. They’re going to charge this family twenty-five thousand dollars a day until it stops.”

  Joey V. tipped back in his chair, removed the cigar from his mouth, and smiled his sardonic smile.

  “Stop the dumping! Ain’t you got the nerve!”

  “I suppose I have, but I’m fighting. It’s called ‘fighting for your life.’ ”

  “Is that so? Why don’t the Dawes brothers stand on their feet and ask me, instead of sending a woman to do the job?”

  “Come on, you know the answer to that. They’ve been asking, they’ve been in court, and they have given up. They didn’t send me here either. They don’t even know I’m here, and I might not even tell them I was here.”

  Joey V. did not reply. When he stood up and went to the slimy window looking out, she was surprised to see that he was a short man, half a head shorter than she. He was strong, all muscle. It had been foolhardy to come here. Not that he would touch her himself, not personally. Once in the top ranks you didn’t dirty your hands.

  “You’ve got nerve!” he said, turning suddenly to her. “What makes you think I should do any favors for you? Why you? What are you to me?”

  “Nothing at all. I simply took my chances. People like you respect a fighter, and I thought—although maybe it was a crazy thought—you might feel like doing some charity. You people do a lot of charity.”

  “Yeah, we do. We like charity. It’s good for the ego.” He laughed. “It’s respectable.”

  I am so tired, she thought. It’s e
asier to scrub the kitchen floor or to weed three rows of carrots than to do this. Nevertheless, she pressed on.

  “Your lease doesn’t have all that long to go. What if you were to cut down a little sooner? You must own dozens of these carting companies all over the country. It would hardly make a dent in your pocketbook, while to us”—she took another long breath—“to us, to my husband and to my son, who will need money for his defense when he comes back, it is … it is life.”

  “And you thought I would care about his life or yours?”

  “I didn’t think you would care—no, although you did know him when he was a little boy.” She stopped, and went on. “And you have sons.… I thought you might see, after what happened with Marple, how in my ignorance I was tricked when I married him, and was left with nothing but a hundred dollars and a child. That in all fairness I was owed something.”

  “By me? Owed something by me?”

  “Why not by you, since you right now are the only one in a position to do it?” She paused, and gambled. “You said charity was respectable. So here’s an opportunity to be respectable.”

  “I’ve gotta laugh. Mrs. Respectable herself comes here telling me—me! You sure have guts.”

  He went back to the window and stood there drumming on the pane with his fingers. Minutes passed.

  I tried, she thought. It was a naive hope. Well, I guess I am naive. That’s my type. I even look it, so they tell me. Always trying to find the best in people. Always trusting in a miracle.

  And suddenly Joey V. cried out, “Oh, what the hell!” He turned, examined his soiled fingers with disgust, and exclaimed, “Hell, why not? This always was a penny-ante operation, anyway. Came out here to look over these books”—he swept his arm toward the desk—“hardly worth the trouble. You’re right, we wouldn’t miss it. So what the hell, okay. No more dumping after tomorrow. And after that, wait out the lease. Or break it, whatever you want.”

  Claudia got up and put her hand out. She must thank him with dignity, not showing the faintest sign of tears, her tears of utmost, merciful, unbelievable relief.

  “Oh, I thank you,” she said. “I thank you. You see, I was right about you. I knew you would be charitable and fair. And you have been.”

  Joey V., accepting the compliment with grace, even paid one in return. “You’ve aged well, not that I ever saw you enough to remember much. But you’re okay, a good-looking woman for your age. And you are a fighter. I like a fighter.”

  So he accompanied Claudia to the office door; she went safely down the stairs and out.

  She had odd sensations. First there was the physical release into the cool, pure air. Then came the lessening of tension, bringing the awareness that her shoulders had been rigid and every muscle tight; she had been frightened almost to death. A fighter, she thought ruefully. If he could have X-rayed my insides, he wouldn’t have said that.

  Then, as she drove slowly home, she began to doubt. The victory was too good to be true. Those people were hardly famous for their compassion! That promise of Joey V.’s might well be a cruel, macabre joke; after her departure he might have summoned the saturnine young man from the lobby, and the two might even now be laughing their heads off at her expense.

  On the other hand—so one often read or saw in a movie—men like Joey V. sometimes had whims, giving a thousand-dollar tip to a headwaiter, or, having read in the newspapers about some stranger’s tragedy, starting an educational fund for his children.

  But if it should turn out well, what a gift, a gift of gratitude, she would have made to Cliff, and to his brother, too, who had stood by her in her trouble and, in spite of their own burdens, were standing by her still! And, as she imagined their astonishment at the news, which, if it was to come, would surely come within the next few days, a proud, excited little smile appeared on Claudia’s lips.

  The morning’s great undertaking had been accomplished. And now she was left with the remainder of the day, with the afternoon hours to be filled until Cliff should come home. Still too stimulated to answer mail at her desk or to do any household chore, she decided to walk to the lake. The far end was often deserted; nothing except the ripple of water would break the silence or disturb the perfection of dark green leafage against the sky.

  She changed her shoes and called Roy. Rob, at fifteen, was too lame to walk the two miles, while Roy was still able. He plodded, but he was eager, and she would walk slowly enough to accommodate him.

  On a large rock conveniently shaped like a love seat, she sat down while Roy stretched out beside her on the warm grass. His nose was low between his paws, and his eyes were fixed on the unmoving indigo circle of the lake. A small white butterfly hovered on a weed not more than a foot away from his nose, but he did not stir.

  Not worth his while, she supposed, or else it’s the walk that’s tired him. It was a long two miles, she conceded, aware that it had never seemed quite so long before.

  But the day itself had been a hundred times longer than an ordinary day. And still so much lay ahead. There were great hills yet to be climbed. It made her tired just to think of them.

  Even with the tenants gone a fearsome problem remained. They would be back to square one, the time when Premier Recycling had been a godsend. There was irony for you! It was a blessing that people couldn’t read the future. And she recalled her wedding day, when the future had been so assured, there in that old peaceful house with its lovely gardens, there with her wonderful Cliff, who would be such a good father to her wonderful son.…

  There were pains in her fingers. And stretching them out before her, she saw no explanation, saw only the rainbow radiance of the diamond. Since they had dropped the insurance on the ring, she almost never wore it; she had indeed asked Cliff to sell it, but he had refused to because, he said, it had belonged to his mother. She suspected that it was also because of pride, a resistance to the admission of final defeat. Her heart ached, thinking of him.

  And as so often during their time together, she told herself that she must stop postponing the truth. Tonight she would tell him about Marple. She should have done so at the start. It would have made no difference to Cliff. Always, though, she had wanted to protect Ted, to shield him from that knowledge, to do nothing that might affect his self-esteem if somehow the information should slip out.

  Doesn’t every one of us have something, she asked herself, something that he hides even from those he loves?

  But now, Ted must come back and face the facts. He was out there, slipping through every net, afraid all this time to write home because he knew the family was being watched. There had been enough cases in the news for him to be aware of that.

  Casper reported fresh clues that Interpol had finally sighted him. The hunt had taken on new life. They were close to the quarry. Deadly serious now, they were about to close in. Let them bring him to justice, Casper had told her kindly. It was possible, after all, that the girls were lying.

  No, they were not lying. Charlotte could tell them that.…

  And once again, she mourned. Whatever his fate, I hope he will regret and do better. I hope he will live at last a decent life, harming no one, and will be safe himself. When he comes back, I will tell him all this, and he will listen to me. He knows how I love him, so he will listen. It is never too late.

  She felt a great hope, a great love. It seemed to her that the love and hope were all around her, in the sun on her back and in the September hum of insects, and in the flare of fire lilies along the road. Every day the sun rose, every year the wild lilies bloomed again.

  Then her heart began throbbing as it had that morning. “You’re too emotional,” she said aloud, so that Roy, thinking she was speaking to him, turned his solemn brown eyes toward her. “Too emotional. That’s what’s the matter with you.”

  A shadow swept over the lake, and automatically she looked up into the sky; it was bright, without clouds; far and high, too high to distinguish what kind they were, a long stream of birds was moving in a spira
l formation toward the south. It made her dizzy to watch them.

  And her heart, accelerating, raced through her chest. Her heart flew to her throat and stuck there in a surge of nausea. It grew darker here under the trees. She slid down from the rock onto the grass beside Roy.

  I had too much excitement today, and then that long walk in the heat. I should really start home, she thought. But there’s no need for alarm. This has happened before. I must just get home and lie down. It will be all right. I’ll just lie down here for a little, she thought again, and was thinking it when, in one instant, the world began to swim. All went swimming in a dark red fog. The most extraordinary pain attacked her, and she grasped her chest, tearing frantically at her shirt. Night fell over her. The lake’s glitter, the leaves that roofed her blind gaze as she fell backward, all went whirling, whirled into that sudden night, and ended.

  EIGHT

  On the morning after the funeral the rain came down. Streams of it splashed on the window-panes. The air was gray with it. And Charlotte, at early breakfast in Claudia’s immaculate kitchen—copper pans, eighteenth-century spice cupboard, potted ivy—was thankful that yesterday had been so bright. The crowd at the services had been enormous. Even people who had been denouncing the family in the editorial pages and at public meetings had come. And there were all the special friends of Claudia, those many women who had worked with her at community affairs, and teenagers who knew her from the young people’s reading room at the library, and all the neighbors up and down the road, and more.

  “She loved this house,” Cliff said. “And she was happy here. Yes, in spite of Ted and all the troubles, thank God we knew a lot of happiness together.”

  Roger, with a quick glance at his wristwatch, made his meaning clear: It’s a long ride back to Boston. Charlotte replied with an almost imperceptible nod. She was still astonished that he had accompanied her here. They had been at her apartment when Bill had telephoned with the news, and Roger had at once insisted upon going home with her. It was not, after all, as if he were a longtime friend who would rightly feel an obligation.