Rohn Federbush - Sally Bianco 03 - The Recorder's Way

by Rohn Federbush

  Max nodded agreement. They sat together quietly, not speaking, somehow in tune with each other. “Will you tell me I’ll get over her?” He didn’t sound convinced. “Should I have known when I thought I smelled her perfume in the office, that first day? Do we need to return Mr. Brent’s money?” Helen tilted her head to question the connection. “You think I’m much of a detective? Didn’t her husband describe her teeth, eyes, tears, that she wanted a baby? Did I want to remain blind to everything? Can’t you see Maybell’s first name is Anita, the last is Brent?”

  “Maybell drove a Mercedes.” Too much information lacked time to process in Helen’s brain. “Isn’t Brent the Honda dealer?”

  “I guess a Honda wasn’t good enough for the likes of her?”

  “Oh, Max.” An explosion of contradictions rocked Helen’s brain. “If you return the money, won’t he suspect something’s wrong?”

  “Should I wait until Brent calls off the investigation?” Max ran his fingers through his dark curls. “Would I be telling the whole truth by waiting?”

  “What about your child?”

  “How can I interfere when she asked me not to cause trouble?”

  Helen wanted to hold his giant head against her, make the whole problem disappear. “You love her enough to give up your parental rights?”

  “Didn’t God ask as much of Abraham?” Max lowered his head into his hands.

  Helen moved around the desk again to rub Max’s hunched shoulders. “God stayed Abraham’s hand, Max. Pray about it. You could ask for a blood test after the child is born.” She wanted to fix everything for Max, but Helen knew asking for God’s will was a better idea. She did not want Max to waste time focusing on resentments against Maybell -- Anita. Helen stopped touching Max. Her inexperience and confusion about her own feelings and plans for him made her ill equipped to discuss Anita’s wickedness. She returned to the client chair on the safe side of Max’s desk. “We should get started on Sally’s case.”

  Max sighed. “Do you think I’m acting like a wimp?”

  Helen embraced him with her words. “Any woman would be proud to own that much emotion from a man.”

  “Love?” Max pronounced the word stoically, as if the question was carved on a moldy gravestone.

  All Helen could offer him was Sally’s new case. “Mrs. Bianco will wonder why we haven’t pinned down any information by now. She should be popping in the door any minute.”

  Chapter Three

  “A darkness that was felt…ashes turned to boils…”

  The Egyptian Plagues

  First Wednesday in May, 2008

  The Firm

  As Helen approached the front door of The Firm, she was surprised at her eagerness to talk about her half-brother. He had been too upset about Anita for her to mention her concerns. Once inside however, she sought out her father instead of climbing the stairs to her partner’s office. Andrew was busily scrolling through computer screens when Helen arrived. His back was to the entrance. Helen thought he’d heard her open the door; but when she touched his shoulder, she startled him.

  He hit the minimize button for the screen. “Helen. Are you early?”

  “What are you researching?” She kissed the side of her father’s cheek.

  Helen biological father would remain unknown to her. Except for the act of producing a half-brother, George Clemmons Senior barely affected her life. Andrew had shared each hour of her life. He was there for each childish trauma and triumphant. Andrew fathered her, nourished the gene pool the original sperm donor provided. Helen thanked the Lord for Andrew, her mother’s champion, her dear father.

  “Sally Bianco’s past.” Andrew answered his daughter. “Thought I might find something to explain where she is. Her fourth husband was shot dead in front of her during an arson investigation in St. Charles, Illinois.”

  “That’s her hometown. Captain Tedler gave Max and me details on three of Mrs. Bianco’s cases when we asked for an employment reference. Two were arsons.” After tucking her briefcase next to her computer desk, Helen poured herself a cup of coffee. “I met with George Clemmons. We’re both blondes.”

  “Not surprising.” Andrew limped over to the coffee pot for a refill. “Could any of the perpetrators in Sally’s cases be released, to do her harm?”

  “I remember one woman died in the fire she’d set. The man who shot her husband wasn’t the arsonist, just crazy.” Helen sipped the hot liquid. No odor accompanied the stale coffee. “A professor was killed by his common-law wife, who then died of a pill overdose. Their henchman is still in jail. A wife-beater killed his first wife. He’s still in jail in Missouri.” Helen careful watched Andrew’s reaction when she asked, “What did you and Mother agree I should do about George?”

  “We think we should invite him to dinner.” Andrew gave her a rare smile. “Maybe with Max? Now that Julia is convinced everyone knows about George, she seems relieved. Did she tell you she ordered a second-hand player piano? Needs it to entertain people when they come over. Been shopping for clothes. You’re not going to believe it, she asked me to put the dishes in the dishwasher after you’d gone to bed.”

  “Mother?”

  “She filled two boxes with her old clothes for Purple Heart. Bought two weeks worth of nightgowns. Says she’s tired of doing laundry every week. The truth about your birth did her no harm. Far from it. She’s acting like a new bride, learning to spread her wings.”

  “Not to fly away?”

  Andrew shook his head. “To claim her own beauty.”

  Helen hugged his shoulders. “You love her.”

  “More every day. But I think you should pick-up after yourself now, make your own bed -- that sort of thing.”

  Thinking about the prospect of two strangers descending on her previously shy mother, Helen automatically made a fresh pot of coffee without firing one synapse for the process. “I’ll go up and ask Max, then call George.” After pouring two cups of coffee, she addressed her father’s back. “Maybe Mother is looking forward to associating more with people. The truth didn’t kill her, or us?”

  Andrew swung his chair away from the computer before sitting down with his fresh cup of coffee. “If I’d known your mother was carrying you, I still would have asked her to marry me. George’s grandmother refused to allow his father’s marriage to Julia. It doesn’t matter now. We’re all civilized adults, Helen. Don’t worry so much. Your mother has always owned a gracious heart.”

  “I’m glad she found you.” Helen thought she might cry at the thought of never having had Andrew in her life. “No girl could ask for a more loving father.”

  “You’re my best girl. Nothing’s changed, except the Lord has seen fit to hand you a grown brother. You might need one to help you handle Max.”

  “I think you’ll like George.”

  “Hey, he’s part of you and your mother, isn’t he?”

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  Upstairs, Max bestowed his best smile on the gift of coffee from Helen and accepted the invitation to dinner. “Do you think George will let me share him? I never enjoyed being an only child, did you?”

  Helen felt rooted to the spot after she handed Max his coffee cup. If anything, she wanted to move closer. She realized for the first time Max never uttered a complete sentence. All his words were coached in tentative questions. “You want to share my brother?”

  “Weren’t you taught to go halves with the neighbor kids?” He punched her shoulder.

  Helen could smell the soap he used from where she was standing. As easily as she had kissed her father she bent closer to kiss his cheek. But Max slipped his hand around her neck and drew her head down for a real kiss. She felt unwilling to move away from his lips, but blinked and took a step back.

  “You don’t kiss like a sister.”

  Helen slapped at his shoulder. “I believe I have just heard the first unqualified statement you ever made.”

  “Do you think it will be my last?”

  She laughed at
the ornery twinkle in his eyes.

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  Max studied Helen’s elliptical path. She wore a soft blue sweater which complemented her coloring better than her red suit. Her slim body seemed tense, her hands clenched and unclenched. “What else is going on?” He rose and walked over to her. He stretched out his arms for a brotherly embrace. “We took on more than we could chew, asking for the whole truth from the universe, didn’t we?”

  Helen melted into his chest. “Sally Bianco was right. We should only invade people’s privacy when a crime has been committed.”

  He touched her soft hair and patted her back, as if to burp any hurt away. She lifted her head and looked into his eyes. She seemed frightened, trembling. It seemed so natural. Max kissed her teary face.

  Helen pushed him away. “Sally Bianco could be dead?”

  “No. Sorry. I mean, kisses just happen, don’t they?” Helen stood there wiping her mouth, brown eyes dilating. Neither of them noticed Andrew Costello turn away from the open office door. Max searched for a safe subject. “Should we listen to Sally’s message again? Could we have missed anything?”

  Max heard Helen sigh as she followed him down the stairs to the computer room. Max did not want to analyze what had just happened. They needed to find Sally Bianco before delving into their feelings about each other…whatever they might be. “Andrew?” Max called too urgently. “Do you want to listen to Sally’s message again?”

  “Sure,” Andrew didn’t look directly at either partner as he restarted the messages. “Helen, write down the phone number on the ID screen.”

  Max listened to the excitement in Sally’s voice, as Helen wrote down the number. “I’ve found a case. St. Anthony’s Hospital allowed three patients to die in 1990. See you tomorrow afternoon, about two. We need to find records of the deaths.”

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  Sure enough, when they started to play back Mrs. Bianco’s message, a phone number appeared on the small identity screen. After hitting the speakerphone button, Helen dialed the number. “St. Anthony’s Retreat Center. Please dial one for the main reception desk.”

  Helen hung up. “She could have been at an AA retreat.”

  Max ran his fingers through his thick hair. “Don’t AA people like to stay anonymous? They won’t be able to tell us if she attended, will they?”

  “Monday and this is already Wednesday.” Helen pulled at her sweater’s hem. “The convent in Adrian is run by Dominican nuns. The nuns will take our inquiry more seriously, if a male descends on them.”

  Max smiled halfheartedly. “Well, I proved I’m a man, haven’t I?”

  Helen’s father gave her a questioning look. Helen had no intention of commenting on the subject of fathering children. “Dad, while we are gone find someone at the police department to issue a warrant for St. Anthony’s Hospital records.”

  As Helen put on her coat to leave, Max called, “Helen?”

  She stopped, then turned around with her prepared let’s-go-get-‘em smile firmly in place.

  “Is the convent connected to the hospital?” Max was pulling on his curls.

  “We’ll find out, won’t we?” She realized she was mimicking Max’s mode of communication. He certainly filled a room. She couldn’t help wondering how tall his children might be.

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  Trip Ann Arbor to Adrian

  Max barely remembered which roads led to the Adrian convent. He briefly considered finding a new apartment on the way and drove to the east side of town before heading south. Helen asked him where he was going. “Without Maybell, my studio on First Street doesn’t seem habitable.” He could engage a mover to pack up his belongings. In the meantime, he’d live in a motel and shop for changes of clothing at Briarwood Mall.

  “Your lifestyle doesn’t match the families in the enclaves of condominiums and gated communities on the outskirts of Ann Arbor.”

  Max nodded in agreement. He noticed Helen emphasized the word families. If they became a family, married, and had maybe five children, then they would fit into the newer affluent housing settlements. But for now thoughts of downtown Ann Arbor’s busy pedestrian nightlife, with the sidewalk restaurant trade and street musicians swiftly negated thoughts of relocating. Home meant living near main campus with young people, summer festivals with street fairs, antique car shows, concerts, live theatre, movies. The non-stop cultural life of Ann Arbor was only blocks away from his apartment.

  Helen asked, “Are you going to allow Maybell, Anita, to ruin your bachelor pad?”

  Max grunted. “Of course, if I’d demanded to be married before being with her, nothing would have happened. No baby harvest while she was married to another man.”

  He remembered an aunt, his mother’s sister, who helped him retain his sanity after his parents’ violent deaths. “Aunt Rose Emery,” Max said. He had lost touch with her after he joined the army to serve in Iraq.

  “Where is your aunt?” Helen asked.

  “When I was thirteen, my father committed suicide after killing my mother in a jealous rage. My aunt comforted me. I remember smelling her freshness, a baby-powder odor clung to her mourning dress. She said she could help.”

  Helen didn’t comment.

  “At that promise, I broke down, sobbed like a three-year-old.” Max kept his eyes on the road. “Aunt Rose let me weep. Finally, she patted my back and told me, ‘If you want to accept Jesus Christ as your Savior, he will take away all your pain.’”

  “I didn’t believe anyone could stop the raging feelings clenching my guts.” Max looked over at Helen. “I remember hanging my head. It w as hopeless.”

  ‘What do you have to lose?’ She asked me and handed me her open Bible, saying, ‘Read aloud Verse 16 of John’s Third Chapter.’”

  I blinked through tears to read the words of Jesus, which were printed in red ink. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

  “You memorized the verse,” Helen said.

  “Aunt Rose asked me if I wanted to believe.” Max kept his eyes on the traffic. “I remember asking her how. She tugged on my curls and told me she knew I trusted her. ‘I’m not going to put bad food in front of you when you come to live with me and belief in our Savior will do you no harm. Try to accept the Lord into your heart.’”

  “Words sprang from my grief, ‘Lord, help me accept you as my Savior.’” Helen touched his arm. Max continued, “I remember Aunt Rose wept, while a feeling without end, as far as the ocean’s reach, filled me with a warmth and unexplainable peace. ‘Wow,’ I said as I reached for Aunt Rose’s hand out of thankfulness.”

  Suddenly to Max, the reality of a child in his future, his child, didn’t feel like a disaster. “Now part of me is going to walk on the same earth I’m treading.” He tried to shoot down his growing elation as he viewed freshly tilled earth on past both sides of the Mustang’s windows. “The weather isn’t warm enough to put the convertible top down.”

  “Without catching pneumonia,” Helen said as if in harmony to his mood change.

  Keeping his eyes on Carpenter Road’s two-lane traffic, Max touched the subject of his unborn child again, as if sucking on a sore tooth. “Helen, you could be right. After the baby is born, I could ask for a blood test … and parental rights of visitation. I’ll never sign over adoption rights. My son, or maybe a beautiful daughter might live in Ann Arbor, go to school at the university.”

  Max stopped the car at a four-way stop, put on his emergency flashers, leaned over the wheel and wept for his lost dream of marriage. He hated women, all of them. He would never touch another woman for as long as he lived. That scared him. He looked over at Helen, who seemed confused by his changing emotions. He was not a homosexual, was he – all those army buddies? Helen recited the Lord’s Prayer out loud.

  Max allowed God’s will to regain preeminence in his life. He asked for forgiveness for his transgressions
as he forgave Anita-Maybell. He turned off the flashers and put the car in gear. He was not a homosexual, bless them all, and would eventually, no doubt, mate with a woman. ‘Please God,’ he prayed, silently. ‘Don’t let me be such a fool again. When I fall in love, I’ll propose marriage and wait until after the wedding to consummate the marriage. I never want to be used by another woman.”

  “The Lord’s rules make life more manageable,” Helen said.

  Max agreed. God’s verdant landscape, a patchwork of color, stretched out before him, restoring hope into the recesses of his soul. “I’m not going to move.”

  The rolling hills around Adrian welcomed their progress toward their destination. Max voiced a prayer of “Thank you, God, for the peace residing again in my soul.”

  “Amen,” Helen chorused.

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  Helen wondered if she should confide in Max as freely as he had with her,before they reached Adrian. “I should tell you the dream I had last night.”

  “Was I in it?” Max seemed relaxed, comfortable with her.

  “I don’t think so. I was at a church service for children. Little boys in suits and girls in white flowered caps received, I think, their first communion. It was a little confusing, the way dreams always are. The children walked down the aisle in pairs, boy-and-girl couples. I think someone told me, or I was supposed to know, they were promising to marry each other when they grew up.”

  Max seemed to have trouble keeping his attention on the road. “They do that in India, don’t they?”

  “Ahh, but these children were American.”

  “Were you one of the children, Helen?”

  “No.” Helen remembered one of the little dream girls had let her wear her white flowered hat. Helen turned her head towards the passenger window so Max couldn’t see her reddening face. “I’m not very mature for a woman of twenty-five.”

  “You’re fine, Helen.” Max patted her shoulder. “Maybe the dream was about missing your childhood with your new brother.”

  Helen forced a bright smile for Max. She knew better. The dream was her wish for a husband, some one like Dad, Andrew. Someone guaranteed to marry her. She regarded Max, the giant next to her. Would he ever think of her as the mother of his children; especially now that another woman was going to give birth to his first child. Helen intended to fight for all of Max’s rights in regard to the child, who she might some day share in mothering. Max’s child. Of course, she would want her own children, too. Maybe with Max. Hopefully, she wouldn’t need to scour the land to find a husband. Surely the Lord would provide a man close at hand, like Max.