The crows took flight, a chorus of whispering wings as they landed in the treetops.
Ellie squared her shoulders, determined. No longer would she ignore Victor. Instead, she was going to confront him. She remembered a saying she’d heard years ago, “If I don’t have a problem with you, and you have a problem with me, then it’s not my problem.” But it was her problem.
Abby rose from her knees, radiant.
The elderly woman entered then, followed by the man with the snow-white hair, the teenager. And then Ellie. She had no expectations. It was just the center, a little round circle on a canvas. Nothing had happened so far. Nothing was going to happen. She stood, staring at the pattern. She just stared. And as she stared, a feeling of warmth came over her. She had no desire to sit, or kneel, to touch the canvas. She just stood there, feeling warm, feeling safe. All around her, people were walking the same path, each bringing their own problems and concerns, their own celebrations…and for the first time in her life, she didn’t mind not being alone. She wasn’t alone.
Leaving the center, she thought of Grandma Betty. She thought of her with every step thereafter, winding in and out, round and round. She thought of her father and Jewel. She thought of Diablo. She thought about her life, Grandma Betty’s life. She thought about death. “Scrooge…” she could hear Grandma Betty saying. “This is Jacob Marley.” She smiled; she couldn’t stop smiling. All she wanted to do was smile. At the end waiting for her, were Abby and flower-child woman, smiling as well.
~ 22 ~
Ellie phoned the nursing home to check on Grandma Betty, was told she was sleeping comfortably, and drove to the barn to confront Victor. Abby wasn’t so sure this was a good idea.
“What if he’s not in a good mood?”
“Too bad.”
“But?”
Ellie smiled reassuringly. “I’m just going to talk to him. This can’t go on. It’s gone on long enough.”
“Maybe we should go talk to Sheila.”
“And tell her what?”
Abby hesitated. “I don’t know. I wish we had proof.”
“Well, we don’t. And that’s why I can’t go to her. Victor won’t need proof. He knows he’s guilty. He knows what he’s been doing. He’s doing it on purpose.”
The two of them got out of the car and walked into the barn. Victor was nowhere to be found. “Do you want me to check up at the house?”
Ellie shook her head. “I’ll come back later.”
“By yourself? No way. Maybe you should bring Diablo with you.”
“Are you kidding? I don’t want him to even know. This is my problem, not his. I’ll deal with it.”
Damian nickered at the sound of Ellie’s voice. “Hey, big guy,” she said, opening his stall door. “How ya doing?”
Damian walked to the front of the stall and nosed around for a carrot.
“Do you have any treats?” she called to Abby.
“Yes, just a second. Does Damian have water?”
Ellie stepped back to look. “No.” His water bucket was empty.
Bubba’s, too. Not low. Empty. Abby checked the next stall. The buckets on both sides were full. “Now what are the odds…?” They checked each and every stall down the aisle; all had water. The only two empty were Bubba’s and Damian’s. “I really, really hate that man.”
Ellie was already headed for the house.
The farm owner, Sheila, answered the door. “Hi! What’s up?”
“Is Victor home?”
“Yeah, he’s in the basement. Why?”
“We need to talk to him,” Abby said.
“About what?” the woman asked, eyeing Abby up and down, dressed in pink.
“About not watering our horses. All the other horses have water but ours,” Ellie said, realizing how ridiculous she probably sounded, even as she said it.
“Maybe they drank it all.”
“No, more than likely Victor didn’t….”
Ellie touched Abby’s arm. “Could you just tell Victor we’d like to talk to him, please.”
Sheila hesitated. “Is this about him building the cage for the crows? We can’t have them around, Ellie. They’re dangerous.”
“No, they’re not. But that’s not what this is about.”
“Well, I’ll tell him. How long are you going to be here?”
Ellie glanced at her watch. “Not long, ten minutes or so.” She’d told the nursing home she’d be there within the hour, should Grandma Betty wake and ask.
“Fine, I’ll have him come down to the barn.”
No need. Victor appeared at her side. “What’s the problem, babe?”
Sheila turned. “They’re worried you didn’t water their horses.”
“What? Why wouldn’t I water their horses?” he asked innocently.
The woman looked at Ellie and Abby.
What could they say?
“Well, we just wanted to make sure.” Abby stood her ground, even when Ellie nudged her again to go. “We were hoping it wasn’t intentional or anything.”
“Not hardly,” Victor said. “When I washed all the buckets this afternoon, maybe I just forgot to fill those two.”
Ellie nodded, backing up, hoping he’d follow them. “Are you going to come down and water them now?”
Victor shrugged. “You two can water them, go ahead.” He shut the door on that, but not before both Abby and Ellie distinctly heard him say to Sheila, “What pains in the ass.”
“Us?” Ellie glared at the closed door.
“Come on,” Abby said. “You were right. She wouldn’t believe us anyway.”
They walked back to the barn, watered their horses, gave them carrots, and were getting ready to leave, when Ellie decided to go investigate the birdcage. She hadn’t wanted to be caught back there before, but with Victor up at the house at the moment, curiosity got the best of her. She rounded the corner of the tool shed, Abby right on her heels, and stopped dead.
The birdcage was huge, looked like a chicken coop, door open, and had bait inside; an injured crow. Ellie approached slowly, not wanting to frighten it, its battered and bloodied wings beating helplessly against its sides.
“Oh dear God,” Abby said. “Is it…?”
Ellie shook her head. Victor had tied its feet to the bottom of the coop with wire, the one leg practically severed from its frantic struggle to get free.
“It’s okay…. It’s okay….” Ellie said softly. She reached underneath the cage, untied its legs, and when it tried desperately to fly but couldn’t, caught it and brought it to her chest. “You’re okay,” she said. “No more harm will come to you. No more harm.” With a trembling hand around its neck and a snap of her wrist, she ended the bird’s suffering.
Abby stood at her side, with tears in her eyes. “Should we bury it?”
“No.” Ellie laid the crow in the field and wiped the blood from her hands onto the grass all around it.
Victor was standing on the front porch of the farmhouse as they pulled out, as if posing for a magazine, one foot on the railing and elbow on knee. Ellie turned when a glint of light caught her eye; the sun reflecting off his cigarette lighter. Flashing, flashing, flashing….
* * *
Grandma Betty woke with a bad taste in her mouth and numbness in her hands and feet. “Leave it to me to die in bits and pieces,” she told Ellie, with a frail laugh. “I wonder what’ll go next?”
Ellie smiled. “Can I get you anything? Are you warm enough?”
“I’m fine.” She’d been sleeping comfortably off and on since Ellie returned. “I’m sorry I’m not better company.”
“You’re perfect company, Grandma. Go back to sleep if you want.”
“No, that’s okay. There’s something I want to tell you. It’s about Dutch.”
Ellie smiled. Dutch was her favorite of the Grandpas she’d had because of Grandma Betty.
“He was a lot like your Diablo.”
“How so?” Ellie asked, taking note. That was the first
time she hadn’t referred to him as the Dildo.
“Oh, he was a lover. He was physical and made everything right that way. But he also used to break my heart. I couldn’t trust him, Ellie. Do you trust Diablo?”
Ellie hesitated, taken off guard.
“If ever there was a look worth a thousand words,” Grandma Betty said, sadly.
“No, it’s not that I don’t trust him. I just don’t know.”
Grandma Betty shook her head. ”Dutch would lie about everything. I loved him, but I couldn’t believe a word he said. To the day he died, I didn’t trust him.”
Ellie lowered her eyes to the floor, kept her tongue. Diablo is not Dutch, she wanted to say. Don’t judge one by the other. But to declare that, would be disrespectful, particularly under the circumstances. Her grandmother was dying, little by little, as she had just joked, but it was true. Ellie could see it. She could feel it, sense it. At the same time though, she was also going to die and would never know….
“They’re two different people, Grandma? They’re….” Ellie sat back. Grandma Betty had drifted off to sleep. “Diablo is not Dutch.” Ellie said, as much to herself as to the walls. “I do trust him. It’s me I can’t trust. I’m different.”
“You’re special,” Grandma Betty said, apparently still awake.
Ellie chuckled. “So are you, Grandma. I love you.”
“I love you too, dear. Now go on. Go, so you can get back before dark.”
Ellie drove straight to Diablo’s. She’d originally intended to swing by her apartment and change clothes. The front of her shirt was spattered with crow’s blood. She’d planned to stop by the barn next. Victor would be feeding; she could confront him. Diablo wasn’t expecting her until much later. She knocked on his door and stood waiting. His car was home, the Harley, home. She knocked again, and held her breath when she heard him yell, “Just a minute!”
He answered the door, hair all mussed, and in nothing but a pair of jeans.
“I’m early,” she said, and walked past him, peeling off her shirt even before he’d gotten the door closed. “Sorry I didn’t phone. I don’t have much time.”
Diablo asked about Grandma Betty, asked about the blood on her shirt. Her answer was the same for both. “Later.”
* * *
Grandma Betty had several surprise visits while Ellie was gone. First, her sister Janie. “I haven’t seen you in so long. Where have you been?”
“Right here,” Janie said. “I’ve died and gone to heaven. Remember?”
Grandma Betty laughed. Surely she must be dreaming. Janie, in heaven?
A nurse poked her arm with a needle.
“Do you remember the day we skipped school and walked to the movie house?”
“Remember it? It was my idea.”
“Yeah, well, I never forgave you for lying to Mommy and Daddy about it.”
“Betty, hold your arm still. Lucy, come here and hold her arm down.”
Lucy? Grandma Betty tried to open her eyes. They wouldn’t budge. “Who the hell is Lucy?”
“Is she that skinny girl from over on Walnut Ridge?”
“No, that was Mary Lou. You’re thinking about the Gibson girl.”
“Yes, that’s her. Lord, was she skinny. I wonder what ever happened to her?”
“I think she ran away from home.”
“Oh, that’s right. She did. Remember that time she came to school all beat up?”
Grandma Betty shuddered. “Don’t talk about that. The last thing I want to talk about while dying is some poor girl getting beat up by her dad.”
“I heard she stabbed him.”
“When? That day?”
“No, later. Three times in the chest. I heard they buried him with the knife still stuck in his chest.”
Grandma Betty tried opening her eyes again. This time they cooperated. “Mercy,” she said, glancing around the room. “April? April, are you over there?” She stared at the drawn curtain, wondered if she had the strength to lean over and pull it open. “Janie? Janie, are you still here? Look and see if Lucy’s in her bed. Damn, I’m so confused. Where’s Ellie?”
“She’ll be back in a little while,” the nurse said. “Now rest your arm. If you keep moving around so much, it’s only going to hurt more.”
Grandma Betty focused on the woman. She had big, big eyes. Really big eyes.
“Stop that!”
Grandma Betty jumped. The woman’s nose was right in front of hers. “No damned wonder your eyes are so big. Get away! Please,” she remembered to add. The woman was gone.
“Hey, Betty!”
Grandma Betty froze. “Dutch…?”
“How you doin’? You okay?”
“Fine, Dutch. How are you? Come here, let me see you?” Grandma Betty searched her mind, searched her eyes, searched inside, searched everywhere. “Dutch? Dutch, where did you go?”
“I’m right here. Look, I’m right here. Smile if you see me.”
Grandma Betty smiled.
“You’re smiling in the wrong direction, Betty. I’m over here.”
Grandma Betty laughed. “Where? Never mind, I don’t care. I can hear you. That’s enough.”
“How are you feeling?”
“All right. It’s good to hear your voice.”
“Betty….”
Grandma Betty turned. “Who’s that?”
“It’s me, Sophie. I need to change your diaper, only don’t move that arm. Okay?”
“No,” Grandma Betty said. “Not now, not while Dutch is here.”
“Dutch? Dutch, who?”
“Dutch, my husband. He’s here and I don’t want him to see me like this. Leave me alone. Please, just leave me alone.”
“I’m sorry, Betty, I can’t. There’s nobody here but you and me. Don’t worry, nobody’s going to see you. I got the curtain pulled.”
“But Dutch was here, I heard him. I heard him! I could even almost see him.”
“Betty, you’re just going to have to calm yourself down. You hungry, hon? Do you want something to eat?”
“No, I don’t eat anymore.”
“Oh, is that why they have you on the IV?”
“I guess so,” Grandma Betty said, tears welling up in her eyes. “How’s come you don’t know I don’t eat anymore. How is it you don’t know?”
“I’m sorry, Betty. I’m new here. Don’t cry. I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
“It’s not you….” Grandma Betty wiped her eyes; salty tears trickling down her cheeks. “I’m just so tired, that’s all. Is it dark out yet?”
“No, not yet. A little while longer.”
Grandma Betty nodded. In a little while, it would all be over.
“Keep that arm still now, okay?”
Grandma Betty folded her hands across her chest, red fingernails showing, and clenched her jaw, just in case. An odd sensation, she thought, this dying. She hoped Ellie got back in time. Being alone was frightening. “April? April, are you there?”
Silence….
~ 23 ~
Diablo wrapped his arms around Ellie and didn’t want to let her go. “Why do you have to leave so early? Did you even eat? Why don’t we go get something to eat?”
Ellie smiled. This was new, his worried about her eating. “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not. You look like hell.”
“Thank you.”
Diablo shrugged. “Who else’ll tell you, if not me?”
Her Grandma, she thought, and fought back instant tears. “I ate at Abby’s earlier, I’m fine. Honest.”
“What? Lunch?”
“Yes.”
“Come on. We can at least go get something at the deli. It won’t take long.”
Ellie followed him in her car to save time. As soon as she was done eating, she was going to head for the barn. It would still be light out. Sunday evenings were usually pretty active; other people would be there. She glanced at her watch and reached for the menu.
“Ellie….”
She looked up.
“I understand,” Diablo said. “A little I mean, about your Grandma.”
Ellie searched his eyes.
“I’m proud of you. Okay?”
Ellie nodded, again fighting back tears. “Okay.”
Her hands trembled as she ate. She’d said she wasn’t hungry, and yet practically wolfed her food down. She talked incessantly. She told him all about the labyrinth.
“I don’t get it,” he said. “You just walk around this canvas.”
“Yes. But not all of them are canvas. Most in fact are made of stone or brick, and are permanent somewhere. Some are in grass. They had pictures of one in a field. It was awesome. And something does happen, Diablo. I can’t explain it, but a feeling comes over you.”
Diablo smiled. “I’ll take your word for it.”
Ellie finished eating, kissed and hugged him and left. Eight-thirty-five, she still had some daylight. If she hurried….
She took a shortcut, but caught every light. When she arrived, there were only two cars parked at the barn. One she recognized as belonging to one of the racetrack people. She parked next to it, hesitated, and drew a deep breath. This was the right thing to do, she told herself. Confront Victor now and get it over with. She should have done it long before this. “I can’t let it go another day.”
When she opened the door and got out of the car, a faint caw sounded in the distance.
She turned, heard it again, and started running. The birdcage. She scrambled over the paddock fence, ran down the hill and around the shed, and screamed as she got close.
Lolita! She was trapped!
Ellie rushed to the cage.
It was padlocked!
“Hold on, hold on….” Lolita frantically beat her wings and head against the sides. “Hold on!” Ellie looked around for something to break the lock. Nothing. She tried stretching the wire mesh, tried pulling it apart, but it sliced her hands. “Damn!” She ran around to the front of the shed, looked inside, and finding a piece of 2x4 with nails pounded into it, grabbed it and ran back and tore away at the wire.
Ellie's Crows Page 13
