Shadow Notes

by Laurel S. Peterson

“There were days I couldn’t.” She looked at me hard. “I was afraid you would turn out like him. You’ve carried your anger around for such a long time, and anger skews people. But you didn’t. You try to do the right thing.” At last, she reached her hand toward me and I took it. “I am honored to have you as a daughter, Clara.”

  I held my breath to prevent my tears. I couldn’t even imagine what it cost her to say that, but I needed to absorb it before I could tell her the same. Even though I knew it was crazy, saying anything positive seemed like absolving Andrew Winters of responsibility.

  “You think he killed Hugh?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Himself?”

  “No. Not that.”

  “But why?”

  “Those notations on the lists you gave me the other day? They correlate to constituents who are giving big private donations to his Political Action Committees, as regularly as once a month. Some of the donors began giving on significant dates. Joe Hankin started contributing shortly after he moved his practice into the city. That’s thirty-five years of campaign donations, long before Winters declared for a national seat. Hankin supported him through council seats, local government, and the state senate. That’s a pretty loyal donor.”

  My toe started tapping the floor in agitation.

  “Then there’s sweet old Melton Honey. He had a few business problems ten years ago or so, something to do with environmental regulations. The state was going to make him perform a very expensive clean-up, when ­suddenly the ­problems disappeared. Melton’s regular donations started coming in shortly after that, but they came through his company, his wife, other company employees.”

  “So the ‘B’ in those notations is for blackmail? Winters is blackmailing his way into the Senate? Oh, for god’s sake!” The trembling congealed into tension in my shoulders and jaw; if I held the blanket tight enough around me, maybe I wouldn’t crack apart.

  “Andrew would call it trading favors, just as he did in school.”

  “Right. I make your problem go away and, because you are so grateful, you fund my campaigns for thirty-five years? I understand a few donations, maybe even a one-time payoff, but these people are scared. These are incidents that could lose them their wealth and position and put them behind bars.” I loosened my hands from the chair arms. “So what do the other letters stand for? BRE? BSA?”

  Mother rubbed at the finish on her nail polish. “I’m pretty sure the RE is for the rape evidence that Hankin withheld. I’m not sure about the SA.”

  “The abbreviations indicate the infraction? SA was on Wendy’s file. Substance abuse?”

  Mother nodded. “That makes sense.”

  “What did Hugh have to do with all this?” My head had been spinning before being knocked out; now, it felt even worse. Stuff fizzled in the air like a blender full of poisonous fruit and ice.

  “That’s the link I haven’t figured out. I told Hugh what I knew, but he was bound by doctor-patient confidentiality. He would never have shared any of this, and he would never have said anything to Winters.” She leaned forward to rest her elbows on her knees.

  I got up to pace the room, moving gingerly from the French doors to the hall door and back again, weaving around Mother’s boxes like a sheep dog trying to herd them. Daylight had gone and an early moonrise cast eerie shadows in the room. The movement eased some of my jailed emotion. “Would anything cause him to break confidentiality?”

  “Hugh was unimpeachable. He had to be or he’d lose all his clients.”

  “Paul told me he talked everything over with Maria.”

  She stood abruptly and flipped on a light. The brightness hurt my eyes. She was staring at me.

  “Maybe someone thought he was going to break confidentiality,” I said.

  “What did you do with Hugh upstairs on the night of my Christmas party?”

  I sucked in a breath. “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Don’t be coy with me, Clara.”

  “You’re blaming this on me? How original.” The simmering rage billowed out. “It’s not my fault your beloved Hugh died. Don’t target me.”

  Suddenly dizzy, I grabbed the back of her chair for balance. I was lashing out not at her, but at the injustice of Andrew Winters getting away with this for thirty-five years.

  Target. That was the word that Loretta used that had been bugging me. That’s how Winters referred to them the night I’d worked over Melton Honey. Did people really refer to their donors that way?

  They might if they perceived them not as donors and colleagues but as blackmail opportunities…

  “Clara, what did you do upstairs with Hugh?”

  “Nothing. I did nothing but ask Hugh about you.”

  “About me?”

  “I came home because I was worried, Mother. Because I’ve been having dreams for weeks about your running from something. Why do you think I’ve been so persistent? I’m trying to save you—because I didn’t save Father.”

  She sat as abruptly as she’d stood, looking as if even the soft chair might break her in half. “Oh, Clara.”

  “Why does it matter what I did with Hugh?”

  “If they thought he told you about the DNA link or…about the blackmail…they had to stop him before he did either of those things.”

  “Then why kill him after he went upstairs with me?”

  “Maybe they figured his death would warn me to keep my silence and make sure you kept yours. And if he hadn’t said anything, they’d eliminated the threat that he would tell anyone else.”

  “Who else would he tell? The press? You just said he wouldn’t.”

  “He talked everything over with Maria.”

  I nodded. “What influence would she have over Andrew Winters?”

  “None. But she knows someone who would, and I know him, too.”

  “Who?”

  She shook her head. “That’s enough for tonight, Clara. I need…. We’ll pick this up later, when our minds are clearer.”

  I protested but Mother got up, the tray in her hands. “Go upstairs,” she said. “I’ll be along in a minute.”

  I trudged up to my bedroom, disheartened. We’d started to be honest with each other, but it hadn’t lasted. Mother had spent a long time keeping secrets from me. But keeping secrets was human. Some things just belonged to us and no one else, except when others could get hurt.

  Then again, the thought of Mother coming to kiss me good night felt strangely comforting. I put on cozy pajamas, a pair I’d found lurking in a bottom drawer. The pink flannel pants and top were soft and almost sheer from wear. I wrapped myself in a red fleece robe and climbed under the bedcovers, suddenly chilled all the way through.

  With a sudden rush of tears, I turned my face into the pillow, smelled the comforting lavender, burrowed into the sheets, hoping that, if I got far enough in, I wouldn’t be the child of a rape victim. I wouldn’t have terrifying dreams, or feel I had to save a woman I barely knew from a menace I didn’t understand.

  Mother’s hand on my shoulder startled me. I crabbed back in the bed, nearly kicking her in my haste to scoot away. Half the bedcovers came with me, and before I was aware of it, I was at the edge, scrabbling for something to hold onto, my head pounding at the sudden movement.

  She grabbed my arm. “Clara! It’s me!”

  Breathing hard, we stared at each other. I shook my head, trying to clear the fog, and felt a deep, painful twinge from the gash.

  “I’ve spooked you, haven’t I? With all this talk.” She smoothed the bedclothes. I hunched back into the middle of the bed and propped myself up with pillows. She sat at the edge.

  “Yeah.” I felt tears threaten again, stopped talking until I regained control. “My skull and my brain feel cracked.” I attempted a grin, thinking of the slug.

  “I wish Hugh w
ere around,” she said.

  “He anchored you, didn’t he?”

  “Your father did, too.” She ran her hand across the spread, a handmade flowered quilt she’d bought from an artist exhibiting at the Museum of Arts and Design. Bands of aquamarine and silver divided the flower blocks. “I’m glad you’re home, Clara. It’s good to have someone around I can trust.”

  I pulled my knees up to my chest and wrapped my arms around them. Being someone my mother trusted seemed like a lot of responsibility. Look at what had happened to the others: dead. I bit my lip.

  She motioned to a glass of warm milk on the side table. “I put a little something in that to help you sleep.” She kissed my forehead and got up. “Good night, darling.”

  Bathed in the first maternal love I’d felt in a long time, I drank the milk down until it was only a thin film coating the glass. Tucked under the covers, I should have slept dream-free. Instead, the moment Mother shut out the light, images started tramping furrows in my brain, like a circus horse on a tether, round and round and round. Only Mother’s “little something” eventually knocked them down enough that I could rest in a sort of nether world, halfway between dreams and waking, halfway between truth and desire.

  Chapter 24

  Mother woke me at nine the next morning; we had to be at the church by ten-thirty for the funeral service. If we got there a little early, she said, she’d call Chief DuPont about the interview she’d promised him. I hoped the man Hetty had been having an affair with would be there as well. Somehow, I had to identify this guy; he might know what got her killed.

  Between my general exhaustion and the bump on my head, I felt as if I were negotiating the world from inside a bad Halloween mask—the kind where you can’t really breathe and it gets all steamed up and you have to press the mask to your face so you can see what’s to the sides as well as straight ahead.

  As I shut off the shower, the front door bell rang, a pealing set of tones meant to evoke Notre Dame. My father had installed the whimsy after an anniversary trip to Paris. A loud and imperious knocking followed the chimes, then the chimes rang out again.

  I flung a towel around my head, threw on my robe, and ran down the stairs while tying the belt. Mother had gotten there first. Mary Ellen stood on the front step.

  “Ringing once would have done the trick, Mary Ellen. No need to bring the house down.” Mother’s icy tones were never better employed.

  “Let me in.” She pushed past us, shutting the door quickly. She looked perfectly turned out as always, her white shirt tucked into black riding pants, her boots spit-shined. “I have to talk to you, Constance.”

  “Why should I talk to you?” She ran her hand through her hair. Not a strand dared fall out of place.

  “Because no matter how much you hate me, you’re curious.”

  The cold floor tiles were frosting my bare feet, but I wasn’t missing a second of this. I wiggled my toes to keep the blood flowing. Mother noticed. Mother noticed everything.

  “Whatever it is,” Mother said, “I’m not going to stand here while Clara gets pneumonia. “Honey—”

  Was she addressing me?

  “—put some warm clothes on. Mary Ellen and I will be in the kitchen.”

  She faced Mary Ellen again. “I’m not talking to you without a witness, and you have twenty minutes, minus however long Clara takes to dress.”

  I hurried up to the bedroom, squeezing water from my hair on the way. I grabbed flannel-lined jeans and a heavy sweater and took them into the bathroom where I shimmied into them with one hand while using the hairdryer with the other. Five minutes later I was no glamour-girl, but I was presentable.

  I rushed back down the stairs and into the kitchen. Mary Ellen and Mother had arranged themselves on opposite sides of the kitchen table, like opponents in a union negotiation. Sun streamed in over my mother’s shoulders, probably blinding Mary Ellen. I imagined that Mother had directed her to that side of the table deliberately. Between them, a tray with the coffee carafe, mugs, sugar, and milk rested like the Berlin Wall. Neither woman was speaking. Mother flipped through the Wall Street Journal. Mary Ellen watched her.

  “Want me to pour?” I asked. Mother nodded without looking up. She’d found the editorial page. “Mary Ellen?” I asked. She nodded. I filled a mug and pushed it toward her, then poured one for my mother. I poured one for myself and sat down. Mary Ellen doctored the drink with milk and three teaspoons of sugar, stirring vigorously.

  Mother took hers black and reluctantly put the paper to the side. “Well?” She folded her arms.

  Mary Ellen sipped her coffee. “You should stop meddling in our affairs.”

  “Meddling?”

  “You and Clara are poking around where you don’t belong.”

  My mother let out a raucous laugh, like a drunken snort. “Please. You gave up all rights to ask me for anything thirty-six years ago when your sociopathic brother raped me in a parking lot. Thirty-six years that he’s been running around free on this planet doing god-knows-what to who-knows-whom else. Thirty-six years that you’ve been backing his story and telling everyone in this town what a liar I am.”

  I’d never heard her so furious or raw or honest. It was painful.

  Mary Ellen remained impervious, the ice queen in her ice castle. “If you don’t, we’ll make sure Clara’s dear friend Paul is brought up on sexual harassment charges, and Clara’s other dear friend Bailey loses her law license for conspiring with the Democratic candidate while working for Republicans. And then there’s dear HIV-infected Richard. So many delicious possibilities for him.” She said it all without a trace of emotion.

  If I’d been a different person, I would have reached across the table and banged her head against the wall until her eyes glazed over and she died. The hatred shocked me. It felt a little too close to my Winters biology and too far from the person I wanted to be.

  “And to prevent this, you want us to do what, exactly?” Mother’s demeanor was as icy as Mary Ellen’s. It was as if the threats hadn’t registered.

  “Clara will resign from the campaign. Can’t have the scandal of a firing. You will burn the DNA report. Clara will stop running around town, talking to everyone she can find about Hugh’s death and your past.”

  “Hugh’s murder remains unsolved?”

  “And Hetty’s. So tragic.” She pouted. “You know Andrew is obsessed. If you don’t acquiesce, he will find a way to eliminate all the…obstacles.”

  “You mean he’d murder us, too?”

  She shrugged.

  I looked at Mother and Mother looked at me. Having watched a lot of TV, as far as I could figure in my TV-educated mind, we’d just witnessed a confession to plan murder and conspiracy. Maybe it didn’t count if your brother was a lawyer.

  “There are two witnesses here to your threats, Mary Ellen.”

  “Should I call Kyle?” I asked her.

  Mary Ellen sneered. “Oh yes, let’s get your little boyfriend involved. Your little black boyfriend. Let’s just see who the judges believe in this town, me and my brother or that newcomer with his sketchy history.”

  Sketchy history? What sketchy history? Was that why he wouldn’t talk about New Orleans?

  Mother said, “All these years, Mary Ellen, and you’re still his lackey. Don’t you want a life of your own?”

  “I’ve been a part of it from the start.”

  Mother’s eyes turned ice cold and she leaned forward. “Yes, Mary Ellen. I have known all these years you sold me to your brother for a prom date.”

  I looked back and forth between them. “I don’t get it.”

  Mother sighed. “Mary Ellen delayed your grandfather, telling him some story about her college prospects and how excited she was to be going to his alma mater. As I recall, you never did go to Princeton, did you?”

  Mary Ellen didn’t look ashamed or c
ontrite. She looked the same as always: calculating. I wondered if she practiced that look in the mirror. Aunt Mary Ellen. I shuddered, suddenly feeling her blood in my veins, and flashing on the blood dreams. Maybe that’s what they’d meant—it was the blood that was coming for Mother—the blood connection she had with the Winters through me. My vision was suddenly filled with blood, and I shook my head to clear it, but I still felt it in the back of my throat.

  I said, “You’ve done your duty. Is there something else you want?”

  Mary Ellen‘s voice took on a wheedling tone. “Andrew wants to win. If there’s some way you could tell me what the outcome of this election would be…if it were negative, maybe what we could do to change that…” She tipped her head to the side, shrugged her eyebrows, as if to say we knew what she was talking about.

  Mother’s chin went up.

  Uh oh.

  I thought about making more coffee. I thought about getting out of the kitchen. I thought about moving to Antarctica. I thought about all the lovely long, lazy days I’d had when I could do pretty much whatever I wanted without worrying about the consequences. I thought about life before I knew how I’d been conceived, before I knew for sure that Mother had the same gift I did, before I remembered hurting Hetty and tried to apologize, before I met Andrew Winters. I thought about working in the garden with my father, about finding Mother’s meditation house. And I thought about how everything in my life, and everything in my mother’s life stemmed from this question, the one that Mary Ellen was again asking my mother, the one that had nearly destroyed her life thirty-five years ago.

  Why is it that we have to keep answering the same questions? It’s as if, in each new incarnation of the soul, a new torment must be overcome. It would be so much easier if we could deal with all the suffering in one lifetime and then proceed directly to “go.”

  When I become God, I’m going to make it work that way.

  I pulled myself out of my wandering thoughts. I wanted to put my head down on the table and take a nap, but Mother and I had to deal with the suffering embodied by Mary Ellen and Andrew Winters and their incessant greed for power. Mary Ellen was still talking. Mary Ellen was always talking. “If you’d just helped us all those years ago, Constance, your life would have been so different. You and I, we might still be friends.” Was that cajolery I heard? “If you’re unwilling, perhaps Clara…?”