The Memory Keeper

by Lisa Stowe

  Chapter 6

  The early morning was clearing, clouds the color of sheep scattered and stretched across mountaintops like airy threads. A brief shower raced across town, but the fine rain was there only long enough to give birth to an elusive rainbow. Cody watched it fade away as she walked down Cedar Street toward Seventh and the City Hall.

  Last night she had been reclining on the motel bed reading a history of Wallace and Burke, her open window filling the room with fresh cool air and the sounds of pattering rain. The ringing of the phone had startled her with its strident tones and for a moment she could not answer it. The only person who would call would be her mother, and she had no desire to learn what new dramatic problem May wanted to blame her for. But after three rings, Cody remembered she had been giving out her number to people, and grabbed up the phone with hope blossoming.

  “Am I speaking with Cody Marsh?” a woman asked.

  “Yes.”

  “The Cody Marsh who is looking for information on Charles Mogen?”

  “Yes." Did she sound too anxious?

  “If you could be at City Hall tomorrow promptly at eight a.m. I will have time to meet with you.”

  “Okay, but who is this and where is City Hall?” Cody asked, perplexed.

  “This is Mayor Naylor.” The woman’s sigh conveyed exasperation. “The City Hall is on Seventh and Cedar. Do you need directions?”

  “No, I can find it.”

  “Good. Ms. Blaine from the museum asked me to contact you, and said you were friends with my brother. She also mentioned you were the one to find him. Because of that I’m willing to meet with you, although I’m not sure how I can help you. Can you tell me exactly what you are looking for?”

  “I’m not really sure,” Cody responded, flustered and flushing in the presence of the professional voice. “I met my grandfather Charles Mogen for the first time a few months ago but he died before I could get to know him. He grew up in this area so I’m trying to find people who might have known him or heard stories about him. I’d also like to learn more about his mother, Alice, and a madam named Ethel Stevenson, who used to look out for Charles." Cody added the last part on impulse, realizing she might learn about her grandfather from people who had shaped his life.

  “Well,” the mayor said, her voice as cool as the autumn evening. “I’m not sure how much I can help but I’m willing to give you an appointment. It will have to be brief though.”

  “I understand,” Cody said. “I know this must be a hard time for you.”

  “My brother’s death, as horrible as it is, can’t impact my work responsibilities. Tomorrow at eight is the only opening I have for several days. As it is, I’m going to have to reschedule several important appointments once the memorial is arranged.”

  Cody bit down on the words she wanted to say. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience,” she said instead.

  “The brief time your appointment takes will hardly be an inconvenience.”

  Cody hadn’t meant her appointment but it would be obviously pointless to clarify her comment. “Well, thanks for the time anyway.”

  “Until tomorrow then." And with that, the conversation ended, leaving Cody simmering as if Kelly had been slighted somehow by a sister not grieving.

  Now, a few minutes before eight, Cody walked up a narrow boxed in staircase in a squat brick building, similar in construction to the museum, but missing the dust and cobwebs.

  The large airy office on the second floor was tastefully decorated with framed historical prints of Wallace. Nothing gave away the personality of the woman behind a desk of cherry wood that complimented her deep auburn hair and fair skin. She was the epitome of what Cody’s coloring might have been if her hair had been less flame bright and her freckles invisible.

  “Ms. Marsh. Thank you for being prompt. I’m Kendra Naylor, mayor of Wallace. And this is my grandfather, Keith Naylor Jr., former mayor.”

  Cody hadn’t seen the elderly man when she came in, and his sudden appearance from a corner of the room startled her. He smiled confidently as he used a cane to maneuver slowly forward, as if aware of her discomfiture. A hump bowed his back and shortened his height but not his stature. When he reached her, he held out a gnarled hand.

  “Cody is it? I hear you are looking for stories about some of our past residents.”

  “Yes,” Cody said, taking his hand, expecting a brief handshake.

  “Kelly was a disappointment,” he said, his thumb caressing her knuckles.

  “Pardon me?” The abrupt topic, with no warning, confused Cody. She tried to pull her hand back but Keith held on, watching her intently.

  “He let my son, his father, down when he decided against politics. He was unduly influenced by Ranger Matt Tanner, got caught up in the romantic ideal of saving people. The reality was Kelly had a job that allowed him to play more than work. If he’d done what the family expected of him, and taken the job of mayor, I’d still have a grandson and Kendra would still have a brother.”

  “But you have to admit,” Kendra said. “He would never have been the mayor I am, right?” Cody saw her reach out almost tentatively toward the old man, but he never looked at Kendra, just continued to rub Cody’s hand.

  “Your talent as a mayor is related to your ability to listen to my guidance,” Keith said. “Though a lady would be married and fully round with child. A woman’s job is to bear the family name forward. You are mayor because we had no male heir to step up.”

  Pinkness stole over Kendra’s cheekbones even as color leached away from around her glossy lips, as if she gritted her teeth. Or maybe bit back words. If allowed to escape, Cody wondered if they would be words of anger or humiliation.

  Cody tugged her hand away and couldn’t stop from wiping her palm down her thigh. Keith’s smile broadened as if he enjoyed her discomfort.

  The old man nodded his head to Kendra, as if tossing her a tidbit of appeasement. “Certainly Kelly would have needed more guidance than you, though. Nevertheless his disobedience to me was his failure.

  “I doubt Kelly asked to be shot in the back,” Cody said, sickened into defending Kelly.

  “Ah, but Kelly is neither here nor there,” Keith said, seemingly oblivious to the cruelty of his words. “You ask about Charles, Alice, and Ethel. An interesting combination. Alice I understand, but why would you ask us about an old whore?”

  “Rachel Blaine mentioned Ethel was more a mother to my grandfather than Alice. And I’m looking for all stories that might connect to Charles." Cody spoke fast, reciting, wanting to end the interview and leave the old man.

  “Of course you are,” Keith said. “I remember Charles clearly, although we weren’t companions, his being from a poorer family as it were. I remember a boy that kept to himself, worked any odd job he could find, unlike me. My only job was learning and excelling in politics. Charles came from a railroad family. Transients. My family, on the other hand, is still here.”

  “And still politicians,” Kendra said.

  Keith patted her on the shoulder, as if bestowing approval and Kendra smiled, her face lighting up.

  “Did Charles have any friends that might still be alive?” Cody asked.

  “As I just said, he was a loner. I’m sure he had some friends, but to be honest I didn’t pay that crowd much mind.”

  “What about Alice?”

  “Alice was quite religious. She was adamant about the evils of drink, and pushed for the closing of bordellos and bars. And yet, many times, she was picked up for being publicly inebriated. She felt communion must be done with real wine, and the faithful had communion with every meal.”

  Cody cringed inwardly at the thought of a little boy living in such an environment. At least her mother didn’t drink, having found hypochondria to be a more productive addiction.

  “Do you know anything about Ethel?” Cody asked.

  “And now, Ms. Marsh, your appointment time is up,” Keith said, rheumy eyes intent as he continued to smile.

&nbs
p; “Pardon me?”

  “We are done reminiscing. No more trips down memory lane. So goodbye." He turned his back on Cody and limped to the desk, picking up some papers and thumbing through them.

  Cody looked at Kendra, who, fidgeting with a pen, seemed unable to meet Cody’s eyes.

  “Well…thank you for your time then." Cody started for the door, feeling the same humiliation she got after spending time with her mother.

  “Ms. Marsh,” Kendra said, standing and coming around from behind the barricade of the desk. “You are asking about a time when things were more traditional, and families kept their personal lives private, which is as it should be in most cases. If there was a child today living as Charles did, I would have acted on it, involved Child Protective Services. However, back then, people did for their own.”

  “Kendra,” Keith said, almost impatiently, as he sat down in the mayor’s chair and adjusted the computer keyboard. “You are a credit to your position as mayor, and the protection of children should be used as a platform for the next election. Shall we talk now about the new mining venture Mr. Russell is contemplating?”

  Cody had become invisible. She recognized the signs, having seen them many times growing up, though rarely so blatant. She left the office, found a public restroom, and scalded her hands clean.

  Out on the street, a brisk wind had finished clearing the sky, and the air held a cleansing damp coolness. Cody turned onto Bank Street, not sure if the meeting had accomplished anything. The more she thought about it, the more she found it strange Charles had not talked about his early years. He had rarely mentioned his childhood, and even more rarely, his mother. Had Alice always been unbalanced, or did it become worse when she was left alone with a child to raise? How could a man leave a child with a woman who was clearly unstable?

  Cody’s fingernails bit into her palms. Why had her own father left her in the care of a mother just as unstable in her own way?

  Without warning, she was overwhelmed by the memory of her last birthday. It had been a cold January day, and with no friends or party to distract her, she had started wondering about her father. A spur of the moment decision had pulled her into her mother’s bedroom to look for mementos of a man she barely remembered. Instead, she had come across her mother’s journal, lying open on the bed. She had not wanted to read it, but the words had jumped up, impaling themselves in her heart.

  “…her twenty-third birthday tomorrow and I suppose I should do something to mark that, but I’ve just been so light headed and dizzy. It’s so hard to believe I have been a single mother for so long. And what a long, hard road it has been, too. Not only dealing with supporting her and raising her and all the financial hardship that means, but having to deal with her being so ungrateful and unappreciative. I’m afraid she’s going to turn out selfish. Just like her father, take, take, take.”

  The words still humiliated Cody, and she walked faster along the street, as if she could outpace the memories. A few cars drove by, and one or two pedestrians passed her, but she was unaware of any of it until she realized she was at the gas station. She continued past to the trailhead behind the building, where caution tape hung limply between trees. Impulsively, she ducked underneath, climbing up into the cool dappled light of the fall woods, escaping the town and people, but unable to leave bitter memories behind as easily.

  What had hurt most when she read the diary was the thought that her mother considered her selfish. Outside of work, her mother demanded every moment, and Cody had rarely begrudged it. Cody had spent so much of her life doing what was expected of her that she was left without the time necessary to invest in developing many friendships. In school she had been horribly shy, hiding in corners so that over the years most kids forgot she was there. As an adult, she’d continued in the background of life, where she was comfortable and safe.

  Brushing against huckleberry bushes, the bright berries long gone, Cody climbed upward. When she reached the spot in the trail where Kelly had died, now cordoned off with more caution tape, she sank down on an old log, still thinking about her life. All Cody had forfeited and left behind and never experienced, all she had given to her mother, and in return May thought so little of her only daughter. The words had been, in a very real sense, a betrayal of love and trust, and had planted the first tiny seeds of dissatisfaction with her life.

  Weak sunlight filtered down, sparkling off dampness left from the earlier rain that had washed away Kelly’s blood. If it wasn’t for the yellow tape, she might not have been able to find the exact spot. The woods had a clean, new feel to them, the air a cold purity that ached as she pulled in a deep lungful. Angrily she wiped tears away with the back of her hand. Why did she allow her mother’s words to still hurt? And why didn’t she have the courage to defend herself against nasty old men like Keith Naylor? She palmed her cheeks again. All crying did was give her a headache, and tears were nothing but another symbol of lost control.

  Pressing the palms of her hands tightly against her eyes, she willed unwanted memories away, shuddering as the damp wood she sat on leached cold through her jeans. Water dripped from leaves, a wind stirred high in the treetops, and small brown creepers sang their autumn songs in the underbrush as they flitted back and forth. The place was peaceful, but Cody kept thinking about the three men who had briefly touched her life and then died.

  Well, she thought, dropping her hands, her mother was miles away, and that in itself was a relief. She was just going through a rough patch because of her grandfather. She would finish what she came for and then step back into her old controlled life, hopefully able to continue as things had been before her grandfather appeared. If, secretly, she wearied of servitude to her mother, she had to admit it was safe and predictable.

  Standing up, she decided to leave memories of humiliation where they belonged, and to quit punishing herself with them. Heading back down the trail Cody smiled slightly as a rogue thought entered, making her feel guilty even as she knew how unrealistic it was.

  It was too bad she couldn’t find a way to leave her mother as well.