Fox River (7 page)

Mel took over. “But not everything. After he heard your voice, he was in such a hurry that he dropped a necklace.”

Christian stared at him.

“That’s the necklace you found on the stairs,” Peter said. “The one that put you in this prison.”

“They’re looking for the jewelry now.” Mel took out his handkerchief again. “He’s told the police where to look. When they find it, it will corroborate his story.”

Christian sat forward. “And if they don’t?”

“Why wouldn’t they?”

“Because it’s been nine years. Where does he say he hid it?”

Peter answered. “Along the fence line between South Land and Claymore Park.”

“Do you know how many people come and go at South Land? Do you think there’s really a chance that if any of the drifters who’ve worked for the Sutherlands found that jewelry they would have turned it in?”

“Zandoff says he was planning to go back for it,” Peter said. “Only he never had the chance. He got scared and took off for Florida without it. But he claims he hid it well. We’ve got a good chance, Christian. A very good chance.”

“And if they do find it?”

“Then we’ll be back in court to have you released while the matter’s investigated further.”

Christian sat absolutely still, but his heart was speeding. He could school his appearance, even his thoughts, but his body remembered what it was like to be free.

Peter reached across the table and rested his hand on Christian’s. “I know how you must feel. Believe me, I know, and so does Mel.”

“How do I feel?” Christian wasn’t even certain.

“Angry so much of your life has been wasted. Hopeful that the worst is almost over. Afraid that it isn’t.”

“Why would Zandoff confess?”

“He doesn’t have anything to lose.”

“He’s got a wife, children….”

“Maybe he wants to do the right thing for once, to show his kids that he had some kind of morals.”

“Maybe he just feels sorry for you,” Mel said. “He knows another man is serving time for something he did.”

Christian knew other men who had killed simply for the pleasure of it. Not a one of them would care if someone else took the rap.

“Maybe he’s bragging.” Peter removed his hand. “Maybe he just wants the world to know how good he was at what he did and how many times he did it.”

“Or maybe he’s hoping if he confesses to a few more murders, he can string the authorities along for a while and hold off his execution date.” Mel put his arms on the table. “Who the hell cares, Christian? That’s not your problem. In fact, as far as I can see, you don’t have a problem right now. You just got to sit tight and wait. They’re bringing metal detectors, and they’re going to start digging holes along the fence line today. Zandoff’s outlined the general area, but this may take a while. Nobody’s exactly sure where or how deep he buried it. We don’t want to miss it by inches.”

Christian said nothing, but his mind was whirling.

“We wanted you to know,” Peter said. “We didn’t want to spring it on you. There’s a chance this won’t come to anything, but it’s a small one. Even without the jewelry to back up Zandoff’s story, we can still get back into court with this. It will take longer, and the outcome won’t be as certain, but the odds are still in your favor.”

“If we have to, we’ll try to find somebody, anybody, who remembers Zandoff being in the area when Miss Sutherland was killed.” Mel took out his handkerchief once more, this time to clean his glasses. “We’ll search the records of local contractors, cheap hotels, ask at bars….”

Everything they described cost money, and lots of it. Every breath Mel took cost money. He had reduced his fees since the beginning, believing he would free Christian, and the resulting publicity would be worth the fees he lost. And to his credit, even after a devastating defeat, he had continued to reduce his fees during the appeals process. But even reduced, Christian’s legal fees could put quadruplets through Ivy League colleges and send them to Europe after graduation.

The money had been paid by Peter Claymore.

Christian switched his gaze to Peter. “If something does happen, and they let me out of here, I’ll find a way to pay you back.”

“You were my son’s best friend. You’re like a son to me, Christian. Robby would have expected me to help you. You don’t owe me a thing.”

But Christian knew he owed Peter everything. Were it not for Peter, his life would be entirely without hope. And despite his better instincts, Christian could feel hope stirring. Despite a past that railed against it. Despite the friends who had deserted him and the detractors who had silently nodded their heads. Hope was light pouring through the broken pieces of his heart.

M
aisy was a good cook, but Jake was a better one. Together they fixed a dinner that tempted Julia out of her self-imposed fast. She had Callie to think about, a vulnerable daughter who did not need another anorexic role model. Television already supplied too many.

She decided to address her own embarrassment upfront. “This is delicious. But I bet I’m making a mess.”

Callie giggled. “You have gravy on your chin.”

Julia felt a napkin dabbing around her mouth. She let her daughter take care of her, grateful that Callie seemed more interested in than frightened by her predicament.

“I’m going to try eating with my eyes closed,” Callie said.

“One messy eater at a table, please.” Julia smiled in her daughter’s direction. “Poor Maisy will have enough to clean up as it is.”

“Another biscuit?” Maisy spoke from across the table. “Julia?”

Julia shook her head. “This is more than I’ve eaten in a week. It’s wonderful.” And it really was. Maisy had always been an eclectic cook, quickly tiring of one cuisine and moving on to another. Thai lemon grass soup or Salvadoran pupusas had been as commonly served as country ham. Tonight she and Jake had prepared Southern classic. Fried chicken, biscuits and cream gravy, green beans cooked with salt pork and Jake’s famous sweet potato pie for dessert. A heart attack on a plate.

“Pie after I clean up?” Maisy asked.

“I’ll help,” Julia said. “I can dry dishes.”

Maisy didn’t argue or fuss. “I’ll help you find your way.”

“I want to see Feather Foot.” Callie’s chair scraped the floor beside Julia. “He might be lonely.”

“I’ll take you.” Jake’s chair scraped, too. “Then we can close up for the night. I could use your help.”

“Can I, Mommy?”

“You bet.” Julia got to her feet and slid her hands along the table until it ended. Maisy took her arm, and, shuffling her feet so as not to trip, Julia followed her mother’s lead.

The kitchen was large enough for a table of its own, enameled metal and cool to the touch. Julia rested her fingers on its edge. Whenever she had needed help she had done her homework here as a young girl, letting Maisy drill her on spelling words or Jake untangle math problems, step by step. She had abandoned this warm family center as she grew older, preferring her own company to theirs. Her room had become a haven, the telephone her lifeline.

Again she thought of Fidelity, and, inevitably, of Christian.

“You have the expression on your face you used to get as a little girl.” Maisy released Julia’s arm. “You’re a million miles away. I used to wonder how to travel that far.”

Julia was surprised. Maisy, for all her love, her sneak attacks into intimacy, rarely expressed what she was feeling. She decided to be honest. “I was just thinking about Fidelity.”

“What brought her to mind?”

“Being here, I guess. I feel like a girl again.”

“She was a big part of your childhood. Christian, too.”

Julia couldn’t touch that. “And Robby. So much sadness.”

“You saw too much sadness.”

“I’ve wondered if that’s what this is about. If I’m blind because of that. If everything finally caught up with me. Fidelity’s murder, Christian’s conviction, Robby’s accident.”

“Did you ask the doctor?”

“Would you share the time of day with that man?”

“Julia, do you want me to see if I can find you a good therapist, somebody you’d feel comfortable talking to?”

Julia could imagine the sort of therapist her mother might choose. An escapee from Esalen, a guru who started each session with ancient Hindu chants or a fully orchestrated psychodrama.

Maisy laughed a little, low and somehow sad. “This is interesting, but I really can almost see your thoughts now. You’ve always been so good at hiding them, but that’s changed.”

“Maisy, I—”

“There’s a woman in Warrenton who is supposed to be excellent. No fireworks or instant revelations. Just good listening skills and sound advice.”

Julia wondered what choice she had. Did she want to call her own friends for recommendations and open her life to more gossip? Could she trust Bard to find someone more suitable?

“Why don’t you give her a try? If you don’t like her, we’ll look for someone else.” Maisy took her arm. “I’ll wash in the dishpan, and I’ll put the clean dishes in the other side of the sink to rinse. You can dry them and stack them on the counter.”

Julia joined her mother at the sink, but the first dish she picked up slipped and fell back into the sink.

“Don’t even say it.” Maisy adjusted the water to a lighter flow. “I won’t put you to drying the good china just yet.”

Julia picked up the plate again and started to rub it with the towel Maisy had provided. “We did this when I was little. Remember? Of course, then I could see what I was doing.”

“From the time we moved in here. When it was just you and me.”

For Julia, those early days seemed like centuries ago. She remembered little before Jake joined their lives and almost nothing of living in the big house with her father. “Why did you move here, Maisy?” She had asked the question before, of course, but she hoped now she would get a more detailed answer.

“Truthfully? Ashbourne’s too large to manage without help, and I thought we needed the time alone to heal after your daddy died.”

“How about later?”

“By then I’d grown to love this place. I couldn’t imagine the two of us rattling around the big house. Then Jake came along…”

Julia couldn’t imagine Jake at the big house, either. Ashbourne had been built by and for people who assumed that they, too, were somehow larger than life. Jake had no such illusions.

Since the conversation was going well, Julia ventured further. “Ashbourne almost seems like a museum. A record of life on the day my father died.”

“Ashbourne belongs to you. I never saw the point of changing things or selling the antiques. I like living here. It will be up to you to decide what to do with Ashbourne once you’re ready.”

“Bard would like to live there.” Ashbourne was grander than Millcreek, although Millcreek had been in his family since the Revolutionary War.

“I always thought as much.”

“But not until you open the property to the Mosby Hunt. It would be too embarrassing for him to live there if you didn’t.”

“And I won’t.” Maisy plunked more dishes on Julia’s side of the sink. “Not as long as the land’s in my name.”

Maisy’s objection to foxhunting at Ashbourne was legendary. Her determination to keep foxhunters off her land had made her the butt of many a local joke and the occasional prank. Julia, by default, had suffered, too.

“Speaking of Bard…” Maisy turned off the water. “I think that’s his car.”

Julia had been waiting all evening for the low purr of the BMW’s engine. Now she heard it, too. “This should be a laugh a minute.”

“Where would you like to talk to him?”

“Somewhere Callie can’t overhear. How about the garden?”

“It’s a little cool tonight.”

“I have a sweater in the dining room.”

“I’ll get the door and the sweater.”

Julia listened as Maisy’s footsteps disappeared. She had steeled herself for this confrontation. Her marriage to Bard had always seemed simple and forthright. It had also been untested, and it was failing this one, as if the added weight of her blindness had tipped a precariously balanced scale.

Moments passed. She heard murmurs from the front of the house, a door close, then footsteps. She dried her hands and turned, leaning against the counter with her arms folded. When he crossed the threshold, she was ready.

“Hello, Bard.”

“Julia.” His voice was tight, as if his throat was closing around it.

“We expected you earlier. Maisy saved a place for you at the dinner table.”

“I’d like to talk to you alone. If I’m allowed?”

She was annoyed by his tone. “You don’t need to be rude. Maisy?”

“Right here. I brought the sweater.”

Julia held out a hand, and Maisy placed the sweater in it. “Need help getting it on?”

“No, I’ll manage.”

Maisy must have turned, because her voice came from a different place. “Julia would like to have this conversation in the garden. Can you help her get there?”

“I can still escort my wife any place she needs to go.”

Julia spoke without thinking. “And any place I don’t need to go, as well.”

“Now who’s being rude?” Bard stepped forward to help her with her sweater.

She didn’t apologize, although it had been a cheap shot. “Let’s go out through this door. Callie’s in the barn with Jake.”

“I understand you sent for Feather Foot, too. Just how long do you intend to stay?”

“As long as I need to.”

She heard the kitchen door open, then felt Bard’s big hand on her upper arm. “Let’s finish this outside.”

He was a large man with a long stride. He did little to modify it as he propelled her to the garden. She stumbled once, and he slowed down, but she could tell he was annoyed by the way he continued to grip her arm.

“You should try this sometime.” Julia came to a halt when he did. “Being dragged along by someone bigger than you. It’s not a reassuring feeling.”

“I didn’t drag you.” He hesitated. “Damn it, I’m sorry. Okay? I’m just so angry.”

“Is this what happens when you don’t get your way? Or hasn’t that happened often enough for you to recognize the signs?”

“You’re determined to be stupid about this, aren’t you?”

“Stupid?”

“It was stupid for you to escape from the clinic. Do you have any idea how that made me look?”

“Let me guess. Like the husband of a stupid woman?”

“Damn it, Julia!”

She was silent, waiting for him to gain control. Although a large part of her wanted to have a screaming match, a larger part knew better. Not only would Callie hear, nothing would be accomplished.

He took a while to get hold of his temper. She imagined steam rising from a boiling kettle, then an unseen hand turning off the heat. The steam billowed, then puffed, and at last died away altogether. But the water was still hot enough to scald.

“Let’s sit down,” he said at last.

“Where are we?”

“There’s a bench under a tree.” He led her there. She could hear him brushing leaves from the wooden slats; then he repositioned her. She could feel the bench against the backs of her knees. She sat gingerly.

Julia knew enough of her mother’s gardening style to visualize how this garden looked in moonlight. With fall in the air, Maisy would have planted gold and orange chrysanthemums. Purple asters bloomed here when the weather began to turn, perhaps there was flowering kale this year. Maisy’s gardens were chaotically haphazard and more beautiful because of it, as if God Himself had randomly sprinkled all the colors of the world with a generous hand.

“I came here a lot as a teenager.” Julia explored the bench with her fingertips. “You can see the road through those trees.” She inclined her head. “Sometimes I’d see you riding by. Did you ever notice me?”

If he understood her attempt to take the conversation to a more conciliatory level, he gave no sign. “What were you thinking, Julia? Dr. Jeffers says you found your way downstairs by yourself. You could have been killed.”

“I had help. Did he also tell you he threatened to have me committed?”

“He was trying to keep you there for your own good.”

“Bard, I’m an amateur psychologist. I’ll admit it. But doesn’t it make sense that I won’t get better unless I’m part of the cure?”

“Maybe you don’t want to get better.”

“Then there’s no point to being at the clinic, is there? Think of all the money we’re saving. I can wallow in my blindness for free.”

He took her hand, swallowing it in his. “I don’t mean consciously, Julia. I know you think you want to get better.”

“Now who’s playing amateur psychologist?”

“Well, if you wanted it badly enough, wouldn’t you just see again?”

“Back to that.”

“I don’t know what to think.” He squeezed her hand.

She let him, even though she really wanted him to disappear.

She wanted him to disappear.
The thought surprised her, and for a moment it choked off conversation.

“We won’t talk about the clinic anymore,” he said at last. “Maybe I was being too heavy-handed.”

Concessions came with a price. She waited.

“I want you to come home.”

She removed her hand from his. “I’m sorry, but for now I’m right where I need to be.”

“I’m not going to work on you to go back to the clinic, if that’s what you’re afraid of. That chapter’s over. We’ll—”

“You’re not listening again. Even if the clinic’s never mentioned, I want to be here. I need to be here. It feels right.”

“What are you really saying? That you need to be here—or you need to be away from me?”