Hide and Seek (2 page)

Two deafening shots came from his gun. He fired right at us. He meant to kill either Jennie or me, maybe both of us.

I had a surprise for Phillip, just this one time.

Peekaboo yourself!

I fired back.

CHAPTER II

S
OMETIMES, I FEEL as though I'm wearing a horrifying scarlet letter—only the letter is
M
, for
Murderess
. I know this feeling will never completely go away and it seems so unfair. It
is
unfair. It's inhuman and indecent.

The memories are jagged and chaotic, but at the end so vivid and horrifying that they are etched into my brain. They will be with me forever.

I'll tell you all of it, sparing no one, especially myself. I know that you want to hear. I know this is a “big news story.” I know what it is to be “news.”
Do you have any idea?
Can you imagine yourself as a piece of news, as cold black type that everybody reads, and makes judgments about?

Area newspapers from Newburgh, Cornwall, Middle-town called the first shooting the worst “family tragedy” in the history of West Point. To me, at the time, it seemed as though it had happened to someone else. Not to Jennie and me, or even to Phillip, as much as he may have deserved it.

Yet a dozen years later, after time and my own denial had clouded the events still further and made even my emotions hazy, a
second killing
has forced me to remember West Point in all of its horrible vividness.

I obsessively confront the questions that pound in my brain: Am I a murderer?

Did I kill not one, but two of my husbands?

I don't know anymore.
I don't know!
As crazy as that sounds, I honestly don't.

It gets terribly cold here—sometimes it seems as cold as it was that Christmas Eve when Phillip died. All I can do is sit in this prison cell, in torment, and wait for the trial to begin.

I decided to write it all down. I'm writing it for myself—but I'm also writing it for you. I'll tell you everything.

When you've read it,
you
decide. That's how our system works, right? A jury of my peers.

And, oh yes, I trust you. I'm a trusting person. That's probably why I'm here, in all of this terrible trouble.

Book One

Star-Crossed

CHAPTER 1

Early winter, 1984

More snow. Another Christmas season. Almost a year after Phillip's death—or as some would have it,
his murder
.

I sat back in the yellow cab as it bounced and plowed through the slush-filled New York streets. I was trying to put my mind in a calm place, but it wouldn't be still for me. I had promised myself I wouldn't be afraid—but I was
very
afraid.

Outside the streaked, wet taxi window, even the Salvation Army Santa Clauses looked miserable. Nobody sane or sensible was out walking today; those who were would not take their hands from their pockets to make a donation. The traffic cops looked like abandoned snowmen. The pigeons had disappeared from every window-sill and rooftop.

I glanced at my own reflection in the cab's window. Very long, blond hair, mostly with a mind of its own, but my best physical attribute, I thought. Freckles that no amount of makeup would ever cover. Nose a little out of proportion. Brown eyes that had, I knew, regained at least some of their half-forgotten sparkle. A small mouth, thickish lips—made, as Phillip joked in the happy days, for fellatio.

The thought of him made me shudder. The idea of sex still makes me afraid, and much worse.

It had been a year since the terrible shooting at West Point. My recovery was slow, both physically and mentally, and it wasn't complete. My leg still hurt, and my brain didn't function with the clarity I'd once taken pride in. I found myself frightened by small noises. I saw threats in nighttime streets when none existed. Previously in pretty good control of my feelings, I had lost that control. I would cry for no reason, grow angry at a neighbor's kindness, be suspicious of friends and afraid of strangers. There were times when I hated myself!

There had been an investigation, of course, but no trial. If Jennie hadn't been so badly beaten, if it had been only me with bloodied hair and a damaged leg, I might have been sent to prison that first time. But the fact that my three-year-old was injured too made our claim of self-defense more convincing.

No prosecutor wanted to take on the case, and the military academy was only too happy to have it hushed up.

Officers, it was a well-known fact,
did not attack their wives and daughters. Wives and daughters really didn't exist at the Point. We were decorative
.

So I took flight, and traveled to New York City, where I rented a two-bedroom apartment. It was a second-floor walkup in a dreary brownstone on West Seventy-fifth Street. I located a day school for Jennie. Our lives began to move at a slower pace.

But I hadn't found what I wanted most: an end to the pain, a beginning to a new life.

I was twenty-five years old. I wore the letter
M
. I had taken someone's life, even if it had been in self-defense.

No guts, no glory
, I urged myself on. I was definitely moving on sheer guts that day. I was chasing a dream I'd held on to and cherished for more than a dozen years.

Perhaps today that new life would start. But was I doing the right thing? Was I ready for this? Or was I about to make a horribly embarrassing mistake?

I tightly held a briefcase in my lap, filled with songs I had written during the past year. Songs—the music and the words—were my way of exposing my pain and expressing my hopes for the future.

Actually, I'd been writing songs since I was ten or eleven. Mostly in my head, but sometimes on paper. The songs were the one thing that everybody seemed to like about me, the one thing I did well.

Were they any good? I thought maybe they were, but Jennie and a squirrel named Smooch were the only ones who had heard them, and, eager for praise as I was, I knew enough not to trust the opinion of a four-year-old, or a squirrel.

Soon, though, there would be another listener. I was on my way to audition the songs for Barry Kahn,
the
Barry Kahn, the singer-composer who had electrified America a decade ago and now was one of the most important record producers in the world.

Barry Kahn wanted to hear my songs
.

Or so he said.

CHAPTER 2

I
WAS PETRIFIED.

And then it got much worse.

“You're late,” he said. Those were his very first words to me. “I work on a very tight schedule.”

“It was the snow,” I said. “It took forever to find a cab, and then it kept skidding. I guess I was nervous and asked the driver to go faster, only he went slower, and—”

Jesus
, I thought.
You sound like a dumb parakeet. Pull yourself together, Polly. Right now!

He was unmoved. Seemed like a real bastard. “You should have left earlier. My days are full. I plan ahead. So should you. Would you like coffee?”

The question, the sudden politeness, took me by surprise. “Yes, please.”

He rang for his secretary. “Cream and sugar?” I nodded. His secretary appeared. “Coffee for Ms. Bradford, Lynn. The works. Danish?” I shook my head. “Nothing for me,” he instructed, his voice filled with the huskiness that made his singing so distinctive.

He dismissed Lynn with a wave, then sat at his desk with his eyes closed, as though he had all eternity. I wondered:
Who the hell is this guy?

He was in his early forties, I guessed, with a receding hairline and brown hair, a long nose, thin mouth, and a slight perpetual stubble on his chin. A homely face (the fans who think he's “sexy” are attracted by his soul, not his looks), but its lines suggested struggle and its repose peace. At our first meeting he was dressed casually, in gray flannel slacks and a blue shirt, open at the neck, obviously expensive but worn with lack of care. Barry Kahn
looked
rather sweet and harmless.

Single, I deduced, and living alone. I wasn't interested in him that way, but I noticed anyway. I'm good with details. I always notice things, especially about people.

Lynn returned with coffee in a china cup, and I took it from her, splashing it on my wrist. Not very relaxed. Indeed, kind of an ass. That's how I felt at the time anyway.

Petrified! As in wood
—
that never, ever moves
.

Barry stood to offer assistance, but I waved him away. “I'm fine.” I'm in control. I'm cool. Pay no attention to the scarlet
M
.

Barry sat back down. “You're quite a letter writer,” he said. I
guess
it was a compliment.

In the hospital, as my recuperation progressed and I began composing song after song, I had planned to write only one letter to him, telling him that I admired him and hoped I could audition for him someday. But the one letter gave rise to another, and by April, I was writing him nearly every week, letters from deep inside my heart, to a person I had never met.
Hooo boy!

Weird, I know, but that's what I'd done. I sure couldn't take the letters back now.

He didn't answer any of them, and I wasn't even sure he read them. I only knew they were never sent back unopened. But I continued to write the letters. Actually, the letters kept me going. Talking to somebody, even if the person didn't talk back.

In a way, I think writing the letters helped me recover. I gradually got stronger, began to believe that one day I would be all right again. I knew Jennie would be okay, or at least as okay as you can be if, at age three, you've witnessed horrible mayhem in your own house.

My sisters traveled from upstate New York, and took turns watching her. The hospital let Jennie visit as often as they could bring her. She was fascinated by my wheelchair and the electric bed. And she could thrill me whenever she hugged me and pleaded, “Sing me a song, Mommy. No. Make up a new song, and sing it.”

I sang to Jennie often. I sang for both of us. I wrote a new song a day.

Then, an amazing thing happened. A miracle. A letter arrived for me at West Point Hospital.

Dear Maggie
, the letter said.

Okay, okay, you win. I've no idea why I'm answering you, but I guess I'm an easy mark even though I don't like to think so and if you tell anybody else, that'll be it for us forever
.

In fact, your letters moved me. I get lots of mail, most of which my secretary throws away without showing to me. And the letters she does give me I throw away
.

But you
—
you're different. You remind me that there are real people out there, not just sycophants wanting to get into my studio. I feel I've actually come to know you a little bit, and that says a whole lot about what you've written so far
.

I was impressed with some of the lyrics you sent me. Amateur stuff—you need a songwriting education
—
but powerful all the same because they say something. None of this means that (a) the education will do you any good; or (b) you can write music for a living, but okay, okay. I'll give you the half hour of my time you asked for “to find out once and for all if I've got a talent for songwriting or not.”

When you get out of the hospital, call Lynn Needham, my secretary, to set up an appointment. But in the meantime, please don't write me any more letters. You've taken up enough of my time already. Don't write to me
—
write more songs!

CHAPTER 3

H
E SIGNED THE letter “Barry,” and now here I was and he was looking at me, and I felt hopelessly out of place, one of those “sycophants” he had grumbled about. I definitely hadn't overdressed—that wasn't my style. I had on a white peasant's blouse, pink camisole, a long black skirt, flat shoes.

But at least I was here. I was going for it.

I was trying so hard not to have any negative thoughts … but things like this, really good things, never happen to people like me. They just
don't
.

“Do you sing your songs, or do you just write them?” he asked.

“I sing them too, at least I hope you'll call it singing.”
Stop apologizing, Maggie. You don't have to apologize for anything
.

“Ever performed professionally?”

“I did some backup singing in clubs around West Point, Newburgh. But my husband didn't like it when I did.”

“He didn't like much, did he?”

“He thought I was exposing myself. Couldn't stand other men looking at me.”
So I shot him
—
three times
.

“But you'd be willing to try it now? Sing in public? You could do that?”

My heart raced at the thought. “Yes, I could.” It seemed the right thing to say.

“Good answer.” He gestured toward a beautiful, shining black Steinway at the far end of his office. “But your first test's in private. Did you bring anything?”

I picked up my briefcase. “Lots. Do you want to hear ballads? Blues?”

He winced. “No, Maggie. Just one. This is an audition, not a gig.”

One song?
I thought. My heart sank.

I had no idea which song to pick.
One
song? I had brought at least two dozen, and now I stood rattled and confused, as though I were standing naked in front of him.

Put it in gear. He's human. He just doesn't act like it. You've sung these songs a thousand times before
.

“Go on,” he said, looking at his watch.
“Please
, Maggie.”

I sucked in a deep breath and sat down at the piano. I'm fairly tall, self-conscious about it, so I prefer to sit. From the seat I could see the silent chaos of Broadway through his window.

Petrified wood
.

Okay
, I thought.
You're here. You're actually auditioning for Barry Kahn. Now, knock his socks off. You … can … do … it
.

“This is a song called ‘Woman in the Moon.’ It's about a … a woman who works nights cleaning buildings in a small town. How she always sees the moon from a certain window while she works. What she dreams about all night in the offices she cleans.”