Life Support (25 page)

“Are you still practicing the piano?” she asked.

Ted nodded. “Yes, I suspect it's like law practice. You never get it exactly right.” Alexia didn't want to discuss the law and decided on a quick exit.

“I'm sorry to interrupt. I'll be going. I don't want to keep you from your work.”

Ted wiped his face with a red bandanna that he took from his back pocket.

“No. I'm thirsty and ready for a break. Would you like some lemonade?”

Alexia hesitated. Ted didn't wait for an answer. “Come inside,” he said and walked toward the front door.

Alexia slowly followed him into the old house. The wooden floors creaked under her feet. The plaster walls were painted in pale pastels.

“For about a hundred years this was the parsonage where every pastor of the church lived,” Ted said. “The senior minister now lives in a house in the Dune View community.”

“I'm familiar with it. Nice area.”

“Yeah, but this house has its charms. Have a look around while I wash up.”

Alexia entered the living room. It was Spartan and functional, not surprising for a bachelor. On the mantel above the fireplace she saw a picture of a young woman leaning against a tree. She stepped closer for a better look. If it was the minister's daughter, the young woman's mother contributed the most to her appearance. The eyes and hair were dark and the cheekbones high, but the mouth and smile were taken directly from Ted Morgan.

Ted stuck his head around the corner. “Do you want to help me make the lemonade?”

“Sure.”

The kitchen was at the rear of the house. There was a bank of windows over the sink that gave a panoramic view of the church graveyard. Alexia looked outside while she washed her hands.

“That's a happy scene,” she said. “Rows and rows of tombstones.”

“Only if you don't like graveyards.”

“Do you like them?”

“Not in a morbid way, but this one has so many old graves that I don't think about the fact that the people are dead. I'm more interested in finding out how they lived when they were alive.”

Alexia dried her hands with a towel. “Are any famous people buried here?”

“A former U.S. senator and at least twenty men who fought in the Civil War. The soldiers' tombstones list their rank and regiment even if they died many years after the war ended. There's also the tombstone of one of the earliest missionaries to the local Indians. He and his wife lived along the Santee River in the 1720s.”

Alexia dried her hands with a towel. There was a large bowl filled with lemons on the counter. Ted handed a knife to Alexia.

“Start cutting them in two while I set up the juicer. We'll need about six or seven.”

“Do you always keep so many lemons on hand?” she asked.

“Usually. I drink it year round.”

While Alexia sliced the lemons, Ted opened a cabinet door and took out the juicer. He plugged it in and pressed a lemon over a device that spun around rapidly until the juice ran into a trough and down into a container. When all the juice was collected, he poured it into a pitcher filled with ice and water. He took out a canister of sugar and dumped in two generous scoops.

“Don't ask me how much sugar I'm putting in,” he said. “It's better not to think about it. The end result is what counts.”

He took two cut-glass tumblers from a cabinet and poured a glass for Alexia and himself. He handed one to Alexia then held his up in the air.

“To Russian composers,” he said.

“And those who play their music,” Alexia responded.

They clinked glasses, and Alexia took a sip.

“This is good,” she said. “The last time I drank something like this was at my grandmother's house in Ohio. She was like you.”

“She loved lemonade?”

“No, she was religious. She went to church all the time.”

A small, rectangular wooden table stood against one wall of the kitchen. Ted sat at one end and Alexia at the other.

“Is that a picture of your daughter in the living room?” Alexia asked.

“Yes. She's twenty-two now and living in New York. She graduated from Juilliard and plays the viola.”

“With the New York Philharmonic?”

Ted laughed. “Maybe someday. She is doing ensemble work and looking for a job with a symphony somewhere in the U.S.”

“And her mother?”

“Lives in California. We've been divorced for many years.”

Alexia took a sip of lemonade and wondered what about Ted Morgan would convince a woman to divorce him. He seemed like a nice man, but male flaws emerge as surely as a daily growth of beard. She thought of another question but stifled it. She was a guest in Ted's home, not cross-examining him on the witness stand. She took another drink and wondered what to talk about since the minister apparently wasn't going to hold up his end of the conversation.

“I just returned from France,” she said. “I visited an old church with stained-glass windows. It was a beautiful place, but none of the windows had a figure who looked directly at me.”

Ted smiled. “Interesting.”

Alexia looked at her glass. If she took a few quick gulps, she could be on her way. She raised the glass and took a long drink. The tart juice made the edges of her tongue tingle. She raised it again and drank until the remaining ice cubes touched her lips. The last drops were sweet with extra sugar.

“Thanks for the lemonade,” she said.

“You're welcome.”

Alexia stood up. Ted stayed seated and leaned back in his chair.

“Before you leave,” he said, “do you want to tell me why you came by the church?”

“Oh, I was going to spend a few minutes alone in the sanctuary.”

“Come anytime. Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, of course.”

It wasn't a big lie, but immediately Alexia felt guilty. The minister had been kind to her and deserved the truth.

“Actually,” she continued slowly, “I lost my job this morning and didn't have any place to go for a couple of hours. I was going to sit in the sanctuary and try to sort through what happened.”

Ted knit his forehead and looked at her with compassion. “I thought you were upset but didn't know why,” he said.

“Really?” Alexia asked in surprise. “I didn't think it was obvious.”

“Sometimes I can tell when a person is troubled. It's like a note out of tune.”

Alexia felt tears suddenly welling up in her eyes. She'd been stoic when leaving the office, but in the presence of the minister her sorrow rose to the surface. She wanted to weep and pour out her heart to Ted Morgan at the same time.

“I'm sorry. This isn't like me.”

Ted stood. “Why don't you go to the sanctuary? That's why you came. We can talk later if you want to. I'll be painting the house for the rest of the afternoon.”

Alexia nodded and turned away before the first tear ran down her cheek into the corner of her mouth in salty contrast to the lingering sweetness of the lemonade. Her vision blurry, she grabbed a handful of tissues from a box in the living room as she fled from the house.

Her feet crunched across the broken seashells of the church parking lot. Inside the sanctuary she let the hot tears flow unhindered. She didn't sob. It wasn't hysteria. It was a release of pent-up feelings by a woman who had made emotional restraint one of the bulwarks of her personality. She sat on the pew nearest the piano and let the disappointment flow from her eyes. Spending the rest of her legal career in close proximity to Ralph Leggitt and Leonard Mitchell would not have been occupational bliss, but she had devoted six years of her life toward achieving a goal that was now impossible to attain. Disappointment was inevitable.

By the third tissue, she began to calm down. Drying her eyes, she looked around the sanctuary. It was a quiet and beautiful place. Ted Morgan and others like him felt at home here; she was still a stranger. But even as a stranger, she felt welcome. Her impulsive decision to stop by the church had been right. She needed a place of peace and protection, a sanctuary where her feelings could be released in safety.

And Ted Morgan was a rarity—a good man. She needed the nudge he provided to release the pent-up dam of her feelings, and she sensed that even now he stood on guard outside to protect her time alone in the sanctuary. She barely knew Ted, but he'd already shown more concern for her as a person than anyone at Leggitt & Freeman except Gwen. The minister showed more facets than musical talent.

Her thoughts shifted. Ted Morgan cared, but what about God? Did the Almighty have an opinion about what had happened to her in Ralph Leggitt's office? Did he have an interest in the direction she took in the future? Was Jesus any more alive than the bones of those buried in the nearby cemetery? Alexia knew the basics of Christianity via osmosis through American culture and contact with her grandmother in Ohio, but she had never seen the relevancy of faith for herself. Perhaps it was time to give it more serious consideration.

Standing and moving to the aisle, she inspected the stained-glass windows. The miracles depicted were for desperate people without any other options. Alexia wasn't desperate, just drained and frustrated and empty. She didn't need a miracle, just a new direction for her ship. If the answer for her future was in the church, she wasn't sure where to look for it.

She approached the window in which Jesus was healing the man at the pool of Bethesda. Keeping her eyes on the face of Jesus, she moved closer until she stood directly beneath him. She inched to the left and came within the range of his gaze. When she did, recognition came.

It was the same look of kindness she'd seen in Ted Morgan's eyes at the kitchen table.

22

The world uncertain comes and goes.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

A
fter posting a two-hundred-dollar cash bond, Rena left the jail by taxi and returned to her hotel. She tried to contact Jeffrey, but he didn't answer at home or on his cell phone. Emotionally exhausted, she went to bed but was unable to sleep. At 3 A.M. she stared at the ceiling and considered calling Giles Porter to confess to the attempted murder of her husband. Maybe then the enormous weight that threatened to crush her chest would be lifted, and she could get some rest. However, after two hours of sleep, she awoke with a measure of strength restored and resolved never to admit wrongdoing. She had acted in self-defense. Her nighttime thoughts were unreliable guides summoned by the stress of the past twenty-four hours. Tossing back the covers, she called room service and ordered breakfast.

Rena didn't want to return to the hospital and run the risk of another encounter with her father-in-law. While eating a poached egg, she phoned Leggitt & Freeman. Alexia was in a meeting. She waited half an hour, tried again, and was told that Ms. Lindale would be out of the office for the rest of the day. Frustrated, Rena searched in vain for the slip of paper on which she'd written the lawyer's cell phone number. When she couldn't find it, she called Leggitt & Freeman again, only to be told by the receptionist that Alexia's personal information was not available. Rena slammed down the phone. Jeffrey had been right. Anyone who worked for Leggitt & Freeman could not be trusted when Ezra was on the scene. Alexia had carried through with her threat to dump her and had lied when promising to help her find other representation.

Rena opened the yellow pages of the Greenville phone book to the attorney section. Page after page of multicolored advertisements promised expert legal help for everything from accountant's malpractice to zoning disputes. Most of the lawyers specializing in criminal law emphasized expertise in DUI cases. Rena narrowed her choices to four women lawyers. Two of them handled medical malpractice and criminal cases. The other two represented people who were injured on the job and criminal cases. Rena dialed the first number.

“Jenkins & Lyons,” the receptionist answered.

“I'd like to talk to Patricia Jenkins,” Rena said.

“May I ask who's calling?”

“Rena Richardson.”

“What type of problem do you have?” the receptionist asked.

“Uh, I'd rather talk to a lawyer about it.”

“Is it a civil or criminal case?”

Rena wasn't sure about the differences. “I've been charged with assault and battery, and my father-in-law is stealing my money with a power of attorney that my husband signed before we were married.”

“Please hold.”

Rena waited for several minutes and listened to five cycles of an advertisement that told about million-dollar verdicts the firm had won against doctors and hospitals. Rena was impressed. Finally, the receptionist returned.

“Ms. Jenkins is out of town for the rest of the week. May I take your number and have her call you back?”

Rena hung up. The next two calls were equally fruitless. On the final call, she spoke with an attorney named Ann Moser. She listened as Rena told her about the assault and battery charge.

“What is the date set for the hearing?” the lawyer asked in a voice that rasped with the hint of long-time cigarette use. “It should be on the bottom of the pink piece of paper they gave you at the jail.”

Rena had put the sheet on the nightstand. She picked it up and looked at the bottom.

“I can't read it. The date didn't come through clearly.”

“Call the jail and give them the number of the case. They will tell you the hearing date. Then get back in touch with me. Do you have any money?”

“Uh, I think so.”

“What do you mean?”

Rena told her about the power of attorney.

The lawyer grunted. “That's not my field. If you hire me on the criminal case, I'll help you find someone else to fight your father-in-law.”

“Thanks,” Rena responded. “I'll be in touch.”

Rena put a star by the number for Ann Moser. She sounded like a tough attorney. And she had no connection with Ezra Richardson.