The Cat, The Devil, The Last Escape (6 page)

Within three years Caroline had paid off the van and equipment and could hire more help for the catered weddings and parties, though still, the whole family pitched in for those. All the years Becky was growing up, her mother would be out of bed and dressed by three in the morning, rolling out pie crusts, baking cakes. Becky's brothers made breakfast until Becky was old enough to cook. Her brothers, as soon as they could drive legally, had done the bakery deliveries before school.

Becky missed her brothers. Even after Ron was killed in the Pacific, she still felt often that he was near her. And though their older brother, James, was still in Japan he was close to them, he liked to write home of that very different part of the world. She looked forward to his return next year when his tour of duty ended.

By the time Becky turned sixteen and got her driver's license, her brothers had moved on with their lives. She had felt very grown-up, handling the deliveries herself, before and after school. She had helped with them after she and Morgan were married, until Sammie was born. Even during the war years Caroline made an adequate living, using special recipes that took little of the precious rationed sugar but were still delicious.

Now, at forty-eight, Caroline was as energetic and slim as ever, a tall, strong woman whom Becky, at this time in her life, deeply envied. She wished she had half her mother's resilience, wished she could follow better Caroline's hardheaded approach to life. Caroline Tanner had always tackled
problems head-on, stubbornly weighing each possible solution, choosing the most viable one, then plunging ahead with no holds barred. If Caroline had tears during those hard years, she cried them in private.

They were halfway through supper when Caroline said, “The next thing is to go for an appeal. You need a better lawyer.” She looked steadily at Becky. “I plan to help with his fees. I want Falon taken down, I want to see
him
in prison. I want Morgan out of that place.”

“Mama, I don't—”

“It's family money. Half of it will be yours one day and you need it now. If it bothers you to take it, you can pay me back after Morgan gets out.”

“If he gets out.”

Caroline stared at her. “
When
he gets out. Morgan is in prison unjustly. We keep at it until we find a better lawyer, get an appeal and a new trial. A fair trial. But not in Rome,” she said bitterly.

Becky laid her hand over Caroline's. “You make it sound so simple.”

“There's no other way. First thing is to find an attorney.”

“I've already made some inquiries,” Becky said. “There are several lawyers in Atlanta I want to see. But, Mama, we need new evidence, stronger evidence, for an appeal. I want to talk with the tellers, with Mrs. Herron and Betty Holmes, and the younger teller. I want to talk with the bank manager, and the witness who saw Morgan's car leave the bank.” She sighed. “I mean to talk with Natalie Hooper, though I don't look forward to facing that piece of trash.”

Caroline gave Becky a long look. “That's not the way to go.” She rose to cut the shortcake and lathered on whipped cream. “Let the lawyer do that. You could compromise the case.”

Watching her mother, Becky thought about that. She watched Sammie, too. Though the child made quick work of
her dessert she was too quiet, hurting so bad inside, missing her daddy.

Still, though, after the good meal Sammie seemed steadier. Her color brightened; she seemed more alive, less subdued than when they'd left the jail. “Can I go outside and play?”

Becky and Caroline looked at each other. “In the front yard,” Becky said. “Stay in front of the big window where we can see you.”

Sammie nodded. She walked quietly through the house and out the front door, not running as she normally would. Becky and Caroline moved into the living room to sit on the couch looking out the bay window, watching her.

“The new attorney should talk to the witnesses,” Caroline repeated. “Particularly Falon's girlfriend, his key witness. What if Falon found out you'd questioned her? Don't you think he'd make trouble?”

“Mama, I . . . tried to speak to her yesterday, in the parking lot after the sentencing. He probably knows that. She was still nervous, even more upset than she showed on the witness stand. I thought if I could get her to say something incriminating . . .”

Watching her mother, Becky wilted. “I guess that was foolish. I approached her as she was getting in her car. She scowled and turned away, said she couldn't talk to me. But,” she said, her hand on Caroline's, “it gave me satisfaction that she was so shaky. I . . . hoped to scare her, make her think about what she'd done.”

“Leave her alone, Becky. That's your attorney's job.” Caroline was quiet for a moment, then her look softened. “When you're the most determined, the most set on something, I see your father in you.”

Becky grinned. “You don't see yourself?”

Caroline laughed.

“I didn't understand until I got older,” Becky said, “how hard it was for you, raising us alone.”

“We did it together,” Caroline said, “the four of us. It was our life and it's been a good one. It's still a good life,” she said. “We'll get through this hard part, this isn't forever.”

Becky hoped it wasn't forever, hoped her mother was right. “No one could have had a better childhood,” she said, “or a closer, stronger family.”

Watching Sammie out the window, where she was petting the neighbors' collie, Becky smiled as Sammie tried to push the dog into the bushes as if in some new game. When he wouldn't go, and Sammie herself crept in beneath the shrubs, a chill touched Becky.

Rising, she moved quickly to the window. Sammie was out of sight. A sleek black convertible came slowly down the street, the top up. As Falon's Ford coupe eased to a crawl they raced for the front door. As they crossed the glassed porch, Falon was in the yard. Behind him the driver's door stood open, they could hear the engine running. They lost sight of him beyond the porch blinds. When they burst out to the walk the car door slammed and the car sped away.

The yard was empty. They couldn't see Sammie, and couldn't see if she was in the car. Becky parted the bushes, peering in, but saw only shadows. The dog had disappeared, too. She screamed for Sammie, then ran, chasing the car, ran until she heard Caroline shout.

“She's here—she's all right.”

Becky turned, saw Caroline kneeling, hugging Sammie. The dog was there, too, pressing against them. Becky knelt beside them, holding Sammie close, the dog licking their faces. Picking Sammie up, Becky carried her in the house like a very small child. They locked the door, and as Caroline checked the back door, Becky sat at the table holding Sammie. “What did he say? What did he do, what did he say to you?”

“He came to the bushes and looked in. We were down at the end. When Brownie growled, Falon backed away. But
he kept looking.” She shivered against Becky. “He told me to come out. Brownie growled again and he turned away. I heard his door slam, heard him drive away.”

Caroline had picked up the phone to call the police. At Becky's look she put the receiver down.

“What good,” Becky said, “after the way we were treated in court? The Rome cops don't like us. They'll write it up as grandstanding, trying to get attention. Who knows what the report would say?” She stared over Sammie's head at Caroline. Could Falon have come in retaliation because she'd talked to Natalie? She should have left the woman alone. She cuddled Sammie, kissing her, terrified for her.

Caroline sat down at the table. “I think you can't stay in Rome. You'll have to get out, move where he won't find you.”

“Where, Mama? I can't afford to rent somewhere. And my work, my bookkeeping accounts are all here.”

Caroline's look was conflicted. “There's my sister, Anne. I doubt many people know where she is or even know I have a sister. I never talk about her, she never comes to see us.”

“I couldn't go there. I haven't seen her since I was in high school. She wouldn't want me and Sammie, she doesn't even like children.” The only time they heard from Anne was an occasional phone call, a familiar duty in which she'd ask after everyone's health but didn't seem to really care. She would send a stiff little card at Christmas, cool and impersonal.

Caroline and Anne, even when they were young children, had been at odds, Anne an austere and withdrawn little girl, disdaining the small pleasures that brought joy to Caroline and her friends. She didn't care to climb trees, play ball, compose and act out complicated stage plays with wildly fancy costumes. Aloof and judgmental, Anne had seemed caught in her own solemn world. As if, Caroline said, Anne had never
been
a child, not in the normal sense. Over the years, after Becky's father died, their family had visited Anne twice in Atlanta. They weren't comfortable in
her big, elegant home, with her formal ways. She had never come up to Rome, though Caroline had invited her many times.

Anne had left Rome very young to work as a secretary in Atlanta. She had married young, and some years later was divorced. She had remained in Atlanta in her Morningside home, comfortable with the money her philandering husband had settled on her. Becky thought that asking to move in with Anne, begging to be taken in like a charity case, was not something she could handle.

But she had to get away from Falon, she had to get Sammie away.

“I'll call her,” Caroline said. “Let me see what I can do.”

“Mama, she won't want us. She certainly won't want a little girl in the house. And to know she'd be harboring a convict's family . . . No, I don't want to go there.”

“We have to try. Sammie can't stay here, it's too dangerous.” She put her hand over Becky's. “Only a few people in town would remember Anne. I doubt they'd know where she went or that she married and later divorced. I doubt anyone would know what her name is now.”

Becky wasn't so sure. In a small town, everyone knew your business. And this small town had turned vicious; people might dredge up anything they could find.

“You have to get Sammie out of Rome, she's the one vulnerable weapon Falon has. He'll use her if he can, to make you stop going for an appeal. He has to be terrified of an appeal, of a new trial.”

Becky watched her mother. “I'll look for a room in Atlanta, I can find a job there. You can keep Sammie close for a few days, keep her inside with you. Once we're settled she'll be in school. Maybe I can get a job with short hours, or take work home as I do here.”

“If Anne will invite you, she won't want rent. Let me try.
You'd be better off there, among other people, if you mean to keep Sammie safe.”

I
T WAS LATE
that night, Becky and Sammie asleep tucked up in Caroline's guest bed, when Sammie woke shivering, clinging to Becky, her body sticky with sweat. When Becky gathered her up, holding her tight, the child said nothing, but lay against Becky in silence. Becky would never force Sammie to tell a dream, that could make her reluctant to reveal any others in the future. Silently she held Sammie until at last the child dozed again, but restlessly, as if still trying to drive away whatever vision haunted her. Only in the small hours did Sammie sleep soundly. Becky slept then, exhausted, holding Sammie close.

I
N
S
AMMIE
'
S DREAM
Daddy was inside the bars and the man with the cold eyes and the narrow head was looking in at him but then he turned and looked hard at her, too. When he reached out for her she woke up. In the dark room she could hear her own heart pounding. Mama held her and kissed her, she clung to Mama for a long time but she was still afraid.

But then when she slept again her dream was nice. She was with the old man, the cowboy, his thin, tanned face, his gray eyes that seemed to see everything. He was in a big airplane looking out the window down at the world laid out below him, the green hills, the tall mountains. Then he was in a big black car with two men in uniform. He was coming now. Soon he would be with Daddy. And in sleep Sammie smiled, snuggling easier against Mama.

B
ECKY WOKE AT
dawn, her eyes dry and grainy, her body aching. Whatever Sammie had experienced last night had
left Becky herself uncertain and distraught. She rose, pulled on her robe, stood looking down at the sleeping child, wanting to touch her soft, innocent cheek but not wanting to wake her.

But when Becky left the room, Misto did wake Sammie. His purr rumbled, his fur was thick and warm, his whiskers tickled her face. In the dim, early light, as she recalled her dream of the cowboy she hugged Misto so tight he wriggled. The cowboy was coming now, and she didn't feel afraid anymore. When she slept again, cocooned with the invisible tomcat, it was a sleep filled with hope that her daddy would come home. That he would come home again, safe.

W
ITH THE SUMMER
heat soaking into Lee's bones, with plenty of good food and rest and with the help of the prison doc, Lee's condition slowly improved. As he grew stronger and wanted something to do, he was assigned light work on the prison farm. Feeding and caring for the four plow horses suited him just fine; they were placid, loving animals and he liked to baby them, to groom them, bring them carrots from the kitchen, trim their hooves when they grew too long. As fall approached, Lee settled comfortably into the pleasant routine of morning work in the stable, then breathing and gym exercises, and late afternoons on his cot with a stack of library books. He was in Dr. Donovan's examining room when the blow struck, when his cozy life changed abruptly and not for the better.

Donovan, finished examining him, paused beside the table, his look solemn, his eyes way too serious. Lee waited uneasily. Were his lungs worse, even though he felt better? But then Donovan smiled, running a hand through his short, pale hair.