The Great Divide (12 page)

People nodded his way, smiled whenever their eyes met. He was neither the tallest man nor the only white face. And he was far from being the best dressed. By the time the singing stopped and the prayers began, Marcus had come to recognize that the only discord was that which he had brought in with him.

After the service he noticed Alma and Austin Hall in the parking lot and walked toward them. As soon as Austin spotted him, he turned and walked away. Marcus halted in front of the big-boned woman and said, “I’m sorry I trouble your husband.”

“It’s not you, Mr. Glenwood.”

“Call me Marcus, please.”

“It’s not you,” she repeated, her voice as sorrowful as the gaze that followed her husband’s retreat.

“I was wondering if I could come by and speak with you today.”

“I have a board of trustees meeting that runs all this week. I’ll be tied up in strategy sessions the rest of today and most of tomorrow. Could we just take a turn here?”

He followed her through the parking lot, observing how people noted their closeness and turned away politely. He moved through a tumultuous crowd, yet was shielded even from the children. Parents steered the littlest ones aside; the older children took swift note of their elders’ reactions and pretended the pair was not even there. “The people here think a lot of you.”

“Gloria was one of their own,” Alma said matter-of-factly. She waited until they had reached the path that bounded the cemetery to ask, “What was it you wanted to see me about?”

“You do not have a case against New Horizons.” It was not how he had intended to express himself. But the day continued to reverberate with an authority that permitted no glossing over his message. “I’ve spent a lot of hours going through the evidence. And I am telling you here and now, there is no motion I could prepare that would result in a positive verdict.”

Alma Hall continued along the gravel path. The cemetery’s waist-high fence was a derelict affair, with many of the iron rods eaten through and weeping rust. The path itself was weed-strewn and unkempt. Thistles and honeysuckle scrambled over the fence and climbed the oldest headstones. The air was scented with wildflowers and blackberries. Families walked the interior ways, pausing now and then to look down at graves and talk quietly among themselves while the children sang and danced about. The atmosphere was subdued yet happy, a pleasant realm of memories and peace.

Alma Hall demanded in her quiet precise way, “Why do I have the impression there is more you want to tell me?”

Marcus took a breath and held it. Kept it locked up tight for what felt like ages, long enough for them to make the turning at the back corner. Which was where Alma halted and turned to him. “Well?”

He squinted out to where girders for the New Horizons headquarters building thrust like giant pikes into the scarred hillside. And
released the breath. And committed. “I need to know whether your goal is actually to win a case against New Horizons.”

“I want my baby home.” A response as firm and solid as the woman herself.

“We might be able to accomplish that just by bringing suit. An accusation of this magnitude would attract a lot of negative attention.”

“Do it.”

“I’m not promising a thing, Mrs. Hall.”

“It’s time you started calling me Alma.”

“This could backfire in the worst possible way.” Almost wishing she would relent and release him. “If New Horizons had a hand in your daughter’s kidnapping, this could drive them farther underground.”

She stabbed the Sunday afternoon with a finger as straight and true as the distant girders. “Those people over there are snakes. They are evil. It doesn’t take a genius to know they’re involved. They’ve lived their entire lives crawling around underground.”

Marcus studied the woman. “That’s a mighty strong statement.”

“You ask anybody who’s had dealings with that group. They dress it up with a fancy logo and nice colors, but they’re snakes out to make a killing off the young. Creating a world of make-believe, telling kids they’ll grow up to be stars if only they buy these fancy clothes and special shoes.” The arm dropped to her side. “What about the warning the other lawyer gave my husband, something about the court arresting us?”

“Actually, they would come after me, not you. It’s called filing a frivolous claim. And yes, it could just happen.”

“But you’re willing to go after them anyway? Even after that other lawyer turned us down?”

The sun rested like a gentle hand upon his head and shoulders. “Let’s just say I’ve got a lot less to lose.”

T
HE RITUAL of fearful tremors chased Marcus from his bed long before the light was strong enough to be called morning. After breakfast he took a final cup of coffee out to the veranda. The wrap-around porch was one of the house’s many follies, with great open rafters of wild cherry exposing a cedar-shingled roof with tiny fake cupolas at each corner. The pillars were maple, including the new ones Marcus had turned and carved himself, and the floor’s planking was ten-inch heart-of-pine. Three of the dozen-odd rockers he remembered from his childhood had been salvaged from termites and wood rot. Marcus was trying to decide which one to sit in when the process server came and went like a ghost from the dreams he had hoped would remain inside. He settled himself just the same, leaving the bulky envelope unopened and unread in the seat beside him.

A morning mist whispered silent fables of autumnal chill. The trees stood as apparitions in the gray half-light. Even the house’s own connection to earth seemed gossamer and fragile. Somewhere out beyond the borders of his vision a motor purred. It appeared to approach from all directions at once, the fog was that thick. A bulky shadow pulled into Marcus’ drive. A door slammed. A wraith scrunched up the graveled walk and became the old pastor in paint-spattered coveralls.

“Got folks telling me of signs all over the county,” Deacon Wilbur said in greeting. “Portents of a hard winter to come.”

“Soon as this mist burns off, we’ll be back in summer heat,” Marcus replied.

“For now.” The old man turned and stared over the porch railing, squinting his whole face as though peering ahead through the mists
of time. “But the dogwoods are already casting off leaves, like we’d lived through hard frosts for weeks on end. And there’s tales of gray squirrels warring over nuts while the acorns lie ten inches deep under the oaks. Nanny goats with winter beards already a foot long. Hoot owls crying the whole night, restless like they was hunting against winter hunger. You ever heard the like?”

“Not in all my born days,” Marcus said, liking the old man immensely.

“Don’t you scoff, now. Don’t you scoff. Such signs and portents are the writing of nature’s hand for them who know the tongue.”

It was the closest Deacon had ever come to what Marcus might consider the normal conversation of friends. “I could brew up a fresh pot of coffee if you’d like a cup.”

“Thank you, no. My back teeth are already like to floating.”

“Would you have a seat here?”

“Don’t mind if I do.” Deacon Wilbur settled himself into the rocker next to Marcus. The chair creaked a gentle welcome, and the floor drummed comfortably as the man set a slow cadence to the morning. “Nice to see you in church yesterday, sitting there among the faithful.”

The burnished mist shimmered slightly. “I enjoyed it.” Marcus fretted that the words were so insufficient as to be insulting, but the old pastor simply rocked and hummed a quiet listening note. “And the music was incredible.”

“I always wanted to sing in the worst way. Only thing I ever got was the worst way.”

“Have you ever been to a white church?” Marcus asked.

“A few times. They were just fine, I suppose.” Deacon Wilbur chose his words carefully. “Problem wasn’t with those churches. It was me. I heard the spirit in there, yes. I wanted to stand up and thank God for the gift. Dance, shout, clap my hands.”

“And they didn’t.”

“Not that I saw. Felt like I was sitting there with the chosen frozen.”

“While I was in your church, I felt good. Comfortable.” Marcus was stymied by his inability to confess just how rare those moments had become.

“I tell you what’s the honest truth.” Deacon’s words flowed in
time to the rocker’s creak. “You’re welcome. The place is yours. I don’t know how to say it plainer than that.”

Marcus felt the pastor’s gift deserved an honest response, and motioned to the packet in the seat on his other side. “A process server showed up an hour ago with the final divorce decree.”

“Right sorry to hear that.” The words were spoken to the fog. “Yes, I truly am.”

The sympathy in Deacon’s voice left Marcus too open not to say what burned his gut like a branding iron. “I’m seriously thinking about getting drunk.”

There was none of the condemnation he expected and half-hoped he would receive. “Didn’t know you were a drinking man.”

“Used to be. Always thought it came with the good life. And it fitted the job. People unload their problems on a lawyer like they do a doctor. I found bourbon helped ease the blows.” He waited for a response, and when none came, the bubbling pressure gave him no choice but to proceed. “I’d been drinking that weekend of the accident. A lot.”

Deacon contemplated the fog a long moment before asking in that deep, honeyed voice, “You taken a drink since then?”

Marcus finished off his mug, wishing it held more than cold coffee. “Not after that first week.”

The reverend spoke as though reading lines written in the mist. “Afraid if you started you might never stop.”

“That’s about right.”

“Afraid when you hit the bottom of the bottle you’d be staring into the darkness of eternal night. Looking straight into your own personal hell.”

Marcus said to the bottom of his cup, “Sounds like you’ve been there yourself.”

“Something I’ve found on life’s hard road. When I’m staring at the great temptations, I’m being turned from an even greater opportunity.” He faced Marcus for the first time since seating himself. “You got something that needs doing? Something strong enough to call to your heart just like this hunger is firing your belly?”

To his surprise, the blinding mist suddenly revealed what he had been half-seeing all morning. “Yes.”

“Then I expect your comfort is gonna come from going and doing.”
Deacon rose, and in the process settled a solid hand upon Marcus’ shoulder. He turned from the fog, the portents read and dismissed. “My bones tend to settle of a morning. Best to get them up and moving about.”

N
ORTH
C
AROLINA
S
TATE
U
NIVERSITY
had once been content to anchor the empty stretches east of Hillsboro Street. Now Hillsboro was a six-lane thoroughfare aimed straight at the capitol, and State’s campus sprawled in every conceivable direction. In the fifties it had been nicknamed Cow College, since over half its student body had been Piedmont farm children down to learn the new science of agriculture. Now its atomic-engineering department held seven NASA contracts, the agricultural-genetics division designed pest-resistant seed strains on behalf of the United Nations and eleven African nations, two professors had won Nobel Prizes in biochemistry, and the veterinary-medicine department held over a thousand groundbreaking patents.

Marcus parked by the original stone bell tower and asked directions to the math department. He found Dr. Austin Hall’s name on the address board and climbed to the third floor. A secretary took note of his age and his suit, checked the roster, and reported that Dr. Hall had a class but should be stopping by his office in about twenty minutes. Marcus used the time to reread the folder from Kirsten Stanstead.

“Mr. Glenwood?” Despite his stiff demeanor, Austin Hall looked seriously jolted by finding Marcus camped outside his office. “What are you doing here?”

Marcus closed the file and rose from the bench. “We need to talk.”

“I’m extremely busy.” Keys jangled nervously in the professor’s grasp. “I have a faculty meeting in ten minutes—”

“You might just make it,” Marcus replied, holding his ground. “If we don’t waste any more time out here.”

Austin Hall’s entire face folded with resignation. “Come on, then.”

The professor wore a three-piece suit of charcoal gray and shoes that squeaked as he walked to his door. “I wish you’d just speak to my wife.”

“This doesn’t have anything to do with Mrs. Hall.” He watched
the man have difficulty fitting the key in the door, and knew he was right to come. “This is between you and me.”

Austin Hall entered an office as clean and tightly structured as his clothing. He dropped his briefcase on the desk and retreated behind the polished wood surface. “All right. What is it?”

Marcus shut the door. “Please sit down, Dr. Hall.”

“I told you, I’m in a hurry to—”

“Sit down.”

The man’s jawline knotted, but he did as he was told. Marcus pulled a chair front and center before the desk, seated himself on the edge, took a breath. Another. Forced himself to expel the air and the words, though he had to clench his hands and his gut to get them out. “Eighteen months ago I was driving back from Wrightsville Beach. My two children were in the backseat. My wife was beside me. We stopped at a diner for lunch. We got back in the car and started off, arguing like we had been ever since we left the beach.”

“Really, Mr. Glenwood, I don’t see any reason why you should barge in here and unload these highly personal details.”

Marcus raised his face a notch. Nothing more. Just let the other man see his eyes. It was enough to shut off the protest. Austin Hall dropped his gaze, fiddled open his jacket, and began toying with the gold watch chain that arched across his middle. Anything but look back into Marcus’ eyes.

Marcus held to the quiet tone, one that sounded almost gentle to his own ears. Like the voice of the doctor who had come to him that day in the hospital. A voice too full of emotion to hold much force. “We entered an intersection, I could have sworn we had the green light but I don’t know, the other driver said it was red and my wife and I were still arguing … ” He searched for air that did not fill his lungs and never would again. “All I saw was a flash of light off to my right, didn’t hear the horn or the brakes, though the police report says there was a skid mark seventeen feet long. Just that flash of light off the truck’s grill, then he hit us. Just behind my wife’s door. Drove in the back right door and …”