The Recluse Storyteller (17 page)

“‘That’s smart. That’s the way you should play this, and everything will be all right.’

“‘Shall we use the door?’ asked Williams.

“‘After you.’

“Williams walked out the door, followed by Red Hat with the device over his head. A dozen police cars and several unmarked ones stood flashing their lights, announcing their line of defense, which couldn’t stop Red Hat. Williams pointed at an unmarked police car with a flashing light on top.

“‘This is your car. Will it work all right?’

“‘It’s my favorite color.’

“‘Excellent.’

“‘Except one thing. I need your gun,’ demanded Red Hat.

“‘I told you. I don’t have a gun.’

“‘Have one of the officers slowly slide one over to me.’

“Williams hesitated, unsure of the request.

“‘Don’t worry. I’m not going to shoot anyone.’

“Williams nodded at a young officer at the perimeter, and he took his pistol out of the holster and slid the gun over to Red Hat, who picked it up and walked towards the car until he was only twenty feet away. He shifted the device under his left arm, raised and aimed the gun, and fired two rounds at the windshield, which didn’t shatter.

“‘Very good. You did what I asked.’

“‘Of course. We want to get through this together. Can the officer have his gun back?’ reminded Williams.

“Red Hat slid it into his pocket.

“‘He’ll get it back. Don’t worry. I bid you goodbye.’

“Red Hat got into the car, locked the doors, put the device on the passenger seat, adjusted the mirror, started the engine, and took off. His daughter awaited him.”

* * *

Margaret stopped and looked over at Cheevers, who had an expression of disbelief on his face. For a minute, he had forgotten where he was or what a strange set of circumstances had grabbed his attention from an unsuspecting source. He looked at Margaret as if he wanted her to go on. He wanted to hear about Red Hat’s daughter. But she stood up, opened the door, and left. Cheevers felt somewhat empty—a nagging feeling of guilt and uncomfortable pain that he didn’t know quite what to do with. He tabbed open his beer and thought about the rest of the six pack sitting in the fridge. That thought relaxed him.

Chapter 13

Margaret Branches Out

Janice phoned but with no success. Mr. Tomsey desperately needed a manual revised. Mrs. Trumble still walked by Margaret’s door with her nose in the air. Reverend Davies frantically spent two days trying to get answers, and Cheevers spent the last couple of days drinking a little more beer than usual. But it was Mrs. Johnson and the twins that Margaret thought about the most.

Saturday morning arrived, but Margaret didn’t go to bed as usual. She thought only of her story but didn’t feel right moving the narration forward if Pam and Sam were not able to take the journey with her. She waited quietly on her sofa for something to happen.

Suddenly, a revolutionary thought occurred to her. If they would not come to her, she would go to them. The thought of it put a knot right in her stomach, for she couldn’t go empty-handed. With all her strength, she would do it. A daytime trip. Quite scandalous, but she figured she could be back in twenty minutes, if she ran. She went to her closet—such purposeful movements did not come naturally for her—and found a navy-blue warm-up suit with double white stripes down the side. She found her pair of hardly used Stan Smith tennis shoes—the same pair she had in high school. She grabbed a hat—certainly a red one—and snatched her sunglasses and purse. She would go incognito.

She walked out of her apartment and immediately ran into Mrs. Trumble. She felt bolder than usual and asked, “fingers hurt?” Mrs. Trumble gasped and let out something more than a small tirade as Margaret descended the staircase. At the front door of the apartment block, Cheevers was entering and hardly noticed who he nearly ran into until the red hat on her head made it obvious.

“Margaret? You have a red hat, too!”

“Red Hat.”

“So how is Red Hat? Williams closing in?”

She tucked her head in her chest and started a full sprint down the street.

“Let me know how he’s doing later, okay?” Cheevers yelled after the strange sight—a woman who ran in a nearly zigzagged fashion as if trying to avoid a barking, biting, little puppy.

Margaret ran, sprinting through the intersection where she had dropped her can of beans, and up to the front door of Full Brands, panting, looking around, and pondering if anyone had noticed her. The whole world looked upon this strange beast with gathered stares and pointing fingers.

She walked through the door calmly, and once again began her sprint, this time down aisle two, nearly plowing over an old couple into the soup cans, where she had once stood defenseless against the onslaught of Reverend Davies. The store manager saw her and had an immediate suspicion that something wasn’t right. He jogged behind her to the frozen food section. She ran to the ice cream freezer and stopped immediately by the Josten’s Chocolate Cherry Swirl shelf. She opened the door, but the shelf was empty. She stared for a moment out of complete incomprehension. The manager stood behind Margaret, anticipating whatever his creative mind could concoct. Margaret shuffled her feet backwards in a poor man’s rendition of the moonwalk, glancing up and down the shelves through the frosted glass, looking for her chocolate-cherry-swirl. She shuffled forward and looked again. Backwards. Forwards. Again and again. It was nowhere to be found, but she felt like she was caught in the rut of a phonograph record, skipping back and forth, looking for the perfect ending to the song but never finding it. Her father had always listened to phonograph records.

Finally, the store manager approached Margaret, as a small army of shoppers began to gather at the sight of her ice cream ritualistic dance.

“Excuse me, ma’am? Can I help you find something?”

Margaret stopped her shuffling and rocked her head up and down for a minute.

“Chocolate-cherry-swirl.”

“Are you looking for Josten’s Chocolate Cherry Swirl?”

“Yes. Must be chocolate-cherry-swirl.”

“Well, I’m sorry, ma’am. Josten’s went bankrupt about two weeks ago. There is no more stock available.”

“Must have chocolate-cherry-swirl.”

“I’m sorry. There is none.”

Margaret leaned her head against the glass door. The bill of her red cap flipped up, causing it to plop onto the floor.

“Ma’am?”

Margaret thought of the twins, who would be so disappointed.

“Ma’am? We have lots of other kinds of ice cream.”

Daddy would bring it home to her every Friday night when she was a girl. “Jostens,” he would say, “is like a little bit of magic. It’s always there to cheer you up.” She lifted her head, turned around, and started to walk home. She had moved only a few steps when the manager called from behind.

“Ma’am. Your red cap.”

“Red Hat.”

“Yes, red hat,” he confirmed with a strange twist of his neck, realizing that there was a whole lot about this woman he would never understand.

She put the cap back on her head and walked down aisle three, glancing right and left at the foodstuff. She stopped at the bean section and grabbed two cans—the only kind she ever bought—then put two loaves of bread from the aisle end-rack under her arm and checked out without incident. As soon as she exited the building, she started again in full sprint, two white plastic bags whirling at her side.

Five minutes later, she stood outside the door of the Johnsons’ apartment, nervously shaking the two white bags up and down. She knocked softly and panted heavily. Seconds later, the door opened and Pam stood in the doorway with a surprised but happy look on her face.

“Ms. Pritcher. Hi. Do you want to see my Mom?”

“Story.”

“Oh really, you want to tell the story? Come in. Come in.”

Margaret followed Pam into the kitchen. Someone was vacuuming down the hallway straight ahead.

“Mom! Ms. Pritcher is here! She is going to tell us a story, all right?” she asked, turning back to Margaret. “She’s right back there. Why don’t you go say ‘hello’ to her, and I’ll go get Sam. She’s over in our bedroom.”

Margaret walked immediately behind Pam, in her exact tracks, following her into the bedroom.

“Sam, Ms. Pritcher is here.”

“I can see that.”

Pam turned around and looked surprised to see Margaret directly behind her.

“Wow, that was fast. So it was okay with my Mom?”

“I brought food.”

She held out the plastic grocery bags, and Sam jumped up to snatch them from her hand.

“Thanks!” she said, reaching deep-down inside one, pulling out a can. “Beans,” she said with a distinct flair of disappointment.

“Beans,” Margaret repeated.

“Oh,” said Pam with a puzzled look on her face as she glanced in the other bag. “And bread.”

“Bread and beans,” repeated Sam. “Oh, that’s interesting.”

“Yes, Sam was just saying how she hasn’t had any beans lately,” added Pam, hoping not to offend their rare guest. “Please, sit down.”

Margaret sat on the edge of Pam’s bed, and the twins huddled together on the other one directly across from it.

“Eat,” said Margaret.

The twins nodded obligingly and decided that a slice of white bread would probably be easier to down than a can of cold beans—especially without an opener. They longingly thought about the days of chocolate-cherry-swirl.

“All right,” said Sam, gulping down a bite of dry, processed, white bread. She thought that this must be what it is like to eat in the middle of a desert. “We’re ready.”

“Oh, yes,” said Pam. “The house was on fire and Gwen and Georgia—”

“And Benjamin,” added Sam.

“Yes, they were standing outside watching it burn. Was their mother in the house? What happened? Was it an accident?”

“And they were leaving with another family. What were their names?”

Margaret leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes.

* * *

“The Thompsons brought the children back to their house in their buggy. The girls wept the whole way while Benjamin continued to sleep.

When they were finally situated inside the small, modest Thompson home—a home with four children of their own—Mr. Thompson sent their two boys and two girls out to play. The girls took Benjamin off of Gwen’s hands and took him outside to play with Buster, who had followed the children to their new home.

“‘Girls,’ started Mr. Thompson. ‘There is something we need to tell you. Your …” He paused and looked over at his wife. ‘Beatrice, can you tell them?’ He felt like some sort of a coward, but he couldn’t get the words out right, so he shifted the responsibility off on his wife, whom he felt was much better at relating to people.

“‘Girls, what my husband is trying to say is … Perhaps you already feel it in your heart.’

“‘Mother is dead,’ said Georgia plainly with little emotion.

“‘Yes.’

“Gwen broke down again in tears. Georgia hardly blinked.

“‘In the fire?’ asked Georgia.

“‘Yes.’

“‘The bright light.’

“‘What?’

“‘The bright light. I saw the bright light this morning. I thought it meant life, but it meant death.’

“The Thompsons looked puzzled.

“‘Bright light?’ asked Mr. Thompson for clarification.

“‘Oh, it was nothing. Just a silly game we played,’ offered Gwen through the pearl droplets on her cheeks, not wanting to delve into their confusing trip to the top of Harper’s Hill.

“‘Father was right,’ Georgia continued, her heart gripped with fear and sadness, wanting once again to feel his comforting touch on her back. She wanted to sit at the table, look him in the eyes, jump into his arms, and laugh and tumble with him in the tall prairie grasses. But he was gone, and now so was their mother.

“‘I thought Mother went to town with you today?’ asked Gwen.

“‘Not exactly. She came over here, and I was able to share some supplies with her, so we wouldn’t have to go the whole way to town. We brought her home a couple hours later after we had talked for a while.’

“‘What started the fire? Why couldn’t she get out?’ pressed Gwen.

“‘Maybe she didn’t want to,’ said Georgia with great resignation in her voice.

“‘Georgia, why would you say such a thing?’ Gwen snapped, giving her a horrified look.

“‘Let’s not think about those things today,’ said Mrs. Thompson.

“The silence encompassed the room for a moment, and each individual measured their attempts to break through eerie stillness but couldn’t decide on a method. Finally, in desperation, Gwen spoke up.

“‘What will become of us?’

“‘This afternoon I’m going into town to get the reverend and some other men to help go through the house. We want to make sure your mother gets a proper burial. Then we’ll have to see what we can do with you kids,’ spoke up Mr. Thompson.