The Second Silence (10 page)

‘Most likely they referred him to someone who specializes in family law.’ Lacey scribbled something on the pad. ‘Soon as I get some answers, I’ll call you. In the meantime, try not to worry. There’s no point in pushing the panic button until we know the score.’ She glanced up sharply. ‘And however tempted you might be, do not, I repeat, do not attempt any further contact with your husband. You have enough problems as it is.
Capisce?’

Reluctantly Noelle nodded. But the thought of her little girl crying for her in the night was etched in her mind like a tattoo. If she could
see
Emma, even for a minute, let her know everything was going to be okay…

‘Can you give us an idea of what to expect?’ Mary straightened, holding her coffee mug balanced on one knee.

The
good
news is that an order of protective custody is strictly stop-gap.’ Lacey absently patted Samantha, snoring away like a bear in hibernation. ‘As soon as a proper hearing is scheduled, you’ll be able to speak your piece, believe me. The first order of business is to set a date, the sooner the better.’

Noelle felt like someone starving who’d been thrown a mere crumb. Yet there was something else she needed to know, something that made her clutch hold of that crumb with all her might. ‘What are my chances of getting Emma back?’

Lacey offered her a rueful smile. ‘If I had the answer to that, I’d be a fortune-teller, not an attorney. We’ll know more tomorrow. Hang tight until then, okay?’ Rising to her feet she walked them to the door, where she squeezed Noelle’s hand in solidarity. ‘Remember, we don’t shoot until we see the whites of their eyes.’

To Noelle, teetering on the outer edge of what she could bear, it sounded like a call to arms.

Doris Quinn, seated in her favorite chair by the window, struggled to poke a needle through her embroidery hoop without stabbing herself. Normally she’d have been napping at this hour. But these were hardly normal circumstances, were they? And however tired she felt, sleep was out of the question. With her granddaughter in trouble, she didn’t have that luxury.

Besides, there was something she needed to do first. Something important.

At the sound of Mary’s car in the driveway, Doris straightened, setting aside her embroidery. But when she tried to stand, her knees buckled, and she fell back with a sigh of forcibly exhaled breath. She was trembling, and her heart felt like a baby bird pecking its way through the fragile shell of her rib cage. A wave of impatience swept over her.

She loathed being sick. It made her feeble. Self-centred, too—each new challenge to her loved ones little more than a test of her own endurance. How would
she
hold up under the strain? Was this going to be the straw that broke the camel’s back? As if her granddaughter’s predicament weren’t worry enough!

Doris fumbled in the pocket of her housecoat for her rosary. Her eyes drifted shut, and her lips began to move, reciting soundlessly: ‘Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death …’

Yes, the Holy Mother would give her strength. When she was expecting her firstborn, the doctor had warned that she might not carry the baby to term. She’d prayed hard then, and hadn’t Mary Catherine come bawling her way into the world with all fingers and toes accounted for? In gratitude Doris had named her after the Blessed Virgin. Mary’s middle name, Catherine, was after her own mother, who, even with five children to round up, dress and feed, had never missed a Sunday or first Friday mass. Yet a more willful child Doris could hardly have imagined. Nothing at all like her sister, who was as easy as a kitten and just as uncomplicated.

It was that difference that had caused her to come down hardest on Mary, so determined was she to set her headstrong eldest on the straight and narrow. Yet somehow she’d failed. Not just as a mother but in the eyes of the Lord.

Oh, yes, she’d done the Christian thing, taking Mary and her baby in all those years ago. But hadn’t she jealously hoarded her daughter’s child? Encouraged Noelle in subtle ways to cleave more to
her?
Doris had been blind to it at the time, but her recent illness, coupled with the knowledge that her time on earth was drawing to an end, had forced her to see the error of her ways.

The worst of it was realizing that even given the chance to do it over, she would have done nothing differently. She’d had to face the fact that she was flawed in some fundamental way. Yet it was that flaw that had also put a roof over their heads and food in their mouths. Her husband, God rest his soul, had been a good man but spineless. She’d had to prod him every inch of the way. Bolster and berate him so he wasn’t passed over when the time came for his boss at the plant, Mr Evans, to promote him to general manager. And whose idea had it been to take out that insurance policy so they wouldn’t be left penniless when he was gone?

But whatever damage had been done, she had to try to rectify at least some of it. Mary Catherine couldn’t go on believing she played only a minor role in her daughter’s life. Noelle
needed
her. Now more than ever. It was time to set matters straight.

Hearing footsteps at the door, Doris hauled herself from her chair, wincing at the sharp pain in her side. Her gaze fell on the painting over the sofa, Christ on the cross, His face turned heavenward in an expression of almost rapturous agony. But there was nothing glorious about dying, she’d discovered. It was really quite
…
common. Even a bit embarrassing. Your stomach rumbled at odd times, and funny smells emanated from under your bedcovers at night. You grew cold easily and cranky at the drop of a hat. You spent half your time on the toilet, the other half in bed. You were forced to depend on people you might previously have done your utmost to avoid.

‘Well, don’t keep me in suspense,’ she piped as Mary and Noelle walked in. ‘What did the woman have to say? From the looks on your faces, it must not have been very encouraging.’

Noelle’s face was white as paper under that storm of black hair that had been the bane of Doris’s existence since Noelle was little. ‘It went okay, I guess.’ She sighed, drifting over to the window as if any moment she expected to see Emma come skipping up the front path. ‘We’ll know more tomorrow.’

Doris snorted in disgust. ‘That husband of yours. I have half a mind to drive over there myself and give him a good—’

‘Mama.’ Mary shot her a warning look. ‘Not now, please.’

Doris’s mouth snapped shut in surprise. How dare she! There was a time that kind of talk would have earned her daughter a smack on the backside. But Mary was no longer a child, and she, Doris, had to save her ammunition for the real battle ahead.

Swallowing her irritation, she said, ‘I have tuna salad in the fridge. Why don’t I make us some sandwiches? There’s a jar of sweet-and-sour pickles, too, left over from that batch I put up last summer.’

Noelle shook her head wearily. ‘Thanks, Nana, but I couldn’t eat anything if I tried. If you don’t mind, I think I’ll go upstairs and lie down for a bit.’

‘Nothing for me either.’ Mary glanced at her watch—slim, gold, expensive-looking. ‘I should be getting back. I don’t want to run into any traffic on my way into the city.’ The hug she gave Noelle was full of warmth and motherly concern. ‘Call the minute you hear anything. If you need me, I’ll be back in a flash.’

Frustration bubbled up inside Doris. She had no doubt Mary meant it, but that wasn’t the point. When her granddaughter replied, ‘Thanks, Mom. I will,’ she wanted to throttle them both.

For heaven’s sake, child, you’ve got to know enough to
ask
for what you need.

Doris followed Mary out onto the porch. ‘Well, it was nice of you to stop by.’ There was a caustic note in her voice.

‘I have an important meeting first thing tomorrow morning. A prospective client. I have to—’ Halfway down the steps, Mary stopped and swung around to face her. ‘Why am I always apologizing to you? I’m going because for the moment there’s nothing else I can do. It’s not like I won’t be back. For God’s sake, Mama, what more do you
want?’

‘You could try being a mother for a change.’

Doris watched her daughter’s fine-boned face grow taut, as if being stretched to fit through some impossibly narrow space. Her cheeks glowed with indignation. Of her two daughters, Mary looked the most like Ted. She had his high forehead and guileless blue-gray eyes, his silky auburn hair that stubbornly refused to stay put, even his maddening habit of standing with one foot turned out, as if in preparation for flight. But there was nothing remotely spineless about her elder daughter.

She felt a moment’s yearning to turn the clock back to the day Mary told her she was pregnant. If only she’d been a little more understanding. If she hadn’t said those awful things
…

‘I don’t need you, of all people, to remind me of the fact that I’m Noelle’s mother.’ In the bright sunlight Mary’s eyes glittered like ice.

She looked as if she wanted to say more, words that caused her mouth to pucker as if biting down on something sour. Doris almost wished she
would
spit it out; only then would they be able to put some of this behind them.

‘Apparently you do,’ she said.

Mary’s chin lifted in defiance. ‘This is where you like me best, isn’t it? Between a rock and a hard place.’

‘This isn’t about
you,
Mary Catherine. It’s about Noelle.’

‘Are you still punishing me? Is that what this is about?’

Doris sighed. She supposed she’d had that coming. But, Lord, why did this have to be so hard? The pain that had started in her side was now thumping throughout every inch of her. And across the street Betty Keenan was practically falling out her second-floor window to get a look at what was going on. Doris felt a flash of irritation before remembering it was Betty who’d watered her yard and collected her mail the two weeks she’d been hospitalized.

‘It’s
you
who can’t forgive,’ she said. ‘Oh, yes, I know, it’s easier to blame it all on me, the fact that you feel shut out of your daughter’s life. But that’s not going to help.’ A tremulous note crept into her voice. ‘Come home, Mary Catherine. She needs
you,
her mother, not a sick old lady who’s just one more thing to worry about.’

Mary stood her ground. ‘You seem to have forgotten I have a busy life of my own, not to mention a business to run.’

‘You don’t need to answer to me. Tell it to Noelle.’

‘You’ve always known exactly what was best, haven’t you?’

The hate in her daughter’s eyes caused Doris to reel. So this was how Mary
really
felt, beneath the studied politeness, the carefully chosen gifts on birthdays and Mother’s Day. This was her legacy. Wearily she replied, ‘I know I didn’t always do right by you, Mary Catherine. That’s why I’m asking you to do the right thing by
your
daughter. For her sake, please …come home. She needs you.’

The moment stretched between them. Mary was the first to break it. ‘I have to go.’ Her voice was cold. She hitched her purse onto her shoulder and spun about.

Doris watched her walk quickly down the path, stiff-legged, shading her eyes against the glare. In the hot July sunlight the yard appeared bleached of color. Mary might have been an image from long ago, a faded snapshot from their family album.

Then she was gone, the dull slam of her car door seeming to reverberate in the stillness. Doris drew in a breath of air laced with the scent of honeysuckle. Only then did she allow herself to collapse in the wicker chair by the door. She was breathing hard, holding the heel of her hand pressed to her side. Yet she was glad her daughter couldn’t see. Mary had no idea how sick she really was. She thought they’d gotten the cancer all out. But if she’d been told the truth, it would only have made her feel obligated to Do the Right Thing, whatever that was.

I don’t want her coming back for all the wrong reasons,
Doris thought. Which was silly, really. Because hadn’t her daughter made it perfectly clear she wasn’t coming back at all?

Mary had chosen the scenic route, which looped about the lake before linking with the road into town. In the past, whenever she’d felt out of sorts, it had acted as balm, a cool hand against a hot forehead. But today it wasn’t having the desired effect. The lake slid past unnoticed. The narrow road, lined with alders and scrub pines, its cool green light flickering amid the branches overhead, might have been the Midtown Tunnel.

How dare
she,
of all people, accuse me of letting my daughter down!
It was beyond unfair; it was outrageous. Of course Mary would do everything in her power to help, but did that mean putting her entire life on hold? It could be weeks, months even. In the meantime, how was she supposed to run a business from more than a hundred miles away?

Noelle wouldn’t have asked it of her; in fact, she’d have been horrified at the idea. Much of the time wasn’t that why Mary hung back? She was never certain how her overtures would be received. It wasn’t that Noelle bore a grudge. That was too simplistic. No, their relationship was like a plant that had been given too little light. Pale and a bit stunted. It would live and was even capable of bearing fruit, but it would never flourish.

The thought brought a pang of regret. She should have done more for Noelle back when it would have made a difference. She
would
have … if she hadn’t been so hell-bent on getting ahead. Her only means of escape had been to work hard and study even harder. So she’d done what she had to. At her daughter’s expense, as it turned out.

But was it fair to put all the blame on herself? She’d been so young. And back then she’d honestly believed it was as much for Noelle’s sake as for her own. Too late she’d realized that having a child wasn’t like owning a cat or a dog. Children couldn’t be placed on hold.

She saw things more clearly now. She saw a grown-up daughter who’d forgiven but could not forget. She understood that some things can be repaired, others merely glued together. And one truth stood clear amid the haze of if onlys and might have beens: There is simply no remedy for time with a child not spent.