I stared at it for most of the night.
I put the satchel on the ottoman of the upholstered chair in my bedroom and never touched it again for the rest of the night.
I never even counted it. The money was kind of an abstract thing that part of me didn’t want to admit actually existed as much as another part needed it to solve my problems. The conflict I felt in having taken it was real.
Not taken, I had to remind myself. Stolen.
I just let it sit, partially feeling a sense of relief. That I could breathe now; that for the time being my son could stay at Milton Farms. That I could pay the mortgage, the house taxes, and get out from under this cloud. That if I wanted to I could even help my folks get out from under theirs. I kept telling myself I’d won the lottery. That no one had actually been harmed by taking it because it was probably ill-gotten gains and no one seemed to miss it or even know it was there.
At least no one I knew, right, Hilary …?
But I hadn’t won the lottery. I’d taken something that belonged to someone else. I was sure I’d crossed the legal line. Tampered with evidence. A foreboding crept in, like in the movies when the bass track starts to drone and the unsuspecting girl opens the back door, letting the killer in. As if the same urge to save my son had also put him in danger.
No matter how victimless it seemed. Someone would miss it.
Someone always missed it.
At some point I dozed, and in the morning my eyes blinked open. Brandon was by my bed, staring at me. “Remi wants to go out.”
Remi. Our caramel-colored toy poodle. I glanced at the clock: 6:41 A.M. I’d probably only gotten a couple of hours of sleep.
“Let her out the back, sweetie,” I said, and shut my eyes again. The yard was totally closed in back there. “Mommy will be up in a little while.”
“You’re going away?”
“No, I’m not going anywhere,” I said.
Then I realized what he was talking about.
Brandon’s eyes were on the satchel. My heart lurched, praying that I hadn’t left it open and he had peeked inside. The last thing I needed was him going on at school about this or to a teacher. Or worse—if it ever happened at some point—to Jim.
I shot up out of bed.
With relief, I saw that the zipper still was closed.
“No. I’m not going anywhere, sweetheart,” I said, my heart regaining its normal pace. “I’m staying with you. Forever. And you’re staying with me, right?”
“I guess.” He just sort of nodded blankly. “I’m going to watch TV.”
“Let Remi out!” I yelled after him.
As soon as he’d left, I jumped out of bed and threw the satchel in my closet. I had to find a place for it. Elena had access to all the usual storage areas and I didn’t exactly need her to inadvertently come upon it either.
I grabbed a nylon ski bag from the basement, shut my door, and transferred the cash from the satchel. If I ever got caught, that leather satchel was the only thing that could tie me directly to Joe Kelty’s car. An hour later, after breakfast—it was Saturday, no school—I lugged the nylon bag outside and around the back of our deck.
It was freezing. The ground was covered with a fresh layer of frost. I was just in moccasins and my robe. I opened the latticed wooden door that led underneath the deck, where we stored the outdoor furniture for the winter. I crawled inside and dragged the bag amid the chaises and pool toys—the crawl space was less than five feet high. A large red Styrofoam drinks cooler was lying next to a folded-up outdoor umbrella. I kneeled and opened the nylon bag. For the first time I started counting what I had. As I’d thought, the first, elastic-bound packet of bills contained a hundred hundreds. Ten thousand dollars! The rest all looked about the same. One by one I took them out and stacked them on the tarp next to the umbrella. I counted fifty of them. $500,000! The sight of so much money filled me with both awe and fear. Fear that I had already crossed a kind of line. Though I felt certain I’d covered my tracks well. I hadn’t given Rollie my name. And he was the only one there. I was just being paranoid, I told myself. Anyone would be. Still, I packed the money back into the nylon bag and zipped it shut. I opened the cooler tub and packed it all in. Then I wedged the whole thing behind a stack of chaises and shut the top.
No one would find it in a million years.
Later I drove down Route 22 toward White Plains until I spotted a house under construction. I got out—no one around—and hurled the black satchel into the half-filled Dumpster. I was glad it was gone. I drove to a Family Discount store and bought a padlock, and when I got back secured the latticed door under my deck.
Maybe it was wrong, I thought, but the real wrong had already been committed. Over a week ago.
I didn’t go back for it again for ten days.