CHAPTER FORTY-five

Mom’s cooking is cause for concern.

Asher and I sit at the table, watching Mom burn hamburgers and French fries. Dad reaches into the fridge and pulls out four glass bottles of Coke. He breathes deeply and loudly. Mom jumps back from the stove, barely missing the grease flying from the hot pan.

“I give up! How about hot fudge sundaes for dinner and hamburgers and French fries for dessert?” Mom asks, heading for the liquor cabinet.

“Sounds good to me,” Asher says, licking his lips.

After mixing herself a martini, Mom scoops vanilla ice cream into glass dishes while Dad sits at the table sipping his Coke. He looks as if someone has died.

“Dad, what’s wrong?” I ask, even though I know the answer.

“I have some news,” he says.

Of course you do, I think. I’ve been here before. We all have.

Three years ago, Dad sat us down in the living room of our row house across from Washington Square Park and delivered the exact same words.

Mom was already lying on the couch. She had a cold compress on her forehead. Asher and I were scared.

It turned out we had reason to be. Dad told us we were moving. To Kansas.

Where the heck was Kansas?

Asher ran to the bookshelf and looked it up in an atlas. Kansas, the rectangular state in the middle of the country. Landlocked. Hours to get anywhere. No trees. All wind. The only people I knew from Kansas were Laura Ingalls Wilder and Dorothy Gale. Frontier women. I was a city girl.

We didn’t have to ask Dad the reason. We were moving because of Frank Beggett. The name we agreed never to utter. The name of the man who murdered a teenage girl; the name of the killer my father exonerated. So much of the evidence seemed to prove he committed the crime. Very little didn’t. But Dad was like a broken record during the trial, repeating the same two words over and over: “Police misconduct.” In the end, that was all the jury remembered. The press had a field day. A travesty of justice.

Later, Mom started drinking. Threw a fit. The word divorce was whispered. A trial separation was brought up as well.

“You go; we’ll move in with Mother,” my mom spat.

“Why does it have to be Kansas?” Asher asked.

“Because I know Kansas,” Dad explained.

This was the first we’d heard of it.

Turned out he’d spent summers near the Colorado border there with his great-aunt Lucille and uncle Olin. He had a cousin who was leaving the “four-seasons-in-one-day climate” for Arizona. Dad wouldn’t give the cousin’s name, which made me suspicious. Maybe the cousin was an outlaw. Maybe that was why Dad had never mentioned Kansas. Especially since this mysterious cousin told Dad about all the small towns “in need of a fine defense attorney.” The point being: it was a perfect opportunity. Dad could relax. Take things slow.

And that was that.

It was my freshman year. Asher was in eighth grade. School had already started. None of that mattered. Not even Mom’s empty threats to leave him.

Case closed.

Now, here in Kansas, here in our new home, Mom walks over and sits beside Dad. He takes Mom’s hand.

“What’s going on?” I ask.

“I’ve been asked by Judge Tate to represent one of the accused,” he says.

My body turns to ice. “You’re going to get them off,” I say.

“Carly, now—”

“How could you?” I shout.

“Carly—”

“Why you?”

“Somebody has to do it,” he says.

“But not you,” I plead. I’m crying now. Dad hands me a napkin to blow my nose. Taking a deep breath, I look at him and ask, “Which one?”

It probably doesn’t matter which one, not really. But to me, it does. They confessed. In the paper Dick Hickock claimed that Perry Smith pulled the trigger and cut Mr. Clutter’s throat. If you had to defend one, wouldn’t you want to defend the one who didn’t pull the trigger and cut a man’s throat? Dick Hickock. I want my dad to say Dick Hickock. I think of Landry. I met Dick Hickock’s mother.

“Which one?” I ask again. “Which one?”

“Perry Smith,” Dad whispers, staring at the floor.

Mom is crying, too. I don’t blame her.

Maybe all those people back in New York City were right to hate Dad. How could he do this to me—to us—again? I grab my coat and my bike from the garage and head straight for Mary Claire’s.

It’s at least a twelve-minute bike ride out to her farm. My knees ache.

All I can think about is my father standing beside Perry Smith. He’s a traitor. He betrayed our family by saying yes. From now on his name will be spoken in the same breath as Benedict Arnold and Judas Iscariot. Judas took thirty pieces of silver in exchange for handing over Jesus with a kiss. Benedict Arnold nearly lost the Revolutionary War by siding with England against the United States. Arthur Fleming broke his promise to his family to free a cold-blooded killer.

What will people do to my dad when they find out?

Dad says he has no choice, that Judge Tate is forcing him to defend Perry Edward Smith. The charge is capital murder—death by hanging.

Forcing him? I don’t buy it. Everybody has a choice.

Dick and Perry had a choice that night back in November.

Liar.

I stand in front of Mary Claire’s front door at least ten minutes before I have enough courage to knock. I turn back to the road and shiver, blowing into my numb hands. It’s dark and cold.

The door squeaks open and a burst of hot air hits my back.

“Carly, what are you doing here?” Mary Claire asks. “It’s late. Carly, what’s wrong?”

“It’s bad. Like, real bad,” I say.

She closed the door behind us, wrapping her arms around herself. “What’s bad?”

“If I tell you, you’ll look at me differently from now on. I just know it.”

“Carly, you’re scaring me,” she says.

I don’t look her in the eye. I can’t. I’m ashamed.

“What did you do?” she asks, rubbing her hands on her arms.

“I didn’t do anything—it was my dad.”

“Your dad?”

The door swings open. It’s Mrs. Haas. “Girls, come inside, you’ll catch your death. Carly, what are you—?”

“I’ll explain later, Mom,” Mary Claire interrupts, dragging me inside, up the stairs, and down the hall to her room. The warmth feels so good. I flop down on her bed. She joins me. We lie side by side. She grabs my hand and interlocks her fingers with mine.

“Now, will you tell me?” she says.

Looking at the ceiling, I tell her. I tell her what Dad said at dinner. I tell her how I feel. I tell her that I can’t take it. I tell her how scared I am to go to school. I tell her I’m afraid of what people will say, think . . . do. I tell her everything.

My stomach growls. I didn’t eat my hot fudge sundae for dinner or my burned hamburger for dessert.

Mary Claire runs downstairs and comes back with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a glass of milk.

“Here,” she says, handing me the plate.

“Thanks,” I say, tearing off the crust. I like to eat that part last.

“So, your dad’s going to represent Perry,” she says.

I nod.

“Carly, I’m sorry,” she says.

“Things are going to be different, aren’t they?” I ask.

“No,” she says, shaking her head. But she’s looking at my glass of milk.

“You’re not a very good liar.”

She flashes me a sad smile. “I don’t claim to be.”

I sit the empty plate on her nightstand and hold the glass of milk with both hands. “Of all the lawyers in all the towns, Judge Tate had to choose my dad.”

“I guess your dad’s the best,” she says.

“I wish he wasn’t.”

She’s quiet for a moment. “You’re not going to be alone. I’ll stand by your side.”

“Will you?”

“Promise,” she says, holding out her pinkie. “You’re my best friend.”

I wrap my pinkie around hers. “Thanks,” I whisper, my chest heavy.

There’s a knock at the door.

“Carly, honey?” Mrs. Haas says. “Your dad’s downstairs.”

Of course she called him. I trudge down the stairs. Dad stands in the entryway, waiting for me. I turn and wave good-bye to Mary Claire. She waves her pinkie back, affirming her promise to me that life isn’t going to change tomorrow. Even though I want to believe her, I can’t. Human nature always gets in the way.