Chapter Ten
As she prepared to leave for work on the second day of her life as a self-employed woman with her own business, Lacette skipped down the stairs, and stopped midway. What her office needed was something, an object or two that made it very personal. She went into her bedroom and collected three of her hand-carved birds and the Native American doll that she bought at the Cabin Fever Festival a month earlier, put them in a tote bag and hurried off to work.
While Lourdes marveled at the beauty of the birds and exclaimed her surprise at Lacette’s skill, Lacette stood beside Lourdes’s desk staring at the Native American doll that she held in her hand. As she held it, it seemed more and more life-like, and although she would forever swear that it wasn’t true, she could see in it the face of the old woman who had sat rocking at the Cabin Fever Festival. And it was more than a premonition; she knew that much. She walked back to her office still holding the doll and sat down just as the telephone rang.
Lourdes’s voice came to her over the intercom. “Phone for you, Lacette.”
“Hello.”
“Hi, Lace, I’m applying for a job at County Bank. I don’t have a thing to wear to the interview Friday, because you know my skirts are so short. Can I borrow one of your lady-like business suits? I swear I’ll give it back to you Saturday.”
Lacette tried to focus on what Kellie said, but she couldn’t think beyond the word, bank.
“Lace, I need the suit, and I promise I’ll give it back to you the same way I got it. Please.”
“Uh. All right. I have a navy blue suit, and I’ll drop it off at the parsonage tomorrow evening.”
“Thanks. Uh . . . what time?”
“I don’t know. It’ll be after six. Or we could meet for dinner, and I’ll bring it along.”
“I don’t . . . think I can make dinner. Uh . . . why don’t I drop by your office and pick it up?”
Precisely what she didn’t want. Kellie wouldn’t resist making a pass at any of her male clients and posing as Lacette. “All right. Come between five and five-thirty.”
She knew from Kellie’s reluctant agreement that her sister would have preferred a different arrangement, but years of dealing with Kellie had taught her the efficacy of self-protection. She hung up, reached for the phone to call the manager of the Warren Pitch Company, her former employer, in an attempt to get the company as a client, and her hand stilled, suspended over the phone as recognition dawned on her.
The old woman. She’d said, “There’s something for you.” The bank. Kellie. She got up and walked from one end of her small office to the other, retracing her steps again and again. “Good Lord.” She slumped into her desk chair, her heart thumping so loud and so fast that she grabbed her chest as if that would slow down her heartbeat. Perspiration poured from her forehead and sweat dampened the back of her neck as awareness dawned on her. Why hadn’t she realized it, and why hadn’t Lawrence thought of it? That brooch could be in a safe deposit box in a bank.
She telephoned Lawrence Bradley. “Everything’s fine,” she said after their greetings, impatient with the small talk. “Lawrence, my gramma’s brooch may be in a safe deposit box in a bank somewhere.”
She listened to silence and imagined that he berated himself for not having thought of it. “What makes you think that?”
“My father said Kellie has searched the house for it. If she’d found it, we’d all know it.”
“She what? She knows I have a court order restraining her from going into that house before your father took possession of it.”
“Well, she ignored it, and after you gave the keys to Daddy, she broke in through a back window and—”
“Don’t tell me . . . never mind. That woman is capable of just about anything. I gather you don’t know which bank. Are you pretty sure it’s in a bank?”
“I have no proof that you’d accept, but I’m fairly certain.”
“Are you saying you have a sixth sense or something like that?”
“You could say that. How do we identify that bank?
“It’s my job, and I’ll get right on it. If Carrie Hooper had a safe deposit box, I’ll know it pretty soon.”
She could barely contain her excitement and her anxiety—not because she coveted the brooch, she didn’t. But because the mystery of its whereabouts had given it larger-than-life significance, at least to Kellie. As she always did when confronting change in her life, change that held uncertainty, Lacette telephoned her father and told him where she thought they would find the brooch.
“Why didn’t we think of that, Daddy?”
“Is this the result of one of your premonitions?”
“Partly.” She told him how it came about. “It bothers me that I took so long to figure it out, but I guess what matters is that I eventually got it. Lawrence Bradley is trying to find the bank.”
“Does Kellie know this?”
“No, Daddy, and I’m not planning to tell her.”
“We have to tell her, because she’s hell-bent on self-destruction because of it. Let me know when Bradley gets it, and I’ll tell her. I want us all to be together when he gives you that brooch.”
She promised that she would, and telephoned Douglas to tell him what had occupied her thoughts for most of the day.
“You mean that old woman at the festival? I thought it unusual that you should go directly to the Native American crafts when you didn’t know where they were, not that it matters. I hope your hunch is correct. What about lunch?”
“Not today. I promised myself that the next time we lunched over here, I’d bring the food from home. Something special.”
“Any other reason why we can’t lunch together?”
“Not that I can think of.”
“Great. Then I’ll be over at twelve-thirty with lunch and you’ll owe me two lunches. I love home baked ham.”
Her eyes rounded as she stared at the phone. She had never baked a ham in her life. “You’ll take what I give you.”
His laughter was fresh air purifying her atmosphere. “And I’ll take what you give me with the greatest pleasure. See you at half-past noon.”
“Douglas, I’m beginning to see that you can turn the simplest most innocent statement into a risqué double entendre.”
The laughter seemed to flow out of him, and she wished she could see the devilry that she knew his eyes reflected. “That’s the way it shapes up in your thoughts, babe. My mind’s as clean as crystal and as pure as falling rain.”
She tried to punish him by not laughing, but failed in the attempt and whooped. “Very funny,” she said when she could get her breath. “See you later.”
For some time after she hung up, she pondered her ignorance of Douglas, for although she had met his parents and his son, she didn’t know enough about him as a man and as an individual to warrant her deep and growing attachment to him. If she examined her feelings carefully, she would have to conclude that she cared for him. And where did that leave her? Her left shoulder flexed lightly. What would be would be, she thought and prepared for her appointment, a first time author who wanted a media blitz sufficient to get her book on The New York Times list of best-sellers. Fat chance of that happening. She’d read the story of an old hippie still trying to find himself at the age of seventy-six and hadn’t been able to muster much sympathy for the hippie. She had none for the writer.
She finally got her desk cleared around a quarter past twelve and went to her bathroom to refresh her makeup and comb her hair, looked in the mirror and thought, I look fine. Men don’t have to look perfect, and if they are too lazy to shave, they can grow a beard and be in fashion. She flicked off the light and went back to her desk, declaring herself independent of lipstick and eye shadow.
Minutes later, Douglas arrived with their lunch, put his packages on her desk, and walked around to where she sat. Without saying one word, he rolled her chair from the desk and lifted her from her seated position. Her heart skipped a beat, and she had that feeling of being suspended in space. Then the warmth, the feeling of security like solid ground beneath her feet enveloped her as his arms enfolded her and his tongue flicked across her lips. She opened to him, and her senses reeled as he possessed her.
He broke the kiss and hugged her to him, softly and gently stroking her back. “I missed you,” he said. “Only twenty-four hours, and I couldn’t wait to see you today. Want to go fishing in the Monacacy River Sunday?”
How could she respond to his comment and his question when every nerve in her body clamored for more of him? “I’ve never been fishing. I have no idea how you do it.”
He squeezed her to him. “It’s easy. I’ll teach you that and anything else that you need help with and that I have any expertise at.”
She stepped back and looked at him, fully aware that he’d left the subject of fishing. “Gee, that’s great. Make a list and I’ll—”
He cut her off, rubbing her nose as he spoke. “Let’s eat before this gets out of hand. I’m just realizing that we both like matching wits with each other. It’s fun, but the food will get cold.”
Later, as she waited for Kellie, she reflected on the events of the day. They would find the brooch, she had three new clients, and best of all, she sensed the possibility of a future with Douglas. At five-thirty, she transferred some papers to her briefcase and prepared to leave, and Kellie rushed into her office, having ignored Lourdes, and entered without knocking or being announced.
“Hi, Lace, sorry I’m late. Let me see which one you brought.” She examined the suit. “I was hoping for one of your designer suits.”
Lacette sucked her teeth, quietly she hoped, but if Kellie heard it she didn’t mind. “Kellie, all of my suits were designed by somebody somewhere. That’s the one I’m lending you.”
Kellie lifted her left shoulder is a careless shrug. “And beggars shouldn’t be choosers, right?”
“I’ll be by the parsonage Sunday morning. You or mama can make some waffles, and I’ll bring some good country sau . . . Oh, dear. I forgot I have a date for Sunday.”
Kellie’s eyes narrowed. “You’re going out with Douglas what’s-his-name? Or is it that Smith fellow?”
Lacette rejoiced that Kellie no longer intimidated her and that she didn’t feel impelled to answer the intimate questions that Kellie felt free to ask her. “Name him whatever you like,” she answered and stood. “I’ll drop you off at the parsonage.” As she said the words, she recalled that she’d never considered the place home, but a temporary residence among the many that their father, a preacher, had secured for them. She wondered how Kellie felt about it and asked her.
“I never questioned the fact that it’s home until Daddy left. Now, it’s sort of like I’m living in a boarding house and not having to pay rent. It’s weird.”
“What will you do when he moves into his house? He said he plans to do that in the next two or three weeks.”
Kellie’s bottom lip sagged. “He said that?” The print of her tongue moving around against her jaw told Lacette that Kellie was ruminating over the effect of her father’s move. “Hmmm. I see.”
She took Kellie to the parsonage but didn’t go in. “Tell Mama I said hi.”
“I will,” Kellie said over her shoulder, “provided I see her.”
Lacette didn’t say, but you live in the same house with her, and there are only two of you, though the thought pressed upon her. Instead, she said, “Maybe we three can have dinner together next week over at my place.”
Kellie turned and walked back to Lacette’s car. “Now that’s an interesting proposition. By the way, will what’s-his-name be there?”
“In spirit, maybe. I’m thinking of dinner for the three of us.”
“We’ve had a few of those since Daddy checked out. They’re like funerals. No thanks. See you.”
Kellie dropped the suit on the living room sofa and raced to the living room window to make certain that Lacette had driven off. She didn’t see the car, so she grabbed her shoulder bag and headed for her father’s house. She had to get in there and search the place from bottom to top before her father moved in, and she only had two weeks. Her biggest obstacle was Douglas Rawlins, and she feared that she couldn’t move him. If I can’t, I’ll take a chance on getting there early Sunday morning when Rawlins will be with Lacette and Daddy will be at church.
Douglas stopped working when he saw her approach, leaned against the handle of a shovel and waited for her to speak.
“I need to get in the house, and I can’t find my keys. Daddy’s out of town. If you don’t want to give me the keys, will you please let me in?”
She had an almost uncontrollable urge to mash his mouth with her fist, for he gazed down at her as if she were nothing, his face without expression. She refused to give up. Stepping closer to him, she smiled. “Please, Douglas. You won’t regret it. I promise.”
Finally, he spoke. “Really? What are you offering this time?”
Marbles fought for space in her belly as she thought of the possibilities should he discard his cloak of immunity to what most men would give an eye tooth to have. She traced the length of his arm from his shoulder to his fingers. “Anything you want and any way you want it.”
He fingered his chin, and she stepped close enough to kiss him, but this time, he backed away. “I see you’ve lowered the price.” What appeared to be a grin hovered around his mouth, though she couldn’t distinguish the grin from a snarl. It occurred to her then that he was toying with her, that he had no intention of acquiescing.
Her jaw jutted out and she backed away, grinding her teeth. “Don’t be so smart. Maybe I’ll get someone to give you a little encouragement.”
His grin widened. “You mean the guy your father had dismissed from the job because he let you use him? That the guy you’re talking about?” His laugh irritated her. “Run along. I have to work, and by the way, figure out what you’ll tell your daddy when he mentions this to you.”
The hell with him! She left walking faster than when she came. She’d get that brooch, and she would get even with him if it was the last thing she did.
Uneasy about the coming showdown with Kellie, the next morning Marshall Graham phoned Lawrence Bradley, the lawyer for Carrie Hooper’s estate. “Lacette told me you’re searching for a safe deposit box. What have you discovered? Anything important?”
“So far, I only know which banks have not leased a safe deposit box to Mrs. Hooper, but I haven’t exhausted my search. It’s the logical place for that brooch, and I expect we’ll find it.”
“Call me when you find it. It’s bound to cause trouble, and I want to do what I can to minimize that.”
“Bet on it. I know your problem, and I know the source. Uh . . . I have to tell you, sir, I am ashamed that I took what she offered. But I did not yield my integrity. I hope you will forgive me.”
“I don’t hold you responsible. Kellie is almost thirty-four years old. Be in touch.”
Marshall wondered for a minute why Kellie would go to such ends in attempting to get the brooch from Bradley. He knew she’d overstepped the bounds of good taste, but not that she went so far. Could one otherwise decent man, as Moody seemed to be, have such a powerful effect of a young girl? He doubted it. Somehow, being catered to by her mother, doing mean things for which he didn’t always punish her, and constantly intimidating Lacette with impunity must have been fertile ground for the seeds of female dominance—that’s what it was, he realized—that Moody sowed. Imagine teaching a spoiled fourteen-year-old that she could rule men! It’s too late for tears, he thought as he removed his glasses and wiped his eyes.
Marshall went to Home Depot and ordered paint for the bedrooms and baths, the foyer and upstairs hallway. The rest could wait, but every bedroom was wallpapered, and he detested walls covered with flowers. He engaged a contractor to clean the carpets and floors and, on the way home, stopped to visit with a sick parishioner. The woman lived alone, and he wound up preparing her a lunch of tuna salad, sliced tomatoes, toast and tea.
“This sure is nice, Rev.,” Myrtle Jones said to him. “I try to eat right, but today I just haven’t felt like doing a thing. I got some water to take my medicine, but it tired me out. Won’t you have some with me?”
“Well,” he said, “maybe I’ll boil a few of those eggs in the refrigerator, and I can have the salad and a sliced egg sandwich. That’ll be plenty for me. He prepared a tray for himself and joined her. “Maybe you ought to have at least half a sandwich. In case you don’t feel like fixing supper.”
She took it. “My appetite is good right now. I guess I just get tired of doing everything for myself. The Lord will bless you, Rev. Graham.”
He said the grace. “I’m blessed, Sister Jones.” As he ate, he found himself sharing with her his problems with Kellie, and once he began to talk, it was as if floodgates opened, and his concerns about his daughter and her behavior flowed out of him.
“I failed her, and I don’t know how it happened. I thought both my daughters were model young people.”
Myrtle sipped her tea and nodded. “First place, it’s not your fault. Whatever she did at fourteen was foolish. Kids experiment, and when they realize they have power, they use it. Whatever your daughter has done since she was fourteen, she’s done consciously, and she knows what is right and what is wrong. I used to tell my students not to use their youth as an excuse to make the errors that will ruin their lives then and later.”
“But we taught her and showed her right from wrong. I can’t understand it.”
“Quit beating yourself and thank God for your other daughter. When they were eighteen or so, I could see the difference between them. Kellie wore her clothes so tight; I used to wonder why she didn’t pop out of them, but not Lacette. Fifty percent success with kids is pretty good these days. I’m glad my grandchildren are grown and looking back on their youth with surprise that they made it. Maybe Kellie will straighten up, too.”
“Thanks for your ear, Myrtle. I’ll drop by again in a couple of days. If you need anything, call me.”
“You’re welcome, and you know it won’t go any further than me, ’cause I don’t gossip. It’s good of you to offer to help me out, but I can’t ask the preacher to come over here and do things for me.”
“You call me.”
He headed home. The bright sunlight and the budding trees along Sabillasville Road bordering Catoctin Mountain Park should have buoyed his spirits, but his mood darkened instead. He couldn’t watch as his daughter ruined her life, but what could he do to prevent it?
His telephone began to ring as he walked into his room at the motel. “Reverend Graham speaking. How may I help you?”
“Daddy. It’s Lacette. Bradley just called and told me he’s found the bank where Gramma had a safe deposit box. But Daddy, this is something awful. Mama’s name is also on the box and she could have opened it.”
“All right. Ask Bradley to open the box and remove the brooch if it’s there. Can you be at the parsonage around five-thirty this evening? I’ll call Cynthia and Kellie and tell them we’re having a family meeting there at that time.”
“I’ll be there.”
He hung up and sat down in the nearest chair. He didn’t recall Cynthia’s having a poor memory, but what reason could she have for not telling the estate manager that her mother had a safe deposit box? She had shortcomings, but she was not an evil person. He made coffee in his electric percolator and sipped it while reading a chapter of The Da Vinci Code. “Confusion abounds in this world,” he said to himself as he put the book aside. After a shower, he dressed and left for a mission that he dreaded.
Lacette arrived shortly after he did and, to his amazement, she walked over to him and handed him a small box that he imagined contained the brooch. She kissed his cheek, hugged her mother and sister and sat down.
He didn’t waste time with preliminaries. “We’ve just discovered that Mama Carrie had a safe deposit box.” He knew the reason for Kellie’s loud gasp, but he ignored it and continued to speak. He looked at Cynthia. “Does this ring a bell with you?”
She shook her head and he asked her, “Are you certain you never knew about that safe deposit box? Mama Carrie opened that box three days after she moved to Frederick.”
Cynthia’s eyes widened, and she slapped her hand over her mouth. “Lord, I forgot all about that. It’s been over ten years. I had the key somewhere. Heavens!” She stood and looked around at them rubbing her hands up and down her sides as she did so. “I declare, I haven’t thought about that box in years. Wonder where that key is?”
He waved a hand suggesting that the matter was of no consequence. “We don’t need it, Cynthia. As executor of the estate, Lawrence had the box opened this afternoon.”
Kellie sprang to her feet. “What was in it? Was that brooch in it? Was it?”
“Sit down, Kellie,” he commanded. “Whether the brooch was in the box should be of no interest to you other than a satisfaction that your sister now has everything her grandmother left her.”
Kellie lunged toward him. “What do you mean? She has it? She can’t have it; it’s mine. Gramma knew I wanted it. It’s mine.”
“Calm down, will you? Are you prepared to exchange your ring for the brooch?”
“Am I . . . You always take her side in everything,” she said to him, then whirled around to face her mother. “You knew all along where it was, and you wouldn’t get it for me. I did everything to get that brooch, even demeaned myself. And all the time, you knew where it was.
“You’re just jealous because Gramma didn’t leave you anything but that car and a coat, and I’ll tell you why.” Kellie walked over to where her mother sat and stood over her. “Gramma left that house to Daddy, because she knew you were cheating on him. Yes, she knew it because I was with her when we both saw you in that car. Yes, that big gray Lincoln Town car with those comfortable backseats. Gramma was so furious that she broke the necklace Grandpa gave her for their twentieth wedding anniversary. She said you didn’t deserve Daddy. Everybody knew what you were doing except Daddy and puritanical little Lacette.”
Marshall stood, walked over to Kellie and took her by the arm. “Sit down. Now! How dare you speak this way to your mother! Whatever happened is between her and me; it’s none of your business. Nothing she’s done comes near what you’ve done in order to have this brooch. You made a prostitute of yourself, with not one man but four, but two of them didn’t accept your offer. One took what you gave, but wouldn’t give you access to the house so you could search it for the brooch. The trifling fellow you seduced and who let you into my house is your lover, the type of man you’ll spend the rest of your life trying to get rid of. You should kiss your mother’s feet.”
He walked over to his wife. “I’m sorry about this, Cynthia. If I had imagined that Kellie would behave this way, I wouldn’t have asked for this meeting.”
He opened the box and nearly gasped at the square diamond surrounded by emeralds. Before handing it to Lacette, he said to Kellie, “Remember that if I ever see you with this brooch, I will immediately deed my house to Lacette.”
“It’s going back into the safe deposit box,” Lacette said. “If I ever marry, I’ll wear it with my wedding dress.”
“It would be a good idea if you got an apartment,” Cynthia said to Kellie. “I’ll be moving in two weeks. Good night all.” She left them and went into the kitchen where they head her running tap water in the sink. He wanted to check whether she was all right, so he peeped in the kitchen, saw that she was drinking a glass of water and went back into the living room where Kellie sat in a catatonic pose.
“She isn’t going to forgive you for that,” he said to Kellie, “and it’s a pity. I’ll be in touch.”
Lacette caught him before he reached his car. “I hated to leave her, Daddy, but I was afraid to stay there with this brooch in my briefcase. She’s gone insane over it.”
“That’s because it is the only thing she ever wanted that she has been denied. She’s . . . well, she’s tragic. I’ll be in touch.” He kissed her cheek, got into his car and drove to the motel where he stayed. He’d come a long way from the farm boy who rose at daybreak, milked cows, cut wood and fed pigs before walking three miles to school and who, in spite of that, graduated at the top of his class and won a full scholarship to North Carolina Central University. He had two university degrees, including a Doctor of Divinity, and had led the ministers’ conference on several occasions. But in spite of those and a number of other accomplishments, he had failed at what mattered most to him, being a good father to both of his children.
“I can’t let it kill me,” he said to himself, as he nursed a blinding headache, “and I can’t give up on her. I have to help her straighten out her life. No matter what she does, she’s my child.”
Kellie trudged up the stairs a beaten person. Where was she going to find money to rent and furnish an apartment? She couldn’t stay with Lacette; indeed, she didn’t want to. She sat on the bed, kicked off her shoes and stared at the telephone, wishing it would ring and she could go to meet Hal and show them that she didn’t need them. Not any of them.
She heard her mother’s footsteps rushing up the stairs and hoped that Cynthia wouldn’t stop at her door but would go on to her own room. Air seeped out of her, and she could feel herself shrinking when the door opened and her mother walked in without knocking.
Cynthia closed the door and let it support her back. “Tonight, for the first time, I saw you as you really are, as a greedy, self-obsessed hedonist who’s oblivious to the rights of other people and who has no concern for other people’s feelings. Yes, that’s what you are.” She didn’t wipe the tears that wet her cheeks, her chin and then her dress. “And the terrible thing is that I saw my role in it.”
“Mama, please. I don’t want to hear it.”
Cynthia raised her hand just high enough to signal her determination to have her say. “But you will hear it. I didn’t say one word when you berated me in the presence of my husband and my daughter, Lacette, who didn’t know until tonight why Marshall left me.”
Kellie turned toward the window. She was not going to listen to it. After all she’d done to get that brooch, and still she would never wear it . . . She jumped up from where she sat on the edge of her bed and started for the door. “You can talk all you want to, but I don’t have to listen while you regurgitate a bunch of stuff I’ve heard a dozen times, and I won’t.”
Cynthia’s hand shot out, detaining her. “You haven’t heard it from me. So you listen. I catered to your whims even when I knew it was wrong, that I should have corrected you, refused you and punished you.
“I indulged you when I should have denied your demands, and I did that many times at Lacette’s expense. It hurts me now to think how she must have suffered and that it was my fault, because I failed her as her mother.”
“Oh, Mama. For the Lord’s sake. Please spare me the melodrama.”
The increased pressure of her mother’s fingers digging into her arm startled her, for Cynthia’s hands had not heretofore done other than caress and stroke her. She tried to pull away but Cynthia, who was almost three inches shorter, stood straighter and held firm. “You’re the queen of melodrama. After that act you pulled downstairs, you should be quiet indefinitely. I thank God that Lacette had Marshall for support. She’s grown up to be a . . .” Her voice wavered. “She’s a fine woman, and I’m proud of her. I . . . I hope she can forgive me.”
Kellie wanted to go where she wouldn’t be reminded of Lacette, the brooch or the mess she’d made of her life because of it. “Mama, will you please let go of me, and let me pass?”
“After I finish my story, you may go wherever you like. You delighted in exposing me to Lacette. So, listen! For almost thirty-five years, I was your father’s faithful slave. I promoted his career at the expense of my own education, bore and raised his children with less help from him than I needed, worked tirelessly in his various churches and allowed myself to be a doormat for his parishioners who acted as if they owned me.
“In all those years, I didn’t have a self. I was a faceless, shapeless woman, cooking, cleaning, grinning and bowing, a shadow of a person whose own children didn’t take her seriously. Marshall was contented with life as we had it, possibly because I never complained. Our love life wasn’t worth a walk across the porch. For the first four or five years of our marriage, he tried to put some life into me, to give me as much in our intimate relations as he received, but I was so seeped in the puritanical doctrines of the church and the often articulated views of my own righteous mother that I couldn’t respond. He eventually gave up trying.
“On my fiftieth birthday, I realized I had nothing I’d dreamed of as a young, single girl, that I had suppressed my will and my dreams for what society thought I should be and do, and I guess the seeds of rebellion were planted that day. We were all celebrating my fifty-fifth birthday when, as I looked at my husband and my children, it occurred to me that I’d been married for over a third of a century and had never had an orgasm. That was the first day that I felt genuine resentment and anger about my life. So when a certain man said to me one Sunday evening as I left church, ‘Why do you do this? Don’t you want anything for yourself? ’ tears gushed out of me like water from a fountain, and before I knew it I was in his arms.
“That was the beginning. Two weeks later, he made a satisfied woman of me. If we weren’t together, I was scheming for opportunities to be with him. All day, no matter what I was doing or where I was, if I wasn’t with him, I was burning to get to him. I took all kinds of chances. I would have walked through fire to be alone with him. I couldn’t get enough of him, and when I took a stupid chance, your father caught me. That’s what I regret most. Not so much that Marshall knows about it as that he witnessed it. I owed him more than that.”
While Cynthia talked, Kellie focused on the picture of herself and Lacette as four-year-olds dressed for church in yellow dresses, yellow and white pinafores and white hats with yellow flowers on the brim. She tried not to hear her mother’s words, for to hear and understand them might impel her to sympathize with her mother, and she didn’t want to do that.
“Look, Mama. I’ve got a headache. I can’t deal with all that.”
“I am not asking you to deal with it. You’ve criticized me. I heard you tell Lacette that I was chasing my youth. I am not foolish, and I know my youth is behind me. But I have a right to feel like a woman, to look great, wear pretty clothes and smile back when a man smiles at me. I have the right to wear a perfume other than that Azure stuff my husband gave me every one of the thirty-five birthdays I had while we were together, and my feet will never test another pair of Reebocks or other sneakers.” She walked out as she came in, without a warning. Simply left.
Kellie lowered her head and rubbed the fingers of her left hand across her forehead. Back and forth. Over and over. Unaccustomed to self-pity and annoyed with herself, she turned on the little radio that rested on her night table hoping to change her mood. But the sound of Luther’s voice caressing the words of “Love Me Tonight” did nothing to raise her spirits.
“If she told the truth about why she had an affair,” Kellie reasoned aloud, “why doesn’t she understand why I can’t stay away from Hal, why I don’t want to stay away from him? And why I won’t?”
In her mind’s eye, she saw the answer to her question as images of his slovenly ways, his unkempt appearance and poor hygiene habits flashed through her memory. She crossed her legs and tightened her muscles in an effort to recreate the feeling she got when he pounded into her. The telephone rang, and she lunged for it.
“Hello. This is Kellie.”
“I’ll be in front of the church in fifteen minutes.”
“Okay,” she said, eschewing any semblance of hesitation. She pulled off her clothes, slipped into a long paisley skirt that had a slit up the left thigh, added a tight red sweater, slung her pocketbook over her shoulder and sped downstairs.
“Where’re you going?” Cynthia called after her.
“Out.” She got a jacket from the closet in the hall foyer and raced to meet Hal.
After allowing the telephone to ring nearly a dozen times, Lacette hung up and faced the fact that she longer had instant access to the members of her family; her parents’ separation had, among its many sequelae, a rupturing of the daily routines to which she was accustomed. She couldn’t count on her mother being at home whenever she called or her father leaving and returning home with clock-like regularity. Did she even have a family? Kellie’s accusations of her mother had stunned her, but the real pain she felt came from her mother’s calm acceptance of Kellie’s vicious assault.
Although she could only surmise that infidelity was at the root of her parents’ breakup, she didn’t know the details, nor was she sure that she wanted to know them. She dialed her father’s number, and when he didn’t respond, she got ready for bed, took a copy of Ann Petry’s novel, The Street, from her bookcase and settled into bed. She read several pages before realizing that, in choosing Petry’s novel, she was trying to understand women of easy virtue. Women like her sister. Tears soaked the pages of her book, but she couldn’t stop their flow. How had her relations with her sister splintered into nothing? She closed the book and tried to sleep, but at sunrise, six hours later, she still struggled to fall asleep for even one minute.
“You all right?” Lourdes asked Lacette when she arrived at her office nearly thirty minutes after the beginning of office hours. “You seem kinda pooped.”
“I am pooped. Nothing drains your energy like fighting for sleep all night. Any calls?”
“Mr. Rawlins wants you to call him at eleven. Nimble Fingers requested a call back as soon as you get in.”
“Thanks.” She made the business call first. “I can do that,” she said in response to a request by the manager of Nimble Fingers that she design and place the company’s ads in strategic TV and radio markets. Satisfied that her fledgling business had taken another step upward, she was in high spirits when she telephoned Douglas.
“Can you get the afternoon off or at least the better part of it?” he asked her.
“Why, yes, if it’s important. What’s up?”
“I’d like you to go with me to look at some property. It’s ideal for my purposes as a landscaper, and that may blind me to its inadequacy in other respects. I need land on which to grow plants and shrubs and to test varieties. I could also build a nursery. You’d see the house and its accommodations. The seller has another bidder, so I can’t shilly-shally about my decision.”
She hesitated long enough to remember that it was the only thing he had asked of her and that, as her own boss, she could come and go as she pleased. “What time?”
“You’ll do it? You’ll go with me?”
His elation shamed her for, to her mind, she was not making a sacrifice but would be doing something she’d enjoy. “Can we eat lunch on the way?”
“Great idea. Let’s take the van, and I’ll bring you back to your car. I’d go after four-thirty, but your father called me this morning to reemphasize his determination to move into his house within the next two weeks. He doesn’t need landscaping for that, but I think he wants changes so he’ll feel that it’s his. Can we leave about one?”
“Okay. I’ll meet you in the hotel lobby.”
Before leaving, she managed to place radio ads for Nimble Fingers, but she had to accept that getting the TV spots on terms acceptable to her client would not be as easy. She met Doug in the lobby and nearly betrayed her feelings to him, when his left arm went around her and his lips against hers sent shivers throughout her nervous system.
Douglas drove along West All Saints Street, the heart of Frederick’s African American life from the late eighteenth century to the middle of the 1900s. “Ever been in that house?” she asked him, pointing to number twenty-two, which once housed the studio of William Grinage, the African-American portrait painter who painted the most widely recognized image of Francis Scott Key.
“Sure I have.” I wonder how many of our schoolchildren know that Grinage was a black man who supplemented his income as a waiter by painting. He painted Key because the local Kiwanis Club commissioned him to do it.”
“Every time I drive out All Saints Street, I think about the suffering of the people who once lived there and of all the great things some of them did.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Like establishing hospitals and schools because the existing ones would not accommodate blacks.” He turned into Market Street and drove for about a mile.
“Are we going outside Frederick?” she asked him, hoping he’d say no.
“We’re stopping at the border.” I know a roadside restaurant there where you can eat all the crab cakes you want.”
After lunch, he drove about half a mile down the road and turned into a short lane that she imagined would be overhung with foliage by mid-July. He stopped at a gray stone, two-story country house and parked. “This place once belonged to a couple who lived in their old age as recluses, and it hasn’t been kept in prime condition, although it’s not in bad shape.”
“Who’s selling it?” she asked him.
“I’m told that their granddaughter is the seller.”
“Are you likely to have trouble with your neighbors, because you’re black?”
“I wouldn’t think so. The houses aren’t near each other, and the closest ones belong to members of other minority groups. Besides, if they don’t like my being here, tough! One thing is certain: nobody can burn it.”
He unlocked the front door, and she stood transfixed by the sunlight that poured through what appeared to be twelve-foot-high, arched windows exposing a forest of tall green trees. In her mind’s eye, she saw the sun rise above the trees and over the distant hills every morning for the rest of her life.
She grasped his arm. “Douglas, this is breathtaking,” she said of the vision before her. Echoes of their footsteps mocked them as they walked through the living room. “Everything in my house could sit in this room,” she said. “You’ll go nuts in this place. It’s so big.”
“If I’m lucky, I won’t be here alone forever.”
They passed through the dining room to the kitchen, a large, relatively very modern one with a large laundry room and two pantries at one end. As they walked, she made notes on a writing pad.
“Well, what do you think?” he asked her while they strolled down the stairs hand-in-hand.
“As far as the appointments are concerned, I wouldn’t hesitate to buy it, but I’d be lonely here alone. You need a new stove and refrigerator, new washer and dryer, a guest toilet downstairs and another bathroom upstairs. Of course, you can get along without that, but the house needs it.”
“What about closet space?”
“Plenty of that. With four bedrooms, you can use one for a closet.”
“What about my kids?”
She looked away from him. “Right. There’s Nick, which means you can only have one more, or two of the same sex, and a guest room.”
They had reached the bottom of the stairs and she continued walking, unaware that he stood against the banister with his face furrowed in a deep frown. “Come back here,” he said. “I thought you liked children.”
She whirled around. “Who said I didn’t?”
“But you just said—”
“I know what I said. We were talking about your children, if I remember.”
She had never seen him move so quickly. He grabbed both of her shoulders. “Don’t play with me, Lacette. Do you or don’t you want to have children?”
Watch it girl. If he wants assurances, he has to declare himself. “Sure I do, provided I find someone who’s willing to give them to me on my terms.”
“What are your terms?” The words came out of him like a growl. “If you’ve got terms, I want to know what they are.”
She didn’t plan to cater to him just because of his seriousness, so she put a smile on her face. “Douglas, lighten up, will you? You can find out when I know where I stand with you. Now, let’s go. I want to look at the grounds.”
He didn’t move. “Let’s get this straight. I wouldn’t knowingly allow a woman to bear an illegitimate child for me. Both I and my child deserve better. I’d expect and demand that my children be born within the framework of a legal marriage. Those are my terms.”
“Mine, too, but I have some terms before I’d get to that point.”
To her surprise, a grin spread over his face. He walked her backward until her back touched the wall and imprisoned her with his body. “What are they?” he whispered into her ear. “Tell me.”
She braced her hands against his chest, and he quickly enfolded her in his arms, then placed his hands against the wall above her head and stared down at her. When she thought her nerves would incinerate from his nearness and possessiveness, one of his hands cradled the back of her head and held it while his mouth seared her lips. She knew his kiss, but she hadn’t known the consuming power of his masculine aura until he erased every thought except those of him and every feeling except those that he gave her. With his free hand, he stroked her left nipple, boldly and deliberately as if he had a right to do it. Hardly aware that her body trembled, she wrapped her arms around him and pulled his tongue deeper into her mouth, demanding as much as she gave.
Abruptly, he moved from her and let his gaze roam over the bare walls and windows. Then he stared down at the naked floor. “What I wouldn’t give right now for more comfortable surroundings,” he said. “I want to make love with you in the worst way. Lacette, I ache for you, but—”
She didn’t want him to finish it, so she kissed his cheek, took his hand and started for the door. “You’re not one bit like I thought you were when I first met you. You’re a tough man.”
His left eyebrow shot up. “Tough? I think you can find a better word than that.”
She could indeed, but she didn’t feel like telling him that he was more man than she’d originally thought. If it had been more convenient, they would be making love at that minute, because he would have engineered it. The man was both bold and determined, and she didn’t doubt that when he went after what he wanted, he got it. She wondered what other surprises he’d give her.
“So what do you think?” he asked her when they were back in the van.
“If it won’t strain your finances, buy it.”
He started the engine and turned the van into the lane. “Would you live here?”
She nearly swallowed her tongue. “In the right circumstances, yes.”