Delilah answered the door, all four-foot-three of her, like she was a giant: completely without fear. She hugged me instantly, as hard her thirteen-year-old arms could. I was glad she was so small; it kept her from reaching my ribs.
“Caleb!” she shouted.
It was partly a greeting and partly an announcement.
She dragged me into the house.
It was a big house. Delilah’s parents were on the wealthy end of the tax scale. Edgar Simmons, her father, was a locally renowned defense attorney. He was away, going through a deposition or some other lawyer thing I don’t quite grasp. Her mother was home. She greeted me warmly, almost as family, and the pair led me to a large sitting room lit by row after row of picture windows. Beatrice Simmons was a homemaker and a socialite. She was plump in a matronly way, and always had a twinkle in her eye. As opposed to many of the wealthy, which I tend to only see from afar, Beatrice did not tend towards overindulgence in cosmetics, or cosmetic surgery. Her clothes were stylish but toned-down. Nothing she wore, from makeup to clothing to jewelry, was particularly flashy or ostentatious. She looked dignified in a simple way; simple not being the same thing as plain. Despite my previous encounters with the rich, this family was good people.
“Edgar isn’t here at the moment,” she said, smiling, “but he’ll be glad to hear you’ve come for a visit.”
We sat around a large, antique oak coffee table and drank coffee. Delilah sipped at a cup of hot chocolate.
“I got a new patch,” Delilah said, sometime during the round-table discussion of nothing in particular.
I looked at her, thankful that someone else had brought it up, because, if it would have been left up to me, it would have been left. Her eye was not a subject I was going to bring up in conversation. But the eyepatch was a cute shade of pink, with a sparkly yet tasteful rhinestone in its center. At least, I hoped it was a rhinestone.
“It looks pretty with your hair,” I said.
It did. The pale pink and the pale yellow of her hair complimented each other. Though I doubted it would ever show up in that combination on a color wheel, on her it was lovely. I looked at it, expecting to be assaulted by horrifying memories. I wasn’t. I felt a mixture of relief and guilt. And then Delilah reached out and touched my hand. It was a gentle touch, the way you might pet a live bird, as soft as a sigh. I felt better.
“I wanted to thank you,” she said.
“You don’t have to…”
“Yes,” she said, cutting me off, “I do. You saved me. I didn’t think anyone would, but you came.”
I chanced a glance at her mother. Beatrice welled up with tears. Only a strict upbringing of disciplined manners allowed her to keep her composure.
“Delilah,” Beatrice said, “Could you leave Mr. Carson and me alone for a moment?”
“Grown-up talk, huh?” Delilah said, returning to being a child. “Boring stuff. Come see me before you leave, Caleb.”
I said I would. She tramped off to some other acre of the house. There was an awkward silence around the table. Beatrice broke it.
“I’m glad you came. She’s been wanting to see you for weeks,” Beatrice said.
“I,” I said, “I kind of got lost.”
“Glad to see you’ve found yourself again,” she said sweetly.
Had I? Maybe.
“I also hear you had a little visit at the police station last night,” she said.
“Yeah,” I said, rubbing the back of my head, “I may have gotten myself into a bit of trouble.”
“From what I hear it was necessary trouble,” she said. “I hear a lot.”
“That you do,” I said.
“What have you gotten yourself into, Caleb?” she asked.
“Just a case,” I said.
“I would think it would be more than that,” she said, sipping her coffee, “By what I’ve been hearing. Is someone else in trouble as well?”
Hannah.
“Someone needs my help,” I said, barely managing to get the words out. “A friend of mine is in trouble.”
“A close friend?”
“Yes.”
“Then I don’t imagine anyone could hold you at fault for doing whatever you have to do to see this friend safely out of her troubles.”
How does she know?
“Do what you have to do,” Beatrice said. “Edgar and I will do whatever we can to help you weather whatever storms come after.”
“I can’t ask that,” I said.
“And you don’t have to,” she replied.
“Please don’t tell Delilah,” I said.
“Nothing I could say would convince her you are anything other than a hero,” Beatrice said, “I wouldn’t believe otherwise, even if I could myself, but I won’t mention it to her if that is what you wish.”
“Thank you.”
Beatrice laughed a small, happy laugh at that.
“She wants to be like you when she grows up,” she said.
“Like me?”
“She wants to help people like you do,” Beatrice said.
“She should go into law, or social work,” I said. “The money’s better, even in social work, and it’s a lot less dangerous.”
“I think she’d make a fine lawyer,” Beatrice said, an air of pride deepening her voice, “but she will do what she will do, and her father and I will be proud.”
“I think she has plenty of time before she needs to start worrying about it,” I said.
“I agree.”
“We owe you so much,” Beatrice said, “and we can never repay you for bringing her back to us.”
“The only gratitude I need is for you to spend every day remembering how precious your time with her is. That’s payment enough.”
We sipped more coffee, in silence. I spent a good deal of time staring out the windows. They had a beautifully landscaped garden, with hedgerows and sprays of colorful flowers. I thanked her for the hospitality and went to find Delilah. She was in another room, sitting in a window seat and absentmindedly sketching in a book. I peered at the picture over her shoulder. It was a good likeness of someone, I just couldn’t place who.
“She’s a magic princess,” Delilah said.
“She looks it,” I said.
“See here,” she said, pointing to the eyes, “Her eyes are full of stars.”
“So they are,” I said, only half-looking. “Did you make her up? Like a story?”
“I dreamt about her,” she said. “She’s pretty, but always seems a little sad. Why would she be sad if she’s a magic princess?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe her magic only works sometimes or maybe she’s cursed, like in the fairy tales.”
“A cursed princess,” she said, “Maybe. I think she’s sad because she has a quest and she can’t complete it.”
“I thought only knights went on quests?”
“She’s magic,” Delilah said as if I was being silly, “but maybe she’s sad because she needs a knight to help her with her quest.”
“Swords and armor do tend to get heavy,” I said, really looking for the first time at the sketch.
The hair on the back of my neck stiffened.
Yvonne.
It was. She looked different as neither a ghost nor a human cinder. And the stars in her eyes, Delilah had drawn them small, but still...
Stars within circles within stars within circles.
“Yep, she needs a knight,” Delilah said. “Like you, Caleb, you were my knight.”
“Justin helped,” I added, somewhat sheepishly.
“Yeah,” she said, “He’s a cop, not a knight.”
Couldn’t fault her logic, so I just chuckled.
We talked about less important things after that. She was excited to go back to school now that she was healed up enough. We talked about Halloween coming up and costumes and jack-o’-lanterns. I told her I’d like to introduce her to Terry. She sparkled after I told her about his house and the party he threw. She knew she couldn’t go. “Grown-up stuff,” she said, but I told her she could visit beforehand if her parents gave the ok. And then, as if waking slowly from a restful dream, the passage of time began to dawn on me. There were still things to do, and if I wanted to be able to take Delilah to Terry’s haunted house, I needed to get about doing them before it was too late.
So, I said goodbye to Beatrice and promised to talk with Edgar when he got a free moment. The call to Justin was short; he would be there to pick me up in a moment or two. I hung up, and Delilah walked me to the door. She didn’t want me to go, and only released her mad clutch when I promised to come back to visit soon. There was such strength in that tiny girl. For the second time, I thought of the book.
Stars within circles within stars within circles.
She’d be worthy, but not now. Now, she needed to enjoy what was left of her childhood. I had killed the men who’d tried to take it away from her. I damn sure wasn’t going to do it myself now. No. One day, maybe the book, but not now. I hugged her as tightly as my ribs would allow and kissed her forehead.
Then I left.