The mattress sagged under their weight. Flannigan spread her across the bed, just the way he used to, with her hair fanning brightly on the pillow and her silky gown smoothed down so her body made one long, lithe line in the moonlight, uninterrupted by wrinkles. Propped on one knee, he leaned over her, his hand warm on her thigh.
“When I see you like this, Tess, I call myself a fool.”
“You never were. Only scared.” She traced the arch of his eyebrows, the shape of his cheekbone, the fine outline of his full lips.
“That feels good.” Closing his eyes, he sighed. “I could fall asleep right here, lying next to you on this mattress with your hands on my face.”
“Sleep, Flannigan?”
“Among other things.”
He stayed where he was awhile longer, with his hand on her leg and her hand on his face. He felt selfish, taking so much pleasure and knowing he couldn’t give any in return. But he felt noble too. It wasn’t often a man was called upon to leave the bed of a woman like Tess.
“You tempt me to stay, Tess.”
“You tempt me to invite you.”
Abruptly he stood, before he changed his mind. Looking down at her, he gave a sad, wistful smile.
“I could never hurt you again, Tess. You’re too important to me.”
“I suppose I should thank you for that.” She reached out for a second pillow, and propped herself up so she could see him better. “Instead I’ll ask for one last favor.”
“Name it. It’s yours.”
“Kiss me good night, Flannigan, and then go quickly.”
He bent over her and tenderly cupped her face. Then he gave her a kiss that started music in her soul. It was tender and sweet and endearing. And it was good-bye. She could feel the loneliness of parting, even as they clung to each other.
At last he broke away. Their eyes met briefly; then he turned quickly and left the room, as she had told him to. The door closed behind him, and she wished she had told him to stay. But what if he had? The loving would have magnificent; there was no doubt about that. They would have stayed in each other’s arms all night long. But when morning came... what would happen then?
She tossed one of the pillows across the bed and lay down on the other. She was foolish to be wishing such things. Forgetting that her shoes were still on her feet, she drifted asleep.
o0o
The sounds of a baby crying woke Tess. She pushed her hair out of her face and peered at the bedside clock, but OToole had his tail curled over its face, so she had to shove him out of the way before she could see the dial.
Six o’clock. She hadn’t been awake at six o’clock in the morning since she was fourteen and Aunt Bertha had rousted her out of bed to dress for school. “But it’s two hours before school,” she’d complain every morning. And Aunt Bertha would always say, “The early bird gets the worm.”
“But I don’t like worms,” she’d retort knowing full well that Aunt Bertha would tell her that real ladies didn’t sass their elders.
Tess crumpled back onto the bed, preparing to fall asleep again, but the baby resumed crying. She was fully awake now. Funny how nothing less than a freight train could wake her when she was in Chicago, and now the small sound of a newborn baby brought her out of a deep slumber in Tupelo.
She slung her peignoir over her shoulders, found her shoes, which had come off during the night and were hidden under the covers, and cracked open Lovey’s bedroom door. Lovey was sitting on the bed, holding the crying baby, and Jim was still sound asleep on the cot he’d pulled out of the hall closet the night before.
“Is anything wrong?” Tess asked.
“No. She’s dry and fed, and this is not a cry of pain. I think she’s lonesome. It seems to be the universal human condition.” Lovey smiled at Tess and motioned her into the bedroom. “Come in and visit.”
Tess tiptoed inside. Lovey patted the mattress beside her.
“Are you sure it’s all right? I know we were all in here last night... but I’ve read about hospitals protecting babies from germs and that sort of thing.”
“Isolation is a far greater threat than germs. Believe me. Jim and I both think that bonding far outweighs caution.”
Tess sat on the edge of the bed, gazing down at the baby.
“She’s so fragile. Aren’t you afraid of hurting her?”
“As long as you keep them close to your body so they won’t think they’re falling and you’re careful to support their little heads, babies do fine.” She looked at the naked longing in Tess’s face. “Do you want to hold her?”
“If you think it will be all right.”
She arranged her arms stiffly, and Lovey placed the baby into them. Little Babs was still sniffling and making unhappy faces, and this new turn of events didn’t cause her any great pleasure. She yelled louder.
“What do I do now?” Tess was genuinely alarmed.
“Why don’t you try walking her and singing to her? Babies love the sound of the human voice.”
Tess stood up and began to walk the baby, uneasily at first, and then, as she got the hang of it, with more confidence. She started humming too. An Irish lullaby she’d learned years ago when she and Flannigan were first dating.
The baby quieted immediately. With her little hand tangled in a long strand of Tess’s red hair, she gazed at her latest source of entertainment.
“I think she likes me.”
“She loves the sound of your voice. And who wouldn’t, Tess? You still have the voice of an angel.” Lovey leaned back against the pillows.
“You must be exhausted.”
“More tired than I should be. It’s my age, I guess. I was much younger when I had the last one.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?”
“If you’ll entertain little Babs for a while, I’ll catch a catnap.” Tess looked alarmed, and Lovey laughed. “I think I saw a rocking chair downstairs. You can’t go wrong with a rocking chair, Tess.”
“Come on, then, little one. Tell Mommy goodbye, and we’ll go downstairs for a grand old rocking chair adventure.” Tess grinned at Lovey.
o0o
Mick was sprawled on the deck of a sailboat, covered only with a towel, and Tess was sitting nearby, combing her wet hair and singing. The song was one of his favorites, Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man. Her beautiful voice lulled him, and he drifted near the edge of sleep, the boat rocking gently from side to side. The singing grew more distinct, and he came up out of the fringes of sleep to listen to the words.
Tess sang of being sad when her lover left and happy when he came back, and Mick knew she was singing to him. Opening his eyes, he lifted himself onto his elbow. He wasn’t on a sailboat at all; he was in Johnny’s house with Johnny’s white sheets tangled around his naked body. But the song was real. Tess’s voice drifted up the staircase, as clear as a summer day.
Mick slid into his shorts and jeans and hurried down the stairs, barefoot. When he reached the bottom step, he sat down. Tess was in the rocking chair, holding Lovey’s baby and singing. It was a picture too beautiful to disturb.
Mick watched and listened and coveted. What if that were their baby Tess held? What if she were singing blues lullabies to a tiny baby girl with her red hair and his blue eyes? Mick knew what her name would be. Jenny. He and Tess had picked it out many years ago.
Grief gathered in his heart for what might have been, and he sat on the bottom step, watching Tess rock Lovey’s baby and mourning for Jenny.
“I wonder where you are, Jenny, my girl?” he said softly.
Was she up there with the angels, crying because he and Tess had never given her a chance to be born? Was she dreaming of strawberry ice cream cones and pony rides and teddy bears and grand adventures with her daddy, carried high on his shoulders, giddy with excitement as he pointed out the different animals at the zoo or named the constellations or showed her the fireflies on a summer evening?
Mick rose from the stairs and walked softly across the room until he was standing behind the rocking chair. Tess slowed her rocking and glanced over her shoulder. Her eyes lit in the center, but she didn’t stop singing. Leaning over the back of the chair, he noticed that the baby was almost asleep.
He tiptoed around the chair and sat on the sofa, facing them, one bare foot propped on his knee.
“I heard you singing,” he said, quietly so as not to wake the baby.
“I’m babysitting for Lovey and Jim.”
“You look natural, Tess.”
“I don’t feel natural. I’m a little scared of this tiny bundle.”
He was somewhat in awe himself, but he didn’t say so. Tess rocked and Mick watched, and finally he got up enough courage to say, “Do you think she’d mind if I held her awhile?”
“Let me ask her.” Tess leaned close to the sleepy baby. “Little one, there’s a big man sitting on the sofa who is dying to hold you. I think he’s all right, but I wouldn’t want to hand you over without getting your opinion.”
Baby Babs yawned and blinked her blue eyes. Tess smiled up at Mick.
“I think she said yes.”
Tess stood up, and they met in front of the rocking chair. They made the transfer from her arms to his as carefully as if they were negotiating world peace. After Mick had the baby, Tess kept her hand under Babs’s bottom.
“She seems to be sagging, Mick.”
“I’ll fix that.” He pulled the baby closer to his chest, and somehow Tess got tangled in with the baby and he ended up holding on to both of them.
He looked at her flushed face and grinned.
“This babysitting does have its compensations. I don’t know who is the sweetest package, you or the baby.”
“You’re still full of Irish blarney, aren’t you, Mick?”
“Only with you, Tess. You always seem to bring out my charm.”
Laughing, Tess took a seat on the sofa and watched while Mick made the acquaintance of baby Babs, his head bent close and one hand cupping the tiny face.
“Sure and if you’re not a wee angel come straight down from heaven to gladen the heart of your old uncle Mick.” He glanced up at Tess. “I think she smiled at me.”
“I have no doubt about it.”
“Look at her tiny hands, Tess. See how she hangs on to me. I think she loves me.”
“Hmmm,” was all Tess could manage to say, for she had a huge lump in her throat.
“Did you see her little feet?” Mick kissed the sole of one tiny foot. “This baby is a miracle.”
Tess wiped her tears with the sleeve of her robe, blinking away the feathers that tried to get into her eye. It was far too late to cry over what might have been.
Jim came down the stairs and reclaimed his baby.
“Feeding time for this little one.”
Tess felt a dreadful sense of loss when Jim carried the baby back upstairs. She sat on the sofa, staring at Mick, slumped in his chair. She had never seen him slump. It seemed to her there was something she should say. But what would it be? I’m sorry? She was, of course, sorry for all the things they had missed—the babies with pink- soled feet, the midnight feedings, the birthday parties, the exhilarating feeling of being called Mommy and Daddy.
In the end she decided it was best to say nothing. After all, today they would be saying goodbye. Forever.
She stood up and quietly left the room. A single purple feather drifted to the floor behind her.
Mick sat in his chair until he could no longer hear her steps on the stairs; then he picked up the feather.
“Dear Tess... always leaving a trail.” He turned it this way and that, and it seemed to him that he could see her reflection in the deep purple feather. “Is that so I can follow you wherever you go?”
He pressed his lips against the feather, then put it in his pocket. How could he follow Tess? They were going in different directions.
o0o
By ten o’clock that morning everyone except Lovey was downstairs. It was Sunday morning, and they were going to say a formal good-bye to Babs.
With Johnny in the lead, they trooped into the rose garden behind the house. The sun slanted across the roses, and distant church bells rang out their melodies of worship.
Johnny placed Babs on a stone bench in the center of the garden. Then, with his hands folded across his chest, he gave a simple eulogy. One by one, the friends came forward and said good-bye to Babs. Each one spoke from the heart.
And when the ceremony was over, Johnny gathered Babs and led the way to his station wagon. Lovey waved good-bye from the second-story bedroom window. They were silent on the drive to the airport where Mick’s Cessna Skyhawk waited.
When they were all in the plane, Mick in the pilot’s seat and Tess in the seat beside him, Johnny leaned over and plucked Tess’s sleeve.
“I want you to be the one, Tess.”
She knew what he meant. They were going to scatter Babs’s ashes over the Mississippi River.
“Are you sure, Johnny?”
“Yes. I know this is what she wants. We talked about it many times. She always said to me, ‘Johnny, take me high into the sky and scatter me over the Mississippi. That way I can always be traveling to new places. Who knows how far the river will take me?’ “ He dashed a tear from his eye. “I can’t do it, Tess. I’m too selfish to let her go.”
Tess took the urn. “I’ll do it, Johnny.”
“Will you sing while you do it? She’d like that.”
“Yes. I’ll sing.”
“Thank you, Tess.” Satisfied, Johnny sat back and strapped himself in. “Ready when you are, Mick.”
Mick nodded. Just before he took the controls, he reached over and squeezed Tess’s hand. She looked down at their joined hands for a second, then up at him. Their gazes touched, lingered, then pulled apart. Mick released her and took the Cessna into the sky.
Tess watched the way he handled the plane with such ease. He’d always been fascinated with flight. She remembered the day he’d got his license. They had cut classes, packed a picnic hamper, and rented a plane. He’d flown all the way to the Gulf Coast for a celebration. And what a celebration. She could still feel the sun on her face and the wind in her hair as they’d made love on a secluded sandy beach.
They flew in silence through crystal sky and shining cloud castles with the roar of the engine in their ears. Far below, the earth divided itself into patches of green and brown with an occasional gray ribbon threading across the landscape.
“River coming up,” Mick shouted, pointing downward.
Tess nodded. Mick took the plane down, skimming the treetops. Tess still knew how to open the window. It was one of the many things Mick had taught her. When he dipped his right wing, she began to sing.
“Shall we gather at the river, where bright angel feet have trod...” Her voice rose sweet and clear above the sound of the engine, and she tipped the urn toward the Mississippi, still singing.
The sun caught Babs’s ashes and turned them to gold; then the shimmering pieces separated and drifted downward into the waiting river.
“Soon we’ll reach the shining river.” Tess sang the familiar hymn. “Soon our pilgrimage will cease; soon our happy hearts will quiver with the melody of peace.”
Mick climbed high into the sky, then turned the plane in a graceful curve and descended toward the river once more.
“Saints protect you, Babs,” he said.
“Farewell, dear friend,” Tess added.
“So long, my friend,” Jim said. “We’ll miss you.”
“Be happy, my darling. Wherever you are, be happy,” said Johnny, his face pressed against the window.
o0o
When they arrived back in Tupelo, Mick was the first to say good-bye. They were in Lovey’s bedroom. Little Babs lay curled in a tiny ball in the middle of the bed, sleeping.
“I guess it’s time to be moving on,” Mick said, shaking hands with Jim and Johnny. He gave Lovey a bear hug, saving Tess for last.
She stood with her back to the window, facing all her friends. When Mick approached her, she didn’t know what to expect, but he folded her in a bear hug, just as he had done with Lovey. She caught him close, absorbing his warmth and strength.
“Good-bye, Tess, my girl,” he whispered, leaning close to her ear. “Be well.”
“You, too, Mick.”
He held her, then abruptly turned away. She couldn’t bear to watch him go.
“Johnny, can I borrow the car?” she asked, already striding toward the door.
“Sure thing, Tess. The keys are on the hall table.”
“Thanks.” As she left the room, she heard the
voices of the three men mingling in a chorus of parting.
She ran down the stairway, jerking up the keys in her headlong flight to the car. By the time she got behind the wheel, she was panting, but not from exertion. There was nothing wrong with her physical condition; there was something wrong with her heart. It was bleeding and cracked and threatening to break.
She drove blindly away from Johnny’s house, not knowing where she was going, not caring. She had to get away from Mick Flannigan. If she had stayed to watch him walk away with his bags, she might have screamed, or cried—or both. This time he would really disappear from her life. Before, it had seemed that he had taken an extended trip and could be expected to return at any moment. Even while she was married to Carson, then to OToole, she had the feeling they were merely filling in until Flannigan came back.
Funny, she had never known that until now, until she’d heard Mick say good-bye. Maybe she’d unconsciously been expecting him back because he hadn’t said good-bye the first time.
Tess found herself on Joyner Street, near the park. On impulse she pulled in, parked the car, and made her way to the redwood bench where she and Flannigan had watched the fireflies. It was too early for them to be out, but still she could feel the evening approach. There was a languorous end-of- the-day feeling in the air. It was almost hypnotic.
She closed her eyes and let peace seep into her soul. Flannigan would probably be taking his bags down the staircase now. No, he wouldn’t have suitcases. He would have a scruffy old duffel bag, probably the same one he’d had ten years ago.
Johnny—and perhaps Jim—would take him to the airport.
She cocked her head, listening. It seemed that she could hear the roar of Mick’s Cessna Skyhawk as it climbed into the sky. If she tilted her head, she figured she would see a tiny silver speck, disappearing over the horizon.
She felt tears gather behind her eyes, and she batted her eyelashes to hold them in.
“I won’t cry. This time I won’t cry.”
“Whatever is wrong, ‘tis not worth your tears.” The voice sounded out of the darkness behind her.
Tess jumped, then turned to see who was talking to her. An old man stood beside an oak tree, staring at her from a face as brown and gnarled as the tree trunk. His white hair and beard were long and scraggly, as if he hadn’t seen the inside of a barbershop for a long time; and he was dressed all in black. The black suit was at least two sizes too big, the pants bagging at the knees, and the jacket sleeves rolled up over his knobby wrists.
“Are you speaking to me?” Tess asked.
“That I am.”
He came out of the shadows, and Tess got a closer look. His suit had a frayed satin collar and a distinctive satin stripe down the sides of the pants. A tuxedo.
She was astonished and curious and not at all afraid. In her career she’d dealt with all kinds of people, and she considered herself a pretty good judge of character. The old man had a lively walk and a perky smile, and his blue eyes were as friendly as a spaniel puppy’s.
When he reached the redwood bench, he gave her a polite, formal bow.
“Would you mind very much if I sat beside you?”
“Not at all.”
“My name’s Casey.” He held out his hand.
“I’m Tess Jones. Glad to meet you, Mr. Casey.”
“Just Casey.” He inched closer and stared at her with bright blue eyes. They reminded her of Flannigan, and she had to look away. “Are you new here, Tess? I haven’t seen you in the park before.”
“I grew up in Tupelo, but I’ve been gone a long time.”
“So, what brings you home?”
“The death of a dear friend.”
“A great sadness, the loss of friends. It hurts nearly as much as the loss of family.” His eyes grew watery, and he wiped them with his handkerchief. “Such a sadness, the loss of family.” He sniffed loudly, then honked his nose.
“Mr. Casey...”
“Just Casey, if you please.” The old man smiled at her through his tears.
Tess melted like ice cream in the sun. Mick used to accuse her of having the world’s most tender heart, and she guessed he was right.
“Is something wrong?” she asked, leaning forward.
“Oh, my dear...”He paused, gazing off into the distance. “No concern of yours.” He sniffed again, shifting so he could see her out of the corner of his eye.
“Oh, please. I hate to see you cry. Please let me help you if I can.”
Casey praised all the saints he knew and a few he didn’t. Lady Luck was finally smiling on him. He guessed there might be a miracle for old Casey after all.
“Well...” Casey’s tears dried miraculously. “I can’t find my son. He’s all I have, you know, all I have in this world. I’ve been searching and searching... for years I’ve been searching.”
“How did you... get lost from him?”
“You see, my beautiful wife died, God rest her soul. Back in those days ‘twasn’t easy for a man to take care of a baby and his job too. The welfare took him away from me.”
“How awful.”
“I did the best I could by him, but I had a hard time keeping help, you see.”
“Where did they take him?”
“First one family and then the other. I kept up with him for a while, and then I was out on the job, traveling, you know, selling shoes, and I got lost from him entirely. When I got home, they had sent him away, south, some said. I never found him again.”
“That’s heartbreaking.” Tess thought of Flannigan. Until he ran away and joined the circus, he’d been in an orphanage in Pass Christian, on the Gulf Coast.
“I’m getting old now. My fondest dream is to see him one more time before I die.”
“Is there someone who can help you? Some agency?”
“Alas, Tess, agency people don’t care much about folks who need their help. They only seem to care about drawing government paychecks.” Casey sighed. “No, I’m afraid that, like Blanche, I have to depend on the kindness of strangers.” He gave her a sidelong glance.
Tess was nobody’s fool. She knew Casey was playing on her heartstrings, but she didn’t mind. This poor old man with his faded tuxedo and his elegant speech needed her. And right now, with Flannigan flying out of her life forever, she especially needed to be important to someone.
“Look,” she said, turning to Casey, “I have a few more days before I have to be back in Chicago. Tell me more about your son, and perhaps I can help you.”
“Well...” Casey closed his eyes, as if he were remembering. “He had the blackest hair you ever saw, curly, too, just like his mother’s. And he had the clearest blue eyes in the world. Pure Irish just like me and his mom.” Casey paused, dabbing his damp face with his handkerchief.
Tess held her breath, knowing she was jumping to quite unwarranted conclusions, but wanting to believe anyway. Casey could have been describing Flannigan.
“He’d be about your age, I’d guess,” Casey continued, “early thirties. Memory fails me sometimes.”
Tess stared into his eyes. Blue. So blue. Just like Mick’s. Wouldn’t it be remarkable if she had somehow stumbled onto Flannigan’s father? It could all fit. Mick had never been certain how he came to be in the orphanage.
“I imagine he’d be a strapping, big man.” He looked down at his own small frame. “His mother was a big, handsome woman.”
Tess jumped off the bench. Flannigan would be leaving town soon. In fact, he might be gone already.
“If you’ll come with me, I think I can help you.” She started running toward the car, then looked back to see old Casey puffing to keep up. She went back and took his hand. “Hurry. Please hurry.”
After she had buckled him into Babs’s sports car, she roared through the streets, taking the curves practically on two wheels.
“There’s really no urgency about this, my dear,” Casey said mildly, hanging on to the dashboard.
“Yes, there is. He might already be gone.”
“Who?”
“Flannigan.”
Casey smiled and clutched the armrest as Tess came to a tire-blistering stop in front of an elegant antebellum home.
“Wait here,” she said, then she was out of the car and running up the steps. “Mick. Mick!”
A slim man with graying hair came to the front door. “Tess, is anything wrong?”
“I have to see Mick. Is he still here, Johnny?”
“He has already gone, Tess. We left him at the airport not ten minutes ago.”
“Oh, God.”
She ran back toward the car, and Johnny called after her. “Tess?”
“I’ll explain later,” she called over her shoulder. Then she slid behind the wheel and roared off in another direction.
o0o
Flannigan’s plane sat on the tarmac, waiting for him. He usually approached the plane with a sense of exhilaration, for he loved flying, loved being high above the rest of the world, far removed from reality, going someplace wonderful and adventurous because it was someplace new.
Today his footsteps dragged, and his duffel bag felt fifty pounds heavier. He didn’t want to leave. And he knew why—Tess.
He tossed his bag into his plane and climbed into the pilot’s seat. But he didn’t gear up for flight. Instead he sat there, staring out over the runway.
Suddenly Tess was in his field of vision, her skirt and her red hair both whipping around her face. She was calling his name as she ran.
He jumped down from the plane.
“Tess? Tess!” He raced toward her, and they met at the edge of the tarmac. He caught her shoulders, and she reached for his face. They stood that way for a while, gazing at each other, speechless. Her hands moved softly over his cheeks, and he knew the feeling of almost-heaven.
When the wonder of seeing her again had diminished, he pulled her into the lee of the terminal.
“How did you get out here, past all the security?”
“I used my winning ways.”
He laughed. “There are a few people inside who will never be the same.”
“Mick. Oh, Mick.” Her hands moved over his face once more. “I’m so glad I’ve found you.”
“I am, too, love.” He cupped her head, tangling his fingers in her silky hair. “We didn’t say goodbye properly.”
“We never do.”
“It’s time to remedy that.”
He bent down, his lips almost touching hers, his eyes shining brighter than all the stars of heaven. She wanted to merge with him, body to body, heart to heart, and let the rest of the world go by. She wanted to stop time and join herself to him in a kiss that would last forever.
She moved closer. His heart thudded against her chest, and his breath was warm on her cheek.
“Mick,” she said, scarcely louder than a sigh.
“Tess, my girl...”
“I didn’t come to say good-bye.”
His head jerked up, and prickles of fear marched along his skin.
“Is something wrong, Tess? Has something happened to Lovey and the baby?”
“Oh, no. It’s nothing like that. I’m sorry I frightened you.” She stepped back, her face shining with pleasure. “This is good news, Mick. Now, I don’t want you to get your hopes up or anything like that. I could be wrong.”
“You always did know how to make a man wait till Christmas. Out with it, my girl.”
“I think I’ve found your father.”