Tess and Flannigan took Casey to buy new clothes. They sat on plush-backed chairs in Reed’s, the finest department store in Tupelo, watching as Casey paraded in front of them, strutting with his chest puffed out, showing off one new outfit after the other.
“My old clothes are fine,” he said, fingering his new twill slacks and striped oxford cloth shirt. “I don’t take charity,” he added, preening in front of a three-way mirror.
“This is not charity,” Mick insisted. “Consider this an investment. How are Tess and I going to get anybody to claim you if you don’t look spiffy? If we don’t polish you up some, we’ll never get you off our hands.”
Casey grinned, then disappeared into the dressing room once more.
“Flannigan, you’re going to hurt his feelings.”
“Casey and I understand each other.” Mick leaned back, pleased with himself. “Besides, didn’t you see the look on his face? He hasn’t had this much fun in years.”
“Neither have you?”
“What?” He swiveled to look at Tess.
“You should see yourself, Mick. You’re as proud of that old man as if he were really your father.”
“What about you, my girl? I thought I saw a daughterly twinkle in your eye when he modeled those Cuban shorts.”
“Bermuda. The shorts were Bermuda.”
“I knew it was one of those islands. I’m a blue jeans man, myself.”
They faced forward again, waiting for Casey to return, but neither of them denied their instincts. As Mick thought about it, he decided he was having the time of his life. Funny how an ordinary outing to a department store could be more satisfying than flying into a strange city and walking strange streets to see if anything exciting beckoned to him.
Suddenly the thought of flying into yet another town filled him with an odd sort of weariness. Maybe he was getting too old to chase rainbows. Or maybe he just didn’t know which rainbow to chase anymore.
Casey returned in a plaid sports coat and linen slacks. They ended up buying him a modest wardrobe, including underwear. He selected an assortment of undershorts featuring Snoopy and Superman and Garfield.
“Do you have some plans there, Casey?” Mick teased.
“Maybe I’m planning to let you borrow them. You’re the one who does all the tomcatting.”
Tess pretended she didn’t hear them. The night in Flannigan’s embrace rose up in her, and she suddenly wanted this journey to last forever. Behind her, Mick and Casey laughed and joked and carried on like old friends. She pictured the three of them, climbing into the rented brown Ford and riding west, into the setting sun. She even heard theme music playing—”Ninety-Nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall.” She and Flannigan used to sing it whenever they traveled. Maybe they would sing it again.
All of a sudden she felt lighthearted. Turning back to Mick and Casey, she said, “Next stop is the barbershop.”
It was afternoon by the time Tess and Mick had Casey ready to travel. Sitting in conference in unit four, they decided to travel by car rather than Mick’s plane. The car was Casey’s choice, mainly because he fancied the idea of the three of them on the road together.
“On a search like this,” he said, “I’m going to have to depend on places to jog my memory. Now, it seems to me I can see places better from the ground than from the air.”
“Don’t you think we should start our search right here in Tupelo?” Tess asked.
“I’ve pretty much scoured this area,” Casey said. “I thought we might head south, down toward Vicksburg.” Vicksburg sounded romantic to him.
“Is there any particular reason you’ve chosen that city?” Tess was beginning to have a few doubts about the success of their venture, especially with Casey in charge. She glanced to Mick for some help in the matter. He winked at her and blew two smoke rings in her direction.
“It’s just a feeling I have.” Casey crossed his hands over his heart. “A feeling in my heart.”
“Probably indigestion,” Mick said. He and Casey laughed. Tess didn’t find it all that funny.
“I don’t know about you two clowns, but I’m planning to get on the road.”
Casey sat back, twirling his gold-tipped cane and smiling as Tess swept from the room. Mick took a long draw on his cigar and watched the door long after she had disappeared.
“Well,” Casey finally said, “aren’t we going after her?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“She’ll be back.”
“How do you know?”
“Because she has four suitcases and nobody to carry them. She’ll come back in here, smiling that pretty smile of hers, and she’ll say, ‘Mick, my suitcases need loading.’“ He laughed. “I’ve always enjoyed watching Tess Jones at work.”
He took his cigar out and studied its glowing tip. “Besides, I want to finish my cigar before we start toward Vicksburg.”
He leaned back and puffed contentedly, thinking of Tess and her four suitcases next door. He loved to feel needed. Although Tess was probably the most independent, free-spirited woman he had ever known, she always made him feel needed.
o0o
Next door, Tess gave OToole a treat so he would travel without complaint. While he was eating, she put the last few items into her suitcases, and then started out the door to get Mick.
“What in the world are you doing, Tess Jones?” She marched back into her room, still giving herself a lecture. “Next thing you know, you won’t even be able to take a bath without Mick Flannigan there to scrub your back.”
She picked up the phone and dialed the front desk.
“This is Tess Jones in unit three. Can you send a bellboy to take my bags to the car?”
“A bellboy? Did you say a bellboy?” The man on the other end of the line hooted with laughter.
“That’s what I said. I have four, and three of them are extremely heavy.”
“Lady, this is not the Beverly Hills Hotel. We don’t have bellboys.”
Tess gave a fleeting thought to charm or bribery or both, then changed her mind. She’d show that Flannigan. If she didn’t miss her guess, he was sitting next door, smoking his cigar and laughing, waiting for her to call him.
“There’s more than one way to skin a cat. Pardon my language, OToole.” She started toward the door. “Wait here,” she told her cat. “I’ll be right back.”
She eased out the door, humming to herself.
Twenty minutes later she pounded on Mick’s door.
“Flannigan. Open up.”
He winked at Casey. “See. What did I tell you?” Tess was standing in the doorway with the sun in her hair. He lounged against the doorframe, drinking in the sight of her. “You’ve come for my help, I see.”
“Your help? Why, Flannigan. All I have to do is snap my fingers, and at least six men come to do my bidding.” Her arms were still sore from lugging her heavy suitcases, but she didn’t tell him that. Instead she stepped aside and nodded toward the Ford. The engine was humming, and the door on the driver’s side was ajar.
“I came to say that I’m off to Vicksburg, in case you want to come along.”
“The engine’s running.”
“I know that. I hot wired it.”
“You hot wired it?”
“Why should that surprise you? You taught me how.” She reached up and pinched his cheek. “Don’t be getting any ideas that you’re indispensable, Flannigan.”
With that final word she pranced off toward the car, looking for all the world like a high-bred, high-strung champion filly.
After Flannigan had finished laughing, he strode after her. She was already sitting behind the wheel, humming along with a blues song that was blaring from the radio.
In one smooth motion he slid under the wheel, lifting and pushing her to the passenger side. Then he slid across and wrapped her in his arms.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
He smiled into her eyes. “What do you think I’m doing?”
“If you’re thinking of love in the afternoon, please remember that this is not your hearse.”
“No curtains?” He glanced into the backseat and pretended to be crushed. “I can’t tell you how that disappoints me.” He held her a fraction of a second longer. “This is not about making love, much as it pains me to disappoint you.” Grinning, he moved back under the wheel. “I’m driving.”
“Now I know why I liked Carson better than you: He was never bossy.”
“Then he was no challenge at all for you. I’ll bet you were bored out of your mind.” He banged the door shut harder than he had meant to. Not only did he hope Carson had been boring, but also impotent.
With black thoughts racing through his mind, he put the car in reverse and backed out of the parking space. Suddenly he slammed on the brakes.
“What’s the matter?” Tess asked.
“We forgot Casey.”
“I didn’t forget Casey. You forgot Casey.”
Mick pulled the car back into the parking slot. She sat in the front seat, holding her heavy hair off her neck as Mick sprinted back into the motel. Not only had they forgotten Casey, they’d forgotten Mick’s bag as well. Things were getting out of hand between them. Tess could see that.
“I have to do better than this, OToole,” she told the cat, who was already drowsing in the sun on the backseat.
Mick disappeared briefly into the motel room, and while he was out of sight, Tess changed her mind about how she could deal with him. It had all been well and good to stand in an empty motel room and vow she could go to his bed as many times as she liked and not lose her heart. That had been before the strawberries and the silver platter and the single black rose tucked into her hair. That had been before he had declared her to be the grandest lady of all.
“Ahh, Flannigan.” She sighed, watching as he came out the door with his duffel bag in one hand and Casey in tow. “You never lost an ounce of your charm, did you?”
Mick was laughing at something Casey was saying. Tess’s heart climbed up into her throat, and tears gathered behind her eyelids.
“Don’t make me wish for things I can’t have, Flannigan,” she whispered. “Don’t make me want you and Casey to be real.”
The two men disappeared behind the car to stow their bags in the trunk. What was she doing sitting in a car headed to Vicksburg, Mississippi, with one man she didn’t dare love and another man she wasn’t sure she could trust?
“Ready?” Mick slid back into the driver’s seat, and Casey settled in beside OToole.
“Ready,” she said, never turning her head to look at him. Somehow it seemed important not to look at him now that they were actually on the road, going to a specific destination. They used to love traveling together.
She was determined that this trip would not be another nostalgic journey into the past.
Afternoon traffic was heavy, so she didn’t talk while Mick drove across town to the Natchez Trace Parkway. When he was on that lonely and beautiful stretch of scenic road, she leaned her head against the back of the seat and closed her eyes.
“Sleepy?” Mick asked.
“Yes.” She didn’t look at him.
He drove a while in silence.
“You can put your head on my shoulder,” he said at last.
“No, thank you.”
“I just thought you might be more comfortable that way.”
He watched her out of the corner of his eye, admiring the way her skin looked in the sunshine pouring through the window. Like soft, ripe peaches. He was hungry just looking at her.
He was selfish, he decided, selfish right down to the cockles of his broken heart. It had broken his heart to leave her ten years ago, and it was breaking his heart to know he had to leave her again. But in spite of all that, in spite of knowing he would walk away when all this business with Casey was over, he still wanted her. Damn his selfish hide, he wanted to touch her skin, to feel her in his arms. And yes, he wanted to make love to her. Now. He wanted to pull the car off the road and take her into one of the secluded groves along the Trace and strip her bare and worship her body just as he had done last night.
His early morning burst of nobility was wearing thin. Now that he’d had a taste of her, he couldn’t even get through one day without aching at the mere sight of her. How he was going to get through the next few days without going to her bed again was a mystery to him.
His hands tightened on the wheel. He had to. He had to leave Tess Jones alone.
“Casey,” he said softly, so as not to awaken Tess. There was no answer. “Casey,” he said again, glancing into the rearview mirror. Casey was fast asleep, his head thrown back and his mouth working in silent snores, like a fish.
Mick was accustomed to traveling alone, with only the noise of the airplane engine to keep him company. In the early days of his gadding about, he had enjoyed his solitude. Lately it had been a lonely way to travel. Now, with no one to talk to, he waited for the lonely feeling to come.
But it didn’t. Mile after mile of the Natchez Trace passed by. Mick played the radio with the volume turned down low, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel when the rhythm was especially lively. Occasionally he glanced in the mirror to check on Casey. But more often he looked at the sleeping beauty by his side.
How could a man feel lonely when he was transporting precious cargo? He clicked off the radio and began to sing, softly, in a deep, rich baritone.
“Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, ninety- nine bottles of beer. Take one down and pass it around, ninety-eight bottles of beer on the wall.... ninety-eight bottles...”
“...of beer on the wall,” Tess chimed in.
“You’re awake,” he said, turning to smile at her.
“You were singing my song.”
“Our traveling song.”
“I didn’t think you’d remember.”
“I could never forget.”
His eyes held hers a fraction longer; then he faced the road. They were silent for a while as memories washed over them. And then Tess began to sing once more.
“Ninety-eight bottles of beer.”
He joined in. “Take one down and pass it around, ninety-seven bottles of beer on the wall.”
By the time they got to fifty bottles of beer on the wall, Casey was awake. He added his lilting Irish tenor to the song. When they finally got to one bottle and the end of the song, Tess declared the three of them could go onstage as a trio.
“You could join my act,” she said.
“You’re a performer, my dear?” Casey asked.
“She’s the best blues singer in the world,” Mick said.
“Pay no attention. He exaggerates.” But Tess was secretly pleased. If Mick kept pinning medals on her, she was going to think he really did like her, just the way she was. That was foolish, of course. If he had thought she was all that great, he never would have left her in the first place.
“Is anybody getting hungry?” Mick asked.
Tess and Casey agreed that all that singing had made them ravenous. Mick stopped in Kosciusko to buy food, and the three of them had a picnic beside the Trace in a shaded glen with a clear stream meandering through the trees. OToole gave up his regal posture long enough to try his paw at fishing.
“ Tis the best meal I’ve ever had,” Casey declared, casting the remnants of his bologna sandwich to the birds. Two mockingbirds and a cardinal ate the crumbs, then flew into the branches of an oak tree and began to sing.
“Excuse me,” Casey said as he trailed along behind the birds. When he was standing under their tree, he picked up a stick and began to conduct nature’s orchestra.
Tess watched for a while, then turned to Mick.
“He’s a professional.”
“How do you know?”
“He’s had training. See how he wields that stick, like a baton.”
“Tess...”He started to tell about Casey, and then he paused, studying her face. It was alight with dreams. What was the use of telling her the truth about Casey now and spoiling her fun? He’d let her have one more day. He’d let all of them have one more day of make-believe.
“What, Mick?”
“Nothing.” He stood up and began to clear away the picnic trash. “I suppose we should be moving on.”
Tess stood for a moment, watching Casey. He was having the time of his life, humming and waving his imaginary baton, his legs white and skinny in his brand-new madras-plaid Bermuda shorts.
“I’m going to miss that old man when we find his son,” she said.
“So will I.”
They loaded the car and set off down the Natchez Trace once more. By the time they arrived in Vicksburg, it was after dark.
Casey rolled down his car window. “Smell that river. I always did want to walk up and down the banks of the Mississippi, watching the riverboats and listening to the sound of their whistles.”
“We’ll do that,” Tess said, “but our main priority will be the search for your son.”
“Of course.”
The passing glare of headlights allowed Casey to catch Mick’s eye in the rearview mirror. Neither of them felt too noble at the moment.
They checked into a motel by the river. And afterward, the three of them strolled beside the Mississippi, arms linked, listening to the rush of water and the far off cry of boat whistles as barges plowed their way south toward the Gulf.
Eventually Casey pleaded old age, and sat on a bench while Mick and Tess walked on down the river. They were holding hands. Casey considered that a good sign.
He leaned on his gold-tipped cane and looked out across the singing waters.
“A selfish, lying old man I’m being, but God, just give me this one little miracle. One miracle, and then I’ll not be askin’ you for more.”
o0o
When the moon was tracking across the skies and Casey was snoring in his very own room, Tess arose from her bed and went to the window. She pressed her forehead against the cool glass pane and looked out into the darkness.
Mick would not come for her tonight. She knew that. He wouldn’t pick her lock, and she wouldn’t awaken with him in her arms. She stared out the window a while, seeing nothing except endless blackness. That’s how she felt inside right now. Darkness that went on forever and ever. Night without end.
She turned from the window and hugged her arms around herself.
“What am I going to do, OToole?”
OToole burrowed his head deeper into his fur, ignoring her.
Tess left the window and walked toward the bathroom light. The lonesome blues fell so heavily on her that her shoulders stooped under the weight. Light from the bathroom spilled onto the vanity, and she dug into her traveling case until she found what she wanted: a single black rose, pressed between the pages of a slim volume of poetry by Yeats. Irish poetry.
She held the fragile rose against her cheek and began to read aloud, softly.
Her eyes skimmed down the rest of the poem, and she read of the poet’s longing to be where “peace comes dropping slow.” She closed the little book, pressing the rose back between the pages.
“Is this what your brooding Irish soul wants, Mick Flannigan? Is this why you left me? So you can find peace in solitude?”
She replaced the book, remembering how Mick had held her hand as they walked beside the river, with his fingers twined in hers and his warm palm sending out a steady heat.
Suddenly she saw a vision of the future, with Mick spinning out his lonely years in a cabin in a glen, and her standing in the spotlights on an empty stage. She slid her robe from her shoulders, letting the feathers trail along the carpet. Then she left her gown in a pile on a chair.
She put on black jogging shorts and a black tank top, and let herself out the door, not even bothering with shoes. Outside, the night was warm and damp with mists rising from the river. Her footsteps fell softly on the grass.
There were no lights inside Flannigan’s room. She picked the lock and eased open the door.