They buried Peyton’s grandfather on a rainy afternoon, the Monday after Easter. Tuesday morning, his father’s law office called to say that Uncle Julian had just been there, urging the partners to “expedite the will.” Peyton still couldn’t believe it. They had gone from a family picnic to a hospital to a funeral, but the death they half expected hadn’t happened, while one they never saw coming delivered a blow.
For the next few days, Peyton spent most of his time at the hospital with his mother, sitting on a stiff, uncomfortable sofa in the sixth-floor waiting room until visiting hours finally rolled around. School would be out soon anyway, so his mother had arranged for him to finish his studies at home—“home,” for now, being the hospital. His father was occasionally responsive but never spoke and didn’t rest easy with anybody except Peyton’s mother, who hadn’t left for a second since the accident.
When Winston and Prentiss called to see if Peyton wanted to go fishing, she insisted that he take the opportunity to escape the oppressive confines of sickness and get some fresh air. The three boys rode their bikes to a put-in on the Skidaway River. It was the great indignity of being fifteen that all three of them could drive—and freely motored around the family farmland in work trucks—but out here, on the open road, they were not allowed behind the wheel without an adult. They remained one birthday away from a driver’s license and its promise of manhood.
Propping their bikes against some scrub pines, they headed for a johnboat that was resting upside down by the water. It wasn’t secured and never had been. All the locals used it and recognized it, so any thief would be summarily caught and throttled. Everybody knew to return it to this exact spot when they were done. Out of habit, the trio jumped back as they flipped the boat over, a precaution against any water moccasins that might’ve nested there since the last time it was in the river.
“Grab the cooler,” Winston said to Peyton as he laid their fishing rods in the boat. In any given situation, Winston assumed authority, even when he had no idea what he was doing. It had been so since they were kids. Peyton would go along unless Winston headed in a particularly stupid direction, and then he would find a way to change their course while making his cousin believe he was still in charge. It kept the peace and kept them out of harm’s way.
He unstrapped the small cooler from the rack on the back of his bike and loaded it in before they shoved off and jumped into the boat. Peyton winked at Prentiss as the two of them took up oars and let Winston have the front seat they knew he wanted—the captain’s position, of course. Prentiss grinned back at him as they dipped their oars into the water and the boat glided downriver.
They were quiet for a while before Prentiss said, “You been stayin’ at the hospital an awful lot.”
“Don’t want to leave Mama by herself,” Peyton said with a shrug.
“What do the doctors say?” Prentiss asked.
“Some of ’em say Daddy’ll get better, some of ’em say he won’t. This one says he’s gotta have brain surgery, that one says it’ll kill him. I don’t know how Mama stands it—’specially with Uncle Julian over there every day telling her she’s too emotional to make decisions and needs to let him do her thinking for her. She won’t, though, and I’m glad.”
“You better be,” Winston chimed in. “Whole family knows he’s always wanted to take over everything. Hey, head for that fork over there.”
Peyton and Prentiss rowed toward a favorite spot on the Skidaway, one where the fish were generally biting this time of the morning. Peyton was thinking about the day his grandfather announced that he was retiring and would be handing the reins of his estate to his eldest son. Granddaddy Cabot had made a big production of it, gathering the whole clan and having a shrimp boil for the occasion. All the adults had circled around the big mahogany desk in the library to witness his grandfather signing the papers, rolling them into a scroll, and handing them to Peyton’s father like a runner passing the baton. Then they all had a champagne toast.
He tried to remember his dad that day, during the gathering his aunts sarcastically called The Coronation. How had his father looked? What had he said? Was he happy to be taking over the estate? Somehow Peyton didn’t think so, but the details wouldn’t come to him.
As for Granddaddy Cabot, he and Peyton had always had a strange relationship. On the one hand, the elder Cabot had made it clear that Marshall was his favorite child and Peyton, by extension, his favorite grandchild. Whenever there was a prized shotgun to be passed down or extra spending money slipped into a palm, these tokens of love, or at least favored status, always went to Peyton. And yet he had never had a real conversation with his grandfather.
“Let’s try casting right here.” Winston pulled him out of a swirl of memory and back into the johnboat he had been absently rowing.
The three boys took up their fishing rods and cast their lines. They drifted along, none of them feeling the need to talk as they watched for signs of movement on the surface of the river. As usual, Winston was the first to grow impatient, reeling in his line to try another spot.
“Peyton,” he said, “I need to tell you something. Uncle Julian was over at the house last night. Heard him tell Mama, like he was all concerned, ‘Baby sister, we need to get Marshall moved to Milledgeville where they can do something about his situation. I think we’re the only ones who can see the truth.’ Can you believe that? ‘Baby sister,’ my hind leg. I can’t believe he called her that, like they were all close and everything.”
“Wait—back up,” Peyton said. “Are you sure he said Milledgeville? Nothing there but the asylum.”
“I know.”
“But why would Uncle Julian want to put Daddy there?”
Winston stood up in the boat and cast his line near some stumps protruding from the water. “I’ll give you two guesses and the first one don’t count. He told Mama he’d already started the paperwork to have Uncle Marshall declared mentally unfit to run the estate.”
Peyton gave his reel a few turns, adjusting his line as he thought it over. “He can’t send Daddy to Milledgeville unless Mama agrees to it, and she never will.”
“Maybe not, but Uncle Julian knows a lot o’ powerful people in Savannah. Sooner or later, he’ll find a way. Just giving you fair warning so you can head him off.”
Peyton knew what his cousin said was true. Despite his mother’s best efforts, Uncle Julian might find a way to do this horrific thing. Not only that, but he’d enjoy every minute of it. Without stopping to weigh his options, Peyton threw down his fishing rod and jumped in the river.
“Where in the Sam Hill are you going?” Winston shouted as he and Prentiss, both looking stunned, sat together in the boat, now oblivious to the fishing rods dangling from their hands.
“Back to the hospital!” Peyton shouted as he swam toward the bank. He scrambled up and ran the distance to his bicycle, then pedaled furiously up the county road.
Before he could get very far, Police Chief Herschel Bramlett pulled up beside him in his pickup truck. “Son, you look like you need to get somewhere.”
“Yes, sir, I sure do. I need to get to the hospital to see about Daddy.”
The chief’s eyes narrowed. “Marshall take a turn?”
“No, sir,” Peyton panted. “I just all of a sudden feel like I need to get back.”
“Well, throw your bike in the truck bed and climb in.”
“I can just sit in the back. I’m all wet from jumping in the river.”
“I ain’t worried about that,” the chief said as Peyton lifted his bicycle into the truck. “I keep some old towels under the seat for emergencies. Looks like you got one. Climb in and you can dry off on the way.”
Peyton took the passenger’s seat and began drying off with the towels as the chief headed for the hospital. Leaning his head out the window, he let the warm wind whip through his hair and hoped it would dry his clothes at least enough so he didn’t drip. Dripping would most definitely get him thrown out of the hospital, especially if Nurse Buck was on duty.
“How’s your mama holdin’ up?” the chief asked.
“Pretty good, I reckon,” Peyton said as he blotted his face with a towel. “She looks real tired, though—’specially after a visit from Uncle Julian.”
The chief frowned and scratched the back of his head. “I don’t mean to speak ill o’ your kin, son, but that one ain’t changed one iota since he was a kid. He was useless then, and he’s useless now.”
“You won’t get any arguments from me.”
“He givin’ your mama trouble?”
“Yes, sir. I just found out he’s trying to get Daddy sent to Milledgeville. That’s why I need to get to the hospital.”
“Milledgeville? That’s low even for Julian. Listen, son, if it looks like he’s about to have his way, you get on the phone and call me, okay?”
“What could you do, Chief?”
“I could slow things down. Your uncle’s got connections, but I got a lot o’ people around here that I’ve helped out, and they owe me a favor or two. I wouldn’t hesitate to call ’em in for your daddy.”
“How come, if you don’t mind my asking?” Peyton covered his head with one of the towels, rubbed it back and forth over his hair, and then ran his fingers through the mess he’d made to try to comb it out.
“Son, I want you to remember something,” the chief said as he turned on his blinker and slowed the truck down. “Your daddy ain’t a bad man. He ain’t a weak one neither. He’s a good man that went through some real bad stuff. I’m still hoping he can find his way back—for your sake as much as anybody’s. And as for your mama, well . . . people don’t come no finer.”
“Thank you.”
The chief pulled into the hospital parking lot and stopped his truck at the front entrance.
“Want me to carry these towels home and get ’em washed?” Peyton asked.
The chief took them from him and crammed them under the truck seat. “No, that’s alright. Ada’s used to me bringin’ home something or other for her to throw in with her washin’. How ’bout I drop your bike off at your house so you don’t have to fool with it?”
“I sure would ’preciate that. And everything else too.”
“You’re more’n welcome. Go on inside, and give your folks my best. And you remember what I said. Julian takes it too far, you gimme a call.”
“I will. I promise. Say hey to Miss Ada for us.”
“I’ll do that.”