VICTOR SAT AT the table and crossed his arms over his chest and stared at his son. He sat staring for a long time. He needed patience now, to practice his own form of forgiveness.
Brad kept his eyes downcast. “Where’s Mom?” he whispered.
“We thought it best to split our time,” Victor said. It was a lie, and he silently asked forgiveness. He’d convinced Fran to stay home, wanting to spare her. This was a matter for a father.
Brad rubbed his eyes. The boy looked haggard and scared.
“Please look at me,” Victor said.
Brad lifted his head.
Jenkins studied his boy’s face. The confident light in his son’s eyes was extinguished.
Jenkins got up and paced in front of the room’s tiny, wired window. He looked out on the town green. A few rusted leaves clung yet to the uppermost crown branches of the oaks. The Civil War cannon’s muzzle was aimed right at him.
He came to the table and looked at Brad. “I need you to be straight. Dead straight. Understand? Tell the truth as God would have you tell it.”
Brad rolled his eyes.
“Do not mock me, or the Lord,” Victor said. His son’s insolence, his arrogant dismissal of God, would undermine him in the end.
“No lies,” Jenkins said. “No matter how hard it is. You are my son. I will get you out of this. With God’s help.”
Brad refrained from his mockery, though Victor saw it shimmering just below the surface.
“I have to know the truth,” Victor said. “Did you hurt that girl?”
“No.” Brad said, anguished.
“We’ve all made mistakes. If you hurt her by accident . . .”
“I didn’t touch her. Not like that.”
Jenkins studied his son’s eyes, shot through like bad egg yolks with bloodied veins.
“OK, I’ll find a way to make this right.” He held his hands out to Brad. “Pray with me.”
Brad refused his father.
A thought passed through Victor’s mind like the shadow of a bird. A single wingbeat of thought. He tried to capture it, but it flew away, gone.
“Dad?” Brad said, concern creeping into his voice. “What is it?”
“Nothing.” The thought was gone. “Why did you refuse a lawyer?”
“I’m innocent. I don’t need one.”
“Your fingerprints are all over the house.”
“I’ve been to the house before, a ton of times.”
“I’m getting you a lawyer. I don’t know how we’re going to pay for it. I may have to use a public defender.”
“I’m innocent. You believe me, right?”
The thought passed through Victor’s mind again, a veil of smoke that vanished as he tried to grasp it.
“Dad?”
“You had sex with that girl?”
“So?”
“You tell them you want a lawyer.”
“Why, if I’m innocent?”
“Because you’re innocent. But you’re still here.”
Jenkins cursed himself. He’d erred. Brad being eighteen or not, Victor should have called a lawyer, straightaway. He was ignorant of the intricacies of law. But as a father, he’d let his son down. If he’d brought in a lawyer, perhaps Brad would not be here now. “The lawyer will figure it out. If you didn’t do it—”
“I didn’t.”
“Then we have nothing to fear.”
Victor tried to keep his voice firm, yet doubt soured his blood at the thought of the evidence against his son. It seemed overwhelming. Who else would have known the girl was alone in Jon’s house? The shadowy thought fluttered through his mind, stirring a memory that dissolved away.
“What?” Brad said. “Why do you keep looking like you’ve seen a ghost?”
“I don’t know,” Victor said.
A rap came on the door. North poked his head into the room. “Time’s up.”
“Pray,” Victor said to Brad as he left the room.
He closed the door quietly behind him and stood in the hallway.
His head pounded. He needed to think.
Something’s going on that I don’t understand, he thought. And I need to understand it.
He walked down the hallway feeling disassociated from his body.
At the dispatcher’s desk, he glanced toward the corner of the waiting room. Fran sat there. Victor stopped abruptly.
Fran stood up.
Victor took her by the elbow and guided her to the corner of the lobby.
“I thought we agreed you were to stay home,” he said.
“He’s my son,” Fran said. She’d left the house without makeup. What used to be a sprinkle of youthful freckles across her cheeks had become a blight of age spots. How lovely she’d once been. How he’d thought she was going to be his salvation.
Her eyes were red, her hair in a bun, the way she wore it when she’d not showered. She attempted a smile, but failed. He was a stranger to his wife and she did not know it.
She put her hands on his. He could not recall the last time they had embraced. She squeezed his hands. “He didn’t do this,” she said. “I’m not just saying it because he’s my son.”
Jenkins nodded.
“Did you get him a lawyer?” Fran said.
“I’m working on it.”
“Get one. Today. Whether he wants one or not.” She let go of his hand. “I want to go see my boy.”