A cold front moved in overnight. Saturday morning I woke up at seven o’clock. I tossed and turned and tried to go back to sleep, but it was no use. I got up and looked out the window. The street downstairs was slick with rain, and standing that close to the drafty window, I could feel that the temperature had dropped.
While the coffee was brewing, I got dressed. Blue jeans, flannel shirt, thick socks, and hiking boots. Okay, they weren’t actual hiking boots. I’d never on-purpose hiked in my life. But these boots were flat-soled and leather and as close as I came. I poured the coffee into a thermos and headed over to Daddy’s house.
It was early, but I wasn’t worried about waking him. My father has always been “up with the chickens” in the early morning hours, as he’d say. He’d be surprised to see me up this early, but I wanted to confess to him that I’d broken my promise and gone to see Sonya. I wanted to tell him about Mama’s burial place, and get him to go with me out to Vince Bascomb’s hunting camp. In short, I wanted to find Mama.
But when I pulled into Daddy’s driveway, I saw that Serena’s blue Hyundai was snuggled alongside his truck in the carport. I backed out and drove on.
This is a good thing, I told myself. She is a nice woman. He deserves some happiness. It’s time. All the same, I was fighting back the tears. The early morning streets were empty. I felt so horribly alone. I almost turned back. I didn’t want to face that desolate cabin by myself. It was too cold, too dark, too wet.
I went anyway. I drove right past the turnoff for the Jernigans’ shack, and on down the road to the driveway to Bascomb’s. As I turned in, a covey of mourning doves that had been pecking away on the broken asphalt rose up and scattered into the treetops. Fly away, doves, I thought. Fly away home.
The cold front had brought rain and high winds. The drive was littered with bits of broken tree limbs and blanketed with fallen leaves. More leaves were still sifting down from the treetops bent over the road. Here and there, bits of bright pink ribbon stood out from the tapestry of leaves. Survey flags. Had the property already been sold? And was Will the buyer? Maybe he would get his dove field after all.
I parked the Volvo in the same place I had on my last visit. I was glad of the boots and jeans this time around. It was copperhead mating season. I hesitated a moment, then rooted around in the Volvo’s trunk until I found what I needed—a wooden yardstick.
At first I deliberately skirted the cabin, walking toward the water’s edge, scuffing my feet and beating the weeds with my yardstick to chase away any lovesick snakes. Then I chided myself. If the well had been the only source for drinking water, the cabin would probably have been built as close as possible to the well.
I squared my shoulders and worked my way back up the gentle slope toward the cabin. I stared at it, trying to picture my mother out here. Had she sat on the glider on that now-crumbling back porch, with her lover’s arm tucked around her? Had she walked in these woods, maybe picking up a stray leaf to bring me for my nature collection? Had Darvis Kane taken her for a moonlight ride in that red rowboat? Was this where she came to escape the drudgery of being a wife and mother?
I tried to reconcile my mundane memories of her, dabbing Joy perfume behind her ears, ironing my daddy’s handkerchiefs, fixing my school lunches, with Sonya’s version; Jeanine, young and yearning for the forbidden, for adventure and intrigue.
I felt myself tense as I got closer to the cabin, and resolved not to stare at it. She was not in that house. Not anymore.
Wielding the yardstick like a sickle, I whacked viciously through the kudzu vines and fallen leaves. Once the stick hit something solid, and I bent down to take a look. I’d found what looked like the remains of Bascomb’s trash pile. With no garbage pickup out this far in the country, most folks simply burned their trash. Old charred tree trunks ringed the fire circle, and with my stick, I poked bits of rusted tin cans, beer bottles, and broken glass.
I worked my way around the house, whacking at random, torn between wanting to find the well and wanting to run far away from this place of ruined lives. But something kept me there.
After an hour I was damp and tired and thirsty. I went back to the Volvo and poured myself a cup of coffee. I was drinking it, savoring the heat between my hands, leaning against the hood of the car, when I heard leaves crackling underfoot, twigs breaking, and voices. Voices coming from the Jernigans’ property line.
I had my car keys out, ready to flee, but then I recognized one of the voices.
It was Big Drew. “Been a long time,” his voice boomed out. “He let the place go to shit. Not that it matters now.”
As I watched, two figures emerged from the trees. Both men were dressed much the same as me, except that they wore vests of hunter safety orange, and baseball caps. It was Drew all right, and with him, his older son. A.J.
I could leave right now. Get in the car and haul ass out of there. But A.J. would recognize the car. There would be questions. Recriminations. It was too late to go.
The men grew closer, and I could see that Drew was puzzled by my presence there.
“Keeley?” A.J. called, when they were a hundred yards away. “Is that you?”
“It’s me,” I said grimly. I put the cap back on the thermos and stowed it in the car, and then I waited.
“Hey there, Keeley,” Drew said as he approached.
“Hello,” I said coolly.
“Whatcha doing out here?” he asked. “It’s private property, you know.”
“I know,” I said. “It’s Vince Bascomb’s property. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind my coming out to take a look around.”
“What for?” A.J. asked with a laugh. “Ain’t nothin’ out here anymore. The house is fallen down. There’s snakes and poison ivy. And spiders. You know how you hate spiders. Not even you could save this old place.”
“I’m looking for something,” I said. “An old abandoned well.”
“Why?” A.J. wondered.
“Ask your father.”
Drew’s eyes narrowed.
A.J. looked from me to his father. “Dad?”
“I don’t know what she’s talking about,” Drew said.
“Okay,” I said. “How about I get to ask a question now? What are you two doing out here?” I glared at Drew. “It’s private property, you know.”
“It’s ours now,” A.J. volunteered. “Vince sold it to us. We own the whole cove now. We’ve got a buyer interested already.” He grinned. “Sweet, huh? It’ll be a gated community.” He gave me a meaningful look. “I’m saving this lot for myself. Once I get it cleared, tear the old place down, it’ll have the best lake view on the cove. Better than the shack’s even. But what’s this about a well?”
“Ask your father,” I repeated. “It’s a pretty interesting story. Kind of a mystery, I think you’d say.”
“Dad?” A.J. asked, his sunny face now puzzled. “I don’t get it.”
“She’s nuts,” Drew said. “Bad news. If that scene she made at your rehearsal dinner didn’t prove that to you, this should.” He put his hand on A.J.’s shoulder. “Let’s go, son. I told your mother we’d be back for breakfast.”
“Was that part of the deal you made with GiGi over the years?” I asked Drew, keeping my voice light, conversational even. “That you could stay out all night, do whatever you wanted, with whomever you wanted, as long as you made it back in time for breakfast with her and the kids?”
“Keeley!” A.J. said sharply. “Cut it out.”
“Ask him about the well,” I said again. “He still hasn’t answered you, you know.”
“Dad?”
Drew turned his back on us and started tromping through the woods. “I’ll see you back at the Jeep.”
A.J. looked torn. “Why haven’t you returned my calls? What’s going on with you?”
“Tell him about the well,” I hollered, running to catch up with Drew. “Go ahead, Big Drew. Tell him about all the parties out here at Vince’s place.”
Drew stopped, turned around, and took a step toward me. I thought for a minute he might reach out and slap my face. I could tell he wanted to. “Shut up!” he hissed.
Now A.J. was right beside me. “What the hell is going on between you two?”
Drew shook his head, as though to warn me off. But it was too late.
“They used to call this the hunting camp,” I cried, gesturing toward the ruined cabin. “Hunting pussy is what they did. This is where Vince Bascomb brought his girlfriend. My mother’s cousin Sonya Wyrick. It was private, out of the way. A perfect little love nest for married men. And Vince was willing to share too. Your dad had a key. He used to bring Lorna Plummer out here.”
A.J. looked like he’d been slapped. “Paige’s mom?” he whispered, staring at his dad. “You and Mrs. Plummer?”
Drew didn’t bother to deny it.
“And my mother came out here with her boyfriend. Darvis Kane. The man she ran away with all those years ago, right, Drew? It was just one big old party for cheaters, wasn’t it?”
Drew Jernigan stood very still. I remembered Sonya’s description of him the night my mother was killed. “Like a statue,” she’d said.
He was stone. He was granite. He was impenetrable. Nothing touched him.
“Vince Bascomb told me the whole story,” I said now.
Drew flinched, just slightly, but enough so that I knew he did have a pulse.
“They were out here that night,” I told A.J. “Your dad and Lorna. My mom and Darvis Kane. Kane had been drinking. He slapped my mother around, and then he left. When he came back, he had a gun. There was a struggle, and my mom was shot.”
A.J. looked horrified. “Dad?”
But Drew was still a statue.
I jerked my head in the direction of the cabin. “She died. Right over there. They never went for help. They never called the police. They were too worried about covering their own butts. Your dad and Lorna dragged my mother’s body out of there and they stuffed her down a well. They covered her with rocks!”
A.J. winced.
“And then they went back to town like nothing happened,” I continued. “I bet you made it back in time for breakfast with GiGi that morning too, didn’t you, Drew?”
I fell on him then, pounding his chest with my fists. “Didn’t you? You and GiGi and your boys had breakfast together every morning. And I never saw my mother again, you son-of-a-bitch.” He didn’t move, didn’t even try to protect himself from my blows. “You son-of-a-bitch,” I cried, clawing at his face. “All these years she’s been out here, and we never knew.”
A.J. grabbed me by the wrists and pulled me gently away from his father. He wrapped his arms around me, but I tore myself away. I wouldn’t, couldn’t take comfort from him. Not from anybody. Not today. I wiped my runny nose on the sleeve of my shirt. “Show me the well,” I said, my voice shaking. “We want to bring her home. My father wants to bury his wife. You can at least have that much decency.”
“Dad?” A.J. asked.
Drew just shook his head.
“Tell her where the fucking well is!” A.J. shouted. “For God’s sake, Dad, show her. You owe them that much.”
Drew sighed. He pointed toward the lake. “Out there. When Georgia Power built the dam to create the lake, all that land was flooded within less than a month afterward. She’s somewhere out there, under maybe twenty, thirty feet of water.”
“I don’t believe you,” I said. “You’re just lying to save your own skin. I’ll ask Mr. Bascomb. He’ll tell me the truth. He doesn’t have anything to lose anymore.”
“He’s dead,” A.J. blurted. “He died Tuesday. The funeral was Thursday.”
“Poor bastard,” Drew said. He gave me a coolly appraising look. “Don’t be so quick to judge others, Keeley. Your mother was a cheap little tramp. We did you and your daddy a favor keeping that quiet all these years.” His smile was sardonic. “But don’t worry. Your secret’s safe.” He turned and looked at A.J. “Coming?”
A.J. shook his head no. I watched Drew tromp off through the underbrush, back toward home and a forgiving wife, and I went to pieces again.
“Son-of-a-bitch,” I screamed at him, sinking to the cold, wet ground. “You didn’t have to leave her out there, you son-of-a-bitch.”
“Keeley,” A.J. said, kneeling down beside me. He put his hand gently on my shoulder. “Let me take you home.”
I shook him off. “Don’t touch me.”