“Kids,” Nora said. “They think it’s their job to drive us crazy.”
Donna nodded and lifted Melanie out of the kiddie seat of her shopping cart.
“Holy moly,” Nora said appraisingly. “You sure look a whole lot thinner than you did in the summer.”
Nora was wearing a black car coat and a straight black skirt. She had a red scarf around her neck. Chiffon.
“How’d you like the Tupperware?” Nora asked. “To tell you the truth, I would have killed my husband if he ever gave me Tupperware for Christmas, but I needed the sale so I couldn’t tell him any wife would prefer a gold necklace. I did talk him into the three-quart container, because the four-quart is worthless unless you’re cooking for an army.”
Donna Durgin was smiling at her, but Nora could feel her slipping away, and Nora didn’t want to lose her; she was, after all, the first mother on the block who had stayed put long enough for Nora to get in two words. Fortunately, the checker who had replaced Cathy Corrigan was so slow they were trapped there together on line.
“Your husband happened to drive up when I was unloading mixing bowls. He told me you were a great cook, and I can’t find a decent recipe for macaroni and cheese. People think it’s so basic, but as far as I’m concerned, fixing good macaroni and cheese is a real talent.”
Donna Durgin was staring at the gold heart on Nora’s charm bracelet. She didn’t notice that Melanie and Scott had begun taking all the Almond Joys down off the candy rack.
“Do you use cheddar?” Nora asked.
“Velveeta,” Donna Durgin said.
“Aha,” Nora said. “That’s the secret. I really appreciate this. My kids turn up their noses at everything I cook. They’re very particular.”
Donna Durgin opened her mouth but nothing came out.
Nora grabbed a bag of potato chips and tossed it onto the checkout counter.
“You should come over to Armand’s sometime. I could do your nails for half price and Armand would never know. He’s a financial moron.”
Two huge tears slipped out of Donna Durgin’s eyes.
“Oh,” Nora said when she saw Donna’s tears. She put down the iceberg lettuce.
Donna Durgin still wasn’t talking, but she had begun to cry in earnest. Her tears filled up the top of a sour cream container, then sloshed over onto the floor.
Nora hoisted her baby up and grabbed Billy. “Put up the rest of the groceries,” she told Billy.
“Me?” Billy said.
“You,” Nora told him. She put an arm around Donna and led her over to the empty carts.
“What is it?” Nora asked. “The Tupperware?” James struggled to get out of her arms, until she let him play with her bracelet.
Donna shook her head and kept crying.
“Everything?” Nora suggested.
Donna Durgin nodded and took a tissue from her coat pocket.
“Those black stretch pants you have,” Donna said finally. “Where did you buy them?”
“Lord and Taylor,” Nora admitted. “Not that I’m one of their regular customers, but sometimes you’ve got to splurge. Good clothes last forever.” Nora looked over at Billy and made a face at him so he would hurry up with the groceries. Between his taking his time and the checker’s amazing lassitude, the line that had formed behind them was backing up past the fruit aisle and into poultry. “You’d look great in black,” Nora told Donna Durgin.
“You think so?” Donna asked.
“Trust me,” Nora said. “Black is classic.”
Donna blew her nose. She noticed that her children had taken most of the candy off the shelves.
“I’m okay now,” Donna said.
“You think so?” Nora said doubtfully.
“Oh, yeah,” Donna said. “Really. Thanks.”
They walked back to the checkout counter, and Nora paid for her groceries, then searched Billy’s pockets for stolen gum while she waited for the checker to make change.
“Mom!” Billy shouted.
“Mr. Innocent,” Nora said to Donna Durgin. Nora grabbed her grocery cart and popped James inside to stand among the paper bags. “We should talk again,” she told Donna.
Donna smiled, even though she seemed to be looking past Nora. “Definitely,” she said. “I’d like that.”
Out in the parking lot, Billy leaned against the cart and watched as Nora loaded the car.
“You could help,” Nora told him. “It’s a great way to build up your muscles.”
Billy grabbed a bag and set it in the front seat.
“I knew this would work out if we just gave people a chance,” Nora said. “People are basically shy, they have to warm up to you, they have to be won over. That’s what you should be thinking about in school.”
“Mrs. Durgin’s going somewhere,” Billy said.
“What?” Nora said, frightened that her one new friend planned to leave her in the lurch. She forgot to yell at Billy for listening in on Donna and grabbed him by his collar. “Where is she going?”
“For a walk,” Billy said.
“Oh, well,” Nora said, relieved. She let go of Billy and settled James into the backseat. “We should all do more of that.”
Donna Durgin went for her walk on December 29, after her children had been tucked into bed and her husband had fallen asleep in front of the TV. She dragged out her old black winter coat, which fit her for the first time in years, and put on some lipstick. She slipped into her snow boots; then, right before she left, she made the children’s lunch for the following day and set the tunafish sandwiches and carrot sticks wrapped in foil on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. At a little after eleven she put her car keys on the kitchen table and went outside. There was some fresh powdery snow covering the ice and a pink moon in the center of the sky. Once she passed the line of poplar trees along her driveway, it was easy to just keep going, and by the time Robert woke up in the morning and realized she was missing, her footprints had all disappeared.
“LOOK,” JOE HENNESSY SAID, “WOMEN DO THINGS we can’t understand every day of their lives. They think in a completely different way, so if you’re trying to figure out what she was thinking, forget it; that’s not going to help you now.”
“You’ve got it all wrong,” Robert Durgin said to him.
They were sitting in the living room while Johnny Knight talked to the children in the kitchen over oatmeal cookies and milk. Ordinarily, Hennessy would have been the one to question the children, but Robert was his neighbor, so Hennessy owed him. And, actually, Johnny Knight wasn’t as bad with the children as Hennessy would have guessed. He had overheard Knight ask the children a few questions about their mother—if she had a favorite place to go, if she had any secret money or bankbooks hidden in a bureau drawer or in the bread box—then he had sat down with them, enjoying the milk and cookies as much as they did. Sometimes being childish paid off.
“Donna wouldn’t just take off,” Robert Durgin told Hennessy. He had smoked a cigarette down to the filter, but he was still holding on to it. “She’s devoted to the kids. She wouldn’t walk out of here. Not alone.”
Hennessy hadn’t taken off his coat, and he leaned back carefully on the bedspread that covered the couch. Donna Durgin had been gone for nearly twenty-four hours, but even though the kids had left their toys around, Hennessy could see she had taken good care of the house. There wasn’t a bit of dust on the Venetian blinds; a lace doily was neatly centered on the coffee table.
“Meaning?” Hennessy said.
“Somebody forced her,” Robert said.
“You were right here on the couch,” Hennessy said. “You slept here all night. You would have heard someone come in.”
“They snuck in,” Robert guessed. “Or they threatened the kids earlier in the day, so she was forced to go meet them in their car.”
“All right,” Hennessy said. “Let me think it over.”
Both men sat back and tried to imagine a madman loose in the neighborhood.
“It doesn’t wash,” Hennessy said.
“I’m telling you,” Robert said. “She wouldn’t leave here of her own free will. Just consider it might not be the way it looks.”
That meant Hennessy had to consider the man beside him. He might have a girlfriend hidden away somewhere, he might have taken out a big life insurance policy. Maybe he was chain-smoking not because Donna was gone but because he feared for his own skin.
“We’ll look into all the possibilities,” Hennessy said.
When they were done in the house, it was too cold to do much talking on the street, so Johnny Knight came to sit with Hennessy in his car. Knight blew on his hands and rubbed them together. “The kids don’t know a thing,” he said. “What about the husband?”
“Robert,” Hennessy said. He reached across and flipped open his glove compartment, took out his Pepto-Bismol, and uncapped the bottle.
“Robert,” Johnny Knight said. “Whoever. Think he’s involved?”
“He’s a printer,” Hennessy said. He took a swig of Pepto-Bismol and replaced the bottle in the glove compartment for later. “He’s never cooked a meal or made a bed in his life, and now he’s got three kids to take care of.”
Johnny Knight shrugged. “She’s gone. He’s still there.”
“Shit,” Hennessy said.
“Yup,” Johnny Knight agreed.
There had never been a murder in town, assault was the absolute limit, but Hennessy had to begin his investigation as if there’d been one. He checked for life insurance policies and found there was one taken out on Robert and nothing on Donna. He drove to Queens and questioned Donna’s mother and sister; he went to the bank where they had their savings account. He found no boyfriends, no bad debts, no leads at all. He stayed out till midnight, searching the neighborhood, talking to neighbors, and when he came home Ellen was waiting up for him in the kitchen.
“Nothing,” Hennessy said.
Ellen had made him a cup of tea and set a plate of cookies on the table. She was wearing a flannel nightgown and her face was drawn.
“It’s as if she was swallowed up by the ground.” Hennessy shook his head.
“I can’t believe it,” Ellen said. While Hennessy was out, she had gone around the house locking the windows; she even latched the storm doors. “Donna and I talked all the time. I would have known if anything was wrong.”
Hennessy took a graham cracker from the plate and broke it in half. “Would you have?” he asked.
“Of course I would. She was my friend. Oh, God.” Ellen put down her teacup. “Was.”
They stared at each other across the table.
“Nothing to show that she’s dead,” Hennessy said.
“Joe!” Ellen said. “Don’t even say that.” She took a cookie and broke it in half. “What did Robert tell the kids?”
“She’s on a trip, a vacation.”
Ellen stood up and rinsed out the teacups, then put them in the drain rack.
“She wasn’t feeling so well,” Ellen said.
“What?” Hennessy said.
“She came over here a few weeks ago and started talking about eating rocks or something. I thought it was indigestion.”
“What exactly did she say?” Hennessy asked sharply.
“Joe!” Ellen said. “I’m not a witness. Don’t talk to me as if I’m a criminal.”
“All right.” Hennessy began again, calmly, just as he would with any witness who was starting to balk. “Just think it over. Any little hint that something was wrong?”
Ellen shook her head.
“Rocks,” Hennessy said.
“I have to go to bed,” Ellen told him. “I can’t stand this.”
Hennessy went into the bedroom with her, still thinking about rocks. The only way to eat them would be to swallow them whole, otherwise you’d crack your teeth to bits, you’d wind up choking on the small, hard pieces. No, you’d have to pick them up, one by one, and open your mouth. You’d have to close your eyes and swallow, and after that you’d have to just accept the consequences of your choice.
THE DOG SLEPT BESIDE THE BED, ON A SMALL blue rug, and at night he ran through his dreams. He ran through the grass and through the rain and in between stars set into the black night.
“Whoa, boy,” Ace would say sometimes, and from where he lay in bed he would stretch out and pat the dog’s head. But the dog never woke from his dreams. He only whimpered and turned on his side, and then began running once more. Someone had once cared for this dog, so it did not come as a complete shock to find that someone cared for him again, and he gave himself completely to Ace. All Ace had to do was purse his lips and the dog would run to him before he whistled. The dog spent a good deal of his time waiting for Ace, in the bedroom—where Marie grudgingly allowed him to stay, although she would have preferred the basement or, better yet, the yard—or in the schoolyard, near the door Ace always came through when the bell rang at two forty-five. Someone had once cared for him, that’s all he knew. Someone had bought him a leather collar with a silver tag that read: My name is Rudy. I belong to Cathy and I live at 75 Hemlock Street. Ace had slipped the name tag off the dog’s collar, but he couldn’t throw it out. He kept it in the inside pocket of his leather jacket, and already the name tag had etched its shape into the pocket, leaving a permanent ridge.
“Rudy,” Ace would whisper as the dog slept beside him. “Go, Rudy,” he would call as he threw a stick across the playing field after school. He had waited for somebody to ask where in hell he had gotten a purebred German shepherd overnight, but nobody did. For the first few days he had kept the dog hidden in his bedroom. He had smuggled in hamburger meat and bowls of milk. He set down newspapers for the dog to pee on. During the first week Ace let the dog on his bed at night, where he curled up beneath the covers, exhausted from the treatment Cathy Corrigan’s father had doled out. The dog’s paws were cold as ice and there was still blood between his pads, which left faint red streaks on the floor.
When Marie discovered the pee-stained newspapers in the garbage, she tracked down the dog. She had a nose for anything unclean, and, as far as she was concerned, dogs were worthless creatures. Ace expected her to give him the third degree and scream for the dog to be taken to the pound. But all Marie did was announce that she wouldn’t have the dog up on her furniture, and she wouldn’t have him begging at the dinner table, and she expected Ace to walk him three times a day. That evening, as soon as the Saint came in from work, Marie said, “Go see what your son brought home.” The Saint knocked on Ace’s door, and when he went into the room and saw the dog he crouched down and clapped his hands.
“Come on, boy,” the Saint said, but Rudy was afraid of him and ran under the bed. The Saint stood up and whistled, but the dog wouldn’t come. “I could use a dog like that down at the station,” he told Ace.
“Sorry, Pop,” Ace said. “He doesn’t like to let me out of his sight.”
That night when they were sitting down for supper, the dog yelped and scratched to be let out of Ace’s bedroom.
“That your dog?” Jackie asked.
Ace concentrated on his meatloaf. He’d been avoiding Jackie ever since the accident; he hadn’t even gone for a ride in Jackie’s new Bel Air, the one Ace had been saving for and hoping to buy. “That’s right.”
“Well, keep that woofer quiet at night,” Jackie said.
Ace stared at his brother. With his new teeth and his rebuilt jaw, Jackie looked more substantial, more solid. And yet when the dog yelped Jackie seemed nervous. That was how Ace realized that his brother knew it was Cathy’s dog, and that his parents also somehow knew, but they didn’t let on any more than Mr. Corrigan had. Ace had worried about Mr. Corrigan; he’d figured there’d be some kind of a scene. Mr. Corrigan would call him a thief, he’d say it ran in the family, then he’d grab the dog or call the police. Or worse, he’d punch Ace, hard, and Ace wouldn’t be able to fight back. But that wouldn’t stop Mr. Corrigan; he’d smack Ace on the side of the head and leave him l
ying there on the lawn, in a heap.
Yet the day they finally crossed paths, Mr. Corrigan acted as if he’d never seen Ace or the dog before in his life. You would have thought that fitting the covers onto his silver trash cans took all his concentration. But the dog recognized Mr. Corrigan. The hair on his neck and his ears went straight up, and he made a low growling noise in the back of his throat. Ace stood paralyzed, waiting for Mr. Corrigan to attack him, but all he did was turn and drag his trash cans up to the house.
So Ace wasn’t surprised when no one at school asked where the dog had come from. The guys on the corner, out for a smoke before the homeroom bell, didn’t say a word, although they all backed away when they saw the dog. Rudy followed Ace everywhere. He stretched out on the tile floor in the bathroom while Ace took a shower; he trotted at Ace’s heels on nights when Ace met Rickie Shapiro at the fence along the Southern State, where they kissed until their mouths were bruised. But, like the guys on the corner, Rickie was afraid of the dog. Even Danny Shapiro seemed uncomfortable when he realized the dog would be walking home from school with them every day.
“Does he bite?” Danny asked.
“He’s a goddamned puppy,” Ace said. “He’s got baby teeth.” Ace threw a tennis ball over the snow on the Winemans’ lawn, and Rudy went after it.
“Yeah,” Danny said uneasily as the dog raced back toward them. “Baby fangs.”
“Drop it,” Ace said, and the dog laid the ball at his feet.
“He understands you,” Danny said. “I swear to God.”
Ace knelt down. “Speak,” he said to the dog. Without Danny’s noticing, he signaled to Rudy by opening and closing his hand. The dog barked on cue, just as Ace had taught him to do.
Danny Shapiro stepped off the sidewalk and into the street. “That dog’s too weird for me,” he said.
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