Agnes

by Jaime Maddox

  He was in this situation for several reasons. His divorce had cost him an oceanfront house on Kiawah Island and an apartment in Manhattan. Several pieces of art, whose value had only appreciated, had left with his wife. These were crippling losses, but only a part of the problem. Just as his growing family had split the trust, they split the revenue from the Parker Companies. The stock market had been most unkind to him, like it had to everyone else on the planet. Competition in their various ventures took a cut out of their business. And while they still made a profit, with so many more ways to divide that revenue, none of them were really doing very well. It was simple math. Dale’s half of the company had been split by his three sons, who had children, who were now beginning to have children of their own.

  His cousin Sandy, the only child of the only child, was sharing just with her only child. Like all the children, her grandson wouldn’t be eligible for his share until the age of eighteen.

  Sandy didn’t need anything from him, but what did she want? She had no reason to come after him, and as far as he knew she had no reason to suspect what he and his father had done. Yet for forty years she and her grandmother had stayed away. Why was she coming back now? As he poured another bourbon and water, Dan vowed that he wouldn’t allow her to harm his family in any way. He was a fighter, and a winner, and if Sandy was coming for a fight he would be ready for her.

  *

  The gravedigger was restless. As was his habit, he silently strolled through the grave markers at Riverview. He knew every marker, the names and the dates and the associations between family members buried in the ground here. He walked to his parents’ grave and sat with them, talking aloud as he often did. They couldn’t answer his questions or offer any advice.

  Since spotting her at her grandmother’s funeral, the gravedigger had been wondering if Sandy Parker would return to the cemetery, and hoping she wouldn’t. As he thought about it, he decided she was a potential threat—to his financial security, and freedom, and way of life. He was tired of the burden of the Parker family. Waiting out her grandmother had been enough; he couldn’t sit around waiting for Sandy to die, too. They were the same age. He might have to spend the rest of his days waiting. Besides, he was getting too old for this kind of stress.

  That damn watch! It was filled with too much sentiment and was far too fancy to wear for work at the cemetery, not really appropriate at all without a nice suit with a vest and a watch pocket. The man who’d helped his father all those years ago had been wearing such a suit when he died. The gravedigger had the watch in mind when he thought of taking the man’s suit. Then he had to go and soil it with urine. Shit, shit, shit. Just like then, things weren’t going his way now, either.

  Sandy Parker had seen the watch and read the newspaper article about his grandfather. How long would it take for her to figure out his secret? This whole Parker family was nothing but trouble and intrigue, from the doctor and his brother right down to this little punk who worked at the lumberyard, all friendly and full of questions.

  The gravedigger thought back to when the intrigue all began. Money had started arriving just after Agnes, sent from a “concerned friend.” A note accompanied the first installment, but thereafter it was simply money wrapped in loose-leaf paper and mailed in a plain white envelope. Initially, it had been addressed to his father, and then, after his father’s death, to him. The note stated that a friend had lost contact with Nellie Parker and wanted to be informed if the woman died. It was that simple. If Mrs. Parker died, obviously the cemetery would be notified to prepare the grave. And the gravedigger’s father would dial a phone number and inform the friend of the sad news.

  In the first year after Agnes, the friend had sent five dollars weekly. A total of two hundred and sixty dollars a year for doing nothing except waiting for Nellie Parker to die. Although the gravedigger’s father didn’t need the money, he didn’t refuse the terms of the note. His father had been smart and cunning, and he was one of the few who came out of Agnes better than before, but for some reason he’d never called the phone number on the note to turn down the deal. Each year, on the anniversary of Agnes, the fee increased by a single dollar, until, breaking the pattern, the year before the fee was bumped from thirty-eight to fifty dollars, and the increase came in the late fall, not the beginning of the spring.

  Years ago, the gravedigger’s father had figured out the identity of the friend. A phone number had been left, after all, and he’d used a contact in the police department to link that phone number to a name. When his father told him the identity of the friend, he’d found the information interesting, because it turned out that he knew both Mrs. Parker and her friend, and he couldn’t figure out why in the hell the friend was sending them good money to find out something she should have been able to find out on her own.

  If his father was worried about the friend, that concern never showed. His father had been worried about Mrs. Parker, though, because of what she knew, so he had watched out for Nellie Parker almost until the day he died, until he was too confused from liver failure to care about anything. If she’d had shown up after Agnes asking questions, his father would have killed the old woman. His father had killed two men because of the secret. What would one more soul on his conscience matter?

  The first man his father had killed was the man with the boat. His father had drowned him, because he knew enough to cause trouble. In the driving rain, after their job was done, his father had hit the man over the head with a wrench and then held his head under the murky water. At first the man with the boat had struggled, but not for long. Soon his body grew still, and then he’d helped his father push the body out into the current of the river, and it was washed away.

  The gravedigger knew the man’s body was never found. The man’s parents were buried at Riverview, and years later, so was his wife, but he and his father had never dug a grave there for the man. His boat was found, so everyone understood that the Susquehanna had claimed him, and no one ever suspected foul play. Had anyone ever asked why the man had been out in his boat that night?

  The second man his father had killed was the man who helped them. That man had to die because he’d become greedy. After he and his father and the man with the boat had risked their lives for their fortune, the man who helped them tried to cheat his father. His father had strangled the man, squeezed his throat until his eyes were bulging and his face turned blue. The man who helped them peed in his pants when his father choked him, and the gravedigger was angry because he would have liked to keep his suit, but it was ruined. They buried the man who helped them atop a coffin in a freshly dug grave at Riverview. He wanted to keep the man’s car, since he couldn’t have the suit. It was a new Cadillac finished in white with leather so soft you could sink in it. His father wouldn’t let him, though, and he’d felt very sad when they set fire to that car out on the Parkers’ land in Hunlock Creek.

  As far as he knew, those were the only people his father had murdered, other than enemies of the United States of America whom he’d killed in Europe during World War II. His father wasn’t a killer, after all. He’d just been trying to recover what was rightfully his, and those two men had gotten in the way.

  Sandy Parker’s return wasn’t good; he understood that now. He’d watched her on the day of the funeral, and she’d seemed to be at peace. She didn’t seem like a woman who was angry, or even curious. He’d been hopeful he didn’t have to worry. Now that she was snooping around, he knew he did.

  Chapter Twelve

  Champagne and Two Shots

  The cabin was still blanketed under the cloak of darkness when Sandy slipped silently from bed and headed for the kitchen. She hadn’t slept well, with the nagging thought that she’d overlooked something the day before still rattling around in her brain. As much as she focused, the elusive detail hadn’t come to her, and she was relieved when the hands on the clock told her it was finally a suitable time to start the day. She was going to start it out well.

  Creaks
from aging planks of hardwood were the only sounds in the quiet night. With no neighbors, no roads, and nothing but woods surrounding it, the house was always peaceful, but at night with the sense of sight muted, the silence was even more profound.

  After growing up on the bucolic Susquehanna, then spending a year here before moving away for college, Sandy at first had had difficulty in adjusting to the city that never sleeps. New York was noisy. It took her months to develop the ability to tune out all the stimulation so she could relax and drift off at night. Once that happened, though, it amazed her that she could ever readjust to the mountains. She seemed to have two mental settings, one for city and one for country, reflecting the two lives she’d lived for nearly forty years. A flip of the switch brought a change in scenery, activity, wardrobe, diet, and attitude. Though seemingly opposite, both homes gave her something she needed, and Sandy loved them equally.

  She was beginning to suspect that the Brooklyn girl asleep in her bed might have a bit of country in her, too. Pat really seemed to enjoy her time in the mountains. From hiking to golfing to sunning on the deck with a book in her hands, she adjusted from her fast-pace lawyer mode to relaxed tourist rather easily. Sandy could sense the energy always flowing through Pat’s veins and had come to understand that Pat could never truly relax. But here in the mountains, she came pretty close.

  Sandy wasn’t sure how she felt about that. After their last weekend together, Sandy had needed a break from Pat. Then she’d thought her reaction to their time together might have been too harsh. Now with Pat back again, Sandy didn’t know what to think.

  The cabin had been her refuge from the world, first with Diane and Angie and then by herself. It was small, with only five rooms and a bath. The small kitchen was separated from the large living room by just a small island of cabinets, and the small, open design created an intimate atmosphere. She was never far from Diane or her guests, and that was why they came here—to be together. There were two bedrooms on the first floor, off the kitchen and living room. A loft looking over the first floor served as the third bedroom. There was only one, well-used bathroom. The cabin had been built from a kit and the log walls had been left unfinished, giving a rustic and warm look to the rooms. It was truly a wilderness retreat, and her property here was a perfect setting for it. She was surrounded by woods, with no neighbors for miles.

  She enjoyed the solitude of the mountains and always found herself refreshed within hours of her arrival here. She forgot board meetings, and audits, and clients as she shifted into mountain mode, checking the cabin for problems, bringing in wood for the fire, wiping down counters and tables, refreshing the linens. All of this mindless work calmed her, and just as it had all those years ago when she worked on the house on Canal Street, the work formed a bond to the cabin that anchored and soothed her.

  At the first expectation of company, her mood changed. Alone, it didn’t matter if she ate cheese and crackers and washed it down with beer. For company, though, she needed food. Real food, prepared and cooked and cleaned-up-after food, and while she could manage the cleanup part easily, it was in the preparation skills that she was lacking. Cooking had been Diane’s forte.

  Company also created a need to clean her house. She needed to at least think of an agenda so she was ready with suggestions when people seemed in need of a distraction. She didn’t relax with company; rather, she felt a need to take care of her guests and tend to their needs so that her own needs went neglected.

  Having Pat as a playmate was fun, but she wasn’t comfortable enough with her to make her a part of her regular routine. She still needed to pay attention to Pat and cater to her. If that feeling ever changed, if she ever felt the urge to tell Pat to just get something herself, it would be a sign that the relationship might make it. She wasn’t there yet, though, and now Sandy was questioning her wisdom in inviting the woman for a second consecutive long weekend.

  Feeling a bit lonely, she’d thought it a good idea when Pat called and asked if she wanted company. Now, Sandy wasn’t so sure, and she wasn’t so sure why. On paper, she should have been falling madly in love with the woman. In her heart, though, it just wasn’t happening.

  She was, however, developing a wonderful friendship and had come to know Pat’s likes and dislikes. At dinner at a restaurant, Sandy could narrow Pat’s choice of entrée down to two or three items from a menu of fifty. For dinner, the woman only ate steak (filet mignon), hamburger, and chicken. Her lunch menu was limited to deli meats and peanut butter. Breakfast was a little more exciting, with occasional eggs, bacon, ham, and pancakes mixed with fruit and yogurt.

  It was fruit and yogurt formed the foundation of the breakfast Sandy had begun to put together on the table. A mixture of strawberries, blueberries, and blackberries went into a plastic bowl atop a heap of vanilla yogurt. No granola, though. That wasn’t on Pat’s list. Sandy packed that into a plastic bag, a serving for one. Next came cheese—a wedge of Havarti and a block of cheddar—along with a bag of bagel chips and jelly. Finally, she retrieved an ancient ice bucket from her closet. It was scratched and dented from many picnics in the mountains, but the stainless steel was thick and unbreakable. After placing a bottle of champagne in the bucket, she poured ice around it, then packed it into her backpack and carefully set all the food and utensils around it.

  Although Pat tended to be practical and predicable, she’d shocked Sandy the night before by suggesting a sunrise hike. On her prior trip to the Poconos, Pat had awakened to find Sandy gone on such a hike, and last night, with the prediction of clear skies that promised a beautiful sunrise, they’d agreed to the adventure. The picnic was Sandy’s idea, and she’d risen just a few minutes early to pack all the necessary ingredients for a delightful morning on the mountain.

  Sneaking back into the bedroom, Sandy paused to take in Pat’s naked form on the bed. She was really a startlingly beautiful woman. Her black hair, thick with a hint of curl, was cut short. Her classic features—long nose, full lips, high cheekbones—appeared flawless in the dim light filtering in from the hallway toward the bed. Tall and muscular, her body suggested she could play the part of WNBA center, and Sandy knew she was tough enough to do the job as well. Even though Pat was approaching fifty, nothing about her physique suggested it.

  Sandy thought back to the night before. After their golf and their dinner and their shopping they’d spent several hours in this bed exploring each other’s bodies, and it had been truly fabulous. She frowned as she studied Pat’s still but exquisite form and asked herself, “Why don’t I love you?” She had no answer to the question. Nothing held her back, there was no reason she shouldn’t.

  Maybe she just needed a little more time. Fortunately, she had plenty. Maybe it was just a matter of letting go of the past, and perhaps once this matter of Jeannie’s headstone was settled she could do just that. She could move forward and embrace love again, perhaps with this woman sleeping in her bed.

  She sat down and gently stroked Pat’s cheek. When her eyes fluttered open, Sandy smiled. “The sunrise awaits.”

  She returned to the kitchen while Pat dressed, and in just a few minutes they were on their way. They both wore jeans and sweatshirts to chase the morning chill, and Pat carried the backpack. “Only if you let me carry it back!” Sandy had argued. In a relationship, you had to share the work, and that’s what this was, right? A relationship?

  Several hundred yards of clearing around the house in all directions now sported mature fruit trees and landscaping that broke up the expanse. After one too many encounters with bears and snakes, she had built the cabin clear of the woods to stay out of their habitat and hoped they would return the favor. Small hills and valleys at the base of a taller range surrounded the flat on which the house was built. From the house they walked almost due west, where the mountain began to climb out of the forest. About halfway up, a half hour’s climb, a clearing afforded a clear view to the east where they could watch the sun rising over the next range.

  The
y talked as they set out in the darkness, and Sandy found the way with a flashlight she splayed over the ground before them, but once on the mountain trail they became quiet as they climbed, all of their breath needed for the effort. The morning chill evaporated as they began to sweat from the hike, and just as the earliest rays of light began to illuminate their path, they reached the clearing.

  Shedding the backpack, Pat opened it and handed Sandy the end of the picnic blanket, which was packed on top. Thin and lightweight, it kept the food clean and didn’t take up much space. They sat beside each other and looked eagerly to the east. It was like listening to an orchestra warm up—here an oboe, there a harp—one sound and then another, each alone and finding its way, with more instruments joining the duet as each line of music played. In the same fashion, colors of the sun appeared one at a time, pale and muted at first, gray blending into pale yellow into pink and then orange and finally a full magnificent sunrise, a symphony of color and light.

  It wouldn’t matter if she watched the sun come up every morning of her life; Sandy knew she would never grow tired of the sight. She looked to her right and studied Pat, who seemed mesmerized by its beauty as well. Silently, Sandy reached for the backpack and pulled out the ice bucket, then proceeded to pop the cork on the champagne. The noise caught Pat’s attention and she turned and smiled in delight. She hadn’t asked about the picnic, and Sandy knew this was a special surprise. As their plastic champagne glasses touched, so did their lips, in a soft and tender kiss.

  Sandy was amazed to find her heart pounding, amazed to see the world spinning, amazed to feel the wetness between her legs. How did this woman have such a physical effect on her? They’d made love not once, not twice, but three times the night before, and now Sandy was ready for more. As they set down the champagne and began the seductive stripping of each other’s clothes, Sandy wondered if she just might fall in love with this woman yet.