A Lethal Legacy

by P. C. Zick

  A Lethal Legacy

  By P.C. Zick

  A Lethal Legacy

  Copyright ©

  2013 by P.C. Zick, 2nd Printing Original Copyright 2003 by Patricia C. Behnke

  All rights reserved.

  Cover Design: Travis Miles

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, events, and dialogues portrayed in this book are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems without permission by the author. The only exception is by a reviewer who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  Author Contact:

  P. C. Zick

  Email – pczick23@gmail.com

  Blog – www.pczick.wordpress.com

  DEDICATION

  To my husband Robert – you’ve made all my dreams come true.

  To my daughter Anna – you’re the best legacy I can leave.

  IN MEMORY

  I remember those who came before me and dedicate this book to them: My father, Harmon Camburn; my mother, Gertrude Stephens Camburn; my aunt Minnie Camburn Eyster; my aunt Vera Nichols Camburn; my uncle Paul Camburn; my brothers Marvin and Donald Camburn; and my cousin Tom Camburn.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  DEDICATION

  IN MEMORY

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER ONE

  The fog enveloped me for the first time on that Thanksgiving in 1986. I remained trapped in it for an entire decade.

  I married, made love, had children, and buried my relatives, but I did it while covered in a shroud of heavy moisture laden with coldness and despair. The years of my youth caught up with me, and my penchant for saving the world served as a guiding light as I fought to break through the deepening depression.

  Trying to live and love and feel with a deep foreboding never leaving my consciousness proved to be a challenge. I knew I couldn't see the road before me. My actions came from instinct because the path in front of me lacked directions.

  On that Thanksgiving eve, I drove over the bridges connecting the bayous and swamps that lead into New Orleans. The evening, warm for November, rained humidity, leaving everything in its wake damp. As I came closer to the city, the fog surrounded my car, swallowing it in one bite. I drove on, not sure where the road would take me, but still happy that I had decided to spend Thanksgiving with my cousin Gary Townsend who had moved to New Orleans almost ten years ago.

  "Hey, Ed, don't you think it's time to get together?" Gary asked when he called the week before to ask me to spend Thanksgiving with him.

  "It's been awhile, hasn't it?" I said.

  "Why don't you come here? Then we can enjoy ourselves without our mothers' fussing over us and Philip growling at me."

  "Who's going to tell them?"

  "Well, you of course, Cuz! Tell them they'll have us both at Christmas. That should be enough for one year, right?"

  Gary and I had grown up in Michigan, but in 1977 when both of our second marriages ended, Gary, an advertising executive, transferred to New Orleans. I was teaching high school English in Ann Arbor for ten years by then, but I aspired to be a novelist. When my mother moved to Florida after my dad died, I began considering a move there. She moved after my father’s death in 1977 and joined Gary's parents in retirement heaven near Ocala.

  By 1979, with two novels published, I quit teaching to write full time, and occasionally offering writing seminars through local community colleges.

  In 1980, I moved from Ann Arbor into an apartment south of Gainesville, the home of the University of Florida, near the flat, yet powerful landscape of Paynes Prairie, and within a half hour's drive to my relatives in Ocala. I left my teaching career in Michigan with little regret and concentrated on my third novel that was a departure of sorts for me. After some research, I began writing about Florida's role in the Civil War.

  Previously I wrote contemporary works with some autobiographical material. More accurately, those books contained Gary's life within their covers. I never wrote about myself, but I certainly had insight into Gary and could pontificate about his shortcomings and insecurities with ease. Gary, forever the faithful cousin, never minded. Or if he did mind, he never let me know.

  North Florida's landscape lured and inspired me unlike anything I had experienced in the industrial regions of southeastern Michigan. The expansive branches of the majestic oak and towering pine trees calmed my senses and allowed me to enjoy the coldest January night and the hottest August afternoon. Either the Atlantic Ocean or the Gulf of Mexico was an hour's drive from my apartment. I found myself yearning for the sound of the waves upon the flat, white beaches of a north Florida coast if I went more than a month without a visit. The coasts boosted my creativity, and the beauty of the rolling hills of the horse farms kept me grounded.

  On one of my first visits to the Atlantic coast, I went to Amelia Island just inside the state line but with a view of Georgia's Cumberland Island across a strait at the northern end of Amelia. I camped at Fort Clinch State Park, where one of the protective fortresses built by the British in the 1800s still stands. On my picnic table, someone had placed a sea oat branch. The sea oat, a highly protected plant that grows on the dunes, consists of a long slender reed with wispy threads coming off the seeds of the plant. It is at once beautiful and fragile looking.

  I took it home with me and placed it in a tiny vase near my computer. A friend saw it one day and asked in horror why I had a sea oat on my desk.

  "I didn't pick it. It was on a picnic table," I said.

  "I'd keep it hidden. You were supposed to leave it there so it could reseed itself," my friend said.

  I found it doubtful that such a wisp of a weed could offer much to the shore, so I read about the sea oat soon after and discovered that although it looks fragile in nature it actually performs an important but unseen duty on the dunes. It has a very long and deep root system that keeps the sand in place and helps prevent erosion.

  I still keep the sprig of sea oats next to me as I write. The plant reminds me of myself. It doesn't look like much with its tall thin stalk, but it provides an unseen service to the world around it.

  People often refer to me as having a lanky build. My sandy brown hair has always defied conventions. During my high school years, Brylcreme kept it in place. During the '60s, I let it grow long, but now it is a respectable length, rather short, but manageable. Standing beside Gary, I look like the sea oat next to his Live Oak tree. His sturdy build, enhanced by the weights he had lifted since high school, and his dark hair, always manageable, provided a contrast that kept most people from ever guessing that we shared some of the same gene pool.

  But I kept the family together. I ran interference with Gary and his family, and since I lived so close to my mother, Gary's parents, and our fathers' sister, Aunt Susan, I became the family's anchor. I didn't mind. In fact, for once in my life, I felt that I was doing something important. Since my own father had died before my mother moved to Florida, I didn't have someone constantly criticizing my every move.

  So like the sea o
at, my outward appearance drew little attention, but I had deeply buried roots that helped keep our family in place.

  When Gary called suggesting that I come to New Orleans for this visit, I didn't hesitate. We had gone too long without seeing one another. Even though Gary and I were cousins, we had a relationship closer than brothers. Born only months apart, we both faced the burden of being only sons of two very different, yet complicated fathers.

  As the fog deepened, I began to feel uncomfortable with my decision to make the twelve-hour drive from Gainesville. It didn't help that I had decided to take the less-traveled roads into Louisiana instead of I-10. Usually the view relaxed me and prepared me for the carnival atmosphere that is New Orleans no matter what time of year. However, the heavy mists on this evening left me feeling uneasy about the holiday that lay ahead. At times, the road disappeared, filling me with the sense that I might also disappear into the fog.

  I settled into a confused state, unsure of why I now dreaded this visit. Gary always gave me a connection with my past and with myself.

  However, I wanted to see Gary and touch base once again with my best friend. We talked on the phone, but the distance in miles kept us from visiting each other as often as we would have liked.

  Where I remained reluctant to become involved with anyone after my second divorce, Gary forged ahead with new relationships after his move to New Orleans.

  Gary knew he disappointed his father, but only in recent years had he stopped trying to please my Uncle Philip. Although I suspected that if Philip would ever offer Gary that much-needed acceptance, Gary would jump off cliffs, swim oceans, and fight wild boars to bask in the glow of his father's love.

  Philip Townsend played football at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor during the late 1920s, gaining a celebrity status as the team's star quarterback. He continued his hero status in the southeastern Michigan area by coaching football teams to two state championships while a coach at Pioneer High School, also in Ann Arbor. As a young boy, Gary didn't show much inclination toward athletics, and his father criticized him regularly for it.

  "What's wrong with you, Gary," became an often-heard comment at the Philip Townsend house.

  To make things tougher on Gary, I did perform well on the playing field. My lanky form might not have attracted girls, but it served me well in basketball and football.

  When Gary didn't make the junior varsity basketball team his first year in high school, Uncle Philip quit talking to Gary for weeks. He wouldn't even look at his son. Although Gary agonized over it, Uncle Philip’s probably saved Gary from further anguish.

  The Junior Varsity coach, who didn't choose Philip Townsend's son for his team, left his position the following year. Philip's previous reputation still allowed him a certain amount of power within the school community even though he left coaching and teaching several years earlier to take a lucrative sales position with a large pharmaceutical company out of Detroit. He made a small fortune selling vitamins.

  The JV basketball coach, new to the area, probably hadn't realized the mistake he made by not putting Gary somewhere on the team, no matter how badly he played. Gary himself only tried out because his father made him.

  When Gary called me the afternoon that the final cut for the team was posted, he seemed relieved, but he dreaded telling his father. Gary's mother, my Aunt Claire, suggested he invite me for dinner to help soften Philip's attacks, which we were all certain would occur. Even his wife was powerless under his abuse.

  We had just finished eating when Claire gave Gary a meaningful look. She waited to clear away the dishes while Gary cleared his throat. The three of us held our breath.

  "Dad, I didn't make the basketball team," Gary said as his father took the last bites of his apple pie.

  "What do you mean you didn't make the basketball team?” Philip shouted. In his world, a son of his would never "not make the team."

  "I don't know. Coach didn't put my name on the list." Gary hung his head while he waited for his father's explosion.

  "Gary, what's the matter with you? Everyone in this family has played sports. Get out there and apply yourself. Look at Ed, for chrissakes. Now there's a true Townsend," Philip said.

  "Philip, stop. . .," began Claire.

  "Sorry, Dad. But I'm going to run for class president."

  "Class president? What kind of pansy runs for class president?" Philip asked.

  "Philip!" Claire repeated. "Leave the boy alone. He'll be the most greatest fantasticest president ever. Right, Ed?" Claire always made up silly-sounding superlatives whenever she most wanted to cover up her true feelings. Mostly she did it when Philip acted stupidly. No matter her reasons for making the words up, it always made me feel close to her when she did it.

  "You bet, Aunt Claire. Gary's the most popular guy in his class. You should see the girls chase him around when we go to the movies."

  Gary and his father both stopped arguing. Philip brought the sports section up in front of his face, and Gary walked slowly down the hall to his bedroom. I looked at Aunt Claire and shrugged. She motioned with her hands for me to follow Gary.

  "I guess I'll call Dad to come and get me, OK?" I said when I entered the bedroom.

  Gary was sprawled across his bed. "I'm not a pansy," he said.

  "Gary, you know how your dad is. Even if you had made the team, things wouldn't have worked out. Remember how he was when we played ball when we were kids? You don't want to go through that again. He doesn't know anything about being a class president, so you'll be safe."

  "Hey, that's right, buddy! To hell with him! Let's walk downtown and get some ice cream. Then call home." Gary always rebounded quickly from one of his father's rebuffs, and in his typical pattern, he would usually do something stupendous in an attempt to win back his respect.

  He won his election by a landslide, not because he had any outstanding qualities for class president, but because he was popular with both females and males. He served in this role for the next three years while doing very little work for his class. He had plenty of girls around to organize everything, while he received all the glory.

  Gary lived right in the heart of the French Quarter. Many of the establishments along Royal Street rented apartments when not using the upper floors as art galleries. I found his place easily, but uneasily parked my car on St. Louis Street a block away. Gary assured me that New Orleans was safe, but I doubted his wisdom especially on this eerie night. The feeling of foreboding remained with me as I locked the car and walked toward his apartment.

  "Cuz! You made it! Finally!" Gary said as he held me at arm's length to give me a long look.

  "Hey, who ordered that fog? How can you live in a place where you can't see the road in front of you?"

  Gary was as handsome as ever. My ex-wife Kelsey said he reminded her of Rock Hudson, but to me, he was just Gary.

  "This is my friend Rick," Gary said as a young man in his twenties approached from the hallway.

  "Hello, Ed. Heard a lot about you." He grabbed my hand before I could think of a response. I’d never heard of Rick before this moment. The last time I talked to Gary he had been living with someone else.

  We walked into the living room just as the phone rang. Gary answered it.

  Rick and I tried to start a conversation, but both realized that our whole reason for being together in this apartment revolved around the person on the phone. We tried to talk about the view of Royal Street from the balcony, but both of us failed as we kept our ears finely tuned to the voice emanating from the other side of the room.

  "Yes, this is Gary Townsend. Who's this?" Gary asked.

  "Kristina? Kris? My daughter?" Rick and I looked at one another in astonishment as we heard Gary's questioning voice. It had been fifteen years since Gary had any contact with his daughter from his first marriage.

  "Of course, I want to see you. I've thought about you every day for the last fifteen years. Yes, yes, really. I want to see you." he repeated. There was silence f
or a moment. "Sure, don't worry, I'll make the arrangements tonight. Give me your phone number. Right. OK, got it. And Kristina? Thanks for calling." He hung up the phone.

  Gary turned toward us. "That was Kristina."

  "What did she want?" I asked. The feeling of dread I that left when I entered the apartment, suddenly returned.

  "She wants to fly here this weekend, if I can arrange it." Gary said.

  "That's wonderful, Gar," Rick said as he embraced him.

  Gary shrugged off Rick's embrace. I could tell he was embarrassed by the open affection in front of me. Rick must have sensed it too because soon afterwards he made his excuses and left for his own apartment for the night.

  "How did she find you?" I asked after Rick left.

  "We didn't really discuss it. Maybe Pam?"

  "Pam? Have you kept in touch with her?"

  "No, but it wouldn't have been hard to trace me. Who cares about all that? She sounds great and wants to see me. That's all that matters."

  "Are you going to call Claire and Philip?" I asked. Claire's heart had been broken when Pam took away her only grandchild so abruptly years earlier.

  "No, I think I'll wait until after we meet. Be sure everything's OK, you know. Besides if it's not, Dad will find some way to blame me." Gary plopped his body down on the couch.

  "What's wrong, Gary?" I asked.

  "Nothing, really. Just a little overwhelmed. It's been a long time. Who knows what Pam has told her?"

  He looked down at his hands as his forefinger began digging into his thumb. "Geez, I haven't done this in a while," he said in amazement as his fingers remembered the old ritual. So far, he hadn't drawn blood.

  "Maybe she hasn't told Kristina anything. Gary, I probably should tell you something," I said.

  "What?"

  "I never told you this, but I promised Pam and I..." I paused as I searched for the words to explain.

  "Come on, Ed, just say it."

  "Pam used to call me after the divorce. But she would never tell me where they were. When I left Ann Arbor, she didn't know how to reach me anymore, so I haven't heard anything for ten years or so." I looked at Gary to get his reaction.