The silence is short and broken and it cuts like glass.
Jarrett starts to stow the phone, but then he brings it back. “Did Thomas ever say why he wanted to see me?” he asks.
Cort answers. “He wanted to tell you about the codex.”
“The codex? What about it?”
“He knows where it is.”
Chapter 27
Thursday, October 14, 1999 - 3 days remain
Bottom line? There was the life she had lived and the truth and they bore no resemblance to each other. And nothing could have prepared her for this revelation when it came, not even her years of training as a psychologist. Not that she could claim a complete lack of knowledge. No. She had banished her share of doubts through the years, the unwanted stabs of intuition. She had ignored clues she would have advised her patients not to ignore. Looking back, Sophia will think she was the doctor in denial of her own illness, the one who must be forced to take her medication. She will think reality is like that, truth is like that. Both can be as inevitable and unpalatable as a disease and potentially as catastrophic. She will think she is the classic example of the old axiom: Do as I say, not as I do....
And it will be this, her own failure, that will cause her to weep, on occasion, even years later when she is very old. While it is true that Russ and Esther manipulated her and deceived her horribly, she allowed them to do it. She had been putty in their hands. But of the two of them, Sophia will always think her mother’s actions were the more despicable. Maybe she would have blamed Russ more if he’d been alive when the news broke. But it is only Esther who is left. Esther who is warned by Trent Hunter, himself, ahead of the big news story that is breaking. But Sophia won’t know about Hunter’s early morning visit to her mother until after she has been blindsided.
She walks into her mother’s house that morning, arms weighted with grocery sacks that contain the hurricane supplies her mother had insisted on having and she assumes it’s business as usual when her mother ignores her. When her mother’s only comment is that if Sophia finds the shopping an imposition, it’s her own fault for having robbed Esther of her car keys.
Sophia grits her teeth to stifle her groan.
Aunt Frances scurries around like a scared little mouse, but Sophia doesn’t question this either. She should have. Especially when Frances trails her to her car fretting that Sophia will hate her. “I have no control over Esther, you know,” Frances says. “I told her to talk to you, but she never listens to me.”
Sophia ought to have realized right then there was something more the matter than what seemed apparent, but she is impatient, anxious to leave. She gives Frances a hug. “It’s all right,” she says. “I’m not upset with you. It’s Mother,” she adds, unnecessarily.
It isn’t going to get easier, either, Sophia thinks driving home. She wonders how she can stand it, doing so much for someone who is so unkind, so ungrateful and rude. Esther behaves as if Sophia were still a child. You’ll do as you’re told. How often had Sophia heard that?
She switches on the radio, switches it off. There is so little between them other than bitterness and Sophia can see no way it will be resolved. The fact that her thoughts are running in this direction as she turns onto her street and sees the news vans parked in front of her house is ironic, but this won’t be apparent to her until later. The drop of her stomach is what registers. She backs her foot off the accelerator. There are reporters with cameramen—Sophia is instantly taken back to her experiences during the Doaks’ trial—milling about on her lawn.
So it’s happened. That’s her first thought.
They’re going to question her about Russ. She’s certain of this, adamant that it is Russ’s wrongdoing that is of interest to them. They’ll claim the artifacts in his collection were stolen. They’ll say he had knowledge of the 2037 codex, perhaps even possession of it. Something like that. They will have already informed Carolyn. They’ll have dropped it on her like a bomb. Sophia’s heart lurches into her throat. Why hadn’t she spoken to Carolyn? Now it’s too late. Trent Hunter, that fool for a man, has done her talking for her.
Even as she wheels into the driveway, they approach, squawking like vultures. She comes around the front of the car, walking rapidly, not making eye contact, intent on reaching her front door. She hears someone shout what she thinks is Russ’s name, the word artifact ...something something ...Tilley. Yes, she’s certain she’s hearing Louis Tilley’s name. Panic fishtails through her chest. She is nearly running now down the walkway.
“Is it true that you once ...?”
“...accident ...abandoned....”
“...aware that Terrence Lucky is ...that he’s alleging ...a child named Dylan....”
She hesitates, shaking her head slightly. Tilley, they said Tilley not Lucky, surely not Lucky, but her ears are ringing. She isn’t hearing properly. She can’t be.
On the front steps, when she stumbles, when her foot bumps something that clatters like glass, she looks down and is startled to see a square blue casserole dish. She’s knocked the lid off and it has skittered against the door. She can see—smell that it holds something edible. The cheese melted on top is bubbly, the color of toast in some places. The stench of parmesan rises and Sophia nearly gags. Her mind flashes to the days following Russ’s death. Neighbors had brought dozens of dishes to her doorstep. There’s a note underneath this one and she plucks it out, reading it even as she fumbles with her door key.
What a difficult time this is for you, dear. If there is anything I can do, please call. It’s signed Lily McKesson.
Sophia draws a blank. Who has died? The door opens, Phil appears. He takes the casserole and her elbow, drawing her into the house.
“The lid,” she says faintly.
“Never mind.” Phil closes the door. “You saw Hunter this morning, his Heart of the Story segment?”
“No. I left early to shop for groceries for Mother and Frances. What are you doing here? Where is Carolyn? Is she all right?”
Phil gestures toward the living room. “In there.” He sets the dish on the hallway table. “You didn’t tell her. You didn’t return Hunter’s calls.”
“I was going to.” Sophia breaks off. There is no decent excuse.
Carolyn is sitting on the edge of the sofa looking stunned, as if she has been knocked flat without warning.
“Oh, Cecie, I’m so sorry.”
“They’re saying you didn’t know? Is that right?”
“I suspected, but I wasn’t sure. I should have told you. I should have called the museum.”
“The museum? What does the museum have to do with it?”
“Your dad, his collection.” Sophia is suddenly unsure; she glances at Phil.
He says her name and bids her to sit. “There, on the sofa,” he says, and his voice, his expression are grave, so very grave.
“What is it?” Sophia looks from Phil to Carolyn. Pale, she’s too pale. “The baby? Larry?”
“They’re fine. You really don’t know? Grandmother didn’t have the TV on?”
“No. What is this about? Tell me.”
“They’re saying,” Carolyn begins, falters, stops.
Sophia’s hands rise without purpose.
Phil says, “They’re saying Jarrett Capshaw is your son.”
Sophia studies his face, the familiar contours; she notes his astonishment, how it is mingled with the warmth of compassion in his eyes, which is also familiar to her and dear. But the rest, what he has said, it’s nonsense. She peers closely at him. “Have you lost your mind?”
“That might be preferable,” he answers.
“I didn’t know you’d ever had a son. How could I not know?” Carolyn is clearly uncomprehending.
“My son is dead.” Sophia directs her appeal to Phil.
“Evidently not.” He perches on the arm of the adjacent wing chair.
“But Russ and my mother, Terrence, they all said so.”
“They lied to you, Sophia,” Phil say
s gently.
She shakes her head.
Carolyn says she wouldn’t have believed it, either, if she hadn’t heard Trent Hunter’s interview with Terrence Lucky.
Sophia eyes close. White noise builds inside her head. They know, Phil and Carolyn, the entire world, knows. Everything. It has all come out: the pregnancy, the relationship with Terrence, his abuse, her drug and alcohol use, the accident. She listens while Phil and Carolyn relate the facts to her in shaded tones of disbelief and consternation.
“How? she asks. “How did Trent Hunter find Terrence?”
“It’s his job,” Phil says. “It’s what he’s trained to do.”
“Terrence Lucky is such a fat, arrogant man.” Carolyn is disgusted. “I can’t believe you were ever with him. It’s like you were this whole other person.”
Sophia tents her fingers over her face.
“I wish you’d told me,” Phil says.
Of course he did. Sophia can feel his distress almost as clearly as her own.
He says, “I doubt Lucky would have talked if Russ were still alive.”
“He was paid to keep it secret,” Carolyn says. “By Dad.”
Sophia lowers her hands. “No, Russ wouldn’t.”
“They have proof. Some kind of contract that Dad drew up.”
“Like a confidentiality agreement,” Phil says.
“Terrence wasn’t the only one Dad paid off either. You really didn’t know?” Carolyn peers at Sophia.
“It isn’t true,” she says and she goes on, citing her grounds for doubt. “My baby was named Dylan. I have his sweater. Terrence sent it to Mother for me to have as a memento because Dylan died. They did everything they could to help me.” She touches her temples. “There’s no way this can be right. It’s”
“Unspeakable,” Phil says. “But I’m sure their intention was to protect you.”
“Dad, it was Dad and his precious family name he was so hell bent to protect.”
“No! Cecie! How can you say such a thing?”
“Because it’s true? You think I don’t know how he was, Mom?”
“But you were so close.”
“Do you remember the fit he threw when I dropped out of Rice and went to work in Paris? And what about when I moved in with Larry? All I asked for was time to consider whether investment banking was the career I wanted to pursue, but it didn’t matter to him if I was unhappy.” Carolyn’s chin wobbles. “His only concern was that I was a college drop-out, living in sin and a disgrace to his name.”
“No.” Sophia restates her denial because she does not, cannot look at what this means. She has spent a lifetime not looking. She is angry at Carolyn now. How dare you bring yourself into this? she wants to shout. But instead, she is collapsing, crumbling, disintegrating into a heap on her knees, holding herself and rocking with the pain that is unbearable and the sound that breaks from her chest—it can’t be coming from her—is godawful, otherworldly, a physical sensation that scrapes her ribs, claws her throat.
“Oh, Mom, don’t.”
Sophia feels Carolyn’s weight settle beside her, feels her arms surround her. Phil presses a tissue into her hand. And she’s grateful for their consolation and humiliated by it, to be in this position, so broken. And still even as she goes about collecting herself, she is scrambling to find some way to explain it, to avoid the acceptance that is inevitable, and she would be successful if, as in the past, Russ or her mother—those watchdogs, her guardians—were only here to distract her, to cajole and beguile her. And now, floating up from this deeper level of awareness, there is yet another realization, that she has always harbored a suspicion of them, of their story, those two who claimed they knew best.
“You know, my dear, there are certain secrets that won’t be kept.” Mrs. Cavanaugh’s admonition floats through Sophia’s mind trailing scents of old roses and lemon oil, that undertow of gas. Mrs. Cavanaugh had been so convinced she knew the truth. But she had been as ignorant of it as Sophia.
The phone bleats. No one moves.
Sophia blows her nose, addresses Carolyn. “You’re furious at me and you have a right to be.”
“I don’t know what I am.”
“I wanted to tell you.”
“You didn’t trust me. You never have.”
“I didn’t trust myself. Them,” Sophia spits the word. “I trusted them.”
A taut silence falls.
“Sophia?” Phil’s voice rises, gentle, coaxing. “Keep talking,” he urges. “What are you thinking?”
How could they? The question is a current of heat arrowing through what are cooler, lighter rivulets of shock, a nascent sense of relief. “You’re sure this is real, not some hoax?” She’s trembling and hugs herself.
“It’s real. It’s hard to understand their motive, I know, but as I was saying to Carolyn before you got here, it was the Fifties. Social standards were much stricter then. You remember how it was. People were judgmental to the point of being vicious. Appearance was—”
“Are you excusing them?”
“Of course not, but as you yourself have said to me many times, Russ’s name and his reputation had to be above reproach. You often spoke as if they were—holy.” There is the briefest of hesitations before Phil utters the word. He props his ankle on his knee, briefly dusts it with his fingertips, lifts his glance to let it rest quietly on Sophia’s before adding yet another word. “Sacrosanct.”
“It’s true, Mom. We both did our bit.”
“God help me,” Sophia whispers.
“Don’t blame yourself.” Phil is reading Sophia’s mind. “You were a scared kid when you met Russ. Alone and vulnerable. You did what you had to survive.”
“If anyone is to blame, it’s Dad and Grandmother. They’re the ones who lied.”
“But I abandoned my son. I made it possible for this to happen.” Although what this was, what its consequences are, Sophia can’t be certain. She looks at Phil. “What about the Phelps?”
“They’ve both passed away.”
“When? Did they keep Dylan? Did they raise him?” Sophia cups her elbows as if to contain the sea of her confusion. Alive. Dylan alive. She can’t wrap her mind around the fact much less take in the idea that the child she thought buried is now a grown man.
Phil says, “They didn’t keep him,” and he goes on to cite the history of troubled circumstances that match the details Sophia has heard from Grace Capshaw, the dark litany of lack and deprivation that marred her husband’s childhood, that robbed him—robbed a boy called Jarrett—of any sense of safety, of his own self-worth. Robbed him of even his name.
Sophia says that now. “They changed his name.”
“It was part of the agreement Dad made,” Carolyn says. “The adoptive mother chose the name Jarrett.”
“Arlene.” Arlene Capshaw who had told Cort she felt his older brother had been abused, Sophia thinks. She closes her eyes seeking relief, but without regard for her wishes her brain attempts to bring the two pictures together: the tiny boy of her memory and the mug shot of the grown man she has seen on the news. But the image that crystallizes is her final vision of Dylan as she last saw him and her breath draws down hard.
Phil touches her knee.
She looks from him to Carolyn.
“What?”
“Jarrett Capshaw’s mug shot, it shows his right eyebrow, the scar. It’s the same, in the same place.” Sophia sets her teeth, but further denial is useless and nearly as unrecognizable now as the truth was only moments ago. “He’s my son. He’s Dylan.”
“I really do have a brother.” Carolyn’s voice lifts as if in question or astonishment or both.
“What am I going to do?”
“What do you want to do?” Phil asks.
“I think you should see him before they—”
Execute him. The rest of Carolyn’s advice hangs unspoken in the air. Sophia is panicked at the idea. She thinks of Grace and Cort, how they have fought for this man and failed, so far,
to infuse him with the desire to live. “His family,” she says. “Grace. I can’t imagine what they must be thinking.”
“I wonder what he thinks,” Carolyn says.
She means Jarrett. Jarrett who was Dylan when he was small. When he fit into Sophia’s arms, when he clung to her. You think if I’d taken you both in he wouldn’t have died.” Esther’s speech from last Saturday echoes through Sophia’s mind. Died. Esther had used that very word. She had not stuttered; she had not looked away. Shock again bends Sophia over her knees.
“Mom?”
You saddle me with that, Esther had accused, you would have me go to my grave carrying the burden of what is your guilt on my back. I didn’t cost that child his life, Sophia, you did.
“Mom?” Carolyn repeats.
But Sophia can only shake her head, no. No! The word repeats in her brain. She can’t number the levels of deceit, the duration of years that it spans, the ways in which her life and the lives of others have been altered as a result. She raises her glance. “If I have to see anyone right now, it’s Mother.”
Carolyn says she’s going too. She offers to drive.
“No, Cecie, it’s too much stress on you already. I feel awful about it.”
“I’m pregnant, Mom, not terminally ill and I want to hear what Grandmother has to say as much as you do. Besides, I don’t think you’re in the best shape to drive yourself.”
Sophia appeals to Phil, but he only shrugs. He either supports Carolyn or he isn’t choosing to take sides. He mentions the news crews, but, thankfully, when they duck out to their cars, the street is empty.
o0o
Esther puts the burden of responsibility on Russ.
While Frances hops around the kitchen like a small addlepated wren assembling the makings for tea because she knows Sophia’s preference for it, Esther says Russ hired a private investigator who tracked down the Phelps.
“They told him they couldn’t keep the child.”
“They would have given Dylan back?” Sophia stares dumbfounded across the table at her mother. She feels as if her heart will crack in two.
“Not to you. They saw the shape you were in. They told the investigator that if you’d gone to the hospital with them, they would have had you taken into custody. Who knows what might have happened then. You must see now that it worked out for the best.”
The Volunteer Page 24