“No. She didn’t talk about it and we got along okay, so . . . I don’t have that kind of temper anyway. I guess she thought I got mostly her genes or something.”
“What about your mom?”
“My mom’s temper? No, she was more . . .” She hesitated. “She didn’t have much of a temper, either.”
They both heard tires in the gravel drive. Hannah took a deep breath and stood up.
“I’m glad your mom was better informed. I think she was very wise to tell you about it. I didn’t at first. I tend not to talk about it much, but she was right. You do need to know how to take care of yourself.”
Chapter Seven
Turns out she was a pillar in the St. John’s Altar Society. The ladies couldn’t say enough about her,” she told Joe later that afternoon as she drove to the high school to pick up Anna after track. “They maintain the altar and the interior of the church, raise funds for flowers and candles and vestments, you know, all the stuff used at the altar.”
“Hence their name, I suspect.”
“Well, yeah. But then the priest—he’s young, a different one than I told you about—he comes over to us after the graveside service, practically in tears, and tells us how much he’s going to miss her. She was the rectory housekeeper, can you believe it? For most of the last twenty years. That was her job.”
“Many people turn to their church in times of crisis.”
“Well, yeah. But the weird thing is I never pictured her as having a job. Or as being an active member of . . . anything. Or as anyone other than who she was the night I left—this sort of beaten spirit who couldn’t lift a finger to help herself, much less someone else. I don’t know.” She slowed at the stop sign. “It’s like it’s finally, genuinely sinking in that time didn’t stop here once I was gone. I mean, I knew it didn’t but . . . I never thought of my mother actually getting up off the floor and making a real life for herself . . . and for Ruth, and then Anna. I never thought of her as . . . being a real person, you know?”
“I believe that’s a common childhood ailment. My younger son didn’t think I could spell my own name until he was almost thirty.”
“But you were always real to him. He loved you, cared about you, worried about you. They both did. I didn’t worry about her, Joe. If I thought about her at all, I simply assumed she stayed locked up in the house and on welfare like before. I was so wrapped up in myself, so busy worrying about me that—”
“No, no, no,” he broke in, his voice stern. “You don’t get to do this to yourself, my friend. You’re not there to add to your guilt list. That’s all in the past. It’s good that you’re getting to know who your mother was. Try to feel proud of her achievements, happy that you were mistaken, glad that she found a purpose in her life. But you have suffered enough for the past. You have tried to forgive her, now you must also forgive yourself.”
“I know.” Her voice came out as weak as her resolve. “It wasn’t her fault, or mine.” Four years of therapy and the final outcome was that her family was a no-fault accident, an act of Nature beyond the control of those involved. Theoretically, even her father wasn’t responsible due to ignorance or mental defect—although her nature wasn’t that theoretical. Her more practical mind told her that right or wrong, at one point or another, they had all made choices.
“Tell me what else happened.” He always knew when she needed to talk, and not about anything in particular.
“Um, two young brothers, a little younger than Anna, and their mother came up to us after the priest left and asked if we wanted them to move their cows.” She smiled at the silence on the other end. “Did I mention there are three cows in a fenced field next to the house?”
“Aromatic cows?”
“Not really, plain brown cows pretty much. Apparently they’re 4-H projects for these two boys and Mama let them use the field in exchange for chores. Anna knows them pretty well. She and I sort of talked it over real fast and decided they could leave the cows for now and maybe work out something with the new owners, and we’d use the boys to help us clean out the house.”
“Always thinking, aren’t you? By the way, I’ve been looking over this list you e-mailed me and I can’t think of anything to add. You seem to have thought of everything. Two antique dealers there at the same time is good business, and having them and the used furniture buyers doing a preliminary walk-through will save you some time, I believe. Was that a car horn?”
“Yes.” She sighed and rolled her eyes. Joe disapproved of talking on the phone while driving—even with a handless earpiece. “They do that here. Honk and wave. I have no idea who they are. And I’m pretty sure they don’t know who I am. I think they just like to honk and wave—like it’s the friendly thing to do. But it’s also annoying, and very distracting.”
“Especially when you’re on the phone.”
“I knew you were going to say that.”
“I know you knew. So, where are you going?”
“To pick Anna up from school.”
“This late?”
“She has track until five thirty. I’m a little early. I’m hoping to see her run.”
“How is she doing?”
“Dealing with Mama’s death or dealing with me?”
“Yes.”
“She cried a little during the service. Not hysterically. A few loose tears . . . Oh! That’s something else I found out. Mama had heart problems for several years. She’d been in the hospital a couple of times, so this wasn’t unexpected.” Not that it would be any less painful for Anna. “Anna let me hold her hand for a few minutes.”
“That’s something.”
“Yeah, but then she hemmed and hawed when the Steadman kids came over to ask if she wanted a ride to school. It took me forever to realize that she wanted to go, but she didn’t want me to feel abandoned if she did.” She paused. “She’s a nice girl, Joe. I like her.”
“Why do you make this sound like a bad thing?”
“It’s not but . . . I don’t want to make a mistake. I don’t want to do anything that might hurt her. She’s gone through so much already.”
“Then you won’t. You’ll bend over backward to do the opposite, you’ll see. Listen to your heart, Hannah. It has all the best answers.”
“Mmm.” If she asked the right questions—maybe. “So, anyway, I wrote my first official note to the school to excuse her absence and she left with them. Then I went back to the house to call junk dealers and antique collectors and work out a plan to evacuate the house. Joe, you wouldn’t believe the stuff in that house.”
“So you’ve said.” He chuckled. “And what about the boy?”
“What boy?”
“The sheriff.”
“Oh. Him.” Her heart picked up some nervous speed. “He’s going to be trouble. He keeps looking at me.”
“Oh? And what do you keep doing to cause this?”
“Nothing. I swear. Every time I looked up, he was staring at me like he’s trying to figure me out.”
“Have him call me. I’ll straighten him out on impossible puzzles.”
“He doesn’t know me,” she said, ignoring his comment. “He remembers this . . . this sad, frightened, pathetic little girl he somehow managed to think he was in love with for two or three seconds in high school and I’m not her.”
“Two or three seconds,” he said shrewdly. “Sometimes that’s all the time it takes.”
“For what?”
“To know someone better than we know ourselves. But if you’re no longer attracted to him, then I can’t see why this would be upsetting. Let him look. You’re a pretty woman. You don’t have to look back, you know.”
“And I can do anything for two weeks, right?”
“Right. Longer if need be.”
“You’re not having fun there, are you?” she asked, eager to change the subject. “It took me so long to get you to retire, maybe I shouldn’t have asked you to watch things for me. Maybe all this is a bigger mistake than I though
t.”
“Don’t you worry. At this moment I recall perfectly why I decided to retire. Your boy, Jim Sauffle, is making my backside ache.”
She cringed. Joe had the patience of Job when it came to new agents starting out—when it came to most everything, actually. His backside didn’t ache often enough to be ignored.
“Talk to me,” she said, slowing to turn into the parking lot at the high school, close to the football field where track events were also held. In short terms Joe described her new associate’s faulty handling of a group health policy for a Precision Auto Parts franchise and then a term life package for a newly married couple with young children from previous marriages. Apparently, he’d quoted a set of terms to both clients, went back a few days later saying he’d found better policies for them, then only the Friday before had reversed his decision once again.
Hannah worried the stitching on the leather-covered steering wheel as she pulled into a parking space overlooking the field below and turned off the engine. “Friday I got Grady’s call, Joe. I’m trying to remember if Jim tried to talk this over with me or if he . . . well, if this is the new Precision place out on Fredrick Avenue near Catonsville. Larry Watts already has a policy on his other franchise. With me. I’m sure Larry would have told him. Why didn’t he just attach them?”
“That’s what Mr. Watts asked me first thing this morning. And since he’s worked with you for so many years, he’s willing to let me get to the bottom of the problem and get back to him. Young Jim and I had a discussion. That’s when I found out about the term life clients as well.”
While her mind tried to wrap itself around the idea that her new associate might be trying to steal from her, issuing new policies to her preexisting clients . . . she became aware of a group of runners taking off around the track.
“Mixed with the multiple quotes, I want to believe all this was a stupid mistake but—” She broke off when a solitary runner broke from the pack, her long legs eating up the track with ease and confidence.
“I’ll keep an eye on him. He did seem confused about—”
“Oh, God, Joe. I wish you could see this.”
“What?”
“Anna. She’s running. She’s . . . beautiful. She’s . . . Joe, she’s so graceful. She’s almost a quarter of a track ahead of the others, and she doesn’t look like she’s straining at all.”
“It’s a quarter mile track?”
“I don’t know. It’s around the football field.”
“Has she gone around more than once?”
“She just started the second loop around.”
“Then she might be a long-distance runner. Sixteen hundred meters maybe.”
“How many laps is that?”
“Four. You said she runs cross-country in the fall?”
“Yeah. I think so. I gotta go, Joe. Do whatever you think best with Jim. I’ll call you back later.”
Hannah couldn’t take her eyes off the tall, lanky girl on the track. Running looked as effortless and natural to her as walking was for most people. Gradually, she’d taken close to a half-track lead ahead of the others and still didn’t seem to be fatiguing. She ran with her knees up, her arms bent, her blond ponytail swishing back and forth in a relaxed rhythm.
She watched Anna through the wire fencing as she made her way to the gate, heading for the bleachers. Being that this was only a practice, there wasn’t a large crowd of spectators. One or two adults, parents she imagined, watching from the stands and a few younger onlookers leaning against a low wire fence around the track—Biscuit and Lucy were among them.
Though their coiffures were somewhat dull due to the funeral that morning, they had gone to great lengths to make up for it with their wardrobes. Hannah now found it endearing in a strange way—perhaps because of the deference they’d both shown to her mother at the service that morning. Both had dressed in severe conservative black clothing, their hair devoid of all but their natural colors. Biscuit served as a pallbearer, along with Grady and his son, and three other gentlemen she hadn’t recognized but later found out were members of the church who knew and were fond of her mother—the parish gardener and two CCD students from many years past.
Lucy had glued herself to her best friend’s side for support and was nothing but caring and concerned. Even on such short acquaintance, all in all Hannah found herself impressed with Anna’s choice in friends—they were certainly her defenders.
During Anna’s third pass around the field, they noticed Hannah’s presence in the bleachers; and while Lucy didn’t seem to care one way or the other, Biscuit started climbing the seats toward her.
“You don’t have to sit up here alone, you know.”
“I don’t want to interrupt . . . or distract her.”
He laughed as he sat down beside her. “Fat chance of that. She gets into a zone and can’t hear or see anything except the sound of her feet and her breathing, and the track about eighty feet ahead of her. Not the whole track. That’s too much. This reporter interviewed her last fall, and he wanted to know what she thought about while she was running. She said she mostly thought about putting one foot in front of the other, and breathing.”
“She makes it look so easy.”
He nodded, watching Anna. “This fourth lap she’ll push it a little harder, to shave off a couple more seconds.”
As if he’d whispered in her ear, Anna picked up her tempo on the far side of the field and while she still looked uncommonly graceful, there was no doubt that she was working harder.
“Does she try to break the record every time she runs?”
“Just her record. It’s always nice to break someone else’s record but that’s not really what it’s all about. If it was, you’d go nuts. There’s always going to be someone faster than you are. After a while you’d have to give up. It’s more fun to beat your own personal best. You get to know yourself pretty well. You test yourself over and over again. And you amaze yourself over and over again by what you can do. It’s a great feeling.”
“You’re speaking from experience.” She waited for Anna to cross the finish line, slow down, circle back halfway toward a man holding a stop watch and a clipboard, then bend with her hands on her knees to catch her breath, before she looked at Biscuit.
“I ran junior varsity three years ago when I was a freshman, then I wrecked my knee in a car accident. It wasn’t the same after that. I can still play basketball, though. I’m a pretty good forward.” He wiggled his fingers at her and grinned. “I have good hands.”
“Do you miss the running?” she asked, ignoring his youthful innuendo. Looking back at Anna, she watched the girl straighten up and look directly at the tall wire fencing on the scoreboard end of the field. Following her gaze, Hannah spotted Cal Steadman leaning against the front of an old light-blue pickup truck, his arms crossed over his chest.
“Nah. Not anymore. It’s more fun to watch Anna do all that work.” Catching her glancing between Anna and Cal, he added, “We all like watching her.”
“Cal comes to watch every day?”
He shrugged. “And to pick up Lucy. And to hang with me.”
She had a sinking feeling in her chest. “I think I messed up again. I’m supposed to let her ride home with Cal, aren’t I? That’s what she wanted to do, right? What she usually does? I’m screwing up her routine.”
“It’s already screwed up. Coach is letting her practice with the relay team for now, but once he decides who to replace her with, it’ll be screwed up even more. Then there’s the move to Baltimore. You picking her up today is pretty minor in the overall screwed-upness of things. Besides, she’s glad that you wanted to see her run.”
“And Cal?” she asked on a hunch. “Is there something . . . going on, between the two of them?”
He scrunched his face and looked like he either didn’t want to or wasn’t supposed to speak on this issue.
“No,” he said at last, and she sensed he was lying—or at least not telling the whole truth
. “Not really. They’re friends, is all.”
“Good friends?”
“Pretty good.” He looked at her, made a quick assessment, then lowered his eyes to concentrate on his black nail polish. “Lucy says Anna’s had this thing for him since like sixth grade. I’m pretty sure she was just his little sister’s best friend until like last summer because he was way hot on Cassie Jordan for a long time. Cal and Cassie, they were a pair. Until last summer. I don’t know what happened. I don’t think he knows what happened, but suddenly he wasn’t so hot on Cassie anymore and they broke up.” He glanced over at his friend, leaning against the pickup truck, then tilted back on the bleacher behind them, his arms stretched out wide. “He’s been smart about it, though. He didn’t make some big, huge move on someone else right away—Cassie would have made her life a hell. But I know my boy and I’ve seen the way he looks at Anna and . . .” His soft laugh was relaxed and philosophical. “His old man knows him, too.”
“Grady?”
“That’s the one.”
“He knows there’s something going on between them?”
“No, but he, like me, saw the potential for something to begin, and he told Cal to back off.”
“Why?”
He bobbed his head. “Because Anna’s leaving town. He said there was no point in starting something that can’t be finished.”
Wise advice stemming from Grady’s firsthand experience. “So this was recent?”
He nodded. “And it was Lucy’s fault . . . again. Seems Cal said something to her about maybe taking Anna to the prom, maybe, and I think Lucy may have said something to Anna about it, of course. But then old Mrs. Benson . . . well, your mom, she died. So when the sheriff told them about you coming, Lucy went off about how unfair it all was . . . including Anna having this thing for Cal for so long and not being able to go to the prom with him now. Cal said it was the nicest nightmare he’d ever had.”
What Happened to Hannah Page 8