by Billie Letts
Then something occurred to him, something he should have picked up on earlier.
Kyle said he’d taken Gaylene to Arthur’s cabin only once, the day of her high school graduation.
But if Kyle had told the truth, Gaylene had been at the cabin with someone else, because according to her diary, she and her classmates didn’t receive their senior rings until after their graduation, sometime in May.
He grabbed Gaylene’s diary and began to leaf through pages until he found the entry of May 15, 1970.
Dear Diary,
Today I graduated which, I think, makes me an adult. Funny though, I still feel like a kid. Mom and Daddy got me a record player in a case with a handle. It looks like a suitcase when it’s closed. I’ll take it with me when I leave for college. (I can hardly wait.) Row gave me “Ticket to Ride” by The Carpenters and Kyle got me a Mickey Mouse watch.
After school, Kyle took me out to Arthur’s cabin by the river to go swimming. The cabin’s real creepy, animal heads on the walls. Kyle got high and wanted us to go in the river naked, but I wouldn’t. I put on my bathing suit and told him if he didn’t wear his underwear, I wasn’t going to go in, so he did.
I tried not to look at him, but I peeked twice. He has skinny legs and a lot of hair on his chest and his low belly, real low on his belly. When he got out of the water with his wet underwear, I could see the outline of his thing.
If Daddy found out I went out there with Kyle, he’d kill me. But I had fun.
Spider Woman
Mark read the rest of the entries, mostly mundane accounts of school and work at the radio station. And though he’d read them before, they took on new meaning now. In one, dated May 14, Gaylene wrote about Arthur giving her a raise and bragging about her work, which made Mark wonder why she was fired a short time later for being “lazy,” “totally without ambition” and “not particularly bright,” as Arthur had claimed.
Then, the May 23, 1970, account confirmed what Mark remembered about the ring.
Dear Diary,
Row and I went to the high school this morning to pick up our class rings which finally came in. A week after we graduated. If the company hadn’t screwed them up last fall, we could have worn them almost our entire senior year.
Mine has a sapphire, my birth stone, and I love it. I’m never going to take it off.
Spider Woman
Curious now, Mark shuffled back through the photographs Rowena had given him until he found the picture of Gaylene in her Hungry Hawk uniform.
It was taken on the Fourth of July. And she was not wearing the ring she vowed never to take off.
Lantana Mitchell handled the Porsche like she’d driven the Grand Prix. She’d lost the satellite truck five blocks from Teeve’s and outraced the TV van before she reached the city limits. And she hadn’t slowed down since.
After Mark had phoned, explained to her what he needed, she’d taken over. An hour later, when they were on the road, he’d asked a couple of questions about how they would manage this charade. She’d smiled. Clearly charades was a game she enjoyed.
Finally she’d told him to relax, assured him she’d “checked things out” and there would be no problem.
Making the decision to call her had come about through a process of elimination. He couldn’t ask Ivy to drive him after their go-round this morning, and Teeve was far too upset to be dealing with him. He thought about asking Hap, but he seemed to be a pretty much go-by-the-book guy, so Mark finally settled on Lantana. He figured she was just shrewd enough to pull this off.
She’d already programmed the global positioning system for their destination, the Haven, so rarely had to check the locator screen on the dash.
“Neat car,” Mark said.
“What do you drive?”
“I’m in a rental.”
“No, I mean in L.A.”
“Jaguar,” he said, remembering their earlier conversation. “Convertible.” His embarrassment showed.
“Hey, Mark. You live in Beverly Hills. What else would you drive? A bondoed Chevy four-by-four?”
She had talked very little at first, but when she did, he could tell she was excited about being involved in this “caper,” as she called it. He supposed the word, for her, conjured up risk, danger. Something outside law and order. And if he had to guess, she wasn’t much of a law-and-order woman.
She lit a cigarette with a slender gold lighter, with “Love from D.L.” engraved on its side. After a right turn at a junction where she ran a stop sign, she glanced at the GPS screen and said, “Ten more miles, give or take a tenth.”
“I’m curious,” Mark said. “Have you been in your room the past couple of days waiting for me to call?”
“Now, sugar, don’t get me wrong here. You’re important to this story, of course, but you’re not the only one. For instance, I’ve spent a good deal of time with Lige Haney. You know who he is?”
“He’s the blind journalist works for the local paper.”
“Yeah, he’s blind all right, but he sees more of what goes on in DeClare than most people who can see.”
“Did he have anything interesting to tell you? Something you didn’t already know?”
“He sure did.”
“Care to share with me?”
“No,” she said, her tone making clear that her response was one she didn’t intend to elaborate on. “But we’ll talk about it in a day or two. When I’m ready.
“For now, you need to do the talking. Tell me what you hope to learn from Kyle Leander.”
By the time Mark filled her in on the senior ring saga and why he needed to connect with Kyle, they’d arrived at the Haven, a three-story brick building constructed in southern plantation style—broad porch, thick columns.
“All right,” Lantana said when she parked in the back of the visitors’ lot. She opened the trunk, got out an aluminum walker and a pair of hospital scrubs. “Put these on.” She handed him the clothes, which caused him to glance around for a place to change. “Come on, Mark. Modesty is the second most overrated virtue in the world.”
“What’s first?”
“Honesty.”
After he was dressed, she draped a lightweight shawl around his shoulders, put his crutch in the trunk and handed him the walker.
“Follow me,” she ordered.
She led him away from the parking lot and into a heavily wooded area, where they dodged wasps and stepped lightly for fear of snakes. When they emerged, they were at the back of the hospital in a magnificent park, the grass so soft and green it looked like a carpet.
A white granite statue of a ten-foot-tall angel stood in the middle of a lake. Glorious flower beds were broken up here and there by wrought-iron benches, water installations and topiary in the shapes of penguins, giraffes, elephants and bear cubs.
Several patients, identifiable by their scrubs, which were identical to the ones Mark was wearing, wandered the garden or sat on the benches, some accompanied by staff—those dressed in white—and a few obviously in the company of family.
As Mark started down one of the sidewalks, Lantana was at his elbow, whispering instructions. “Shuffle, Mark. Let your shoulders droop a bit. Look vulnerable.”
“Hell, I am vulnerable.”
“Then quit hiding it. Stop and turn to me occasionally as if you’re in need of reassurance.”
Mark took another ten steps, then turned to Lantana. “Please reassure me that they’re not going to strap me into a straitjacket and toss me in a padded room here.”
“They won’t! Well, they probably won’t. Do you see him?”
“No.”
“He should be out here. I called to see what time he would ‘take the sun.’ They said between one and two.”
“There he is. Sitting on the other side of the lake, the bench left of the giraffe.”
“Okay. Take your time. The worst thing you can do here is act like you have a purpose.”
; “You sure know a lot about this place.”
Mark leaned heavily on the walker and kept his head down until they passed a woman having a rambling conversation with God.
“You know, Lord, that I shouldn’t be here, but my daughter, the little bitch, had my water shut off and killed my cat, so I’m asking you to strike her dead, but make it look like an accident. Lord, at bingo tonight, call B-seven, my lucky number. I can win a trip to Hawaii, first class. They serve strawberry daiquiris in first class, the best damn daiquiris you’ve ever tasted, Lord. Oh, one more thing . . .”
Mark locked eyes with Lantana, who whispered, “See what can happen?”
Finally they reached the bench where Kyle was sitting, apparently asleep—eyes closed, chin on his chest, mouth open.
“Kyle. It’s me, Nicky Jack,” he said, expecting little, if any, response or recognition.
But Kyle opened his eyes, jerked upright and hugged him. “Dude. You’re in here, too. Cool!”
“No, I’m here to see you.”
“That is just too awesome.” Kyle seemed overjoyed. “How’s your leg?”
“Fine.”
“Nicky Jack, you know I didn’t do that. I’ve never even held a gun. Well, only once, but that was for a robbery and it wasn’t loaded.”
“That’s not why I’m here.”
“Who’s the pretty lady?” Kyle asked.
“Friend of mine. Lantana Mitchell.”
“Hi,” she said. “I was around here in 1972, but I believe you were away.”
“Drying out?”
“Yes, I think that’s what I heard.”
“Well, take it from me. It’s not all it’s cracked up to be.”
Mark said, “Kyle, I’ve got some questions I’d like to run by you if you feel up to it.”
“Aw, man, I feel great. Go ahead.”
“Okay. Why did Arthur fire Gaylene at the radio station?”
“Fire her? He didn’t fire her. She quit.”
“Do you know why?”
“She said there was no particular reason, she just wanted to do something else that summer before she went off to college. But I don’t know. She didn’t make as much at the Hungry Hawk as she got paid at the station. Finally, though, it didn’t really matter, did it.” Kyle’s eyes filled with tears.
“Were you surprised when she left?”
“If I’d been there, maybe I could’ve talked her out of leaving. ’Course, that was just selfishness on my part, ’cause when she was there, I could see her every day.” He smiled. “Every day.” He turned serious then. “It happened while Arthur had me stashed away again.”
“Kyle, you’re doing fine. Feel like one more question?”
“Sure, Nicky Jack. For you, anything.”
Mark explained that he’d learned from reading Gaylene’s diary that the seniors did not receive their rings until after graduation owing to some screwup by the company. As a result, she couldn’t have lost it at the cabin when Kyle took her there on May 15, because she didn’t get her ring until May 23.
Kyle seemed unable to comprehend what he’d just heard. He cocked his head to one side, ran his hand over his beard and squinted as his eyes searched the sky.
“Kyle?” Mark said, hoping to bring him back to earth. “Do you understand the situation I just described?”
“Nicky Jack, I found her ring under a cushion of the couch in the cabin. Nearly two years after she was killed.”
“Then maybe, I mean . . . well, there’s a chance she went to the cabin another time. Sometime later. With someone else.”
“No! She wouldn’t do that, she didn’t even like it there.”
“Kyle, what if she didn’t want to go, but someone didn’t give her a choice?”
“You mean, like forced her to go?”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“Who would do that?”
“That’s what I was hoping you could tell me.”
“No one ever went to the cabin unless Arthur invited them. He had the only key.”
“Then where did you get yours?”
“I swiped it from his key ring the day I took Gaylene out there, but he never found out. I put it back soon’s I got to town.”
“So, do you think Arthur took her to the cabin?” Mark asked.
“Arthur? Why would he?”
“Kyle, there’s a good chance Gaylene got pregnant that night.”
“What? I don’t understand why you’d say that.”
“Because I was born nine months later.”
“Arthur? No! No! Gaylene would never have had sex with him. Not with Arthur. She wouldn’t have!”
“Not if she had a choice,” Mark said.
“No, man! That’s not right.”
“Maybe it’s not, Kyle. But Gaylene did go to jail on the twenty-eighth of June. DUI. And someone did pick her up just an hour or so later, while she was still drunk.”
“Was it Arthur?”
“I can’t be sure, but whoever it was probably took her to his cabin.”
“Oh, God. He raped her, didn’t he. And she couldn’t do anything about it. No one was there to help her. Oh, God.”
Kyle began to rock back and forth on the bench, his arms wrapped around him like he was trying to hold himself together.
“You know why I couldn’t help her?” Kyle said. “Because Arthur, that bastard, had sent me away again. Had me locked up. But if I’d been here with her . . .”
Kyle started to wail, making loud, high-pitched sounds like an animal in pain.
Lantana scooted in beside him, put her arm around his shoulder and made soothing sounds, but he was beyond anything anyone could do for him as he struck out at her, one of his elbows jabbing her face just beneath her right eye. Totally out of control.
As two men in white rushed him, Kyle broke away, made a wobbly dash for the trees. But he never got there. After a clumsy struggle, they subdued him and dragged him, still screaming, toward the building.
Lantana got them down the road in a hurry until she stopped at a service station, where she washed up and got some ice on an eye that was swelling and turning darker by the minute. She had a tear in her panty hose just beneath her knee, where an ugly bruise was spreading.
“You okay?” Mark asked as she slid back beneath the wheel.
“Probably a little worse than I look.”
“Lantana, I’m sorry I got you into that.”
“You couldn’t have known how he was going to react.”
They were quiet for a while on the way back to town. Lantana tried conversation a few times but was met with silence as Mark, his head turned toward the window, watched the scenery fly by without seeing any of it.
Finally, as they reached the edge of DeClare, Mark said, “Kyle’s right. Arthur did it. He got Gaylene out of jail while she was still drunk, took her out to his cabin and raped her.”
Chapter Twenty-nine
Arthur McFadden, pacing in his office with a cell phone at his ear, a cigar in his mouth, didn’t realize Mark had entered the radio station and was watching him from the doorway.
“Yes, I understand that,” Arthur said into the mouthpiece, then, with his free hand, rubbed at the bridge of his nose as he listened to the voice on the line.
Now, with the realization that this man could be his father, Mark saw him in a very different way from the two previous times they’d come face-to-face. Every feature, every gesture, every movement, took on new meaning.
Arthur was tall; at his prime he’d probably been six two or three, about Mark’s height. And he was terribly thin, a characteristic Mark might have attributed to the old man’s health or age—except for the framed photos he’d seen on the walls of the cabin. Arthur had always been slender. So had Mark.
The only facial feature Mark thought similar to his own was Arthur’s chin, square with a bold jawline. Other than that, Mark believed himself to favor Gaylene Harjo more than Arthur M
cFadden, a comforting feeling.
Arthur walked with his left shoulder higher than his right, just as Mark did, and both men had a tendency to drag their feet a bit with their steps.
But Mark knew, without a doubt, that he could find many similarities between himself and most men if he looked hard enough. And the characteristics he’d identified in Arthur that were much like his own certainly didn’t indicate that this was the man who had fathered him.
When Arthur finally noticed Mark standing in the door, he said, “I’ll have to call you back. Someone’s here.”
As soon as he snapped the cell phone closed, and even before he acknowledged Mark’s presence, he got his jacket from a coat-rack in the corner of the room and put it on as if he were preparing for a business meeting.
“That was the head of security at the Haven,” Arthur said. “I’ve spoken to him twice and to the nursing supervisor once. You and your lady friend caused quite a stir out there this afternoon.”
“Yes, I suppose we did.”
“In our last conversation, our only conversation, I asked you to leave Kyle alone. I thought I had thoroughly explained his reaction to seeing you, which was a disaster. But apparently you didn’t listen, or else you went there with the purpose of agitating him. In either case, the outcome is the same.”
“Exactly what does that mean?”
“Kyle has been removed from the general population of the hospital.”
“Meaning a padded cell,” Mark said.
“You, and you alone, Mr. Harjo, or whatever you call yourself, are responsible for making his recovery so much more difficult than it needs to be. As a result, he’s sedated and under constant watch.”
“Kyle’s always sedated, isn’t he?”
“Today’s circumstances were markedly different. He tried to end his life.”
The statement hit Mark hard, but he worked at not losing his focus, remembering that he was talking to a man who was a liar, probably a rapist, perhaps a killer.
“I don’t believe I’ll accept the responsibility for that, Mr. McFadden. Why don’t you add that to your list of credits.”