Down River

by John Hart

  “I can offer you cream and sugar for your coffee, or something harder if you prefer. I’m having sherry.”

  “Just coffee, please. Black.”

  I followed her down a wide hall full of somber art and fine-grained furnishings. Heavy drapes defended the interior from excessive sunlight, but ornate lamps burned in every room. Through open doors, I saw leather that gleamed and further hints of subdued color. A grandfather clock ticked somewhere in the vastness.

  “You have a lovely home,” I said.

  “Yes,” she agreed.

  In the kitchen, she lifted a tray and carried it into a small sitting room. “Sit,” she said, and poured coffee from a silver service. I sat on a narrow chair with hard arms. The china cup felt as light as spun sugar.

  “You think me cold,” she said without preamble. “In the matter of my daughter, you think me cold.”

  I lowered the cup to its saucer. “I know something of family dysfunction.”

  “I was rather harsh when last we spoke of her. I would hate for you to think me either senile or without heart.”

  “It can get complicated. I would not presume to judge.”

  She sipped her sherry, and the crystal stemware made a sound like bells as she set it on the silver tray. “I’m not a zealot, Mr. Chase. I do not condemn my daughter because she worships the trees and the dirt and God knows what else. I would be heartless, indeed, to cast out my only child for reasons as intangible as mere differences of faith.”

  “Then, may I ask why?”

  “You may not!”

  I leaned back, laced my fingers. “With all due respect, Mrs. Yates, you broached the subject.”

  Her smile was tight. “You’re right, of course. The mind wanders and the mouth, it seems, is more than willing to follow.”

  She trailed off, looked suddenly uncertain. I leaned forward so that our faces were close. “Ma’am, what is it that you want to discuss with me?”

  “You found her?”

  “I did.”

  She lowered her gaze and I saw powder blue lines in the paper-thin eyelids. Her lips pursed, thin and bloodless under lipstick the color of a December sunset.

  “It’s been twenty years,” she said. “Two decades since last I saw or spoke to my daughter.” She lifted the sherry and drank, then lay a light hand on my wrist. Her eyes widened as her voice cracked. “How is she?”

  I leaned away from the desperation in her face, the quiet, weak hunger. She was an old woman, alone, and after two decades, the wall of anger had finally crumbled. She missed her daughter. I understood. And so I told her what I could. She sat perfectly still and absorbed everything I said. I sugarcoated nothing. By the end, her eyes were down. A large diamond spun loosely on her finger as she twisted the ring.

  “I was in my mid-thirties when I had her. She was . . . unplanned.” She looked up. “She was more child than woman the last time I saw her. Half her life ago.”

  I was confused. “How old is your daughter?” I asked.

  “Forty-one.”

  “I assumed that she was much older.”

  Mrs. Yates frowned. “It’s the hair,” she said, gesturing at her own hair, thin and white and lacquered. “An unfortunate family trait. Mine turned white in my early twenties. Sarah was even younger.”

  She levered herself out of the chair and crossed the room on stiff ankles. From a shelf beside the fireplace, she took down a photograph in a polished, silver frame. A smile bent the lines in her face as she stared at it. One finger trembled on the glass as she traced something I could not see. She came back to her seat and handed me the photograph. “That’s the last one I ever took of her. She was nineteen.”

  I studied the picture: the animal grin and stark green eyes, the blond hair shot with white. She rode bareback on a horse the color of a northern sea. Fingers twisted into the mane. One hand lay flat on the animal’s neck as she leaned forward as if to whisper in its ear.

  I felt a momentary disconnect, as if the words that came were not my own. “Mrs. Yates, earlier, I asked about the reasons that you and your daughter stopped speaking.”

  “Yes.” Hesitant.

  “I’d like to ask you again.” She balked, and I glanced again at the photo. “Please,” I said.

  She folded her hands in her lap. “I try not to think of it.”

  “Mrs. Yates . . .?”

  She nodded. “Perhaps it will help,” she said, but a minute passed before she spoke again. “We fought,” she finally said. “That may seem normal to you, but we did not fight as most mothers and daughters would. She knew how to hurt me at an early age, knew where to put the knife and how to twist it. In honesty, I suppose I hurt her, too, but she refused to obey the rules. And they were good rules,” she said quickly. “Fair rules. Necessary ones.” She shook her head. “I knew she was destined for great failure. I just didn’t think that it would find her so young.”

  “What failure?”

  “She was already confused. Running all over the county like some kind of druid. Arguing with me about the meaning of God. Smoking pot and God knows what else. I swear to you, it was enough to make a mother weep for a daughter’s soul.”

  She refilled her sherry, drank a large swallow. “She was twenty-one when the baby came. Unmarried and unrepentant. Lived in a tent in the woods. With my grandbaby!” She shook her head. “I wouldn’t have it. Couldn’t have it.” She paused, gazing inward. “I did what I had to do.”

  I waited, knowing more or less how the story would end.

  She sat up straighter. “I talked to her, of course. I tried to make her see the error of her ways. I invited her back into my home, told her I would help her raise the child properly. But she wouldn’t listen. Said she was going to build a cabin, but she was deluding herself. She had no money, no resources.” The old lady sipped sherry and sniffed. “I got the authorities involved . . .”

  The words trailed off. I was about to prompt her when she spoke, loudly. “She ran away. With my grandbaby. California, I heard, on a quest for like-minded people. Freaks, if you ask me. Witches and pagans and drug abusers.” She nodded. “Well, let me tell you”—she nodded again, repeated herself—“let me tell you . . .”

  “California?”

  She finished the sherry. “She was high when she went off the road. High on pot with the baby in the car. Sarah never walked again. And I never saw the child, either. My grandchild died in California, Mr. Chase. My daughter came back a cripple. I never forgave her and we’ve not spoken since.”

  She stood abruptly, swiping at her eyes. “Now, how about something to eat?”

  She rustled her way into the kitchen, where she stood with her hands pressed flat on polished granite, head bowed. She did not move. She did open her eyes. Food, I knew, would not be prepared.

  I stood and placed the photograph back on the shelf. I tilted it to catch what light there was.

  It was all there.

  So clear to me now.

  I lay a finger on the glass, traced the line of her bright smile, and understood, finally, why she seemed so familiar to me.

  She looked just like Grace.

  I cut into the trees from a bright, empty stretch of road, passed by Ken Miller’s bus without slowing down. When I pulled to a stop in front of Sarah Yates’s cabin, a cloud of red dust hung in the air behind my car. I crossed the porch in two strides, and my hand was loud on the door. No answer. But the van was here, canoe at the dock. I pounded again and heard a noise inside, a low muffle that swelled into footsteps.

  Ken Miller opened the door.

  He wore a towel around his waist. Sweat matted the hair on his chest. A hot flush infused his face. “What the hell do you want?” he asked.

  Beyond him, shadows filled the main room. The bedroom door stood ajar.

  “I’d like to speak with Sarah,” I said.

  “She’s indisposed.”

  Then, from within, Sarah’s voice. “Who is it, Ken?”

  He yelled over his shou
lder. “It’s Adam Chase, all hot and bothered about something!”

  “Ask him to wait a minute, then come and help me.”

  “Sarah . . .” He was displeased.

  “Don’t make me repeat myself,” Sarah said.

  When Ken looked back at me, there was murder in his eyes. “I am so tired of you,” he said, then pointed at the row of chairs on the porch. “Wait over there.” Five minutes later, the door opened again. Ken pushed past me without looking up. His jeans were unbuttoned, shoes untied. He walked off without once looking back. A few moments later, Sarah rolled her chair onto the porch.

  Her words came as a matter of course. “No man likes being interrupted in flagrante delicto.” She wore a flannel robe and slippers. The back of her hair was still wet with sweat. “That’s the nature of the beast.”

  She rolled to a stop and set the brake on her chair.

  “You and Ken . . .?” I said.

  She shrugged. “When it suits.”

  I searched her face, looking for hints of Grace, and wondering how I’d ever missed it. They had the same heart-shaped face, same mouth. The eyes were a different color, but had the same shape. Sarah was older, her face more full, the white hair . . .

  “Well, spit it out,” she said. “You’re here for a reason.”

  “I saw your mother again today.”

  “Good for you.”

  “She showed me a picture of you when you were young.”

  “So.”

  “You looked just like Grace Shepherd. You still do in a lot of ways.”

  “Ah.” She said nothing else.

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’ve been waiting twenty years for someone to notice that. You’re the first one. I guess it’s no surprise. I don’t see many people.”

  “You’re her mother.”

  “I’ve not been her mother for twenty years.”

  “Your child did not die in California, then?”

  She turned sharp eyes on me. “You covered some ground with my mother, didn’t you?”

  “She misses you.”

  Sarah waved a loose hand. “Bullshit. She misses her youth, misses the things she’s lost. I’m no more than a symbol of all that.”

  “But Grace is her granddaughter?”

  Her voice rose. “I would never allow her to raise a child of mine! I know what that road looks like: narrow and sharp and unforgiving.”

  “So you lied about the accident?”

  She rubbed her lifeless legs. “That was no lie. But my daughter survived.”

  “And you gave her up?”

  The smile was cold, eyes like green stone. “I’m no mother. I thought that maybe I could be, but that was just self-deception.” She looked away. “I was unqualified in every way.”

  “Who’s the father?”

  She sighed. “A man. Tall and fine and proud, but just a man.”

  “Dolf Shepherd,” I said.

  She looked frightened. “Why would you believe that?”

  “You gave him the child to raise. In the note you gave me, you wrote of good people who love him. Of good people who will remember.”

  Her face hardened.

  “There’s no other reason you would do that.”

  “You know nothing,” she said.

  “It fits.”

  She measured me, debating her words. When she spoke, it was with determined finality. Like she’d made some brutal decision.

  “I should have never spoken to you,” she said.

  They buried Danny Faith under a featureless, steel sky. We settled into folding chairs that could have been formed from the same metal. Heat percolated through everything so that clothing grew damp and flowers drooped. Women I’d never seen moved crenellated fans before faces done up in hard-won perfection. The funeral was planned and paid for by an aunt of Danny’s whom I’d never met. I picked her out easily enough—she had the same red hair—and I pegged the rest of the women as her friends. They’d come in old cars with smallish men, and their diamonds struggled for luster in the empty light.

  His aunt looked pained, but I watched her in silent admiration. The coffin cost more than her car. Her friends had traveled far to be with her.

  A good woman, I thought.

  We sat for a while in near perfect silence, waiting for the appointed time and the words that would follow Danny into the ground. I saw Grantham at the same time that his eyes found me. He stood at a distance in a dark, buttoned coat. He watched the gathering, studied faces, and I tried to ignore him. He was doing his job—nothing personal—but I saw that my father was watching him, too.

  The preacher was the same who’d buried my mother, and the years had been cruel to him. Sadness spilled from his eyes. His face stretched, long and careworn. Yet his words still had the power to comfort. Heads moved in accord. A woman crossed herself.

  For me, the irony was hard. I found Danny in one hole so he could be put into another. But I nodded at times, and the prayers rolled off my lips, too. He’d been my friend and I’d failed him. So, I prayed for his soul.

  And I prayed for mine.

  I watched Grace as the preacher finished his talk of salvation and eternal love. Her face showed nothing, but she had eyes as blue as Dolf’s. She held herself rigidly and clasped a small purse against her black dress. It was obvious why Danny loved her, why anyone would. Even here, at this place, eyes seemed to find her. Even the women paid attention.

  When the preacher finished, he gestured to Danny’s aunt, who moved slowly to the graveside and laid a white flower on the coffin. Then she turned and began making her way down the row of seats. She took hands, said thankful words to my father, to Janice, and to Miriam. Her face softened when she stopped before Grace. She took one of her hands in both of hers, and paused, so that everyone recognized the moment.

  In that space of time, she beamed. “I understand that he loved you very much.” She let Grace’s hand fall, and tears slipped down the withered planes of her face. “You would have made a beautiful couple.”

  Then she sobbed and walked away, a bent figure under a stained metal sky.

  Her friends followed, climbed into the old cars with their silent husbands. My family left, as well, but I lingered for some reason. No, I told myself. That was a lie.

  I knew the reason, and I fooled no one. Not my father. Not the preacher.

  No one.

  I sat on the small metal chair until all were gone but the gravediggers, who lingered at a respectful distance. I regarded them as I stood: rough men in hard-worn clothes. They would wait as long as it took. They were used to it, got paid for it. Then, when all had left, they would lower Danny into the earth.

  I looked for Grantham, but he was gone. I laid a hand on my friend’s coffin, felt the smooth perfection, then turned down the long slope that led, in the end, to the stone that bore my mother’s name. I knelt in the grass and listened to the distant sound of Danny’s descent. I bowed my head and said one last prayer. I stayed there for a long time, reliving what memories I had. I often came back to that day under the dock, when slanting light set her eyes on fire. She’d said that there was such magic in the world, but she was wrong. Most of it died with her.

  When, finally, I stood, I saw the preacher.

  “I’m sorry to disturb you,” he said.

  “Hello, Father. You’re not disturbing me.” I gestured toward Danny’s grave. “You gave a nice service.”

  He moved to stand beside me, stared at my mother’s stone. “I still think of her, you know. Such a shame. So young. So full of life . . .”

  I knew where his mind had gone. So full of life until she’d taken her own. The peace I’d felt vanished. In its place rose the familiar anger. Where was this man, I asked myself, this preacher? Where was he when the darkness consumed her?

  “Those are just words, Father.” He saw the emotion in me. “Words count for nothing.”

  “There’s no one to blame, Adam. Other than memories, words are all we h
ave. I did not mean to upset you.”

  His regret rolled off of me, and looking at the lush grass that covered my mother, I felt an emptiness like I had never known. Even the anger was gone.

  “There’s nothing you can do for me, Father.”

  He clasped his hands in front of the vestment he wore. “A loss like this can do untold damage to troubled souls. You should look to the family you still have. You can be of comfort to each other.”

  “That’s good advice.” I turned to leave.

  “Adam.” I stopped. His eyes held a troubled look. “Believe it or not, I normally stay out of other people’s affairs, unless, of course, I’m asked. So, I’m hesitant to intrude. But I am confused about something. May I ask a question?”

  “Of course.”

  “Am I right to understand that Danny was in love with Grace?”

  “That’s right. He was.”

  He shook his head, and the look of troubled perplexity deepened. Melancholy came off him in waves.

  “Father?”

  He gestured toward the distant church. “After the service, I found Miriam kneeling at the altar, crying. Weeping, actually.” He shook his head again. “She was barely coherent. She damned God, right there in front of me. I’m worried. I still don’t understand.”

  “Don’t understand what?”

  “She was crying for Danny.” He unclasped his fingers, spread his palms like wings. “She said they were going to be married.”

  CHAPTER 31

  I pictured the scene as I started the car. Miriam in her sweeping black dress, her face full of hate and secret hurt. I saw her crumpled beneath the shining cross, hands clenched as she damned God in his own house and shunned the help of an honest priest. I thought I understood, saw the ugly bits of it. It was Grace, in perfect stillness, head tilted skyward as Danny’s aunt said, I understand that he loved you very much. And it was Miriam’s face beyond her, the sudden slackness, the dark glass that covered her eyes as those words rolled over Danny’s coffin and mournful strangers tipped their heads in silent condolence for a great love lost.