“Refuses what?”
“Nothing.”
“It’s okay to be upset with her even if—”
“I’m upset you’re going through my private finances.”
“One: I’m not going through them. I got myself looped into it as a favor from the state police. A generous favor. Two: your private life is over. Even if Rebecca and Sally are found sunning in Miami with cases of simultaneous amnesia—it’s over. You need to tell me the truth. All of it. Here. Now. You’re all alone without me. You realize that, I hope.”
Jonah wondered what would happen if he left, dismissed this affront.
Except, Maurice was right: Jonah was alone. The women who had flocked to his house with casseroles were Rebecca’s friends. Not Jonah’s. And they remained on the porch, timid as they handed their baking dishes to Jonah as they peeked behind him into the house, as if he might have his wife and daughter in there, tied to chairs or stuffed in a trunk. Before all this, he’d met colleagues on occasion to play bass in a band of rotating musicians, or for some backgammon and a few pops. But these were not friends. They did not know him. The only people who knew him were Rebecca and Maurice. Besides them, Jonah had always been, comfortably, a loner. All he’d ever wanted, needed, was Rebecca’s company, and when he’d finally won it, he’d exalted in it. Since then a family with her was all he’d wanted. It was still all he wanted. His family.
“So what if it upsets you that Rebecca doesn’t work more?” Maurice said. “No one is going to crucify you for it. I’m not. I know how she could be. Difficult. What wife isn’t? What husband? I’m a monster to live with. That’s nature. Things are said. Things we never expected to happen, happen. It’s life.”
Jonah did not like where this was headed. He rubbed the heel of a palm on the arm of his chair. Sweat trickled down his back. Maurice knew how Rebecca could be. True. And he knew how Jonah could be. Had been. His temper. Maurice also knew Jonah had worked hard to stymie it. For the most part. What Maurice did not know was that Rebecca had acted distracted and nervous lately, out of sorts, and Jonah did not want him to know. It was the last thing he wanted anyone to know. Because— He tried to rid his mind of the toxic thought. Her behavior was, in a word, suspicious.
“We both know she has a hard time sometimes,” Maurice said. “Can be . . . dramatic. Some might say troubled.”
“Troubled is going too far. And it’s not her fault. I don’t want that getting out, it has nothing to do—”
“Let me finish. The state police believe you played a role in your daughter and wife’s disappearance.”
“I’m not going to sit here and—”
“What is it you don’t get? Why won’t you let me help you? You’re your own worst enemy. Impatient. Stubborn. That temper. This is goddamned serious, Jonah. You are in serious, serious trouble here.”
“But I—”
Maurice tossed the folder at Jonah, papers fluttering to the floor. “You don’t want to help yourself, I can’t help you.” He rose and started to leave the office.
“Wait,” Jonah said. If Maurice left now, Jonah would have no one. He’d be as alone as the day he was born. “Sit. Please. Okay. Sit.”
“Can I finish?” Maurice said.
Jonah nodded.
“There’s not a cop besides me—not a soul in this town—who believes your hands are clean. And they’re approaching this case that way. Possible double murder. Of your wife and child.”
Jonah had known that as the spouse he was a suspect by default. But to hear it spoken like this— He couldn’t breathe.
“Take your time, calm down and focus,” Maurice said. “Before I leave this room, we need to come up with a theory that does not include you. I know you didn’t do what they think. But I can’t help if you don’t let me and won’t let me posit alternative theories for them to investigate.”
When he was able to breathe again, Jonah said, “What about a boy from Sally’s school. Or one of the mean girls who are always—”
“Maybe if it were just Sally missing. But you think a boy or girl overtook them both, tricked an adult somehow, and—” Maurice shook his head. “We’ve interviewed every teacher. Every coworker. Every person we know she’s come in contact with in years. There’s nothing firm. We’re interviewing the few possible kids. That takes time. It’s delicate. Their parents need to be present. But I doubt there’s anything there.” Except there was something; Jonah had seen it in Maurice’s eyes when he’d mentioned teachers, hadn’t he?
Maurice tapped a pen on the birdhouse on the desk. “This is killing you. Me too. But . . . You’re lying. Come clean so I can clear you of something you didn’t do.”
“What is it you know?” Jonah said. “What are the cops thinking? I want to tell the truth, but I don’t want my private life that has nothing to do with this to come out.”
Maurice lifted the top off the birdhouse, fished out a handful of Red Hots, shook a few into his mouth. “The state cops think something ugly had happened between you and Rebecca, and Sally got involved and— Something happened. I’ve told them no. No way. You didn’t do it. Couldn’t. I told them, if anything, you had a fight and Rebecca took off with Sally. But they don’t believe it. Because how far could Rebecca get without a car? There’s a rare outside chance she took Sally for some air, say, and ran into someone of a nasty element and— You see how slim those odds are? A lunatic just passing through Podunk, Vermont? And Rebecca and Sally haven’t come back. Haven’t been seen. To the state cops, that leaves you. They know you’ve lied to them. So they don’t believe a word you speak.”
It took every iota of self-control for Jonah to sit and listen, but what Maurice said made sense. How could Jonah fault the police for thinking it was him? What were the odds that Rebecca and Sally had met a stranger between town and home? Then again, this sort of thing—women and girls vanishing—happened across the world, every day, didn’t it? Dark stars aligned so poor souls collided with cruel predators.
“I have a theory,” Maurice said. “One that clears you, but that I hate to imagine. First, though, you need to admit you fought. It’s obvious. Even to someone who doesn’t know you like I do. If you don’t tell the truth about the simple things, the police will hound you and never look elsewhere. Tell the truth. For your daughter and wife.”
Jonah exhaled, trembling. “Okay,” he said. Perhaps, he thought, it would feel good to come clean on that end. Perhaps it would help. “We fought. But it was nothing.” He stopped, suddenly certain he’d made a mistake, been tricked. Had he been brought here to be asked questions and helped by a friend or interrogated by a sheriff? Did he need a lawyer? He’d been solicited by attorneys out of state, but not entertained them. And no attorney in the region had approached him, perhaps afraid to appear as an ambulance chaser. Besides, Jonah hadn’t been charged with anything.
Yet, a voice said.
“Did it get physical as the state police believe? In any way at all?” Maurice asked.
“Of course not.”
“Because. I’ve seen her go after you, remember, and it’s—”
“That happened once. She was exhausted and coming off the flu. Sally had been acting up and exacerbating things, and then you and Julia stopped by unexpected. And—”
“It was embarrassing. Just to see it. But I know from domestic calls, this stuff most often isn’t isolated to a single event.”
“It happened once.”
“But it was just last week. What am I supposed to tell the state police detectives? How am I supposed to vouch for you, for her, if the state police continue to press me as your close friend, press Julia, for God’s sake, about the state of your marriage? Because they are pressing, and so far we’ve told them nothing. Given them nothing. Julia can hardly stand the pressure. She’s distraught, too, and will crack. We can’t have that. I can’t.”
“Rebecca had every right to lay into me.”
“No one has a right to hit anyone.”
“Hit? She
slapped me.”
“Your face was gashed when we got there.”
“It was nothing. You don’t know the whole story.”
“I need to know it. The detectives outside that door, they plan to know it. That night Julia and I stopped in, Rebecca was like a different person. I saw it. Even Julia saw that. It scared her, Rebecca’s behavior. So. One last time. Tell me. Did things get out of hand, did she get, how would you put it? Volatile? Antagonistic? Did her mood escalate? Did she slap you? That fresh cut on your head, was it really from a fall against the stove? If she gave you that gash, you were in your right to defend your—”
“This is insane,” Jonah snapped.
A noise came from behind him, the doorknob turned behind him.
“We’re fine,” Maurice said toward the door.
Jonah wondered: What had Julia and Maurice sensed that night Rebecca had launched into him? Had they sensed what Jonah had started to sense, what had always been his gravest fear and nightmare, from the very first in marrying her: that sooner or later she’d tire of him, see him for what he was and start to look—
“You see how easy it is for even me, your friend,” Maurice said, “to agitate you. Did Rebecca trigger that side of you? That rage? God knows, I know, your anger comes from a world of shit you grew up in that’s hard to shake.”
“We were kids. You can’t hold those times against me.” Jonah squeezed the chair’s arms. He wanted to smash the chair to dust. His heart wailed.
“I don’t hold it against you,” Maurice said. “Shit. I was worse, and I was from the good home. I know what you kids go through. That’s why Julia and I adopted Lucinda. So she wouldn’t have to go through it. But they—” Maurice eyed the door, leaned in, colluding. “They don’t know how bad you had it. They’d never believe the shit you survived. And if they did, they’d scoff at you for using your childhood as an excuse. I won’t scoff. Because I know.”
“What do you think I did?” Jonah said.
“I don’t think it. But they believe it. Tell me about the lies you’ve told, all of them.”
There was only so much Jonah could tell Maurice. Would tell anyone. He had sensed a shift in Rebecca, a tension, a distance, and that night just before Julia and Maurice had stopped in unexpectedly, Jonah had merely joked with Rebecca about his apprehension, perhaps subconsciously testing the waters, and she’d swung a backhand at him so her engagement ring slashed his cheek, her reaction so instantaneous and intense he’d known in an instant his suspicions were misplaced. She’d not intended to cut him, just meant to swat him away. And she wouldn’t have reacted so volatilely if she’d not been genuinely wounded by his insinuations, innocent of them. She would not have lashed out at him again in front of their good friends when Jonah had later made an offhand comment about men—successful, grounded, centered men; real men—coming into the store where she worked.
Wouldn’t she? a voice said.
“Is she still on medication?” Maurice said.
Jonah recoiled. The only thing worse than the state police believing he’d murdered his wife and child was the intimation that his wife was ill. Unstable. Rebecca had missed a few days of her medication a week earlier, but only because she’d had the flu. She’d been her normal self even when off the medication. Jonah believed the medication disturbed her more than aided her. “Of course she’s on her medication.”
Maurice shook his head and frowned. “You need to stop. We took the prescription bottle from the bathroom and ran the dates. She’s been off her medication for at least ten days. If she—”
“You need to stop. That’s who needs to stop.” Jonah pounded his fist on the birdhouse that sat on the desk, crushed the roof and sliced his hand on the splintering wood. The edge of his palm spurted blood. He cupped his bleeding hand to his shirt, extracted a long sharp shard of wood from his flesh.
The office door began to open.
“Keep that door shut,” Maurice shouted. He addressed Jonah. “You just keep lying. About fighting, medication, insurance.”
“I get nothing from insurance if they’ve disappeared. And I wouldn’t want it. It’s hardly a motive for—”
“You’d get the money. It would take seven years but—”
“Jesus Christ. I can’t even imagine that. I can’t even imagine this.” He waved his arms around. “Any of this. What are you not telling me. Why don’t you come clean and tell me the truth? There’s something. I can tell—”
Maurice propped his elbows on his desk and leaned toward Jonah. “Take a breath. Okay. In confidence? As friends here? The state police know something happened the night before you called me, the night before the girls went missing.”
“I’ve come clean. Rebecca and I argued.”
“That’s not it. For starters. You lied about sleeping on top of the comforter next to your wife.” Maurice’s voice was calm, quiet. Controlled. Everything Jonah was not. “Forensics prove the comforter and sheets and pillow cases were freshly washed, yet none on your side had a single hair of yours. Plenty of Rebecca’s hairs, even though she slept on the other side. If you’d spent even ten seconds on that bed, we’d have evidence to prove it. Instead we have evidence that proves you didn’t. Proves you lied.”
Jonah’s mouth hung open. How could one tiny, innocuous lie amount to so much?
“You’ve forced them to ask: If he lied about that, too, what else did he lie about? Where did he sleep? If he slept at all. With who? And why would he lie?”
“Jesus Christ. I slept in Sally’s room. Comforting her.”
“From what?”
“Just. Comforting her. Like any other night.”
“This wasn’t any other night. It’s the last night anyone’s seen your family. And the next morning. You went to campus abnormally early. A janitor saw you.”
“I woke early. I was stiff from being on the floor. I wanted to get out of there. I needed space.”
“From what?”
“Just. Space.”
“Did you see Rebecca and Sally in the morning?” Maurice said.
“I didn’t want to wake them. I brought home flowers and a dress and coat to apologize later that day, for God’s sake. Why would I do that if—”
“You didn’t kiss your daughter good-bye?”
Tell the truth, Jonah’s mind screamed.
“No. I sneaked out.”
“Then—” Maurice drummed his fingers on the top of the birdhouse. “How do you know Sally was home? That either of them was home that morning?”
“Of course they were home.”
“How do you know, if you didn’t see either of them?”
“Where else could she have been? I didn’t physically see Sally. I didn’t kiss or touch her because I didn’t want to wake her. But I saw a heap of blankets. It had to be her.”
“And you didn’t see your wife. The state police . . . they don’t think either one of them was there in the morning. They think that whatever happened to them, whatever caused their disappearance, happened the night before you called me. The night you’ve now confessed you argued.”
Confessed? Did Maurice believe him, or not? Was he here to free Jonah or to trap him? “That’s impossible. I fell asleep in Sally’s room with her asleep in bed. If anyone had come in the night . . . or . . . No. They had to be home when I left in the morning. They had to be. What aren’t you telling me? Goddamn it. You stop holding back. What do you know? What do the police know?”
“Sally never showed up at school the morning you sneaked out.”
“What?” Jonah said, floored.
“And you didn’t call in her absence, and Rebecca didn’t either. This being a small town, no one was concerned. Until after the girls disappeared. We got a call from a person in administration who found it suspicious.”
Jonah felt weak with nausea and bewilderment, not just at Maurice’s revelation, but at a memory that struck him cold. The afternoon he’d come home. The crooked painting. It had seemed odd. But he had not kno
wn why. Now he knew. It was odd that the picture was crooked at all that time of day. If Rebecca had been home any time after eight a.m. when the morning train had gone through, she would have straightened the crooked picture after the rumble of the train had skewed it.
Maybe she had left the house before eight o’clock, and nothing had happened in the night. His daughter and wife had been home. They had to have been.
“You’ve been withholding information from me,” Jonah said.
“We’ve been withholding information? Sally never showed at school and Rebecca was not seen in town by anyone. The only thing the state police can conclude is your wife and daughter disappeared the night before you called me, an evening about which you won’t tell us anything helpful.”
Us, Jonah thought. So now it’s us: Maurice and the state police.
Jonah stared at the cut on his hand from smashing the birdhouse, his shirt sopped with blood. He took a deep breath. “Why don’t you believe me?”
“I do.”
“You keep making it seem like you’re interrogating me, and I know you’re holding back, hiding something.”
“I am holding back.”
“Tell me what it is. Please, tell me.”
“I know you didn’t do it. But knowing that, and knowing the odds of a random encounter whether Sally and Rebecca fled your home or were out for a stroll, what does that leave us with?”
Jonah tried to swallow, but couldn’t; his throat felt choked with sand.
“I know you’d do anything for Rebecca, anything,” Maurice said.
“Of course I would. She’s my wife.”
“Anything to protect her, or her memory.”
“Of— What?”
Maurice cleared his throat, picked at a piece of wood that had broken off the birdhouse. “I believe you’ve been lying and hiding things since the start because you’re protecting Rebecca, or her memory, and protecting your own part in this for arguing with her, pushing her. Maybe not consciously, but subconsciously, maybe you’re in denial, because God knows I’m in denial and have skirted around it here for an hour trying to find the guts to say it straight. You’re lying because deep down you believe the same thing I do, whether it happened that night while you slept, or in the morning after you sneaked out early.” Maurice gritted his teeth as if trying to swallow poison. “Rebecca has harmed herself and Sally.”
What Remains of Her Page 6