Summer at Hideaway Key

by Barbara Davis

  She paused to pick through them, gathered now into a tidy pile: a matchbook from someplace called Top of the Sixes on Fifth Avenue, a souvenir ashtray from Niagara Falls, ticket stubs for a showing of The Unsinkable Molly Brown at the Winter Garden Theatre. They weren’t much, really, random blips on a nebulous timeline, but they were at least tangible, a way of fixing Lily-Mae in the world, a glimpse of life beyond Mt. Zion. Her aunt had dined out, traveled, attended the theatre. Not exactly earth-shattering, but it was more than she’d known when she’d climbed out of bed that morning, and with any luck she’d know more before the day ended.

  Resolved, she reached for the next box, smaller than most but surprisingly heavy as she dragged it over and wrestled back the flaps. Her heart skittered as she peered inside at the hodgepodge of old scrapbooks, some leather, some cloth—all bulging with promise. For a moment she actually felt dizzy, breath held as she lifted out one of the albums and laid it in her lap.

  She ran her fingers over the cover, grainy green leather embossed with gold around the edges. It was nothing extraordinary, and yet it might as well have been the Holy Grail resting against her knees. Her hands felt shaky as she spread the book open, her breath leaving in a soft rush as she stared down at the young faces of Caroline and Lily-Mae. The first shot was of the sisters on the steps of a crumbling brownstone, stiff and unsmiling in plain dark coats. The trees were bare, the corners of the steps packed with dirty snow. Lily had to squint to make out the caption scrawled beneath—March 1956 at Mrs. Bingham’s. Only a month after the last journal entry at Mt. Zion.

  Lily swallowed a sudden lump in her throat. She had done it. She had vowed to get herself and Caroline away from Harwood Zell, and she had. In fact, unless Lily was mistaken about the license plate on the battered Buick in the corner of the shot, she had managed to get them all the way to New York. The observation was quickly shelved as Lily spotted the shadow stretching across the cracked slate walkway. Who had taken the photo?

  The question continued to niggle as she paged through the rest of the album, poring over the details of each and every photograph, as if some hidden clue might suddenly jump out and answer all her questions. She knew better, of course. Especially since most of the photos were of Caroline: Caroline in a wide straw boater looking sullen beside a giant Easter Bunny; Caroline modeling a shiny new pair of skates; Caroline in bathrobe and curlers, hanging tinsel on an emaciated-looking Christmas tree. But where were the pictures of Lily-Mae? For a woman who had eventually become a celebrated model, she had certainly managed to steer clear of the camera.

  Finally, she resurfaced in the second album, though almost always as part of a crowd, a group of five or six faces that quickly became familiar to Lily, attending picnics, dances, days at the beach, though never quite happy. There was no missing the guarded expression in those beautiful eyes, the wary, almost skittish smile when she was forced to look into the camera. But then, after what she’d been through, Lily supposed she had a right to that.

  And then on the last page she found a shot that felt different: Lily-Mae posing in a swimsuit—with a man. He was older than Lily-Mae, but handsome in a Robert Redford sort of way, with striking eyes, a long, squarish jaw, and a shock of wavy blond hair. He was standing with his arm around Lily-Mae’s bare midriff, but that wasn’t the surprising part. The surprising part was that Lily-Mae didn’t appear to mind one bit. In fact, she looked almost happy.

  Intrigued, Lily studied the photo. There was water in the background, a small dock and a few boats, and below, in a hand Lily knew only too well, the words: Jasper and me. Palm Beach, 4th of July, 1957.

  Who was Jasper?

  Rhona’s so-called Golden Boy? One of Lily-Mae’s many other men? The sender of the postcard from Paris? All of the above? Or none? Whoever he was, Lily-Mae was clearly comfortable with him. Gone were the shadows, the restless counterfeit smile, replaced with trust—and perhaps something more.

  A crack of thunder jolted Lily back to the present. Glancing up from the photo, she saw that it was raining, and apparently had been for some time. She’d been so engrossed in the photographs she hadn’t noticed. A look at her watch confirmed what she already knew. Dean was right; you really could set your watch by the afternoon storms. She had managed to work straight through lunch, too absorbed in the photographs to register the gnawing in her belly. She considered breaking for a quick bite but decided to push on instead. She could eat later. Right now, she was more interested in learning more about Jasper.

  Reaching back into the box, she fished out the remaining three scrapbooks and laid them in her lap, surprised to find them all covered in the same dark blue cloth. They were smaller than the others, and not like scrapbooks at all. It took a moment to realize what she was holding—but only a moment.

  TWENTY

  March 11, 1956

  Mt. Zion Missionary Poor Farm

  I knew we were leaving the day I found Caroline with Zell. I didn’t know how, or when, I only knew it had to be soon. A plan was already churning in my head, how we could get away, what I would need to do to keep us fed. I just didn’t know how to get Caroline to go along with any of it. She barely spoke to me anymore. What if she refused to go? A year ago, I wouldn’t have thought such a thing possible, but now I could imagine her doing almost anything to spite me.

  Unless I could find a way to make her want to go.

  And then, one morning while I was sitting through Sunday service, it came to me: the one thing that might sway her. I was sitting in the back pew, where I always sit on Sundays, listening to Zell thunder on about honoring thy father and thy mother, and suddenly I knew what I had to do.

  One day after mail call, I asked Caroline to slip away with me to the pond. I told her I had a secret that no one else could hear—a secret about Mama. It broke my heart to see her eyes light up when I said it, but I knew it was the only way to get her away, to keep her safe.

  Later, at the pond, I told her I’d finally had a letter from Mama, that she’d sent money and wanted us to come to Richmond to live with her. I told her Mama had married a fine man with lots of money, and that she wanted her girls back, that she wanted us to be a family again, but that Zell wouldn’t let us go if he knew.

  Her lip began to quiver, her beautiful green eyes shimmering with tears. For two and a half years she had waited to hear the words I was saying. Only I knew they weren’t true. Still, I made myself keep talking. I told her we would need to slip out one night after everyone was asleep, and then run away, and then we would be with Mama.

  Caroline’s eyes went as wide as quarters as I told her my plan. She was afraid, but promised to be brave when the time came, to do whatever I told her and not complain. Anything, so long as we could be together again with Mama. We pinkie swore then, and she threw her arms around my neck. And just like that, she was my Bitsy again.

  I spent the next week working out the details, watching closely and biding my time, running exactly how it would work over in my mind until I knew every move we would make, every place where the plan might hit a snag. I rehearsed it my head like a movie, running it forward, then backward, then forward again, knowing full well we would only get one chance—knowing, too, what would happen if we failed.

  And then one day there was nothing to do but go.

  I waited until supper, when I knew the grounds would be empty, to slip out of the mess. I kept my head down as I hurried across the yard, trying not look furtive as I snuck past the dorms, then sidled up to the office door at the back of the chapel. I didn’t bother trying the knob. I knew it would be locked. Zell was always careful to lock up when he left. But he wasn’t always careful about where he kept his spare keys.

  I had run across them months ago, at the back of a drawer in the filing cabinet, had even seen him use them a few times when he lost track of his regular set, which he did nearly as often as he lost track of his cigarettes. It had been surprisingly e
asy to slip them into my coat pocket the previous day. I waited for him to get up from his desk and go down the hall to the bathroom, and then I took them. I had no idea which key went to what, but I knew the three I needed were somewhere on that ring.

  It was full dark by the time I reached the office door. My hands shook as I fumbled the key ring out of my coat pocket and began trying them one at a time. None of them seemed to work. Dread turned to desperation at the thought that all my careful planning would come to nothing. And then, finally, the seventh key slid home.

  The reek of stale smoke hit me as I ducked inside. I froze, struck suddenly by the sheer madness of what I was doing—and by a sickening certainty that it couldn’t possibly work. Too many things could go wrong, like getting caught in Zell’s office in the pitch-dark, taking money that didn’t belong to me.

  What would happen to Caroline then?

  Could it be any worse than what would happen if we stayed? If I decided to abandon my scheme, confess to Caroline, that the letter from Mama had never existed? I couldn’t do it. I had told a terrible lie, one that would eventually break my sister’s heart, and there was no way to take it back. The least I could do was make it count for something.

  I moved to the desk, calmer somehow, once I had made the decision to see the thing through. I was clumsy in the dark, holding my breath until I finally found the key to the center drawer.

  The strongbox was where it usually was. Even in the dark I found the last key easily, smaller than the rest, and stubby. My stomach lurched as the latch sprang open, a cold snick in the quiet. I didn’t stop to count what was there, just scooped out the stack of bills, folded them into my pocket, and returned the box to the drawer. On the way out, I grabbed the single key that hung on a peg near the door—the final key to freedom.

  My heart was thundering as I stepped back out into the night, my hand sweaty around the clump of stolen bills in my pocket. It felt like a lot. I hoped it was, because it was going to have to feed us until we landed somewhere and I could find a job.

  I wondered, as I crossed toward the dorm, how long it would take for someone to miss us, how long before Zell discovered the empty lockbox and was told about the truck. It wouldn’t take him long to put it all together, and even less time to call the police when he did. I just hoped Caroline and I were miles away when he did.

  The few things we were taking—shoes, and a change of clothes, my journals, the Bible Mama gave me, and Chessie—were already bundled into a pillowcase, and waiting in my footlocker. All that was left was to give Caroline the signal and wait until everyone was asleep. Waiting was the hardest part, lying in the dark after lights-out, listening for the stillness to settle over the dorm, and then the heavy breathing sounds that meant the others had fallen asleep. I was terrified that I would fall asleep, too, and miss our chance, or that Caroline would balk when the time came.

  Hours crept by before I felt sure the coast was clear. Even then I pretended to go to the bathroom, checking each cot as I passed. No one stirred. Tiptoeing to Caroline’s bed I shook her awake, a finger to my lips to remind her to keep quiet. Her eyes opened drowsily, then went wide when she realized it was time.

  It took only a moment to slip into our coats, and for me to ease the lumpy pillowcase from my footlocker. The door squealed softly as I pulled it open. I held my breath, praying. When nothing happened, I stepped out into the cold, Caroline close on my heels. And then we were running, tearing toward the old barn behind the chicken coop, the night a blur as we pounded barefoot over half-frozen ground.

  The battered delivery truck gleamed like an old ghost in the open doorway of the barn, the most welcome sight I had ever seen. I hissed at Caroline to get in, then dug the key from my pocket and scrambled up behind the wheel, grateful for all the times Daddy let me drive back from town so long as I didn’t tell Mama he’d drunk too much.

  My heart plummeted when I turned the key, the reluctant grind of the engine echoing the death of all my hopes. Caroline’s eyes met mine, glittering with panic. I tried a second time, and then a third, nearly sobbing when the thing finally coughed, then churned to life. I felt small behind the wheel, and couldn’t see two feet in front of me with the headlights off. Caroline’s hand clutched my arm as the front gate came into sight. I blinked back tears as we passed beneath the painted wooden sign I had first glimpsed more than two years ago.

  “Is this the way to Richmond?” Caroline asked as I turned off the dirt road and onto a two-lane stretch of pavement.

  I nodded, but said nothing. The truth was I didn’t know and I didn’t care.

  I wondered what time it was as the road ground away beneath us. There wasn’t another car in sight, but l kept one eye on the mirror as I drove. I expected to see lights at any moment—flashing red ones, mostly—but none came. After a while, Caroline drifted off to sleep, huddled for warmth in her oversize coat, knees tucked to her chest.

  Reaching over, I tucked the corners in around her bare ankles, wishing I had made her put on her shoes. My own feet were so numb I could barely feel the pedals anymore, and the steering wheel was like ice in my hands. The truck had no heat, or at least none that I’d found. I held tighter to the wheel, trying to stop myself from shaking. It didn’t help. Soon I was trembling so violently that my teeth were knocking together, and I thought I might shake apart. Finally, I had to pull over.

  I turned off the headlights and sat there in the dark, clutching the wheel while the spasms racked me, and the reality of the last few hours sank in. I was grateful Caroline was a sound sleeper. I wouldn’t have wanted her to see me that way, or to see me roll down the window and get sick down the side of the truck. Eventually, the shaking stopped, and the urgency to keep moving retuned. I had no idea what time it was or how soon it would be light, but I knew the farther we were from Mt. Zion when our empty beds were discovered, the better our chances of not getting caught.

  Caroline stirred but didn’t wake as the truck bumped back onto the pavement. I envied her. I was so very tired. But there was still so much to do. I needed to decide where we were going, where we would live, how I would find work—and how I would ever make Caroline forgive me when she learned that I had lied to her.

  I had no idea where we were, only that we were still in Tennessee, somewhere along a bare stretch of Highway 70, when the truck began to sputter.

  The coughing and bucking woke Caroline with a start. “What’s happening?”

  “I don’t know. Something’s wrong with the truck.”

  I managed to get us off the road before it died completely, noting with a pang of dread that the sky in front of us was beginning to show the first blushes of pink. East. We’d been heading east. Only now we weren’t heading anywhere. Frantic, I scanned the dash for the fuel gauge, and felt my belly plummet. After all my careful planning, I had never thought to check the gas gauge.

  I fought back tears as I reached for the pillowcase and quickly untied the knot. “We’re out of gas,” I said flatly, handing Caroline her shoes. “We’re going to have to walk.”

  Her eyes rounded. “Walk where?”

  “To a gas station.”

  “I don’t see any gas station.”

  “I don’t, either, but there has to be one up ahead somewhere.”

  “But I’m tired.”

  “I’m tired, too,” I told her wearily. “But the truck won’t go without gas. The sun is coming up. We need to hurry.”

  “Then we’ll have to walk back?”

  “Yes. We’ll have to walk back and put the gas in the truck.”

  “Can’t I just wait here while you go?”

  I thought about that. I would make better time on my own, but I didn’t dare leave her alone. What if Zell came looking and spotted the truck? Or the police. “I’m sorry, Bitsy, but we need to stay together. They might already be looking for us—to take us back.”

  I let the wo
rds dangle, their meaning plain. If they found us, we would never make it to Richmond—or Mama. That’s all it took to make Caroline put on her shoes. I checked to make sure the money was still in my pocket, slung the pillowcase containing all our worldly goods over my shoulder, and started walking east.

  Caroline did her best to keep up, poor thing, but after a while she began to lag behind. I had no choice but to slow my own pace, but as the sky continued to brighten and the stars began to dim, I found myself growing more and more anxious. I had hoped to be out of Tennessee by morning, but that wasn’t going to happen. All we could do was keep putting one foot in front of the other.

  I was worrying about how I was going to find breakfast for Caroline when I heard the hum of tires behind us. I froze, my legs nearly buckling when I turned to see headlights on the horizon. Finally, dread turned to panic and I grabbed Caroline’s arm, dragging her back from the road, toward a thick stand of trees. I thought I might be sick again as we huddled there, watching the lights grow larger and brighter by the minute. If they had spotted the truck on the roadside they would know to look for us on foot.

  I nearly wept with relief when the car drove past, its black and gold plates clearly not local. But as we stepped from the shadows the car stopped, its back-up lights flashing on. I tried to drag Caroline back to the trees, but she wouldn’t move, her eyes big as quarters as she watched the approaching lights. I shook her savagely, desperate to get us away, but she seemed not to know I was there.