Wild Raspberries

by Connie Chappell

  “Before that? Never?” Beebe asked Arnett, who shook her head. “I would think country club membership a perk. You didn’t take advantage of it?”

  “John worked from the club,” Arnett said. “I couldn’t just show up. I could call him, and I did, but we weren’t members. John never paid a membership. I’d have known.”

  “I guess I assumed there’d been a membership. In fact, I find it quite odd there wasn’t.” Beebe aimed her puzzled expression at Callie. “Can you clear that up? Are you a member?”

  “There was a difference between Jack and me in the club’s eyes. I’m an employee who’s expected to cater to club members and participate in functions when invited. Jack had an agreement with the club. He didn’t pay for office space, and he didn’t pay membership dues. I think they were both in exchange for his ability to bring well-known golfers to the club. He was public relations when he was out designing or modifying courses. That had a certain value for the club, a prestige the board members took in exchange for his membership.” Callie took a moment. She’d reached the crux of the matter. “I think the membership extended to Arnett, but I don’t think he bothered to tell her.”

  “Obviously he didn’t,” Beebe said, aggrieved on Arnett’s behalf. “The club was out of bounds: a place for Jack without Arnett.”

  “That’s the way it was before I became the pro there. It wasn’t done to accommodate me,” Callie clarified.

  “He thought it through, and he established a place of seclusion early in his marriage. That’s telling.” Beebe looked at Lizbeth. “You’re awfully quiet. What are you thinking? Are you surprised?

  “Not really. That was Dad’s way.”

  “Secluded? Unapproachable? A man of boundaries?” Beebe suggested.

  “I wouldn’t say secluded. He was definitely approachable. It wasn’t so much that he had boundaries. I knew him as a man very deliberate in his actions. I understood he had under-the-table control of Arnett.”

  “Did you get that understanding from Dan?” Arnett asked, defensive.

  “No, it was first-hand. From Dad.”

  Beebe sank into the chair back. “Well, under-the-table control. That was delicately stated.” With a flourish, she made a notation on her tablet. “I’m going to remember to ask you to explain that later. I’m honestly not as interested in your explanation as I am in my next snoopy question.” Her eyes turned toward Callie. “By your interpretation, you two never let your guard down. Jack marked the club as his own. You two had the surrounding grounds, a path through the woods, a protected world. What happened? There were nineteen successful years. How did Arnett catch on? Did you throw caution to the wind?”

  “Jack never said, but I think it was my fault.”

  Beebe’s mouth gaped. “Jack never said! And you didn’t ask him?”

  “I didn’t push him to tell me things—”

  Beebe cut Callie off with an accusation. “He kept secrets.”

  “No. Not secrets,” Callie said, working to keep a civil tongue. “I respected his privacy. His marriage was his business. He controlled what crossed over into our relationship. But in this case, I think he was sparing my feelings because I caused it.”

  “What happened? What did you do?”

  Beebe’s words and eyes bore into Callie until the memory from her first night in Baron was triggered. She heard Lucius’s prodding voice: “Tell your story.” She did, in the simplest of terms.

  “I fell in love with Jack all over again. That’s all.”

  For several seconds, the world around Callie seemed to hold its breath while it decided the worth of her words. The quiet in the cabin was so complete, it worked to amplify the buzzing of a fly against the window screen. She continued her story in the same soft tone she used for its introduction.

  “I was always deeply in love with Jack, but there was a specific instance one December when I felt that miraculous feeling of falling in love. Instantaneous. Irreversible. Out of my hands. It wasn’t until the next April that Arnett tossed him out.”

  “First things first,” Beebe said. “Tell me about December.”

  Callie complied. “The weather hadn’t turned, so Jack and I set a time to meet at a driving range in town. He arrived first and was inside, talking with the man managing the range. It seemed to me they were acquaintances. I realized later—much later—Jack was trying to clue me in to the situation. He acted surprised to see me, but I didn’t catch on. We each grabbed a bucket of balls and went through the connecting door to the stalls. We pulled drivers out of our bags. Jack was telling a story. I don’t even remember how it went, but I remember everything else about him.”

  The scene painted in her mind was as vivid as the day she lived it. She remembered every detail: Jack’s relaxed stance. The golf club at his side. His other hand slipped in a pants pocket. His broad shoulders. The golf jacket that brought out his eyes, more blue than gray.

  “He was happy,” Callie said. “Laughing. He amused himself with his own story. And I couldn’t take my eyes off him. The next thing I knew, I took two steps and kissed him.”

  “What did he do?” Beebe’s question dissolved Callie’s memory.

  “Nothing. He didn’t say not here, be careful. He seemed genuinely overcome. Words failed him. Which was a novelty because Jack was never at a loss for words.” Callie smiled. “He just tipped his head the way he did. I saw a softness come into his eyes. He said, ‘I love you too, little girl.’ That endearment has always touched my heart.” Callie thought Lucius would be proud that she didn’t hold back her true feelings. “Maybe ten, fifteen minutes later, Arnett showed up. Jack took an attitude with her, wanting to know why she was there. She turned the question to me.”

  Arnett sat, tightlipped, hands clenched. She was forced to listen to the telling of a romantic moment between her husband and his lover. If body language meant anything, Arnett’s blustery reaction waited in the breech. If it died there, she might make it through the caucus lecture-free. She already suffered one lecture from Professor Beebe.

  It was then that an alarm sounded in Callie’s head and Beebe’s underlying motivation struck home. Beebe was questioning Callie on sensitive subject matter to test Arnett’s ability to keep her temper curbed. The ladies would be astonished by Callie’s next thought: Hang in there, Arnett. You’re passing so far.

  “What happened after Arnett arrived?” Beebe asked.

  “They had words, then Jack persuaded her to go home. A few minutes later, he went home, too.”

  “And you thought everything that came after was your fault because you kissed him and that man saw.” Beebe put two and two together.

  “Either that, or the man knew Arnett, was suspicious of Jack’s and my coincidental arrival, and called her. Or that was just a day she decided to follow him.”

  “So which was it, Arnett?”

  “The man was my niece’s husband. He was just filling in that weekend for the owner who had an out-of-town wedding to attend. He called. He didn’t see them kiss. If I’d known that, I’d have had all I needed. I would have booted him out three days before Christmas.”

  Callie’s mouth suddenly dried to dust, but Beebe took the news with no reaction other than to check her watch. Laying a hand on her stomach, she said, “I know you were going to cook, Callie, but I see this going a little longer and I need you here.” She ran a finger through the air, indicating their wagons drawn in a circle. “I’m going to put in the lasagna. You don’t mind, do you? I can feel the hungries coming.”

  Callie and Beebe went to the kitchen. Callie pulled the packaged lasagna from the freezer, set the oven to preheat, and filled a drinking glass with water. Beebe followed her back to the living room. She opene
d a package of cheese bites. “Hors d’oeuvres, ladies. Help yourselves.” No one partook but Beebe.

  “Lizbeth, what was the holiday like at the Sebring homestead that Christmas?”

  “Dan and Gary were aware. She phoned them before Dad returned from the driving range. They discounted it. Their parents had been married forty years. To Dan and Gary, that meant everything was fine. They believed their father—that the driving range was an accidental meeting. They accused their mother of exaggerating, building things up in her mind. They told her to let it go. That was her first conniption about Callie. Mostly, they were about Dad’s traveling, always being away from home. Even when he was in town, he was continually away from home. To answer your question: On Christmas Day, she was chilly toward him. He ignored it and concentrated on family, the grandsons, who were blissfully unaware.”

  Beebe turned to Arnett. “So everyone talked you down? You had no defenders?”

  “Stella believed me. My sister-in-law.”

  “Stella was not a fan of Jack?”

  Arnett shook her head. “She told me to get evidence, so I hid a tape recorder in his car.” She paused to display a satisfied smile. “I got all I needed. The boys switched teams quickly. I’d been right all along.”

  “Clever Arnett,” Beebe acknowledged. “A tape recorder.”

  “I got John’s side of a phone conversation with her.” Arnett pointed at Callie. “He was reminiscing about a sexual encounter on a beach somewhere.”

  “It was inside a beach house,” Callie said haughtily, correcting Arnett’s conveyed misconception.

  “I don’t think we need specifics,” Beebe put in.

  The oven’s indicator light clicked off, and Lizbeth jumped up to tend to the lasagna.

  “So after Arnett kicked Jack out, he moved in with you?”

  Callie shook her head at Beebe. “No, he got an apartment. He wanted a place where Dan and Gary would visit, where Chad could come and stay overnight. His family would never come to my house, nor allow the grandkids to visit him there. He rented an apartment in April. In June, we got the lung cancer diagnosis. He had a continual cough for months, and I finally got him to see the doctor. When the surgery was scheduled to remove part of his lung and it was obvious he’d need nursing for several weeks after he was released from the hospital, the boys insisted he move back in with Arnett. He moved back the day before the surgery.”

  “She would nurse him?”

  “Yes.”

  Beebe studied Arnett closely, then directed her question to Callie. “And he moved back?”

  “Yes.”

  “That must have been horrible for you.”

  Callie nodded. “And for Jack. He cried when he told me what he agreed to do. That was the first time I ever saw him cry.”

  “When he was going to be separated from you?”

  “I was banned from the hospital, too. Days passed before Jack called. I was a wreck. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t eat. For two days, I called the ICU nurses’ station and got updates, but by the third day, a nurse answered who asked if I was family. I wasn’t, so no update for me. The nurse must have advised Gary. He put a note on the chart forbidding phone updates.”

  “And then Jack found a way to call you.”

  “Yes.”

  “But you told me you nursed him.” A determined Beebe was inching her way through all the muck surrounding that period in Jack’s life, and Callie could see where she was headed.

  “That was later,” Callie said.

  Lizbeth returned and started to speak, wanting to clarify. Beebe eyed her sharply, silencing her.

  “What’s the story, Callie? Why don’t you just tell me the rest of it?”

  Callie balked at answering either of those questions. She felt like the runner caught between bases. Beebe’s second set of caucus rules—or was it her third?—were pressing hard against the peculiar affinity she felt for Arnett.

  Callie set the tone days ago out by Arnett’s pool with her parting comment. The one that caused understanding to dawn on Arnett’s face. The one that referenced a bond between the two women. Callie and Arnett arrived at Heatherwood sharing a secret—a secret they kept even from Jack.

  Old Promises

  Pressures of conscience mounted for Callie.

  “What is it with you two?” Beebe’s gaze ricocheted from Arnett to Callie. “You’re looking pretty conspiratorial. You two get together and cook something up?”

  Callie’s loyalties were torn, but she remained reticent.

  “Honesty reigns, Callie. All. Week. Long.” Beebe closed one eye and turned the other to penetrate Callie’s defenses. “Come on. Give it up.”

  Old promises caved. Callie shook her head at Arnett and shrugged the hopelessness of the situation.

  “Arnett called me a week after Jack got home from the hospital.” Callie no sooner spoke the words than Arnett groaned and caught her head in her hands. “She asked me to call back in a half-hour and she’d take the phone to Jack. She wanted me to ask him if he still wanted to live with me. She wanted me to convince him to move to my house.”

  Lizbeth’s whole body jerked around to face her mother-in-law seated beside her. “Arnett,” she gasped.

  Arnett fell back against the couch, eyes closed.

  “You didn’t know?” Beebe rolled her eyes at Lizbeth. “Why am I even surprised?”

  “I had no idea. Dan and Gary didn’t either. Arnett, why?”

  Arnett’s eyes were open. Her lips parted. In her panicky state, she formed no words.

  Beebe brought the line of questioning back to Callie. “Why call back? She already had you on the phone.”

  “So Jack would hear the phone ring.”

  A light dawned in Beebe’s eyes. “Otherwise he’d know she placed the call to you. I guess I don’t know the game of deceit quite as well as you two do.”

  Angry, Callie defended her actions. “It had to be convincing for Jack, and I don’t think you ought to call it deceit until you’ve heard the whole story. At that moment, I thought Arnett committed the most selfless act any wife in her position could.”

  “If the younger other woman is defending the bitchy wife, then this is probably the story we came for, huh, Lizbeth?” Beebe pulled one meaty leg over the other and folded both arms across her chest. “I won’t interrupt again.”

  Callie stared down Beebe’s sarcasm. She wanted to feel mutual disrespect, but Beebe’s scorn was warranted. And Beebe was right. The time had come to speak the truth.

  “It’s understandable that Arnett gets off the rails when she’s around me. What Jack and I did was wrong. I’ve said that. Jack and Arnett had a bad marriage. I’ve said that. The boys talked Jack into moving back with Arnett after the surgery. Jack and Arnett didn’t want that. Given her situation, that woman picked up the phone and called me, and I will forever be grateful.”

  Callie faced a jaw-hanging Arnett. “I’ll be upfront. Your motivations were often blurry, but there was one part of your story that convinced me your heart was directing your actions.” To Beebe and Lizbeth: “I visited Jack in the hospital the night before his discharge. He surprised me with the news that Arnett suggested he call me once a day. She volunteered to leave the house every day for thirty minutes, so he could make the call. I got the first few calls at the club. But Monday came, my day off. I was home. I expected him to call the house phone. But he didn’t. He called my cell. It wasn’t on.” The pang of guilt she always felt when she thought of Jack’s disappointment that morning pierced her again. “When Arnett got back, she went to his room. She asked and he told her I didn’t answer. From some other room, she calle
d me. She asked if I still wanted him to move in. Well, of course I did. Then she told me a few things. They’d made a follow-up visit to the surgeon. Jack wasn’t eating; he was depressed. Very depressed. If he didn’t snap out of it—well, his recovery was at stake. When Jack told her I didn’t answer, she said he just pulled the bed covers over his head. I always thought that was so she wouldn’t see him cry.” Callie’s voice faltered. She took time before continuing. “I’d been on edge for two weeks. Now I was frantic. I burst into tears. I hurt him. He must have thought I stopped caring. But that was the turning point. Arnett told me to get hold of myself, and call back. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.” Arnett didn’t look up when Callie spoke to her. “I really didn’t think he’d agree. He’d been so willing to do whatever the boys wanted.”

  Callie wiped the wet from under her eyes. Etched in her mind was the memory of standing perfectly still in the center of her kitchen. The world stopped for a few breathless moments while she braved to ask Jack two questions. “I asked him if he loved me, and he said yes. Then I asked if he wanted to move to my house, and he said yes. That was the happiest moment of my life.” Callie found Arnett looking at her. “It was the concern, the real concern in your voice when you said he pulled the covers over his head that told me some part of you wanted what was best for Jack.”

  Lizbeth slid out to the edge of the couch for a better look at Arnett. “But you let Dan and Gary—all of us—believe moving to Callie’s was Dad’s idea. He took the rap for you. They blamed their father entirely. They cut him off for over a month. No calls, no contact, no grandkids. And you said nothing!”

  Callie was as disheartened as Lizbeth when Arnett answered the charge by reducing her position to two baseline strategies that summarized so much of her life.

  “I didn’t want to be the bad guy in their eyes. John always protected me from that.”

  “That’s all you have to say.” Lizbeth glared at Callie. “And you’re defending her?” Before Callie could answer, Lizbeth said, “She just didn’t want Dad to die under her care. It was all about her. While Dad recuperated in your house, Dan and Gary pouted and sulked like little boys. I tried everything to get them to relent.” Then her wrath returned to Arnett. “Why didn’t you say something? That was precious time lost. Time sons should have spent with their dying father. You just let them suffer. All three of them suffered while you sat back and watched!” Lizbeth rose to tower over Arnett. “No,” she said, “you will never touch my son.”