by Martin Clark
“And simply getting rid of her wasn’t enough. You needed to do something for your brother, but you couldn’t just tell him that you’d killed his wife. He’d stew and worry and fret and live on eggshells the rest of his life, wouldn’t he? And he’d probably condemn you for it. Even as much as he hated her, he wouldn’t want to cross that line.”
“Exactly.” Pascal nodded. “At first I wasn’t going to tell him anything. I was just going to do it for him and let it be.”
“But then you get the chance to wipe the slate clean with the fucked-up confession. The problem’s gone, and you repay your brother in currency that he can accept and appreciate.”
“Right.”
“Damn smart plan.” Pauletta’s tone was noncommittal, all lawyer.
“It sort of fell into place over time. The confession and DWI, that helped me out in two ways. It let me appear to do something for Evers; that was very important. But at the same time, it settled things with the police and let me get on with my life. Over and above making things right with Evers, giving me the chance to do that, taking the blame for this got a lot off of me. This thing was a hell of a lot more than I expected. I never should have done it. Never. I was mad and guilty and ashamed and pretty desperate to do something with my life other than burden Evers. That was a terrible, pernicious combination. Jo Miller deserved it, but I shouldn’t have been the one to pull the trigger.” Pascal’s lips trembled, his voice caught. “She deserved it, but I shouldn’t have shot her.” He stopped for a moment, and neither he nor Pauletta said anything. “At any rate, I had to get it settled, ended, over. I couldn’t stand the guilt and all the worry, worrying about the police finally finding out what really happened. I couldn’t leave it open, so I brought it to a head and built in some escape routes and booby traps. Confessing helped me twice over, really.” Pascal squirmed some; Pauletta could tell that he was becoming agitated, uneasy.
“And it worked. You’ll serve a few months, and that’s it. You’re off the hook, can’t be retried, you’re even with your brother, a martyr in his eyes, his evil wife’s dead as a doornail and all the people you care about think you’re a hero of sorts.”
“One problem, you see.” Pascal started coming apart; his hands began shaking, rattling the chain on the handcuffs, and he wrapped his fingers together in a tight, bloodless fist. “Shit. You don’t know how bad this is when I look back on it.” His voice was uneven and his eyes were wet to the rim, a wall of tears balanced on the brink, about to break and scatter. “This really didn’t make me any less of a fuck-up. It probably made things worse.”
“I don’t get it. Why the change of heart? You’re remorseful? I’m not following you.”
Pascal dabbed at the corner of his eye with the back of his arm. “Two things. The big thing, the most important thing, is the shrine and Ruth Esther. Jo Miller had fucking throat cancer. She was going to die. Henry wins the lottery. Warren Dillon gets shot. Rudy asks for a car … gets it. I ask to be beatific and suddenly my life is good, fun. I meet a nice woman—Ruth Esther, who seems to like me. There’s something going on there. Oh, and don’t forget, Ruth Esther takes us on this crazy trip, all that’s part of it, too. I was … well, meddling, sticking my nose in. Some kind of interloper. So then I’m sitting in here—this is the second thing—and it dawns on me that Ruth Esther who is … holy—believe what you will, you’ve got to believe in something—Ruth Esther tries to stop me that night by taking the car so I can’t go. Everything was already taken care of, out of my hands. That, Pauletta, was a sign. ‘Don’t do it. Your fucking car is gone.’”
“I agree that you were wrong, Pascal, and that you should be punished. Everything else is just chance and things happening. It’s good you’re remorseful. You should be. Don’t fuck it up by feeling that way because you’re cowardly or afraid, or because you suddenly believe in voodoo and fairies. You should feel bad—feel terrible—because you killed a woman.”
“You can’t know how shitty this is, how scared I am.”
Pauletta held up her hand, shook her finger at him. “Actually … when you think about it, Ruth Esther’s taking the car and leaving was sort of a good thing as far as your fabrication goes. It made your story that much more believable to Evers. Right? Do you see what I’m saying? Your discovering the car gone—and Evers knowing that it was gone—made your reason for confessing seem to have some decent sense to it. I’m not buying into Evers’ and your …” Pauletta stopped. “Into your theory that all this is running on some sort of schedule and according to plan, but you could just as easily read something good into Ruth Esther using the car.”
“It was a very clear warning, and I ignored it. It’s that simple.”
“Well, I think most of what you’re saying is silly, a lot of rot. But regardless of all that, I can see why you feel so awful.”
“I do. I do. You can’t imagine.” Pascal choked. He had started to cry, was sobbing. “Believe me I do. I’m not cut out to live with this, either. I’ll never get over it, be the same. That’s why I needed to tell you. Confession’s good for the soul. That’s what they say, right?”
Pauletta rocked forward in her seat. “So I’ve heard. But I don’t know that telling me’s going to do you any good, Pascal. What difference does it make that I know?”
“Someone needs to know that I’m sorry.” Pascal was still crying. “Someone needs to know that I realize I was wrong. And that I’ve figured it out, figured out that I crossed up Ruth Esther and the relic.”
Pauletta laughed and shook her head at the same time. “My, my. You and Evers are going to have a lot to talk about. It looks like I’m the only unwashed heathen left in the group.” She hesitated. “Well, there’s Artis, I guess.”
“Talk to Evers? About what? I’m not sure I understand.”
“I suspect you will, soon enough.”
“You’re not going to tell him, are you? He’d just agonize over it, and I’d be right back in the same old pit looking up at him, waiting for him to throw me a rope. It would undo the little good to come out of this.”
“I’ll never mention it to anyone, Pascal. But I can’t settle this for you. It’s a huge thing, killing another person.”
Pascal was drained; he hung his head and slouched down in his chair. He was sobbing, but there didn’t seem to be as many tears. “You believe that I know I was wrong, and that I’m contrite, don’t you?”
“I do, Pascal. I believe you.” Pauletta’s voice was gentle, generous.
“Maybe you can fit me in your wishes and petitions and prayers.”
“Sorry, that’s not something I do.”
“Whatever. It’s a little like Martin Luther; sometimes you need lightning to strike a tree right in front of you and scare you shitless.”
Pauletta stood up and wrapped her arms around Pascal, held on to him and rubbed and patted his back. He was still sitting down, and he started to weep a little harder. “She was a terrible woman, Pascal. People have done worse. And it’s good you love your brother so much. That’s about all I can give you.” She picked up her jacket and walked to the door, left Pascal slumped and bent, bound up in chains, sitting with his legs stretched out in front of him, about to fall out of his seat. She walked out of the room and didn’t look back, heard the door clang and shut behind her.
TWELVE
THREE WEEKS LATER, ON A CLEAR FRIDAY EVENING, EVERS WAS sitting with his legs spread in a V at the edge of the yard in which he’d grown up. He was wearing shorts and could feel the grass underneath his legs tickling and scraping his skin. At his apartment above the Coin-O-Matic, the walls were bare and his plates and glasses were wrapped in newspaper, but he’d decided to leave a lot behind. He’d already spent a day filling up plastic garbage bags, hauling them down the stairs and tossing them over the metal lip of the Dumpster beside the Laundromat; the sacks of trash would clatter and collapse when they landed, then settle in with the rest of the glass and cans and junk people had finished with and thrown away.
E
vers was cutting small, straight lines with a pair of lawn clippers, new ones with black foam handles. He was working on the high grass in front of a flower garden full of vines and weeds and burgundy, yellow, and purple blooms on thin green stems. After lunch, he’d discovered the family’s old croquet set in the basement, and now he looked out and traced the whole game in his mind: the wire wickets, the stakes with colored bands and grooves lathed into the wood, the turn near the birdbath where the course curved in front of the flower bed and headed back to the house. He recalled that Pascal used to carry a gin and tonic around the layout and swing his mallet with only one hand, barely stooping to hit his ball.
Evers’ parents’ neighbor, Lizzy Blankenship, came out on her porch and walked across her lawn to the flowers along the yard’s border. “It’s so nice to see you back,” she said. “What a fine surprise.”
“It’s good to be back.” He looked up at her. Mrs. Blankenship was smiling, and her hands were clasped together in front of her.
“How are you doing?”
“I’m doing okay, I think. Just trying to get things in shape around here.”
Mrs. Blankenship nodded. “We all need to do that every now and then, I guess.”
“I agree,” Evers said.
“I heard you were moving back full-time pretty soon.”
“Yes ma’am. I think this will be a good place for me. I’ve already gotten the power connected and phones and some new carpets. I think I’ll be happy here.”
“I hope so.” Mrs. Blankenship paused. The old woman shifted her head and looked past Evers. “Have you gotten some help?”
“Help?” He turned and glanced over his shoulder. Pauletta was lifting a brown bag of groceries out of Evers’ car, the new white Lincoln. He dropped the clippers and leaned back on his palms and laughed. When he stopped laughing, he told Mrs. Blankenship simply that Pauletta was his friend. “She’s been really good to me,” Evers said. “I like her.”
“Oh, I see. Yes …”
“She’s a lawyer, too.”
“When will you be coming back for good?” asked Mrs. Blankenship.
“Probably in the late fall, when the leaves begin to change.”
“Will your lawyer friend be coming?”
“Perhaps, but you never know with her.”
“Of course.” Mrs. Blankenship smiled. “So do you have a girlfriend now? I mean, well, you know, I guess ‘girlfriend’ sounds so old-fashioned.”
“Not really.”
“I was so sorry to hear about your wife and everything and your brother.”
“Thanks.”
“How’s Pascal doing?”
“He’s okay. The last time we were together we talked about the way bread smells in elementary-school cafeterias and how many convicts listen to NPR.”
“And you’re not going to stand for your office again, is that right? I read in the Journal that you’re quitting your judge position.”
“That’s right. I’m not sure I want to judge people anymore, and I’m not sure that I want everyone dragging out my personal problems.”
“I see. Good for you. Good. Let me know if I can help you with anything. It’s nice to have one of my boys back.”
After Mrs. Blankenship left, Evers cut a fistful of flowers and took them with him into the kitchen. He left them on a table lying on their sides, some of the petals folded and bent underneath themselves.
“For me, Sweet Prince?” asked Pauletta. She was standing at the sink with the water running, her back to Evers.
“For the house.”
“House flowers, then. Same family as wallflowers?”
“I cut them from the garden on the edge of the lawn.”
Pauletta turned toward him, drying her hands on a small cloth towel. “I’m really glad you asked me to spend the weekend with you. I hope this sojourn doesn’t hurt your standing with the ancient neighbor.”
“I doubt it will. I told her that you were the housekeeper.”
Pauletta smiled. “But she still wanted to know if we’re sleeping together.”
“You know, since you mentioned the subject, it occurs to me that resuming sex might not be a bad idea.” He put his hands in his pockets. “Only if you want to, of course. I’d hoped it was sort of implicit when you agreed to spend the weekend with me.”
“You need a goal when you fuck. But perhaps I could make an exception. Who knows.”
“I need a pleasant, eighteenth-century, white-gloved, gazebo-by-the-water type of romance, all the right parts of instinct and interest. I want to sit on my porch in June and watch cars pass on the highway. I want to hold hands and watch television together on Sunday mornings and eat cereal and pecan twirls in old robes. I want to be sublimely satisfied.”
“Then I don’t guess we’ll be fucking after dinner.”
“I didn’t mean to suggest that I needed it now, or for that matter that I can’t have it with you. Like I said, I think that’s part of all this, our ending up together.”
Pauletta laughed. “Lord Byron, Keats, Shelley, Evers Wheeling. All the Romantics. You always say the right thing.”
“I appreciate your being kind to me. I do.” Evers spoke quietly.
“You’re welcome.”
“I mean it. You were good to help us and all. Very few people would’ve been so generous.”
Pauletta folded the towel in half and laid it down. “Have you heard much from Pascal?”
“All the time. He doesn’t like many of the people, of course, but he likes the time alone. He seems a little down, but he’ll be out soon. Maybe we can go see him on Sunday. I thought I’d ask you.”
“That would be fine.” She was facing Evers. “Have you told him about Ruth Esther and your theory and newfound faith?”
“Sure. I wrote him and talked to him. I saw him the Sunday after I won the Lincoln.”
“What did he say?”
“His exact words were ‘whatever.’” Evers smiled and then started laughing.
“He … well, I suspect that maybe he has given it more thought than you might expect,” Pauletta said. She leaned against the sink.
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing. Nothing. He’s just thoughtful, and you two are brothers. So that’s all he said to you?”
“Yeah. You know Pascal.”
“Not as well as you do.”
“And you still think I’m mad as a hatter, right? Is that going to hurt my chances of sleeping with you? I hope not. And long term, I hope it doesn’t derail our time together. Consider it a charming idiosyncrasy, like a goatee or a bad hat.”
Pauletta folded her arms across her chest. “I’m not sure what to make of it.” She dropped her eyes. “I wasn’t sure that I was going to mention this to you and embolden—”
“I’m already pretty firm in my take on all this,” Evers interrupted. “Nothing you say’s going to matter to me one way or the other. I know the truth. The bottom line is that you can never know anything for sure. Nothing. There are no positives, just shades and degrees of faith. It’s like that with everything. Fluke water stain or image of Christ, weather balloon debris or alien ship, Thomas Jefferson slept with Sally Hemmings or he didn’t. You bet that the sun will come up tomorrow in the east, your brakes will work, your lunch isn’t contaminated with carcinogens or piss from a disgruntled busboy, a dog won’t bite and that the gym teacher isn’t seducing your teenage daughter. It’s just a question of how long and how sturdy the span is between the two sides, like James West—remember The Wild, Wild West? Remember how he’d take this terrifically small derringer out of the secret space in his boot heel and load the gun with an arrow tip and rope and shoot the rope across a river or pool of acid or some other threatening gulf? James West would bridge the gap with a single thread and then transport himself over the problem. That’s the way things really are.”
“Sometimes you just don’t know everything, Evers. Little stress fractures that you can’t see in an iron support, a plank that
looks sturdy but is full of termites.” Pauletta thought about telling Evers the truth about Pascal, licked her lips and let the inclination fade away, decided then and there that she never would, that she shouldn’t, that it was none of her business.
“I know all I need to know.”
“Well, at any rate, on a more immediate and worldly note, I found out Tuesday that the Poverty Law Center in Charleston is closing. Hard to believe, but the white, potbellied solons in our legislature have cut the program’s funding to just about nothing. Also, the center’s lease is up, and the owner wants to sell the building. Obviously, they need some money. I’m on the board of directors. I could buy the whole building and have it repaired and redone for around a million bucks. And I’m going to do it.”
“Good. I’m not going to say anything about it, how nicely that fits.”
Pauletta cleared her throat. “You wouldn’t have any interest in working there, would you?”
Evers shook his head. “Sorry. My new world order doesn’t involve my abandoning common sense and all reason and principle. I still detest affirmative action, welfare, deadbeat renters, scofflaws, criminals, thugs, shoplifters and people who don’t pay child support. I’d vote to end the Poverty Law Center, too.”
“I’m sure you’d prefer a police state and some sort of Middle Eastern system of justice—hands and feet and arms chopped off in public spectacle.”
Evers grinned. “You like me, don’t you? I can count on you.” He picked up a flower.
“I guess so. You have some good points. Even though there’s a lot I don’t like about you. I mean, you have very little balance, a strange view of women and you really don’t like black people, do you?” She shifted her weight.
“I’m pretty evenhanded with my dislikes and likes. I try to spread them out based on petty self-interest more than anything else. And I like you—you’re black.”
“Why? How come?”
“Because you’re dependable and determined, and I like the way you look,” Evers said.
“Perhaps you could be a reference book of sorts.”