The Secrets of Rosa Lee

by Jodi Thomas

  Sidney laughed. “You have an interesting family, Mr. McCormick, but Rosa Lee wasn’t ugly. I have a picture of her.” Sidney pulled a small framed picture out of her briefcase. “The librarians found it on a shelf among the books. It seemed she never gave away or sold a single book all her life. Books and roses were her loves, I guess.”

  Sloan took the picture. “She looks sad,” he said handing it back. “She also could’ve been an ancestor of yours. Same strong chin.”

  Sidney smiled. “Not likely, my grandmother’s people were from Tennessee. The few my father had were from Chicago. I’ve got a box of the most bored-looking ancestors you’ve ever seen. Mother’s side in Confederate uniforms, Father’s in Union. My grandmother Minnie used to laugh and say even though they married seventy years after the War Between the States, some of her relatives never forgave her for marrying a Yankee.”

  He laughed. “I come from a family like that. I’m not sure some to this day would be too fond of you. They’d still hear that hint of northern accent in your speech.”

  “I don’t have an accent.”

  “I know, but I like you anyway.”

  She couldn’t help herself, she had to say, “Why?”

  He backed off the gas a little. “You have no idea, do you?”

  “What?”

  “How intelligent you are. Or what a fine-looking woman lies beneath that brain.” He said it more as a statement than a compliment. “I guess with teaching eighteen-year-olds you must see yourself as older.”

  “And what do you see?”

  “You probably don’t want to know.”

  “I think I do.” She didn’t want to admit it but he was right about her looking at her students with their cute young bodies and trendy clothes. She feared she suffered in comparison.

  “First, promise you won’t get mad. I don’t want to be out here in the middle of nowhere with an angry woman.”

  Sidney nodded, trying not to look as if anything he might say would affect her one way or the other.

  Sloan winked at her before turning back to stare at the road. “When I look at you, I see a body that could offer heaven and pale blue eyes that promise honesty. It’s a deadly combination.”

  She laughed knowing that he was teasing her. “We’d best get back to Rosa Lee’s life. I brought a map of Wichita Falls that should help us locate the retirement home.”

  He caught her hand before she could pull the map out. “You don’t believe me, do you, Sidney?”

  “No, but I’m not angry.”

  She thought he might say something else, but he just held her hand a moment longer and then stared straight ahead. She wished she’d known him better—she might have joked with him. She might have admitted wishing his compliment could be true.

  Two hours later they walked into the third retirement home. Sidney had been given the name of a developer who built and managed several facilities. Since it was Saturday, the main office was closed, so their only choice was to go to each building complex. The first one was more like apartments than a nursing home. A young girl at the desk didn’t have a list with her, but swore there was no one by the name of Carter in the building. The second complex fell more under assisted living. Here, the nurses seemed well able to handle anything. They were professional but of no help in finding Rosa Lee’s nurse.

  The third try didn’t look any more promising. Here most of the patients were in wheelchairs and the staff appeared bored and overworked. Their questions were passed along from one orderly to another over the blare of a TV in the lobby area.

  Sidney hated the place. It smelled of urine and dust. The front desk was cluttered with half-eaten breakfasts on trays.

  Sloan leaned over the counter and shouted his question for the fourth time. A tired-looking woman glanced up and pointed toward the left hallway. “Carter’s in there. Number three. She doesn’t get many visitors.”

  As they headed toward the room, Sloan slid his arm across her shoulder and Sidney didn’t move away. The comfort felt good as they slowly pushed the door open.

  Annie Carter looked tiny in her chair by the window. Her room was orderly, but plain. One painting hung on the wall, a small depiction of an English garden done in shades of blue. Whoever had hung it hadn’t considered that the person looking at it would be in a wheelchair.

  “Miss Carter?” Sidney stepped into the room. “May we come in?”

  The little woman’s eyes widened in fear. “Are you real or spirit?”

  Sidney was taken aback by the question, but Sloan simply knelt beside the tiny woman’s chair. “I’m flesh and blood, Miss Carter. Would you like to pinch me to make sure?”

  When she raised her fingers, he added, “Not too hard now, I tend to yell.”

  A wrinkled hand patted his arm. “No, thank you, I don’t want to hurt you. I just have to ask now and then. When you’re my age and close to crossing over, you need to be reminded which world you’re in now and then.”

  “I understand,” he said. “It won’t be long before you’re walking with the angels.”

  “Oh happy day,” she nodded. “I’m ready with my bag packed whenever the good Lord decides to take me. Some of us leave too early, but most of us are forced to set at the station long after we’re ready to go.”

  Sloan held her tiny hand and turned to Sidney. “Miss Carter, I’d like you to meet Sidney Dickerson. She teaches at the college in Clifton Creek.”

  “Oh,” Miss Carter looked impressed. “She looks like someone I used to know, but I can’t recall anyone named Dickerson.”

  To Sidney’s surprise, Miss Carter giggled. “But then, these days everyone is someone I used to know. I’ve outlived two husbands, all my brothers and sisters, and most of my friends. If I hang around much longer I won’t have anyone at my funeral.”

  “Maybe it’s time you made a few new friends. Name’s Sloan McCormick.”

  Dancing eyes darted from him to Sidney. “You her fellow?”

  Before Sidney could answer, he said, “That I am. Fell for her at first sight.”

  Sidney couldn’t believe it. Sloan had wrapped Miss Carter around his finger in less than a minute and proceeded to tell her lies. One dinner didn’t make them a couple any more than one kiss did. But now wasn’t the time to straighten out the facts. She’d do that later. Right now she needed to find out as much as she could about Annie Carter and her last day in Rosa Lee’s employ.

  She sat down in the only other chair in the room and got out her notepad while Sloan complimented the old woman on the only personal item they could see in the room. “That’s a mighty fine painting,” he said.

  “Thank you,” Miss Carter answered. She watched Sidney carefully as if she didn’t quite believe her real. “I’ve had it for years. A dear friend gave it to me. She could paint flowers so real you’d swear you could smell them.”

  “Miss Carter,” Sidney began. “I’d like to ask you a few questions about Rosa Lee Altman.”

  “Of course you would, my dear.” The old woman leaned back in her chair. “After we talk, can we go down the hall to the kitchen and have ice cream? It’ll make the day seem like a party. I have a weakness for chocolate ice cream. It keeps a little fat on my bones.”

  “I’ll push you myself,” Sloan said.

  Sidney wondered how much of the old woman’s mind was left. She didn’t seem to grasp the idea that they were strangers.

  “Where do you want me to start, dear?” She patted Sidney’s hand.

  “At the beginning.”

  Miss Carter closed her eyes for a minute, collected her thoughts. When she opened them once more, Sidney saw determination in her watery gaze. “I retired from being a school nurse over twenty years ago. My arthritis was bothering me too bad to keep working so hard, but I found a part-time job with Dr. Eastland. He wanted me to check on some of his older patients who couldn’t, or wouldn’t, come to the office. Miss Altman was one of them.”

  Miss Carter waited for Sidney to make notes. “Sh
e must have been about eighty when I first knocked on her door. For a while she wouldn’t let me in, so we visited on the porch. But slowly, she finally asked me inside. I felt quite honored to be invited. She might have been shy but she was a fine southern lady. I could tell just by looking. The place was like a library, books everywhere. She told me she ordered them from a bookstore in Dallas. I’ll bet she had a hundred on gardening alone.”

  “What kind of health was she in?” Sidney moved closer hoping to keep Miss Carter on track.

  “Good, strong as an ox. Worked out in those flower beds of hers from dawn till dark. Dr. Eastland said she had good bones but she worried about her mind failing. She always wanted me to question her to make sure she wasn’t slipping mentally. I told her I wasn’t all that far behind her in age and I might not notice, but she made me ask.”

  “What kind of questions?” Sloan leaned against the windowsill. He looked so totally out of place, both women smiled at him.

  Miss Carter continued, “Made me ask her to recite her social-security number like if she accidentally forgot it I should put her to sleep right then. I thought it was a game, but she never missed, not one number of it, or the code.”

  “The code?” Sidney and Sloan both echoed.

  “She had a rhyme she always said. Told me someone would ask me to repeat it one day after her death.” The old woman frowned. “I didn’t figure you’d wait years to come by. I’m not even sure I remember it now. In truth, I thought it was just a memory game she played.”

  Sidney knew Miss Carter’s story had nothing to do with whether to save the house, but she was fascinated. “Try,” she whispered.

  After a few minutes the old woman shook her head. “I can’t.” Tears floated in her eyes. “It’s been too long. I’d love to keep my promise to her, but I can’t.”

  Sloan put his hand over hers and said, “It will come, Miss Carter. How about we go down for ice cream?”

  They pushed her down the hallway to a large lunchroom and Miss Carter seemed to cheer up. “I usually only come here for dinner. They bring my breakfast and lunch to the room. I like the evening meal, lots of people, lots of noise. Only independent people eat here and my hands won’t let me push myself three times a day.”

  Sloan walked over to an ice-cream machine at the corner of a bar cluttered with coffee and tea containers. “I’m surprised you don’t come down for the ice cream.” He pulled a cone from the box next to it. He glanced from her to the machine. “You can’t reach the machine, can you?”

  She shrugged. “Keeps me thin. Otherwise, I’d be a ball. Once in a while someone helps me and I sneak down here. One of the orderlies usually gets me one after dinner if he’s not too busy.”

  Sloan made her an ice-cream cone Dairy Queen would be proud of, then without asking, made Sidney one. They ate over by the windows.

  When they’d finished, Miss Carter put her hand on Sidney’s arm. “I found her resting in her bed, like she’d passed in her sleep. I don’t think she suffered, dear. I think she dreamed her way into heaven.”

  Sidney guessed the old woman must have thought she knew Rosa Lee. “I’m glad,” Sidney said and was surprised how much she meant the words.

  Miss Carter continued, “She left me a note about what to do with her clothes and such. She said she didn’t want anyone in the house but me and the people who came to take her body out.

  “I stayed right by her side until they carried her out, then I locked the door, like I knew she would have wanted me to. If she didn’t want people wandering about when she was alive, she sure wouldn’t want them doing so after she died.”

  “That was kind of you,” Sidney said.

  “I was her friend,” Miss Carter answered with tears sparkling in her eyes.

  Sloan pushed Miss Carter back to her room. When she was in her place by the window, he knelt down close to her chair. “I’ll be back next week, Miss Carter, for another date if you’ve a mind to hit the ice-cream machine again.”

  “I’ll be waiting.”

  Sidney hugged her goodbye. “I’d like to come again, too. Just for a visit. Not to talk about Rosa Lee.”

  Miss Carter let out a short cry. “I remember,” she said. “I remember the line Miss Altman used to say. I thought she must have learned it when she was a child because it had her name in it.”

  Sidney and Sloan waited while the old woman took a deep breath and said, “Gone in thirty-four, a love forgotten nevermore. Look among roses ever bright for the key to unlock the secrets of Rosa Lee.”

  Miss Carter frowned. “There was another line, but I don’t remember it.”

  Sidney scribbled the saying and glanced up. “Try,” she whispered.

  Miss Carter closed her eyes. “A mirror turns, blending old and young, to the chime of a tune that was never sung.”

  “What does it mean?” Sloan asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe it was just a saying. She never would explain anything more about it.” Miss Carter looked tired. “After she died, I looked among her roses for a key, but I never found anything. The garden was a maze. No matter which path you took, you returned to her back door. It must have been just a rhyme because what kind of rose is ever bright?” The old woman laughed. “She had lots of talents, but Rosa Lee wasn’t much on poetry.”

  Miss Carter said her farewell and pulled the cord for the nurse.

  Sloan offered to lift her into bed, but she said he needed to take care of his woman.

  Sidney felt his arm go round her and pull her into the hallway. “Are you all right?” He sounded frightened.

  “Why?” she managed to say, her thoughts still filled with the rhyme.

  “Because you look like you’re about to pass out.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Sloan slammed Sidney’s door and ran through the rain to the other side of his truck. He flipped the driver’s seat down and reached in the back for a flask. Without bothering to ask, he mixed the whiskey with what was left of her Coke and handed it to her. He had no idea if the whiskey would help, but it couldn’t hurt. The professor looked as if she’d seen a ghost.

  As she drank, he watched a little of the color return to her face. The rain pounded hard, closing out all the world but the pickup’s cab. He started the engine wishing he understood what had upset her, surprising himself by how much he cared. “Do I need to drive to the hospital?” Maybe she was having one of those spells she’d had on Monday when the drill bit flew through the window at the Altman place. He was no doctor. He had no idea what would help.

  “No. It’s not another panic attack or whatever the doctors called it on Monday,” she answered his unasked question and took a long drink. “I’ll be all right in a minute.”

  “What did you have to eat today?” His mom’s answer to everything from a cold to cancer was food. They had picked up Cokes on their way out of Clifton Creek but he hadn’t thought to ask if she’d wanted anything else.

  “I skipped breakfast.”

  “I was afraid of that. It’s after one. How about we eat lunch and you tell me what shook you up back there?”

  Sidney nodded. “Your bedside manner could use a little work, but thanks for getting me out of that place. If I’d had to breathe that air much longer I might truly have passed out.”

  He watched her closely, unsure she wasn’t putting on an act of being brave. She looked healthy, but she might be one of those fragile women for all he knew. His mother had spent her entire marriage convincing Sloan’s dad how fragile she was. She’d stayed in bed most of her three pregnancies and continued nap time long after her children had given it up because she had to rest. Strange thing was, she outlived Sloan’s dad by almost twenty years.

  Sidney broke into his thoughts. “I’m fine. Really.”

  He leaned across and tilted her face up with his hand. “You still look pale.” His thumb brushed across her cheek as he studied her. Her skin was soft, warm and free of makeup. Most women her age wore so much they needed a separate
piece of luggage just to carry it all.

  “I promise, I’m all right,” she insisted, reading his mind again. “But, you’re right. I’m starving.”

  He relaxed and straightened back to his side of the seat. “I know just the place. Best chicken-fry in the state.”

  Fifteen minutes later they were shown to a booth in a crowded restaurant known as the Pioneer. He shook his head when the waitress tried to hand him a menu and ordered two chicken-fried steak specials.

  “Specials?” Sidney asked when they were alone once more.

  “Beans, fried okra, potatoes and steak covered in gravy.”

  She turned her head as if she were trying to understand another language. He liked that about her, he decided. She never acted as if she knew something when she didn’t, but she was a woman no one would ever take for a fool.

  When the food arrived he noticed he’d forgotten to mention rolls, corn bread and a salad. While they ate, the place began to clear. It finally got quiet enough to hear music in the background blending with the sound of the rain. Sloan listened to the voices around him and decided not to ask Sidney any questions here.

  He ordered cobbler, but neither of them ate more than a few bites. She didn’t try to make small talk. He needed to think, to replay again the last thing Miss Carter had said. Somewhere in the rhyme lay the answer and maybe even a key to understanding Sidney.

  He paid the bill, took her hand as they left the booth and didn’t turn loose of her until they were back in his truck. Something about her made him feel like a kid on his first date. He couldn’t remember how many years it had been since he’d wanted to hold a woman’s hand. Sloan wasn’t sure he could explain his attraction to her if he tried.

  “Better?” he asked, liking the color returning to her face. She had a kind of beauty that would still be there when she was eighty, he thought.