“What do you want me to call you?”
“What did you call her?”
“Mom—I thought you knew.”
“David, call me Mother.”
“I’d love to. I want to. Mother.” And then, after holding her close: “Mother, who is my father?”
“He’ll tell you.”
“Yes, but when?”
“As soon as he’s free to speak. It won’t be long—but don’t ask me to say more, David. If I do, I may find myself hoping—and I mustn’t, mustn’t, ever.”
“You mean that someone would die?”
“Yes, that’s what I mean.”
“And when that happens, what?”
“Your father and I can be married.”
“And it’s going to be soon, you say?”
“I didn’t say! Don’t ask me.”
“You said it wouldn’t be long.”
“Then all right, I said that. I didn’t say how long is long.”
Then at last she turned to Jill and took her face in both hands. She kissed her, then picked up the mink coat, which she had thrown over a chair, put it on, and pulled it around her. Then she opened the door and went out. We both followed, and I put her into her car. She started it, pulled ahead, and swung around the circle in front of the house. As she made the turn, where the circle joined on to the lane, she blew kisses, one to me, one to Jill.
“What did I do?” asked Jill. “I must have done something to change her.”
“She didn’t change. She blew you a kiss, didn’t she?”
“She changed from warm to ice.”
“You said you were telling the officers, so they could find Mom.”
“Well? Why shouldn’t I?”
“OK, but don’t ask any help of me.”
“Her, we’re talking about.”
“Or her.”
“I’m going nuts. Why not?”
“I’ve tried to explain to you. I’m mountain. She’s mountain. Mom’s her kin, that’s all.”
“Didn’t you hear what she said? She doesn’t respect her.”
“You can say that again.”
“And yet, on account of this Mom being kin, she’d block me off from making her give back what’s mine?”
“I didn’t notice any blocking.”
“For Christ’s sake, I’m going nuts.”
“Don’t ask her to help.”
“Or you to help?”
“I told you, she and I have been close.”
“I have to think this over.”
She went in the house and sat down off by herself. I sat down and put my arm around her. But she got up, put on her coat, and went out.
13
SHE WAS GONE FOR some time. I didn’t peep, except to keep track that she hadn’t gone off, that her car was still in the driveway. But then I went out to look: she wasn’t there. I went around the house, wondering where she could be, and took a chance on the river. Sure enough, there she was. But she hardly turned around when I came. “Dave,” she whispered, “it talks.”
“You have to be putting me on.”
We both kept still to listen. Each time they’d come in clear, the sounds of the river at night, which you don’t hear by daylight, how it whispers and burbles and gurgles, and tinkles and tankles and glugs, and sometimes lets go with a roar. She stood drawing deep breaths and listening. “It’s beautiful, just beautiful,” she murmured. Then she jumped at the sound of a slap. “What was that?” she asked.
“Fish jumping, was all.”
“Sounded big.”
“Well, why not? Flood time’s food time, for him. Plenty to eat, so he grows.”
“I never even thought of fish while I was out there—I mean in it. I was, you know.”
“Well, they thought of you. They were looking right at you, probably.”
“Could we catch one and have him for supper?”
“Why not?”
“Do you have a pole?”
“Handline, good enough.”
“Aw, I forgot, we have to have bait, and we can’t in the dead of the night start digging for worms.”
“Aren’t shrimp good enough?”
“How do you catch them?”
“With a can opener.”
“You goof.”
We laughed and went up the path to the house. I found the handline in the porch closet and the shrimp in the kitchen. As soon as I’d opened the can, I said: “OK, we’re in business, but I warn you right now that fishing’s bad for that dress, that beautiful dress Mr. York bought you.”
“I’ll put on your pants.”
“Then OK.”
We went in the den where both of us changed our clothes, putting on something rough. We went to the back porch again, picked up the line and bait, and went down again to the river. I showed her how to bait up and said: “You can be the fisherman. I’ll row the boat. Now what do you want to catch?”
“Which is the biggest?”
“Carp.”
“Then I want me a carp.”
“He’s big and fat, but the flavor’s not too good. He’s what’s used for gefilte fish.”
“Well, 10 million Jews can’t be wrong.”
“On carp, they could be.”
“He’s big?”
“Oh, big and fat and thick.”
“I want carp.”
“Then we’ll go where carp is.”
I explained that pike and muskalong like it out in the middle, catfish down on the bottom, but carp up in the shallows, “so that’s where we’ll go after him.” On the near side, above my landing, was a creek that had no name, for the reason that it wasn’t there except in flood time. But it was flood time now, and I had an idea that carp might like it. So I rowed over, past the snag, past the lower end of the island, and on up to the creek mouth. Jill had never fished before, and I explained what she should do—drop the line overboard, let it run till she felt it touch bottom, then pull it up a few inches, to leave the baited hook above the mud, where the fish would swim to feed. So she reached in the can for a shrimp, baited the hook, and dropped the line overboard. She had hardly pulled it off bottom when she gave a little squeal: “Oh! It twitched! I could feel it! It was a nibble!” But I had her pull in, and of course her hook was bare. We baited the hook and she tried again. Then 10 or 12 feet away, a flash of silver showed, but a big flash, to the sound of a loud flop. “Dave!” she yelped. “One is out there, a great big one. I could see him!” She pulled in, checked that her hook was still baited, and then started swinging it around, I suppose to throw it out where she’d seen the fish. But in mortal terror I crouched down in the boat, yelling, “Don’t do that! Stop it! Stop whirling that hook around! Do you want it to rip out my eye?”
She hadn’t thought of that.
But the tree saved her the trouble, the one we were pulled in beside, a big white sycamore sticking out of the water just off our bow. Ordinarily it was on land, but with the river in flood, the water had risen around it, so the boat was almost touching it, and the hook, where she’d whirled it around, had snagged in the tree, so we wouldn’t be catching fish until we got it out. I told her: “First, sit down. Sit down, keep still, and stop hollering.”
She did.
“Now, take hold of me and move from the stern to the bow. Don’t stand up—or you could go overboard.” To trim the boat, I moved from the cross-seat, where I was, to the stern, where she had been. “Now wait till I snug the boat in, jam it against the tree, and hold it tight with the oar.”
She did.
I bumped the bow to the tree, then held it tight by shoving an oar to the bottom. The water at that point was no more than two feet deep, so it made as firm a fix as is possible with such a boat.
“Now reach as well as you can without standing up and try to loosen the hook. It has a barb on it, so you may have to twist it. But if you can get your fingers on it, you should be able to get it out.”
She reached, but then said: “I have to stand up.”<
br />
“No! Please! To hell with the hook. Let’s go home and have the lamb.”
“It’s OK. There’s a hollow here on the side that I can hook my fingers into so if I do lose my balance, I can hang on. Hold everything! I can feel the hook, I’m wobbling it. I have it—wind it in.”
I did, but she didn’t sit down. She said: “I have to shift my position, so I don’t go plopping down between the tree and the boat.”
“For God’s sake, be careful—I can’t help you. I have to hang onto this oar so I can steady the boat.”
“There’s something else in here.”
“Probably a hive of bees. Leave it alone.”
“It’s not bees, it’s—”
She handed something to me and asked me to take it, but I dared not let go of the oar, where I had it jammed on bottom, or the boat would veer off and drop her in the water. She said: “It has straps on it and one of them’s caught on something. I can’t get it loose.”
I had a Boy Scout knife in my pocket. I opened it and gave it to her. She tried to take it from me but couldn’t hang onto whatever it was she had and stretch far enough to get it. I held onto the oar in the water with one hand, then with the other picked up the second oar, laid it on the cross-seat, put the knife on it, and that way lifted it to her. She took it, cut, and then flung something into the boat. Then she stooped down to the front seat and at last was back in. I said: “Let’s go home. Let’s look at what you found.”
“Yes, I think we better.”
We rowed back, beached the boat, then felt our way up the path, and on into the house, both afraid to wonder what we had, yet both hoping. But when we turned the light on we saw what we always knew it would be. There was the red zipper bag, the one Shaw had had, all stuffed out tight, with the end of one strap cut off, where it had caught in some crack inside the hollow. We looked at each other and kissed. Then we pulled the zipper and there the money was, pack after pack of twenties, 100 to the pack, with printed wrappers around them, each reading $2,000. When we felt them, they were damp but not soaking wet.
“Of course,” she exclaimed. “The bag went in the river, too, and water would seep in, but only a little bit at a time, through the zipper. It wasn’t more than a minute before he climbed out beside me.”
“I think we could dry those bills in the oven,” and I snapped it on.
But after a moment or two, she said, “Dave, why couldn’t we use your plate, that steel thing you have, for cooking fritters? We could heat it, then turn off the heat, put the packs on, and let them stay there and bake. That way, they couldn’t burn, but at the same time, we could see what we’re doing.”
“OK.”
So that’s how we did it and pretty soon came out with nice new money, all dry, all perfect. “And you know what, Dave?” she whispered. “What the beauty part is? It’s all mine! I have the paper to show—Bob York gave it to me.”
“That’s right,” I said. “Wonderful.”
“But that’s not all.”
“Yeah? What else?”
“It’s all ours.”
“Little Jill, it’s yours.”
“But what’s mine is yours. After all, you’re God.”
It was beautiful being with her in the kitchen, knowing it had all turned out right and that now we could be happy. She got the paper out of her bag and let me read it. It was in the form of a letter, signed by Russell Morgan, president of Trans-U.S.&C., and listing the bills by number.
Then it said something like: “I hereby, as president of Trans-U.S.&C, and by the authority of its directors, do give, assign, and convey the said bills to you, in acknowledgment of your gallantry, bravery, and quick thinking, in saving a valuable plane and the lives of twenty-eight passengers, a pilot, copilot, and stewardess—” I read it, and then she let go of my hand to get up and kiss the money, every pack. I said: “Hey, watch it, you’ll blister your mouth.”
“You can kiss it and make it well.”
“Come here.”
She came, and we started being happy all over again. Then she asked: “Dave, what about her?”
“What about who?”
“Well, who do you think? We know who put it there. She has to be the one.”
“Then—she put it there.”
“Well, what do we do about her?”
“Leave me out.”
“What do I do about her?”
After a long time, I asked: “Do you have to do anything?”
“OK, but what do I say?”
“In what way, say?”
I knew what she meant, of course. She couldn’t just find this money, bank it, and not tell anyone. She would have to tell Mr. Morgan, and from then on the thing would have to come out—in the papers, to Edgren, to Mantle, to everyone. And yet, I couldn’t make myself face it. Face up to it, is what I’m trying to say. Because Mom had stolen that money, of that there could be no doubt. And it belonged to Jill, of that there could be no doubt. And Mom had tried to get her killed, of that most of all, there could be no doubt. And yet I was ducking the rap, and I knew why. I was mountain and that’s how we do—stand by our kin regardless, no matter how guilty they are.
But over and above that, Mom was still Mom to me, no matter how silly she was or what ideas she’d got in her head. And over and above that was what I couldn’t sidestep: she’d stashed that money for me, so we could go off with it, to Florida or some other place, and lay out on the beach with it, and then go inside now and then, to take off our clothes or whatever. Pretty soon Jill asked:
“And what do I do?”
When you’re backed in a corner, you yell. “OK,” I told her, “prosecute. Call Edgren, call Mantle, tell them come out and take it as evidence. Could be a year before you see it again—if you ever see it again. Have you thought of that? Suppose somebody steals it, out of the sheriff’s office? Are you sure Washington County is going to be nice about it and pay it back to you, pack for pack and dollar for dollar?”
“You’re just saying that.”
“OK, you say.”
“Let’s go in the other room”
We started into the living room, but halfway there she stopped and went back to the kitchen. “I can’t leave it here,” she whispered. “I can’t bear to. I have to have it with me.”
By then the red bag was dried out or pretty near dried out, and she stuffed the money back in it. Then, carrying it by the two straps she led to the sitting room and sat down on the sofa—still in my pants and jacket. After some time she asked: “You don’t want me to prosecute?”
“Well? Would you?”
“Suppose they prosecute anyway.”
“You mean Edgren and Mantle?”
“And Knight, if that’s his name. That lawyer from the state’s attorney’s office.”
“It’s your money, don’t forget. If you don’t charge her, they can’t.”
“I’m not so sure of that.”
“If it’s your money she took—”
“The money’s not all.”
“What else is there?”
“Her lying to the police—the sheriff, whatever he is, deputy sheriff, if that’s it. Giving false information’s against the law, and whose money it is is not the whole point.”
“So?”
“They could prosecute you.”
“Me? For what?”
“Yes you, Dave Howell, who looks like God and acts like a mountain outlaw.”
“I asked you, for what?”
“Giving false information—giving no information, about this Mom character and how she blew. Listen, I have to report this money. I can’t let them go on looking for it, trying to find it for me, and not say I already have it.”
“OK, then, you have to report it.”
“Well, don’t I?”
“Listen, it’s your money.”
“You want me prosecuted for lying to them? Not telling the truth is lying, I would think.”
“OK, that’s what you think.”
/> “What do you think?”
“Do I have to think?”
“I’m going back to town.”
“I was hoping you’d spend the night.”
“I was hoping to, too.”
“I’m telling you right now, if I’d found a hundred grand, the place I’d take it wouldn’t be to a Marietta motel, that—”
We sat there, suddenly so self-conscious we couldn’t talk or look at each other. Then she went in the den and came out with one of my blankets. “OK,” she told me, “I’m spending the night.” She put a sofa pillow under her head, stretched out on the sofa, and pulled the blanket over her.
“What’s the big idea?” I asked her.
“I’m sleeping here, that’s what.”
“Oh no, you’re not.”
I went over and started to pick up the blanket, but a foot drove into my gut. I staggered back against the table. She pulled the blanket on again. “Dave,” she said, “good night.”
“Good night.”
14
HER VOICE AT THE phone woke me in the morning. When I looked it was eight o’clock. I went in the living room, and she was just hanging up. “That was Bob York,” she told me. “He’s so excited he can’t talk. He cautioned me, though, not to do anything and especially not to tell anyone until I’ve talked to a lawyer. Since we already have one, I mean that one who was here yesterday, he thought it was all very simple and would probably ‘work itself out,’ as he said, without me having to do much of anything—except carry the money to bank. What was that lawyer’s name?”
“Bledsoe.”
“Will you look up his number for me?”
York had told her to call him at home before he left for his office and not to tip him off over the phone, “what it’s all about, because he could easily spread it around without even meaning to if someone is there when you call, before you’re together on it about what you’re going to do.” So she did, but Bledsoe was pretty grumpy about it, telling her call him later at his office, “after I’ve had a chance to open my mail.” So she asked me to talk to him, and I worked on him a little, but think it was my voice, how I sounded over the phone, that alerted him that something big was up. So he said that as soon as he’d had breakfast, he would be out. Her clothes, her regular clothes, the ones she’d changed out of to put on the fishing gear she’d worn during the night, were in my room, and I left her there to dress while I went up and bathed. When I came down she was piling the money on the table in front of the fireplace and folding the blanket over it. We had just finished our bacon and eggs and were back in the living room when Bledsoe’s car pulled up. I let him in. He got to it at once: “What is this?” he asked. “But before you tell me, first let me tell you: You don’t call an attorney at his home unless it’s emergency, and—”