In the morning, they drove to the cemetery against the early-morning traffic streaming into the city and Beth waited in the car while Candy went in to interview the caretaker. After about twenty minutes, Candy returned, a slip of paper in one hand. She got into the car and sat for a moment, looking straight ahead, gripping the wheel. Beth thought she would burst.
“What?” she finally asked.
“It was a four-corner bingo, Bethie,” Candy said. “Look here.” She held up the paper. “Hill, Samuel Seth. A–14. Out of all the Catholic cemeteries in all the cities in all the world, she walked into this one.”
Beth had not expected to feel so near tears. But neither she nor Candy spoke as they picked among the simple stones to the flat marker that read, after the name, “April 6, 1983–April 14, 1983.” And below it, “Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow.”
“That’s weird,” Candy said. Beth’s voice wouldn’t come. “So. He died in a week.”
“But of what?”
“Of complications of prematurity,” Candy said, and to Beth’s look, added, “I saw the death certificate, Beth. They had it on file here. It was the county hospital. And remember, our old buddy Herb didn’t even know she was pregnant when she moved in.”
“Forget it,” Beth said. “Let’s just forget it.”
“And what do you think the inscription means?”
“It’s Shakespeare. Macbeth, where he talks about how life creeps in its petty pace from day to day. It’s very famous.”
“I guess I didn’t go to that school,” Candy sighed. “But it’s not what you would imagine for a child. She was already probably not entirely there, Beth.”
“It doesn’t seem that strange to me,” Beth said. “I guess because I wasn’t entirely there, either, when I felt like that.”
Beth drove on the way home, and Candy dozed restlessly. They were past Rockford when Beth suddenly sat erect and jammed the brakes.
“What?” Candy yelled. “What’s wrong?”
“Her hair was white,” Beth said.
“Whose hair was white?”
“Cecil’s. I just remembered. The day of the reunion—I never think of it, I haven’t thought about it in years. But Ellen said Cecil’s hair was white. Dyed platinum. And Herb Fox said she was sick. She was always skinny. And even later, when she was well again and met George, he said she wore her hair up most of the time, in a bun. So she could have looked like a little old lady, even though she was young I mean, in a hat and everything.”
“Detective Cappadora, that is very good work,” Candy said. “That could be it. It very well could be. I thank you. Now, I’ll just go home and relax, like Dr. Clomid says. I’ll be pregnant by Friday.”
CHAPTER 29
Beth woke the next morning to the sounds of voices raised, arguing, below her window. She’d fallen into bed the night before, waving away Pat’s urgent questions, not even bothering to brush her teeth, pausing only long enough to shuck her jeans.
Now, as she tried to bring herself to full consciousness—her head felt like a heavy flower on a stalk, likely to snap at a movement—she was shocked to realize that the angrier voice was Sam’s.
“I already told you!” Sam was saying. “This is what I always do!”
And Pat’s voice responded, “Look. Those kinds of fireworks are illegal. We’ll go out on Rick and Laurie’s boat and we’ll see real fireworks. You can see them all over the whole city….”
“I’d rather stay with my dad, though,” said Sam. “I don’t remember Madison. And we have fireworks my uncle Pete brings from Missouri, and they’re really cool, and only the grownups do the punks, so it’s real safe….”
Beth sat up, settling her elbows on the windowsill to see the two of them. Vincent was down there, too, fiddling with stuff in the trunk of the car, but Pat and Sam were facing each other squarely in the middle of the driveway. The way they stood, Beth noticed with a pang, with their fists planted on their hips in confrontation, was exactly the same.
Beth had believed the hardest thing that she would have to face today would be to try to interpret for Pat not only the facts she and Candy had learned but their import. She had almost decided that the facts would have to be sufficient…at least until she’d had time to sort through all the empathy she couldn’t help feeling about Cecil and her lonely, useless week of motherhood, followed by the later, even more lonely and ultimately useless years.
Beth jumped out of bed and into her jeans. She would sooner have tried to break up a three-dog fight than explain all that to Pat. He would call it Beth’s crazy yen to ferret out the dark cloud behind every silver lining. It would enrage him, he would say her musings were the kind of stuff that filled up the second hour of made-for-TV movies. The tiff below was a welcome obstacle. Who knew, maybe Pat was right—that all they needed to do was give Sam time. There was no other alternative.
She bolted down the stairs and out the door. Sam and Pat were still bickering, and even Vincent was getting in on the act.
“Sam, it’s actually pretty fun,” he was saying. “All the other boats are out on Lake Mendota, and people are cheering and stuff. It’s neat. You’ll like it. And Rick and Laurie have this big pool in their backyard….”
“I’m not going,” said Sam.
“Well,” Pat told him gently, “you are going. You are going when the rest of us go, because that’s what we planned. I’m going to go into the house and get the cooler, and when your mother is dressed and Kerry is ready, we’re all going to get into the car and we’re going to go.”
“Maybe we can show you the house,” Vincent suggested, then. Beth felt a spurt of pride surprise her; he sounded so reasonable, so nearly parental. “Don’t you want to see the house where we lived?”
Still sulky, Sam said, “Why would I want to see where you lived? I don’t remember being born.”
“Aren’t you a little curious? Lincoln didn’t remember being born, either, but I bet he liked going back and looking at the little log cabin,” Vincent said.
Sam said, “You’re not curious about my life. You never came over to see my room or anything. You don’t even like my dad.”
Beth broke in, “Of course we like George, Sam.” Samlooked at her, just noticing she was there. “It’s not that we don’t like him—”
“You don’t even care about what he thinks.”
“Not that much,” Vincent agreed, cheerfully.
“Vincent,” Beth warned.
“I don’t think you like him, or you’d let me go and spend Fourth of July with him the way I want to.”
“The fact is,” Pat said, breathing harder. “You’re our son. Not George’s. We’re doing our best, Sam, but some things we’re goddamn well going to do as a family. That’s how it is. There are some things that just aren’t negotiable.”
“You just want to show me off!” Sam cried then, and turned to Beth, stricken. “I didn’t mean that.”
“I know,” she told him. “Go get your mitt now, or whatever else you want to take, and let’s go.” Sam slumped into the house, Beowulf following him, chuffing hopefully.
Beth turned to Pat. “You know what?” she told him, suddenly inspired. “Let’s take two cars. I want to run up to Peshtigo tomorrow and shoot some stock. And I was thinking I’d take him. Sam. Just him and me. Spend some time with him.”
She noticed Vincent slowing down, suddenly concentrating on her, and felt like whispering under the force of his gaze.
Pat didn’t notice. He griped, “Now? Why in the hell now?”
“Don’t get all juiced, Paddy. I just thought, since I’d be halfway there…I’ve been wanting to do this anyhow, and I think it could help, if he just gets a chance to talk to one of us alone. It’s okay, right? This is a good time, because he seems to be opening up, doesn’t he?”
Pat stalked up onto the porch and hefted the cooler. “I don’t care, Bethie,” he said. “Though I can tell you, don’t expect some big mother-and-child confession. I’ve spent a ton
of time with him, between here and the ball field and the stadium and the restaurant and stuff, and the kid is completely cut off. He’s so self-possessed I envy it.”
“Maybe he’s just scared to say things,” Beth offered. “He didn’t seem so in control this morning.”
Pat smiled wearily. “Do what you want.” Sam walked out onto the porch. Pat turned to him. “’Sgo, buddy. You can ride with your mom, okay?”
But Sam, with a last-ditch effort to save face, insisted on riding with Vincent, even though Kerry begged him to come with her in Beth’s old Volvo and play Car Bingo.
He did cheer up at Laurie and Rick’s, paddling amiably in their pool, eating not one but three burgers with everything, Rick’s special recipe. Just before dark, they launched Rick’s boat from the Robertson Pier, Rick deviling Laurie the whole time about all the years she’d teased him for taking the Queen Mary out on a lake the size of a postage stamp. “Bet you’re glad it seats nine now, right?” Rick kept asking, while Laurie threw life jackets at his head.
They rocked gently on the dark water in the middle of the lake, and after a while the rockets began, to the north and east, washing the children’s faces in green and blue and violet streaks of light. Covertly, Beth watched Sam and thought, once, she could see tears in his eyes. But when he caught her looking at him, he deliberately smiled, showing his big, even teeth, a smile that seemed intended to tell her that he was a good boy, after all, and not spoiled. She wanted to scoop him up then, and hold him bundled against her. Tomorrow, Beth thought then, tomorrow and tomorrow.
The next morning’s start was held up until past noon by a long, late breakfast and a torrential flurry of goodbyes—of switching bags and bundles back and forth between the two cars four times to get it right, and the momentary loss of Vincent, who took off unannounced with his brand-new license to pay a surprise visit to old Alex Shore. After all that, Sam and Beth were content to sit spent in the front seat for the first hour, listening to Tom Petty sing about good girls who loved Elvis. Beth headed up Highway 151 toward Fond du Lac, where already a few trees were starting to turn, then onto 41, past Green Bay, near but not quite on the hip of Lake Michigan. She was feeling corky for some reason, renewed and released, and she laughed appreciatively when Sam suddenly started to sing along with her.
“How’d you learn how to harmonize?” she asked him.
“My mom could sing,” Sam said happily, then slipped a glance at her. “I’m sorry.”
“Honey,” Beth told him. “I know she could sing. She had a beautiful voice. I think it’s neat that you do, too.”
“You knew my mother.” It was not a question. “I mean, you knew Cecilia.”
“Sure,” Beth said, her heart quickening. It was the most he’d ever asked of her. “Everybody knew her. She was hot. Cute and talented. I was jealous of her, because she was friends with Aunt Ellen—with my best friend, Ellen.”
“Why?”
“Because Cecil was so…grownup. And I thought Ellen would like her better. She didn’t, though.”
My God, thought Beth, why the hell would I say that?
“Was she nice?”
“She was…everybody was drawn to her. She was like a movie star, sort of.”
“Not to me.”
Beth’s stomach fluttered. Slowly, she thought. Line up. “You mean, she wasn’t nice to you?”
Sam laughed. He laughed! “No, I mean I didn’t think she was like a movie star. She was just my mom. Even when I saw her on TV, when I was little, my dad says I would just go, ‘Oh, there’s Mom.’” Beth tried to laugh, and instead croaked. Oh, help, she thought—“She was just my mom”—oh, help. But Sam went on, “Was my mom…mentally ill, back then?”
Beth winced. “No. She was different….” Beth felt Sam stiffen and tried to backtrack. “Not in a bad way. She was just…an actress.”
“I think sometimes she got mental because of what she did.”
Beth almost swerved, but then recovered the wheel. Was he trying to tell her that he’d been aware, when he was small, that Cecil had stolen him? “Because of what she did? What do you mean?”
“I mean, stealing a kid. I started thinking after I met you guys, maybe she didn’t get mental because I was too…you know, hard for her to handle on her own. She got mental because she did this thing a long time ago.”
“Sam,” Beth said slowly, “you weren’t hard to handle. You were the easiest kid in the world. Ask Dad. And Sarah…your grandma Lockhart said she was sick sometimes even when she was a little girl.”
Sam nodded, and Beth thought, You wanted this, too, didn’t you? Should I go on, risk spoiling what feels delicate and new? But I could lose the moment, too. I’ve lost more than my share.
“Sam, you make me wonder,” Beth said, “if you knew that Cecil wasn’t your…real mom.”
“No. I thought she was.”
“So you mean, you just started thinking about why she got sick since you came back, just this spring.”
“Right. Do you have any other CDs?”
Beth was caught short. “What?”
“Any other ones. Because this one started over. Do you have any old Beatles or something?”
“All I want you to know, Sam, was that it wasn’t…” But he was rummaging in the glove box, virtually holding up a semaphore that signaled “End of Chat.” So Beth found him an Animals disc, and started nattering about Peshtigo, praying to draw him out, get him talking again.
“Do you know what the Great Chicago Fire is?” she asked.
Sam gave her a pitying look. “Uh, yes,” he said.
“Well, did you know that there was an even worse fire, in Peshtigo, in this little town we’re going to, and it was in the same year, in 1871, and on the same day?”
“Get out,” said Sam.
And having snagged him, Beth pulled up next to the fire museum, in an old church just off 41. “We could go in here. It’s cool. There’s all this stuff that was found after the fire, like farm tools all twisted from the heat. They called it ‘the great tornado of fire.’ Want to?”
“Is that what you’re going to take pictures of?”
“No. I was going to take some pictures in this little cemetery down the road, where a lot of people who died in it are buried.”
“Why?”
“Well, I like cemeteries.” Tomorrow, she thought. Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. “And, it’s…you know…it was a great tragedy. Every single building in this whole town burned. Every one.”
“And people…?”
“Hundreds of people died. I mean, you know, lots more than died in the Chicago fire, Sam, but that was a big city, so that was what everybody paid attention to.”
“We could go to the cemetery then.”
“Okay.”
Now, Beth thought, can I remember where it is? She turned the car around—the last time she’d been in Peshtigo had been…when?…in ’91? She’d made pictures for Midwest Living, for a section on historical observances and ghost towns. But she barely recalled that shoot—it was like so many of the things she did the first years after the reunion, a gauzy dream. Today, she could look at whole contact sheets of pictures from those years and have no memory of ever having framed those images in her lens, or laid eyes on the people she must have spoken to and spent time with.
She remembered earlier times in Peshtigo, before Ben was lost, with much more clarity. The town had always been one of Beth’s favorite photographic shrines. Once, newly pregnant with Kerry, she had photographed the graves of a family in the little cemetery outside the museum, where they lay under a huge tree that had long outlived them: Sarah, Beloved Wife; Alvey, Age One; Maria, Age Two; Arthur, Husband and Father. She had lain down on the grass above those bones, and thought—as she used to think, in her newspaper days, every time she made a picture of a stretcher burdened by a blanketed form so small it seemed to have no topography at all, if I feel this entire, if I let this wound me, my own will be spared. I will be absolved, by l
ent and prior pain, from destruction in the first person. The scythe will whicker blindly all around, but miss Vincent, miss Ben.
The memory of the self who actually believed such prevention possible touched Beth today with a kind of abashed pity, like a ten-year-old still believing in Santa Claus.
Wandering with that more innocent Beth, she missed the modest iron arch that marked Rock of Ages, and had to turn around in a farmer’s stupendously green field. She remembered, then, that the incursion of road repairs had forced the moving of the cemetery’s oldest graves up onto a hill more than a block away.
“That’s where I want to go,” she told Sam, “up on the hill. That’s where the people from the fire are.”
She pulled into the cemetery over a graveled rise, parked, and hurriedly began unpacking her equipment. The afternoon was getting old; and the late light, with its low color temperature, its orangeness, was what she wanted for compositions of the rectangular and rounded shapes of the headstones. She took out her little flash unit, for backup, the case with the Hasselblad, a fold-up reflector so new it still felt stiff and funny under her hand.
“What do you want me to take?” Ben asked, and Beth realized it still caught her off guard, how easily, naturally helpful he was—well raised, well bred.
She gave Sam her bag and they began to hike up a narrow, stony path. Beth watched her son, only half-aware of the building drama of the late light. There was a crowned tomb with smaller headstones ringing it like pupils around a teacher’s desk. “Let’s take that,” she told him; and Sam watched her as she squatted, shooting up from the base of the tallest monument.
“What do you see?” Sam asked her.
“What I’m looking at,” Beth said, “is the way the big tombstone sits against the sky, almost like it’s protecting the little ones. Here…” She unlooped the strap from around her neck and put the viewer in front of Sam’s eyes. “See?”