Vivi said, “It also doesn’t help that in over two hours, we found only eight people to talk to. And not one lead.”
Teensy voiced everyone’s frustration when she said, “If this were forty—even thirty—years ago, we would have already talked to fifty people by now. And they wouldn’t be acting as if we were walking up to mug them either.”
It was Caro who spotted the maintenance man in the shadows next to the First Baptist Church. No one else saw him, and she announced her observation in typical Caro fashion. Without uttering a word, she snapped the fingers of her left hand at Teensy and then pointed toward the church. Then she went back to studying the map, wearing her prescription wraparound sunglasses, with the little clear oxygen tube just below her nose.
Teensy pulled to the curb. Vivi got out and marched purposefully across the lawn to talk to the old man clipping the hedge in the shadows. Vivi guessed him to be in his late seventies, but wasn’t sure. His gray work shirt and pants looked like they had probably fit him long ago but now just hung loosely on his skinny frame. He wore a red stocking hat, and had a café-au-lait-colored face. His old work clothes were clean and pressed.
Vivi started in with her questioning routine, which she had down pat by this point.
“Excuse me, sir, I hate to bother you, but—”
“That the new Saab convertible I seen on the TV?” he asked.
The old man didn’t really look at Vivi, but he scratched his chin slowly for a good long while and looked out toward Teensy’s car.
Vivi did not really get the impression he was asking her. She stifled the urge to grab his hedge clippers and snip at his toes, yelling, “Dance! Dance!” She quickly snapped out of her little fantasy and added: “This is really very urgent. It could be a matter of life and death.”
He said, “Yeah, I seen something a little unusual yesterday.
“What I seen was a white woman pull over in front of the church. She done got out of her car holding a little girl, then walked around the car to the passenger’s side. She hold that baby up high in the sunlight for a long moment and then open the side door. Then she strap that baby in a car seat and done drove off. I ask myself why she stop right here in front of the church like that, all sudden-like.”
Vivi’s hands were shaking as she wrote down the make of the car and the description of the woman. She asked him about the license plate.
“My eyesight not good enough no more to see no license number.”
“Well, can you remember anything, anything at all? A little girl has been kidnapped, and we have to find her.”
“Lady, just how many white Mazdas with a dent on the front fender be in this town? The lady be heavy-like, with brown hair, and the baby be fair as can be. My eyesight might be fading, but I tell you that car was a Mazda, musta’ been ten, twelve years old. My nephew drive a Mazda. I know my Mazdas. Ain’t give him nothing but trouble. I know my Mazdas.”
“Thank you, sir,” Vivi said.
“God bless you and that baby child,” the man said, turning back to his yard work.
Viviane Walker headed back to the car, waving her tablet in the air, running as fast as any sixty-eight-year-old had ever moved across that church lawn.
They drove straight to the police station with the information.
“Thank you, ladies,” the detective said, after making them wait for almost an hour, during which they took turns raging. “We appreciate your citizenly behavior, but the professionals have the situation fully under control. And you can trust that Judge Ogden is watch-dogging the investigation carefully. I’ll pass this information down the appropriate channels. Why don’t yall go on home now, leave it to the trained professionals?”
They drove over one more block, and Caro stayed in the car as Teensy and Vivi rushed up the steps of the courthouse toward George’s office. A starched young male secretary in the outer office told them that he understood that they were personal friends of Judge Ogden, but the judge could not possibly be disturbed.
Vivi whipped out the Zippo cigarette lighter she had carried in her purse since 1944. “If George Ogden does not come through that door in thirty seconds to have a word with Vivi Abbott Walker, I will light his tasteful reception area on fire.” The young man just stood there with his mouth hanging open, so Vivi ignited a few of the silk leaves on the fake ficus tree for dramatic effect.
Vivi was shown into George’s office, and she stood in front of Necie’s furious, red-faced husband. “George, you and I have not always seen eye to eye on many issues, to say the goddamn least. But I think I can say that we have always acknowledged each other’s intelligence.”
She then recited the facts as the Ya-Yas knew them. To his credit, George Ogden ran with them.
The SWAT team broke down the door of Edythe Spevey’s apartment on the third morning after the child disappeared. They went in with riot gear and Kevlar vests and guns at the ready.
What they found was a clean apartment that smelled like homemade applesauce. The windows had lace curtains, and the kitchen floor had been recently waxed. What they found was an overweight woman with a pale complexion, thick glasses, and a rather large nose playing with a blond-haired baby girl on a blanket on the carpet. The child was spotlessly clean, and she was surrounded by new toys. Rosalyn cried when she was taken away from Edythe by the policeman with the headgear on. He terrified the baby.
Necie Ogden was the one who single-handedly pushed to have Edythe put in Central Louisiana State Mental Hospital for observation, rather than putting her on trial for kidnapping as George had insisted. Necie had defied her husband few times in her life, but they had been important times. “George,” she had insisted, “God has been merciful to us. Not a hair on Rosalyn’s head was damaged. We should show mercy as well.”
The Ya-Yas had been at Necie’s side almost the entire time. They had cooked food, prayed, manned the telephones, and organized the flyer distribution. They had loved her the best they could. When the hearing and everything was over, Necie collapsed into the arms of Vivi and Teensy. Caro sat in a chair nearby, holding Necie’s hand. Necie began to sob.
“Don’t worry, I’m crying from relief,” she told her girlfriends of more than half a century. “But it’s so sad! That young woman Edythe was in my charge at one time. She was in Troop 55. You remember, Vivi. Edythe Spevey was there when I backed the station wagon into the telephone pole during the Girl Scout campout. Was there something I should have done for her? Were there signs back then that she needed help?”
“Please,” Vivi said. “Don’t carry that cross, Denise. That child was a weirdo back then, and I knew it. Her mother was a weirdo in high school, and that daughter didn’t fall far from the tree. Just thank God and the Holy Lady that we got Rosalyn back. Just be grateful your daughter did not crack up during the three days she waited, not knowing what was happening to her only daughter. Just pray that Edythe doesn’t get loose and do it again.”
“You did the right thing, Necie,” Caro said. “Edythe will spend the rest of her days in the mental health care system. Which, in the state of Louisiana, might as well be like being imprisoned in the Middle East or something. That woman won’t see the inside of a video store again.”
Teensy sighed. “You’re right, Necie. It is sad. It is nothing but sad.”
For a while, the entire extended Ya-Ya tribe was paralyzed with fear. With each passing day, though, each of them found a way out of the fear that had been injected into their lives like poison. All except Joanie.
She refused to leave the house, even to go grocery shopping. Necie and Grove brought everything in. Joanie held on to Rosalyn, who was not allowed out of her sight—was barely allowed out of her arms. She grew obsessed with having the most sophisticated surveillance system available installed in their home. Rosalyn was not allowed to go to day care. Lee-Lee Walker was allowed to come over and play, but that was it. Grove stayed home from his law office for almost two weeks, but eventually he had to get back to work. Then Nec
ie came over daily, and when Joanie had to do something within the house, Necie held her granddaughter and crooned old Harry James tunes and saw that the child had a ring of protection around her. When Joanie was out of the room long enough, Necie encouraged the child to romp on her own, although Joanie had forbidden anyone to let Rosalyn even play outside.
Her prayer life stronger than ever, Necie’s own terror dissolved far faster than her daughter’s. Necie did not feel they were truly safe, however, until she started visiting Edythe at the mental institution. She prayed for a miracle: for the ability to see through Edythe’s actions to the innocence within her. When she learned that Myrtis was at Harmony Home with no one to visit her, Necie’s volunteer hours increased. She saw not only how lonely Edythe was, but how confined Myrtis was—confined in her scrambled brain, confined in a nursing home where she rarely saw the light of day. She began to visit each of them regularly. Then she forgave. And with forgiveness came peace.
The other Ya-Yas weren’t so sure. Necie was too good-hearted, or even “downright naive.” Sometimes they agreed with George: the Spevey woman should have been locked up at St. Gabriel Women’s Prison in South Louisiana, and never let out.
One day when Necie visited Edythe at the hospital, she decided to bring Edythe a baby doll. “Here’s your baby, Edythe,” Necie said. “She’s been waiting for her mama.”
Edythe’s entire body changed. The tight, deep wrinkles between her eyebrows relaxed; her whole face opened up and her eyes shone; her chest swelled under her pink flannel nightgown. Tears filled Necie’s eyes as she witnessed Edythe’s rapture and joyful obsession with the baby doll. She watched as Edythe kissed the doll’s forehead and then closed her eyes, pressing the baby doll tenderly to her breast. Necie’s heart broke as she watched Edythe slowly open her eyes and begin to stroke the doll’s hair. Every finger of Edythe’s hand spoke of peace, spoke of completeness.
There are mysteries in this world I will never understand, Necie thought.
After a while, Edythe began to hum. After a moment of humming, she began to sing.
“Hush little baby, don’t say a word
Mama’s gonna buy you a mockingbird
And if that mockingbird don’t sing,
Mama’s gonna buy you a diamond ring.”
In that moment, Necie saw Edythe as she had been outside the curtains she and Vivi had made from sheets during the Girl Scout campout when Edythe was ten and Joanie a year older. She remembered Edythe wearing an old bathrobe, a hairnet, and those hideous black pointy eyeglasses, like a little old lady. But she also remembered the little girl who loved nature. The little girl who knew the names of plants and butterflies when the other little girls barely even noticed.
Necie’s heart grew ripe. “I’m leaving now, Edythe. I know you’ll take good care of your baby.”
“I’ll take good care of my baby, oh yes ma’am I will,” Edythe said. “I will place a crown of stars upon her head. She is my little daughter of God.”
Necie sat in the parking lot of the mental hospital for a long time before she drove home. She thought of things she had done that no one knew about, not even the Ya-Yas, not as far as she could tell. She thought about how tangled the mind can get. She thought of the Blessed Virgin, who must have held her baby tenderly. Was Mary really aware of what would happen to her Savior Son? If she was, how was it that her heart did not burst from pain in that first moment the Angel Gabriel appeared to her? If we knew the suffering ahead, Necie thought, we would all jump off the Garnet River Bridge.
Necie thought of currents, deep at the bottom of the river. She thought of her husband, the Republican, the racist. Of how she loved him. Of how she forgave him for what he did not yet know. She thought of her life, of the love that she had possessed and let go of.
I am blessed, she thought. I have seven wonderful children. I did not have to long for a baby girl. I did not have to steal one. I have stolen other things, though. Haven’t we all? There are no stones to throw here. I have no stones in my hand.
A Bountiful Garden
SAFETY
November 1994
The afternoon that little Rosalyn was kidnapped, Baylor Walker had just returned to his law offices after being in depositions all day. He was tired. Didn’t even know what time it was, but it felt like time for a nap. When Carlene, his secretary, buzzed him to tell him his mother was on the phone, he hesitated before taking the call. Calls from Vivi could exhaust him. They could sometimes make him laugh, but often even the laughter exhausted him. His mother was half elixir, half poison to his system.
He took a deep breath, and took the call on the speaker phone.
“Hey, Gorgeous,” he said. “What’s up?”
“Bay, I need to talk fast. There is a crisis. I’m calling you because I don’t want to be blamed for upsetting Melissa. Joanie’s daughter, Rosalyn, was kidnapped less than ninety minutes ago. I wanted you to know. Where are Lee-Lee, Caitlin, and Jeff?”
Baylor picked up the receiver. “Hold on. Did you say Rosalyn has been kidnapped? Have yall been drinking?”
“No, we have not been drinking. It happened at Video Schmideo. Rosalyn simply disappeared. We’re terrified that something awful has happened. I’m worried about the children. Do you know where Caitlin and Jeff and Lee-Lee are right now? Are they with Melissa?”
Baylor’s voice dropped into its deeper range, his “lawyer” range, the one he’d cultivated in law school, the one he slipped into whenever he was upset and trying hard not to show it.
“Mama, I’m sure the kids are safe with Melissa. Please just calm down. Rosalyn probably wandered into another store. We live in a small town here; kids don’t just get kidnapped like something out of a TV movie. Take a deep breath and say your Rosary. Everything’s going to be okay, you hear?”
“I’ve got to run,” Vivi said. “The Ya-Yas and I have to be with Necie. I love you. Bye.” With that, his mother hung up.
For a moment, he missed her voice, wished she had stayed on the line a bit longer. A wave of anxiety started to rise, but Baylor kept it down. He had to stay calm. Had to take care of his family. He went into the bathroom that was private to his office. Standing in front of the sink, he splashed water over his face, cold as he could stand it. Wake up. You thought your day was winding down, but it has just begun.
Baylor stepped back into his office and grabbed his suit coat off the antique coat stand. Within five minutes he was out the door and in his car, speeding down Jefferson Street. He dared any cop to stop him. There wasn’t a ticket he couldn’t have fixed. He sped down the old brick streets at fifty miles an hour, took a left onto Olive Street on two wheels, and then a right on Twenty-first before screeching to a halt in front of Our Lady of Divine Compassion parochial school, where he thought Melissa would be picking up the twins, Jeff and Caitlin, who were in fourth grade. He scanned the street for Melissa’s white minivan. Jesus! Where was she? He looked at his watch. What was he thinking? It was already 4:45 P.M. His wife would have already picked up the twins and gone home. He reached for the car phone and punched in his home number.
“Walker residence, Jeff Walker speaking,” the boy’s voice said, like Melissa had taught the children to say. Phone manners were everything to Melissa.
“Jeff,” Baylor said, relieved. “You okay?”
“Yessir. I’m doing my history homework. Daddy, did you know that a squirrel used to be able to travel on treetops all the way from Alabama to Maine back in the 1800s? That was before all the trees got—”
“Jeff, where is your sister, Caitlin? Let me speak to Caitlin.”
“Uh, I don’t know where she is, Daddy.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know where she is? Go get her. Put her on the phone.”
“She and Mama are somewhere else.”
“Are they home?” Baylor asked.
“I think so.”
“Jeff, listen to me. Put down the phone and go find your mother and Caitlin and Lee-Lee, too. You hear me?
Go find them right now. This is important. This is no time to mess around.”
“Yessir,” Jeff said, sounding scared.
Baylor started the car and pulled out of the parking spot. He automatically crossed himself as he sped by the church he was raised in. He thought of his guardian angel. He thought of his children’s guardian angels. The concept of a guardian angel was something that he was taught before he even started school, and it was somehow easier for him to grasp than the existence of God. Each of us has an angel assigned to us alone, to take care of us throughout our whole lives. How Sidda told him in secret that she once thought she saw an angel over by the Divine Compassion cafeteria by the azalea bushes.
Angel of God,
my guardian dear,
to whom God’s love commits me here,
ever this day,
be at my side
to light and guard,
to rule and guide.
Amen.
He tried his best to imagine each of his children’s guardian angels. How Lee-Lee’s angel looked different from Jeff ’s. Even though they were twins, Jeff and Caitlin had two completely different angels. Was there such a thing as twin angels? Baylor was amazed at the ocean of Catholicity that flooded his mind. Hah. Laugh. Laugh if you want, he thought. I’ll take whatever help I can get.
As he drove through town, he made a bargain: God, let my children be okay, and I will do whatever you want. Turn my practice into a Legal Aid for the thousands of poor, uneducated black people in Louisiana. No, he knew he would not convert his entire law practice to that. But he vowed that if the children were kept safe, he would work on a sliding scale for any poor person, black or white, who walked into his office. He would make up the difference by working longer hours for clients who could pay well. He already did this from time to time, but he would step it up, make it an office policy. And he’d give up hard liquor. He’d been meaning to anyway. Now he would do it. Beer only from now on. Maybe a little wine. Hell, they gave you wine at Communion now. Yeah, he could still drink wine. He had not been to Mass since last Christmas; he was no devout Catholic. Yet how quickly it all came back in his hour of need.