Paddy Plays in Dead Mule Swamp (18 page)

It was a little tricky to supervise
both girls’ projects at the same time, but they were patient. While
I worked with Star, Sunny watched and listened. I demonstrated how
the arrows on the pattern indicated the direction the pieces should
be laid on the fabric, and how to know when an edge should be lined
up with a fold. Shortly after noon, we had both patterns pinned
down. The next step was to cut the pieces out, but I suggested
lunch first. The day was hot and humid, and my head was beginning
to ache. I wasn’t sure I was up for an afternoon of questions and
chatter.

I suggested we had done enough for one
day, and offered to take us all out to eat. The girls were
enthusiastic since they were seldom able to do that. I asked them
to play with Paddy for a few minutes while I changed the dressing
on my arm, and soon we were all in the Jeep, except for Paddy. I
decided he should stay home rather than wait for us in a hot
car.

An idea had been brewing in my mind,
and I decided I might as well see what the girls
thought.

“Would you be interested in going to
Paula’s Place for lunch?” I asked. “We won’t do it if it will upset
you, but maybe it will help you remember that your mom was always
looking for a way to take care of you.”

“I’d like that,” said Star. “It’s so
weird that I’m almost old enough to have that kind of job. It makes
me feel really close to her.”

“Is Paula a real person, or just the
name of the restaurant?” Sunny asked.

“She’s real,” I said. I’ve met
her.”

“Was she a friend of our mom?” Sunny
wound the tail of her t-shirt around her fingers.

“She’s a little older than your mom,
but yes, they were friends. She’d like to meet you. Actually, I
think she knew you when you were babies.”

“Let’s do it!” Star said.

“OK with you?” I asked Sunny. She
nodded, but the big smile she’d had before Angelica had been found
still hadn’t returned. The drive to Waabishki only took about
twenty minutes on the main roads, but by the time we got there the
lunch crowd was thinning and we didn’t have to wait at all for a
booth to open up. The girls took one side, and I sat opposite them.
I noticed Madison was working again today, and she remembered me
too.

“Hi there,” she said cheerfully. “I
see you have friends with you today.”

“I do,” I answered. “I think Paula
would like to meet them, if she has a minute.”

“I’ll tell her,” Madison said, leaving
menus and sweating glasses of ice water on our table. The waitress
sounded less surly and more professional today.

Sunny gulped some of the cold water.
“This is fun,” she began. “Can I order anything I want?”

“Sure.”

“We sometimes get hamburgers, or maybe
soft ice cream, but nothing like this.” A smile teased the corners
of her mouth.

“Silly, we ate out with Dad a couple
of times,” Star said.

“That was a long time ago. I was
little and had to order off the kiddie menu. Hot dogs or grilled
cheese.” Sunny wrinkled her nose.

“I guess you’re right,” Star mused.
“It was at least a couple of years ago.” She sat up straight and
wiggled a finger at Sunny. “You make me feel old!”

Sunny giggled and said, “You are
old.”

I steered the conversation back to the
food. “Better look at the menu. There are sandwiches or big salads,
or you can get a half sandwich with soup and French
fries.”

“I want something I never had before!”
Sunny announced. “What’s Oriental Chicken Salad? Did the chicken
come from China?”

“I doubt that,” I said, “but it’s
good. It has lots of lettuce with cold chicken, and other veggies,
and mandarin oranges on top. I might have that myself.”

“I want the turkey club with bacon,”
said Star. “And a small fruit salad.”

“Can I have a Coke, too?” pleaded
Sunny.

“Of course,” I said.

“This is a lot of money for one meal,”
Star said. She looked worried.

I smiled at her. “It’s a treat today.
Just enjoy it.”

She smiled back at me. The look in her
eyes was very grown up. “Maybe I can pay you back some day,” she
said.

Madison took our orders, and before
she was finished, Paula came and slid in beside me.

“Look at you!” She beamed at the
girls. “I’m so happy to see you again, although I’m sure you don’t
remember me. I’m Paula Wentworth. You must be Star.” She then
turned to the younger girl. “And Sunny.”

“Hello,” the girls said, together,
tentatively. Star continued, more boldly. “Miss Ana says you knew
our mother. What was she like?”

“She had a difficult life, honey.
That’s for sure. I don’t mean any disrespect to your father, but
they were both so young with no real skills. She wanted to find an
honest way to earn enough money to move into a real house, and buy
you two some nice things.”

“Were you her friend?” Sunny
asked.

“She was younger than I am. Not much,
but it always seems like a lot when you are in school. She would
sometimes tell me that she dreamed of having a pretty flower bed,
or decorating a bedroom in pink for you two. As it was, you were
lucky to have a bed instead of a mattress on the floor.”

Star’s face was stony. “We’re not
stupid little kids, you know. We’ve heard a lot of things this
week. Talk about drug dealing. Why would we have to sleep on the
floor if Mom had lots of drug money?”

Paula took a breath. “OK,” she said.
“I’ll be honest. You are old enough to hear the truth. But none of
what I said was a lie. Not at all. Your mom loved you very much. I
think your parents got sucked into the drug culture. Then I think
Angelica woke up and tried to get DuWayne to stop the drug dealing.
But once you’re in that business, it’s really hard to get
out.”

“It must be like trying to change
groups at school,” Star said.

“Yes, but even harder, because there’s
real money involved,” I put in.

Paula continued, “I’m pretty sure, at
some point, she stopped taking the drug money when DuWayne brought
it home, and then they would fight about it.”

“How do you know that?” asked
Sunny.

“I do remember some arguing,” Star
added, looking thoughtful.

“Do you know Frank Garis?” Paula
asked.

“We met him at the memorial service,”
Star said. “You were there, too.” This was news to me, but maybe
Paula had been behind me, and left quickly. I was glad to know she
had made it.

“Frank’s my brother. He and DuWayne
were good friends back then. So I heard some things that other
people might not have.”

“Why would she leave us?” Sunny asked
in an anguished voice, a tear suddenly rolling down her
cheek.

Star looked around and then put an arm
around her younger sister. “Shhh, don’t cry here,” she said
insistently. Sunny sniffed and wiped her cheek.

“She didn’t want to,” Paula said. “The
fact that she was killed proves it. She had no intention of leaving
you, and now you know that for certain. It’s really sad, but you
never have to wonder how much your mom loved you. She always
carried pictures of you. You looked like two little
dolls!”

“Thank you,” Star said. “It’s nice to
know that someone thought our mother was a good person.”

Sunny wiped the back of her hand
across the other cheek and nodded.

“Here comes your food,” Paula said.
“May I give you each a little hug?” She stood up. The girls slid
out of the booth and let themselves be held. “I understand that you
hardly know me, but if you need a friend, or some help, just call
me. You’ve got Ana, too. You’ve had a rough patch, but I know you
are winners, and things are going to get better.”

The girls pulled away and looked at
Paula. Her hug had been just right, not smothering, but just enough
to show them she really cared. I felt confident that Paula was
genuinely concerned for the girls, no matter what her father’s
attitude was.

Paula lifted Sunny’s chin.
“Smile?”

“OK,” Sunny said, and gave her a
lopsided grin.

“You can’t enjoy good food when you
are sad,” Paula said. Madison had been waiting until the hugs were
finished, but as the girls sat down again she placed the plates in
front of us and then laid the check on the table beside me. Paula
scooped it up and said, “This is on the house.” She winked at Star,
who smiled back.

The food smelled delicious. We dug in,
and the taste was no disappointment either.

Chapter 27

My body still ached from the tumble
down the gravel embankment, but I felt as if I wasn’t giving the
girls enough attention, and I didn’t want to take them right home
after such a serious conversation. The ibuprofen had helped a lot.
Much to my own surprise I heard myself say, “Since the meal was
free, why don’t we spend the money to go canoeing.”

Both girls perked up. “I want to do
that!” Sunny was now grinning for real. “Where can we
go?”

“There are canoes to rent at Turtle
Lake,” I explained. “It can’t be too much for an hour.”

“What about Paddy?” Star
asked.

“He’ll be fine at home for that long.
He’d be no use in a small boat anyway, so this is a perfect day to
do it. And it’s so hot; it will feel good to be on the
water.”

After we finished eating, we drove
down Kirtland Road, and the turnoff to the boat livery was well
marked. I wasn’t sure how we were going to manage with three
people, but the young woman, probably a college student, operating
the rental booth suggested Star take a kayak, and that Sunny and I
could use a canoe. “That way you can all paddle,” she
explained.

She looked askance at my bandaged
arm.

“It’s just a scrape,” I assured
her.

We took off our shoes, donned life
jackets and with some help from the girl managed to get the boats
into the water from the sandy beach without getting completely
soaked.

“I’m thinking some of you are
novices,” she said.

I wasn’t, and turned the canoe just
enough so I could see the girl on the shore. However, for the sake
of Star and Sunny I simply said, “That’s true enough.”

“It’s an easy paddle to this side of
the island. See the dock?” She pointed, and I nodded. “You can
disembark there for a few minutes to stretch your legs, and then
paddle back. Just remember to tie up the boats, or pull them onto
the beach, so they don’t float off.”

“We will,” I said.

“I don’t recommend going too far that
way.” Now she pointed to the north side of the island. There’s a
current where the river flows through the lake, and although it’s
not really dangerous, it’s tricky unless you are
experienced.”

That made me think of the drag marks
I’d seen on my beach, and of the dock site at the abandoned house.
“Could someone paddle down the river, if they put in below the
dam?” I asked.

“In theory, sure. But I don’t know if
there are a lot of trees fallen across the water, or what the
current is like, or even what the depth is. Unless boaters keep a
river open it tends to become unnavigable because of snags.
Fishermen might clear it, though. Why?”

“I own some river property,” I
answered vaguely.

“Hurry up, I’m getting hot,” Sunny
said, and she splashed me with the paddle. I grinned. The
fun-loving sunbeam was coming back.

We paddled out across the lake, and
Star showed considerable skill at navigating the kayak. I suspected
she might be a natural athlete. We easily made it to the island,
and explored the shore, picking up colored stones and snail shells
for a while before it was time to head back.

Despite my sore muscles, the exercise
felt good, and there was a lot more splashing and laughing before
we returned to the canoe livery a little less than an hour
later.

The towels I now kept in the car came
in handy again, and I was relieved that I could return the girls
home this week without having experienced any traumatic events.
Soon we were in the Jeep and headed back toward the Leonards’
home.

It seemed impossible that it was only
a week earlier that their mother had been found. Except for
identification, the official autopsy wasn’t even complete. I was
sure Adele would have called me if the Sheriff’s Office had
released any information and discussed it over the radio. She kept
a police scanner in the store office.

“This was so much fun, Miss Ana!”
Sunny broke into my thoughts.

“Why are you doing all this for us?”
Star asked. “I mean, I’m having a great time, and I’m glad we’re
making some school clothes, but you hardly know us,
really.”

I looked at her, and she
was giving me that same cold look she had given Paula. This week
had taken a toll on both girls, but in different ways. “Hmmm. I’m
not sure I can explain it completely,” I began. “When I first met
you, it’s true I came to your house because the church assigned me
to get to know you. But then we began to have fun together. That
was all real. It
is
real.”