A Wild Red Rose (24 page)

Her cousin Chelsea gave similar testimony, only having no Clint in her life or layers of tough hide built up over the years, broke down and cried on the verge of hysteria. If possible, her story was worse. At home and handy, the blonde woman who so resembled her mother got no trips abroad, only promises that Dewey would tell Anna what Chelsea begged him to do to her. If that failed and his daughter seemed to waver toward confession, he hinted that her mother might have a fatal accident so the two of them could be alone together forever. She had no idea he’d move on as she matured.

Against the advice of his attorney, Dewey wanted to tell his side. His perversion went so deep, he perceived his actions as normal and easily explained. Mounting to the witness box, he swore to tell the truth—as he saw it. The lawyer made sure his client appeared well-dressed, nicely groomed, and completely sober, a tidy disguise for a scrawny and disgusting middle-aged man, a retro-vision of the man Dewey had once been before paying life’s tolls for heavy drinking and his secret debauchery of girls.

“See here,” Dewey began. “I want to set the record straight. I never molested any child. These here girls all bled before I touched them. That’s nature’s sign they are women and not children anymore, the getting of their period. In a lot of cultures, they’d be ready for marriage. All I did was train them for that. Their husbands should thank me one day.”

Clint surged to his feet. In the row behind him, Bodey Landrum set hands on his shoulders to push him down again, but Clint shook him off as easily as a bull did even such a skilled rider. He took a few steps before a huge bailiff got in his way, and he lowered his head as if he’d butt the man in the gut to get at Dewey. Calmly, the officer of the court asked him to return to his seat. That didn’t really change his mind about vaulting the barrier between him and Dewey and beating this terrible man to a pulp again, but Renee’s hand on his arm and a soft request to stay by her side did. Clint settled against her, hip to hip with the babies in her belly kicking against his side, but she felt his pulse racing beneath her fingertips.

Her uncle pointed a finger in their direction. “See there now, that’s the guy who beat me up. Broke two of my teeth.” Dewey showed the unrepaired damage of his ragged dentition to the jury. The female members turned their heads away. “Stove in some ribs, too. He’s the one should be on trial.”

Ex-Aunt Anna stood with a fist raised in the air as if to make herself appear taller and more noticeable. “Liar! I kicked your ribs in Dewey, and you know it. Give me credit for something.”

“I was married to that woman. She got a mean temper. You see why I turned to my daughter for comfort, don’t you?” Dewey turned to the jury for sympathy. Even the men looked in another direction. His attorney buried his face in his nicely manicured hands.

Not a stupid person considering what he’d gotten away with for years, Dewey noted their reaction and changed his tact. “See, I got a condition. It’s called hebephilia. Now ain’t that a mouthful? It means I have a yen for girls who just became women, you know, around eleven. That’s what the shrinks tell me. I’m pretty much done with the gals around sixteen when it becomes ephebophilia, except for the redhead over there. She kept coming back for more Dewey years past that age. Really, I only need court-ordered therapy, not a jail sentence.”

He kept an eye on Clint who stirred in his seat, but gave the jury an ingratiating broken-toothed grin that failed to charm, so he returned to his first weird defense. “Like I was saying, I trained those girls good. Always used a condom till I got them on the pill and never gave a one of them any diseases. I kept away the boys who might have knocked them up. Like my niece, Renee. Her feller put her in a family way long before they got hitched. Thought I taught her how to avoid that, but she turned into a real slut, not like my other pretty girls who still remember Dewey’s lessons.”

A woman seated near Anna with the other two witnesses, her dark-eyed, wounded daughters, began cursing in Spanish and spit on the courtroom floor. Clint bolted to his feet again. This time Bodey locked his arms around his friend, not to save Dewey but to protect the bullfighter from arrest.

Chelsea began to scream, “Yes, I remember your lessons—so well sex repels me. I’ll never have a normal life, never!”

The gavel pounded. “Clear the spectators, bailiff. Whatever anyone thinks of the accused, I will not have pandemonium in my courtroom.” Despite her words, the judge, a woman, looked at the victims with compassion on her face. “The law will deal with him.”

It did. The verdict came in guilty, very guilty, after only a half hour of deliberation. The judge assigned the maximum sentence on their recommendation, adding years for each of the four known victims. If Dewey ever got parole, he’d be a doddering old man wearing diapers by the time he got out.

“I’m glad this is over,” Renee said as they walked from the courthouse. The November air cooled her skin, and she hoped Clint’s temper. “I despise what he did to me, but I hate what he did to you in there, Clint. You would have killed him if he’d gotten off.”

“I can’t deny it.”

“If I turned you into a murderer, I couldn’t live with myself anymore.”

“It would have been Dewey who did that, not you, Renee. Never blame yourself again for any of this.”

“Hell, I’d have helped you hide the body,” Bodey said. Having no wish to expose Eve to this lurid trial, he’d left his own pregnant wife at home. “Let’s vamoose and tell the ladies waiting at home the good news that Dewey won’t be around anymore.”

“As long as he’s locked up, I’ll get over it like the bulls that lose all their fury once the rodeo is done. But, that pervert does deserve to die,” Clint said, meaning every word.

****

Others agreed. Uncle Dewey didn’t thrive in the penal system. Nor did he serve out his sentence. An inmate shived him the shower in the most trite of prison deaths. The warden personally called Chelsea to express his regrets about not being able to protect her father and to ask what she wanted done with his body.

She gave a short answer. “Cremate it. I’ll come to get the ashes.”

Chelsea asked Renee to ride along the day she received the cremains of her father stashed in a plain cardboard box. Clint spoke out against it, but Renee insisted on honoring the request. Just the two of them would go together and see Dewey to his end.

“She’s not strong like me. She doesn’t have a person like you in her life. I can do this for her, help her gain all that closure my therapist always talks about. For me, the circle is almost completed. Let me see it through to the end,” she argued.

He let his wife go with reluctance. She held Chelsea’s hand as the warden presented the box and again expressed his condolences.

“I don’t need kind words. Just tell me exactly how he died,” Chelsea insisted.

The head of the prison, an older man, had the demeanor of a kindly grandfather despite his high-ranking position in the prison system. Known for being compassionate, he never let a prisoner walk that last mile alone. “You really don’t want to know that, Miss. Better you remember your father as he was.”

“I want to hear every detail.” Eyes hard as blue pebbles reinforced her words.

“Okay, then. Cons don’t take to child molesters. They raped him with a broomstick before stabbing him in the gut and trying to saw off his genitals with a piece of sharpened plastic. He didn’t die right away, lived long enough to know he’d been mutilated. Lots of internal damage carried him off in a few hours. We did do our best to save him and find the culprits. No one talked.”

“I appreciate your telling me, Warden,” Chelsea replied with a soft voice and perfect good manners. She stood, shook his hand, and exited with the small brown box tucked in her capacious handbag.

Back in the car, she turned to Renee. “Maybe now I can sleep at night knowing he’ll never creep into my bedroom again. I’m glad he suffered.”

Renee couldn’t say she grieved for Uncle Dewey, but the manner of his death shook her a little. Loving Clint Beck made his wild red rose grow back with fewer thorns. “Chelsea, call if you want to talk. Only I can totally understand. What will you do with the ashes?”

“Pull over at the next gas station.”

“We don’t need to fill up yet.”

“I’ll only be a minute.”

Presuming a rest stop, Renee steered into the first station off the interstate. Well, these days she could always use a bathroom. A six months, the babies enjoyed bouncing on her bladder. Chelsea got out lugging her heavy purse, but didn’t veer toward the restrooms. She made her way to a dumpster with Renee following, raised the lid, and chucked the brown box full of ashes into the bin among the used menstrual pads from the ladies room, half-eaten sausage sandwiches, and a multitude of flies. The heavy lid clanged down like iron being forged into a chain link.

“Garbage,” her cousin said. “Just garbage, and this is where he belongs.”

Renee didn’t disagree, though she would have used the word, “Closure.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Renee Beck, big as a cattle barn, knew she made Clint’s entire family nervous. They’d given her the end seat in their box at the Heart of Texas Coliseum in Waco so she could overflow into the aisle and get up easily for bathroom breaks. That hadn’t been necessary as she’d been sucking only the ice chips in her drink since their arrival at the Texas Circuit Finals Rodeo. Renee knew she had been willful about coming along for Clint’s last performance as a bullfighter, but they’d wanted to leave her safely behind in San Antonio. She wasn’t going to miss his big moment, not for anything.

Clint took her to Texas for Christmas despite the reservations Dr. Maddox had about late term travel. The flight in the corporate jet had been swift and smooth. Forgiving Gunter Beck was tougher. Standing stiffly before a roaring fire in the living room, her father-in-law officially burned the last of the prenuptial copies and gave her a brief and formal hug as a welcome to the family. Lena Beck kissed her husband and ran her be-ringed fingers through his white hair—welcoming him back into the family, too.

The next night on Christmas Eve, a party very like the one Renee imagined on her last visit to Hacienda Hidalgo followed a trip to Mass. Candelaria lined the drive upon their return. Guests, drinks in hand, swarmed the inner and outer courtyards with tiny white lights illuminating their way among swathes of red, pink, and white poinsettias. A mariachi band played outside in the clear, chilly air. The inner courtyard with its adobe walls radiated the warmth of the day and retained the heat of the outdoor kitchen stocked with cast iron kettles of Beck products. The vast dining room table with all its candelabra lit held an array of foods from Lena’s recipes.

Clint’s sisters and his seven nieces and nephews plied her with tidbits, though at this point Renee had to admit she couldn’t hold very much of anything, not food or fluids. She stayed in the rocker by the fire and admired the tall Christmas tree with its interesting combination of antique German ornaments and colorful Mexican decorations of pressed tin and straw since everyone seemed to fear she’d drop those babies right out on the floor if she moved. Guests came to her to be introduced to Clinton’s new and very pregnant wife.

They spent Christmas as a quiet family day. Clint presented his wife once more with the Zuni parure, hers to keep forever, and a platinum wedding band with a channel of deep, green emeralds. A big Christmas dinner followed, then afternoon naps for the elderly and expectant. Grandchildren ranging in age from eight to fifteen ran amok everywhere. When Clint came to the quiet bedroom wing and laid down beside her, his hand on her belly, his babies kicking inside, Renee slept peacefully during a holiday where no Uncle Dewey prowled the halls seeking the moment when he could molest his niece.

On New Year’s Eve, Gunter Beck brought his daughter-in-law a flute of ginger ale to toast the coming year. He clinked his glass against hers and said, “
Prost
Neujahr
”, then looking at her belly, “
Zum Wohle!”—
Happy New Year and To your Health—old German sayings that passed down in his family. The severe old man smiled when she repeated the words after him.

All cordiality between them vanished the next day when Renee announced she would attend Clint’s last bullfighting performance in Waco and his induction into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame with the rest of the family. Gunter Beck grew red in the face and rocked back on his heels.

“Stay here and rest. You should not be gadding about when you are so—so…”

“Huge? Go ahead and say it. That won’t keep me from going. I’ll rent a car and come after you if I must,” and she stamped her foot.

Clint and Lena gasped as if her action would bring on labor that very moment. It hadn’t. Noreen once commented that Renee must have inherited the child-carrying ability of the legendary Ramona Niles who had given birth to twelve, including one set of twins, with no trouble at all. Renee’s twin pregnancy had been free of problems, and she wanted to see Clint perform if she had to hitchhike to Waco. In the end, the Becks rented a limousine, and they’d gone in style and comfort.

Renee experienced the first labor pain just past Austin. After that, the pangs came irregularly and without any agony. Nothing to worry about. They would probably stop soon. The pains didn’t cease. They increased as she climbed to the box. By the time Clint performed, and the camera switched to his family after he’d jumped the bull in three different ways, she had to paste a brilliant smile on her face to disguise her clenched teeth. Wearing darkest green and the Zuni parure, she surely looked like a gigantic black hole in the universe surrounded by glittering stars on that big screen. Lena assured her she had a radiant glow. Liar, sweet liar.

His post-performance interview seemed endless. Clint waved for her come join him. Nice that he wasn’t ashamed of her size, but oh, the agony of getting down those stairs to reach his side. She’d stayed there, tucked under his arm and grinning like a politician’s wife until the commentator moved away.

Through gritted teeth, Renee said, “Clint, the babies are coming.”