The Shape of Mercy (29 page)

A
t first I didn’t know what to do. After several frustrating moments in my car, I decided I should at least leave a message for Professor Turrell.

I wrote a quick note telling him I had been unable to get the copy of the transcription that day but I would try again and let him know as soon as I had it. I tacked it to his office door.

Then I pondered whether or not I should buy a new thumb drive, go back to Abigail’s, tell her I wanted to fix a few things in the transcription, and copy it again. But if she had already seen my note, she knew I’d left the next move up to her. And if
she
took the thumb drive, there was no way I could go back there and pretend she hadn’t.

But I didn’t think Abigail had taken it. I was pretty sure it was Esperanza.

She came into the library as I tossed the thumb drive into my purse. Esperanza had seen me put it in there, had told me Abigail wanted to meet with me, and then stood at the door to the library instead of showing me out to the patio. As soon as I was in the dining room, she must have walked over to my purse and taken the thumb drive.

But why?

Esperanza had never read the diary. She didn’t like it. Didn’t like what it stood for.

And yet she had taken the thumb drive.

I couldn’t go back to Abigail’s, but I could try to find Esperanza.

It wasn’t hard to locate Esperanzas address. I remembered her last name, and she had given me her husbands name on the patio: Arturo. There was only one Arturo De Salvo in the Santa Barbara phone book.

Her condo was easy to find too. Perched on a hill within a couple blocks of the ocean, Esperanza and Arturo lived in a rather stylish town-house. Small, but nicely landscaped and well cared for.

I rang her doorbell and prayed silently for wisdom. I didn’t want to say anything I would regret.

When the door opened and Esperanza saw me through the screen door, her eyes grew wide and she said something in Spanish.

“Hello, Esperanza.”

“Why are you here? Something happen to Miss Abigail?”

“No. Nothing’s happened to Abigail.”

The look of panic fell away but her eyes were still wide. “Then why are you here?”

“I think you may have something that belongs to me,” I said as nicely as I could.

Esperanza just looked at me through the screen.

“Please, Esperanza. I need it for school. It has assignments on it.” That was partly true. I did need it for school, but I didn’t have any current assignments saved on it.

“I don’t have it,” she said simply.

“I think you do.”

“No, I don’t. I gave it to Abigail. Before she came out to you on the patio.”

“Why did you do that?” I didn’t try to hide my frustration.

“Because the diary is hers. You can’t take a copy for you. And I know that’s what you did with that little silver thing. You can’t do that.”

“That little silver thing is mine!”

“But the diary is Miss Abigail’s. You can’t take it. Abigail has been very good to me and my family for many years. She bought for me and Arturo this lovely house. She helped send our children to college. She pays for Arturo’s insulin. There is nothing I wouldn’t do for her. I take care of her like she takes care of me. That is why I took it.”

I sighed. “I wasn’t going to do anything with it.”

“Then you can ask her for it yourself. Ask her for copy. Don’t just take it.”

Esperanza was right. I should have asked. Abigail might have said yes. Not now of course, but before the argument on the patio, she might have.

“Is that why you were trying to get my attention this morning, when Abigail told you to go home?” I asked.

“No. I didn’t think she should be left alone. I didn’t know how long you’d be staying.”

“What do you mean?”

Esperanza hesitated a moment and then swung open the screen door. “You want to come in?”

I stepped inside.

Esperanza’s living room was decorated in bright oranges and greens, and tiled in soft beige. Lingering aromas of cumin and garlic wafted around the room. “Please, sit down,” she said.

I took a seat on an ivory-hued sofa. Esperanza sat next to me.

“I’m worried about Abigail,” she said. “She came home early from Maine, she looks very tired, and I think she had to give Graham more money. I think maybe he’s in over his head. I don’t know. But she’s not herself these days.”

“Do you know why she came home early?”

“No. She didn’t tell me. But I think she left because they argued. They don’t get along, those two. They never have.”

Guilt crept across me. I had seen how sad Abigail looked when she
walked out onto the patio. I’d been too mad to consider showing her any compassion, too sure she had purposely misled me. And then I had accused her of lying to me while she probably had my thumb drive in her pocket, a stolen copy of her diary tucked in its memory.

“Should I go back over there?” I asked Esperanza.

“I think maybe I should.”

“I want to come with you. I … I owe Abigail an apology.”

She shrugged. “I guess you can come with me. I’ll tell Arturo where I’m going.”

Esperanza was only gone a moment or two.

“Let me drive,” I said. “I don’t mind bringing you back here later.”

Esperanza nodded, and we started for the front door.

“Why does Abigail feel like she has such an obligation to take care of Graham financially?” I asked. “Is he ill?”

Esperanza held the door open for me. “Graham is not ill. Graham is addicted. To money and gambling.”

“And Abigail feels obligated to bail him out? Every time?”

“If he were my son, I would not do for him what she has done. She gives him too much. He takes advantage of her.”

We walked across carefully laid paving stones to my car.

“Did Abigail promise Dorothea she’d take care of him or something?” I asked.

Esperanza stopped and looked at me. “Dorothea?”

Her surprised look startled me. “Isn’t Graham her cousin Dorothea’s son?

Esperanza tossed her head back. “Ay yi yi. I thought you knew. Graham is hers. Graham is her son.”

“Her son?” I gasped.

Esperanza looked off toward the ocean, probably wondering how much she should say. Then she turned to me. “She married a man long after the gardener’s son moved away. His name was Edward Swift and he
had a boy named Graham. Mama told me Abigail was quite a bit older than Edward. His wife had died in childbirth. Abigail adopted Graham and they lived in the Santa Barbara house with Mr. Boyles. Edward and her father argued about everything. My mother told me Abigail tried to make the marriage work but she didn’t really love Edward. Edward loved the money, but I don’t think he loved Abigail. He had some money of his own when they married, but he lost it. I don’t know how. A bad investment of some kind. Graham was
un mocoso
—a brat. I remember him. He was older than me and I was afraid of him. And Edward had other women. Many, I hear. The marriage did not last. Mr. Boyles had made Edward sign an agreement—what is it called?”

“A prenuptial agreement?”

“Sí. So Edward, he got none of Abigail’s money. But Abigail had adopted that little boy, and you don’t divorce a child. Edward found a new rich lady to take him in, but Abigail, she’s been paying for Graham ever since.”

We resumed walking to my car. “That’s such a sad story.”

“This is why she tells me, she tells you, she wishes she had married the gardener’s son. Even if it would have been hard, even if she had to move, even if she lost her rich friends. At least she would have love. And love you can’t put price on, no? No price for it.”

“Would she really have lost all her rich friends? Would she really have had to move?” I asked. Were people in her circle of friends that shallow?

“Maybe. I don’t know. My mama said it would have been very hard. But my mama could see he loved her. And Abigail seemed fond of him. But I guess she didn’t love him enough.”

“Why would it have been so hard? Just because Abigail had money?”

Esperanza frowned at me and huffed. “I told you this wasn’t about money!”

“Well, what was it about?” I felt like I had been sent to the corner.

“The gardener’s son was Japanese. They fell in love during World War II,
comprende?
But after Pearl Harbor the gardener and his son were sent to an internment camp, even though they had had both been born in California, in San Francisco. No one trusted Japanese Americans then. My mama told me Miss Abigail decided she could not bear, the stig … What is word? Stig …”

I closed my eyes. “Stigma.”

“Stigma, sí. She let him go. She turned him down. And then she never found another man who loved her like he did. The gardener’s son had done nothing wrong. Nothing. But he was Japanese. Now
that
is a sad story.”

We stood at my car, but neither one of us got in.

“After the war, did she see him again?” I asked, though I think I knew already Abigail hadn’t.

“I don’t know. My mama didn’t think so. Abigail was alone in that house with her father for twenty years before she met Edward. I think she had given up on marriage. Then Edward came along and, ay yi yi, nothing but trouble.”

“So Abigail doesn’t know what became of the gardener’s son?”

“I don’t think so.”

Such a wasted life. No wonder reading the diary was too painful for Abigail. Mercy’s life had been wasted too, but in a completely different way.

“What was his name?” I asked. “Do you know?”

“How come you want to know?” I shrugged.

“I don’t know.”

“Give me your cell phone.”

I handed it to her across the car. Esperanza punched in a few numbers and a few seconds later began speaking in rapid Spanish. I understood only a few words. Mama, Abigail,
novio.
Boyfriend. She hung up and handed the phone back to me.

“Mama remembered his name. It was Tomoharu Kimura. Miss Abigail called him Tom.”

A few minutes later, we were at Abigail’s front door, letting ourselves in.

“I’ll go see if she is sleeping. You wait, okay?” Esperanza took the stairs.

I wandered into the library and saw that Abigail had removed the box that held the diary. She must have put it away.

The laptop was gone too.

That surprised me. The transcription hadn’t been proofed yet. I had only just finished it. It was probably littered with typos and grammatical mistakes.

A tiny sliver of fear worked its way through my body as I stood there looking at the empty writing desk. No diary. No laptop.

And no thumb drive.

Abigail what have you done?

I heard hurried footsteps on the stairs. A moment later, Esperanza appeared at the doorway to the library and confirmed what I suddenly knew was true.

Abigail had gone.

She had taken the laptop and the diary.

And left not so much as a sticky note telling us where she had gone.

T
here was nothing I could do but go to class the next day and see if Esperanza called to tell me Abigail had returned.

She didn’t call.

I felt like I had been robbed. The diary wasn’t mine, and technically I had finished the work I was hired to do. Abigail owed me a bit of money, but that was all. She didn’t owe me anything else.