The Unbidden Truth (17 page)

W
hen Frank bought his house, it was with a vague hope that Barbara would be willing to move in with him, and even as he recognized his never-voiced hope, he had chided himself as a foolish old man. He had known it wasn't going to happen, but still he had hoped. On the few occasions when circumstances made it necessary that she come and stay for a few days, or weeks in this case, he had to remind himself repeatedly to give her room, not ask questions, and above all not to give her any orders. He knew that she would take off if he crossed the line. What he wanted to do that Saturday afternoon was to tell her to light somewhere and relax.

She wanted, or more likely needed, a long walk, but intermittent rain had fallen all morning, and now she was waiting for Sylvia to call, and after that it might be getting dark, or the rain might return. She was upstairs and down repeatedly, and
when up he could hear her pacing in the hall, and when down, she wandered into the living room, dining room, kitchen, around and around.

He heard the doorbell chime and left his study in time to see Alan admitting Darren.

“Hi,” Darren said. “You're still job hunting?”

Alan grinned. “Times are tough.”

“Afternoon,” Frank said, stepping forward into the hall. “Come on in.”

Barbara came downstairs and stopped at the bottom when she saw Darren.

His gaze on her was as searching as it had been when he saw Alan. “Hello again. I'm on a mission,” he said.

He turned to Frank. “Herbert has Carrie and Todd working with him on the basement rec room, and I'm an errand boy. Herbert says you have a big steamer pan of some sort, and he'd like to borrow it. He plans to make molé tomorrow and Carrie's going to make tamales, and you're both invited to share the feast. The steamer is for her to use. You're welcome, too,” he said to Alan.

Alan shook his head. “No, thanks. I have a lot of reading to do.”

Frank glanced at Barbara. She shrugged. “Sure.” She looked at her watch.

“Now I'm off to shop,” Darren said. “I have a long list, and I don't even know what most of the things on it are. Herbert said I have to go to the Kiva for them. He also said my kitchen is piss-poor in the way of ingredients.”

“I'll go with you,” Frank said, glad to have an excuse to get out and leave Barbara to her pacing. “Maybe we can figure it out together. In fact, I'll buy salad makings and add to the feast.”

Belatedly Barbara realized she should make a contribution. “I'll bring a dessert,” she said.

After they left together, Barbara resumed her pacing. “Why doesn't she call?” Barbara muttered to herself, looking at her watch again. “How long does it take to eat lunch?” She went back upstairs.

It was ten minutes after four when the call came. Sylvia's voice was as hushed as it had been before. “Reporting,” she said. “Pamela Costello was there. I couldn't get away. But I have what you need.” She kept her voice almost inaudible and she referred to Nora by initials. The only thing she had not been able to find out was when Nora bought the wig. “She was either evasive or trying to remember,” Sylvia said. “I don't think she suspected anything, though, and then Pamela changed the subject and I thought it wise not to go back there.”

After hanging up, Barbara drew a deep breath. At least she could relax a bit now, since Larry had left early that morning for his fishing trip and he would not be back until the coming Friday. On the other hand, the wig shop was in San Francisco and that was a nuisance.

 

Dinner that Sunday was extraordinary, everyone agreed. Herbert had made duck molé, not turkey, and explained that any time turkey would be good, duck would be better. He went into a long description of how he had cooked two ducks the day before in order to cool them and skim the fat from the broth. “It's the broth that makes it,” he said complacently.

Carrie listened and nodded now and then. Her tamales were equally good, they all said, and she smiled and nodded again. But she kept thinking how weird this dinner was, as if
everyone at the table except her and Todd shared secrets. Darren kept his gaze on Barbara and Barbara's mind was somewhere else much of the time, and when it came back now and then, she said something that might or might not be on the subject. Or on a subject already over with.

Carrie had a feeling that Mr. Holloway and Herbert had already been acquainted when they both pretended to meet for the first time.

And halfway through dinner Morgan began to bark, and Herbert was on his feet and halfway to the door before anyone else even moved. When he came back, he said, “That dang dog, I can't teach him a thing. He's got a brain as big as a flea. Just a car turning in the driveway.”

Carrie laughed derisively. She had watched Herbert make hand signals, and Morgan respond instantly. When she tried the same signals, Morgan simply looked at her with his tongue hanging out and an idiotic dog grin on his face. The way he was trained, it was almost as if Morgan was less a pet than a watchdog. But she had always believed watchdogs were big and fierce, Doberman pinschers or mastiffs or even pit bulls, and Morgan looked like a Raggedy Ann kind of dog. But no one could come onto the property without setting him off.

She saw the quick exchange of glances that passed between Mr. Holloway and Herbert when he came in, and she thought this was how it was when her parents and other adults had shared a secret. There had been strong undercurrents that she had sensed and had not been able to unravel.
When?
She caught in her breath and held it, but the moment was already gone, the memory too fleeting to grasp. Todd began to talk with enthusiasm about ghost towns, and she lost even the feeling that she had almost captured something from her childhood.

Barbara did not want to linger and socialize after they finished a bakery cake she had picked up on the way to Darren's house. “I know it's rude to eat and run,” she said. “It's just that I have some things to get done tonight.” It was less an apology than a statement of fact.

“Let's fix a plate for Alan,” Darren said. “There's a lot left over.”

“The philosopher?” Carrie asked. “He's staying with you?”

“At Dad's house. Out of work, out of luck,” Barbara said. “It's temporary.”

Carrie frowned, glanced at Herbert, then away. Two men crashing with friends? She felt a strange stirring in her stomach and might have asked more, but Herbert was gathering things from the table and talking to Todd, and she remained silent.

“I can reach you at Frank's house?” Darren asked, holding Barbara's coat a few minutes later.

“Yes, for now, at least. It's simpler that way.” And that was less an explanation than a dodge, she knew, but there it was. She did not elaborate, and he did not ask any further questions.

 

Carrie had channel-hopped for a short time, then turned off the TV. She had never had her own television before, and it was now more of a curiosity than a necessity. She rarely found anything of interest on it. She picked up a book, put it down when she realized that nothing she was reading was leaving any impression. She missed her car, she thought then. She wasn't used to being cooped up, having to rely on others to take her shopping, take her to work, to the library. Every time she called about her car it was the same story, they were try
ing to track down a couple of parts, an alternator and a differential something or other.

Thank heavens, she thought, that Herbert had showed up when he did, or she would really be stuck, imprisoned here in this lovely apartment. Her eyes widened, and she gazed about as if seeing her apartment for the first time. Why on earth had Darren furnished it before he finished his own house? Everything up here was brand-new except the piano. She had not considered before how improbable it was for Darren to furnish the apartment so completely. He wanted the rent money, she told herself. She had no idea how much the rent was for the apartment. Her benefactors were covering it, Barbara had said. But why? Why pay for an apartment for a stranger? They should have picked a local girl or woman to help, not a stranger passing through.

And Morgan. The more she considered the dog the more convinced she was that he was really a watchdog, superbly trained to do a job. And Herbert was a puzzle. He could do everything apparently, and the first thing he had done here was put in a security system, and then another one at the restaurant. He hadn't needed any cooking lessons in molé. He was a true master chef. How had he known Mr. Holloway had a steamer?

The vague disquietude she had felt at dinner had returned, and it had grown to an undeniable worry, even a fear. Too many coincidences. Herbert appeared and her car died. Whenever she wanted to go out for anything, he was there to take her. If Morgan barked, he was out like a shot. She had thought it was to make Morgan stop barking. Now she considered another alternative. He was checking on whoever or whatever had roused Morgan. Like a prison guard.

Was Barbara distrustful, afraid she would run away? Carrie shook her head after a moment. She was certain Barbara had not known about the apartment until she returned from a trip and Carrie showed her around. If not to keep her in, then to keep someone else out? Guard her?

She shook her head harder. From what? From whom? She had never seen a criminal run off with the loot. Never witnessed any criminal act of any sort. Petty stuff, yes, but nothing big, nothing major. Nothing to require a bodyguard. She knew nothing about Joe Wenzel's murder. There was no reason anyone on earth would come looking for her.

Unless, she thought, there was something from her forgotten childhood. A chill raced through her, and she jumped up and went to the kitchen to make a cup of tea. She wanted something hot, something sweet. She stood waiting for the kettle to reach a boil. If she had no memories of her own, only those of that other little girl, Carolyn, so be it. She was through running away from them. Always before when those other memories surfaced, there had been a way to escape, to run to another state, another city, another job. No more.

The kettle whistled, startling her. She put a tea bag into a cup and poured in some boiled water. Then, sitting at her table waiting for the tea to steep, she recalled an article she had read about how to train your memory. She had rejected the whole notion at the time, not wanting to remember, afraid of being crazy. She was still terrified of the idea of insanity, but she couldn't run anywhere now. She was imprisoned, and Herbert was either her guard or her protector.

She was surprised by how much of the article she had retained, as if she had put it aside intact until she was ready to use it. If you have a snapshot of something, hold it, examine
it, question it. Where were you? Who was with you? Were you warm, cold? Write it down with every detail you can recall immediately, then work to expand it. What were you wearing? What is beyond your point of view…?

When she started to lift her cup, her hand was shaking, and she said under her breath, “Cut it out! You're a big girl now. Adrienne isn't going to smack you, and you aren't going to the hospital. Get a grip.”

A moment later when she started to pick up her cup, her hand was still shaking. Resolutely she held the cup in both hands, welcoming the warmth, and sipped the tea.

O
n Monday morning Barbara told her crew what Sylvia had learned about the wig, and then she said to Bailey. “Mattie Thorne, Gregory Wenzel's date for the night of the murder. I want you to drive from her house to the Wenzel house at between two-thirty and three in the morning on a Saturday night. Two trips, one sticking to the speed limit, one the way a young man might drive at that time of night. Next Saturday would work. Also, how long it would take to get from her place to the motel that late, and finally time from the motel to the Wenzel house in the middle of the night.”

Bailey's scowl was set as he made more notes. “It won't work,” he said. “Time of death before two. They can pin that down pretty close these days.”

“Just curious,” Barbara said. “Tomorrow I'm off to San Francisco to buy a wig, and it probably will be late when I get back. So you have plenty of time to get stuff for me.”

His look was baleful, but he made no comment.

“You shouldn't be the one to go after the wig,” Shelley said.

“What do you mean?”

“You don't fit the part. No offense, Barbara, but you really don't look like the kind of woman who would spend a couple thousand dollars for a wig. I should do it. And it will take two days at least. There has to be a fitting.”

Barbara shook her head. “You went out and bought a wig in the afternoon less than a year ago. What do you mean a fitting, two days?”

“That was a cheap wig, and you're talking about human hair. Each hair is sewn or tied in place, and then a lining is made, and the whole thing is fitted to you, shrunken down or stretched, whatever it needs. It takes time. I can do it. Put on a couple of rings, earrings—you know, dress the part—and demand that it be ready within a day.”

After a moment Barbara nodded, recognizing that she was out of her depth here. “Okay. I have a timetable. Carrie started to work at the lounge on July fifth and Wenzel was killed on August tenth. I want to know if Nora bought a wig within that period. I intended to ask for one exactly like hers, and get someone to refer to the books to make certain. I don't want any suspicion raised. I'll have to get a deposition and a copy of a receipt, but not yet and I don't want any paperwork to vanish mysteriously. Once I turn over my witness list the prosecution will know I'm going after the Wenzel pack, but I'll put that off until the last possible day.”

“If she bought it before or after that time frame, do you still want a black wig of human hair?” Shelley asked.

“Absolutely.”

“They might not have an exact match in stock and have to order one. I'll take care of it.”

Barbara nodded. Shelley would deck herself out as the rich little playgirl, a real Valley Girl, and she knew exactly how to behave as such. She would do fine.

“You can say you will be Sacagawea in a play,” Bailey said, deadpan. “A novelty, a blue-eyed Indian.”

Shelley gave him a puzzled look. “I don't have to explain a thing. I just want it.”

Well, well, Frank thought, admiring how the little pink-and-gold fairy princess had put down both Barbara and Bailey without hesitation. He suppressed a smile and did not say a word for fear she would add him to her hit list for the morning.

When the others had left and Barbara stood up to return to her desk, her gaze fell upon the red poppy, but she felt as if she were looking through it to the map on the opposite side. “Later,” she promised under her breath, as if speaking to the ghosts of those men who had struggled and died in the desert. “First the trial, and then your turn.”

 

It always happened like this, she thought days later. Time stalled for weeks, and then each day blurred and melted into the next too fast to track. Always a surprise, even if expected, time did its trick as the trial date approached.

On Thanksgiving, Herbert invited everyone to Darren's for a feast. Shelley, Alex, Dr. Minnick, even Alan, who had someone lined up to take his place for the day. On the phone Herbert had said, “And don't nobody bring nothing. I got it all planned out.”

Dr. Minnick, who had been mentor to Alex during his tempestuous adolescence and into adulthood, was greeted
as an old friend by both Frank and Barbara. Carrie had met him only once, during the swimming party Shelley had given at the end of summer, and she was surprised by the warmth he extended to her. Alex had been lucky to have him, she had decided months earlier, and she thought again that evening.

Todd explained to everyone how he and Herbert had brought down the table from Carrie's apartment, and also dishes, because his dad didn't have enough. And Darren was mildly apologetic about the mismatched dinnerware.

“Don't pay it no nevermind,” Herbert said. “It ain't what the food goes on that matters, it's what goes on the plates that counts. Dig in, folks.”

He had made broiled mushroom cups stuffed with tiny pink shrimp for starters. Then he brought out a mammoth whole steelhead stuffed with crab and lobster, covered with paper-thin slices of lemon that he had glazed in the oven; a casserole of baked squash topped with pine nuts; asparagus in a wonderful sauce that he had invented. “You start with a really good white wine,” he said, serving it, “and go on from there. A little this, a little that.” Potato puffs were crisp and brown on the outside, and melt-in-the-mouth tender inside.

The talk revolved around food. The best meal he had eaten before today, Dr. Minnick said, was in Paris, but that meal had to move to second place from now on. Frank remembered a pie his mother used to make with squash. Shelley said her favorite after-school food had been a hamburger drowning under ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard. Everyone at the table groaned except Todd, who nodded.

Herbert beamed. “I always say when folks are eating and talking about other food it means they're liking what's on their
plates,” he said a bit smugly. “If they start talking politics, you better see to what went wrong in the kitchen.”

When they could eat no more, Herbert started to clear the table. “Now you folks just set still and enjoy your wine and start digesting, and me and these here volunteers will take care of this, and then we'll have us some dessert.” Todd and Carrie were already up, starting to carry plates to the kitchen.

Soon Carrie and Todd began to place dessert plates, saucers, even shallow bowls on the table. Darren groaned. “Next week, I'll buy some dishes,” he said.

“You'll forget,” Carrie said, smiling at him. “You won't give it another thought until the next time you want them.”

Herbert brought in the dessert. “It's sort of a hybrid something or other,” he said. “Not quite a torte, not quite a bombay, not quite a baked Alaska. I'll get around to naming it one of these days.” It was a beautiful spiral of white ice cream or whipped cream on top of a very dark chocolate base. Sugar cubes followed the curves of the spiral from base to top.

“He melted ice cream and mixed it with whipped cream and froze it again,” Todd said. “I watched him.”

“Hush, boy. You don't give away the cook's secrets.” Herbert picked up a tiny saucepan and felt it, then slowly dribbled hot liqueur along the sugar cubes. He held a match to it and it flared with a blue flame.

Carrie screamed and leaped up, knocking over her chair as she backed away from the table. She was the same color as the white cream. She ran from the room. Barbara was on her feet instantly and caught up with her at the back door before Carrie could open it. She pulled Carrie away from the door and held her.

“It's all right, Carrie. You're safe. It's all right.”

Carrie was shaking convulsively in her arms, and then Dr. Minnick was at her side. “I'll see to her,” he said. “You go on back to the table. We'll go into the living room for a minute or two. Come along, Carrie. Come with me.” He put his arm about her shoulders and gently led her toward the living room.

Barbara followed them to the door and watched as they sat on the sofa, Dr. Minnick's arm still about Carrie. And she was whispering. “I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It's my fault. I'm sorry.”

Dr. Minnick looked up and motioned Barbara away, and she returned to the dining room where everyone was standing up as if in a tableau.

“Lordy, I'm sorry,” Herbert said. “Lordy, I wouldn't hurt that girl for anything, and look what I did.”

“You couldn't have known,” Frank said. “No one could have known.”

He looked at Barbara. “Is she all right?”

“Dr. Minnick's taking care of her,” Barbara said. “They'll come back in a minute or two.”

“Well, let's have dessert,” Frank said. He didn't look as if he wanted another bite of anything, and no one else seemed inclined to resume eating.

Barbara gazed at the hybrid dessert Herbert had created. The sugar cubes had turned a rich brown, caramelized. “Stairway to heaven,” she said.

“That's what I'll call it from now on,” Herbert said, sitting down. “Except I'll never make that danged thing again.”

In the living room Carrie's shaking had subsided. Dr. Minnick was speaking in a low voice, and only gradually did his words start to register with her. “You're remembering terrible things, child, but they all happened long ago and they can't hurt you now.”

“I can't remember,” she whispered. “I try, but I can't remember. I'm sorry.” She could feel tears burning her eyes, but they didn't fall. There was no relief from unshed tears, they just burned and burned.

“Carrie, I'm going to teach you a trick to keep you safe from memory's pain. Put your hands out, child, like a viewfinder in a camera shot. Both hands, Carrie, straight out before you. Like this.” He withdrew his arm from her shoulders and held out his hands, his thumbs together, forming three sides of a rectangle. “You, too, Carrie. Just like this.”

She put out her hands. They were shaking.

“Good, that's just right,” he said. “When you have a memory that hurts, that's where you'll put it. Right out there where you can look at it, but it can't reach you.” Very gently he took her hands and placed them in her lap. “And it's still going to be out there, where it can't reach you.”

He continued to talk to her in a quiet voice and gradually her hands stopped shaking, and she even felt peaceful.

In the dining room Todd said, “The ice cream is melting.” He looked at Darren, then at Herbert. “Are you going to cut it?”

Herbert shook himself and nodded. “You bet I am, and you get the first piece.”

Everyone had been served, and Todd had his half eaten before Carrie and Dr. Minnick returned. She went to her chair and said, “I'm terribly embarrassed. I'm so sorry. It was the fire. I seem to have a fear of sudden fire. Please forgive me.” She was still a little pale, but otherwise she looked completely normal. Dr. Minnick held her chair and she sat down. “Oh,” she said, “it's melting. Have you named it yet?” She took a bite.

“Barbara named it,” Herbert said. “Stairway to heaven. Reckon that's as good a name as you can hope for.”

Dr. Minnick returned to his chair, sat down and took a bite, then closed his eyes and said, “Superb! Kahlua! The secret ingredient. That's exactly the right name. Herbert, you're a genius. This would win prizes.”

Herbert's big grin spread across his face and they all began to eat and talk again.

 

In the foyer at Frank's house later, taking off her coat, Barbara said, “What if she breaks like that in court?” She was thinking of what Janey Lipscomb had said about abreaction. If Carrie began to relieve whatever nightmares haunted her, there was no way to predict the outcome.

That Frank's expression reflected her anxiety was not reassuring.

 

Carrie's table and chair had been restored to their proper places in her apartment, and she had finished putting away her dishes, then stood undecided. She was exhausted, but not sleepy enough to go to bed. She went to the living-room area and sat down, thinking of Dr. Minnick and his trick with the hands. She put them out before her the way he had instructed, then shook her head. She had tried every technique suggested in the article she had read long ago, and nothing had worked. She still had moments of memory of what should be an epic story of her forgotten childhood. Flashes with no beginning, no ending and most often no meaning. Not her life, she reminded herself, that of her alter ego, Carolyn. It wasn't fair to be able to remember snapshots, fragments of an imaginary girl's life, and not her own.

She knew that if the back door of Darren's house had not been closed and locked, she would have run out in a mad,
mindless flight until she was caught and stopped, or until she had fallen. Run away from what? She had no answer.

She continued to sit quietly for a time, and then got up and prepared for bed. It was no use trying to call the memories up. They never came when called.

She was drifting toward sleep when she glimpsed the other little girl, Carolyn. She held perfectly still for fear of banishing the image, then, moving very slowly she put her hands out before her and formed the box to hold the memory.