“Does that surprise you?” she asked. “I think, at some level, Leonard can’t believe it’s true. That there must be some sort of extenuating circumstances. His father couldn’t have done what they said he’s done.”
Paul nodded. “Thank you for your time, Gabriella.”
It was nearly ten when Paul got home.
He locked the front door once he was inside. As he was about to climb the steps upward, his gaze was drawn to the door to the garage.
Paul reached out for the doorknob, but then pulled his hand back.
There’s no need to check, he told himself.
But the longer he stood in that spot, the more he knew he was going to have to prove it to himself. It was like going back into the house to make sure you’d turned off the stove. You knew you’d done it, you knew it was off, but you had to know.
He turned back the bolt on the door, opened it, and reached his hand around to flick on the light. He stepped around the various boxes and pieces of furniture until he was in the far corner of the garage, where the cartons of books were piled atop the wooden blanket box.
This is crazy, he told himself. Of course it’s in there.
He held his breath, listening. If the keys were tapping away in that box, he’d surely hear them.
And he was hearing nothing.
Which was a good sign, right?
And even if there had been anything going on in that box since Paul put the typewriter in there, he had not left any paper in it. So the machine wouldn’t be able to do any communicating.
No, wait.
Not true.
What about those sheets of paper scattered all over the kitchen? How in the fuck had that happened?
How did countless sheets get rolled into the typewriter? And how the hell did they get pulled out?
Paul began moving the cartons of books off the blanket box. Once he had it cleared off, he knelt down, slipped his hand into the groove under the lid to allow him to lift it up easily.
Just do it.
Lift it up and look inside.
Paul took a deep breath, and brought the lid up.
“Paul!”
“Jesus!” he shouted, dropping the lid and whirling around. His heart jackhammered in his chest.
The interior door to the garage was open about a foot, Charlotte’s head poking in.
“What are you doing?” she said. “I thought I heard you come in, but then you didn’t come upstairs.”
“You scared me half to death,” he said, still kneeling.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” he said. “I was... checking. That’s all.”
He turned back to the blanket box and lifted the lid, casting light down into it.
The typewriter was there. There was no paper rolled into it, no other paper to be found, not counting the stacks of old magazines.
Paul swallowed, lowered the lid, and stood.
“Well?” Charlotte asked.
“It’s here,” he said.
“Well, of course it is. For God’s sake, come to bed.”
He nodded sheepishly and walked across the garage, hit the light, and closed the door as he went back into the house.
Thirty-Seven
Paul was in front of his laptop when his cell phone rang shortly after noon the following day. It was Gabriella Hoffman.
“It’s set up for tomorrow,” she told him. “For both of you.”
“I can’t thank you enough,” he said. “He’s willing to see me?”
“He is.”
Then he called Anna White and told her they were set for a prison visit with Kenneth Hoffman, if she was still interested in coming.
“Yes,” she said without hesitation. She would have to clear her schedule for the day, and make sure that she could get Rosie, a retired nurse who lived next door who often checked in on her father whenever Anna had to be away for any length of time.
“Why don’t I drive,” she said.
Paul was going to ask why, then figured, if he were dealing with someone who’d suffered a head injury and from all indications was borderline delusional, he’d want to be the one behind the wheel, too.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ll come to your place, then we’ll head up in your car.”
“Was there ever any talk of Charlotte coming with us?” ANNA asked as they backed out of her driveway. The prison facility where Kenneth Hoffman was serving his time was near Waterbury. Anna figured it would take the better part of an hour to get there. She entered its address into the in-dash GPS system on her Lincoln SUV. They’d start out by taking Derby-Milford Road up to Highway 34, jogging west, then heading north on 8.
“She knew I was trying to arrange a visit with Kenneth, but when she knew you’d agreed to go with me, she thought that was best. She told me she came to see you.”
Anna glanced over. “I told her she should. There was no reason to keep it a secret. She’s worried about you.”
Paul nodded. “More now than ever.”
“Well, you are going through more now than you were before.”
“It’s not just that,” he said. “She just seems... more caring. In between moments where she thinks I’m totally nuts. Anyway, she decided to take a day herself and get out of town. Her mother’s in Tribeca, and she hasn’t been into the city to visit her in weeks. They’re not that close, actually, so I was a little surprised, but anyway, I dropped her off at the station this morning. Knowing Charlotte, she’ll also make time to hit Bloomingdale’s before catching the train home. I don’t know when we’ll be back so I told her to take a cab home from the station.”
Anna swerved too late to miss a pothole. A loud, metallic rattle came from the rear cargo area. It sounded like it was inside the vehicle. Before Paul could ask, Anna said, “Golf clubs.”
“Oh. You play?”
“Some. Every time I play there’s at least one club missing. My dad keeps taking them so he can hit some balls in the backyard and never puts them back.” She changed topics. “What are you really hoping to get out of this? Seeing Kenneth?”
“I’m not going in with any expectations. I guess I’ll see how it goes.”
She noticed a manila envelope on his lap. “What’s in there?”
“Something I want to show him, if they’ll let me.”
“You want to show me?”
He slid several pages out of the envelope. They were the messages he had found in the typewriter and scattered across the floor.
Anna glanced over several times as Paul leafed through them for her. “I simply don’t know what to make of them, Paul.”
“They’re proof,” he said.
“Of what, exactly?”
He glanced at her. “Maybe you think they’re proof that I’ve gone mad. I think they’re proof that Jill and Catherine Lamb are trying to reach me.”
Anna decided not to respond.
They drove a few more miles in silence until Paul said, “Tell me about Frank, about your father.”
“Well, he’s a wonderful man. A retired animator. Worked for Warner Bros., actually knew Walt Disney. Still watches cartoons every single day. He’s been living with me since my mother passed away. The last year or so, things have... started to happen. Confusion. Sometimes he thinks I’m my mom, his wife. Other times he wants me to take him to visit her. I fear we’re on a slippery slope.”
“It happens,” Paul said.
Her lips compressed before she spoke. “He’s been a great help to me for so long. He’s been telling me I need to find a place for him. Like he’s worried about being a burden to me.” The lips pressed tightly together again, as if somehow that would ward off tears. “Says there’s no reason for me to be keeping him around.”