At the front desk she paid with cash. The bearded fat man didn’t blink an eye, just gave her change. The room was ancient. Scarred wood furniture, worn-out bedspread, limp drapes. She finished the bag of chips she’d bought at the last gas station. Her side felt like fire. Was it going to keep getting worse?
She took four Tylenols, didn’t undress, just fell into bed. She slept most of the night. She woke before dawn, sick with hurting. When she stripped and looked in the mirror her whole side was purple, a vast, tender bruise. Sure as hell her ribs were cracked, maybe broken. She didn’t need this, she didn’t want to move on Meredith Wilson in this condition.
Picking up the phone, she cajoled the bearded, overweight rube at the front desk into sending her up some breakfast. What she got was stale cold cereal with milk that was about to go sour, and a cup of lukewarm coffee. She ate, took four more pain pills, crawled back in bed and slept.
She stayed in the fusty room a week, hurting bad, sure her ribs were broken. She didn’t want to see some doctor. Toward the end of the week the pain began to ease, and the bruises were fading. She lived on stale cereal and stale cheese sandwiches. On the eighth day she hauled herself out of bed, sick of the place, sick of the food. It was late morning, later than she’d meant to start, but she couldn’t stand waiting any longer. Making sure she had the map, she headed out, paid the rest of her bill with cash. She stopped at a burger place for takeout, first hot food she’d had in a week.
None of the narrow back roads were marked, most of them dirt with patches of gravel, walled in by thick timber tangled with bushes and vines. She had to guess which road, none were marked. Only once in a while did a small, faded sign appear, but with names she couldn’t find on the local map. Twice she came to dead ends and had to turn around. It was early yet, but the woods were growing dim; this was taking longer than she’d planned. She didn’t want to get on toward evening out here, get lost in the pitch-dark. She wanted to find the woman, do what she came for, and get back to civilization.
Meredith Wilson was the first of the jurors who had left the city after the two accidents. She didn’t know whether it was because of the accidents. Her friend from the court, who’d gotten the sealed jury list for her, said for sure the Wilson woman was going back to Georgia to be with her sick father; Meredith Wilson had told her all about it. A jury clerk could get real friendly with the jury, bringing them sandwiches and coffee and all. Her friend Denise Ripley, they went way back, they’d been in high school together, in the city. Denise had worked for the Clerk of the Court for years—she had not only given Tekla the jury list and their addresses, she’d passed along other useful information, including several people headed for Molena Point, maybe for a few days’ getaway after the stress of the trial.
She’d found out more about those people, first in the city itself, talking to their neighbors, checking mailboxes. That’s why it took so long from the time Herbert was sentenced and sent to San Quentin until she went into action. Took time, finding out how best to get at each of those righteous jurors who had sentenced her son to die—die for a pitiful weakness that Herbert himself couldn’t help and that no one knew how to cure.
On these narrow dirt roads trying to follow the map, it seemed like she’d been driving forever; and now the road itself was beginning to darken as the sun dropped behind the trees. The sky was clouding over again, too. She didn’t like this. But she was too far now to turn back.
When she came to the next fork, she could see a small sign. When she brightened the headlights, a thrill touched her: the hand-carved letters read wilson. This was it. She wasn’t lost. Far ahead through the pine woods, scruffy open fields still held evening light. She turned off the headlights, moved on up the dirt road. She could smell the stink of chicken houses, smell them before she saw them. Bumping along, she came to the turnoff that led, maybe a quarter mile, to the long rows of corrugated metal buildings rusted and sour with chicken dirt. A cottage stood between the road and the metal structures, its two front windows faintly lit, enough to light her way—a raw wooden shack with a weedy vegetable garden along one side. A wide front porch ran across the front, complete with rocking chairs. She could smell woodsmoke and could smell meat frying. Before turning into the long dirt drive she paused at the mailbox.
The name and numbers were nearly invisible. robert clive wilson. She pulled along the rutted drive to a small stand of red-leaved trees. She decided the ground was hard enough that she wouldn’t get stuck. Carefully she backed into the shadows between the spindly trunks. She didn’t get out of the car but sat waiting for full dark. Finding the house cheered her, had put her back in charge again. She sat watching the windows as darkness closed in, feeling the car rock when the wind picked up. She’d say she was looking for a Timmie Lee Baker. Any name would do, she’d say she was lost. She could repeat road names from the map and from the few nearly illegible signs; that was all she needed to get her foot in the door. When it was dark enough and with the wind pushing at her back, she stepped out of the car, the loaded .357 heavy in her jacket pocket as she approached the house.
36
Late-evening sun shone through Wilma’s dining room windows into the large new cat cage she had set up there. The bedroom quarters had grown too small for full-time use. Now Dulcie and the kittens, and Joe Grey, too, had room to sprawl for a nap in the sunshine. The ringing phone woke Joe.
The babies didn’t stir, they slept deeply, their tummies extended and full. Nor did Dulcie wake, worn out from the kittens crawling over her in their attempts at rough-and-tumble. The babies’ eyes were open and their tiny ears unfurled. It was less than two weeks and Joe was proud of them; John Firetti called them precocious and waited eagerly for their first words. They all waited, trying to think how to keep them from talking at the wrong time, in front of the wrong people.
Wilma answered the phone on the second ring. Joe heard her desk chair squeak.
“Oh, yes, I’d love that. What can I do?” By the smile in her voice he could tell it was Charlie, she had a special tone for her niece. “Are you sure? Is Max . . . ?” She was quiet, then, “Yes, that sounds fine.” Hanging up, she looked across into the dining room. “Charlie’s on her way over with a shrimp casserole, a last-minute potluck. Ryan and Clyde are bringing a salad. Max will be along, he’s at the station waiting . . .” She paused, watching Joe. “Waiting for a callback from Georgia.”
Joe came to full attention.
She said, “Looks like they’ve got Tekla!”
He leaped out of the pen and headed for the cat door. Wilma watched him disappear. She couldn’tnot have told him, nor would she have stopped him.
Joe, racing from peak to peak, was hardly aware of clouds darkening toward evening. Almost thundering over the roofs, he hit the courthouse tiles, raced their length and dropped down the oak tree to the station. He slid in through the glass door behind a pair of teenage girls. Across the lobby, Detective Davis was headed down the hall toward Max’s office. Joe fled past the counter, hoping to avoid Evijean, but a familiar voice stopped him.
“Yes, sir, Captain. I’m still waiting, I’ll put it straight through.” Mabel Farthy’s voice—Mabel was back. There she was, his blond, pillow-soft friend standing at the counter beside sour-faced Evijean Simpson, a stack of papers and files between them. Was Mabel catching up on the cases at hand? Was this Evijean’s last day? He was torn between racing to Max’s office or leaping to the counter.