Dark Series, The Color of Seven and The Color of Dusk (Books We Love Special Edition) (9 page)

Ria turned onto Martin Luther King Boulevard, making a square and heading up Cherry Street.

“Fourth Street,” Paul said
,
“
i
n the old days.
And then in the early 1900s it changed to Broadway.
The original St. Joseph’s was right there,” he said, pointing.

“The Catholic
c
hurch?
Down here?”

“U
n
-huh.”

She turned and headed down Cherry Street,
Macon’s main drag since its earliest beginnings. The roll
call of the past continued.

“Jacques,” he said
,
“
g
rocers.
Farquhar & Co., hardware.
Straton’s.
That was a gun company.
Gibian’s. Grocery and tobacco.
Coben’s. Liquor and cigars.
They imported some from Cuba you could steal for.
Goodwyn & Small, drug store.”

Ria looked at the buildings as he pointed
and saw
the past overlaid on the present
.
So Coben’s liquor and cigars ‘imported some from Cuba you could steal for’, did they?

“Lieb’s groceries,” Paul continued.
“Dr. Kenan’s office.
Hertz’ Clothing.
I—”
He broke off suddenly and restarted the sentence.
“
If you can believe its ad, it was the only choice of Macon’s professional
men.”

Ria turned at the top of Poplar Street and cut back down Cotton.
The names just kept coming.
“Bunk’s.
Books and stationers.
Oliver & Holt.
Grocers.”

She settled into a slow and stately pace, dissecting the town into small squares and touring slowly along
.

“Rogers & Winn, crackers and candy.
Bone & Chappell, groceries. Cox and Corbin, liquor and groceries.
O’Gorman’s.
Dry goods.”

“Did Macon do anything but eat, Paul?”

“Oh, but think about it!
To walk in a store and have the clerks call you by name, knowing that this cook’s household preferred pork, and this one was shopping for beef, and little Ria Knight had a preference for lemon drops.”

“It does sound nice.”

“It was,” he said, gazing out at the storefronts.

Was it now?
She said nothing, moving out from the center of town, cutting down streets and continuing her squared pattern.

She turned back down to pick up Martin Luther and take the back road to Eisenhower Parkway.

“Hey!” Paul protested.
“It’s after dark!
Please tell me you don’t drive this route by yourself after dark?”

Ria laughed.
No way to breed that protective instinct out of a southern man.
And no, this absolutely wasn’t a route for a lone woman to take after dark.
Not now.
Not in the present.

“No, I don’t, I promise. Daddy and Johnny’d both have heart attacks.
But since I’m not alone, and we
’re
on this tour, I thought we’d pass the old streets.”

Small jukey-style nightclubs sent flashy light into the darkness, blown bulbs obscuring part of their names.
Crowds stood in front of liquor stores.
The
strange aroma indigent to this one particular area of the city
crept into
the car.
An indefinable smell, not exactly greasy, not exactly dirty.
A funky smell that existed nowhere else in town. They passed the remains of a Johnny V’s Drive-In that had seen much better days.

“The
se streets,” he said, gesturing to the short concrete posts which in daylight designated Ell Street, Hazel Street, Edge Street. “In the
1880s, th
is was
middle-class Macon.
Good working people, solid houses.
Families.
New babies.
Hope.
Those days are long-gone, though.
”

“That makes me feel very sad, Paul.”

“Me, too,” he said.

She turned
right at the intersection with Eisenhower Parkway and headed back towards the
mall
, melancholy with memories of streets that used to be.
Had time suspended itself?
Ria thought they’d been gone much longer than they had. The
mall
was still open
when they pulled in
.

“How much longer—”

“
I don’t quite know long I’ll—”

They laughed.

“Okay,” Ria said. “You answered my question. You don’t know how much longer you’ll be in town.”

“N
ot exactly. But if you’d like—”

“I would. Very much.”

He grinned. “Suppose I’d been about to suggest a wild weekend at the Hilton?”

“Ha
ven’t had a
Hilton
here
in a long time. You’re a lot better with the past than you are with the present. And I was pretty sure you weren’t going to suggest that. Yet.”

“I bet you give your witnesses the devil.”

“Haven’t had that many trials yet, to tell the truth.”

“I’ll call you.”

“I’m easy to find. No such thing as an unlisted attorney. Or an attorney without a business card.”
She reached into the door’s side pocket and pulled one out, handing it to him.

He hesitated.
Instead of leaning over and kissing her goodnight, he reached his hand out and picked up her own, bringing it to his lips. When he dropped it, the light reflected off his wedding ring, highlighting the etchings in the gold band. She pulled his hand back into the light.

“How unusual!” she said, peering through the shadows at the rolled scrollwork.

“My wife was an unusual woman. So are you.” She dropped his hand.

“Paul!”

“Yes?”

“What was her name?”

“Her name?”

“Your wife.”

He hesitated almost imperceptibly.

“Chloe. It’s been a special
evening, Ria.”

“Yes. It was.”

He got out of the car.
“Go on and pull out now, so I can make sure you’re headed home okay.”

He stood, obviously going nowhere until she did.
That southern chivalry again.
She eased off the clutch and
moved forward, back out toward
Bloomfield.

While she drove, her mind
moved
in hyper-speed
,
process
ing
the data compiled by the evening. Name, looks, voice, background.
Knowledge of a city long past
. A
tobacco shop with a
‘
cherry blend
that beat anything in London’. Another
that imported Cuban cigars ‘you could steal for’.

A skillful weaving of fact and fiction? Most successful liars incorporated as much truth as possible into their fabrications.
Made for less confusion, wasn’t as easy to get tripped up. When people found it expeditious to change their names, most often they dropped a surname, switched to a middle name, or tagged on a mother’s maiden name.

She pulled into the two-car garage in the back of the house on Orange Street, formerly the carriage house. Sometimes she
believed she could see waiting buggies, hear
the soft snicker of a horse. She turned off the ignition. Time to have a long t
alk
with herself.

“Okay, Ria,” she whispered. “Admit it. You think he’s Paul Devlin. Your Paul Devlin. Who comes to life and assumes solid form on the first full moon of October. Will you get a grip?”

She got out of the car and went inside. Had he found the secret of eternal youth? Did he still live and breathe and walk, telling smooth stories blending fact and falsehood? Why hadn’t he said he was a doctor? Why wouldn’t he have kept his training updated?

She went inside and up the steps, opening her apartment door.
She automatically undressed and pulled on her robe. Then she walked to the living room, formerly the Devlin bedroom, and sat down on one of her sofas.

Paul Everett wasn’t a ghost. Not the Paul she’d met at the bookstore, eaten dinner with,
gone back in time with.
He ate and drank and spent money. Modern money. And he was solid. She’d touched him.
He’d kissed her hand. She picked up one of the sofa pillows and hugged it to her.

She’d lost her mind.
End of story.
She’d met a
flesh and blood, living man.
Who just coincidentally had almost the same name
as the vision that haunted her house
.
And
a
de
ceased
wife w
ith t
he same name
.
How far could
coincidence
go?

He was out of the car,
she thought.
W
e were talking quietly, and I expected him to say her name was Chloe. I was primed for it. He
said Cathy. Or Claire. Or Candice
.

She got up and went into her room. She’d misunderstood, that was all. She’d place a phone call tomorrow, and confirm once and for all that a flesh and blood man named Paul Everett was on a leave of absence from the, what had he said? The Mobile Reporter.
Then she’d make an appointment with a psychiatrist.

She clicked the lamp off and settled into her pillows.
In her uneasy slumbers, she drove up and down the unpaved streets of 1888 Macon in her Mustang classic, passing horses standing with their reins wrapped casually around horse posts, teams of dray horses pulling delivery vans. The store names were painted on the front glass. A. B. Farquar, S. R. Jacques & Co., Coben’s, Kuhns, Lieb’s Fine Groceries. Paul Everett, dressed in tan Dockers and denim shirt, stood side by side with Paul Devlin, dressed in the tight britches and high-topped riding boots of 1888. Both men moved, just out of her reach, drawing her forward with gestures of their hands, pulling her back, back, back in time.

Chapter
Eleven

She didn’t know how long she’d
slept
when the sounds woke her. Muffled sounds
. Paul Devlin. Crying over Chloe’s things.
She g
ot up and moved to the door, and there he was.
He
lifted a perfume bottle and held the stopper to his nose. The gesture caught her heart. How many nights had he cried for Chloe in this room?

She walked to his side.
His hand moved
. I
n the glow of the nightlights plugged around her living room, she caught the gleam of gold on his finger. His wedding ring.

She moved closer and
tou
ched his image.
A
gain he
disappeared at her touch. But not before she saw the rolled etchings engraved on the band of his ring.

Was he back?
H
ad he ever been gone?
She returned to her bed
and
tossed restlessly
until dawn.

* * *

At 9:30 the next morning, Ria dialed a phone number.
She’d already checked the internet.
Mobile’s newspaper was the Press-Register.
It didn’t have a Mobile Reporter.
And a call to personnel verified that no reporter named Paul Everett
worked for it.
Or ever had.

She hung up.
Well. If there was no v
erifiable living Paul Everett, his supposedly deceased double definitely had a verified address.
Rose Arbor Cemetery.
Today’s schedule was hectic but her plans weren’t
daytime plans, anyway.

She went out of her office to their secretary’s desk.

“Katie, would you do me a favor? Not professional. Girl stuff.”

“Sure.”

“If I’m in the office and I get a phone call from a Paul Everett, interrupt me.”

Katie narrowed her eyes.

“
I don’t know the name. Out of state attorney?
”

“
Nope.
”

“Adjuster?”

“No
pe
.”

Katie grinned. She gave Ria the devil about her social life, or lack of one.