Fancy Pants (36 page)
Chapter
25
Teddy stared at Dallie's back as the two of them stood in line at the25
counter of a McDonald's off 1-81. He wished he had a red and black
plaid flannel shirt like that, along with a wide leather belt and jeans
with a torn pocket. His mother threw out his jeans as soon as they got
the tiniest little hole in the knee, just when they were starting to
feel soft and comfortable. Teddy stared down at his leather play
sneakers and then ahead at Dallie's scuffed brown cowboy boots. He
decided to put cowboy boots on
his Christmas list.
As Dallie picked up the tray and walked toward a table at the back of
the restaurant, Teddy trotted along behind him, his small legs taking
two quick skips, trying to keep up. At first when they'd been heading
out of Manhattan into New Jersey, Teddy had tried asking Dallie a few
questions about whether he had a cowboy hat or rode a horse, but Dallie
hadn't said much. Teddy had finally fallen silent, even though he had a
million things he wanted to know.
For as long as Teddy could remember, Holly Grace had told him stories
about Dallie Beaudine and Skeet Cooper— how they'd met up on the road
when Dallie was only fifteen after Dallie had escaped from the evil
clutches of Jaycee Beaudine, and how they'd traveled the interstates
hustling the rich boys at the country clubs. She'd told him about bar
fights and playing a round of golf left-handed and miraculous
eighteenth-hole victories snatched from the jaws of defeat. In his
mind, Holly Grace's stories had gotten mixed up with his Spiderman
comic books and Star Wars and the legends he read in school about the
wild West. Ever since they'd moved to New York, Teddy had begged his
morn to let him meet Dallie when he came to visit Holly Grace, but she
always had one excuse or another. And now that it had finally happened,
Teddy knew this should be just about the most exciting day of his life.
Except that he wanted to go home now because it wasn't turning out
anything like he'd imagined.
Teddy unwrapped the hamburger and lifted the top off the bun. It had
ketchup on it. He wrapped it back up. Suddenly Dallie turned in his
seat and looked right across the table into Teddy's face. He stared at
him, just stared without saying a word. Teddy began to feel nervous,
like he'd done something wrong. In his imagination, Dallie would have
done things like reach over and slap him ten, the way Gerry Jaffe did.
Dallie would say, "Hey, pardner, you look like the kind of man me and
Skeet might like to have on the road with us when things get tough." In
his imagination, Dallie would have liked him a whole lot more.
Teddy reached for his Coke and then pretended to study a sign over on
the side of the room about eating breakfast at McDonald's. It seemed
funny to him that Dallie was taking him so far away to meet his
mother—he hadn't even known that Dallie and his mom knew each other.
But if Holly Grace had told Dallie it was all right, he guessed it was.
Still, he wished his mom was with them right now.
Dallie spoke so abruptly that Teddy jumped. "Do you always wear those
glasses?"
"Not always." Teddy slipped them off, carefully folded in the stems,
and put them on the table. The sign about eating breakfast at
McDonald's blurred. "My mom says it's important what's inside a person,
not what's outside—like if they wear glasses or not."
Dallie made some kind of noise that didn't sound very nice, and then
nodded his head toward the hamburger. "Why aren't you eating?"
Teddy pushed at the package with the end of his finger. "I said I
wanted a plain hamburger," he
muttered. "It's got ketchup."
Dallie's face got a funny, tight look. "So what? A little bit of
ketchup never hurt anybody."
"I'm allergic," Teddy replied.
Dallie snorted, and Teddy realized that he didn't like people who
didn't like ketchup or people who had allergies. He thought about
eating the hamburger anyway, just to show Dallie he could do it, but
his stomach was already feeling funny, and ketchup made him think about
blood and guts and eating
eyeballs. Besides, he would end up with an
itchy rash all over his body.
Teddy tried to think of something to say that would make Dallie like
him. He wasn't used to having to think about making grown-ups like him.
With kids his own age, sometimes they thought he was a jerk or he
thought they were jerks, but not with grown-ups. He chewed on his
bottom lip for a minute, and then he said, "I've got an I.Q. of one
hundred sixty-eight. I go to gifted class."
Dallie snorted again, and Teddy knew he'd made another mistake. It had
sounded like he was bragging, but he'd just thought Dallie might be
interested.
"Where did you get that name—Teddy?" Dallie asked. He said the name
funny, like he was trying to
get rid of it fast.
"When I was born, my mom was reading a story about some kid named Teddy
by this famous writer—
J. R. Salinger. It's short for Theodore."
Dallie's expression grew even more sour. "J. D. Salinger. Doesn't
anybody call you Ted?"
"Oh, yeah," Teddy lied. "About everybody. All the kids and everything.
I mean, just about everybody except Holly Grace and Mom. You can call
me Ted if you want to."
Dallie reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. Teddy saw
something frozen and hard in his face. "Go on up and get yourself
another hamburger fixed the way you want it."
Teddy looked at the dollar bill Dallie was holding out and then back
down at his hamburger. "I guess this'll be all right." He slowly pushed
back the wrapper.
Dallie's hand slammed down over the hamburger. "I said go get another
one, dammit."
Teddy felt sick. Sometimes his mom yelled at him if he made a fresh
remark or didn't do his chores, but it never made his stomach feel all
wiggly like this, because he knew his mom loved him and didn't want him
to grow up to be a jerk. But he could tell that Dallie didn't love him.
Dallie didn't even like him. Teddy's jaw set in a small, rebellious
line. "I'm not hungry, and I want to go home."
"Well, that's just too damned bad. We're going to be on the road for a
while, just like I told you."
Teddy glared at him. "I want to go home. I have to go to school on
Monday."
Dallie got up from the table and jerked his head toward the door. "Come
on. If you're going to act like a spoiled brat, you can do it while
we're on the road."
Teddy lagged behind on the way out the door. He didn't care anymore
about all Holly Grace's dumb old stories. As far as he was concerned,
Dallie was a big old butt-wipe. Slipping his glasses back on, Teddy
tucked his hand in his pocket. The switch comb felt warm and reassuring
as it settled against his palm.
He wished it was real. If Lasher the
Great was here, he could take care of old Dallie Butt-Wipe Beaudine.
As soon as the car moved onto the interstate, Dallie punched the
accelerator and shot into the left lane. He knew he was acting like a
real son of a bitch. He knew, but he couldn't stop himself. The rage
wouldn't leave him, and he wanted to hit something about as badly as
he'd ever wanted anything in his life. His anger kept eating away at
him, growing bigger and stronger until he could hardly contain it. He
felt as if some of his manhood had been stripped away. He was
thirty-seven years old and he didn't have a goddamn thing to show for
it. He was a second-rate pro golfer. He'd been a failure as a husband,
a goddamn criminal as a father. And now this.
That bitch. That goddamn selfish, spoiled little rich-girl bitch. She'd
given birth to his child and never said a word. All those stories she'd
told Holly Grace—those lies. He'd believed them. Christ, she'd gotten
back at him all right, just like she'd said she would the night they'd
had that fight in the Roustabout parking lot. With a snap of her
fingers, she'd given him
the most contemptuous fuck-you a woman could give a man. She'd taken
away his right to know his own son. Dallie glanced over at the boy
sitting in the passenger seat next to him, the son who was the flesh of
his body just as surely as Danny had been. Francesca must have
discovered by now that he had disappeared. The thought gave him a
moment's bitter satisfaction.
He hoped she was hurting real bad.
* * *
Wynette looked very much as Francesca remembered it, although some ofthe stores had changed. As
she studied the town through the windshield
of her rental car, she realized that life had carried her in a huge
circle right back to the point where everything had really begun for
her.
She hunched her shoulders in a futile attempt to relieve some of the
tension in her neck. She still didn't know if she'd done the right
thing by leaving Manhattan to fly to Texas, but after three unbearable
days
of waiting for the phone to ring and dodging reporters who wanted
to interview her about her relationship with Stefan, she had reached
the point where she had to do something.
Holly Grace had suggested she fly to Wynette. "That's where Dallie
always heads when he's hurting," she had said, "and I guess he's
hurting pretty bad right now."
Francesca had tried to ignore the accusation in Holly Grace's voice,
but it was difficult. After ten years of friendship, their relationship
was seriously strained. The day Francesca had returned from London,
Holly Grace had announced, "I'll stick by you, Francesca, because
that's the way I'm made, but it's going to be a while before 1 trust
you again."
Francesca had tried to make her understand. "I couldn't tell you the
truth. Not as close as you are to Dallie."
"So you lied to me? You fed me that stupid story about Teddy's father
in England, and I believed it all these years." Holly Grace's face had
darkened with anger. "Don't you understand that family means something
to Dallie? With other men it might not matter, but Dallie isn't like
other men. He's spent all his life trying to create a family around
him—Skeet, Miss Sybil, me, all those strays he's picked up ever the
years. This is going to just about kill him. His first son
died, and you stole his second one."
A wave of anger had shot through Francesca, all the sharper because she
had felt a prick of guilt. "Don't you judge me, Holly Grace Beaudine!
You and Dallie both have some awfully freewheeling ideas of morality,
and I won't have either of you shaking your finger at me. You don't
know what it's like to hate who you are—to have to remake yourself. I
did what I needed to do at the time. And if I had to go through it
again, I'd do exactly the same thing."
Holly Grace had been unmoved. "Then you'd be a bitch twice over,
wouldn't you?"
Francesca blinked her eyes against tears as she turned onto the street
that held Dallie's Easter egg house. She was heartsick over Holly
Grace's inability to understand that Dallie's long-ago affair with her
hadn't been anything more than a small sexual diversion in his
life—certainly nothing to justify the kidnapping
of a nine-year-old
child. Why was Holly Grace taking sides against her? Francesca wondered
if she was doing the right thing by not involving the police, but she
couldn't bear the idea of seeing Teddy's name smeared all over the
tabloids. "Love Child of Television Personality Kidnapped by Golf Pro
Father." She could see it now— photographs of all of them. Her
relationship with Stefan would become even more public, and they would
dig up all the old stories about Dallie and Holly Grace.
Francesca remembered all too well what had happened after "China Colt"
had made Holly Grace famous. Every detail of her unusual marriage to
one of professional golf's most colorful players had suddenly become
fodder for the media, and as one wild story followed another, neither
of them could go anywhere without being dogged by paparazzi. Holly
Grace handled it better than Dallie, who was accustomed to sports
reporters but not the sensationalis-tic press. It hadn't taken him long
to start throwing his fists, which had eventually attracted the
attention of the PGA commissioner. Following a particularly nasty
altercation in Albuquerque, Dallie had been suspended from tournament
play for several months. Holly Grace had divorced him soon after to try
to make both their lives more peaceful.
The house still bore its lavender trim and chain of leaping
jackrabbits, although the tangerine paint had been touched up by a less
skillful hand than Miss Sybil's. The old schoolteacher met Francesca at
the door. It had been ten years since they'd seen each other. Miss
Sybil had shrunk in size and her shoulders were more stooped, but her
voice hadn't lost its authority.
"Come in, my dear, come in and get out of the cold. My, my, you'd think
this was Boston instead of Texas, the way the temperature's dropped. My
dear, I've been at sixes and sevens ever since you called."
Francesca gave her a gentle hug. "Thank you for letting me come. After
everything I told you on the phone, I wasn't sure you'd want to see me."
"Not want to see you? My gracious, I've been counting the hours." Miss
Sybil led the way toward the kitchen and asked Francesca to pour them
both coffee. "I don't like to complain, but life hasn't been very
interesting lately. I can't get around the way I used to, and Dallas
was keeping company with such a dreadful young woman. I couldn't even
interest her in Danielle Steel, let alone the classics." She gestured
Francesca into a seat across from her at the kitchen table. "My, my, I
can't tell you how proud I am of you. When I think of how far you've
come . . ." She suddenly drilled Francesca with her schoolteacher's
gaze. "Now tell me all about this dreadful situation."
Francesca told her, sparing nothing. To her relief, Miss Sybil wasn't
nearly as condemnatory as Holly Grace had been. She seemed to
understand Francesca's need to establish her independence; however, she
was clearly worried about Dallie's reaction to discovering that he had
a child. "I believe Holly Grace is correct," she finally said. "Dallas
must be on his way back to Wynette, and we can be quite certain he
won't take this well. You'll stay in the guest room, Francesca, until
he gets here."
Francesca had planned to stay at the hotel, but she gratefully accepted
the invitation. As long as she remained in the house, she would feel
that she'd somehow gotten closer to Teddy. Half an hour later,
Francesca found herself curled up beneath an old patchwork quilt while
the winter sunlight trickled in through the lace curtains and the old
radiator hissed out a comforting flow of heat. She fell asleep almost
instantly.
By noon of the next day, Dallie still hadn't appeared and she was
nearly frantic with anxiety. Maybe she should have stayed in New York?
What if he wasn't coming to Wynette?
And then Holly Grace called and told her that Skeet had disappeared.
"What do you mean, disappeared?" Francesca exclaimed. "He said he'd
contact you if he heard anything."
"Dallie probably called him and told him to keep his mouth shut. I
expect Skeet's gone to meet him."
Francesca felt angry and impotent. If Dallie had told Skeet to put a
gun to his head, he would probably have done that, too. By
midafternoon, when Miss Sybil left to go to her pottery class,
Francesca was ready to jump out of her skin. What was taking Dallie so
long? Afraid to leave the house for fear Dallie would appear, she tried
to study the American history material for her citizenship exam, but
she couldn't concentrate. She began pacing through the house and ended
up in Dallie's bedroom, where a collection of his golf trophies sat in
the front window catching the thin wintry light. She picked up a copy
of a golf magazine with his picture on the cover. "Dallas
Beaudine—Always a Bridesmaid, Never a Bride." She noticed that the
laugh lines at the corners of his eyes were deeper and his features had
a sharper cast, but maturity hadn't robbed him of one morsel of his
good looks. He was even more gorgeous than she remembered.
She searched his face for some small sign of Teddy, but saw nothing.
Once again, she wondered how he had known that Teddy was his son.
Putting down the magazine, she looked over at the bed and a shower of
memories drifted over her. Was that where Teddy had been conceived, or
had it happened earlier, in a Louisiana swamp when Dallie had stretched
her out over the trunk of that Buick Riviera?
The phone next to the bed rang. She banged her foot on the bed frame as
she raced over to it and snatched up the receiver. "Hello! Hello?"
Silence greeted her.
"Dallie?" The name came out like a sob. "Dallie, is that you?"
There was no answer. She felt a prickling along the back of her neck,
and her heart began to race. She was certain someone was there; her
ears strained to catch a sound. "Teddy?" she whispered. "Teddy . . .
it's Mommy."
"It's me, Miss Fancy Pants." Dallie's voice was low and bitter, making
her old nickname sound like an obscenity. "We've got some talking to
do. Meet me at the quarry north of town in half an hour."
She heard the finality in his voice and she cried out, "Wait! Is Teddy
there? I want to talk to him!"
But the line had gone dead.
She raced downstairs, snatched her suede jacket from the hall closet,
and pulled it on over her sweater and jeans. That morning, she had tied
her hair at the nape of her neck with a scarf, and now, in her haste,
she got the thin silk tangled in the jacket collar. Her hands trembled
as she pulled the scarf free. Why was he doing this? Why didn't he
bring Teddy to the house? What if Teddy was sick? What if something had
happened?
Her breathing was quick and shallow as she started the car and backed
it out onto the street. Ignoring the speed limit, she drove to the
first service station she could find and asked for directions. The
instructions were complex, and she missed a route marker north of town,
going miles out of her way before she found the flat dirt road that led
to the quarry. Her hands ached from their tight grip on the steering
wheel. Over an hour had passed since his call. Would he wait for her?
She told herself that Teddy was safe—Dallie might hurt her, but he
would never hurt a child. The thought brought her only a small measure
of comfort.
The quarry sat back from the road like a giant wound, bleak and
forbidding in the fading gray winter light, overwhelming in its size.
The last shift of workers had apparently left for the day because the
vast, flat yard that fronted the quarry was deserted. Pyramids of
reddish stone stood near the idle trucks. Miles of silent conveyer
belts led to green-painted hoppers sitting like giant funnels above the
ground. Francesca drove across the yard toward a corrugated metal
building, but she saw no sign of life, no vehicles other than the idle
quarry trucks. She was too late, she thought. Dallie had already left.
Her mouth dry with anxiety, she drove her car out of
the yard and along the road to the maw of the quarry.
It looked to Francesca, in her agitated state of mind, as if a giant
knife had sliced open the earth, gouging its way straight down to hell.
Desolate, eerie, raw, the canyon of the quarry dwarfed everything on
the horizon. A scattering of bare winter trees above the rim on the
opposite side looked like toothpick twigs, the hills in the distance
like baby sandpiles. Even the darkening sky no longer loomed so large;
it seemed more like a lid that had been dropped down over an enormous
empty cauldron. She shuddered as she forced herself to drive to the
edge, where two hundred feet of red granite had been sliced open layer
by layer, the process of desecration paradoxically revealing the
secrets of its creation.
In the last of the light, she could dimly make out one of Teddy's toy
cars sitting at the bottom.
For a fraction of a moment she felt disoriented, and then she realized
the car was real, not a toy at all. It was just as real as the
Lilliputian man who leaned against the hood. She pressed her eyes shut
for a moment, and her chin quivered. He had chosen this awful place
purposely because he wanted her to feel dwarfed and powerless.
Struggling for control, she backed the car away from the rim and then
drove along it, almost missing a steep gravel road that led into the
quarry's depths. Slowly, she began her descent.
As the dark quarry walls rose above her, she mentally steadied herself.
For years, she'd been charging at seemingly impenetrable barriers,
battering herself against them until they gave way. Dallie was merely
another barrier she had to move. And she had an advantage he couldn't
anticipate. No matter what he might have told himself, he was expecting
to confront the girl he remembered, his twenty-one-year-old Fancy Pants.
Even as she had gazed down at him from the lip of the quarry, she had
sensed that he was alone. As she drove nearer, she saw nothing that
made her think differently. Teddy wasn't there. Dallie wanted to
extract his full pound of flesh before he gave her back her child. She
parked her car at an angle to the front of his, but nearly forty feet
away. If this was to be a showdown, she would play her own war of
nerves. The
light was almost gone and she left her headlights on. Opening the door,
she got out deliberately—no haste, no wasted motion, no glances spared
for those looming granite walls. She came toward him slowly, walking in
the path of the headlights with her arms at her sides and her spine
straight. A chill blast of wind tore at her scarf and spanked the end
against her cheek. She locked her eyes with his.
He stood facing her with his back to the car, hips leaning at an angle
against the front of the hood, ankles crossed, arms crossed—all of him
locked tight and closed away. His head was bare, and he wore only a
sleeveless down vest over his flannel shirt. His boots were dusty with
the red grit from the quarry, as if
he had been there for some time.
She drew near him, her chin high, her gaze steady. Only when she was
close enough could she see how terrible he looked, not at all like the
magazine-cover photograph. In the glare from the headlights, she noted
that his skin had a drawn, gray cast, and his jaw was covered with
stubble. Only those Newman-blue eyes were familiar, except that they
had turned as cold and hard as the rock beneath her feet. She stopped
in front of him. "Where's Teddy?"
A blade of night wind cut through the quarry, lifting the hair away
from his forehead. He stepped away from the car and straightened to his
full height. For a moment he didn't say anything. He just stood there
looking down at her as if she were a particularly loathsome piece of
human refuse.
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