Pickin Clover (23 page)

“Morning, Polly.” Like a black cloud, the aftermath of their fight hung between them, and much as he wanted to dispel it, he couldn’t think how to begin. More than anything, he wanted to tell her about Duncan, to share the tumultuous feelings the boy and his illness aroused, but of course he couldn’t do that. It would only upset her, the way it was upsetting him.

“The real estate agent’s here.”

Polly’s abrupt and distant tone told him how angry she was.

“He’s suggested a price and wants to know if it’s agreeable with you. I told him whatever you two decide is fine with me. I’ll put him on.”

She was gone before Michael could respond. He talked with the agent for several moments, thinking of Polly instead of the house.

“Could I speak with my wife again, please?” He’d get Valerie to shuffle the appointments; they’d go out to lunch together; he’d apologize for last night.

“She’s out with your little girl. She gave me a set of keys. I’ll lock up when I leave.”

With a heavy heart, Michael hung up. He dialed Polly’s cell phone number but got no response. That left him with a cold, hard knot in his stomach, but there wasn’t time for despair, not here, not now.

Benedict was waiting, Michael reminded himself, and he’d need all the patience and fortitude he could muster to deal with the angry, disagreeable man. At least the CAT scan would provide undeniable proof that Benedict was creating his own stress, Michael thought wearily.

He opened the lab report and skimmed the results. Astounded, he read them a second time, then a third.

Chronic subdural hematoma
.

Malcolm Benedict had a mass of blood under his skull that certainly would account for persistent headaches, and would require immediate surgery. Benedict had been right all along: there was an organic reason for his problem. Michael and the other doctors had been wrong. The first test results had been misinterpreted, and no one except Benedict had considered redoing them.

Michael stared at the lab report. He looked from it to the file underneath, Duncan’s file. Why hadn’t Duncan’s tumor responded the way it should have to the radiation? He hurried out to find Valerie.

“Schedule a CAT scan for Duncan Hendricks, A.S.A.P.”

He’d reexamine the original slides and compare them with the new. It hardly seemed possible that a mistake could have been made, but there was no harm in checking.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Sitting in her car in front of her mother’s house, Polly waited for her sister.

Norah had phoned just before the real estate agent arrived that morning, and without any greeting said in a tense voice, “Mom’s still not home. I’ve been calling since six this morning and there’s no answer. I’ve called her friends and checked with her neighbors. Nobody’s seen her for three days. She’s disappeared, Polly, and we’ve got to do something. Meet me at her place. We’ll see if maybe there’s a note or something I missed the other day.”

Polly had agreed, and Norah hung up without saying goodbye.

“Why can’t we go in and see Auntie?” Clover was whining. “I need a drink. I have to pee.”

Clover’s petulant voice grated on Polly’s nerves. “Auntie’s not at home. We’ll go in when Norah comes. You can get a drink then and use the bathroom.”

“Where did Auntie go? Why didn’t she take me?”

Good question. Polly was caring for a child she couldn’t like, her marriage was a shambles, her sister hated her, and her house was about to be sold. Frannie was on holiday just when she needed her most, and now Isabelle had disappeared. For a mad moment, Polly almost gave in to hysterical laughter. Her life was turning into a soap opera.

Norah drove up and parked, and Polly got out.

“Hiya, Norah.” The moment Polly let her out of the car, Clover ran over and grabbed Norah’s hand as if it were a life preserver.

They stood for a tense moment, looking at each other, and Polly struggled for something to say that might break the charged atmosphere.

“This is like the showdown at the OK Corral,” she joked. “I left my gun at home, so you’re safe.”

Her sister gave a strained smile. “So did I. Let’s go in and see what we can find.”

Polly’s heart sank. Gun or not, it was all too obvious that Norah was still angry.

They found the key and opened the door. The old, familiar odor of cigarette smoke mingled with a stronger smell of rotting garbage.

“Yuck.” Polly checked the can under the sink and found it overflowing. “I’m taking this out.” She dumped the garbage into the tin in the alley and paused on the way back to admire the paint job, the pristine backyard, the steps Jerome had repaired. The place looked better than it had since her father was alive, which was ironic, considering that everything else was falling apart at a rapid rate.

“There’s no note down here that I can see,” Norah announced when Polly came in. “Let’s go up and look in Mom’s bedroom.”

Polly followed Norah and Clover up the stairs. Clover was still clinging to Norah like a piece of Velcro, Polly noted.

The bed in Isabelle’s room was unmade and the room was in its customary state of chaos. Two dresses, several pairs of panties and a slip had been tossed on the trunk Isabelle used as a night table. More discarded clothing fell from the chair, and a black bra peeped out from under the dresser, the top of which was littered with costume jewelry, empty coffee cups, overflowing ashtrays and a thick layer of dust.

The usual collection of cardboard boxes holding god only knows what were stacked against one wall, and dozens of the paperback Westerns Isabelle adored cluttered the board-and-brick bookshelf under the window.

Norah stared at the open doors of the bulging closet. “Could you tell if any of her clothes were missing, Polly?”

Polly shook her head. “Not a chance. She’s got so many, nobody could tell. Any sign of her purse? If she’s gone somewhere, she’ll have taken her purse with her.”

“Which one d’you think she was using?” Norah gestured at the closet, where a welter of handbags was piled on the shelf.

Polly tried to remember and couldn’t. “Maybe a straw one? I’m not sure.”

“It’s white,” Clover said with conviction. “Auntie’s purse is white. It gots a little green one inside it where she keeps all her money.”

“You’re right. I remember now!” Norah exclaimed. “Good for you, Clover.” She did a quick survey. “It’s not up here, and I didn’t see it downstairs, either.”

They checked the other two bedrooms.

“This is where Polly and I slept when we were little girls like you,” Norah told Clover.

“Where did Susannah sleep?” Clover looked up at Norah.

“Susannah didn’t live here,” Polly said shortly.

“She lived at your house, right?” Clover asked Polly. “’Cause you’re her mommy, right?”

“Right.” Why was this kid so obsessed with Susannah?

“And Isabelle is our mommy,” Norah explained. “Now, let’s go look a bit more downstairs.”

They searched, but the purse wasn’t around. And there wasn’t any note. Nothing indicated where Isabelle might be or when she might be back.

“I give up. I need a cup of coffee.” Polly felt exhausted.

“I could use a cup, too,” Norah agreed. In the kitchen Polly emptied the half-filled coffee maker and washed it before starting a fresh pot to drip.

Norah gave Clover a stack of old National Geographies. Isabelle had at least twelve boxes filled with them. They found a pair of scissors, and Clover sat at the kitchen table, happily snipping away at a photo spread of elephants.

Polly filled two mugs and silently handed one to Norah. The air was once again thick with all the things unsaid between them.

“Let’s go sit in the living room.” Norah led the way, and when they were seated, Polly on the old sagging sofa and Norah on one of the rump-sprung chairs, Norah gave a huge sigh. “Polly, I apologize for the things I said last night. I got myself into a state over...” She gulped and went pink. “Over Jerome,” she finally said. “I hardly slept all night I felt so bad about taking it out on you.”

Polly thought back over the previous evening and shuddered. “Maybe you weren’t all wrong,” she said in a gloomy tone. “Maybe I am like Mom.”

After all, Michael had pretty much said the same things, hadn’t he?

“Oh, you’re not. I mean, you’re like her in that you’re both beautiful and charismatic in a way I never have been. I’ve always been a little jealous of that. See, I...I care about Jerome, and I very much want him to feel the same way about me, so much that it scares me silly,” Norah confessed. “Oh, Pol, it’s easier to get mad at you than to take a hard look at myself.” She swallowed the coffee as if it were medicine and stared down at the dusty carpet. “More than anything I want what you’ve got, Pol.” Her voice was wistful. “You have a rock-solid marriage, a husband who adores you. Losing Susannah was awful for all of us, but you’ve got such courage. You went for help. You worked hard at getting through it, while I...”

Tears welled up and rolled down Norah’s cheeks. She wiped at them with her fingers and choked back sobs. “I ran away. I went to Seattle and locked myself in a hotel room for four days and bawled. I was so shattered I couldn’t be around anybody, and I feel so guilty about that, about not being there for you when you needed me.”

A hard core of resentment began to melt inside Polly. She had blamed Norah; she’d thought her actions insensitive and outright cruel. Hearing what had really happened made her heart go out to her sister, because she understood.

“Losing Susannah was so enormous. I loved her so. I do love her so.” Norah wept.

“I know you do. She knew you did. You were the best auntie a kid could have.”

“I want children so much, Polly,” Norah acknowledged. “Sometimes it’s like a physical pain inside me. I hold the babies in the nursery and I ache for my own.”

Polly knew all about that ache. “I didn’t know you felt this way. I thought you wanted a career instead of a marriage.”

“I’d convinced myself I did because every time I met someone I cared for, something went wrong. I’ve always blamed the men,” Norah admitted. “I finally figured out when I couldn’t sleep last night that I go into relationships believing they won’t work, that I’m not good enough, so I look for ways to end them. That way it’s me doing the dumping instead of the other way around.” She dug in her jeans pocket and came up with a tattered tissue, which she used to mop her eyes and blow her nose. “Pretty dumb, huh? I’m thirty-four. It’s taken me all these years to figure this out and now it sounds so simple.”

But it didn’t sound simple at all to Polly. She’d spent enough time with Frannie to know that insights into one’s psyche were hard-won and painful. She told Norah so, and something Norah had said echoed inside her brain.

You have a rock-solid marriage, a husband who adores you...

If Norah only knew the truth. And why shouldn’t she? Polly wondered suddenly. Norah was her sister, and she’d just been bone honest.

Polly sucked in a deep breath and told Norah some of what was really happening in her life. She began with Stokes and the financial crisis, and how she’d contributed to it by spending money recklessly after Susannah’s death. The only thing Polly couldn’t bring herself to admit was how bad things were between her said Michael. That hurt was too painful, her fear too deep.

Instead, she talked about the loss of the house, her inability to draw, the sense of inadequacy she’d always had because, unlike Norah, she had no formal career. “That’s what I’ve always envied about you, Norah. I’d give anything to have a job I cared about, somewhere I had to go every day, a purpose to my life.” She’d been holding the tears back, but now she let them come. "I lost all that when Susannah died.”

“Oh, Pol.” Norah moved over to the sofa. She hugged Polly, holding her and stroking her hair as if Polly were her little sister instead of the other way around. Both were crying now, healing tears that rolled down their cheeks and made wet splotches on their T-shirts.

They became aware of Clover standing a few steps away, her forehead wrinkled in a frown.

“Are you crying ’cause your mommy went away?” she asked, adding in an understanding tone, “I cried when my mommy went away.”

“Oh, sweetheart, c’mere.” Norah sniffled and she and Polly enfolded Clover in their arms. At that moment, Polly felt closer to the little girl than she ever had before.

“Sometimes crying helps, doesn’t it, honey?” Norah’s voice was tear-choked.

Clover endured the embrace for a few seconds, then announced, “You’re squeezing me too tight and I still gots to pee.”

Tears gave way to laughter as Clover scampered down the hall to the bathroom.

“She’s such a funny, sweet little thing, and I want to get to know her better, Polly. I’m starting my long break tomorrow. Would you mind if I had her for a couple days?”

Rubbing the thumb that still ached from Clover’s teeth, Polly decided to let Norah find out for herself that the kid wasn’t always sweet. "You free tomorrow morning, by any chance? I’ve got an appointment, and I was wondering what to do with Clover.” Their newfound intimacy prompted her to add, “It’s with Frannie, at the hospital. I need to talk to her again. I could drop Clover off at your place.”