Stillwatch (17 page)

Authors: Mary Higgins Clark

Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Anthologies (Multiple Authors)

BOOK: Stillwatch

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Irene and Wislon with Dean, age 6 months.
She picked up a packet of letters. The rubber band snapped andthey scattered on the carpet. Quickly she gathered and glanced throughthem. One especially caught her eye.

DearMomMom,

Thank you. I guess those are the only words for allthe years of sacrifice to put me through college andlaw school. I know all about the dresses you didn’tbuy, the outings you never attended with the otherlades in town. Long ago promised I’d try to be just

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like Dad I’ll keep that promise. I love you. Andremember to go to the doctor please. That coughsounded awfully deep.

Your loving son,Dean

An obituary notice for Irene Wagner Adams was beneath the letter.It was dated six months later.Tears blurred Pat’s eyes for the young man who had not beenashamed to express his love for his mother.
She too had experiencedthat generous love. Her hand in his. Her screaming delight when hecame home. Daddy. Daddy. Swung high in the air and tossed up andstrong hands catching her. She was riding her tricycle down thedriveway . . . her knees scraping along gravel . . . his voice saying,“This won’t hurt much, Kerry. We have to make sure it’s clean . . .What kind of ice cream should we get? . . .”
The doorbell rang. Pat swept the pictures and letters together andstood up. Half of them spilled from her arms as she tried to jam theminto the carton. The doorbell rang again, this time more insistently.She scrambled to pick up the scattered photos and notes and hidethem with the others. She started from the room and realized she’dforgotten to put away the pictures of her parents and the RaggedyAnn doll. Suppose Toby had come in here and seen them! She droppedthem into the carton and shoved it under the table.Toby was about to ring the bell again when she yanked open the door.Involuntarily, she stepped back as his bulky frame filled the doorway.“I was just giving up on you!” His attempt to sound genial didn’tcome off.“Don’t give up on me, Toby,” she said coldly. Who was he to beannoyed at having to wait a few seconds? He seemed to be studyingher. She glanced down and realized how grimy her hands were andthat she had been rubbing her eyes. Her face was probably smearedwith dirt.“You look like you were making mud pies.” There was a puzzled,suspicious expression on his face. She didn’t answer him. He shiftedthe package under his arm, and the oversized onyx ring moved backand forth on his finger. “Where do you want this stuff, Pat? In the library?”

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“Yes.”He followed her so closely that she had the uneasy feeling he wouldcrash into her if she stopped suddenly. Sitting cross-legged for solong had made her right leg numb, and she was favoring it.“You limping, Pat? You didn’t fall on the ice or anything, did you?”You don’t miss a trick, she thought. “Put the box on the table,”she told him.“Okay. I gotta get right back. The Senator wasn’t happy abouthaving to figure out where these albums were. I can see myself out.”She waited until she heard the front door dose before she went tosecure the bolt. As she reached the foyer, the door opened again.Toby seemed startled to see her standing there; then his face creasedin an unpleasant smile. “That lock wouldn’t keep out anyone whoknew his way around, Pat,” he said. “Be sure to use the dead bolt.”The Senator ’s additional material was a hodgepodge of newspaperclippings and fan letters. Most of the pictures were shots of her atpolitical ceremonies, state dinners, ribbon-cutting ceremonies,inaugurations. As Pat turned the pages, several of them fluttered downto the floor.The back pages of the album were more promising. She cameupon an enlarged photo of a young Abigail and Willard seated on ablanket near a lake. He was reading to her. It was an idyllic setting,they looked like lovers on a Victorian cameo.There were a few more snapshots that might fit into a montage. Atlast she had gone through everything and bent down to retrieve thepictures that had fallen. Underneath one of them was a folded sheetof expensive notepaper. She opened it. It read:

Billy darling. You were splendid in the hearings thisafternoon. I am so proud of you I love you so and lookforward to a lifetime of being with you, of workingwith you. Oh, my dearest we really are going to makea difference in this world

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The letter was dated May 13. Willard Jennings had been on hisway to deliver the commencement address when he met his death onMay 20.What a terrific wrap-up that would make Pat exulted. It would quietanyone who thinks of the Senator as cold and uncaring. If she could onlypersuade Luther to let her read the note on the program. How would itsound? “Billy darling,” she read aloud. “I’m so sorry . . .”Her voice broke. What is the matter with me? she thought impatiently.Firmly, she began again. “Billy darling. You were splendid. . . .”

107

On the twenty-third of December at 2 P.M. Senator Abigail Jenningssat in the library of her home with Toby and Philip and watched thetelecast as the Vice President of the United States formally tenderedhis resignation to the Chief Executive.Her lips dry, her fingernails digging into her palms, Abigail listenedas the Vice President, propped on pillows in his hospital bed, ashen-faced and obviously dying, said in a surprisingly strong voice, “I hadexpected to withhold my decision until after the first of the year.However, I feel that it is my clear duty to vacate this office and havethe line of succession to Chief Executive of this great countryuncompromised. I am grateful for the confidence the President andmy party expressed when I was twice chosen to be the VicePresidential candidate. I am grateful to the people of the United Statesfor having given me the opportunity to serve them.”With profound regret, the President accepted the resignation ofhis old friend and colleague. When asked if he had decided on areplacement, he said, “I have a few ideas.” But he declined to respondto the names suggested by the press.Toby whistled. “Well, it’s happened, Abby.”“Senator, mark my words . . .” Philip began.“Be quiet and listen!” she snapped. As the scene in the hospitalroom ended, the camera focused on Luther Pelham in the newsroomof Potomac Cable.“A historic moment,” Luther began. With dignified reticence herecounted a brief history of the Vice Presidency and then came to thepoint. “The time has come for a woman to be selected for the highoffice . . . a woman with the necessary experience and provedexpertise. Mr. President, choose
her
now.”Abigail laughed sharply. “Meaning me.”

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The phone began to ring. “That will be reporters. I’m not in,” she said.An hour later the press was still camped outside Abigail’s home. Finallyshe agreed to an interview. Outwardly she was calm. She said that shewas busy with preparations for a Christmas supper for friends. Whenasked if she expected to be appointed Vice President, she said in anamused tone, “Now, you really can’t expect me to comment on that.”Once the door closed behind her, her expression and mannerchanged. Even Toby did not dare to cross the line.Luther phoned to confirm the taping schedule. Abigail’s raisedvoice could be heard throughout the house. “Yes, I saw it. You wantto know something? I probably have this in the bag right now, withoutthat damn program hanging over my head. I told you it was a rottenidea. Don’t tell
me
you only wanted to help me. You wanted to haveme obligated to you, and we both know it.”Abigail’s voice lowered, and Philip exchanged glances with Toby.“What did you find out?” he asked.“Pat Traymore was up in Apple Junction last week. She stoppedat the newspaper office and got some back issues. She visitedSaunders, the guy who was sweet on Abby when she was a kid. Hetalked his head off to her. Then she saw the retired school principalwho knew Abby. I was at Pat’s house in Georgetown when Saundersphoned her.”“How much damage could any of those people do to the Senator?”Philip asked.Toby shrugged. “It depends. Did you find out anything about the house?”“Some,” Philip told him. “We got to the realty company that hasbeen renting it for years. They had a new tenant all lined up, but thebank handling the trust for the heirs said that someone in the familywas planning to use it and it wouldn’t be for rent again.”“Someone
in
the family?” Toby repeated. “
Who in
the family?”“I would guess Pat Traymore,” Philip said sarcastically.“Don’t get smart with me,” Toby snapped. “I want to know
who
owns that place now, and
which
relative is using it.”

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With mixed emotions Pat watched Potomac Cable cover the VicePresident’s resignation. At the end of Luther’s segment, the anchormansaid that it was considered unlikely the President would name asuccessor before the New Year.And we air the program on the twenty-seventh, Pat thought.As Sam had predicted the first night she was in Washington, shemight have a hand in the selection of the first woman Vice President.Once again her sleep had been interrupted by troubled dreams.Did she really remember her mother and father so clearly, or was sheconfusing the films and pictures she had seen of them with reality?The memory of his bandaging her knee and taking her for ice creamwas authentic. She was sure of that. But hadn’t there also been timeswhen she had pulled the pillow over her ears because of angry voicesand hysterical weeping?She was determined to finish reviewing her father ’s effects.Doggedly she had examined the material and found herselfincreasingly concerned about the references to her mother. There wereletters from her grandmother to Renée. One of them, dated six monthsbefore the tragedy, said:
“Renée, dear, the tone of your note troublesme. If you feel you are having onslaughts of depression again, pleasego into counseling immediately.”
It had been her grandmother, according to the newspaper articles,who had claimed that Dean Adams was an unstable personality.She found a letter from her father to her mother written the yearbefore their deaths:

Dear Renée,

I am pretty upset that you want to spend the entiresummer in New Hampshire with Kerry. You must knowhow much I miss you both. It is absolutely necessaryfor me to go to Wisconsin Why not give it a try? Wecan rent a Steinway for you while you’re there. Icertainly understand that Mother ’s old spinet is hardlyappropriate. Please, dear. For my sake.

Pat felt as though she were trying to remove bandages from afestering wound. The nearer she got to the wound itself, the harder it

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was to pull the adhesive from it. The sense of pain, emotional andeven physical, was increasingly acute.One of the cartons was filled with Christmas ornaments and stringsof lights. They gave her an idea. She would get a small Christmastree. Why not? Where were Veronica and Charles now? She consultedtheir itinerary. Their ship would be putting in at St. John tomorrow.She wondered if she could phone them on Christmas Day.The mail was a welcome respite. She had an abundance of cardsand invitations from her friends in Boston.
“Come up just for the dayof you possibly can.” “We’re all waiting for the program.” “An Enemyfor this one, Pat-not just the nomination”
One letter had been forwarded from Boston Cable. The return-address sticker on the envelope read: CATHERINE GRANEY, 22BALSAM PLACE, RICHMOND, VA.
Graney,
Pat thought. That was the name of the pilot who diedwith Willard Jennings.The letter was brief:

Dear Miss Traymore:

I have read that you are planning to prepare andnarrate a program about Senator Abigail Jennings.As one who has had the opportunity to appreciateseveral of your fine documentaries, I feel it imperativeto notify you that the program about Senator AbegailJennings may become the subject of a lawsuit. I warnyou, do not give the Senator the opportunity to discussWillard Jennings’ death. For your own sake, don’t lether assert that pilot error cost her husband his life.That pilot, my husband, died too. And believe me, it isa bitter joke that she dares to affect the pose of abereaved widow. If you wish to speak with me, youmay call me at this number: 804-555-6841.

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