Chương 11
She would not cry here.
Margaret continued more softly.
“You remember being controlled. I remember being terrified.”
That stopped Laura.
Not because it excused anything.
Because she believed her.
Margaret looked down.
“You were going to have a baby. Your father was dying. David was getting divorced. Claire barely spoke to her father. I had spent forty years believing that if I organized things properly, nothing truly terrible could happen.”
A bitter little smile touched her mouth.
“That was an idiotic belief.”
David looked at her.
Laura had never heard Margaret call one of her own beliefs idiotic.
“What happened in the lawyer’s office?” Laura asked.
Margaret breathed in.
“Thomas was tired.”
“Confused?”
“At first.”
David shifted.
Margaret looked at him.
“He had taken pain medication that morning. I wanted to postpone.”
David frowned.
“You never told me that.”
“You never asked.”
“That’s not—”
Laura raised a hand.
“Go on.”
“We waited. He had coffee. We talked for almost an hour. By the time the attorney came in, your father was himself.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I knew him.”
“That isn’t legal capacity.”
“I’m not making a legal argument.”
“What did Dad say?”
“He said he wanted the restrictions.”
“Permanent?”
Margaret hesitated.
“He agreed to them.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“He agreed.”
“Did he ask for five years?”
“Yes.”
Laura’s chest tightened.
“And you argued against it.”
“Yes.”
“In the meeting?”
“Yes.”
“In front of the lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“And Dad eventually agreed with you.”
“Yes.”
“Then why did he write afterward saying he didn’t remember approving permanent discretion?”
Margaret’s face changed.
“I don’t know.”
“Was he confused?”
“I don’t know.”
The words sounded strange from her.
Laura leaned forward.
“Then why are you asking David to swear he was competent?”
“Because I believe he was.”
“You believe.”
“Yes.”
“That isn’t the same as knowing.”
“No.”
The admission sat among the plates.
David said, “Why didn’t you tell Bancroft that?”
Margaret looked at him.
“Because they asked whether I believed he had capacity. I said yes.”
“And then you asked me for an affidavit.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Her fingers tightened around the napkin.
“Because if the amendment is challenged, everything becomes public.”
Laura frowned.
“Trust litigation isn’t necessarily public in every detail.”
“Enough will be.”
“What are you afraid of?”
Margaret looked at her.
For several seconds Laura thought she would refuse.
Then Margaret said, “The letters.”
“What letters?”
“Not those.”
David went still.
Margaret looked older again.
“There are letters your father wrote during the last year of his life.”
“To whom?”
“To me.”
Laura waited.
“What do they say?”
Margaret’s eyes moved to the dining-room windows.
Outside, evening had settled over the lake.
“He was angry.”
“At you?”
“Yes.”
“About the trust?”
“About many things.”
David leaned forward.
“Where are they?”
“At the house.”
“Why would Bancroft get them?”
“They’re referenced in correspondence with the attorney.”
Laura felt the shape of something approaching.
“What did Dad accuse you of?”
Margaret’s jaw tightened.
“Controlling him.”
Nobody spoke.
The waiter appeared to ask whether everything was satisfactory.
Margaret looked up and said, with astonishing normality, “The salmon is excellent.”
The waiter smiled.
Laura nearly laughed from sheer disbelief.
When he left, Margaret said, “Your father was sick, frightened, and furious that his body had stopped obeying him. Sometimes that anger was directed at me.”
“Did he have reason?”
“Yes.”
The answer was quiet.
Laura waited.
Margaret folded the napkin.
“I canceled appointments when he was too tired.”
“That sounds reasonable.”
“I answered calls for him.”
“Also reasonable.”
“I stopped giving him the checkbook.”
David frowned.
“Why?”
“He wrote the same donation twice. Twenty-five thousand dollars each.”
“To where?”
“A hospital foundation.”
“Did they return one?”
“Yes.”
“So?”
“So I became afraid.”
Margaret looked at her hands.
“I began checking everything.”
Laura understood before her mother finished.
“His mail.”
“Yes.”
“His calls.”
“Yes.”
“His legal documents.”
“Yes.”
“Did he know?”
“Eventually.”
“And he hated you for it.”
Margaret’s eyes lifted.
“Sometimes.”
There was no self-pity in the answer.
That made it difficult to dismiss.
“Did you pressure him about my trust?” Laura asked.
“Yes.”
David closed his eyes.
Margaret continued before either could speak.
“I believed I was right.”
“That doesn’t make it okay.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
Margaret’s voice sharpened.
“Yes, Laura. I know that now. I did not know it then.”
The dining room continued around them.
A child at another table dropped a spoon.
All three Hayeses flinched.
The child’s father picked it up.
Nothing happened.
Laura looked at her mother.
“Why Emma?”
Margaret’s face closed.
“Don’t.”
“No. That is the thing I actually came here to understand.”
“I apologized.”
“You did. I’m asking why.”
Margaret stared at the untouched salmon.
“Because she was holding the cake server exactly the way you used to hold a knife.”
Laura frowned.
“What?”
“Left hand too close to the blade. Fingers curled under.”
“That’s why you grabbed it?”
“Yes.”
“You could have said, ‘Careful.’”
“I did.”
“Emma says you grabbed it.”
“I did.”
“And then it fell.”
“Yes.”
“And you blamed her.”
Margaret swallowed.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I was angry.”
“At the trust.”
“At David.”
“At me.”
“Yes.”
“At Dad.”
Margaret’s eyes flashed.
Laura knew she had found it.
“You’re still angry at him.”
Her mother looked away.
“He left me with a mess.”
“He died.”
“I’m aware.”
The words came out cold.
Then Margaret’s face changed.
She pressed two fingers against her mouth.
For the first time Laura understood that the coldness was not absence.
It was containment.
Margaret lowered her hand.
“He spent the last year of his life accusing me of treating him like a child while depending on me for almost everything. He would tell me to take over, then hate me for taking over. He would ask me to make decisions, then accuse me of controlling him.”
Her voice trembled once.
“He died angry with me.”
Laura did not know that.
May you like
David apparently did not either.
“His last coherent conversation with me,” Margaret said, “was an argument.”
