Chương 7
My father is worse. I’m staying until the doctors decide whether he can travel. I hate that sentence because it sounds like an excuse.
Whatever you think I did, ask me yourself.
M.
He read it twice.
Among Elizabeth’s letters was one written the same week.
Max,
Your mother says you know about the baby and want me to end the pregnancy. She showed me your letter. I don’t know what to believe. I keep thinking about the morning you tried to make pancakes and burned the towel. That person would call me. That person would not send his mother.
I am keeping the baby.
If you want nothing to do with us, say it to me.
Elizabeth
The letter had never been mailed. In the margin, years later, Elizabeth had written: I was afraid the loan threat was real. It was.
Maxwell closed the box.
Claire had been reading the copies of the loan documents.
“These were not demand notices,” she said. “They were internal reviews.”
“What does that mean?” Dana asked.
“It means Evelyn presented a possible action as if it had already been authorized. The bank could have called the loans, but there is no evidence it intended to.”
“She lied,” Maxwell said.
Claire looked at him.
“Yes.”
The digital recorder contained eleven files. Most were Elizabeth speaking dates and names for Dana. One contained Nora.
The recording had been made three months before her death.
“If Maxwell ever hears this,” Nora said, “I don’t want the first thing he knows about me to be that I needed something.”
Her voice was the same as on the call, but less guarded.
“I teach art at Green Lake Middle School. I’m not great at it every day. Last week I made a seventh grader cry because I told him his project looked rushed. It was rushed, but apparently you can be right and still be a jerk.”
Dana smiled faintly.
Maxwell did not.
“I have two daughters. Lucy thinks rules are promises adults are too lazy to keep. Lily sings when she brushes her teeth and denies it if anyone listens. Their father, Daniel, left when they were babies. That isn’t the dramatic part. He was young and selfish, and then he got used to being gone.”
Nora paused.
“My mother thinks I should contact you because she’s sick. I think contacting someone because you need them gives them the wrong idea about why you came.”
There was a faint scraping sound, perhaps a chair moving.
“I did try before. Your office thinks I’m dangerous or greedy. Maybe both. I don’t know what your mother told them. I used to imagine meeting you and saying something impressive. Now I mostly want to ask whether you knew.”
Another pause.
“If you didn’t, I’m sorry. If you did, I don’t want you near my children.”
The file ended.
Maxwell remained in the bank’s private viewing room after the others stepped outside.
He sat with the recorder in his palm.
Nora had given him two possible versions of himself. In one, he was ignorant. In the other, cruel.
He had spent three days clinging to ignorance as if it were innocence.
At the next supervised visit, Lucy brought a sketchbook.
“My mom drew these,” she said.
They sat at a low table while Lily built a house from magnetic tiles. Simone remained near the window.
The drawings were quick studies in pencil: people waiting at bus stops, a sleeping dog, a grocery clerk stacking oranges, Lucy at five with her mouth open in laughter, Lily wearing swimming goggles in a bathtub.
The hands were unfinished in nearly every picture.
Maxwell touched the edge of a page.
“Your grandmother told me she couldn’t draw hands.”
“She could,” Lucy said. “She just didn’t like them.”
“I heard her recording.”
Lucy’s head lifted.
“What recording?”
“One she made before the accident.”
“For who?”
“For me.”
Lucy closed the sketchbook.
“You don’t get to have it.”
“I don’t have it. It belongs to her estate.”
“You listened.”
“Yes.”
“Did Grandma say you could?”
“She kept it in the box for me.”
Lucy stood.
“You’re stealing her.”
Maxwell remained seated.
“What does that mean?”
“You didn’t know her, and now you’re taking her pictures and her voice and acting sad.”
“I am sad.”
“You don’t get to be.”
Lily stopped building.
“Lucy.”
“No.” Lucy’s face reddened. “He has everything.”
Maxwell looked at Simone.
She did not rescue him.
He stood slowly.
“I don’t have your mother.”
“You never did.”
“No.”
Lucy’s breathing became uneven.
“And I don’t have the years I should have known her. I can’t take yours.”
“You’re trying.”
“I’m trying to learn about her.”
“That’s the same thing.”
“It may feel that way.”
“Stop talking like a lawyer.”
“I’m not a lawyer.”
“You have six.”
“Seven,” Lily said quietly.
Lucy turned on her.
“Whose side are you on?”
Lily’s eyes widened.
“Nobody’s.”
“Then stop helping him.”
Lily kicked the magnetic house. Tiles scattered beneath the table. The sound startled her, and she began to cry.
Lucy immediately crouched beside her.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Lil.”
Maxwell stepped forward.
Lucy held up one hand without looking at him.
“Don’t.”
He stopped.
Simone gathered Lily into her arms. Lily hid her face against Simone’s shoulder.
Lucy picked up the tiles one at a time. Her anger vanished into concentration.
Maxwell knelt several feet away and began gathering pieces from his side of the table.
Lucy looked at him.
“I said don’t.”
“I’m cleaning up the tiles.”
“I can do it.”
“I know.”
They continued in silence.
When the floor was clear, Maxwell returned the sketchbook without asking to see the rest.
The following morning, Gordon Voss arrived at Maxwell’s office in a tan jacket and open-collared shirt. Retirement had softened his body but not his eyes.
Adrian and Claire sat beside Maxwell at the conference table.
Voss declined coffee.
May you like
“I assume this concerns Elizabeth Winters,” he said.
Maxwell slid the archived watch-list record across the table.
