A Thread of Truth Page 13

  I am none of those things.

  “I won’t be ordered around in my own shop, not by you or anyone. I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

  He put both hands on the counter and leaned toward me, his arms flexed, straining beneath the sleeved confinement of his jacket.

  “Maybe you didn’t understand me the first time,” he said, lowering his voice until it was a whisper. “I’m not leaving without her.” He didn’t blink. Neither did I.

  “Ivy is my wife. Almost two years ago she disappeared with my children. She’s a kidnapper and a thief. If you try to hide her, you’re going to find yourself in a world of trouble.”

  “I don’t know who you think you are, but I’ve had just about enough of your threats. Get out of my shop or I’m going to call the police.”

  He just kept staring at me, refusing to budge. I could tell he was trying to intimidate me with his immovable demeanor and, though on the inside I was shaking, on the outside I was unflinching.

  The skin near the base of his shirt collar was beginning to turn red. He was angry, frustrated at his inability to bully me into doing what he wanted.

  Well, isn’t that too bad, I thought, working to keep my lips from bowing into a smile. It’s a bit harder going toe-to-toe with an old broad who’s been around the block a few times than it is pushing Ivy and your kids around, isn’t it?

  I waited one moment more, hoping he’d back down, then straightened my shoulders and reached for the phone.

  He beat me to it, clamped his big paw over the receiver, and wouldn’t let go.

  “You need to make a call, Mister?” Charlie asked as he walked in through the open door holding a bunch of white daisies clutched in his fist. “You’ll find a pay phone down at the gas station.”

  Charlie isn’t a short man. He works out three days a week and is in good shape, but Ivy’s husband had six inches on him in height and Charlie had at least a decade on him in age. Yet, there Charlie was, glaring at this intruder with both his hands balled up into fists and, even though one of those fists was still clutching a nosegay of summer flowers, the pugnacious tilt of Charlie’s chin made it clear that he was itching to throw a punch, the perfect illustration of the phrase “got his Irish up.” I do love that man.

  Ivy’s husband, Hodge, turned around to face Charlie. “Nice flowers.”

  Charlie took a step forward.

  “Hey, I’m not trying to cause any problems,” Hodge said calmly. He opened his hands and dropped his shoulders, deliberately taking a less provocative stance as if trying to develop a man-to-man rapport with Charlie. That seemed to be his modus operandi: First try charm and manipulation and, if that didn’t work, go for threats and intimidation.

  “All I want is to see my wife. I know she’s here. Her car’s parked outside. I’m not going to leave until I get to talk to her. She’s my wife. I love her and I want to see her, that’s all.”

  Charlie spoke before I could stop him. “Yes. We’ve heard all about how you show your love for Ivy. Fists in place of flowers. Kicks instead of kisses. Quite the devoted husband, aren’t you?”

  “Is that what she told you? That I hit her?” He shook his head and sighed. “Listen, I love Ivy, I always have, but you don’t know her like I do. She’s had a hard life. Father died when she was a little girl, mother was killed in a car wreck a few years later. And then there was her stepfather,” he huffed. “He was a real prince of a guy, used Ivy for his personal punching bag. She ran away. Started living on the streets. That’s when I found her.”

  His eyes drifted up toward the ceiling, away from Charlie, as if having a conversation with himself, and rubbed his neck with his big right hand. “She was so beautiful. It took me about five minutes to fall in love with her. Less. How could I not? And I…well…I thought I could rescue her,” he said ruefully and then let out a short, self-mocking laugh.

  “Love conquers all. That’s what I thought at the time, but when a person is scarred like that, so badly and so young…”

  He started a bit and looked at Charlie again, as if suddenly remembering he wasn’t alone. He cleared his throat. “I love Ivy; I always will. She’s my wife and I promised to love her and take care of her for better or worse. I know she can be very convincing, but Ivy has”—he hesitated as if looking for a word that would describe the poor, disturbed bride he was only trying to save from herself without sounding disloyal—“issues.”

  What a guy. What a performance.

  The thing is, I did know Ivy. I’d been working side by side with her for over a year and I knew she wasn’t the pathetic, mental basket case he was making her out to be. It was everything I could do to keep myself from spitting on Hodge Edelman’s shoes and then kicking him in the shins.

  The problem was, he was a very good actor, a brilliant one. If I hadn’t known Ivy as I did, I might have been convinced by his performance. Even worse, his story sounded almost true. Ivy hasn’t told me everything about her past, but enough so that I knew that many of the details he was sharing were accurate. He’d added a few facts, left out some others. Almost true or not, it still added up to a lie, but someone who didn’t know Ivy might be inclined to believe his version of the story. In a courtroom, wearing his solid-citizen blue blazer and making his polished delivery, he would make a believable witness. More believable, perhaps, than Ivy, with that hollow and hunted look in her eyes.

  Much as I wanted him out of my shop, I needed to hear what he had to say. I needed to study his story and his demeanor because, clearly, this was the tact he was going to take, to paint Ivy as a lying, mentally unbalanced young woman and himself as the long-suffering but devoted husband who’d fallen in love too hard and married too quickly to realize what he was getting himself into, but who wasn’t going to back away from his family obligations, no matter how burdensome they’d become.

  I didn’t believe him, but someone who didn’t know Ivy like I did might. A judge might. I listened as long as I could, looking for the chinks in his armor. The best offense is a strong defense.

  “The thing is,” he continued, turning to me now, trying to win me to his side, or at least cause me to consider the possibility that he was telling the truth, “Ivy sometimes has a hard time separating fact from fiction. It’s not her fault. After all she’s been through I guess it’s understandable, but when she feels overwhelmed or upset about something, her first instinct is to run, you know? She doesn’t like confrontation.” He sighed again, heavily.

  “This whole thing was my fault. We had an argument about something stupid; now, I can’t even remember what. I got mad. I didn’t touch her—I’d never do that—but I raised my voice. I shouldn’t have. I know how she gets. But I really didn’t think it was that big a deal. I went to work, figured we’d talk it out when I got home, but by then, she was gone.”

  He looked me in the eye, held out his hands palms out, a magician bent on convincing me he had nothing up his sleeves. “Ma’am, I’m sorry I was so gruff with you before. Really. It’s just that I’ve been looking for my wife and my children for months on end. I’d almost given up hope of ever finding them…”

  He sniffed. The same man who’d leaned across the counter and tried to bully me into giving up his abused wife actually sniffed and blinked as if now, suddenly overwhelmed by tenderness, it was all he could do to keep back the tears. Watching this farce, I was suddenly overwhelmed by a desire to lose my lunch.

  “I’ve been away on business,” he continued. “When I got home last night, one of my neighbors came over to the house and told me she’d seen Ivy on that quilting show. It was just for a second, but she wrote down the name of your shop. I got in my car and drove up here right away. Didn’t even remember to call the office and tell them where I’d gone until I’d crossed the state line. I was so worried that I’d be too late. Like I said, whenever something upsets her, Ivy’s first instinct is to run. And then, when I got here and saw her car parked on the street, I was so anxious to see her…Well, like I said
, I shouldn’t have been so gruff with you. I’m really sorry. Miss? Ms.?” He looked at me questioningly.

  I’d found out what I’d needed to know.

  “You don’t need to know my name,” I said. “You won’t be staying that long.”

  He frowned and I could see his jaw clench as he struggled to maintain his kinder, gentler façade. “I told you. I can’t leave. I won’t. Not without Ivy and my kids.”

  Still clasping the now-slightly-wilted daisies, Charlie took three steps to the right, moving solidly into Edelman’s field of vision, a pugilist circling his opponent, eager for the bell to sound and the first round to begin. “Well you’re going to have to. You’re not welcome here. You are leaving. I’d advise you to do so under your own steam. It’ll be less embarrassing.”

  “Less embarrassing?” Edelman said wryly, dropping all pretense of affability. “Less embarrassing for you? Yeah, I can see how you’d be worried about that because, Mister, it’s going to take ten guys twice the size of you to get me to leave here without taking what’s mine with me.”

  “Now there’s an interesting picture. Not sure we can muster an army quite as big as that on short notice. Instead of ten guys, how about one lawyer?”

  Franklin Spaulding, with Abigail close behind, came through the door right on time to pick me up for the zoning meeting. Franklin reached into his pocket and withdrew his weapon.

  “My card. Franklin Spaulding.” He smiled cordially and extended his hand with his business card in it, as if introducing himself to a potential new client at a cocktail party. “Your wife’s attorney, to be more exact. If I’m not mistaken, there are some officers at your home and office right now, trying to serve you with divorce papers.”

  Edelman took the business card, read it, and scowled. Franklin smiled and inclined his head slightly. “Good-bye, Mr. Edelman. I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again soon.”

  “Count on it,” Edelman growled and shoved the card in his pocket before heading for the still open door. He slammed it behind him, making the bells ring so hard you’d have thought Christmas had come early.

  For a moment, everyone was quiet. Then Abigail spoke, with an uncharacteristically high and flute-like pitch to her voice.

  “My! What a smell of sulphur!” she exclaimed and waved her hands, Glinda the Good banishing the lingering aroma of her wicked sister to the west.

  That broke the tension.

  “Well, that was interesting.” I chuckled. “Charlie, when you came through the door, it was like a scene from one of those old spaghetti Westerns, a shootout between the white hats and black, but with a bit of a twist. What’s with the flowers? Were you planning on beating him over the head with them, then hog-tying him with a length of florist’s wire?”

  Charlie looked at the bedraggled bouquet and colored a bit. “They were for you, of course. You sounded upset and then you wouldn’t tell me why. You said it was too complicated to explain over the phone.” He shifted his shoulders defensively.

  “I thought maybe you were rethinking our relationship. So, as soon as you hung up, I grabbed a bunch of flowers from off one of the tables in the dining room and ran over here to talk you out of it.”

  I came out from behind the counter and took the daisies from him. “Oh, Charlie, they’re beautiful. Thank you. But, you didn’t have to do that. I’m not rethinking anything. I’m afraid you’re stuck with me, sweetie.” I rocked up on my toes and gave him a quick kiss on the lips.

  “I can live with that.”

  “So, Franklin, what do we do now? More to the point, what do we think he’s doing now?” I asked, tilting my head toward the door through which Hodge Edelman had just exited.

  Franklin took a handkerchief from his pocket and mopped his brow, looking drained and a bit less formidable than he had just a minute before. “Right now? My guess is he’s driving around, trying to find a phone booth with an intact set of yellow pages so he can get himself a lawyer. At least, that’s what he’ll be doing if he’s got any brains at all.”

  “A question that seems to be in some doubt,” added Charlie with a smirk.

  Abigail moved closer to Franklin, slipping her arm through his. “Well, it won’t do him any good whatever he does. The best lawyer in the county is already working on this case.” She looked up at Franklin, her face beaming confidence.

  “Mmmm,” Franklin murmured noncommittally. “For Ivy’s sake, I hope you’re right.” He pulled on his nose and thought for a moment.

  “As far as the next move,” he said wearily, “it’s mine. There’s enough time before the meeting. I’d better go upstairs and talk to Ivy.”

  17

  Ivy Peterman

  “Because I said so, Bethany, that’s why!” I shouted at my daughter.

  I felt terrible for yelling, but at the moment I wasn’t in the mood to explain my reasoning to her. There wasn’t time.

  Sniffing, Bethany shuffled back into the bedroom she shared with Bobby and started morosely tossing her stuffed animals into the open cardboard box that I’d left sitting on the floor for that purpose. Bobby laughed and started chucking his building blocks into the box, too, thinking it was some kind of game. Every time one of the blocks made it into the box he’d clap his chubby hands and yell, “Two points! Two points for me!” At least one of my children was happy.

  I turned back to my own work, taking the clean clothes from the laundry basket, folding them, and piling them into the empty suitcase that was sitting on the dinette where we’d eaten all our meals for the last year and a half. I pulled a pair of my jeans out of the basket and held them up, trying to decide if I should bring them or not. It was amazing to realize how many possessions we’d accumulated since we’d moved to New Bern. Clearly, we wouldn’t be able to take everything with us, but I wanted to make sure I left enough room for the things that really mattered. Something I simply refused to leave behind were the quilts; the two that Abigail had made for the kids and the one I’d made in Evelyn’s class. However, the quilts were bulky and that meant less room for other things, like clothes.

  I tossed the jeans onto the “leave behind” pile. They were pretty worn and, besides, it was more important to leave space for the kids’ clothes than mine. I could get along with a couple of pairs of slacks, some tops, and a sweater or two—that and the sundress that Evelyn had helped me make. I pulled it out of the basket and folded it carefully and hugged it to my chest. It wasn’t really practical to bring it along. I could only wear it for a few months a year and didn’t have much cause for dressing up. I knew I should put it on the pile with the worn blue jeans and other discards, but I hesitated.

  I didn’t own a camera. I wanted one, but they were expensive. Every now and again I’d buy one of those disposable jobs at the drugstore and take pictures of Bethany and Bobby, but I couldn’t afford to spend much on developing pictures. And none of the few photographs we did have included me; I was always behind the camera.

  Once I loaded our few boxes and bags into the trunk, buckled the kids into their seats, turned on the ignition, and pulled out onto the highway, leaving New Bern, Connecticut, in my rearview mirror, I would have nothing to remind me of its curbed, orderly streets and peaceful town green, the charming antique homes with painted shutters, and the picket garden gates that swung wide to welcome visitors and, of course, the people.

  But this, this dress with the profusion of violet and purple hydrangeas blooming on the rippling gathers of the skirt and the sage-colored piping that reminded me of late summer in Connecticut’s quiet corner…

  Every time I saw this beautiful dress, or stroked the smooth, fine-loomed cotton with my fingertips, it was like opening a photograph album in my mind. I might never have occasion to wear that dress again, but every time I saw it, I would remember Evelyn, and Abigail, and Margot, and all my friends at Cobbled Court Quilts. I would remember New Bern, the only place I ever lived that felt like home.

  If there wasn’t enough room in the suitcase for u
nderwear, then that was just too bad. No way was I leaving my dress behind.

  I laid the dress on top of the stack, closed and latched the lid of the suitcase, put it on the floor next to a big, black garbage bag loaded with sheets, pillows, and a set of towels, and went into my room to get the last two suitcases.

  Belly-down and with my head and torso under the bed, I was dragging out the other suitcases when I heard the electronic beep of the intercom telling me that someone was standing outside the locked front door of the Stanton Center and had rung my apartment, wanting me to press the buzzer that would unlock the door.

  When I heard the beep, I tried to scramble out from underneath the bed, yelling for Bethany to not touch anything, but the tail of my shirt got stuck on one of the metal supports of the bedframe. By the time I ran into the family room, Bethany had already pressed the door-release buzzer and was chirping happily into the intercom.

  “Okay. See you in a minute!”

  I was too late.

  “Bethany! Didn’t you hear me telling you not to touch the intercom? I’ve told you before! You’re not supposed to open the door for anyone! Do you hear me? Not for anyone!”

  Bethany tilted her head to one side and frowned. “But it wasn’t anyone. It was Margot.”

  I took a deep breath and let it out again slowly, relieved. Hodge wasn’t ascending the steps to the door of our second-floor apartment, but I didn’t want to see Margot, either. Things were hard enough as it was.

  I looked around the family room and considered hiding the suitcases and bags in the closet, but there wasn’t time. Margot was already knocking on the door.

  “Bethany, go to your room. Decide what books you want to take. You can only bring five. And help Bobby pick out five for himself too, all right?”

  “But I want to see Margot,” she whined.

  I hissed through clenched teeth and pointed my finger in the direction of Bethany’s room. “Go!”