The coffee cups and plates bounced off the carpeted floor. Legs visibly trembling, Howard sat down hard in the recliner. The color had drained from his face, except for his nose, which turned bright red. When he fumbled a handkerchief from his breast pocket. Claire caught the glimpse of embroidered initials before he held it to his face and began to sob.
“Oh God, oh God.” And then no words, just strangled sounds. Howard was the first person who had seen the ring who truly mourned Elizabeth, whose grief seemed as fresh as yesterday. There was nothing worse than the sound of hearing an old man sob, Claire thought while she stared down at the ring, wishing she were anywhere but here. Old men had been brought up not to cry, so that when they did it sounded like something irreparable was tearing inside them. The sound wasn’t meant for anyone else’s ears, a private grief with no calculation to it.
Charlie got up and went to him. She was so petite, and Howard so lanky, that standing she was barely taller standing than he was sitting. She reached out and pulled his head onto her shoulder.
There was a long awkward silence, punctuated by the sound of Howard’s ragged breathing. Claire wished she had thought of a more subtle way to show him the ring, something slower that would have given him time to brace himself for what was coming. It was clear that Howard had loved Elizabeth. Even fifty years later he had not yet come to terms with her loss.
Finally, with a heavy sigh, Howard lifted his head from Charlie’s shoulder. She sat down on the arm of the recliner and rested her hand on his shoulder. Howard wiped his eyes, refolded his handkerchief and then tucked it away in his breast pocket. From the same pocket he pulled a pair of reading glasses from his pocket and pushed them up his nose, then slowly raised his head. Behind his glasses, his magnified wet blue eyes swam like fish in an aquarium. Without saying a word, he reached for the ring, his trembling fingers dancing across Claire’s palm. His hand seemed to sink at its solid weight.
“Liz’s ring.” He surprised Claire by thrusting the ring back at her. “In the wall? Did you find anything else there?”
She hadn’t thought about the possibility that the ring might hold anything more than the ring. “There was just a little hole. I had to get it out with a stick. I don’t think there was anything else there but this ring.”
“The ring being there is what I do not understand,” Charlie said. “I am sure Allen said she gave the ring back to him.”
“Did he say that? I don’t really remember.” Howard pulled out the handkerchief again, half-turned away from them and blew his nose. Holding the balled up handkerchief to his bowed forehead, he spoke from behind the shelter of his forearm. The lawnmower was switched off, and they could now hear Howard’s ragged breathing. “Everything from that time is a blur. I don’t remember her funeral, I don’t even remember the rest of that year.”
“You loved her,” Charlie said simply.
Howard’s face crumpled again. His mouth sucked into itself. He shook his head, but didn’t say anything. When he finally spoke, his voice was bitter. “If I had really loved her, things would have been different. They wouldn’t have turned out the way they did. People can get to the point where they feel like they don’t have any choices, except the worst one.” Claire suddenly knew that Elizabeth had told Howard about the pregnancy. “But if they could only lift their heads up and see, look around a little bit, then they wouldn’t have to -” there was a long pause “- to do the things they do. I’ve spent fifty years wishing I had done something different, said something different. I’ve had fifty years. And Liz hasn’t had a single day.”
“Howard, Howard,” Charlie said slowly. She gave Claire a meaningful look across Howard’s bowed shoulders. “I am no longer so certain that Elizabeth killed herself.”
He lifted his head, confusion twisting his features. “Of course she did.” He hesitated, a gentleman with mores fifty years out of date. “Only a few people know this, but, but Elizabeth, was, well, was pregnant.”
“I know that, Howard, but there is more.” Charlie explained about the blood. But the more she explained, the more confused Howard looked.
“I’m not quite following you,” Howard shook his head slowly. “You think someone hurt Liz? But no one would want to hurt her. That just plain doesn’t make sense.”
“That,” Charlie said, “is what I want to talk to Allen and Mary about.” She squeezed past him and into the dining room to look out the window. “And their garage door is now open, so they are home.” She came back into the living room and patted him on the shoulder. “You stay here. Take some deep breaths. You have had a great shock. Claire and I will go and talk to them right now.”
Chapter 21
1944
Marching in formation is hypnotic. Charlotte keeps her gaze focused on the feet ahead of her. Rows of five women. Ten feet.
Her eyes fasten on these feet, marching, marching. Some are bare and leave bloody footprints. Even though she is lucky enough to have shoes, she has found they are never dry.
Marching, marching. There is no sense in it. They march along rutted roads, the mud frozen into ice, through flat fields, sometimes through the woods, and then back to camp again.
Yesterday she took off her socks for the first time in 82 days. All her toenails came off with them. She shook them out, silvery paper, then put the socks back on.
Marching, marching, marching. When she closes her eyes tonight, she knows she will march in her dreams.
Ahead of her, someone falls to her knees. Charlotte veers to the left, walks past her, so close her fingers brush the woman’s bare scalp.
Her gaze does not waver from those feet, eight of them now. When the shot rings out, she does not look back.
Walking next to Charlotte, an SS woman officer, feet in leather boots, tall in her wool cape with its high black hood, laughs.
Chapter 22
1951
Warren entered the house so quietly that Charlie didn’t know he was home until she heard him speak. She was in the kitchen with Tom. Her thirst had reasserted itself. The body had its needs and could not be denied for long. How many years had it been since she had first learned that lesson and been shamed by it?
“What happened here?” Warren’s voice rapped out from the living room, making them both start.
Warren’s tone reminded Charlie that Elizabeth had said her future father-in-law had been in the military during what had been called the Great War, back when they thought there would be no other, had served as an officer. When the government had called for volunteers to go to Korea, Warren had urged his son to go, telling Allen that American soldiers would just need to bang a few heads together, that the “gook” problem would be settled in a week. Now things looked like they might grind on forever, and what Truman called “a simple police action” had spit out Warren’s son permanently maimed. Still, Warren didn’t seem to feel any guilt, or to have second thoughts.
Charlie peeked around the kitchen wall where Austrid and Warren stood only a few inches from each other. Neither of them were looking at Elizabeth’s sheet-draped body.
“She’s dead.” Austrid drew herself up to her full height, her eyes nearly level with her husband’s. She sounded like she wanted to shout but she kept her words to a low hiss that Charlie had to strain to hear. “I never wanted her living here, never. You’re the one who took her in, brought death and gossip under our roof. Our name will be dragged through the mud! She’s a foolish, flighty little chippy who leaves messes for others to clean up.” Charlie glanced at Tom and he raised an eyebrow.
“That’s enough, Austrid.” Warren’s soft words were enough to stop his wife cold. “Where’s Tom? He called me.”
Tom stepped out of the kitchen, with Charlie following. “Right here, sir.”
“Tell me what happened here.”
“Well, sir,” he began, when Charlie interrupted. She didn’t like Warren, and she didn’t want to hear Tom’s explanation, sure to be all larded with sir’s. Quickly, she sketched in t
he details of what had happened.
Warren took a deep breath, then turned to Tom. “Let me see her.”
Then came the only moment where Warren seemed in anything less than perfect control. When Tom lifted white sheet from Elizabeth’s equally white face, Warren’s eyes squinted reflexively, like a man blinded by the noonday sun. Elizabeth now seemed to be made of wax, a clever replica of the real girl, her skin pale and translucent next to the black of the gown she wore. Charlie watched as Warren reached out his hand and ran it lightly over Elizabeth’s hair, so gently that she might have been a sleeping child. When his reached the place where blood matted the fine strands, he jerked his hand back, staring at the blood smeared on his fingers.
“What happened here?” When he looked up at them, Warren’s face was perfectly smooth again, without even the flicker of a muscle or a tear in his eye to reveal his feelings.
“I’m sorry, sir. She fell against the cabinet when I cut her down.”
Charlie knew her anger was misplaced, but at every “sir” she wanted to shake Tom. She gritted her teeth even more when Warren ordered Tom to get a broom and sweep up the glass.
“Did you find a note?”
“We’ve been looking.” Austrid raised her long slender hands in the air and then dropping them. “There’s no note. Nothing. Just – her.” With her chin, she indicated Elizabeth’s body.
Why all this concern about a note, Charlie wondered. Were they afraid it might reveal some secret about their son?
Warren turned to Tom again. “Who else have you called? Have you called the police?”
“Just you, sir.”
“Good. We don’t need Allen to be hurt any more than he already will be.”
“Where is he?” Austrid asked. “Why isn’t he with you?”
“He’s out at a job site. There’s no phone there. The secretary knows to send him home the minute he gets back.”
Austrid said, “You should have gone out to meet him. He’ll drive home like a maniac and get in an accident.”
Warren’s thin lips got even thinner. “She doesn’t know anything else than to tell him to come home, so she can’t say anything else.”
“With a message like that, he’ll know enough,” Austrid said. “He’ll guess right away that something is wrong.”
“He’s going to have to know anyway, Austrid. He’s not a little boy anymore. He’s a man, or have you forgotten? He’s going to have to figure out how to take this like a man.”
Then Warren went into his den, which was just off the living room. He left the door open. Charlie could hear the sound of him dialing, of his long, rattling sigh as he waited for the phone to be answered. “Bob? This is Warren. There’s been a terrible accident.” A pause. “My future daughter-in-law. I don’t want to discuss it over the phone. I need you to come here and help us make arrangements. And be sure to bring your bag. My wife will need something to calm her nerves.”
But Austrid didn’t seem distraught. She was staring at Elizabeth’s body, which was once again covered, and she seemed blazingly alive. In Charlie’s experience, Austrid was normally varying shades of ash and cardboard, but now bright color stained her cheeks. Her breathing was shallow and rapid. Her head was up and her hands were tight fists. The other woman’s gray gaze met Charlie’s. Austrid’s chin was raised, and she stared down the bridge of her nose like a challenge. It was Charlie who finally looked away.
The next hour brought a whirlwind of activity that spun around the dead girl. Tom was sent out to buy a black wreath for the door. Without being asked, Charlie made herself useful by making tea and coffee. For anyone who looked like they could use it, she tipped in a bit of whiskey from a bottle she found in Warren’s liquor cabinet. She tidied up, throwing away the empty wine bottle and rinsing out the two glasses she found in the sink. She also answered the door from time to time. The doctor was the first to arrive, coming less than twenty minutes after Warren’s call. He didn’t spend much time with Elizabeth, and the way he touched her, with no gentleness, as if she had never been a human being and was now nothing but a messy problem, sent Charlie back to the kitchen, where she had a swallow of whiskey without the coffee. His indifference reminded her too much of the camps.
Warren had also called Elizabeth’s mother at home and her father at the factory where he was working as a floor sweeper. They arrived separately. Mr. Ellsworth was tall and gaunt and absolutely quiet when he looked upon his daughter’s waxy face. Mrs. Ellsworth came with a baby on her hip and a child clinging to her dress. Her husband shouted at her for that, while she whined in a piteous way, asking what else was she to do with them. Warren took the four of them back into his den and shut the door.
Then a black hearse pulled up, and the doctor and Tom helped the two men inside bundle Elizabeth away, still covered by the sheet. At the sight of one of her linen sheets being wheeled out the door, Austrid finally did become distraught, bringing to life Warren’s earlier accusation. She began to protest that the sheet had been imported from Ireland, until Warren and the doctor hustled her back to her bedroom. Charlie couldn’t make out her words behind the closed door, just the sound of her voice rising and falling like a siren, even as the hearse slid away.
Charlie sent Tom to Lynches Market to buy more coffee, as well as to the liquor store. Without bothering Warren, she gave him money from her own pocketbook. She really wanted to tell Tom to go home, but she didn’t want to get him in trouble. At the same time, she had no desire to listen to Warren ordering him about and Tom’s polite replies.
After Tom left, Charlie was surprised when she looked at her watch to see that it was only three in the afternoon. She longed for night to fall, for the chance to leave this place and try to sleep without dreams.
A few minutes later, there was another knock on the door. Charlie opened it cautiously. She’d already turned away one inquiring neighbor, blocking the door so they couldn’t see Elizabeth’s body, but this time it was Howard, fresh home from teaching. His face was drained of color, and he was shaking so much that it was hard for him to even speak. “Elizabeth?” he said, his tone rising.
Charlie drew him inside to hide him from prying eyes. She placed a hand on arm and found it already trembling.
“She’s dead, Howard.”
He let out a long low moan, and she was reminded of a dog she had seen once, thrown to the side of the road by a car, making a noise just like that, trying to crawl forward on two front legs, dragging its broken body behind it.
“I … she … Do the police have any suspects?”
Charlie had to tell him, he would find out sooner or later, although she dreaded it, somehow already knowing he would blame himself.
“Howard – she hung herself.”
His mouth fell open, and she saw that he had a tooth missing in the back. The teeth on either side of the space were brown. “No! That’s not true! No!”
The force of the denial brought Warren out from the bedroom, where he had been murmuring with the doctor. “Howard, I’m sorry. I know Elizabeth considered you a good friend.”
Howard was still blank with shock. “But how – who?”
“Charlie here found her,” Warren said, leaving out Tom.
“And she was” – his mouth worked as he tried to say the word – “hanging? I don’t understand. This doesn’t make any sense. Are you sure?”
“Tom and I cut her down.” Charlie put her hand on his arm, but he turned away from her and her hand fell away.
“When was this?”
“A few hours ago. A little after one o’clock.”
“But – she hung herself? Where? How?”
Charlie pointed to the great beam. “She stood on a kitchen chair and threw the rope over.”
“It was a cord,” Warren corrected. “I found the place where she cut it off the curtains.”
Howard swiveled his head, scanning the room “Where is she? I need to see her. I won’t believe this until I see Elizabeth.”
??
?They’ve taken her away,” Charlie said quietly.
“So the police have been here?”
“No.” Warren bit the word off. “This is a private, family matter, Howard, and we are keeping it that way. She’s at Moyter’s Mortuary. We’re just waiting for Allen to come home now.”
“He doesn’t know?”
“Not yet.”
“Doesn’t know what?” The quiet voice behind them made them all jump. Allen stood there, one hand on the doorknob, the other on his cane. “What doesn’t Allen know?” Each word was carefully enunciated.
For once, Warren seemed at a loss for words. “Son, um, Elizabeth is…”
“Dead,” Allen finished for him. “The woman two doors down was kind enough to tell me that she had seen the hearse. And that she had caught a glimpse of long blond hair falling out from underneath the sheet that covered the body.” He swayed and would have fallen it if weren’t for his cane.
“Oh, Allen,” Howard said, and hand stretched out his toward the other man, but then stopped short.
“You’ve been drinking.” Warren seemed more surprised than anything.
“After I heard that bit of news, I went down to Renners and had a couple of shots.”
“You mean you were outside and didn’t come in? Your mother and I have been waiting for you.”
“I know. The secretary said I was to come home immediately. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.” Allen’s words had a terrible lilt to them, and his eyes never left Warrens’ face.
Warren looked shocked. “Now is not the time for jokes, son.”
“What do you want me to do then, cry? Oh, I forget, a man never cries. A man knows how not to cry.” Allen put on an English accent. “Stiff upper lip and all that.” He resumed his normal tone. “A man knows how to clean up the mess like it never happened. Isn’t that what you think, Father? So is that what you did – cleaned up the mess, got everything back to normal? So I couldn’t even see her? I couldn’t even see what she had done to herself?”