She considered and then nodded.
"Wait here. I have something that might help you accept what I'm saying," she declared and left us. The attendant was joined by the redheaded man and they both blocked the doorway.
"Cops are on their way," he said gleefully.
"Cary, we're only getting ourselves into deeper trouble," I whispered. He didn't hear me. He glared at the two attendants. Moments later, the nurse reappeared, carrying a small cloth bag.
"These were her personal things. Among them," she said, "is this," she said, lifting a thick notebook out of the bag. "It was her diary. Her doctors encouraged her to keep it, hoping recollections, thoughts would help her revive her identity. Apparently, no one ever came for it. If she wasn't gone," the nurse added in a harder tone, "I wouldn't be giving it to you, now would I?"
I took the bag and the notebook and tugged on Cary's hand.
"Please, Cary. She's right."
He wilted, accepting what he was told. "Where is she buried?" he asked softly.
"I don't know. You'll have to contact Mr. Crowley tomorrow and ask him for whatever details he has. He's the administrator here. He will be in his office at nine a.m. I'm asking you now to leave these premises. The police are on their way and you will be placed under arrest if you don't go," she threatened.
"Cary."
"We're too late," he said more to himself than to me. "I'm sorry," Mrs. Kleckner said, "but I have told you the truth. I've done more than I have to do and more than Mr. Crowley will approve of, I'm sure."
"Thank you," I said, pulling Cary harder.
He stepped back with me.
"Laura," he said shaking his head. "I'm sorry we were too late."
We reached the truck just as the police car arrived. The officers spoke to Mrs. Kleckner and then questioned us. When I promised we would leave, they let us go.
Cary drove back on the strength of his anger and hate. We hardly said a word to each other. All that mattered to him now was to find out where Laura had been buried. It was mid-morning by the time we drove into Grandma Olivia's driveway. Both of us were physically exhausted, but our emotions gave us the strength to continue.
Loretta came rushing down the hallway when we entered the house.
"Where have you been?" she asked.
"What is it?"
"Your grandmother turned worse last night and was rushed to the hospital," she said.
"She's not gonig to die," Cary said, shaking his head at me. "She's not getting away that easily."
Loretta's eyes nearly bulged out of her head. "What?"
"Nothing. We're on our way to the hospital," I told her and we left.
We found Judge Childs in the lobby talking with the doctor when we arrived.
"Melody! Where have you two been?" he asked. "Everyone's been worried sick."
"Never mind where we've been," Cary said. "How is she? Can she talk?"
"I'm afraid not," the doctor said. "She's fallen into a coma."
Cary's shoulders sank. Then he brightened with a thought.
"Do you know about Laura?" he asked the Judge.
"What? What about Laura?"
"He doesn't know, Cary," I said. "She did tell me that."
"What's he talking about, Melody?" the Judge asked.
We went to the hospital cafeteria to get something to eat and I told my grandfather the story. He listened with horror.
"I guess I really never knew her," he said. "To keep all that from me. She was a very determined, private woman who literally needed no one. I'm sorry," he said to Cary. "I'll find out what you want to know. I promise," he said. "You two go home and get some rest. Let me take care of this."
"Thank you, Grandpa," I said and he smiled.
I went home with Cary to help him with Aunt Sara and May, after which we went up to his attic hideaway and fell asleep in each other's arms.
At the moment it seemed to be the safest place in the whole world.
Epilogue
.
Grandma Olivia died two days later, having
never regained consciousness. Her doctor said it was a blessing because if she would have come out of the coma, she would have been far worse and Olivia Logan was not the sort of woman who could live under institutionalized care.
Cary didn't want to attend the funeral, but a strange thing happened to me. I suddenly saw things from Grandma Olivia's prospective. Why air our dirty laundry in public? Why embarrass the family?
"After all," I explained, "you still want to live and build a life here, Cary."
He listened and then shook his head with a smile.
"You were probably the right choice for Grandma Olivia's throne, Melody. I'll give the devil her credit there, but that's about all," he added firmly. "Okay, I'll put on the proper face. I see I'm going to need you to make sure I do the right things from now on," he kidded.
Kenneth and Holly had returned from their honeymoon and we had all spent a night together going over the recent events.
"She was a cold, hard woman, and so
intimidating, most men didn't challenge her, especially the men in her family," Kenneth remarked. "I remember how afraid I was of her when I was younger and used to visit with Haille, Chester and Jacob. When she told us something, we did it and did it fast. I never thought of her as happy though."
"She didn't want anyone else to be happy either," Cary muttered.
None of us spoke. It was better to let the thunder and lightning play itself out and look forward to brighter skies.
The funeral was as large as expected. We decided not to have Grandpa Samuel brought along. He didn't understand what was happening and we all agreed it would be just more confusing and
troublesome for him.
I don't know how I got through my final exams, but I did and my grades were as good as I had hoped. I stayed at Aunt Sara's and shut myself up in what had been Laura's room, spending almost two days writing and rewriting my valedictorian speech.
Since Grandma Olivia's hospitalization and death, I had moved in with Cary, Aunt Sara and May again. I hated the thought of being in that grand empty mansion, full of darkness, shadows and family secrets.
The Judge began to go over all the estate documents for us and one day, we all went to his home to listen to what would be. Grandma Olivia had done what she had promised ... she had left
instructions for my taking eventual control of most of the family fortune. In the meantime it was held in a trust supervised by her bankers and brokers and the Judge was appointed executor.
"You will have to decide about the house," he said. "You can put it up for sale or you can move into it."
"Let's put it up for sale," I said quickly. "I don't think it holds enough happy memories for the family."
"I understand," the Judge said.
With such a fortune in our hands, Cary could be confidant that his boat building business would be a reality. He could build on his small beginnings and establish his own company. Kenneth gave him advice and the two of them went searching the area for a good site to put up a factory.
The night before graduation, Cary and I took a walk on the beach. I was too nervous to sleep anyway. So much attention was on me and our family since Grandma Olivia's passing. I was nervous and sure the audience would hang on every word of my
valedictorian address.
"Have you given thought to what you want to do, Melody?" Cary asked me. We stopped at the edge of the water and stared out at the moonwalk that led to the edge of the world.
"I'm not going to the prep school, Cary. The kind of life Grandma Olivia was designing for me is not the life I want for myself," I said. "I don't want to strive to get my name in the society columns."
"I know you're very smart and should probably go to college, but--"
"I don't want to go to college just to say I'm in college, Cary. Maybe I'll go next year. But
somewhere close. I think I have a clear view of what I want now."
"Wha
t's that?" he asked turning to me.
"I want something simpler but more substantial. I want what I never had, Cary. I want a real family, real love."
"Could you have it with me? Now?" he asked timidly. "We could build this new business together and we could build our own house and we--"
I put my fingers on his lips.
"I was wondering when you would have the nerve to ask," I said and he laughed.
We kissed and held each other. The ocean seemed to glitter even more and the stars, the stars were never ever as bright.
The next day was magnificent. Without a cloud in the sky, with the wind warm and gentle, we were able to have an outdoor graduation ceremony. I began my speech with the first lines of a mountain song Papa George had taught me years and years ago.
"I have come a long way from home with just a hope and a prayer,
But I got a suitcase full of memories to keep me warm on lonely nights."
I turned to my fellow graduates and talked about graduation as a kind of pulling up on the anchor and setting sail--of being captains of our own destiny. We were leaving our parents, our friends and our teachers back on the shore and setting out on a course of our own making. I talked about courage and opportunity and thanked our families and teachers for giving it to us. I ended by singing the first line of This Land Is Your Land and an amazing thing happened: the whole audience joined me and sang the whole song.
I was overwhelmed by the applause and the congratulations afterward. People who didn't know me well told me how proud Grandma Olivia would have been. Cary's eyes grew dark and angry, but he kept his rage contained when I gave him a look of reprimand.
Afterward, we had a party at Aunt Sara's. Kenneth, Holly and Judge Childs were there, as well as Roy Patterson and Theresa. Cary made a clam bake and I played the fiddle. Judge Childs said he would take a piece of the graduation cake up to Grandpa Samuel the next day.
Cary and I set a date for our wedding soon afterward. In the meantime, I spent my summer days with May and Aunt Sara while Cary worked on the new boat and began to build the factory on the site he and Kenneth had found.
One morning May came in with the mail and waved something at me, all excited. It was a postcard. It had been sent from Palm Springs, California. There wasn't much written.
Hi,
I just thought I'd drop you a line to tell you I'm no longer with Richard. I'm with a real agent this time. He's even taken me to Palm Springs for a holiday and he says I have a good chance of making it.
Wish me luck.
Gina Simon
"Who's Gina Simon?" May signed and then pronounced as best she could.
"Just someone I once knew," I said. "No one, really." I tossed the card into the garbage can, but later, I went back and retrieved it.
I couldn't help it. I was like someone lost on the desert who had been given a drop of water to cherish. What else could I do?
I went upstairs and put the letter with my other mementos.
And then I looked at Laura's bag of
possessions, the only things left from her strange and tragic existence. Neither Cary nor I could get ourselves to do anything about them.
I couldn't just ignore them anymore, however. I reached in and took out the thick notebook which had been her diary. Then I went downstairs and sat behind the house in the big wooden chair that faced the ocean and I began to read.
A long time ago, I lived a fairy tale life, it began. My eyes lifted from the page as I took a deep breath.
Off in the distance a sailboat looked caught in the calm and remained painted against the blue horizon while above it, puffy white clouds waited for the same wind.
All the world was standing still, holding its breath. Even the terns froze on the beach and looked my way.
When the wind began again, it carried a song it wished I would sing for Laura, for Cary, for all of us.
I would sing it, I thought.
Now, finally, I would sing it.
V. C. Andrews, Unfinished Symphony
(Series: Logan # 3)
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