They had to coax him out. Blankets, then hot soup at some roadside place after he’d changed his clothes in the men’s room.
What were you thinking, his mother said, going into the water like that? She’s going to need you, George. Your own life comes second now. You don’t matter anymore, she might’ve said. You don’t deserve to.
They waited in the parking lot while his father bought an ice-cream cone for Franny. His mother’s eyes were as watery and gray as the Sound. Looking shrunken in her outsized coat, she reached out to take his hand and he could feel something breaking inside of him.
They think I did it, he said.
Well, they won’t get far with that.
The wind blew hard. He wondered what she was thinking. She looked up into the suddenly bright sun and closed her eyes.
They lived in an old saltbox on a cove, overlooking the water. As a boy, he’d owned a series of sailboats. When they got out of the car, he wondered vaguely if his old Vagabond was still in the shed. He had to remind himself that this was no ordinary visit.
They left him alone. He stayed in his childhood room, lying on the twin bed, and the afternoon brought the thick gloom of a winter storm. In the kitchen downstairs, the radio repeated its grinding emergency warning: more snow predicted, travel advisories, etc. He could hear Franny’s staccato footsteps all over the house. At least she was all right, he thought. Even though he couldn’t begin to predict what she’d experienced; he doubted he could ever know.
He nodded off for a while and woke to the ringing telephone. He assumed that it was Catherine’s mother, or perhaps her sister. Later, his father knocked and leaned into the room in his cardigan sweater, tentatively, as if George had some contagious illness he didn’t want to catch.
They called here, looking for you.
Lawton?
His father nodded. They want to talk to Franny.
George shook his head. I won’t allow it.
All right. That’s your decision.
His father stood there, watching him.
She wasn’t happy, George said. With me, I mean.
His father waited.
We were having problems.
This information made no difference, and his father was suddenly all business. I’ve been in touch with that lawyer you suggested. He’s on retainer now and has already done some good. Nothing you said last night can be used against you in a criminal case. As it turns out, you didn’t have to submit to an interview. Of course, they didn’t tell you that. If the police want to talk to you again, your lawyer will have to be present. Those are the stipulations now.
I didn’t know that was possible, George said.
Anything’s possible with the right attorney. His father looked at him briefly, definitively, and closed the door.
—
THE HOURS slowly passed. He was like a tenant in their house. He sensed their uncertainty, their judgment. He thought of this time, this schism of abeyance, as his own realized version of hell.
Your in-laws are on their way, his mother told him, a warning. They’ve agreed to have the funeral here.
She was making pancakes and had burned a few—not a new tendency. The kitchen had the same smell he remembered from childhood, the ever-present salvages of burnt toast left on the Formica like fossils, evidence of her good motherly intentions. She poured him a cup of coffee.
How soon?
A couple hours.
Okay, he said, sipping the coffee, not tasting it, his mouth tasting of rubber or some other toxic residue, fear. Seeing Catherine’s parents would be difficult, witnessing their grief. Suddenly ill, he pushed the cup away and got up.
I made these for you, his mother said, holding the plate of pancakes, standing there, her face pale, her hair as wiry and brittle as pine needles. It was nearly noon and she was still in her nightgown, and in a cluttered corner of the countertop he spotted her glass of gin. Don’t you want to know where Franny is?
He asked her with his eyes.
Your father took her to the carwash. You used to love that.
Yes, he said—but that was a lie. He had always been a little terrified of the dark cement tunnel on Liberty Street, the long arcade of equipment, the vicious yellow tubes of the vacuums, the deep-black skin of the employees.
I need some air, he said.
Of course. His mother looked ravaged, there was no other word for it. Go for a walk.
He found one of his old jackets in the closet. Bracing himself for the cold, he walked down the narrow lane to the empty, desolate beach. All the neighbors were gone for winter, and the flat sand stretched down to water that was dark, almost black. Walking along the shore, he shoved his hands into his pockets and discovered a crushed pack of Camels, the unfiltered brand he’d smoked in graduate school. He lit one, dragged deeply. The tobacco was stale, but he didn’t care. He wanted the burn in his chest; he’d smoke a whole pack if he could. He watched a low-flying gull surveying the water, the beach. It flew up into the white sky and disappeared.
—
AN HOUR LATER, maybe two, he heard a car and his mother-in-law’s high-pitched voice: Frances Clare, look how you’ve grown!
He stood in front of the mirror and buttoned his collar, then tucked in his shirt, trying not to look at his face.
He went downstairs. His mother had Franny at the kitchen table, coloring. She was watching the child intently, as if some telling revelation would appear on the paper, when in fact all Franny had drawn were flowers. He kissed the top of her head. That’s a nice picture, Franny.
I’m making daisies. She was pressing hard, making thick waxy stripes of grass.
Isn’t that nice, his mother said. She looked up at him, appraising or admiring him, he couldn’t tell which, and he knew it didn’t matter. His mother was on his side, no matter what. They’re in there with your father, she said.
When he entered the living room, the room went quiet. Rose and Keith were sitting on the couch and looked up at him without recognition, like strangers waiting for a bus. Without a word, George leaned over and kissed his mother-in-law, then shook her husband’s hand.
Rose stood to embrace him, shaking in his arms. What happened, George? What happened to our Cathy?
I wish I knew.
Her eyes filled with tears. Who could do such a thing?
Of course they’re trying to pin it on me, George said.
Rose blinked, looked away. Her whole body seemed to contract, and he took his hands away as she sank back into the couch.
I don’t know what happened, he told them. I don’t know any more than you do.
It’s just an awful thing, she said to the room. Just awful.
Can I get you anything?
No, thank you. I just want to sit here.
To his relief, Franny ran into the room with her picture. Look at my picture, Grandma Rose.
Well, now, you’re quite the artist, aren’t you? Come onto Grandma’s lap. She pulled the child into her arms. Now, where’d my kiss go? Did you take my kiss?
Franny shook her head and held up her empty palms. I don’t have it.
Is it in your pocket?
I don’t have any pockets!
Is it in your shoe? I’ll bet it is.
Franny scrambled onto the floor, pulled off a shoe and shook it hard. Here it is, she cried. It fell out like a little rock. She held out her hand for her grandmother to see.
Oh! I knew it.
You take it, Franny said.
Put it right here, Rose told her, leaning forward.
Franny touched her grandmother’s cheek and Rose hugged her tight. Lord our God, that’s the best darned kiss in the whole world.
—
THE SNOW TURNED to rain. They sat there together with the cold light pouring in through the picture window. His father was watching a game, college basketball. Intermittently, bursts of wild cheer filled the room. George drank a little gin. Just after halftime, a car pulled into the gravel driveway.
There’s Agnes now, his mother-in-law said.
I’ll go. George went to the door, glad for something to do, and watched his sister-in-law and her husband get out of the car. Agnes, newly pregnant, had already put on weight. Paul was carrying a platter of food wrapped in plastic and held his wife’s arm as they came up the walk.
Agnes, George said, and kissed her cheek.
Her eyes seemed to prickle. How is this possible?
I don’t have an answer for that.
He held her a minute, loosely, and without affection. She was shorter than Catherine, round-shouldered, substantial. She broke their embrace and wiped her eyes as her husband came inside.
Hello, Paul, he said, shaking his hand.
I’m sorry for your loss.
Here, let me take that. You all go inside.
They all drank too much. Now and again, Rose was overcome. Water and pills were fetched. They tried to remain composed for Franny’s sake, but their stagy enthusiasm confused her, and she fussed and cried and twisted in their arms.
Time for a nap, little puppy. When he scooped her into his arms, she giggled and shrieked and kicked her legs.
No, Daddy, not yet.
He laid her down in the guest room, on one of the twin beds, and pulled the blankets up under her chin. Are you warm enough?
Where’s Momma?
The question alarmed him, and he tried to mask it. She’s up in heaven with God, sweetheart. Remember what Mommy told you?
God lives in the sky.
That’s right.
But I want her, Daddy.
You can whisper to her. Just whisper and she’ll hear you.
She looked up at the ceiling. Up there?
Yes, right up there. He kissed her forehead. She looked at him and he hugged her. She held him very tightly.
Mommy is with you, Franny. She’s with you every minute. Okay?
Franny turned away and closed her eyes. He sat there a moment, watching her. He sensed someone in the doorway and turned and met his mother’s eyes. At once he felt supervised, self-conscious. She was his warden now, he thought, joining her in the hall.
Has she said anything?
No.
She looked at him sharply. I just can’t stop wondering. She was all day in that house.
I know.
Unsatisfied, she shook her head. She must have seen something.
We may never know.
That’s not good enough. What about that boy? I wonder if he had something to do with it.
He’s just a kid, Mother.
You never know. Kids these days. It’s a different world.
He sighed. What could he possibly say? I’m sorry, Mother, he finally said.
She looked at him strangely, as if trying to determine his meaning. I know you are, son. I know.
—
LATE IN THE AFTERNOON, Agnes wanted to walk. He took his mother’s cigarettes and went with her, pushing an umbrella over their heads. Briefly, after college, she’d lived with them in the city. He’d gotten to know her, and the one thing he understood about Agnes was that she was prone to compromise. Easily accepted things just as they were, whether in her work or in her relationships. Her husband, he thought, was a drip. He sensed that she’d admired Catherine, but never told her so, which maybe wasn’t so unusual. Perhaps that was how sisters were.
Winter on the Sound offered a bleak dissolution of color. They stood looking out at the water. He lit a cigarette.
I want you to know, she said, that you can trust me.
Okay, he said. That’s good. I appreciate that.
I mean with anything.
He nodded.
I know you had nothing to do with this.
I don’t know what to say, Agnes.
I can’t imagine what you must be going through.
It’s very difficult.
She put her hand on his arm and kissed him on the cheek and he could smell the perfume she’d put on that morning, Chanel No 5, the same scent his wife had been wearing since college, and he wondered if it had been deliberate. Agnes seemed, in that moment, a complete and total stranger. It came to him that he hardly knew these people. And they certainly didn’t know him. They’d already come to their own conclusions about his wife’s murder. And, like a good son-in-law, he’d acquiesced, assuming the stoic resignation of the accused.
—
ON MONDAY MORNING, hours before the funeral, the police came poking around. His father had seen them in town, blatant outsiders. A couple camera crews parked at the end of their road, waiting to get a shot of him. They were at the cemetery, too; George and the others watched it later that night on the local news, the two families standing over her grave. Their faces. The distortion of grief.
The next afternoon, two of Lawton’s lackeys knocked on the door. George was up in his room, trying to rest. He could hear his mother letting them in, their voices filling the living room as if they wanted him to hear every word.
He won’t be interviewed without his lawyer, his mother told them.
All right, one of them said. We understand that. But tell your son we’ve got an investigation to run. It would be helpful to talk to him. He knew his wife better than any of us. We could certainly use his help.
His mother said something he couldn’t make out and they left. From the window in his bedroom George watched them walk down to the beach, their jackets filling with wind as they stood at the shore. One of them scooped some sand into his hand and jiggled it around like pocket change. The partner said something and he laughed, and they glanced up at his window. Caught, George backed away, letting the curtain fall into place over the glass.
—
A WEEK OR SO LATER, he drove back to Chosen to pick up some things—his bank book, checks, his wife’s jewelry. The trick to hiding something, she’d told him once, is to put it right out in plain sight. His father had offered to go along, but he needed to do this on his own. He needed to be alone in that house, with her.
He took the three-hour drive in silence. In the freedom of his car he allowed himself to think of the girl, and how she’d looked at him that last time.
At last he turned down their road, where he feared some unseen surveyor might be watching him. He scanned the trees, the outlying fields, but saw no one. The house looked abandoned. As he stepped out of the car, it occurred to him that he was frightened. His mouth was dry and his head ached. He had history here, he reminded himself, and some of it had been good.
The police had come and gone. The house felt used, trampled by strangers. Their old room looked bare. Someone had come in to clean up the blood. You couldn’t see any on the walls. He wondered who had done it, if it was a specialized job. He stood over the bed, looking down at the space his wife had filled. On impulse, he grabbed the mattress and jerked it upright and jostled it into the hallway and down the stairs and out the front door, sweating and cursing. He dragged it into the field over ice and snow and left it there on the hard ground. Then he went to the barn to look for gasoline. The can wasn’t full, but there was enough, and he poured it out over the mattress. It only took one match.
And he stood there and watched it burn.
Chosen, New York, 1978
1
JUST BEFORE WINTER they took the cows. Their mother had sent them upstairs, but the boy and his brothers watched from their window. There were two trucks with slatted sides and he could see the cows all pushed together and he could hear them moaning, for this old farm was the only home they’d ever had. Then the boss, a carton-shaped man in a plaid shirt and gloves, whirled his arm around like he was working a lasso and the first truck pulled out and a thick brown dust rose up in the air. Their father waited, his arms crossed on his chest like someone about to be hit. The man shuffled over in his untied boots, kicking up the dirt, and handed him a slip of paper and said something, the words turning to smoke in the cold air, and he touched the brim of his hat like he was sorry and climbed up into his cab and jerked the gears
and rolled out. Again dust filled the air, and the sun went away. For a minute or so they couldn’t see their father, and the boy thought it was like a trick, how one minute you have everything, the next you don’t. It went quiet for a little while, and then the sky opened like it was cut, and the rain fell into the dirt and yammered on the old tin buckets.
Ignoring his brothers, he ran down the staircase hung with crooked pictures of dead relatives, the banister black with filth, and across the scuffed floors, vaguely aware of his mother in the kitchen, and pushed open the storm door and ran out into the rain, past the barns with their empty stanchions, into the field of broken grass, and kept on running. Up the hill, over the hard ground, along the ridge with its mangled dandelions, and finally, when he could run no farther, he stopped with his hands on his knees, gulping the cold air, knowing he had finished crying and also that he was too old for it now. He looked down at the farm where his mother had first carried him and then bore him and held him as an infant in her arms, and now he cried some more, this time like a man cries, when he knows what is to come.
—
HIS NAME WAS Cole Harold Hale. He’d been named after his great-grandpa, who had bought the farm in 1908 and turned it into a dairy. Cole’s father, Calvin, had grown up here and had taught Cole and his brothers how to do things just like his own father had taught him. He hadn’t gone past high school, but if you asked him anything he always came up with some answer. Didn’t matter what it was about, he knew a whole lot of things. He was tall and stoop-shouldered and walked around in an old blood-colored coat, and he had a tight, sewn-up look on his face, like he’d swallowed glass. His hands were big as Frisbees and they’d fly at you when you didn’t expect it. He spoke in a code. Not even Eddy understood it. He could hurt their mother. Doors would close. He’d drive off in his truck.
On that night, though, he didn’t go anywhere. He stayed out in the barn with his whiskey. Finally, their mother went out to check. She stood in the doorway, holding a blanket like a sleeping child, but he wouldn’t take it. She came back to the house and lay on the couch with her back to the room. Cole covered her with the same blanket and waited for her to say something, to tell him he was a good, thoughtful boy like she often did, but she said nothing, and he went up to find his brothers.