Читать книгу Freeing the Magician - Dawn Leger - Страница 9

The three of us would have qualified for a pain medication commercial the next morning. We were all feeling the strain of the prior afternoon’s exertions, and none of us felt like doing anything more than reading and drinking coffee all morning. The weather did not encourage any other options, as it was cold and threatening with gray skies looming and a brisk wind bringing frigid temperatures from the north.

“I’m taking this coffee and going back to my warm bed,” Peggy announced. “You two can figure out what to do with yourselves, I’m sure.”

She pointed out that there was an abundance of food in the fridge, more than enough pastries, and the telephone for any other emergencies.

“I think we can manage,” I said. “Are you sure you feel all right today? Can we do anything for you? How about some nice chicken soup for lunch?”

She made a face. “No, please do not wait on me. I hate being treated like I’m sick.”

“That’s true,” Michael said. “She’s the worst patient ever.”

“If I need anything—and that’s a very big if—I will text you on my very handy cell phone. But don’t hold your breath. I’ll come down eventually, but for now, for a change, I just want to loaf around in my pjs,” she said.

“Go Mom,” Michael said. “We’ll try not to make too much noise.”

“Or too much mess,” she said, shaking a finger in his direction as she took a cinnamon roll and napkin and disappeared around the corner.

“More coffee?” I asked. I got up and refilled my cup and held up the carafe.

“Sure,” Michael said. “So, what’s going on? You look like the cat that ate the canary.”

“Speaking of which, where is that little black devil anyway? We probably should keep him away from your mother today, since he caused so much trouble yesterday.”

“He was curled up on the bed when I came down,” Michael said. “Come on, what are you up to?”

I looked around the corner to make sure Peggy was out of earshot, and then I went and sat down at the counter next to him I told him about my encounter with the ghost during the night.

“Okay, how much wine did you have after I fell asleep?” he asked, laughing.

“Wait here,” I said. “I’m going to check on Louie.”

I ran up the stairs and stopped outside Peggy’s door, listening to the sounds of the television coming through, and then I proceeded to my own room. Louie was buried in the middle of the blankets, head covered with paws, so I was careful not to wake him. I pulled the letter from its hiding place in my luggage and returned to discover Michael making a fire in the family room.

“This is nice,” I said.

“We might as well get comfortable if we’re going to tell ghost stories,” he said. “I think I can remember some good ones from when I was in summer camp.”

I retrieved my coffee cup and threw myself onto the couch. “Well, then, you’re probably not interested in looking at the letter the ghost dropped before she disappeared,” I said.

“Really?” He came over and sat next to me. “Let me see that. It’s addressed to my father. Where did you get this?”

“The ghost was holding it, and when I approached her, she dropped it. I picked it up and brought it to my room last night,” I said. “Should we open it?”

He looked at me. “Duh,” he said. He looked at it a second and then handed it back to me. “I can’t—you do it.”

I pulled the letter out and unfolded it. “Nice handwriting,” I said.

“A woman,” he said. “Is there a date? Who’s it from?”

“You want me to see who it’s from before we read what it’s about?”

“Yes,” he said.

I put the letter down. “Do you read the end of books first?”

“That’s different,” he said. “Just look at the name.”

“It says, Carolyn Jalbert. Do you have any idea who that is?”

“No. Okay, go back to the beginning then.”

“See, it didn’t do any good to peek, now did it?”

“You are making me crazy here,” he said. “Can you just read the damned letter?”

“If you wanted to just read it, why didn’t you just read it yourself?” I asked.

“Oh, my freaking God. Give it to me,” he said.

“Okay, I’ll read it,” I said.

“Dear Mr. Simone. This is your last chance. I am very disappointed that you have not answered any of my other letters, but I suppose that you don’t believe what I have written to you. This is not a fraud, I am not trying to extort money from you, I am a desperate mother trying to do what I can to save my child, and you are my last hope. Please do not throw this letter away, please help me save my daughter’s life!”

I paused and took a swig of coffee. “Oh, this is very dramatic,” I said. “You don’t know anything about this?”

“No,” he said. “What’s the postmark on the envelope?” He took it from me. “Hmm, that’s strange.”

“What?”

“It’s postmarked three months before he died,” he said. “Keep reading.”

“As I wrote to you before, my daughter is adopted and is very ill. She will die if she does not get a transplant, and the only people who are possible donors are immediate family members. I have prevailed upon the adoption agency to give me a name, and they gave me yours. I do not know the circumstances of why you and your wife gave up this wonderful child for adoption, and I do not judge you, for if you had not done so, I would never had known the joys of motherhood. I am grateful to you for this. Because of you, I have been able to raise this child to be a wonderful young lady, and I know you would be proud to know her, and perhaps you will someday. For whatever reason you had to give her up, please consider how important it is that you acknowledge her now. This is our last chance. We have tried all other options, and there is no other hope. Please call this number and say that you will agree to be tested. You don’t have to ever meet her (or any of us) if you don’t want to. Please, please, call the hospital and say you’ll come. It can be you, or your wife, or any other children you have—the more relatives, the more chances that one of you will be a perfect match and one of you can save our beloved Kristen.”

“What?” he yelled. “You added that—let me see, it’s not really her name. What the hell is this? It has to be some kind of extortion or something, don’t you think?”

I looked at the paper and shook my head. “No, I have the sense that this is real,” I said. “I didn’t say anything yesterday when your Mom was there, but I found a bundle of these letters in your father’s desk drawer, so I just slipped them into a box and stuck them in my luggage to look at later. I thought maybe he’d been having an affair or something, so I didn’t want to talk about them while Peggy was around. But this, this is unexpected. And, as outrageous as it sounds, in my gut I feel like it’s true.”

“How could it be, that my parents had another child they gave up for adoption and I never knew about it? That’s so, so crazy. I guess I can’t even get my head around it.”

“But I think, in many ways, you always knew it. You knew you had a sister, on a very deep level, and that’s why you made up the stories about Kristen.” I took a sip of coffee. “My God, that must have driven your parents crazy, having you insist that you had a sister, despite all their efforts to dissuade you. Kids are very intuitive, though, and you knew what you knew.”

“Yeah, sure,” he said. “Now what, though? I mean, say this is true. Which I am not saying I believe, but for argument’s sake, let’s say it is. What do you think happened? She’s probably dead now, because I don’t think he went and donated any organs to save her. I wonder what happened to her.”

He got up and poked at the fire, then paced back and forth in front of it. “I don’t feel like I want to go up and say to my mother, so hey, how about that sister of mine you gave away…and then you ignored when she was deathly ill and needed a transplant? I don’t know if I even want to go there with her, she seems like she’s already on the edge with so much going on in her life right now.”

“Well, you know, these letters are addressed to your father, and they were hidden in his desk, so it’s possible that she didn’t even know about this woman contacting him. I wouldn’t put that burden on her,” I said. “One thing at a time, anyway. There’s a lot of information here, and maybe we can confirm some of it independently before you ever ask Peggy about it, if you even decide to do that.”

“Don’t you think it’s kind of coincidental that I got that card a couple of days ago, and then we came up here and you found this letter?” he asked.

“Michael,” I said. “There are no coincidences.”

He came and sat down next to me and buried his head in my lap. “This is too much,” he said.

I tousled his hair. “I know, honey, but let’s take it one step at a time, okay?”

He nodded. “What’s step one?”

“I need to go back upstairs and look through those boxes of documents more carefully before they get shredded,” I said. “Now that I have something to look for, I can see if there are any papers related to the birth of another child, for example.”

“Or even something about this transplant business,” he said.

“Right,” I said. “I did see a lot of medical records, but I just chucked them. Maybe we should save them somehow?

“That’s a good idea…” he sat up. “What am I saying? I’m saying that there is a possibility that this might be true. Oh my God. Do I believe that? Do you?”

I looked at him, frowning. “I do, Michael. I’m not sure why, or how, or what the circumstances might have been, but I feel that the basic facts of this story are true. We just need to flesh out the details a little bit. And then we can see if your sister is still alive.”

“I think I’m going to be sick,” he said.

“No, you’re not,” I said. “It’s a lot to take in, sure. Just breathe, you can do it. Think about your pretend friend, close your eyes. What did she look like? Can you see her?” He smiled. “That’s good. Keep her in your mind that way, and let’s try to find her.”

He opened his eyes, and they were brimming with tears. “Cassie, I always wanted her to be real, but this, now, it’s too…late.”

“Michael, how can it be too late? It’s never too late to make peace with your family,” I said. “Remember, we’ll just do this one step at a time. It’ll be all right.”

“Okay, I guess,” he said. “I have the feeling this is opening Pandora’s box. I think I’m going to regret that I ever started looking into this.”

“Now that you know about the possibility, how can you say we shouldn’t find out what we can about this?” I asked. “Even if all we learn is that the person who wrote the letters was trying to extort your father for some reason, don’t you want to know that?”

“Yes, sure, but how do we get to the bottom of it without telling Peggy? I don’t see a way, and that’s my concern. I don’t want to open the matter if it’s going to drag up all those bad old memories for her, and I really don’t want to have that conversation where I say, ‘Hey, Mom, did you have another child that you gave away without telling me?’” he said.

“Got it,” I said. “Let me go and get the box with the medical records. I think I can put it in the car, and then I can look at it when we get back to New York. If I don’t find anything in there, or from the other letters, then we’ll just drop the entire matter. Okay?”

“All right,” he said. “Just make sure you are extra sweet when you ask Detective Friday to run down these names in his little ol’ computer, okay?”

“Yes,” I said. “Now, why don’t you go and check on Peggy and distract her while I go upstairs and poke around for those records? Can you tell her a nice story about your latest conquest, something romantic that will not make her want to wash your mouth out with soap?”

“Let me see…Nope,” he said. Grinning, he pulled me to my feet and we carried the detritus of our breakfast back to the kitchen. “Let me regale her with the story of your escapades with Paxton and Javi. She’ll love knowing that she’s got a killer in her kitchen.”

“Really?” I smacked his arm as we walked up the stairs. “I had to shoot poor Paxton, he had a gun at my head. And anyway, I did him a favor. He was going to die of terminal cancer soon. Geez, now you made me feel bad.”

“Sorry,” he said. “Try to keep quiet up there.”

I pulled the stairs down from the attic and climbed up while Michael knocked on his mother’s bedroom door. “May I come in?” he asked.

As I climbed the stairs, I heard him say, “Oh, are you watching ‘Home Alone?’ I love that movie! Skootch over, I’m getting in.”

I turned on the overhead light, pulled up a stool, and took the cover off a box. Back to the drawing board.