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“No, but she did have enough money tucked away to support herself. For a while, at any rate.”
“How much?”
“That’s a subject of debate. She claimed fifty thousand dollars, but that was never verified.”
“Where’d she get that kind of money?”
“From an insurance settlement. As I understand it, there was a problem when I was born. I guess the doctor botched the delivery, and she had to have an emergency hysterectomy. She hired a lawyer and sued. Whatever she collected, she signed a confidentiality clause promising she wouldn’t disclose the details.”
“Clearly, she did.”
“Well, yes, but nobody believed her. She did keep something in a safe deposit box she rented in a bank down here and she emptied that the week she left. She also took the Chevy my dad bought her the day before.”
“Ta
“Exactly. It’s like she and the car were both vaporized.”
“How old was she when she disappeared?”
“Twenty-four.”
“Which would make her what, now, fifty-eight or so?”
“That’s right.”
“How long were your parents married?”
“Eight years.”
I may be lousy at math, but I picked up on that. “So she was sixteen when she married him.”
“Fifteen. She was sixteen when I was born.”
“How old was he?”
“Nineteen. They had to. She was pregnant with me.”
“I could have guessed that.” I studied her face. “Ta
Daisy flicked a look at Ta
“I know, but it’s hard to talk about this stuff, especially when he’s not here to tell his side.”
“You can trust me or not. It’s up to you.” I waited a couple of beats and then said, “I’m trying to make a decision here. I can’t operate in a vacuum. I need all the information I can get.”
She colored slightly. “I’m sorry. They had what you’d call a ‘volatile relationship.’ I can remember that myself. Big screaming fights. Slaps. Broken dishes. Doors slamming. Accusations, threats.” She put an index finger in her mouth and began to worry the nail with her teeth. I was getting so tense watching her, I nearly slapped her hand.
“Either of them ever hit you?”
She shook her head with certainty. “I usually stayed in my room till it was over.”
“Did she ever call the cops?”
“Two or three times that I remember, though it was probably more.”
“Let me take a guess. She’d threaten to file charges, but in the end, she’d always back down and the two of them would get all lovey-dovey again.”
“I think someone from the sheriff’s department was working on that. I remember him coming to the house. A deputy in a tan uniform.”
“Trying to talk her into taking action.”
“That’s right. He must have made headway. Somebody told me she’d asked for a restraining order, but there was some kind of screwup and the judge never signed.”
“So given their marital history, after she disappeared, the sheriff’s department talked to your dad because they thought he might’ve had a hand in it.”
“Well, yes, but I don’t believe he’d do that.”
“But what if I find out he did? Then you’ve lost both parents. At least now you’ve got him. Do you want to take that risk?”
Tears formed a bright line of silver along her lower lids. “I have to know.” She put a hand against her mouth to still the trembling. Tears had made her complexion a patchy red, like a sudden case of hives. It took courage to do what she was doing, I had to give her that. Stirring up old dirt. Most people would have been happy to sweep it under the rug.
Ta
“You could have done this years ago. Why now?”
“I started thinking. There are still a few people left who knew her back then, but they’re scattering and a lot of them are dead. If I put it off much longer, they’ll all be gone.”
“Does your dad know what you’re up to?”
“This isn’t about him. It’s about me.”
“But it could affect him nonetheless.”
“That’s a chance I’ll have to take.”
“Because?”
She sat on her hands, putting them under her thighs, either to warm them or to keep them from trembling. “I’m stuck. I can’t get past this. My mother took off when I was seven. Poof. She was gone. I want to know why. I’m entitled to the information. What did I do to deserve that? That’s all I’m asking. If she’s dead, okay. And if it turns out he killed her, then so be it. At least I’ll know it wasn’t about her rejecting me.” Tears welled and she blinked rapidly, willing them away. “Have you ever been abandoned? Do you know how that feels? To think someone just didn’t give a shit about you?”
“I’ve had experience with that,” I replied with care.
“It has been the defining fact of my life,” she said, enunciating every word.
I started to speak, but she cut me off. “I know what you’re going to say. ‘What she did had nothing to do with you.’ You know how many times I’ve heard that? ‘It wasn’t your fault. People do what they do for reasons of their own.’ Well, bullshit. And you want to know the hell of it? She took the dog. A yappy Pomeranian named Baby she hadn’t even had a month.”
I couldn’t think of a response so I kept my mouth shut.
She was silent for a moment. “I can’t have a man in my life because I don’t trust a soul. I’ve been burned more than once and I’m petrified it’s only going to happen again. Do you know how many shrinks I’ve been through? Do you know how much money I’ve spent trying to make my peace? They fire me. Have you ever heard of such a thing? They throw up their hands and claim I won’t do the work. What work? What kind of work can you do around that? It sticks in my craw. Why’d she leave me when she turned around and took the fuckin’ dog?”
3
I met Daisy Sullivan at my office at 9:00 the next morning. Having shown me a glimpse at her rage, she’d retreated into calm. She was pleasant, reasonable, and cooperative. We decided to set a cap on the amount of money she’d pay me. She gave me her personal check for twenty-five hundred dollars, essentially five hundred dollars a day for five days. When we reached that point, we’d see if I’d learned enough to warrant further investigation. This was Tuesday, and Daisy was on her way back to Santa Maria, where she worked in the records department at a medical center. The plan was that I’d follow her in my car, drop it off at her place, and then we’d take hers and head out to the little town of Serena Station, fifteen miles away. I wanted to see the house where the Sullivans were living when her mother was last seen.
Driving north on the 101, I kept an eye on the rear end of Daisy’s 1980 Honda, dusty white with an enormous dent across the trunk. I couldn’t think how she’d done that. It looked like a tree trunk had fallen on her car. She was the kind of driver who stayed close to the berm, her brake lights flashing off and on like winking Christmas bulbs. As I drove, the flaxen hills appeared to approach and recede, the chaparral as dense and scratchy-looking as a new wool blanket. A gray haze of dried grass undulated at the side of the road, whipped by the breeze created by the passing cars. A recent fire had created an artificial autumn, the hillsides as bronze as a sepia photograph. Tree leaves were scorched to a papery beige. Shrubs were reduced to black sticks. Tree stubs, like broken pipes, protruded from the ashen earth. Occasionally, only half a tree would be singed, looking as though brown branches had been grafted onto green.
Ahead of me, Daisy activated her turn signal and eased off the highway, taking the 135, which angled north and west. I followed. Idly I picked up the map I’d folded into thirds and laid on the passenger seat. A quick glance showed a widespread smattering of small towns, no more than dots on the landscape: Barker, Freeman, Tullis, Arnaud, Silas, and Cromwell, the latter being the largest, with a population of 6,200. I’m always curious how such communities come into existence. Time permitting, I’d make the rounds so I could see for myself.