Late One Night

24

Crunch of snow underfoot. Tangles of corn stubble poking through. The ridges uneven beneath her feet. Missy tried her best to stay between the rows where the ground was more level. Her breath made little clouds in the cold air. It was some hundred yards across the field, and by the time she got to the end where the woods began she could feel the cold in her toes, and her cheeks and nose stung from the wind lashing her face.

She took her first steps into the woods, where the land began to roll, and she stopped to rest before trudging to the crest of the hill.

At first she thought she was hearing the wind as it rose and fell and then rose again with an eerie noise of breath and complaint. Then she came to understand that what she heard coming from somewhere deeper in the woods was a noise from a living thing — a grunting, snuffling sound that froze her and made her strain to listen more closely, trying to determine if what she heard came from a person or an animal.

She was afraid to find out, but she knew she couldn’t just walk away. She moved on, feeling the strain in her calves and hamstrings as she climbed the hill.

Once Brandi had gone, and it was just Laverne Ott and Ronnie in the hallway of the school, Cynda Stout went to fetch the principal and then excused herself to slip into the bathroom to clean up those watercolor brushes.

The principal, Mrs. Piper, was a woman Laverne knew from the days when she’d taught Ronnie and Della and Missy and so many others at Victory School out in the country. A two-room school-house, before all the country schools consolidated and the kids rode the bus into Goldengate.

Irene Piper had taught in those country schools too, before becoming the principal at Goldengate. She was a woman from Laverne’s generation — a tall, white-haired woman in a navy blue suit and an ivory blouse with a ruffled bodice.

“Laverne,” she said, “is there something I can do for you?”

“I need a room,” Laverne said. “Somewhere I can have a private conversation.”

Irene nodded. “You can use my office.” She smiled. “By this time of day, I’m sick of it anyway.”

“I shouldn’t be long. Then maybe you and I can have a chat?”

“Take your time. I’m not going anywhere. It’s the fourth-grade class play tonight. I’ll be eating a sandwich for supper.”

“My daughter is in that play.” Ronnie’s voice was hoarse with emotion. Laverne could imagine the day he’d had. “Sarah Black. She’s the bridge. I’d forgotten the play was tonight.”

Irene touched him lightly on his arm. “She’s a good girl, your Sarah.”

“Forgetful,” he said. “Good thing her head’s attached.”

“Well,” said Irene. “Most kids her age are a little scatterbrained.” She nodded down the hallway to the open door of her office. “Go on,” she said to Laverne. “Have your talk. I’ll be down in the cafeteria. Just come look for me when you’re done.”

“She’s been working on her part,” Ronnie said, his voice growing louder now. “Sarah. I’ve heard her around the house.”

“I’m sure she’ll do fine,” Irene said. She glanced at Laverne and lifted her eyebrows in concern.

“Yes,” said Laverne, putting her hand on Ronnie’s shoulder as if to nudge him down the hallway. “Sarah will make us all proud.”

“I love her,” Ronnie said, and his lip was trembling now. “I love all my girls. I wouldn’t do a thing to hurt them. Really, Miss Ott, I swear.”

From the crest of the hill, Missy looked down to the bottom of the slope. A gully cut through the floor of the woods, and there at the lip of that gully, where the land gave out and fell away, Shooter Rowe was on his knees. His back was to Missy, and she could see his shoulders convulsing with his sobs.

The goat — it was the old billy goat, Methuselah — was on the ground a few feet from Shooter, looking as if it had lain down for a sleep, but Missy could see the blood on his chest and blood on the snow, and she knew he was dead.

Shooter’s back straightened, and he got to his feet. That’s when Missy saw that he still held the shotgun. He had the butt end resting on the ground, and he used it for a crutch as he pushed himself up. Then, with a cry that came from somewhere deep in his chest, a cry barely human, he threw the shotgun down into the gully.

The wind had suddenly died down, and the crows were back, coming to perch on the bare limbs of the trees. Their calls split the air.

Shooter turned to the goat, and though Missy knew she’d happened upon something so private she should have turned away and left Shooter Rowe to finish what he’d come into the woods to do, she couldn’t. She called out his name. She let him know she was there, watching.

_________

Laverne and Ronnie sat in the chairs in front of Irene Piper’s desk, the chairs students took when teachers sent them to the principal’s office, or parents who came to have a chat about their children. La-verne purposely chose not to sit behind the desk with Ronnie across from her because she didn’t want that space between them. She wanted to put him at ease so she could talk to him about the night of the fire and whether he’d meant to threaten Brandi with that knife. She meant to ask him what dark thoughts might be in his heart, and she wanted him to feel comfortable enough to tell her the truth.

“Ronnie, I’ve known you a good long while. Ever since you were a boy in my class.”

“Yes, ma’am. That’s right.”

He’d always been a polite boy. Always a little bit smaller than the other boys, a little slower with his lessons, just a few ticks behind his whole life. Maybe that’s why he always seemed to be barreling ahead — whether running on the playground, or later driving fast in his Firebird, or walking out on Della for a life with Brandi Tate — like he knew he had to catch up, so intent on getting somewhere that he failed to see that he was about to crash into something.

Now there was this business about the fire and what he might have done, and what more he might be capable of doing. “I understand there’s a matter of this knife,” she said. “Your pocketknife.”

Ronnie sat, bent over with his elbows on his legs and his hands, fingers and thumbs pressed together as if in prayer, pointing down to the floor. It seemed so long ago to Laverne that he was her student and also a member of her Sunday School class, and she taught him how to do “Here’s the church, here’s the steeple” with his fingers. So long, and not so long at the same time. She could tell he was afraid, the way he’d been all those years ago when she’d had to give him a talking to about something or the other. She could see that little boy inside his man’s body, but now she had to ask him these questions.

“I never meant any harm to Brandi.” He lifted his face to look at Laverne Ott, his mouth twisted into a grimace, his eyes narrowed. “I know Angel told you about finding my knife out at the trailer. I know Brandi’s talked to you, too.”

On the wall behind Ronnie was a poster of a quote from Dr. Seuss. Laverne remembered that it came from Horton Hears a Who. White letters on a pale blue background: “A person’s a person, no matter how small.” She had to keep asking Ronnie questions. She had to determine whether he was a threat to his children, whether there was cause to remove them from his care.

“Ronnie, I’m going to ask you straight out. Were you at the trailer the night it burned?”

He answered right away, his voice a whisper. “I’m not denying that.”

“Why were you out there?”

Her tone changed then to the severe voice she’d always used with students when she wanted to make sure they understood that they needed to tell the truth.

“Miss Ott, don’t you know me well enough?”

She wouldn’t answer because it was her job to get the facts straight. Her opinion of what kind of man someone was didn’t matter. One thing she’d learned over the years was that all sorts of people, no matter how upright they seemed, were capable of all sorts of things.

“You walked out on Della and took up with Brandi.” Laverne couldn’t stop herself from saying it even though she knew she shouldn’t. “I never thought you’d do that either.”

“Are you saying you think I started that fire?”

She shook her head. “I’m saying I can’t rule anything out. I’m sorry.” She meant it as she always did when she investigated a case: sorry that circumstances were such that they required her attention, sorry for what people’s lives could come to. “I have to look at everything, Ronnie.” She paused a moment and then asked him again. “Did you put that trailer on fire?”

He wouldn’t answer. He just kept rocking back and forth in his chair. “You just have to trust me,” he finally said.

“Ronnie, I want you to understand something.” Laverne was patient. She explained to him that it was her job to make sure the girls were safe. She let the silence settle around them. Then she said, “If the court thinks your girls are in danger, I’ll have to take them out of your and Brandi’s house and put them in foster care.”

“I don’t want my girls in foster care. I know what that’s like, and you should know too. If you want my girls safe, you won’t do that to them.”

Laverne knew that he’d moved in and out of foster homes after his mother died and his father wouldn’t keep him. She also knew that, hard as Children and Family Services tried, they couldn’t always ensure that each foster home was ideal.

“I’ll do my best by your girls,” she said. “And you should know I’ll get to the truth. I was your teacher, Ronnie.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You can’t hide from the truth. No matter what you choose to say or not say.” Laverne waited for her words to sink in. She hoped that Ronnie would say something, anything that might save him, but when enough time had passed to make it clear he wasn’t going to let her know anything else, she said, “The truth always finds us. I taught you that in Sunday School.” She stood up from her chair, eager to find Irene Piper to tell her she was finished with her office, anxious to get to Brandi’s house to talk to the girls. But first she had a last word for Ronnie. “I’m disappointed that you don’t seem to remember what you learned from me.”

Then she left him to think about that.

_________

Shooter lifted his head, looking up the long slope to where Missy stood, feeling her heart in her chest. She didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to explain why she’d come looking for him. It was something about everything she felt, the miscarriages, the trailer fire. All the sadness, all somehow contained in the sight of Shooter leading that goat across the field and into the woods.

“I saw you,” she finally said, meaning of course that she’d seen him from the house.

“That goat was sick.” He shouted up to her. He waved his arms about, his open barn coat flapping at his sides. “Foot and mouth disease. There’s no cure, you know, and it spreads fast. What choice did I have? I had to put him down.”

“I know it was a hard thing.” Missy was struggling to find the words that would say all she felt. “I know how Captain loves those goats.”

Shooter nodded. He wiped his sleeve across his face. “I don’t know how I’m going to tell him.” He bent over and put his hands on his knees. Then he straightened and said to her, “Methuselah was his favorite. It’s going to break his heart.”

“Did you come out here so Captain wouldn’t see?”

“Sometimes when something’s sick like that, all you can do is put it down.”

He went to the goat and before Missy knew he was going to do it, he stooped and pushed against the goat’s stomach, shoving it toward the lip of the gulley.

She couldn’t watch anymore. She’d already turned to start back toward home when she heard the snapping of branches, the thump of the body, dead weight falling.

Laverne hoped that Ronnie wouldn’t follow her to Brandi’s house. She’d call for the sheriff if he tried to make trouble. Not that she thought he would. He’d been devastated when he’d left the school. He’d been pulling away from the curb in his Firebird when she came out from saying goodbye and thank you to Irene Piper. Not in his usual rambunctious way, foot heavy on the accelerator, but slow and easy. She watched his brake lights come on at the stop sign where Cedar intersected with Main, and she held her breath as he sat there and sat there though there was no traffic coming, before finally making a left-hand turn. It was like he was thinking about what his next move should be, and that was enough to worry her.

Brandi was alone with the girls when Laverne got to her house. It was dark now, nearly five o’clock, and Brandi was getting supper on the table.

“Sarah’s school play,” she said, when she let Laverne in the door. “With so much going on, I forgot all about it.”

Laverne thought for a moment how it could have been an ordinary evening, and this, an ordinary family — Brandi dishing up food so the kids could eat, Ronnie about to walk in any minute, saying he was sorry he was late, couldn’t be helped. Then everyone eating as quickly as they could so they could get to the school because Sarah was the voice of the bridge in The Three Billy Goats Gruff.

“Ronnie said he never meant to hurt you with that knife,” Laverne said to Brandi. The girls were in the kitchen helping with supper, and Laverne and Brandi were standing just inside the front door. Laverne kept her voice down so the girls wouldn’t hear. “Do you think he meant to come at you with it?”

Brandi had on a red bib apron, and her stomach swelled beneath it. “Come in here with me.” Brandi’s eyes were wide open, urgent. She took Laverne by her elbow. “I’ve got something to show you.”

Laverne followed Brandi back to her and Ronnie’s bedroom. A stack of baby books teetered on the bedside table, clumps of used Kleenex scattered over it. A pair of house shoes with the faces of sock monkeys on them peeked out from under the bed. A yellow bathrobe with red hearts on it had fallen onto the floor. The bed hadn’t been made that morning. The top sheet and a purple blanket were twisted into a wad. The flowered comforter spilled over the end. It was the bed of a woman who’d had a night of trouble.

Brandi’s purse was on the dresser. She opened it and took out a black T-shirt. “Look at this,” she said to Laverne. She showed her where a strip of the shirt had been torn away. “Smell it.” Brandi held the shirt up to Laverne’s face. “Go on. What’s it smell like?”

“I’m not sure,” Laverne said.

“Take another sniff.” Brandi offered the shirt again. “Gasoline?”

“I’d say so. Yes. Is this Ronnie’s?”

Brandi nodded. “I found it in his car right before you got to the school. What do you think it means?”

So they’d come to this: everything meant something. Laverne knew that was the point where living stopped seeming natural and everything became a struggle. That’s where Brandi and Ronnie were now — that place where each little thing was suspect.

“I don’t know what it means,” Laverne said, and it was true. She didn’t. “But I think Sheriff Biggs should know about it.”

Brandi put her hands on her swollen stomach. “Here I am less than five months away from my delivery.” She put her hand to her mouth and choked down a sob. “This was supposed to be such a happy time for Ronnie and me.”

“Don’t give up on happiness yet.” Laverne patted Brandi’s arm. “This story isn’t over.”

“But I talked to Missy. She wants the girls. I told her I thought that would be best. I can’t be home to take care of them. She can.”

Laverne knew that Missy’s heart was good. She loved those girls and wanted to do right by them, and now the threat that Ronnie seemed to present had given her the chance to step in.

Brandi shook her head. “And now that Wayne’s in poor health, there’s no chance that Lois can take on more.” She chuckled. “And she and Wayne sure as heck aren’t in my fan club. They think the world of Missy. They’re happy for her to have the girls.” Brandi dabbed at her eyes with the heels of her palms. “I just hope I’m doing the right thing.”

“How can it ever be wrong when someone tries to get at the truth?”

“I don’t know. I just feel everything coming apart.”

“We’ll get it right,” Laverne said. “Trust me.”

When she got back from Shooter’s woods and stepped into her house, Missy picked up the phone meaning to call Brandi at home, but just then the phone rang, startling her.

It was Pat. He said, “I’ve been thinking about Ronnie’s girls.” He went silent for a few seconds, and Missy waited, wondering whether he’d give her his approval. She’d made it clear last night that it didn’t matter. She’d go ahead with or without his support. “I want you to know,” he said, “that I’m with you. I love those girls. We’ll make a good home for them. I’ve been trying to call you to let you know.”

She felt the tears coming. This was what it had been like the times she’d been pregnant, the two of them excited about having a baby.

Laverne Ott had already made plain what would have to happen to put the girls in her and Pat’s custody. First, Laverne would have to determine that it was unsafe for them to stay with Ronnie. Then, once Lois and Wayne confirmed that they couldn’t care for the girls, Missy and Pat would have to pass medical checks, and the State and the FBI would have to run criminal background checks on them. Then, within forty-eight hours, a sheltered care hearing in the local court would determine custody. The good news was that the State of Illinois recognized godparents as relatives, and Children’s Protective Services always wanted to try for placement with family if at all possible. Missy and Pat, now that Wayne’s health made it difficult for Lois to take the girls, were a more preferable option than licensed foster care parents, according to Laverne.

Missy knew that if she and Pat got the girls, they’d come with all the hurt they carried after the fire. She knew everything wouldn’t be smooth sailing at first, but she’d win them over with love. She’d give them all the love she’d saved up for the babies she’d lost.

“I was out in the woods,” she said to Pat.

“What in the heck were you doing out there?”

She told him about Shooter and the goat and how she heard the shot and had to go see what had happened. “I stood and watched for as long as I could stand it.”

“Why did he put that goat down?”

“He said it had foot and mouth.”

For a good while, Pat didn’t say a word. Then, finally, he said in a very quiet voice, as if he were afraid of what he was saying, “Missy, there hasn’t been any foot and mouth in this country for nearly eighty years.”