Bloodlines

59

ON TUESDAY MORNING, I WAS SURPRISED TO GET A CALL FROM HELEN Swan.

“Irene, I need your help.”

“Whatever I can do, Helen.”

“I need someone to take me over to Lillian’s as soon as possible.”

“All right, I think I can manage that.” I told her I’d be right over.

The morning was chilly and overcast, the kind of dull weather that saves itself for the weekend, when it can really make you miserable. Helen was bundled into a coat that probably fit her once, but she seemed lost in it now. She complained that the Kelly women’s cars were either too high or too low as I helped her into the Jeep.

She seemed extremely agitated, but after an attempt to get her to tell me what was on her mind was met with a polite but firm rebuff, I stayed quiet.

She noticed and said, “Tell me about your search through the storage unit. Anything interesting?”

“A great deal.” I told her about going through O’Connor’s early diaries, but given her mood, decided not to tell her of his first impressions of her. Instead I generally described some of the things I had found so far. I wasn’t entirely sure she was listening to me. We spent the last few minutes of the ride in silence.

When we reached Lillian’s house and pulled into the big circular drive, she said, “This won’t take long.” Then she paused and said, “I’ve been rude, and you’ve been so kind. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m fine.”

“That’s my girl!” she said.

“Need help getting out?”

“No,” she said, and jumped down, scaring the hell out of me.

I saw her walk up to the house-apparently uninjured-and knock on the door. I waited.

She rang the bell. I waited.

She knocked again. I got out of the car.

“Was Lillian expecting you?” I asked.

“Of course she was.” She turned toward the house and shouted, “That’s why she’s not answering the damned door!”

“Did you call her?”

“She has that obnoxious thingamajig that allows a person to screen calls.”

“An answering machine?”

“No! I’ve got an answering machine. She’s got-oh, what do they call it?”

“Caller ID?”

“Yes! That’s it! Incredibly rude.”

“Are you telling me she got a call from you and refused to answer when she saw your number?”

“Yes.”

“And you came over here, anyway.”

“If you have somewhere else to be, you needn’t wait for me. I’ll stay here until she”-turning toward the house again-“opens the damned door!”

I took my cell phone out of my purse. “What’s Lillian’s phone number?”

Her eyes lit up in appreciation. She gave me the number.

Lillian answered on the second ring.

“Hello, Irene.”

“Lillian, I’m on your front porch. Helen’s here, too. Please don’t make her stand out here. I’m afraid she’ll get a chill, and even if that doesn’t kill her, the guilt will kill me.”

“That stubborn old woman!”

“Please, Lillian.”

“All right, all right. Might as well get this over and done with.”

A pale, thin housekeeper, who must have been just on the other side of the door-the damned door, Helen would have said-opened it and asked us to come in.

“I miss Hastings,” Helen murmured, not as softly as she probably thought she did.

“Now, Swanie, why on earth have you dragged Irene into this?” Lillian asked as she came forward to meet us.

“Because she and Lydia are the closest thing I have to daughters these days,” Helen said sharply. “Granddaughters, I suppose I should say. The point is, I’m old as hell and I want to make sure that if I croak in my sleep, someone else will know full well what you are up to.”

Lillian looked as if she had been slapped.

“Yes,” Helen said. “Unlike some people I know-”

“That’s enough!” Lillian snapped.

They stood glaring at each other.

I glanced toward the housekeeper, whose wide blue eyes indicated she was a fascinated audience.

I ventured onto the battlefield with, “Maybe we could move into a room where we could discuss this calmly and privately.”

They both fixed their glares on me, seemed to recognize that I was not the enemy-yet, anyway-and thawed a bit. Lillian glanced at the housekeeper. “Yes. Let’s go into the library.”

“Do you need me to bring anything, ma’am?” the housekeeper asked hopefully. She had an Eastern European accent that I couldn’t quite place.

“No, thank you, Bella,” Lillian replied.

“I’ll just clear the-”

“Let that wait, please,” Lillian said. “Thank you. That’s all for now.”

In the library, a fire was already burning in the hearth, a coffee urn had been brought in, and several china cups-three of which had been used- rested on saucers on a side table.

“Oh, Lillian, how could you?” Helen said in despair. “You’ve already done it, haven’t you?”

“Yes,” Lillian said.

“Done what?” I asked.

“Agreed to give a blood sample for a DNA test,” she said offhandedly. “Please be seated, Helen. You, too, Irene. The coffee’s still fresh and hot. Would you care for some?”

We both agreed to it. I studied Lillian while she played hostess. She was impeccably dressed, as always. A lovely silk suit. Simple but striking jewelry. She was still a woman with presence, and appeared younger than her years. But in ways that weren’t easy to name, she hadn’t aged as well as my aunt Mary or Helen. Although she had apparently had face-lifts, no one seemed to have done the same for her spirits. Unhappiness had made its mark over the decades. Although she enjoyed far more luxuries and comforts in life than either Mary or Helen, I found myself feeling sorry for her.

We all sat. We all drank coffee. No one said a word. Hell if I was going to be the one to light the fuse. I was starting to worry about Helen, who looked twice as upset as she had been before we arrived. I couldn’t figure it out. I knew Max must be happy. Why was Helen angry?

Eventually, Lillian said, “How have you been, Irene? I haven’t seen you in a long time.”

“Fine,” I said. “And you?”

Instead of answering, she asked me about Frank. Easy for me to talk about Frank.

After about five minutes of this, Helen suddenly said, “You really don’t care about him, do you? Not really.”

“Frank?” Lillian asked.

“You know I don’t mean Frank! You don’t care about Max!”

“Of course I care about him. That’s why I did what I did.”

“Oh, really? What do you suppose is going to happen when the Yeagers learn that you’ve submitted blood for a DNA test?”

“Mitch is not stupid, Helen-”

“I never inspected him as closely as some others did.”

“-however little you may think of him,” Lillian went on. “He has known for several years now that this would be possible. News stories about the power of DNA tests have abounded recently, and I’m sure he has imagined that Max would want to know his origins. Mitch has been thinking that at any time, I could participate in the testing, and Mitch would have awkward questions to answer if Max proved to be the missing child.”

She turned to me. “Perhaps it’s for the best that you are here today. Perhaps a story could run in tomorrow’s paper, saying I’ve already submitted a blood sample? If you think it would be newsworthy, that is.”

“She doesn’t lay out the front page, you know,” Helen said. “Why can’t you ever learn what it is a reporter does and does not do?”

“I can provide you with the name of the doctor who drew the blood,” Lillian said, ignoring her. “And give you the name and address of the lab that has the sample-or will have it in a few hours, anyway. Max is flying it up to Seattle. He’s chosen a lab up there.”

“Thank God he’s out of the area, anyway,” Helen said.

“He’ll be back Monday.”

“My God,” Helen said. “What can be done?”

“Nothing,” Lillian said. “Will you please use that brain of yours? The key has been to get the test in progress before Mitch could do anything about it. If I waited, he might kidnap Max again, just to keep him from being tested. I felt as you did, until Max told me he was willing to take some extreme measures. Exhumations are not done quite so speedily as blood tests, Helen. If it were to become known that Kathleen would be exhumed-a thought I find unbearable to begin with-Mitch would have the time he needs to make sure something horrible happens to Max.”

“What do you think has stopped him before now?” I asked.

“My very well-known refusal. Knowing that I refused the tests, and that I would fight an exhumation, has been enough.”

“You egotistical fool,” Helen said.

I said, “But Max might have gone to the other side of the family for help. If Warren Ducane-”

Lillian interrupted. “Mitch probably doubts that a man in hiding for over two decades will come forward just to make the parents of Max’s fiancée happy.”

“Exactly why is he in hiding?” I asked.

“I have no idea,” Lillian answered.

“Because,” Helen said, “he has known that no one-no one has a longer memory than Mitch Yeager when it comes to avenging slights or injuries. If he needs twenty years to carry out his revenge, he’ll happily take that long to do it. As Lillian is fully aware.”

“Yes, and Warren would be a target of that revenge,” Lillian said. “He took Max away from Mitch and caused questions to be raised about Mitch and his nephews. Mitch had worked hard to make everyone forget his beginnings.”

“She means,” Helen said, “that his father was a good-for-nothing who abandoned his family, his mother was a drunk, and his brother was a thief and a bootlegger. Mitch’s own business practices have never been entirely aboveboard, either.”

“He tried to change,” Lillian said, “but there were always those who were ready to snub him or remind him of his past. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps if the Express had left him alone, he would have been just another successful businessman.”

“I don’t believe it!” Helen said furiously. “A woman your age cannot be so hopelessly naïve! After that speech, I could swear you’re still carrying a torch for Mitch Yeager. Good God, Lillian! Have you forgotten what he’s done?”

“No,” Lillian said quietly. “How can you possibly ask such a thing?”

“I can ask it when you do things on impulse, things that will only hurt Max. You haven’t solved a problem, Lily-you’ve only created new ones, as well you know. Or is this your own-” She stopped herself, with a visible effort, from finishing that sentence. “You really don’t care about what this will do to Max or anyone else, do you, Lily?”

“He’s all I care about in this, Helen.”

“Helen,” I said, “what aren’t you telling me?”

That silenced them both.

“I know you both adore Max,” I said. “And you know I would never want any harm to come to him, either. I’m trying to figure out what’s really going on here. There are only two possible outcomes for these tests. One is that Max is Lillian’s grandson.”

“I feel sure he is Katy’s son, don’t you, Helen? He is so much like her.”

“Don’t play games with me, Lillian! You’ve put him in danger!”

“I can’t help but think she’s right, Lillian,” I said, “although if we alert the police, they may be able to help us. Because if he is your grandson, Mitch Yeager’s ties to the events of that night in 1958 will be difficult for him to refute.”

“You go right ahead and tell Frank.”

“But, Lillian, you have to face the fact that there is a possibility that the tests will prove he is not your grandson, which-”

“Which will again leave him with no idea who he is,” Helen said. “And no real possibility of ever finding out the truth. Don’t you remember what he went through when all this began? How confused and unsure he was? He’ll feel he came by all his wealth and advantages dishonestly, that he has robbed the estate of some poor murdered infant who will never be found. Oh, Lily, why didn’t you tell Gisella Ross’s parents to stow the Mayflower Compact where the sun don’t shine, right alongside the blue book and all the other trappings of their stupid snobbery?”

“You might as well ask me why I didn’t assassinate Watson and Crick when I saw what their DNA discoveries might lead to,” Lillian said. “Don’t you see, Helen? You’re the one who’s being naïve. Max has never felt sure of his identity. Never. From the moment I learned that DNA was being used to determine paternity, I knew that sooner or later he would want to have DNA tests done. He has, in fact, asked many times before. He cares for my wishes, and without this added pressure from Gisella’s family, perhaps I would have been able to go to my grave without having to face what I’m facing now. But the Rosses’ request is only an excuse that he was all too happy to grab hold of.” She sighed dramatically. “I understand they can test hair from a hairbrush. I feared it was only a matter of time before I’d discover Max combing through my brushes.”

Both women fell silent again. Helen stood and said, “Irene, please take me home.”

“So you see it my way now?” Lillian asked.

“Oh no, Lillian.”

Lillian suddenly went white. “You wouldn’t say anything about- Helen, I’ve made the right choice. You’ll see I’m right.”

“I don’t want to hurt you, Lily, but I can hardly believe you’ve considered all the implications. I think you’re wrong about why Mitch hasn’t harmed Max.”

“What do you mean? What do you mean by that?”

“You tell me Mitch is intelligent. And you tell me you think you’re the reason Mitch hasn’t harmed Max.” Her hands clenched and unclenched. “I’ve never told you this, Lillian, but there was a reason Katy asked Jack to come to her birthday party that night, and it wasn’t just to spite you.”

“Helen, there’s no need to go into this now, is there?”

“She was upset about something and she tried to talk to him, but Jack said you and Todd made sure she was never alone with him for more than a minute. So she used one of those minutes to slip him a note. Conn found it in the pocket of Jack’s overcoat. It probably should have ended up with the police, but both Jack and Conn knew what it might do to your reputation.”

Lillian glanced at me and said, “Perhaps we should discuss this-”

“Irene has all of Conn’s old papers now, so I’m sure she’ll come across it, if she hasn’t already. Jack kept the note for years, because it was the last thing Katy had given to him, even if it only hurt him to see it. I finally told him to give it to Conn, that Conn could keep it in the collection of things the two of them gathered while they were trying to investigate all that happened on that night.”

“You don’t know that Conn kept it!” Lillian said. “Please-”

“Oh, he kept it. He mentioned it to me when Eric and Ian were facing charges in ’seventy-eight. If he had it then, he kept it.”

Helen turned to me. “The note said, ‘Is it true Mitch Yeager is my father? You’re the only one who will tell me the truth.’” She stared hard at Lillian as she said this last sentence.

“Katy thought Mitch Yeager was her father?” I asked, stunned.

“Damn it, Helen! What have you done to me!”

“All about you, isn’t it, Lily? Well, I’m tired of it.”

“But…Helen,” I asked, “are you saying that Mitch Yeager thinks Max is his grandson?”

“Yes. At least, there’s a real possibility that he does.”

“Is it true?” I asked Lillian. “Was Mitch Yeager Katy’s father?”

“No. I’ve told him that again and again.”

“But he has reason to believe he could be?”

“I don’t think I should answer that.”

“Cut the crap. You tell her or I will,” Helen said.

“You horrid old bitch!” Lillian said.

I thought back to O’Connor’s diaries. “Katy was twenty-one in January of 1958, so she was born in January of 1937, and would have been conceived in April or early May of 1936. Possibly a little later, but prematurely born infants weren’t as likely to survive then, so it’s more likely she was conceived in April or May. Mitch Yeager was on trial around then, but out on bail for most of April.”

“Go on,” Helen said, which drew another plea from Lillian. Helen shrugged and said, “Tell her yourself, then.”

“I…I was a stupid young girl,” Lillian said bitterly. “Mitch and I had been having an off-and-on affair for some time. I had been rather sheltered, and I rebelled. I found there was something exciting about him.”

“You dated Jack Corrigan in April of that year, too,” I said. “I’ve seen that in O’Connor’s diaries.”

“Diaries! He was a child!”

Helen smiled. “Jack told him to keep them, Lillian. Conn also wrote little stories about everything he had seen and heard.”

“Everything?” Lillian said weakly.

“Jack showed a few of them to me when he first started giving him ‘assignments’-they were uncanny. Jack used to say that Conn was born holding a pen, and I believe it’s true.”

Lillian frowned, then admitted, “Yes, I dated Jack. Mostly to make Mitch and Harold jealous, I suppose.”

I remembered O’Connor’s observations and wondered if that was true. But I didn’t say that-couldn’t say that in front of Helen. I was already wondering if I should have kept my big mouth shut about Jack’s previous affairs.

I glanced at her and found that far from looking injured over Lillian’s talk of dating Jack, she looked knowing-almost smug. Maybe she didn’t care about Jack’s past, since she was the only one he married. Of course, Jack and Helen had been friends long before they married, so she must have known that “Handsome Jack” hadn’t lived a celibate life.

Lillian said, “You may not be aware of it, but Winston Wrigley-the first one, I mean-was my godfather. He was furious when he found out that I was dating Jack. One of his own reporters! Then later, Mitch told him that if the paper printed so much as one more negative story about him, he’d tell the world a few stories about me.”

“What kind of stories?”

“The kind that might have caused problems for my marriage.”

I waited.

“You have to understand that Harold was my parents’ choice,” Lillian said, “and though I liked him, he didn’t seem as romantic as the other fellows did to me. Then he did something very romantic-he asked me to elope with him, and I did, in late April.”

Helen stood and walked toward the big windows, looking out on the gardens below them.

“Was Mitch upset?” I asked.

“Upset! I should say so. Mitch had this insane notion-he was sure I had married Harold as quickly as I did because I was pregnant with his-Mitch’s, I mean-child. According to this cockamamie theory of his, since Mitch was in jail and would likely go to prison, there was nothing else I could do, and so in desperation I made a fool out of Harold.”

“You mean he believed Harold was raising his daughter?”

“Exactly.”

“But then, why would he harm Katy?”

“I’ve never been as sure as others are that Mitch himself was behind all of that,” Lillian said primly.

Helen made a noise of derision. “Lillian, tell the truth.”

“All right, I will. Katy hated him and made no secret of it. She never failed to be rude to him, and he resented it-she publicly insulted him, and Mitch won’t tolerate that from anyone. Jack and Helen had something to do with her attitude toward him, I’m sure.”

“If that’s so,” Helen said, “I’m glad of it.”

“Are you?” Lillian said. “What if it cost Katy her life?”

Helen didn’t answer right away. After a moment, she said, “I was always proud of Katy. If Mitch Yeager had anything to do with her murder, and I can prove it, I don’t care what she did to him. Don’t make it sound as if she deserved what happened to her. I didn’t cause her to be murdered, either, Lillian. And you know it.”

“Yes, of course,” Lillian said. “I didn’t mean that. I-oh, Helen, you know I loved her and was proud of her! It was just that you made me so damned angry! Forgive me?”

Helen didn’t answer.

“Helen,” I said, “it seems to me that what’s done is done-the tests are going to be in progress soon. Lillian is right about one thing-Max seems determined to find out whether or not he’s Katy’s missing child. You won’t be able to stop him from doing that.”

She sighed and turned toward me. “Yes, I suppose you’re right. Let’s go, Irene. I’m suddenly very tired.”

She fussed a little when I offered to help her climb into the Jeep, complained about how much she hated seat belts when I refused to close the passenger door until she had hers on. Warned me not to slam the door when she gave in and exaggerated a startled jump when I shut it.

I stood outside the passenger side of the Jeep for a moment, a sensation of being watched suddenly coming over me, causing goose bumps to prickle along my skin. I spun around, as if I might catch some watcher unawares, but saw nothing. I looked around me. The street was quiet. No faces stared back from windows in the few houses I could see from here. There were trees and shrubs planted for privacy all along the borders of Lillian’s property. I scanned them, looking for a glimpse of a face, a sign of movement.

Behind me, the passenger door to the Jeep opened. I didn’t need to fake being startled.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“I thought I heard someone call my name,” I said. “I was mistaken.”

“Liar,” she said, and shut the door. It didn’t close all the way. She reopened it, on an impressive list of expletives, and slammed it shut again.

The ride to her home was silent. She let me help her out of the Jeep. She gave me a big hug and said, “You’ve endured a morning with two stupid, querulous old women. I’m sorry, Irene.”

“Oh, one of those women is dumb as a fox, getting me to tag along,” I said. “What aren’t you telling me?”

She touched a dry, thin hand to my cheek and said, “I’d tell you everything if I could. I meant what I said to Lillian-you and Lydia make me very proud. But I’ve made promises, Irene. I intend to keep them, at least for now. But you keep digging, and don’t be discouraged or afraid of what you may find, and my little promises won’t matter at all.”

“All right, I will.”

I walked her to her door. “Helen, I just remembered something I wanted to ask you about.”

“Yes?”

“In 1936, you left the paper for a while.”

A look came into her eyes, one I had seen a few times before. In college, if I turned in something she especially liked, she got that same look. “Yes. Come in for a moment, won’t you? I won’t keep you, but it’s too brisk out here for this talk.”

We went inside and shed our coats. We sat together on her sofa.

“I did leave the paper,” she said. “For about a year. How do you know about that?”

“O’Connor’s diary mentioned it. Why did you leave?”

“Several reasons. I’ll give you a few of them. First, I wasn’t being paid the same wage my male counterparts were making, even though I was supporting myself.”

“Wrigley the first was still in charge?”

“Yes. An old man by then. I went in to ask for a raise, he told me he couldn’t give me one-didn’t I know there was a Depression on, and there were men who wanted my job, and so forth. Take it or leave it, he said.”

“So you left it.”

“Yes. That’s why everyone thought I had left. But you see, I knew what his reaction would be, so it served as a way for me to disguise my other reasons for leaving.”

“Which were?”

“First and foremost, I was madly in love with a man who felt a great deal of affection for me, but whom I could plainly see was not ready to settle down.”

“Jack.”

“Jack. Gorgeous as all get out, and a devil to boot. He was younger than I, and still sowing his wild oats.” She smiled. “You can’t change them, you know. They have to outgrow it.”

“You knew about Lillian?”

“Oh yes. Lily was as beautiful as he was. They made a striking couple. And of course, her old man was loaded, so she thought that would keep Jack chasing after her. What he liked about her was her spirit, not her father’s money.”

“Is Lillian why you left?”

“No, being jealous or angry of Jack’s women would have been exhausting and useless as well. He also had a way of-oh, at the time I was convinced it was some rogue’s trick of his, but he made me believe I was something special, that he might flirt here or there, but that I truly mattered to him. Besides, I liked Lillian. I admired that spirit in her, too. She was barely out of high school, but she could put a woman twice her age in her place. A bit spoiled, but she’s smart and if you get her interested in something other than herself, she can surprise you with her generosity and drive.”

“She was married by the time you left the paper, right?”

“Yes, although Harold was never much of a husband. They weren’t married a month before he moved to Europe without her. He traveled all over the world. He was involved in the sale of supplies to military groups, including ammunition-just barely kept his nose clean as far as the government was concerned, but many American companies profited from wars in other countries during those years. Barrett Ducane was one of his business partners. I think he even did some business with Mitch.”

“Lillian was pregnant when Harold left for Europe?”

“Yes. She had lost both parents not long after her wedding-a car accident. She wanted to get away for a while after that happened. It was summer and terribly hot, so she decided to go up to a huge cabin owned by her family-a lodge, really-in the mountains. She later told me that she felt alone and abandoned and began to think about women who were less fortunate than she, and that’s when she got the idea that she’d start a place for unwed mothers.”

“I didn’t know about that.”

“It’s still in existence. She purchased another, smaller cabin nearby. If the Vanderveers had known of the scandalous use she had made of the lodge, they would have come back to haunt her. But she made the right choice. I think it kept her occupied, kept her from dwelling on her problems. And away from Thelma Ducane, who was a terrible influence on her. Those unwed mothers were better women than Thelma, who had the morals of a jackal.”

“How did you get involved?”

“She heard that I had left the paper and was looking for a job. She was Wrigley’s godchild, and he was fond of her.” She smiled. “Dear Lillian. She gave the old man a great deal of misery over letting me go, and told him that she was going to hire me just to spite him. So she invited me to come up there to help her run her home for unwed mothers. And fiercely refused to let me consider coming back to the newspaper. We got along famously.”

“Wasn’t that frowned on back then, a single woman working around unwed mothers?”

She laughed. “Irene, what do you think they thought of women who worked for newspapers?”

“Oh. The cabin-the smaller one? That’s the place where Katy was born?”

“Yes.”

“No wonder you were so close to her.”

“Yes, I was a part of her life from the very beginning.”

“And later, Lillian gave the cabin to Katy, and Katy willed it to Jack?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve always wondered about that will. Do you know why she wrote it?”

Helen hesitated, then said, “I can answer that, but-I can answer it more fully if you will first call Lillian and tell her that you want her to give me permission to tell you all about the day Katy made the will.”

I looked at her as if she were nuts.

“Courage failing you? She is younger than I am, but I still think you’d beat her in a fair fight.”

I pulled out my cell phone and pressed redial.

Lillian answered, and when I told her what I wanted, she said, “Put her on the phone.”

I handed it to Helen.

After a moment, Helen said, “Yes, of course I forgive you. And you forgive me, I hope?”

There was another long pause, during which Helen rolled her eyes. “Yes, it was a terrible thing to say to you.”

Another pause. “Yes, I will… this will be for the best. You understand that?…I’m glad… Thank you… Yes, I’ll see you then. Good-bye.”

She looked at the phone, handed it to me, and said, “You’ll have to hang up. I can’t stand those things. And the buttons are so small. Who designs such things?”

I disconnected the call and put the phone away. I turned to her and said, “Wow.”

“Wow?”

“You two had a hellacious fight, one I was afraid would end in blows, and that’s all it took to patch things up?”

“We’ve had lots of practice over the past sixty or so years. Eventually you figure out that you’ll never have enough time to enjoy the company of your closest friends, so it’s best to learn how to mend damage quickly.” She paused, then said, “Lydia called me yesterday.”

I felt my spine stiffen.

“Do you know,” Helen said, “I think she’s in the wrong.”

“Not entirely,” I admitted. “Really, my attitude started it.”

“Perhaps, but the thing is, she knows that for the most part, it’s she who is in the wrong now.”

“She knows?”

“Yes. Which is why you’ll have to be the one to make another effort, Irene-so that she can admit it.”

I frowned.

“Is the worst thing she said to you worth more to you than the best thing she’s ever done for you?”

“Not even close.”

“Then let go of it. Call her. Invite her somewhere. Not to talk things out, just to see each other, and when the time comes you can tell each other how stupid all of this fighting is. All right?”

“If she snubs me again, I am siccing you on her.”

“I doubt it will be necessary.”

“Tell me about the will.”

She sighed. “All right. I want you to understand two things. The first is that I didn’t know the answer to this until very recently. I threatened to sell the cabin, and I suppose that was enough to make Lillian cave in and tell me what had happened. The other is that this is absolutely confidential. If you feel you might have to tell someone at some point in time, it will have to be after Lillian has given you permission, or because she’s dead. If you can’t promise that, I can’t tell you.”

“All right.”

“Here’s what Lillian told me. A few days before Katy’s birthday, Mitch came across Katy and Lillian when they were together, doing some shopping downtown. Their hands were full, holding the handles of their shopping bags-you know the type of bag-big fancy paper bags with twine handles. The chauffeur had already gone ahead with an armload of boxes, and was going to bring the car around. Mitch offered to help carry the bags until the car arrived, and Katy snubbed him. He asked her why she was always so rude to him. She said something like, ‘Uncle Jack has told me all about you.’”

“I remember O’Connor mentioning that she called him that.”

“She had always called Jack that, from the time she was little. Jack was much more of a father to her than Harold was-Harold spent less than a half-dozen nights a month at home. But whatever she called Jack, she probably shouldn’t have mentioned him to Mitch. Jack’s name was always enough to make him lose his temper.”

“Because of the stories he wrote about Mitch?”

“I think so. Although God knows Mitch’s mind works differently than a reasonable person’s-he can’t forgive any injury, he’s quick to perceive a slight, and he sees the smallest criticism as a major insult. Which is why what happened next was-was the worst thing that could have happened.

“According to Lillian, Mitch took her by the chin and said, ‘Uncle Jack, is it? He’s not your uncle, any more than Harold’s your father. Didn’t your mother ever tell you how close we were, all those years ago?’ Katy spit in his face.”

“Not that I blame Katy,” I said, “but given what happened later, why didn’t Lillian tell the police about this?”

“Irene, you must remember that for twenty years, we thought Katy had drowned in a boating accident. Lillian told me she thought of going to the police about it in 1978, when you found out what had really happened to Katy and Todd, but when she saw that even Ian and Eric wouldn’t be convicted, she realized that it would be her word against Mitch’s and Mitch would claim it never happened.”

“No one else saw it?”

“Someone might have seen it, but to be able to recall a relatively minor incident twenty years later? She doubted anyone heard him. At the time it happened, she was hardly in a state to take down names from witnesses-she was hoping no one had seen it. She apologized to Mitch and fortunately her driver pulled up just then, which is probably all that kept Mitch from striking Katy.”

“What happened after that?”

“Lillian dragged Katy into the car and, once they were home, scolded her. She tells me that Katy retaliated by asking certain uncomfortable questions about Lillian’s past, and why there had never been any other children in the family, and so on. Lillian refused to answer them, and told her she should be less worried about Lillian’s youthful foolishness and much more worried about her own-that insulting a man like Mitch Yeager could be extremely dangerous. When she asked if Mitch was her father, Lillian said that if she didn’t want someone to spit in her face, she’d better stop asking such things.”

“And the will?”

“Ah, yes. The will. Katy said Jack should have been her father, and that she loved him more than anyone she was related to by blood. Lillian said, ‘This is your family, and it will be Max’s family, and you ought to be grateful that you weren’t raised by a drunkard without two nickels to rub together.’”

“Ouch.”

“Lillian said that Katy managed a parting shot as she left the house. She told Lillian to roll up all her nickels and shove them up her ass-yes, I know, not very ladylike-and that drunk or sober, Jack could do a better job of raising a child in a shack than Lillian or any of the Ducanes could in a mansion.”

“So she went from there to a lawyer?”

“Oh, that wasn’t the mystery it seemed at first. Apparently she already had an appointment to see him. Dan Norton-the homicide detective who first investigated their disappearances?-did look into the business of the will back in 1958. The lawyer told Norton that she had come to consult him about getting a divorce from Todd, something she had told others she intended to do. She arrived early-probably a result of storming out of Lillian’s house before she planned to leave. While she waited to see the lawyer, she talked to another client who was there to have a will and other papers drawn up-a young widow who said she wanted to make sure that if anything happened to her, her children would be left in the care of an aunt, and not her mother.”

“Which made Katy think of her own child. And she made sure Jack had a shack to raise him in.”

“Yes.”

I thought about all she had told me. “I’m not sure this brings me any further along,” I said.

“Perhaps not. Keep reading those diaries of Conn’s,” she said. “And come to me again if I can be of any help.”

I thanked her for confiding in me. Just before I left, I asked, “Helen, are you hoping the tests prove Max is the missing child, or that he isn’t?”

“I’m hoping for Max’s happiness and safety. That above all and more than anything.”

“Nothing more?”

“Oh, are you asking me if it would be a relief to know that Katy’s child lived? Yes, because given what you and Conn figured out about that night, if Max isn’t that child, I fear that child was murdered. I also hope that perhaps, one fine day, there will be justice. Justice would be sweet. It’s one of the things that happens as you age, you know. The taste buds go like everything else, but the last ones to leave you are the ones that can taste sweetness. If the good Lord is willing, I’d like to taste a little sweet justice for Katy.”