Panic

28

‘T hose poor kids,’ Dealey Todd said. He hovered near eighty, but he wore the unfettered smile of a child. His hair had beaten a long-ago retreat, leaving a trail of freckles mapped across his head. He wore old khakis that needed a wash and a shirt faded with loving wear. His den held a rat’s nest of old paperbacks and three TVs, one tuned and muted to CNN, the others tuned to a telenovela, also muted.

‘Learning Spanish,’ he said.

‘Watching pretty girls,’ his wife said.

Evan’s throat tightened as CNN played. His face had been on CNN repeatedly in the past couple of days, although other stories had now bumped his from the news. But Bedford’s disguise seemed to work; Dealey Todd hadn’t given him a more curious look than he would have given any other stranger when Evan introduced himself and Carrie as Bill and Terry Smithson. Probably Dealey paid more attention to the telenovela bosoms than he did the news feeds.

Mrs. Todd was a bustling woman who offered coffee and promptly vanished into the kitchen to watch yet another television.

Evan decided to play a sympathetic hand. ‘We think my parents came through the Hope Home orphanage, but their records were destroyed,’ said Evan. ‘We’re trying to locate any other alternative source of records, and also to learn more about the Home. My parents died several years ago, and we want to piece together their early lives.’

‘Admirable,’ Dealey Todd said. ‘Interest in your parents. My own daughter lives down in Cleveland and can’t be bothered to phone more than once a month.’

‘Dealey,’ Mrs. Todd called from the kitchen. ‘They don’t care about that, honey doll.’

The honey doll made a sour face. ‘Okay, the orphanage.’ He shrugged, returned to his smile, sipped at his black coffee. ‘Orphanage got built, then it burned ten years later. So you might be in for a long, difficult haul to find records.’

Evan shook his head. ‘There has to be a source for records. Who built it? Maybe whatever charity sponsored it has what I need.’

‘Let’s see.’ Dealey closed his eyes in thought. ‘Originally a nondenominational charity out of Dayton started it up, but they sold it to’ – he tapped on his bottom lip – ‘let’s see, I want to say a company out of Delaware. You could probably find a record of sale at the county clerk’s office. But I remember they went bankrupt, too, after the fire, and no one rebuilt the orphanage.’

A bankrupt owner. God only knew what had happened to the files. But Evan knew from his documentary interviews that dead ends often had left turns, just out of view. He thought for a second and asked, ‘How did the town view the orphanage?’

‘Y’know, not that Goinsville isn’t a charitable place, ’cause it is, but many folks around here weren’t overjoyed with the orphanage. Kind of a not-in-my-backyard feeling. Bunch of so-called church ladies were just tight-jawed about it-’

‘Dealey, honey doll, don’t exaggerate,’ Mrs. Todd called from the kitchen.

‘I thought when I retired from the paper I left editors behind,’ Dealey said.

Silence from the kitchen.

‘I’m not exaggerating,’ he said to Evan and Carrie. ‘People didn’t like in particular that young ladies in trouble could go to Hope Home and drop their precious loads. You get the sinners along with the end product.’ He stopped suddenly, the smile now uneasy, remembering that he was speaking of Evan’s parents and grandmothers.

‘Did anyone dislike the place enough to burn it?’ Evan asked.

‘Everyone thought it was an accident at first, the wiring. But six months after the fire, a teenager named Eddie Childers shot his mama and himself. The police found souvenirs from both burn sites – baby socks, a girl’s uniform from the orphanage, family photos from the workers at the courthouse. All stashed under his bed. I’ll never forget that, I was there when the officers found the stuff. And he left a note taking responsibility. He was a wild kid. Sad, very sad.’

‘So the records of any children born at the Hope Home were destroyed,’ Evan said. ‘Because both the orphanage and the county courthouse were gone, and the owners went bankrupt.’

‘Yes, basically,’ Dealey said. ‘I remember I wrote a few stories about the company that owned the orphanage after it burned… because, you know, it brought about twenty or so jobs to the town. People hoped they’d rebuild. Twenty jobs is twenty jobs.’

‘Well, we’ll look up those stories at the library,’ Carrie said.

Evan thought, This is a dead end, this is nothing. It couldn’t be. And then he thought, That is the point, Goinsville is a dead end. Someone wanted it to be the end of the road for anyone who ever came looking for Evan’s parents. It can’t be. You can’t run a business that takes care of kids and have every bit of its history vanish…

‘Thanks for your time,’ Carrie said.

‘Twenty jobs,’ Evan said suddenly. ‘Hey, do you know anyone who worked at the Hope Home that might still be alive?’

Dealey bit his lip in thought. Mrs. Todd emerged from the kitchen. ‘Well, Dealey’s cousin’s wife worked at the orphanage as a volunteer. Read the kiddies stories every Wednesday, you know. Get ’em interested in books because you know that’s the key to success. I remember because Phyllis won a volunteer-of-the-year award, and my mother-in-law nagged at me for weeks to volunteer myself. She might be able to help you, or give you the names of the employees.’

‘Does she by any chance still live around here?’ Evan asked. ‘I could show her pictures of my mom and dad, see if she would remember them.’

‘Sure,’ Dealey said. ‘Phyllis Garner. She lives five streets over.’

‘Phyllis is as sharp as a tack,’ said Mrs. Todd. ‘Honey doll, shame it don’t run in your family.’

A quick phone call determined that Mrs. Garner was home, watching the same soap opera as Mrs. Todd. They drove over the five streets with Dealey Todd to an immaculately maintained brick home, shaded by giant oaks. Mrs. Garner wore a lavender sweater set, was perfectly coiffed, and was eighty-five if a day.

Phyllis Garner gestured them to sit on a floral couch.

‘I know it’s been many years, ma’am.’ Evan showed her current photos of his parents. ‘Their names were Arthur and Julie Smithson.’

Phyllis Garner studied the photo. ‘Smithson. I think I do recall that name. James!’ Phyllis called to her grandson, who was puttering around in her garage. ‘Come help me a minute.’ They vanished down into a basement, leaving Dealey, Evan, and Carrie to talk about the weather and college football, two of Dealey’s keen interests.

Phyllis returned fifteen minutes later, dusty, but smiling. The grandson carried a box. He set it on the coffee table and left to finish his puttering.

Phyllis sat down between Evan and Carrie, opened the box, and pulled out a yellowing scrapbook. ‘Photos of the kids. Mementos. They’d draw me a picture and sign it for Miss Phyllis. One girl always signed it for Mommy, told me she needed to practice on me, for the day when she got herself a real mother. It broke my heart. I wanted to bring her home but my husband wouldn’t hear of it, and it was the only argument I never won. My heart bled for those children. No one wanted them. That’s the worst thing in this world, to be unwanted. I hope you recognize your parents in here.’ She flipped through pages. Phyllis Garner, radiant and beautiful and probably every orphan’s dream. Evan wondered if she had been conscious of how the bereft children must have ached for her to slip her hand into theirs and say, You’re coming home with me. It might have been less painful if such an angel had kept her distance.

She pointed at a photo of a group of six or seven children. Evan’s eyes went to the children first, looking for his father and mother in every face. No. Not them. Then he noticed the man standing behind the children.

The man was short, balding, but not completely bald. He wore glasses and a thin, academician’s beard. But the shape of the face, the sureness of the stance, were the same. Evan had seen the face several times, in the news clippings left anonymously for him at his lecture four months ago. The man’s smile was tight, as though bottling in the scintillating personality that had made him such a force in London.

Alexander Bast.

‘That man. Who’s he?’ Evan asked. He kept his voice steady.

Phyllis Garner flipped the picture over; she had a list of names written in tidy cursive on the back. ‘Edward Simms. He owned the company that ran Hope Home. He only came here once, that I recall. I asked him to pose with a group of the children. In honor of his visit. My God, he smiled, but you would have thought I scalded him. He acted like the children were dirty. The other ladies found him charming, but I don’t have to count scales to know a snake.’

Carrie’s hand closed around Evan’s arm. Hard. She pointed wordlessly at a tall, thin boy standing near Bast. Shock on her face.

‘What’s the matter, dear?’ Phyllis asked.