The Cat, The Devil, The Last Escape

32

THE CHRISTMAS TREE shone bright in the Chesserson living room with its many-colored lights, its red and golden balls, silver ropes and bright tinsel. Sammie seemed hardly to notice the tree, nor did she gently rattle the colorful packages. This wasn’t Christmas Eve. Christmas would be when Daddy came home. For days her stubborn spirit had remained with Morgan and Lee aboard a speeding train or walking cold beside the highway, two lone men crossing the vast, empty land.

When Anne put a Christmas record on to play softly, Sammie didn’t want to hear the music. Rolling over on the couch she pulled the afghan over her face, pretending to sleep. In the dark beneath the cover she lay thinking of Christmas when she was little, when Daddy was there. When they were together in their own house decorating their own tree or having supper at Caroline’s among the scents of Christmas baking. The music, then, had been wonderful, the boys’ choir Sammie loved, the church music, but now music only brought tears. This Christmas week, her mother had gone to church several times, but Sammie didn’t want to go, she didn’t want to see the life-sized crèche or hear the story of the Christ child, they only made her sad.

Caroline drove down on Christmas Eve after making her last deliveries. They had arranged the dining table so they could see not only the living room fire but the Christmas tree. Though they sat down to a supper of Mariol’s good shrimp gumbo, a fresh salad, and Caroline’s pecan pie, Sammie was quiet and unresponsive. Only later, when she was given no choice but to share her bed with Grandma, had she snuggled down against Caroline.

Sammie was equally quiet Christmas morning, was slow getting up and dressing. Upstairs, even Mariol’s baked eggs and cheese grits failed to cheer her. She was far away with her daddy and Lee, the night still dark on the desert, the low moon brightening the pale sand.

Mariol had laid a fire on the hearth, its flames reflecting rainbows among the bright decorations. Sammie tried to be cheerful. She looked up into the tree, touched a few boxes, and smiled at the adults, but she was only pretending. The joy they had hoped would blossom this morning was a thin parody. They could only be there for her, love her, could only try to ease her worry.

When she opened her presents, the Little House books Becky had bought for her, and the new winter coat in a soft, cozy red that was Sammie’s favorite color, she pretended excitement. She tried the coat on and twirled around, smiling. She read the first pages of the first book, but her preoccupation and distress filled the room. Caroline had brought her a new bike, as Sammie had outgrown her small one. Anne and Mariol had chosen a small, carved chest from Anne’s attic that had been in the family since Anne was a child, and had filled it with new drawing pads, crayons, colored pencils, and a watercolor set. Sammie tore off the wrappings, pretending excitement. She straddled the bike with its red ribbon tied to the handlebars. But her spirit walked the lonely roads, slept cold on the rumbling trains. It was not until later that morning when all the gifts had been unwrapped that suddenly Sammie brightened.

Mariol was putting another log on the fire. The living room was a comfortable shambles of torn Christmas paper, scattered boxes and ribbon. As Mariol rose from the hearth, turning toward the tree, she went hushed and still.

At the base of the tree among tangles of paper the lower branches were moving, branches shifted and sprang back, though there was nothing there to disturb them. A shiny red bell began to swing but nothing had touched it. A golden ball twirled, the tinsel shivered, another branch bowed down as if with a heavy weight.

Mariol didn’t move, no one moved or spoke. Becky and Caroline remained intently watching as Sammie slipped toward the tree, reaching.

Anne, not moving from her chair, reached out involuntarily, just as Sammie was reaching; something within her was sharply stirred.

They watched Sammie kneel, holding out her arms, cuddling some invisible presence. The sleeve and collar of Sammie’s robe were pulled and stretched as if something unseen scrambled up, to push against her face.

“Christmas ghost,” Anne said softly.

They could see only joy in Sammie, bright pleasure as she stroked her invisible visitor. They watched for a long time, the four women silent and unmoving, Sammie hardly aware of them.

When she did look up, her face colored, she didn’t know how to explain what was happening, she didn’t want to explain.

Mariol said, “There were stories in my family, Cajun stories that ghosts will return on Christmas to be with their family, to share in the joy of the day. Ghosts of children usually, though often of family pets.” Mariol looked over at Anne, and they shared a comfortable smile. When Mariol turned away, Anne rose too; soon they all four left the room, left Sammie and her friend to themselves. Only then did the ghost cat make himself seen.

Dropping heavily into Sammie’s lap he reached a paw to her cheek. She held him tight and they sat for a long time beneath the bright tree, Sammie stroking, Misto snuggling and purring. And Sammie knew, wherever Daddy and Lee were, that this Christmas morning, for this moment, they were safe, they were all right.

TAKING THE THREE hundred dollars from his pocket, Lee handed it to Morgan. They were walking the dusty road, headed into Blythe. “If the feds spot me,” Lee said, “you beat it out of there fast. Hop a ride to L.A. and go on with the plan. Find a lawyer you think you can trust, get settled with him, then turn yourself in to T.I. the way we laid it out.” He knew it would be easier for Morgan if they stayed together. Lee knew L.A. a bit, he could find his way around the city. If they made it out of Blythe together, maybe their luck would hold.

It was a long walk into Blythe, they’d left well before the sun was up, eating cold Spam and stale crackers as they strode along. By the time they entered town the sun was up, there was traffic on the street, the stores were opening. Lee pulled his hat brim low and scanned the street for anyone he knew, for Jake Ellson’s red truck or for Jake himself. When they neared the new bank, Morgan waited in a shop across the street, keeping watch for the law, for a cop or anyone in a suit who looked like a federal agent. The new bank, built after Lee had left Blythe, stood on the cleared site of the old, burned bank, next to the post office he had robbed. Entering the high-ceilinged lobby, Lee tailed onto the shortest line.

They had, before approaching the bank, turned down a side street where they could see several trucks parked behind the shops loaded with crated vegetables, and two refrigerator trucks. “Drivers are stoking up on breakfast,” Lee had said, “before they head out.” Within ten minutes they had lined up a ride to L.A. Now, in line, he stood tense, ready to move out fast if Morgan slipped in to alert him. Sure as hell, the feds had talked with Lee’s PO and knew about his savings account.

Jake Ellson, his friend and boss, would have told them nothing. But his PO would be more than cooperative. Lee could see no back or side door leading out of the lobby, only the front, glass entry. As the man ahead of him finished and turned away counting a handful of bills, the heavy-jowled clerk watched Lee impatiently. “Next?”

Lee pushed his bankbook across the counter. “Like to draw out my savings, close my account.”

The clerk looked Lee over, then thumbed open the savings book. “It’s been almost a year since the last entry.”

“Something wrong with that?”

“No. Just that most folks have more activity in their accounts.”

“I’ve been traveling. Alaska. I’m in kind of a hurry, the wife’s waiting.”

The clerk started to say something more but changed his mind. “Excuse me for a moment.” When he left his window, disappearing into the back, Lee was ready to bolt, to get the hell out of there.

But his quick departure could blow it, if there was nothing wrong. He didn’t need a suspicious bank clerk nosing around. Waiting for the man to return, Lee began to fidget, glancing out the front window. When the clerk didn’t return, the patrons behind Lee pressed closer, annoyed at the delay. Beyond the big windows, a slowing movement caught Lee’s eye, and a police car slid into view, stopping at the curb. Lee forced himself to stay steady, but he was ready to move as one of the two officers got out.

When the officer headed away, down the street, Lee relaxed. The clerk was gone a long time. Some of the men behind Lee moved to another line. He watched the absent cop return carrying a paper bag and two paper cups sealed with paper lids. The cops were pulling away when the clerk did return.

“Sorry for the delay, Mr. Fontana. We’ve had a bookkeeping change, and what with the move and all . . . It took me a while to find your account and figure up the interest. The total is eight hundred and forty-two dollars. How would you like it?”

“Seven hundreds, the rest in small bills.” Lee waited, still strung tight, while the clerk counted out the money. Stuffing it in his pocket he headed for the street. From the far curb, Morgan crossed over to join him.

They moved along the side street to the refrigerator truck parked behind the bank beside the half-dozen other rigs. There were storage sheds and a small warehouse back there, and the rear doors to the post office and small businesses. The driver stood wiping his mouth from breakfast: a young, ruddy-faced fellow with a short beard neatly trimmed, and clear blue eyes. He nodded to Lee, looked Morgan over, nodded again, and they stepped up into the cab.

THE RIDE INTO L.A. was quiet, the driver uncommunicative. He drove the long rig like he was on a close schedule and didn’t need any small talk. Morgan, sitting in the middle, looked white and tense, whether from their companion’s aggressive driving or from thinking about turning themselves in, Lee didn’t know. They hadn’t talked much about that part of the plan, about being back inside prison walls. Morgan hadn’t talked too much about facing Falon, but Lee knew he was scared.

Well, hell, they were both nervous. If you weren’t nervous, you weren’t on your toes. Traveling north, Morgan seemed diverted only by the desert. The flat, pale, treeless land fascinated the Georgia boy, who was used to miles of dense pine woods. The endless flat sand stretching away was foreign and strange. The sudden patches of crops laid on the sand as bright as green carpets were even more unnatural. The groves of tall palms flicking by, their precise rows fanning past at dizzying speed like cards shuffled too fast, all was new and exotic.

Lee dozed over Banning Pass and down into San Bernardino. The big diesel ate up the miles until, in east L.A., they parted from the driver at a wholesale warehouse. They found a bus stop and, jolted in their seats and breathing gas fumes, they arrived at last in downtown L.A. Fog softened the low commercial buildings, and it, too, smelled of gas or of some industrial residue. At the first phone booth they came to, Lee flipped through the yellow pages to the attorneys.

It was all instinct now. Jabbing his finger at a name he liked, he dropped a nickel in the slot. It might take a dozen calls or more before he found a lawyer who sounded right, but he had nothing else to go on.

The first five calls, he couldn’t get past cold, officious secretaries. He gave the same story each time: they needed a lawyer to save a man’s life, they could pay up front, and the details of the problem were confidential. On the sixth call the secretary, maybe taking pity on the older man’s stumbling voice, put him through to Reginald Storm.

Storm sounded calm and direct. Lee remained devious, as circumspect as he could be. He laid out only enough of Morgan’s story to stir Storm’s interest. Storm asked a number of questions, as if he might be filling in more blanks than Lee liked. He had to convince Storm to see them, had to hint at their escape without telling him much; he couldn’t let Storm blow the whistle on them. If the feds grabbed them before they turned themselves in at T.I., there was a chance they’d ship them straight back to Georgia. They talked for maybe twenty minutes, and Storm seemed to really listen. But when he said he’d make time right then, that they could come on up, his willingness put Lee off, left Lee nervous again.

Hanging up, he looked at Morgan. “I think he knows more than I told him, he makes me edgy.” He shook his head. “But even so, I like the sound of him. He seems direct and no-nonsense. What do you think, you want to take a chance or forget him, try someone else?”

Morgan thought for only a minute. “We’re taking a chance, no matter who we choose. Let’s go for it.”

Storm had given Lee directions. They walked the seven blocks at double time, Lee praying they weren’t walking into trouble, that they’d made the right decision.

Reginald Storm’s office was one flight up, in a plain redbrick building that looked clean and well kept. A narrow strip of lawn separated it from the street, bisected by a short walk of pale stone. The four name plaques mounted beside the glassed entry were those of Storm himself, a doctor, an accountant, and an estate attorney—all one might need when contemplating the end of life, except for spiritual attention.

“Come on,” Morgan said, heading for the stairs, “before I lose my nerve.”