Chapter FIFTEEN
I don’t think I said anything for a minute or two, but sat on that dirt-encrusted rock listening to the race of the river, inhaling its damp, dark smells. A bug crawled on my neck and I slapped it away. “That’s not funny,” I said. “I’m not in the mood for jokes, Grady.”
“I wish it were a joke. I’d give anything if it were a joke.” Grady sighed and I could just make out the outline of his face in the semidarkness. “Tobias King was my father,” he said. “My natural father, I guess you’d call him, except he was about as unnatural as a father could be. And Tobias King wasn’t even his real name. It just happened to be the one he was using at the time.”
“What do you mean, you killed him?”
“It was an accident. I didn’t mean to. Hell, Kate, I was eleven years old and I hated his guts. I did my best to stay as far away from him as I could.” Grady picked up a stick and threw it into the water.
“So, what was he doing here?” And why are you telling me this?
“He planned to blackmail Mom and Dad. Said they’d have to pay good money or he’d take me back. That would’ve been a laugh! Like he ever cared about me to begin with.”
“But they had already adopted you. How could he—”
“He wasn’t around when my real mother died—hadn’t been around for years. I guess everybody thought he was dead, too. At least they didn’t expect him back, so technically, he might have had a case.”
“But how . . .” Did I really want to know this? I took another swallow of water. It was warm and I wasn’t sure I was going to keep it down.
“Remember how we used to explore down here? Uncle Ernest had told us that yarn about a cave somewhere, and I thought I might find the Confederate gold in there. Anyway, the old man must’ve known where to find me because he was waiting here one day—grabbed me just before I came out into the clearing.” Grady fanned himself with the cap he’d bought at some golf course in Tennessee. “Liked to have scared the— Well, it shook me up pretty bad.
“He’d been drinking and stunk to high heaven. I’ll never forget the feeling of his filthy hands on my arms. We struggled, with me pulling one way and him another. At that point, he wasn’t too steady on his feet and I lit into him, butted him with my head and shoved him as hard as I could.”
I could feel Grady looking at me, but I couldn’t meet his gaze. “His head hit a rock when he fell,” he said.
“And when Bev and I found him that day, you pretended you didn’t know anything about it.”
“It wasn’t until the next day that you saw him. I was scared to go back there by myself, afraid he wouldn’t be dead. He sure wasn’t moving, breathing, either, but here he was reappearing after all those years. I thought he might be like one of those bad guys in the movies who just keep on coming back when you think they’re dead.”
I tried not to flinch when my cousin touched my arm. “I’m sorry, Kate. But I had to find out, and I couldn’t tell anybody what I’d done.”
“You’ve never told this to anybody? Not even Beverly?”
He shook his head. “Especially not Beverly. You know how softhearted she is. Was.”
“But you said yourself it was an accident. Nobody in their right mind would’ve blamed you for what you did in self-defense.”
“True, but a kid isn’t rational about things like that. All I knew was that I had killed the old man . . . and I was glad. By the time I was old enough to realize what I should have done, it was too late to try and make things right. After all, what good would it have done? What good would it do now?”
“So, why are you telling me?”
“Being here in this place stirred things up, I guess. And frankly, it’s been bothering me for a long time, like a wound that never healed. Can you imagine me sharing this with Mom, or even Dad? You’re the closest to a sister I ever had, Kate.”
I patted his arm but didn’t speak. I suppose I should’ve been honored, but I wished my cousin had waited until it was daylight and I had Josie back again to unburden himself.
“Bev had a hard time that day you found him,” Grady went on, “and I felt bad about that, but if I had told her what really happened, she would’ve felt a lot worse.”
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Dry leaves rustled nearby and I slipped from the rock, hoping it might be Josie or one of the others coming to look for us. “Josie! Josie!” I shouted. “Are you out there? Honey, it’s Mom!”
“It’s only an animal—raccoon, I think—heading for the riverbank,” Grady said gently.
“Then let’s yell anyway. Yell together! Maybe somebody will hear us. I just can’t sit here doing nothing.”
We spent the next few minutes screaming into the night, and between the two of us managed to find our way a few more feet alongside the river without falling in. I felt my way to a slender tree and leaned against it, waiting for an answer that never came.
“You know, Kate, Josie might already be back at Bramblewood. She’s probably up there now pigging out on the last of the chocolate chip cookies,” Grady said.
I almost smiled. He had said the right thing, even if I doubted it was true. My injured hand was throbbing, and next to having Josie back, I wanted a hot shower more than anything I could think of, but I would crawl all night on my hands and knees if I thought I might find her.
I heard Grady take out his water bottle and drink. “I wish things had been better between Bev and me before she died,” he said, replacing the cap.
“But I thought they were. Wasn’t she planning to come back to this area when she finished the requirements for her degree? Sounded to me like the two of you had sort of rekindled things.” This was not a good time, I reminded myself, to tell him the police believed Beverly’s death wasn’t an accident.
“To some extent, yes, but things were more or less unsettled.” He turned his head away when he spoke and I had difficulty hearing him over the sound of the water.
“It wasn’t your fault, Grady. Beverly made her own choices—and in the end she had chosen to come home. Her mom told me Bev could hardly wait.”
“It wouldn’t have been any too soon. You should’ve seen that dinky place she lived in . . . way out in the middle of nowhere and so small you didn’t have room to swing a cat!”
“But how . . .” I stopped myself before I said it. Grady had said he’d never visited Beverly in Pennsylvania!
“. . . how long had she lived there?” I continued. “Probably not more than a couple of years. I mean, most people don’t seem to mind an inconvenience like that if it’s temporary. And I got the idea she really enjoyed her part-time job up there. Worked in a nursery or a garden shop—something like that—didn’t she?”
I babbled on and on, trying to cover my tracks. I couldn’t see Grady’s face in the darkness, so I wasn’t sure if he’d noticed my slipup or not.
Grady had admitted killing his own father. In self-defense, he’d said. But how could I be sure he was telling the truth? And then there was Ella’s tragic tumble. Grady had been at Bramblewood that day long enough to have planned it, and he knew how much she cared about that cat. Maybe the house-keeper had learned something about Grady’s encounter with Tobias King. Ella Stegall usually minced no words. She would have confronted him with it.
And Beverly. Dear God, I didn’t even want to think about the possibility that my cousin had something to do with our old friend’s death. Their breakup years before had had a traumatic effect on Grady. Had she rejected him again? Or maybe he had confided in her about what happened to his father, just as he had to me.
I could be next. Instinctively, I stepped back, putting the small tree between us. What was the matter with me? This was Grady! The same Grady who had helped me to build a treehouse, taught me to ride a bike. How could I think he would intentionally harm me—or anyone else?
Grady was quiet, and I wondered if he guessed what I was thinking. Finally he spoke. “It doesn’t look like we’re going to get out of here anytime soon. I think we should try to find a place where we can at least close our eyes and rest a little—maybe get a few minutes of sleep.”
I wasn’t about to close my eyes, and there was no way I was going to sleep with my child cowering and afraid somewhere in this wild, rugged place, but I let my cousin take my hand and lead me to a place where he said he thought the terrain leveled off a bit.
“I’m sure we passed a place just a little way up the hill where we might be able to stretch out—looked like a few small pines in sort of a clearing. There, when somebody comes looking, they’ll be able to see us better.”
Grady’s words were comforting and he gave my shoulder a reassuring pat, just like the old Grady would—the one who could always think of something fun to do, and who never failed to make me laugh. Guilt overwhelmed me. What was I thinking? Just because my cousin knew Beverly had lived in a small apartment, didn’t mean he had been there. Bev had probably told him about it.
Then my foot slipped as Grady helped me over a log, and when I reached out to steady myself, my hand brushed the front of his shirt. It was an old shirt of Uncle Lum’s that Grady had put on for protection against brambles and insects, just as I wore one of Uncle Ernest’s, and the pocket drooped low on his chest.
I recovered quickly, said something lame about being clumsy and tried to pretend I hadn’t felt the flashlight battery in my cousin’s shirt pocket. Had Grady removed a battery so we wouldn’t be able to see?
I had to get away! Even if I stumbled about in the darkness, surely I could find a place to curl up in and hide until light. I had to!
“This should be okay, don’t you think?” Grady shoved aside the branches of a sapling blocking our way, then stomped in a circle, kicking stones and limbs to the side. “It’s not the Hilton, but at least we don’t have to worry about falling into the river—ouch! Watch out for that limb—almost took off the top of my head!”
Then why don’t you put that damn battery back in the flashlight so we can see?
“It’s fine,” I said instead, “but first I have to have a little privacy. Guess I drank too much water.”
“You mean you have to pee? My God, Kate, I’m not going to look. Couldn’t see even if I wanted to.”
“But you could hear. Come on, Grady, I’m modest. Give me a break!”
He snorted. “Since when? I remember when we used to go skinny dipping out at Periwinkle Springs.”
“Yeah, back when we were kids.” I waited. “Just go a few steps away and turn around. Is that too much to ask?”
“Oh, I guess not,” he said finally. “But you’re going to be sorry if I fall and break my neck.”
He turned and went back the way we had come, and I listened, counting his steps: twelve . . . thirteen . . . fourteen . . . then waited until I couldn’t hear him anymore. I had no idea where to go, which way to turn, but I had to do something fast.
Then, on the other side of what looked like a huge rhododendron bush, something moved, pale and ghostlike in the darkness. It seemed almost filmy, flitting among the branches, and I was about one breath away from a scream when I caught the fragrance, subtle and sweet.
Strawberries.
“This way. Hurry!” Augusta reached out and took my hand, and at her touch I wasn’t afraid anymore.
“It’s about time!” I said as I followed her, dipping under overhanging limbs, skirting stumps and stones. “Where have you been?”
“Never far away, Kathryn. You should know that by now.”
“And where’s Josie? Is she all right?”
But Augusta didn’t answer.
Behind us, I could hear Grady calling my name.