He closed his eyes to stop the tears from coming. It might have been an accident, of course. She might have gone into the park that night, just as she had done as a child, and slipped and fallen from the cliffs. But he didn’t believe it for a minute. Caitlin knew the park like she knew the back of her hand. Like Nest did. Like Evelyn. It had always been a part of their lives. Even Evelyn had grown up in a house that adjoined the park. They were a part of it in the same way as the trees and the burial mounds and the squirrels and birds and all the rest. No, Caitlin didn’t slip and fall. She killed herself.
And he still didn’t know why.
He stared out the window at the drive leading up to Sinnis-sippi Road. It was hard losing Caitlin, but he thought it would be unbearable if he lost Evelyn. Their time together spanned almost fifty years; he couldn’t remember what his life had been like before her. There really wasn’t anything without her. He hated the drinking and the smoking, hated the way she had retired to the kitchen table and taken up residence, and hated the hard way she had come to view her life. But he would rather have her that way than not have her at all.
But what was he going to do to keep her? She was slipping away from him, one day at a time, as if she were sitting in a raft with the mooring lines slipped, drifting slowly out to sea while he stood helplessly on the shore and watched. He clasped h’is big hands before him and shrugged his shoulders. He was strong and smart and his life was marked by his accomplishments, but he did not know what to do to save her.
He reached up and loosened his tie. What could he do, after all, that would make a difference? Was there anyone who could tell him? He had spoken with Ralph Emery, but the minister had told him that Evelyn had to want to be helped before anyone could reach her. He had come out to the house to talk with her once or twice, but Evelyn had shown no interest in reaching out. Nest was the only one she cared about, and he thought sometimes that maybe Nest made a small difference in Evelyn just by being there. But Nest was still a child, and there was only so much a child could do.
Besides, he thought uneasily, Nest was too much like her grandmother for comfort.
He pulled off his tie, draped it over the easy chair with his coat, and walked to the phone to call Mel Riorden. He dialed, and the phone rang only once before Mel picked up.
“Riorden.”
“Mel? It’s Bob Freemark.”
“Yeah, thanks for calling back. I appreciate it.”
Old Bob smiled to himself. “What were you doing, standing by the phone waiting for me?”
“Something like that. This isn’t funny. I’ve got a problem.” Mel Riorden’s tone of voice made that abundantly apparent, but Old Bob said nothing, waiting Mel out. “You have to keep this to yourself, Bob, if I tell you. You have to promise me that. I wouldn’t involve you if I didn’t have to, but I can’t let this thing slide and I don’t know how to deal with it. I’ve already tried and been told to go to hell.”
Old Bob pulled back the desk chair and seated himself. “Well, this doesn’t have to go beyond you and me if you don’t want it to, Mel. Why don’t you just tell me what it is?”
Mel Riorden gave a worried sigh. “It’s Deny. The kid’s more trouble than a dozen alligators in the laundry chute and stupid to boot. If he wasn’t my sister’s kid . ..” He trailed off. “Well, you’ve heard it all before. Anyway, I’m in church for the early mass with Carol and a couple of the grandkids. Al Garcia’s there, too. With Angie and their kids. So afterward, I go in for a coffee and a cookie like everyone else. I say hello to Al and Angie, to a couple of others. Everyone’s having a nice visit. I’m standing there, munching my cookie, sipping my coffee, Carol’s off with the grandkids, all’s right with the world, and up comes my sister. She looks really bad, worried as can be, all bent out of shape. First off, I think she’s been drinking. But then I see it’s something else. She says to me, ‘Mel, you got to talk to him. You got to find out what’s going on and put a stop to it.’ “