All Around the Town (4 page)

Sarah found it easy to answer Dr. Carpenter's questions. "Yes. Laurie was different when she came back. Even then I was certain she must have been sexually abused. But my mother insisted on telling everyone that she was sure loving people who wanted a child had taken her. Mother needed to believe that. Fifteen years ago people didn't talk about that kind of abuse. But Laurie was so frightened to go to bed. She loved my father but would never sit on his lap again. She didn't want him to touch her. She was afraid of men in general."

"Surely she was examined when she was found?"

"Yes, at the hospital in Pennsylvania."

"Those records may still exist. I wish you'd arrange to send for them. What about that recurring dream?"

"She had it again last night. She was absolutely terrified. She calls it the knife dream. Ever since she came back to us, she's been afraid of sharp knives."

"How much personality change did you observe?"

"At first a great deal. Laurie was an outgoing sociable child before she was kidnapped. A little spoiled, I suppose, but very sweet. She had a play group and loved to visit back and forth with her friends. After she came back she would never stay overnight in anyone's house again. She always seemed a little distant with her peers.

"She chose to go to Clinton College because it's only an hour-and-a-half drive away and she came home many weekends."

Carpenter asked, "What about boyfriends?"

"As you'll see, she's a very beautiful young woman. She certainly got asked out plenty and in high school did go to the usual dances and games. She never seemed interested in anyone until Gregg Bennett, and that ended abruptly."

"Why?"

"We don't know. Gregg doesn't know. They went together all last year. He attends Clinton College as well and would often come home weekends with her. We liked him tremendously, and Laurie seemed so happy with him. They're both good athletes, especially fine golfers. Then one day last spring it was over. No explanations. Just over. She won't talk about it, won't talk to Gregg. He came to see us. He has no idea what caused the break. He's in England this semester, and I don't know that he's even heard about my parents."

"I'd like to see Laurie tomorrow at eleven."

The next morning Sarah drove Laurie to the appointment and promised to return in exactly fifty minutes. "I'll bring in some stuff for dinner," she told her. "We've got to perk up that appetite of yours."

Laurie nodded and followed Carpenter into his private office. With something like panic in her face, she refused to recline on the couch, choosing to sit across the desk from him. She waited silently, her expression sad and withdrawn.

Obvious profound depression. Carpenter thought. "I'd like to help you, Laurie."

"Can you bring back my mother and father?"

"I wish I could. Laurie, your parents are dead because a bus malfunctioned."

"They're dead because I didn't have my car inspected."

"You forgot."

"I didn't forget. I decided to break the appointment at the gas station. I said I'd go to the free inspection center at the Motor Vehicle Agency. That one I forgot, but I deliberately broke the first appointment. It's my fault."

"Why did you break the first appointment?" He watched closely as Laurie Kenyon considered the question.

"There was a reason but I don't know what it was."

"How much does it cost to have the car inspected at the gas station?"

"Twenty dollars."

"And it's free at the Motor Vehicle Agency. Isn't that a good enough reason?"

She seemed to be immersed in her own thoughts. Carpenter wondered if she had heard him. Then she whispered, "No," and shook her head.

"Then why do you think you broke the first appointment?"

Now he was sure she had not heard him. She was in a different place. He tried another tack. "Laurie, Sarah tells me that you've been having bad dreams again, or rather the same bad dream you used to have has come back."

Inside her mind, Laurie heard a loud wail. She pulled her legs against her chest and buried her head. The wailing wasn't just inside her. It was coming from her chest and throat and mouth.

Chapter
13

THE MEETING with Preacher Rutland Garrison and the television producers was sobering.

They had eaten lunch in the private dining room of Worldwide Cable, the company that syndicated Garrison's program to an international audience. Over coffee, he made himself very clear. "I began the 'Church of the Airways' when ten-inch black-and-white TVs were luxuries," he said. "Over the years this ministry has given comfort, hope and faith to millions of people. It has raised a great deal of money for worthwhile charities. I intend to see that the right person continues my work after me."

Bic and Opal had nodded, their faces set in expressions of deference, respect and piety. The following Sunday they were introduced on the "Church of the Airways." Bic spoke for forty minutes.

He told of his wasted youth, his vain desire to be a rock star, of the voice the good Lord had given him and how he had abused it with vile secular songs. He spoke of the miracle of his conversion. Yea, verily, he understood the road to Damascus. He had traveled it in the footsteps of Paul. The Lord didn't say, "Saul, Saul, why persecuteth thou Me?" No, the question hurt even more. At least Saul thought he was acting in the name of the Lord when he tried to blot out Christianity. As he, Bobby, stood in that crowded dirty nightclub, singing those filthy lyrics, a voice filled his heart and soul, a voice that was so powerful and yet so sad, so angry and yet so forgiving. The voice asked, "Bobby, Bobby, why do you blaspheme me?"

Here he began to cry.

At the end of the sermon. Preacher Rutland Garrison put a fatherly arm around him. Bobby beckoned to Carla to join him. She came onto the set, her eyes moist, her lips quivering. He introduced her to the Worldwide audience.

They led the closing hymn together. "'Bringing in the sheaves...'"

After the program the switchboard came alive with calls praising the Reverend Bobby Hawkins. He was invited to return in two weeks.

On the drive back to Georgia, Bic was silent for hours. Then he said, "Lee's at the college in Clinton, New Jersey. Maybe she'll go back. Maybe she won't. The Lord is warning me it's time to remind her of what will happen if she talks about us."

Bic was going to be chosen as Rutland Garrison's successor. Opal could sense it. Garrison had been taken in the same as all the others. But if Lee started remembering... "What are you going to do about her, Bic?"

"I got ideas. Opal. Ideas that came to me full blown while I was praying."

Chapter
14

ON HER SECOND VISIT to Dr. Carpenter, Laurie told him that she was returning to college the next Monday. "It's better for me, better for Sarah," she said calmly. "She's so worried about me that she hasn't gone back to work, and work will be the best thing for her. And I'll have to study like crazy to make up for losing nearly three weeks."

Carpenter was not sure what he was seeing. There was something different about Laurie Kenyon, a brisk matter-of-fact attitude that was at total variance with the crushed, heartbroken girl he had seen a week earlier.

That day she had worn a gold cashmere jacket, beautifully cut black slacks, a gold, black and white silk blouse. Her hair had been loose around her shoulders. Today she had on jeans and a baggy sweater. Her hair was pulled back and held by a clip. She seemed totally composed.

"Have you had any more nightmares, Laurie?"

She shrugged. "I'm positively embarrassed remembering the way I carried on last week. Look, a lot of people have bad dreams and they don't go mewing around about them. Right?"

"Wrong," he said quietly. "Laurie, since you feel so much stronger, why don't you stretch out on the couch and relax and let's talk?" Carefully he watched her reaction.

It was the same as last week. Absolute panic in her eyes. This time the panic was followed by a defiant expression that was almost a sneer. "There's no need to stretch out. I'm perfectly capable of talking sitting up. Not that there's much to talk about. Two things went wrong in my life. In both cases I'm to blame. I admit it."

"You blame yourself for being kidnapped when you were four?"

"Of course. I was forbidden to go out front alone. I mean really forbidden. My mother was so afraid that I'd forget and run into the road. There was a teenager who lived down the block, and he had a lead foot on the accelerator. The only time that I remember my mother really scolding me was when she caught me on the front lawn, alone, throwing a ball in the air. And you know I'm responsible for my parents' death."

It was not the time to explore that. "Laurie, I want to help you. Sarah told me that your parents believed that you were better off not to have psychological counseling after your abduction. That probably is part of the reason you're resisting talking to me now. Why don't you just close your eyes and rest and try to learn to feel comfortable with me? In other sessions we may be able to work together."

"You're so sure there will be other sessions?"

"I hope so. Will there be?"

"Only to please Sarah. I'll be coming home weekends, so they'll have to be on Saturdays."

"That can be arranged. You're coming home every weekend?"

"Yes."

"Is that because you want to be with Sarah?"

The question seemed to excite her. The matter-of-fact attitude disappeared. Laurie crossed her legs, lifted her chin, reached her hand back and opened the clip that held her hair in a ponytail.

Carpenter watched as the shining blond mass fell around her face. A secretive smile played on her lips. "His wife comes home weekends," she said. "There's no use hanging around the college then."

Chapter
15

LAURIE OPENED the door of her car. "Starting to feel like fall," she said.

The first leaves were falling from the trees. Last night the heat had gone on automatically. "Yes, it does," Sarah said. "Now look, if it's too much for you..."

"It won't be. You put all the creeps in prison, and I'll make up all the classes I missed and keep my cum laude. I still may even have a shot at magna. You left me in the dust with your summa. See you Friday night." She started to give Sarah a quick hug, then clung to her. "Sarah, don't you ever let me switch cars with you."

Sarah smoothed Laurie's hair. "Hey, I thought we'd agreed that Mom and Dad would get real upset about that kind of thinking. After you see Dr. Carpenter on Saturday, let's go for a round of golf."

Laurie attempted a smile. "Winner buys dinner."

"That's because you know you'll beat me."

SARAH WAVED vigorously until the car was no longer in sight, then turned back to the house. It was so quiet, so empty. The prevailing wisdom was to make no dramatic changes after a family death, but her instinct told her that she should start hunting immediately for another place, perhaps a condo, and put the house on the market. Maybe she'd phone Dr. Carpenter and ask him about that.

She was already dressed for work. She picked up her briefcase and shoulder bag, which were on the table in the foyer. The delicate eighteenth-century table, inlaid with marble, and the mirror above it were antiques that had belonged to her grandmother. Where would they and all the other lovely pieces, all the first-edition volumes of classics that lined John Kenyon's library fit in a two-bedroom condo? Sarah pushed the thought away.

Instinctively she glanced in the mirror and was shocked at what she saw. Her complexion was dead white. There were deep circles under her eyes. Her face had always been thin, but now her cheeks were hollowed out. Her lips were ashen. She remembered her mother saying that last morning, "Sarah, why not wear a little makeup? Shadow would bring out your eyes..."

She dropped her shoulder bag and briefcase back on the table and went upstairs. From the vanity in her bathroom she took her seldom-used cosmetic case. The image of her mother in her shell-pink dressing gown, so naturally pretty, so endearingly maternal, telling her to put on eyeshadow brought at last the scalding tears she had forced back for Laurie's sake.

IT WAS SO GOOD to get to her airless office with its chipped-paint walls, stacks of files, ringing telephone. Her coworkers in the prosecutor's office had come to the funeral home en masse. Her closest friends had been at the funeral, had phoned and stopped at the house these past few weeks.

Today they all seemed to understand that she wanted to get back to a semblance of normality. "Good to have you back." A quick hug. Then the welcome "Sarah, let me know when you have a minute..."

Lunch was a cheese on rye and black coffee from the courthouse cafeteria. By three o'clock Sarah had the satisfying feeling that she'd made a dent in responding to the urgent messages from plaintiffs, witnesses and attorneys.

At four o'clock, unable to wait any longer, she called Laurie's room at college. The phone was picked up immediately. "Hello."

"Laurie, it's me. How's it going?"

"So-so. I went to three classes, then cut the last one. I just felt so tired."

"No wonder. You haven't had a decent night's sleep. What are you doing tonight?"