The Swan House (35 page)

“What can I do for you, young ladies?” she asked, rather jovially, I thought, for someone who worked with crazy people.

“We are looking for Mr. Henry Becker,” I stated, trying to sound professional.

She furrowed her brow and started shuffling her papers. “Is he a patient at Resthaven? I don't recall . . .”

“Oh no! Not a patient. He works here.”

She shook her head, “No, I don't believe that we have—” Then her expression changed, and she smiled, “Oh yes. Mr. Becker! Yes, I know who you mean. He did work here before I came. Quite a character, I've heard! But he retired a few years ago. I'm sorry.”

My heart fell.

Rachel was quick to the rescue. “Would you possibly have his address? You see, it's rather urgent.” She motioned with her head toward the car, where Carl was sitting. “One of his relatives has been searching for him.”

I shot Rachel a what-in-the-world look, and she snapped her eyes at me, so I kept quiet.

“Let me see. Just a sec, girls.” She came back five minutes later with a piece of paper. “Today you're in luck!”

With the nurse's precise directions, it took us another thirty minutes to find Henry Becker's house. It sat at the end of a dirt road, with pastureland all around. On one side of the house were flower beds, meticulously tended to, with a garden on the other. A rusting metal mailbox and a split-rail fence marked the entrance to the drive- way—as did a dog, a spotted hound dog who had been announcing our arrival for the past few minutes. A trickle of smoke came from the chimney.

Henry Becker was old, at least seventy, I'd say, and he had the same tobacco-stained teeth, droopy eyes, and broad smile that I'd seen in Mama's sketchbook. When we drove up to his house, he was hoeing in the garden. I couldn't tell how tall he was, but I could tell he was thin under a pair of baggy pants held up by suspenders. His first look was suspicious.

Carl hopped out of the car and stood off by the fence. “We're looking for a Mr. Henry Becker. A man who used to work at Rest-haven Sanatorium.”

“I'm Henry Becker.”

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Becker. Name's Carl Matthews. These ladies here, well, I've driven them all the way from Atlanta to see you and ask a few questions. I'm afraid it's about one of their mothers, who spent some time at Resthaven.”

Henry Becker spit a wad of tobacco in the dirt and called over his shoulder into the house, “Martha, we gots viz'tas.” Then he walked over to our car, and leaning on the hoe in much the same way he'd leaned on the rake in the sketch, he peered in at us.

“Well, ya gonna sit there all day or come on in th' house and git ya somethin' ta drink?” He stared at us both for a long moment, and then a trace of a smile formed on his chapped lips.

Rachel and I stepped out of the car.

“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Becker.” I stuck out my hand. “Please forgive us for just showing up at your house.”

He ignored my gesture and pointed a gnarled hand toward me. “You remind me of someone just a bit, young lady.”

“I'm Mary Swan Middleton. Sheila Middleton's daughter.”

His face turned into a road map of smiles and wrinkles. “Well, ya don't say! My, my! Imagine that! It's nice ta see ya, Miz Middleton!” He motioned to all of us. “Mary Swan. Yessir, I remember yore mama talking 'bout you. Come on in with yore friends and set with us a spell.” He deposited the hoe by the fence. His step was springy. “So yore Sheila Middleton's daughter. How is yore mama, honey?”

His back was to me as Rachel, Carl, and I followed him up the three wooden steps to the front porch. I cleared my throat awkwardly and said, “Um, well, she, she died in the Paris plane crash.”

He stopped in midstep and looked back at me with a shocked expression on his face. “Miz Sheila? Lawd, no! Ya don't mean it.” He shook his head, obviously greatly disturbed by my pronouncement. “Not Miz Sheila. Such a beautiful young thing. My, my. Yes, I heard 'bout that crash. Mighty tragic.” He looked off toward the fields, which stretched on every side far into the distance. Then he continued into the house, saying, “Terrible news. So sorry.”

After a moment he regained his composure and asked, “What can I help you with, Miz Middleton and Miz . . .”

“Abrams. Rachel Abrams.”

He called to his wife, still lost in some thought. “Martha, I'm bringin' some viz'tas in.”

Martha Becker had snow-white hair like Grandmom's and a kindly smile, and she was almost as big as Ella Mae. She walked with a visible limp as she came from the back of the house. “Nice ta meet ya,” she replied as Mr. Becker introduced us.

“This here young lady is the daughter of Sheila Middleton.” The way he said it, I could tell his wife must have known Mama too. “Poor Miz Middleton died in that plane crash this past summer.”

“You don't mean it!” Mrs. Becker's face fell. “Dear Lawd! That dear woman.” She seemed every bit as distraught as Mr. Becker to hear the news.

We were in the den with its cozy fire blazing in the fireplace. “Have a seat, chil'un,” Martha Becker said, indicating a chair and a sofa, both worn looking. Then she limped out of the room, promising to bring some drinks.

Mr. Becker seated himself in a rocking chair, bent down, picked up a piece of wood and a knife, and began whittling. “I shore am sorry to hear about yore mother. Now, tell me, Miz Middleton . . .”

“Just call me Mary Swan.”

Carl and Rachel and I watched his slow meticulous strokes as his knife peeled away a thin layer of wood. “Tell me, Mary Swan, what brings ya ta see me?”

“Well . . .” I glanced at Rachel and Carl, who both urged me on with their eyes. “It's a strange story, and it really has nothing to do with the crash. You see, I was chosen to find the three paintings that were missing from the High Museum last year.” I thought he might acknowledge this event, but he kept on whittling, so I continued. “One of the paintings was Mama's and then, as you know, another was yours, and so I thought if I could find you, and talk to you, maybe you'd have an idea of where the paintings are.”

He scratched his head a moment and then shook it, saying, “Never painted a picture in my life.”

I felt a little confused. “What about the one that was going to be hung in the High Museum in Atlanta last year?”

“Don't know nothin' about that painting, Mary Swan.” He chuckled. “I'm no painter. Kin whittle me a fine piece of wood, mind you,” and he held up the carving to show the emerging shape of what looked like the ear of some kind of animal. “Yore mama, now she could paint. Yessir. She painted bee-u-ti-ful things.”

“But the newspapers, the curator, everybody said that one of the missing paintings was painted by Henry Becker. They'd inspected the paintings. It had to be true.”

“Well, there's obviously some mistake. Mus' be talkin' 'bout another Henry Becker. I'm shore there's a whole lotta Henry Beckers in the world, young lady. All's I know is that I ain't never painted nothin' in my whole life.”

Devastated—that was the only word to describe how I felt.

He saw it immediately and reached over and patted my hand. “I'm awful sorry, Mary Swan. Sorry that ya came all this way.”

“But you knew my mother?”

“Yes, I knew her well.”

“For how long did you know her?”

“Well, now, I knew yore mama ever since she first started coming to Resthaven, 'bout ten or twelve years ago, I s'pect.”

My throat was tight. I could tell that Rachel and Carl felt miserable for me too, but they didn't say a word. “Can you tell me about Resthaven?” That came out in a hoarse whisper.

“You don't know about Resthaven, young lady?”

“Not much. Hardly anything. I just know that my mama went there when she was . . . tired. And sometimes she stayed a whole month. And I think I visited her there once when I was really little.” I swallowed. Then I pleaded, “Tell me about Resthaven, Mr. Becker. Please.”

He set down the carving and ran his weathered hands over his face. Then he let out a sigh. “Resthaven is a home for people who have an illness, I guess you'd say. People who's tired o' dealin' with some of the mean things in this world. It's a good place, Miz Middleton. He'ps folks out. And I worked there taking care of the grounds for over twenty-five years. Just retired in 1960. Yore mama came there probably every six months or so. Sometimes she'd stay a week, sometimes a month or longer.”

“Why?”

“To rest.”

“Because she was sad, depressed?”

“That's right.” I could tell he felt uncomfortable admitting that.

“And did Mama paint at Resthaven?”

“Not at first, I don't b'lieve.” He wrinkled his brow as though calculating how much of Mama's story to reveal. “I b'lieve they didn't want her to do nuthin' at first but jus' rest. I noticed her right away, 'cause she'd jus' sit in the gardens and stare at the flowers. And she'd talk to me. Talked ta me lots. Told me I was a mighty fine gard'ner to have such good-looking roses. We talked a bit, yore mama and me.”

His face clouded. “And so when your mama came up to me one day not too long after she first arrived at Resthaven, cryin' so hard, well, it nearly broke my heart. She was so young and perty and fragile. And she looked at me with those big green eyes. Jus' like yours, Miz Middleton. Eyes just like yours. And she was crying to beat the band. So I went over to her and asked her what was the matter. Sometimes I'd talk to the patients like that.” He wiped his face with a handkerchief while Rachel, Carl, and I sat perched on our seats, totally absorbed.

“She said that she had begged her doctor to take her off the med'cine and let her paint, but he wouldn't listen. She said that if only he would let her paint, she'd git better.”

“So what did you do?”

“Well, later I talked to one of the nurses I knew kinda well 'bout what she said. And she musta said somethin' to a doctor, 'cause 'fore you knowed it, Miz Sheila was thankin' me and sayin' I'd saved her life.” He shook his head as if he couldn't quite believe his own story. “And eva' after that, whenever she was at Resthaven, she'd be a'sittin' out in the gardens painting. Happiest expression on her perty face, and hummin' jus' like a little girl. Hummin' to herse'f and paintin'. And she swore she'd give me one of her paintings. And she did.”

“She gave you a painting?” All three of us sat up straight at that. I could feel Henry Becker's letter burning a hole in my pocket.

“Shore did. Ex-quisite, is what me and Martha says. We calls her paintin' exquisite. Nicest thing we eva' owned.” He pulled himself up out of the rocking chair and said, “Come on back to our bedroom, young'uns, and I'll show it to you.”

We followed Mr. Becker into his small bedroom. Framed family photos sat on top of two cedar chests of drawers. Several small hand-woven rugs were on the floor, and hanging on the wall above the bed was a real oil painting, looking incongruous in its surroundings. The painting showed Resthaven at dusk, and there was a type of wild energy in the strokes. Flowers bloomed rampantly, and there was a violent wind blowing the trees. But in the distance, beside a tossing magnolia tree, a man was on his knees tending to a flower bed, seemingly oblivious to the imminent storm.

I'd been raised to have an artistic eye, and I could tell it was a fine painting. But I could tell something else right away. “Mama didn't paint this,” I said, then added, “But it's a really nice painting. Mama mostly painted portraits.”

Henry Becker shook his head and chuckled softly. “'Scuse me for saying it, Miz Middleton, but I know yore mama painted that paintin' 'cause I watched her do it. She painted it the first time she eva' came to Resthaven. Cain't ya see that's me there beside the tree?” His gnarled hand quivered ever so slightly as he pointed toward the figure in the painting.

“She showed me this here paintin' soon as it was done, and she was mighty proud of it. And so was I. And I convinced her to let the doctor see it. And he said she was mighty talented, and he swore to her she wouldn't eva' have to take another pill while she was there.”

“Are you telling me that Mama painted this? While she was at Resthaven?”

“I am.”

“But it doesn't look a thing like what she normally painted!”

He cocked his head. “Funny you should say that, 'cause that's what she always told me. She said, ‘Henry, I paint so much better and different at Resthaven.'”

I went up to the painting and examined it for a signature. Mama's was easy to recognize, big and flowery. “She didn't sign it,” I said, unable to hide my disappointment.

“Shore she did. Right there by the primroses. Don't ya see it? SMM.”

I peered at the dark painting and saw the initials, almost planted in the ground beside the purple and yellow flowers. Her initials, all right. But not the signature she usually painted. Nothing in the whole painting seemed one thing like Mama.

My mind felt stuffed and a little panicky. “But you never painted anything? Ever?”

He shook his head.

Suddenly another idea flashed into my mind. “Have you ever heard of Leslie Leschamps?”

“Shore have.”

“Well, she was the other painter whose work was lost.”

“The Leslie Leschamps I know ain't no painter. She's a nurse.”

The pounding in my heart resumed. Stupidly, because I already knew the answer, I asked, “Where is she a nurse?”

“At Resthaven.”

We ended up eating lunch with the Beckers and spending a good part of the afternoon with them. When Rachel said, “Mary Swan, we need to be going,” Henry Becker smiled politely and put his hand on my arm and asked, “Do ya mind if Mary Swan and I have a little talk 'fore you hit the road?” And Mrs. Becker hurriedly called Carl and Rachel over to look at the garden.