a short story by Bernice FisherThe Intruder
Ann slammed on the brake and squinted at the object frozen in the headlights. A tree, leaves still clinging to its branches, lay across the width of the driveway.
"Damn!"
It was just past four o'clock, but dusk came early in October. Already the lilac bushes bordering the driveway were swallowed up in shadows. A gust of wind whispered through the trees, sending a shower of leaves skidding across the roof of Ann's car before they dropped to the wet asphalt.
Ann lifted two suitcases out of the trunk and set them down on the driveway; they contained everything she needed to survive for the two weeks she would stay at the house and seal its doom--strip it of its furnishings and put it up for sale.
She struggled up the driveway, pulling the suitcases behind her. The woods gave way to a Queen Anne house, its shades drawn. A bas-relief design painted in shades of green and rust stretched beneath a spindled porch where a trellis was locked in a strangle hold by a tangle of blood-red Virginia Creeper. Ann felt a lump in her throat when she saw the planter along the front railing filled with the skeletal remains of last summer's geraniums. As long as she could remember, her mother had taken pride in her geraniums. Now her mother, like the geraniums, was a dead, lovely memory.
Ann pushed the front door open and lifted the suitcases over the threshold. A stale, musty, odor greeted her. She switched on a light, pulled the suitcases across the parquet floor in the hallway. The security system was off. Strange. Delphine Andrews, a neighbor, had agreed to take care of the house until Ann arrived. Why didn't she check the security system?
An envelope bearing Ann's name leaned drunkenly against a small lamp on the hall table. She ripped the envelope open. A hand-written message in spidery letters covered a sheet of lined paper.
"Ann,
Hope you had a good trip from Chicago. I miss your mom. She was a good friend.
Sorry about the tree in the driveway. We had a storm a couple of days ago. Lots of trees down around town and out here in the country. Sean and his friend Nick will be over to clear it away.
The security system isn't working properly. I turned it on before I left on Friday, but when I came back on Monday, it was off. Maybe you should have someone check it. Call me when you arrive.
Delphine"
Remnants of her mother's life littered the living room--old copies of Time and Newsweek were scattered across the coffee table, and some newspapers lay on the sofa. Memories of her childhood in this house flooded Anne's mind, followed by waves of regret. Maybe she should have found time to visit more often during these past few years when her mother needed her most. The problem was, McKenzie and Company needed her, too; she worked sixty hours a week, often more, and she was up for a promotion. The four hundred mile trip from Chicago to Stillwater was one she didn't make often, in spite of her mother's pleadings. She just couldn't spare the time.
A feeling of annoyance displaced her reminiscences when she caught sight of a drawer hanging open in her mother's desk. She hated messes-hated clutter. She thumbed through a scattering of papers-bank statements, receipts, bills stamped "paid." A letter from the power company threatening to turn off the electricity. Her mother must have finally remembered to pay the bill. What other unpleasant surprise would she find in this pile of papers? She closed the drawer with a sigh and shivered as a cold draft angled past her. Delphine had left a window open somewhere in the house. More incompetence.
She stood still and listened. Someone was walking around upstairs. Her mother's ghost, come to chastise her for being a negligent daughter? Not likely. Ann didn't believe in ghosts. She heard a sound she couldn't identify. A feeling of panic moved up her spine and tingled at the edge of her consciousness. A board creaked overhead.
Ann groped in her handbag for her cell phone and found it, then stood, frozen. He--or she--would hear her talking. What if he had a gun? She switched off the lamp in the living room and stood motionless, her heart pounding, and resisted the urge to call out: Mother?
Footsteps again, this time, crossing the upstairs hall. A door closed. Was it Delphine, back to check on something? But where was her car?
Ann felt her throat go dry. She could disappear, and no one would miss her, because she had come a day early. She wanted to get the job done as soon as she could and get back to Chicago. McKenzie and Company needed her.
Footsteps again, this time near the stairway. Maybe it was an escapee from the federal prison at Oak Park Heights, two miles away. A step creaked-the third step down. He was coming downstairs. Her glance fell on the closet door a few feet away, and she slipped inside, her heart beating wildly. It was a walk-in closet, long and narrow, where her mother stored out of season clothes. She felt her way past the old trunk stuffed with family mementoes, past the racks of clothes, to the far end, Scarcely daring to breath, she made her way between the racks of coats and dresses and flattened herself against the wall behind them. Would he see her suitcases in the front hall or notice the light in the entry? She gripped the cell phone and waited. .
The doorknob turned, the closet door opened, and at the sound of a switch, the closet was suddenly flooded with light. She was trapped. Had he noticed the light in the hall and come looking for her? Or maybe, seen the suitcases?
For a few seconds--or was it minutes?--there was no sound. The footsteps came closer. Ann held her breath. She could only see him from his waist down; the clothes hanging in front of her, the clothes she dared not move, obscured his head and shoulders. She could have reached out and touched him. She forced her mind from the edge of panic by memorizing every detail of the man's clothing--dark blue suede jacket, gray corduroy pants. His shoes caught her attention--black kiltie loafers with two tassels. She knew someone with shoes like that-Andrew Murray, a salesmen at McKenzie. The shoes were imports, he said. From Italy. Cost him a mint. As if she cared about his shoes. Or him.
The man stopped a few feet away. She was afraid to breathe, afraid that he had seen her. She heard him opening a box, sorting through its contents. After what seemed to Ann an endless time, he turned off the light and closed the closet door behind him.
When she heard his footsteps receding, she opened the door a sliver and listened. He was in the dining room, opening the drawers in the buffet--slowly, methodically. There was no haste in his movements, no fear that someone would interrupt his search. He moved with the slow, deliberate precision of a man alone in an empty house. Finally, his footsteps tapped across a tile floor, and a door closed-- the back door. She had never seen his face, but she would remember his shoes,
She dialed 911.
The police came in seven minutes. The detective, who identified himself as Michael Larson, was adamant that she not spend the night, but Ann was just as adamant that she would. He questioned her about what she saw and heard, advised her to be sure the security system was working. He would check with her renter in the guest house and find out if he saw anything.
Her mother had mentioned a renter, a student who was going to William Mitchell to study law. Quite handy around the house, her mother said, but she had made no mention of trouble with intruders.
"And don't forget to change the locks," Larson said.
"But the security system--"
Larson smiled. "Doesn't help much if the guy has a key, does it. About the renter: Some of the guys say they've seen him around. Came out of nowhere. Better keep an eye on him."
Only after he left did Ann remember that she had forgotten to tell Detective Larson about the intruder's shoes.
* * *
Ann was awakened by the sound of a car starting at dawn on Wednesday; then wondered if she had just been dreaming. All night she lay awake, listening to creaks, squeaks and imaginary footsteps, the mournful sounds of a deserted house. An owl hooting in a tree branch close to her bedroom window startled her awake from a fitful sleep.
At 6 A.M., she showered, dressed and went out to retrieve the meager supply of groceries she had left in her car. The sun was just rising beyond the trees, and the sound of a rooster crowing came from somewhere in the distance.
She made coffee, took her time eating breakfast, and unpacked, squeezing her clothes into drawers her mother had emptied, hanging her coat and jacket in the already crowded closet, and pouring another cup of coffee. She stared out the window at the guest house-an ivy-covered building where her parents had once housed overnight guests.
The locksmith arrived promptly at eight o'clock, convinced that she had an emergency after she told him about the burglar, and he set to work changing the front and back door locks. He found nothing wrong with the security system.
He had just left when the back doorbell rang. She opened the door and looked into Sean Casey's flat Irish face. Delphine's son. Sean had the wholesome, clean cut look of a high school quarterback--square jaw, high cheekbones, cheerful smile. She last saw him three years ago when she came home to visit her mother--a hurried visit, squeezed between Ann's preparations for a seminar and a sixty-hour week. In spite of her realization that her mother could not survive alone much longer, Ann returned to Chicago. She was determined not to let her mother's problems jeopardize her chance for a promotion.
Sean held the chainsaw out for her inspection. "Nick and I'll get the tree cleared away and be outa here in no time," he said, and disappeared around the corner of the house.
* * *
After listening to two hours of chain sawing and shouting, Ann decided that it wouldn't hurt to show Sean and his friend her appreciation for their quick response to her problem with the driveway. She put some doughnuts on a tray, added some plastic cups and filled a thermos with hot coffee. The chain saw stopped just as she reached the turn in the driveway.
"Think it over, Nick. She's just your type--big brown eyes, long silky brown hair and a shape--oh, God, Nick, is she built. I go for blondes myself--hot blondes with big boobs."
"Like Tracy," another voice said.
"Yeah, like Tracy. But this one--man, she's the type that could generate some action if she likes you. I'll bet she'd go for a charming, smart guy like you, even if you've been out of circulation for awhile-incarcerated, shall we say?"
"I guess you could say that."
Ann shuddered. An ex-con. That she didn't need.
A murmured response, which she couldn't hear, was followed by another burst of laughter and Sean's retort: "Think about it. Nice big house to live in. Great for a guy like you that ain't got nothin'."
"Hasn't got anything, you clod," the first voice said.
"Nothing except that junker you're driving."
"Least it's paid for. That's more than you can say for that vehicle you're driving, Casey."
Ann caught a glimpse of a dusty Volkswagon and a red Dodge Ram parked behind her car. Logs and sawdust were scattered across the drive. Some instinct kept her immobile, eager for the next installment of the soap opera playing out a few yards away. Sean's voice again:
"What do ya think, Nick? Want me to introduce you? Annie and I--we've been friends since high school." The whine of the chain saw broke the silence.
Sean was standing beside a pile of sawdust and the dismembered remains of the tree-some split logs, a scattering of leaves and brush. He looked up, saw Ann walking toward him, and smiled.
"I thought you guys might like some coffee," she said. "And doughnuts." She set the tray on the tree stump. "Time for a break, don't you think?"
"Hey, Annie, meet my buddy, Nick Morgantini. You'll be seeing a lot of him. He lives in your guest house. Or maybe your Mom told you? He's been-away for awhile-"
"Hey!" Nick snapped.
"Hi, Nick. Happy to meet you, and thanks for helping."
The man named Nick had the dark complexion of a Mafia don. A mass of wavy, blue-black hair framed his face and curled down his neck. She didn't like the look of him; the intensity of his gaze made her uncomfortable.
"Hi. Happy to meet you." It was not the voice she would have expected from someone so robust looking, but velvety-soft, like a priest in a confessional, pitched low, so as to be barely audible.
When they finished clearing the tree away, Ann offered to pay them, but they refused. Sean walked back to his red pickup in the driveway and waved as he backed out into the street. Nick turned back toward the guest house.
"Wait. Have you had any trouble with prowlers here?" She told Nick about the prowler she surprised in the house.
He shrugged. "I never heard Martha-your mother-say."
Ann found a lease agreement among her mother's papers that morning. The lease giving Nick the right to rent the guest house would expire in five months. Ann wished it would expire sooner.
"Maybe you can keep an eye open. "
"I'm a glorified security guard--is that it?"
A smart ass ex-con. "I'm not asking you to be a security guard. I have electronics to do that."
"Electronics can be disabled."
"So can people."
"Good point."
She closed all of the curtains and drapes at sunset, checked the locks on the windows and doors, checked the security system and fell asleep watching television.
Between her efforts to organize and dispose of her mother's things, a tedious chore, Ann watched the guest house, where lights glowed across the darkness of the yard well past midnight. Once she heard footsteps along the driveway beside the house and saw Nick in the moonlight, standing at the edge of the woods. When he turned to look toward the house, she retreated behind the drape.
* * *
A week later, she walked across the back yard to fill the bird feeder. She didn't see Nick sitting in the greem Adirondack chair in the back yard until it was too late to turn back.
"Join me," he said, and she sat in the chair beside him.
She had learned nothing about him after their initial meeting and was as disinclined to ask questions as much as he seemed reluctant to answer them. She leaned back and closed her eyes, hypnotized by the unexpected warmth of the mid-October sunshine.
"You like walking in the woods, don't you," she said. She remembered seeing him in the moonlight, vanishing into the darkness.
"Oh, yeah. it's quiet. I like listening to the night sounds-crickets chirping, leaves rustling-So-how's the packing coming along?
"I'll never finish. There's so much to get ready for the second hand store, to sell-to keep-to give away."
"Need some help?" His question caught her by surprise. She preferred to do the packing by herself; she didn't want anyone telling her what to do, but her back was still hurting from picking up boxes. She could have hired someone, but she was torn between her desire for efficiency and her concern for her mother's belongings. Each thing she found was part of her mother's life, or part of her own.
"I. . . well, maybe."
Nick appeared at the back door the next morning, Saturday. She had organized the packing materials and told him what she wanted done.
He worked fast, deftly taping boxes, stacking them, labeling their contents until she was stiff with bending and lifting and her brain was going into overload with deciding what to keep and what to give away, but Nick's presence lightened the chore more than she had imagined it could. He showed her how to tie knots that wouldn't slide out, told jokes and showed a side of himself that she found intriguing. Where once she had thought him sinister, he seemed to her now like the kind of friend she never had, someone who listened and understood,
They worked until six; then he cooked hamburgers on the grill, and they sat in the Adirondack chairs drinking manhattans and talking long into the evening. Words swung between them on gossamer threads, and she marvelled at how well he understood her, and how much they had in common. She felt reassured when he said "we" should finish packing by tomorrow; he wasn't going to abandon her when she needed him.
"Tomorrow is Sunday. The Lord doesn't bless work that's done on Sunday, but maybe He'll forgive us this one time," he said, laughing. When all of the boxes were packed, labeled and lined up in the dining room, Nick suggested that they celebrate by going out to dinner. He disappeared into the guest house and reappeared, a half hour later, miraculously transformed in a suit and a tie. He was wearing black kiltie loafers with tassels. She was too astonished to speak.
"Hey, I must look good. You're speechless with admiration, I see."
"Your shoes. . . ."
"My morale builders. Bought them in Rome. Like them?" He stepped back and studied her face. "What's wrong?"
"You're the one who was prowling around my house, that first day I came . . "
"Hey, calm down. I can explain. . . "
"I was there-in that closet-I saw your shoes--those shoes. You were opening boxes. . "
Unexpectedly, Nick laughed. "You were hiding in the closet? That's hilarious."
"You think that's funny? You were going through my mother's things, her papers. You were ransacking the house. What right had you to do that?" she demanded. She remembered Sean's saying that Nick had been incarcerated, a statement he didn't deny.
He looked amazed. "Will you stop ranting and let me explain? There isn't anything missing, is there? "
"I don't know. But you had no right-"
His face was inscrutable, his dark eyes glowing with a strange fire. He turned and stalked out of the house. Ann thought of calling Larson, of telling him, but she wasn't sure what she would say. She didn't know if anything was missing or not; she had lived away from home too long to remember where her mother kept anything.
* * *
A week passed. The house seemed emptier than before, her feeling of aloneness underlined by Nick's disappearance--the Volkswagon was no longer parked in the driveway, nor did she see lights on at night. She was sorry now that she hadn't listened when he tried to explain.
When she finally summoned up the courage to knock at the door of the guest house a week later, there was no answer. She opened the door with her key and saw an envelope on the kitchen table. It contained a check for two months' rent. Nothing else.
She walked through the empty house-opened the closets, the cupboards, the linen closet-all empty, all clean and in perfect order. The furniture was exactly placed as he had found it.
She lacked the incentive to go on packing and doing what had to be done before the house was sold. She hired a mover to come in and pack what was left, asked the Salvation Army to take the things she no longer needed or could use, locked the boxes away with the things she wanted to keep in a spare bedroom, set the burglar alarm and called Larson and Delphine to tell them she was going back to Chicago. A half a dozen phone calls had convinced her that McKenzie and Company needed her. There was nothing left for her in Oak Park. * * *
At first, she worked hard, trying to make up for the two weeks she had missed-working overtime until her head ached and her eyes burned from lack of sleep. But after a few weeks of frenzied activity, the doings of McKenzie and Company seemed not to matter as much as before. When someone else got the promotion she had hoped for, she decided she had had enough. She was going home.
She moved out of her rented condo and drove back to Oak Park, to live in the house where she had grown up; she saw it now as a refuge from the world. She would begin again, but she didn't know what she was going to do with the rest of her life; she knew only that she couldn't go on as before.
* * *
Ann had lost her vision for her life, her purpose, her ambition, so she waited. For what, she didn't know. Alone in the big Queen Anne house, she stumbled listlessly through the tasks she needed to do to stay alive-shopped for groceries, cleaned the house, mowed the lawn, filled the bird feeders. She took heart in the realization that the goldfinches would be back soon, remembering how she and her mother had watched them from the kitchen window.
Her mind was flooded with memories of her mother, and with the memories came a searing regret for how much of her mother's life she had missed through indifference, and how much she had misunderstood because of her own self-absorption. She had lost everything in life that mattered-her mother, her job, and Nick; how could he ever forgive her?
She read the books in her mother's library-War and Peace, The Return of the Native, Kristin Lavransdatter, books of short stories, biographies of famous people-Peter the Great, Marie Antoinette, Marcel Proust. She was stunned by the broad range of her mother's interests.
It was in Carlyle's French Revolution that she found an envelope with a sheet of paper. When she unfolded it, checks scattered across her lap and fluttered to the floor. She recognized her mother's handwriting on the note she held in her hand:
"Ann, I want you to destroy the checks so Nick doesn't find them. He'll be angry if he does. He wouldn't let me pay him. This was all I could do."
She read the message over and over, trying to understand, then she picked up the check in her lap. It was made out to Martha Redmond,, and it had Nick's signature. She stooped down to gather the checks on the floor-each for a different month, each in the same amount-the figure she had seen on the lease agreement. Her mother had endorsed every check but not deposited it. She must have fogotten. Or had she? Delphine was her mother's best friend. Maybe she would know.
* * *
The next day she drove to Stillwater to see Delphine. She sat on a stool in the kitchen and watched Delphine take an apple pie from the oven.
"How about a piece of apple pie? I'll give you a piece to take home, too."
Anne nodded. "I love it. And thanks for taking care of the house. I'd like to pay you. . "
"Oh, no. It's the least I could do. Martha and I have been friends for so many years."
Ann watched Delphine pour two cups of tea and sit opposite her before she gathered the courage to ask what she most wanted to know:
"I was wondering-whatever happened to Nick?" She tried to sound casual, as if it weren't a matter of any consequence, but her hand shook when she lifted the cup of tea to her lips, and a dark little pool gathered in her saucer when she set the cup down.
"Nick?" Delphine's blue eyes sparkled. "I keep telling him he'll be an old man, and he'll have spent his whole young manhood molding away in libraries. 'Get out and have some fun while you're young' I keep telling him. But. . " she shrugged. "it doesn't help. I was surprised when he moved out of your guest house and came to say goodbye. I asked him why he was leaving. He made some flip remark-can't remember what he said-so I figured you two had a falling-out.Your mom wouldn't have been able to stay in that house if it hadn't been for Nick. She was getting pretty forgetful, you know."
Ann set her cup down with trembling hands. "If it hadn't been for Nick? What do you mean?"
"He didn't tell you, did he. That's so like Nick. For one thing, he made sure she paid the utility bills. She kept stuffing them into drawers and forgetting all about them, so he'd wait until she was out in the yard or taking a nap-he had a key, of course--and he'd check her desk drawers and dining room drawers if a bill didn't come when it should. He was careful about that. He'd make out the checks for her, and she'd sign them. Toward the end there, she was-well, kind of confused."
"He did-all of that?"
"Oh, yeah. Didn't Martha tell you? She tried to pay him, but he wouldn't take anything, not even when she offered to let him live in the guest house rent free last year, when she needed so much help. He insisted on paying her."
"Great apple pie," Ann said, but she had lost her appetite.
"We didn't see much of him this past year. He was either studying to pass the bar exam or taking care of Martha," Delphine said. "If something didn't work, sometimes she'd forget to tell him.
"One day last winter he went to check on her, and the house was freezing cold-the furnace wasn't working. She was all huddled up near the fireplace, Martha was, trying to burn some news- papers. He made her sit in the cottage until the repairman came and fixed the furnace. He bought her groceries-always saw to it that she had enough food in the fridge. Sometimes he even had to make sure she'd eaten, there, toward the end. And he was so patient. The only time I ever saw him get mad was when Sean teased him about being in the monastery-"
"The monastery?"
"Oh, yeah. Didn't he tell you?"
"No."
"Before he went to law school, he was studying to be a Franciscan brother at St. Francis of the Lake in Chaska. Sean always told people he'd been "incarcerated." Sean's quite a joker-well, you know how Sean is. Nick talked about going back after he passed his bar exam."
Ann had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. Nick had been her mother's caretaker, doing all of the things she should have done while she was busy climbing the corporate ladder. Or at least hired someone to help. And she had accused him of being a thief.
"Did he go back to the monastery, then?" She felt something heavy in the pit of her stomach. I don't want to hear about this. I don't want to hear it.
"He got a job at the Dorothy Day Center in St. Paul, last we heard. I wasn't surprised, in a way, because he's such a giving kind of person. Whether he's a brother or not, I don't know.Haven't heard from him for a month or so."
It was almost dark when Ann arrived home. She put the car in the garage, walked into the kitchen. and looked out the window before she turned on the light. No lights on in the guest house, no car in the driveway. Moonlight flooded the back yard and melted into the edge of the woods where a line of evergreens stood in military precision.
Oh, Mom. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I knew, but I didn't understand.And now, it's too late.
* * * The Dorothy Day Center was a squat no-frills concrete building near the heart of downtown St. Paul. Ann parked at the curb, fed half-dollars into the meter, and threaded her way through the knots of homeless people who stood at the front of the building-people with backpacks, cast-off clothes and somber expressions-some black, some white, some Oriental. She felt alien to them in her tan cashmere coat and Gucci bag, yet felt a kinship with them, too. They were, as she was, the detritus of corporate America, the drop-outs, the square pegs who did not fit.
It had rained that morning, and the odor of damp clothes mingled with the smell of disinfectant; the floor was shiny, the walls sparkling white. An elderly lady with an ill-fitting wool coat and cotton stockings wrinkled at the ankles nodded as she passed.
"Excuse me. I'm looking for Nick Morgantini. Can you tell me where I can find him?"
"You mean Brother Nick?"
Ann's heart stopped. "Yes."
"You won't find him in his office," the woman said. "He don't spend much time there. He's always out here doing stuff." She led Ann to a doorway that opened on a large room with windows hat looked out at a busy street. "He was here a few minutes ago. There-"
Ann followed the woman's gaze to a far corner of the room. Nick was down on one knee, looking up into the face of an elderly woman who had strands of white hair hanging out beneath a knit cap. He reached out and put a hand on her arm. He was dressed like one of the people he served, one of the street people, with a brown shaggy sweater and a pair of worn jeans. He rose, touched the woman's shoulder, and turned to walk away.
"Nick." At the sound of her voice, he stopped abruptly and faced her, surprised, at first, then wary. "Nick, I--Delphine told me about-everything you did for my mother. I didn't know. . .We need to talk."
"Do we? Well, that's what I'm here for. How about a cup of coffee? And a doughnut, maybe?" he asked, with a forced cheerfulness so unlike him. He poured two cups of coffee and led her to a small table. "So-what can I do for you? The corporate world giving you a bad time?"
"I want to thank you for everything you did for my mother. I didn't know. . . I didn't know she was so-she had such a hard time. Tell me about my mother. Please."
His face softened. "Martha. A bit confused the last few months, but-we got along."
She sat on the bench opposite him, her body tensed in anticipation and fear-fear that she would break down as she listened to his anecdotes about her mother, his expression changing to match his story, a mixture of frowns and smiles.
"She was a lonely woman from first to last. She read your e-mails to me, so that I felt as if I knew you-your ambitions-dreams--hopes. Then you'd call-never often enough for her. I saw you once when you came to visit, but you never stayed long-never more than a day. Then you were off in that Porsche."
"I didn't think she cared. . . "
"Oh, she cared, all right. But she never understood-never understood. . . "
"What?"
"Never understood why you didn't come home more often. . . Hey, you don't need to explain to me. It all water under the dam, now. We had good times together, the first two years you were gone. We played chess a lot that first year-sometimes I let her win, but not often, because she knew what I was doing, and it made her mad. And later, I read to her . . ."
"What? What did you read?"
"Her favorite books." Either by accident or design, he spared her the indignity of making her ask. She knew her mother had a large collection of books, enough to cover most of a wall in the spare room. All her life she had seen her mother reading, sitting in her rocker, but Ann had never asked what she was reading, never discussed it with her. I didn't know her, Ann thought. I didn't know her.
"She loved Kristin Lavransdatter. I think that was her favorite. And Agatha Christie. We-I read Carlyle's The French Revolution and a biography of Peter the Great and some short stories. She was especially fond of Saki. It was fun reading to someone who was so-receptive. She loved being read to. Her eyes were failing-macular degeneration, the doctor said. She had trouble reading."
Outside, a gray sky hovered above the mist-shrouded dome of the cathedral, standing high on a hill overlooking the city.
"That day you were going through the drawers-you were looking for bills my mother might have tucked away in some odd places-Why didn't you tell me?"
He shrugged and frowned at something across the room. "I tried, you know. I guess I just wanted to save you some trouble-trying to be sure the bills had all been paid, and you wouldn't have to deal with any surprises."
"I thank you, Nick, with all of my heart-thank you for being so good to my mother when I couldn't. But-" She opened her handbag and took out the envelope. "You were looking for this, too, weren't you." She slid the envelope, still stuffed with checks, across the table. "Go ahead, read her note."
He stared at the note in disbelief. "Where did she hide them? Hey, I know you can't cash some of these. They've probably expired. I'll write new ones."
"No, you won't. I'm going to honor her wishes. Keep them, Brother Nick."
"Not any more.I left the monastery. Guess I'll always be Brother Nick to some of these folks." He stood up suddenly. "I'm sorry, but we're short of help, and I have a guy coming in at-five minutes from now. I'll walk you out." He held her coat, and she slipped into it without looking at him. She was too close to tears. Suddenly she felt old, as if she had wasted her life and there was no time left to change anything, though she desperately wanted to.
"I'll walk you to your car," he said. "Just to be safe. Panhandlers-sometimes they get a bit pushy. I suppose you'll be going back to McKenzie and Company," he said. "There's nothing to keep you here now."
She was getting cold. A biting north wind stung her cheeks with a cold mist. "I'll never go back. I don't know what I'll do with the rest of my life, but I'll never go back," she said. "And you? What will you do?"
Nick stood with his hands in his pockets, staring off in the distance, his face inscrutable. "I guess we all do what we have to do. There's a lot of ugliness out there. A lot of people can't climb that mountain of self-indulgence and materialism. I'm one of them. That's why I'm here. I can't be indifferent to people's suffering. Sometimes I wish I could be. Sometimes I feel so--overwhelmed by it.
"I've passed my bar exam, and a lot of these folks need legal help. Some of them get into so damned much trouble, and they don't know what to do. They come here, and we try to help them. Feed them. Give them a place to sleep. Listen to their problems. Hey, while you're trying to figure out what to do with your life, why don't you volunteer here? With me? Until you find a job?"
"I--don't know."
"Think about it, will you?"
"I guess I could do that. Help you here, I mean."
"I'll give you my card." He frowned, searched his pockets. "Here it is. You can call me. Or maybe I should call you. Just to be sure you don't forget. Your number is the same as before. Right?"
"Right. I won't forget."
He looked at his watch. "Hey, it's almost four-thirty. I'm off at five. Can you wait? We can go out to dinner. I mean, I'll take you to dinner, and we can talk."
"I'd like that." I'd like to know about my mother--what her life was--toward the end. I guess I should have come home more often." 'i'll bring you her diaries. She kept diaries for years. She gave me a box of them. I'll bring them first chance I get. They're yours, after all." "She gave hem to you, not to me, because she knew you cared, and I didn't."
"Oh, no. Not that. She thought you were too busy to read them, not that you didn't care. I'm sure she didn't think that." "But I didn't care. Don't you understand? I didn't care. And she knew." The End
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