“Of course,” said Molly, struggling to contain her disappointment. “I understand.”
Making dinnerâwhat a great excuse not to invite in your daughters whom you haven't seen in over twenty years. Nell just stared wide-eyed at Tim O'Hara, her expression a blend of uncertainty and startled recognition.
“Look,” said Molly, coming to her sister's rescue, “we don't want to take up too much of your time. There are just a few things I thought you might be able to help us clear up about Grandma. You know she died.”
Tim O'Hara stared back blankly.
“Margaret Jellinek,” said Molly. “Our grandmother. She died last week.”
“Oh, Maggie,” he said, looking almost relieved. “Yeah, right. Dead, huh? Sorry about that. My condolences.”
“There are some things we don't understand, and we thought you might remember.”
“Well, I was sort of persona non grata with Maggie,” he said. “She was pretty pissed when Angie and I eloped. I don't know that I can tell you much.”
“Did you know that she was once an actress?”
“Yeah? I never heard anything about that.”
“Do you know where Grandma lived or what she might have been doing before she came to Pelletreau?”
“No,” answered O'Hara. “You really would do better asking somebody else.”
“What about Grandma's marriage?” asked Molly in a measured drawl. “Did she ever talk about that?”
O'Hara broke into a strange, unpleasant chuckle.
“Oh, sure,” he said. “That was the whole problem. Between Maggie and me, I mean. Maggie ran off with a guy her family didn't approve of when she was a teenager, see? Dick Jellinek was
his name. Richard Jellinek. He walked out on Maggie when Angie was just a baby. Deserted them.”
“I never knew that,” said Molly, surprised.
To her Richard Jellinek had always been just “Bride's Father” on the yellowing copy of Angie O'Hara's marriage license that Molly kept in the safe-deposit box. Grandma had never even mentioned her ex-husband's name, let alone that she had fallen out with her family because of him or that he had deserted her. At last they were finally getting somewhere.
“That was why Maggie was so furious when Angie and I eloped, I guess,” O'Hara went on. “The old lady had wrecked her life by running off with a man, and she thought that Angie was going to do the same with me.”
Obviously Grandma had been right.
Tim O'Hara smiled guiltily, like a taxpayer who had just admitted too much to an IRS agent. Molly glanced over at Nell, who seemed confused and uncomfortable. She alternated staring at the ground and stealing peeks at her father, as if she expected he might suddenly give her a hug or break into song the way he used to when they were little.
“Did you ever hear anything about Grandma's family?” Molly asked, trying not to let her feelings show on her face.
“Well, they were rich, I know,” said O'Hara.
“Excuse me?” said Molly.
“Yeah, the old lady got a little tipsy one night right after Angie and I got married, and let slip her folks were loaded. She claimed they owned a castle or something.”
Molly couldn't speak for a moment. The notion that her grandmother had grown up wealthy was like hearing that an umbrella had once been a rose.
“Why didn't she go to them when her marriage broke up?” she said finally.
“Yeah, that's what Angie wanted to know,” said O'Hara. “But the old lady wouldn't say. She was too proud, I guess. Too stubborn.”
Molly shook her head with disbelief. Had Grandma really lived in a castle? She had always told Molly that all of her family was dead. Were there still relatives somewhere, wondering where she was? Molly looked over at Nell, but couldn't catch her eye.
“The more Angie thought about it, the angrier she got,” continued Tim O'Hara. “âYou mean, I could have grown up rich in a castle instead of dirt poor in Pelletreau?' she hollered at Maggie once. âYou wouldn't have been happy, believe me,' Maggie yelled back. Angie barely spoke to the old lady for a year after that, she was so pissed.”
“Poor mom,” said Molly softly.
“Yeah,” said O'Hara sympatheticallyâor was it pity? “It would have been just as well if she had never written to them.”
“Mom wrote to Grandma's family?” asked Molly, amazed. “How did she find out who they were, where they lived?”
“Right before we split up Angie was over at her mother's and found an insurance policy in some old book,” answered O'Hara. “It listed Maggie's father as next of kin: Mr. Something-or-other Gale and his address. So Angie wrote him a letter and poured her heart out.”
“Gale,” repeated Molly, turning the unfamiliar name over in her mind. “You can't remember his first name?”
O'Hara shook his head.
“Hey, this was a long time ago.”
“Where did they live?”
Tim O'Hara waved a manicured hand, and smiled his lopsided smile.
“The address was up North somewhere. New England, I
think. I never knew exactly. All I remember is that their name was Gale.”
Molly looked over at Nell. Her sister was staring at the ground, her face without expression. Hadn't she understood a word that Tim O'Hara had said? Their mother had reached back and touched the past, had connected with Grandma's parents, the family that none of them had ever known existedâthe Gales!
Tim O'Hara glanced again at his watch, not noticing the tears that had welled up inexplicably in Molly's eyes.
“What happened then?” she asked.
“Nothing,” said O'Hara with a shrug. “Maggie's father never answered. Your mom wrote a few more times. Never heard from anyone.”
He looked over his shoulder at the closed front door of the beautiful house and shifted his weight from side to side.
“So. Is there anything else I can help you with or is that about it?”
“That's about it,” murmured Molly. “Oh, one last thing. Do you know if Grandma had any good jewelry? We've been looking around but haven't found anything.”
“Fat chance,” he said with a laugh. “Rich parents or not, Maggie didn't have diddly-squat. Why would you think she had any jewelry?”
“Oh, it's just that most women have a little jewelry. It doesn't matter.”
“I'm sorry I can't invite the two of you in for dinner,” said O'Hara. “We just ⦠well, we weren't expecting company.”
“Oh, we have to run anyway,” said Molly with an artificial smile. “But thanks. You've been a lot of help.”
“If you'd like some candy, I've got a few boxes of samples in the front closet that I can let you have.”
“No, that's okay.”
“Okay, then,” he said, extending his hand. “Thanks for stopping by.”
Molly awkwardly shook his hand. When he offered it to Nell, she turned and ran back to the van. Tim O'Hara grinned weakly, opened the door and scuttled back into his big white house.
Molly walked slowly back to the van. Nell was already sitting there in the passenger seat, her chin propped up between her hands. Her eyes were wet with tears.
“Oh, Nellie,” said Molly reaching over to try to comfort her. “Don't do that. He's just an idiot.”
Nell pushed Molly's hand away again and sobbed soundlessly.
“Some family, we've got, huh?” said Molly, starting the engine. “Daddy's a jerk. Clyde's a Neanderthal. Our long-lost grandfather, Richard Jellinek, was a rat, and our rich Yankee relatives, the Gales, were so mean that they wouldn't even answer Mom's letters.”
Nell slumped in the seat and rubbed her eyes, but didn't look over.
“You know,” said Molly, “the more I think about this, the madder I'm getting. Why couldn't Grandma just go back home after her marriage broke up and give Mom a chance to have a life? Would it really have been so hard to admit she made a mistake? We didn't know her at all, Nell. Not at all.”
The van began making the grinding noises it did when it was unhappy. Molly slowed down. Nell wiped her eyes, slumped in her seat and stared out unhappily at the wealthy suburb's big landscaped houses. They drove for a minute in silence, then Molly started talking again, as if she had never left off.
“The Gales must have loved Grandma once,” she declared. “She was their daughter, after all. And they were rich, so they were probably the ones who gave her the ring. Maybe Grandma still has brothers and sisters or nieces and nephews who would
want to know what happened to her. To Mom. To us even, if they knew we were alive.”
Nell looked over at Molly for the first time, her questioning eyes reflecting a lifetime of pain and hurt and helplessness.
“It would be nice to have a real family, wouldn't it?” said Molly.
Nell's upper lip trembled. She reached over and touched Molly on the arm.
“I'm getting an idea,” said Molly with a familiar look in her eye.
Nell pulled back her hand. The last time Molly had had that look in her eye they had wound up driving a hundred miles to buy a player piano from a lady in a shopping mall.
“Oh, come on, don't be a such a chicken,” said Molly. “You know it makes sense. There must be some Gales left up in New England somewhere, and there's no reason why we can't find them. Grandma was a big Broadway actress. There must still be records that can tell us where she came from originally. All we have to do is get to New York and do a little research.”
Nell looked heavenward.
“Come on, Nellie. Don't you want to know about the Gales? Don't you want to know about Grandma's big stage career?”
Nell shook her head an emphatic no.
“Don't you want to find out about the ring?”
Nell shook her head again.
“Can you really walk away from our last chance at having someone else in the world who cares whether we live or die?”
Nell frowned.
“Then it's settled,” said Molly. “I knew you'd see the light.”
Nell pointed at Molly. Then she mimed holding the wheel of a car. Then she pointed her finger at her chest, and then at her temple and turned it slowly. You. Drive. Me. Crazy.
“I love you, too,” declared Molly happily. “We'll just follow Grandma's footsteps back to New England and present the Gales with two brand-new relatives. It may be fifty years too late, but maybe, just maybe, we'll end up with the family that Mom always wanted. At the very least I'll bet they'll invite us in for a cup of coffee!”
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“Hello?” Molly announced, pushing open the screen door of Taffy Hupperman's house. “It's us.”
Taffy's living room looked as if it hadn't been cleaned since Molly's last visit, two months ago. Dust bunnies the size of Chihuahuas roamed the hardwood floors, occasionally colliding with abandoned articles of footwear. The furniture was draped with dirty laundry of all description. Every surface displayed Taffy's collection of used Chinese takeout cartons, which in quantity rivaled Molly's collection of oyster plates.
“Taffy? Are you home? Why do you leave this door open? There's a serial killer on every block these days, don't you watch television? Taffy?”
“Does someone call?” boomed Taffy, emerging from the kitchen waving a turkey leg like a magic wand. “Why, can it be the young O'Hara girl? By God, yes! Accompanied by her factotum and sibling, Little Nell, she of the smiling Irish eyes and bosom as white as the driven snow.”
Taffy was a little bit taller than Nell and several times as wide. She had dead-mouse blond hair, tiny teeth, and a face that would be pretty if she lost a hundred pounds. She wore Farmer-Brown coveralls that totally obscured her figure while doing nothing to conceal her girth.
“Why don't you lock your door?” said Molly, hands on her hips.
“Oh, shut up, you little pork chop,” said Taffy, brushing past Molly and draping a fat arm around Nell's shoulder. “I want to say hello to my friend, Nell. How are you, honey? You been a good girl? I haven't seen you in a dog's age. Come over here, there's someone I want you to meet.”
If sound had come from Nell's mouth it would have been a giggle, judging by her expression. Molly rolled her eyes and wished again that she had someone other than Taffy who she could come to at times like this. A visit with Taffy was like Alice's trip down the rabbit hole. Or a production conference with some over-the-top movie queen from the heyday of Hollywood. Taffy turned to the kitchen door.
“Oomba-lapa-tu!” she yelled, waving her turkey leg. “Oomba-lapa-tu, queen of the jungle! Get your royal ass in here this instant. I want you to meet my oldest friends in the world.”