The Memory of All That (7 page)

Chapter 13

Astounded, Marnie questioned further, “You were engaged to someone else when we married?” Suddenly, she remembered that Ruth had mentioned it when she confronted her earlier.

“Let’s go up to your room and discuss this in private,” David said as he took her by the arm. Just then his cell phone rang, and he pulled it out of his pocket.

As he talked, Marnie thought,
My room? Why isn’t it our room? Where is he sleeping?
She wondered if he had been sharing a room with Celeste, if his ex-fiancée had been living in the house while she supposedly cared for Jonathan. Jealousy started edging its way into her brain.

Ridiculous,
she thought.
Absolutely ridiculous to be jealous of a man I feel like I just met.
As quickly as she had that thought, another popped into her head.
He’s my husband. Whether I remember him or not, I have every right to be jealous.

After a few words, he turned to her. “We’ll have to put off our talk for now. I need to go back to the plant. I promise we’ll talk at the first opportunity.”

She was filled with questions but acquiesced. “OK,” she said quietly.

He tipped her chin up with his finger. “That’s another way you’ve changed. I’d have expected you to throw a hissy fit when I put off talking to you. It’s like you’ve grown up, become more adult. Maybe whatever happened to you was a good thing.”

Marnie looked into his deep blue eyes. For a minute, she thought he was going to kiss her, but at last he removed his finger and broke eye contact. Striding to the front door, he turned and smiled before opening it. “Bye,” he said and was gone.

When she returned to her room, she found Alice putting fresh towels in the bathroom.

“You seem like you’re doing a lot better today, Miss Marnie. I was lookin’ for you earlier, to be sure you were OK, and Cook said you and Mr. David went out for lunch.”

“Yes, he took me to the Roadhouse.”

Alice said nothing, but the look on her face registered disapproval.

“He told me I used to work there. I think he was hoping that going there would bring up some memories.”

“Did it?”

“No, it didn’t.” Marnie went to one of the armchairs in front of the window and sat down. “Alice, David told me you have known me since I was a little girl.”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Since the doctor has said people can tell me some things about my past, would you come sit with me and visit? Please? I have to get some clue about why I am the person David and Ruth say I am. They are painting a terrible picture of the things I’ve done.”

Alice went to the chair facing Marnie and sat down. “Ever since you came home with no memory, I’ve been thinking a lot about those days and what you were like then.”

“Tell me. What was I like?”

“You were just a little girl when you and your mother moved in across the hall from me. That was in the Green Oaks Apartments over on Poplar Street. She and your papa had just gotten a divorce.”

“My parents! You know, Alice, in all this trouble, I haven’t given any thought to my mother and father. Does she still live here? Where is my father?”

“No, honey. She died about five or six years ago. I don’t know nothin’ about your papa, whether he’s still alive or not. I never knew him. I think he lived in Phoenix. She mentioned that one time.”

“I’m sorry I interrupted. Please go on.”

“Anyway, Pamela had just gotten a divorce and a job. I don’t remember right off where you moved here from, Phoenix maybe, but she got a job as secretary to Mr. Robert Barrett, David’s father, and moved here. Like I said, she moved in right across the hall. I was already working here in this house. I’ve been a maid here since I was old enough to work. I was part time when I was in high school, helping out with parties and such. When I graduated, I had a job working at the five and dime, but when another maid quit, I came to work here and I’ve been here ever since.

“That sort of made a connection between me and Pamela, both working for the same folks. Of course, she was in a different class from me. She was real high class, always dressed to the nines, she was, and I’m just working folk.”

Marnie leaned forward and rested her forearms on her legs. “What did she look like, Alice? Do I look like her?”

“No, you don’t. Well, maybe I’m wrong about that. You have her chin and mouth. But her coloring was different. She kept her hair blond, but I think her natural color was light brown. That’s what color her eyebrows were, and that’s usually how you tell. You must have gotten your dark hair and eyes from your papa.”

“This is so interesting, Alice. Thank you for sharing.” She leaned back in the chair. “Did I ever get to see my father?”

“Not that I ever knew, and I think I’d know. I’d baby-sit you when your mother went out, which wasn’t very often, or when she had to work late, which she did a lot. You’d come across the hall to my place or else I’d go across to yours. She and I were friends, but she didn’t tell me her personal stuff.”

“Doctor Means said I was always getting scrapes and
bruises
when I was a kid.”

Alice laughed. “Yes, you were. You was never interested in playing dolls with the other girls in the neighborhood. You followed the boys instead, on your bike or roller skates. At that age, they’d try to avoid you or run you off, but you were a persistent little thing. You tried your best to keep up.”

“The doctor told me I broke my arm when I was ten trying to get into their treehouse.”

Alice gave another chuckle. “Yes, I remember that time. The boys had a treehouse in that great big oak tree in the vacant lot next to the apartment house. You were forever trying to get in there, and they were forever stopping you. So, one day you decided to climb up the tree next to it, shimmy along a branch that reached over to where you wanted to go, and get in the treehouse that way. Trouble was, the branch broke and down you came. You ended up with a broke arm.”

“It seems like I would remember something like a broken arm.” Marnie rubbed first one arm, then the other, as if that would bring back a memory.

“Anyway, you always did like to be where the boys were. When you was a little thing, it was funny, but when you got to be a teenager, it was a problem. You liked the boys, and the boys liked you—too much, if you get my meaning.

“When you graduated from high school, your mother promised you a new car if you’d go to business school in Centerview and graduate with good grades. She thought you needed good training so’s you could always find work. She said she was living proof a woman needed to be able to support herself.”

“It sounds like she had a hard life and wanted me to be able to take care of myself.”

“Yes, she did, but Pamela always did spoil you rotten—bought you new clothes and whatever you wanted. But she didn’t have enough money to give you everything the rich kids had, and that’s what you wanted—to be rich and go dancing at the country club and swimming in the club pool in the summer.”

Marnie got to her feet and walked to the other side of the room. “It sounds like I was more interested in the things money could buy, rather than being sure I had a way to earn my own living. Did I go to business school?”

“You finished business school, all right, and got your car—a red convertible you drove all over town. Your mother was set on you doing something you could make a living at. She said she didn’t get enough alimony and child support to get by, but she had a good job. You got a job right off, at an architect’s office, but you didn’t like it. You said it was ‘boring as all get out’ and you wanted to work where the action was. When you turned twenty-one, you quit and went to work at the Roadhouse. You said you could make more in tips than you could being a secretary. But that’s an awful rough place to work.”

“Is that where I met David?”

“You might have met him there. I don’t know. But that’s not where you were when you started dating. You were working at Barrett Enterprises.”

“Where my mother worked?”

“Well, see, she had a heart attack and died, all of a sudden. I don’t think she even knew she had any heart problems. And about the same time, you got fired at the Roadhouse.”

“Why did I get fired?”

“Sam’s wife—Sam Whiteville is the owner—Sam’s wife said you were carrying on with Sam and threatened to leave him if he didn’t fire you, so he did.”

“Was I? Carrying on with Sam?”

“I don’t know for sure. You were young and pretty, and Sam was middle-aged and fat. You could have had anyone you wanted. I don’t know why you’d want Sam. But maybe there was some advantage to it. You were always looking out for what or who could give you something.”

Marnie shook her head in denial. The more she heard, the less she liked herself.

“So there you was, your mother dead and you with no job. So Mr. Robert offered you a job at the plant.”

“I got my mother’s job?”

Alice chuckled. “Land’s no, child. She had years of experience, and you didn’t. He got you a job in one of the offices—I don’t know which one. I think you set your sights on Mr. David at that point. You’d see him in the plant and come home saying how handsome he was. He’d finished college by then and was being trained by his father and his Uncle John about how everything at the plant worked.”

“David said he was engaged to Celeste when we got married. How did that happen?”

“Yes, he was engaged to Miss Celeste. Then everything changed.”

“How? Why?”

“What changed everything was the plane crash.”

Chapter 14

“A plane crash?”

“Yes, Mr. Robert and Mr. John were flying to meet with some government people about some contract for Barrett Enterprises to make something. They were in their own private plane, and a storm came up. Mr. Robert, Mr. John, and the pilot were all killed. That’s when Mr. David had to take over the whole business by himself.”

“That must have been hard, his being so young and just learning everything.”

“It was, and for a while there, he kinda went off and started drinking too much. He was engaged to Miss Celeste, but he started seeing you, too”—Alice stood up—“and then you two got married, and that’s all I can tell you.”

“This morning Ruth said I had gotten pregnant to trap him into marriage.”

“That’s between you and Mr. David. It isn’t any of my business,” Alice said determinedly.

“But you can answer me this. How long had we been married when Jonathan was born?”

After a long pause, Alice answered, “Almost six months.”

Alice picked up the pile of dirty towels from where she had put them by the door and left, leaving Marnie with some history of her childhood. It didn’t help. She didn’t remember any more than she had before the conversation, which was nothing, and it brought up a lot more questions. She wished David would come home and tell her more about how they became involved with each other.

After sitting a while longer, pondering all she had learned, she decided to go see what Jonathan was doing and meet Mrs. Tucker.
Although,
she thought,
I’ve already met her many times, I’m sure.

She found them in the playroom. Jonathan was sitting on the floor, running his toy cars over a road he had built of wooden blocks. An older woman sat in the rocking chair, crocheting. Marnie had imagined Mrs. Tucker to be a younger woman, someone who would sit on the floor and play with her son, or throw a ball in the yard, or help him learn to ride a bike. If she, Marnie, had failed to be a good mother, she at least had a vision of a kindly person, perhaps a young widow or divorcée, who could be active with a young child.

The woman who glanced up from her handiwork was, perhaps, in her sixties. She had gray hair, which was pulled back from her face in a tight bun. She looked up at Marnie through round, steel-rimmed glasses and lowered the yarn project to her lap.

“Good evening, Mrs. Barrett.”

“Good evening,” Marnie answered and looked at Jonathan. “Hello, Jonathan.”

“Hi,” he replied, smiling at her.

“Say, ‘Good evening, Mother’,” the older woman prompted.

“Good evening, Mother,” he parroted and looked down at his lap. His smile had faded.

Marnie knew at that moment she didn’t like Mrs. Tucker. It wasn’t that she spoke in an unkind tone, but she could tell in that one brief exchange Mrs. Tucker was a stickler for protocol and preciseness far beyond good manners. In that moment, Marnie determined she would spend more time with her son than she had in her forgotten past, and she would watch Mrs. Tucker to see if she treated Jonathan with love and kindness. The thought of him not being loved almost brought her back to tears, but she held her emotions in check. She didn’t dare risk another meltdown.

“Mrs. Tucker, I’m sure someone in the household has told you about my loss of memory.”

“Yes. It was explained to me.” Mouth set in a firm line, she looked as if she didn’t believe any such thing was possible.

“So, you see, it’s like this is the first time I’ve met you.”

The older woman sat silently, waiting for more.

“People tell me I was not very involved in my son’s life before, but I intend to correct that deficiency. I will be spending more time with Jonathan now.”

“Are you firing me?”

“No, not at all. I’m sure Jonathan is very attached to you, and I’m also sure I will not be able to spend all my time with him. You are still needed, but I will be asking questions about his care.”

The older woman’s face changed as relief washed over her.

Why, she was afraid of losing her job
, Marnie thought.

“How long have you been with Jonathan?”

“Since he was about two weeks old, so that would be a little over four years.”

“So you’re four, Jonathan?” Marnie asked with a smile.

“Yes, ma’am.” He smiled back at her.

“And you do everything with him? Do I do anything for him?”

“I stay with him day and night. I usually have Saturdays and Sundays off, and he goes wherever his father goes. Or that girl, Mary, takes care of him.”

“Does he go to any preschool or anything like that?”

“No. His grandmother told me to teach him his ABCs and good manners. She’s the one who hired me, not you,” she said with a tone of disgust.

Why am I not taking care of my own child? Why is he not in some sort of learning environment? And why is Ruth the person who hired Jonathan’s caretaker, not me or David?

“Well, I’m sure you’ve been doing a good job caring for him. He seems to be a polite and well-behaved young man, and since it sounds like I haven’t been spending much time with him, you must be the person responsible for that. Thank you.”

With that, Mrs. Tucker smiled, and it seemed to Marnie she relaxed even more.

“You’re welcome, Mrs. Barrett. It is a pleasure to care for him. He is a very good little boy, and smart, too.”

“The doctor can’t tell me when or if my memory will come back, so until it does, I may be asking you some questions—questions I should already know the answers to.”

“That’s perfectly all right, Mrs. Barrett. You ask away. It must be terrible, losing your memory like that.”

At that moment, a buzzer sounded. Marnie looked around and saw the small contraption above the door. Mrs. Tucker provided an explanation.

“That’s the signal from the kitchen to indicate our supper is ready.” She stood and walked to a button on the wall beside the door. “I buzz back once to let Mrs. Grady know I’ve heard it and we’ll be coming down. If I want it sent up for any reason, if Jonathan is sick, for example, I buzz twice.”

“They send it up on the stupid thing!” Jonathan exclaimed.

“The dumbwaiter, Jonathan,” Mrs. Tucker corrected him.

“Dumbwaiter,” he repeated. “Do you want to see it?”

“Certainly,” Marnie answered. “That sounds very interesting.”

Jonathan took her hand and led her into the hall to a door a few steps away. Opening it revealed a compartment about two feet wide and two feet deep. On the side was a button similar to an elevator button.

“See, Mrs. Grady puts the tray on the stu—uh, dumbwaiter and pushes the button, and it comes up here to us, and we get it off.”

“How very handy that is!”

Mrs. Tucker spoke up. “Not only for meals, but the maids can send the laundry up and down on it also. It makes it easier than carrying it up and down the stairs.”

“I can see it would help a lot,” Marnie replied.

“Come, Jonathan. You know you must put away your cars and blocks before we go down to eat.” She placed her hand on his shoulder. “Say goodnight to your mother before we go.”

He looked up into Mrs. Tucker’s face and then dropped his gaze to the floor.

“Goodnight, Mother,” he intoned.