Vanishing Act (7 page)

T
hree Catholic lay sisters came out of Mary Margaret Catholic lay sisters came out of Mary Margaret Hayes's room as I entered. The woman I took to be her was propped up in the hospital bed closest to the window, watching TV, when I walked in. She was alone in the room, a shrunken, skeletal figure of a woman who could have been anywhere between fifty and seventy, having been stripped clean of whatever individuality she'd possessed by the cancer that was eating her alive.

She was clutching a large crucifix with both hands. The skin on them looked thin as tissue and was covered with large bruises caused by the various needles and injections to which she'd been subjected. Her grayish-blond hair was sparse. Pink patches of scalp shone through. But I could see Bryan's and Melissa's features stamped in her profile, from the slight tilt of their noses to the determined jut of their chins. I was about to knock on the door and ask if I could come in, when Mrs. Hayes turned her head and saw me.

She frowned. “Who are you?” she demanded in a suspicious voice.

“Robin Light.” As I took another step in, I noticed the statue of Jesus standing on the night table next to her. This woman definitely had all of her bases covered, I recall thinking. “Remember you called and asked me to come over.”

“Of course I remember. Because I'm dying doesn't mean I'm an idiot,” she rapped out in a voice as sharp as vinegar. She pointed to a chair. “Sit down. Bryan's already left for the night. Robin Light.” She repeated my name, turning it over in her mouth while she scrutinized me. “What kind of a name is that?”

Something made me say “What do you mean?” even though I knew exactly what Mrs. Hayes meant.

When I was younger, my grandmother had asked my friends that question whenever I brought a new one home. It had embarrassed me then. It seemed that along with sipping tea through a lump of sugar, that question had marked my grandmother as the immigrant she was. I'd jump in before my friend could reply, and make a joke out of the question. Eventually, though, she'd ask me again after my friend had left and I'd always answer, just as I was going to do now.

“And Bryan told me you were very smart.” Mrs. Hayes sighed in exasperation. “Are you Catholic? Protestant?”

I was going to say Buddhist, but her look made me feel guilty and I told the truth. “No. I'm Jewish,” I replied as I pulled the chair she'd pointed to next to her bedside and sat down. “Is that going to be a problem?”

She snorted. “Of course not. I've always liked the Jews. It's those Pentacostals I can't stomach. Anyway, I'm not one to point the finger. I didn't come back to my faith till later in life. Are you religious?”

“Not really.” Not at all, I would have answered if I were being strictly truthful. When was the last time I'd been to synagogue? I couldn't remember. Was it ten, fifteen years ago? There are lapsed Catholics. I wondered if there are lapsed Jews as well.

“Well, it's a good thing to have a spiritual life, an important thing.” Mrs. Hayes gestured to the empty bed across the way, all made up and waiting for its next customer. “I've gone through five roommates now.” She leaned forward and touched my wrist. Her touch was as light as dust.

“They come and go. The last one, poor dear, didn't have anyone to visit her. Her family had been killed in the camps and she could never bring herself to get involved with anyone else. They finally had to send her to a nursing home even though she didn't want to go. Luckily God's not going to let that happen to me. I wouldn't like that at all.” Her eyes strayed to the TV and back to me. Friends was on. “I don't think they expected me to live as long as I have, but He's not going to take me to Him until I know what happened to my girl.” She pointed with a trembling finger to the statue of Christ. “Jesus will see to that.”

Well, it was nice to know He was on the case.

“My Bryan spoke to you, right? He told you what happened?”

I nodded.

“He's trying, and that's important. Could you?” She pointed toward the water pitcher on the nightstand. I poured her a cup and helped her drink. “I'm glad he's in school. It's a good thing. A good thing.” A spasm of pain twisted her face. She closed her eyes and clutched her cross, her fingers grown white from the pressure of her grasp. When she released it a moment later, her upper lip was beaded with sweat.

I leaned over. “Can I get you something?”

The shake of her head was almost imperceptible. A moment later she opened her eyes and continued as if nothing had happened. “I need to know,” she said, her voice a fierce whisper, willing me by force of her desire to understand. “I need to know whether Melissa is alive or dead. It's all right if she's passed on,” she continued, dropping her voice even lower, “then we'll just meet on the other side.” Suddenly I was surprised by a pang of jealousy. It must be wonderful to have that kind of faith, I thought while Mrs. Hayes paused for a few seconds to gather her strength before continuing. “I want this all straightened out before I go. I've never left anything a mess in my life, and I don't intend to start now.”

I nodded again.

“Is that all you can do?” Mrs. Hayes snapped, glaring at me. “Shake your head up and down? You must have questions. Don't you have anything to ask me? Anything at all?”

“Of course I do.” If Mrs. Hayes was like this when she was at death's door, I didn't even want to imagine what she was like when she'd been on her feet. Bryan and Melissa must have had a tough time of it growing up, I decided. I asked her if she had any ideas about what had happened to her daughter.

Mrs. Hayes studied the lights out the window for a minute before answering. “I'll tell you what I told the police. I don't know what happened to Melissa. The only thing I do know is that something was bothering her before she disappeared. We were close, Melissa and I.” Mrs. Hayes turned back and looked at me. “I know you may find that hard to believe.” She brushed away my assurances that I didn't. “But I could feel something was bothering her.”

“Did you ask her what it was?”

“Naturally. Several times. But she wouldn't say—I don't think she wanted to worry me—she said it wasn't a big deal, that I shouldn't worry, she'd take care of it herself. She liked doing that, you know—taking charge, fixing things—that's one of the reasons she and her brother were always fighting. ”

“Because she tried to fix him?”

Mrs. Hayes gave a sad little smile of remembrance. “He used to call her bossy, but he would have been a trial for Mary herself when he was little.”

“So you don't have a hint of what was bothering your daughter?”

“I know whatever it was happened at school.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because she'd changed when she came home after the end of her freshman year. She seemed ... distracted ... as if she were wondering what to do about something.”

“She wasn't depressed?”

“Thoughtful might be a better word. She was very quiet, quieter than usual, but not in a sad type of way.”

“Could the way she was acting have had anything to do with her roommate's death?”

“No, I don't think so. We talked about that.” Mrs. Hayes swallowed. “This was something else.”

Score one for Beth. “Her boyfriend?”

“My Bryan seems to think so.”

“But you don't?”

“Melissa was a level-headed, sensible girl. She knew better than to put herself in a position where anything bad could happen to her. She was planning on going on and getting her Ph.D. in education. She really didn't have time for men.”

I made a noncommittal comment. I didn't have the heart to tell her that according to Beth, her daughter was anything but sensible when it came to men, that she'd been planning on getting married very soon. As I listened to Mrs. Hayes speak, I couldn't help wondering what else she didn't know.

She picked her next words carefully. “Bryan feels very strongly about his sister. He's someone who feels things deeply, sometimes too deeply.” Her voice trailed off.

I didn't say anything, preferring to sit quietly and listen to the comings and goings in the hospital corridor instead. Mrs. Hayes would come around to what she wanted to tell me in her own time.

“Bryan's offered to pay you, hasn't he?” she asked suddenly. “I told him to.”

“Yes.”

“Is it enough?” Her tone was worried.

“It's fine,” I assured her.

“Good.” Her eyes focused on the TV again. “If you need more, you be sure and tell me.”

I told her I would.

She licked her lips. They were cracked and red. “I shouldn't have taken that second job,” she informed me. “I should have stayed at home.”

“From what I heard, you didn't have a choice.”

“I should have had more faith in the Lord.” Mrs. Hayes's voice had dropped lower, and I was having trouble hearing her over the clatter of the cart being pushed down the hallway. She turned toward me and reached for my hands. “I want you to promise me something.”

“If I can,” I said cautiously, thinking Mrs. Hayes was going to ask me to promise I'd find out what happened to her daughter in the next week or so, which at the rate I was going looked like an impossibility; but that wasn't what she wanted at all.

Mrs. Hayes studied my face for a minute before going on. I began to grow uncomfortable under the intensity of her scrutiny. “Swear to me,” she finally said, “that no matter what happens, you'll protect my son.”

The window curtains were billowing back and forth, rising and falling in time with the air from the heat register. I watched them as I thought about the implications of what Mrs. Hayes had just said. I wanted to say the right thing, I wanted to say something tactful. Instead, I heard myself blurting out, “You think Bryan had something to do with his sister's disappearance, don't you?”

Mrs. Hayes scowled at me and withdrew her hands from mine. I'd been judged and found wanting. For a moment I was sure she was going to order me out of her room, but she clasped her crucifix instead. “That's a terrible, terrible thing to tell me,” she replied, anger and sorrow warring in her voice.

“I'm sorry,” I said, apologizing even though I knew with absolute conviction that I was right. I leaned forward slightly. “I don't understand.”

“Precisely.”

I waited for elucidation.

“I don't think that,” Mrs. Hayes explained. She grabbed my hand again and rubbed its top with her fingers. “You believe me, don't you?”

I didn't, but I said I did. I wasn't going to tell a dying woman I thought she was lying to herself.

“I'm afraid the police might though,” Mrs. Hayes went on. Her scowl was gone, replaced by a worried frown.

“Why would they do that?” I asked, curious to hear what she was going to say. I'd heard Marks's comments. Now I wanted to hear hers.

She released my hand and once more touched the crucifix lying on her chest. She ran a finger absentmindedly along the edge of the cross before replying. “Because of all the trouble Bryan got in when he was younger. That's why I sent him away, you know,” Mrs. Hayes continued when I didn't say anything. “I didn't want to, I just felt I had no other choice. I just couldn't stand the phone calls from school anymore or finding his friends lounging around on the sofa. Every time I opened a cabinet door I'd find beer bottles someone had hidden. And his behavior was beginning to affect Melissa. She didn't say anything, she never would, but I knew it really bothered her, even though she begged me not to send him away, to let him stay in the house.” Mrs. Hayes stopped speaking and glanced out the window again into the darkness outside. “Things would have been different if his father had lived. Boys need their fathers.” Mrs. Hayes turned her eyes to the television.

I watched with her and waited for her to start talking.

A moment later she took up her narrative. “I'm glad I sent him to that school. It was so hard, but it was the best thing I've ever done. God only knows what would have happened if I hadn't. But he's better now. Much better. And he and Melissa have become very close, but you know how the police are, dear.” She favored me with a look. “They're paid to see the bad side of things, and they see so much of it that they don't believe people really do change.”

“Change is difficult. People tend to backslide,” I observed noncommittally, wondering if she'd tell me about Bryan's arrest. “Does your son still have a gun?” I asked when she didn't.

She sat up straighter. Her eyes blazed. Anger gave her energy. “Who told you that?” she demanded.

“A detective,” I replied, feeling bad that I'd brought up the subject.

“It was his friend's gun. He was holding it for him. Did this detective tell you that?”

“No.”

“That proves my point.” Her voice was triumphant.

“The guy must have been a good friend of your son's.”

Mrs. Hayes pursed her lips. “Bryan's problem is that he's too trusting. He'd be willing to give a stranger the shirt off his back. He's always been like that, ever since he was a baby.”

“That can lead to problems.”

“I know.” She started to cough.

I gave her some water. After she was done drinking, she sank back in her pillow, her meager store of energy spent. “So you'll take care of things for me?” Mrs. Hayes said. Her skin was so pale, she seemed to blend in with the sheets.