26
PATRICK LEFT THE room, and a moment later Audra heard the front door open and close, then a swell of voices as the reporters swarmed him. She looked toward the window that faced out onto the street. Through the net curtain she saw them, like crows on carrion. They hushed as Patrick said something, microphones and recorders under his nose. Then a roar as he finished, pushing his way through them.
Monsters, all of them. Ghouls seeking flesh to sell. Yet it was she who was painted as a beast. The killer of her own children.
Audra watched as Patrick fought his way to a car double-parked across the road, the reporters hounding him all the way. He blasted the horn to make them move, then a squeal of tires as he took off, the reporters dancing out of his path.
They drifted, their focus lost, huddled into smaller groups. Women fixed their makeup. Men fixed their hair. Cameramen and sound engineers fussed. Some moved to the diner across the way.
‘I’m a monster?’ Audra asked the empty room.
‘Are you?’
Audra spun around and saw Mrs Gerber in a doorway at the back of the room, one she hadn’t realized was there. She could see over the landlady’s shoulder that it led to the kitchen.
‘No, I’m not,’ Audra said.
Mrs Gerber looked at the carpet, a frown on her lips. ‘Did that man spit on my floor?’
‘Yes,’ Audra said. ‘Did you hear that?’
‘Yeah,’ Mrs Gerber said. She tapped the circular window with her fingertip. ‘Saw it, too.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Audra said, turning to leave.
‘Sorry? Don’t be an ass. Too many women apologize for the behavior of men.’
Audra didn’t know how to respond. She went to the doorway leading to the hall.
‘My husband used to beat me too,’ Mrs Gerber said. ‘Funny thing. Everyone thought he was the nicest man. I’d go out to the store and someone would say, oh, I saw your Jimmy yesterday, isn’t he just a sweetheart? But they didn’t know. Even when I wore sleeves too long for the weather, no one thought to ask why. They just thought he was the bee’s knees.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Audra said.
‘Stop apologizing, for goodness’ sake. People say the same about Ronnie Whiteside. He’s a good man, a war hero, all that. But I know what kind of man he is. I’ve seen it for myself.’
‘Tell me,’ Audra said.
Mrs Gerber exhaled, her small shoulders sagging inside her cardigan. ‘One night, not long after they closed the mine, I was upstairs looking out onto the street. Used to be a bar across the way, McGleenan’s, not much of a place. I watched Lewis Bodie stagger out of there, hardly fit to put one foot in front of another. Bodie got a payout from the mine for losing his job, same as a lot of the men around here, but he drank his up faster than most. He staggered right out of the bar and into Sheriff Whiteside. They talked a bit, and I could see Bodie getting agitated, and I remember thinking, just shut your mouth and go home, or you’ll wind up in a cell. Next thing I know, Sheriff Whiteside just belted him across the jaw. Bodie went down like a bag of sand, and I thought, well, he maybe had it coming. But it didn’t stop there.’
Mrs Gerber’s gaze went to the window, out onto the street.
‘Ronnie Whiteside laid into Lewis Bodie like he was ready to kill him. He beat him and beat him, and I could hear it, the sound of his fists and his boots, and Bodie crying and begging. And even when he went quiet, Sheriff Whiteside kept going. When he finally stopped, he just stood there awhile, breathing hard. Then he bent down, took Bodie’s wallet, and helped himself to whatever money he found there. And I remember thinking if it was anyone else doing the beating, I’d call the sheriff. So who do I call?
‘Then next morning I look out the window again, and there’s an ambulance from Gutteridge General outside the sheriff’s station. It turns out Lewis Bodie died in his cell overnight. And I never breathed a word of it to anybody. So now I hear you say Whiteside has your children. Him I could believe it of, but Mary Collins? Her with a sick child and all?’
‘That’s right,’ Audra said.
‘Everyone around here thinks Ronnie Whiteside is a good man. Same as they thought my husband was a good man. But I know different. Just tell me something.’
‘What?’
Mrs Gerber stared at her from one doorway to the other, her eyes hard and sharp like blades. Audra realized that each of them stood on a threshold, and she supposed that should mean something. But she couldn’t think what.
‘Did you hurt your babies?’
‘No, ma’am,’ Audra said, holding her gaze.
Mrs Gerber nodded. ‘Well, then. You go up to your room and try to get a little sleep. I’ll bring you up some coffee later on, maybe some cake.’
‘Thank you,’ Audra said. ‘I’d like that.’
Mrs Gerber nodded once more and disappeared back into the kitchen. Audra went to the hall and climbed the two flights of stairs. As she approached her room, she noticed the door was open an inch or two. She remembered she hadn’t locked it, but she was certain she had at least closed it behind her. But it was an old house, the kind where floorboards creaked, windows rattled, and doors sometimes didn’t latch properly.
Audra entered the room, put her shoulder to the door to close it. She slid the chain lock into place, then went to the bed. Tiredness weighed heavy behind her eyes as she sat on the edge of the mattress and kicked off her shoes.
Only when she lifted her head did she see the man in the corner, the brown paper bag in his hand.