Chapter Seventeen #2
Diana read about Grace’s injuries in the newspaper, but in person, they are staggering. During the open house, Grace was bundled up in a knit blanket, so Diana hadn’t taken in the damage. Now, she can’t pull her eyes away.
Grace is showing Diana what was done to her by the fire to make a point, to send a message, and Diana grasps for what to say. “I hope you’re better today. Yesterday . . .”
Grace shrugs on her coat as Diana’s words die off. “Go,” she says to Scout, and the dog takes off to chase an unlucky squirrel.
The two women walk, their steps slow but steady.
Neither speaks. While Grace appears content with the silence, Diana is agitated, understanding she’s on unstable ground.
She has so many questions, such an acute need for Grace to tell her what happened all those years ago, but now, here, in this other woman’s sadness, she’s not sure how to begin, which question to ask first.
Scout trots back to Grace, panting, the squirrel long gone. Grace bends down to pick up a gnarled stick and tosses it a few feet to the right. Scout races off after it, his tail wagging with excitement.
As Grace stands up, a twinge of pain flickers across her face. Diana recognizes the melancholy this other woman carries. It’s in her profile, the downward slant of her mouth, and the way the air around her is laden with pain and regret.
Grace gestures to the broken paddock fence. “This all looked different when Tom was with us. William and some friends built the barn that first summer we were on the farm. He carved our initials into the rafters and promised we’d grow old here together.”
In her coat pocket, Diana clenches the rock from Grace’s yard, focusing on the sharp point digging into her skin, letting the pain keep her upright.
“Why did you come back?” Grace asks.
“I wanted to ask you about Tom and the time he worked for you and your husband.”
“Why? Because of this promise to your son?”
“Tom had a secret,” Diana says. “Something terrible he did when he was a teenager. I need to know what it was.” She unzips her purse and pulls out a photocopy of the letter. She thought about bringing the original with her to Hamilton but, at the last minute, slid a copy into her purse instead.
“Tom’s death . . . It feels like both long ago and only yesterday.
He had what people said was a courageous battle with cancer.
” Diana frowns. “I hate when people equate cancer with war. It’s too simplistic, too violent.
Though the treatment is its own kind of violence, I guess.
” She tucks her hair behind her ears and tries to slow down her words.
“Plus it sounds as if there could have been a different outcome, that Tom had options, that he could have lived, but his cancer was too advanced. I understand now that he saw his death as a debt he owed. To the universe, maybe to you and your husband.”
Diana lets her sentences spill out, one after another, so Grace won’t interrupt. She’s afraid she’ll lose her nerve if she pauses even for a moment.
“I didn’t know you existed until two days ago. Which is strange, because Tom and I were together for twenty years. We told each other everything.”
Diana looks up from the letter. “Well, I thought we told each other everything. From what I’ve been able to piece together, that time Tom worked for you during high school was important to him.
Formative. You and your husband were special to him, too.
So special our son is named Duncan William, after, I believe, your husband. ”
There’s a sharp intake of breath from Grace. “I think this letter has to do with your fire,” Diana continues. “With your injuries and your husband’s death. The authorities said Carson Roy started the fire, but I have this feeling Tom was involved somehow.”
As Grace considers the paper in Diana’s outstretched hand, her apprehension, so clearly reflected in her face, morphs into fear, and finally, to curiosity. Scout is at her side again, licking her hand. She pats him and takes the letter.
Grace reaches for her glasses, placing them on her face with a precise sweep of her arm.
She is so still when she reads that Diana cannot help but fidget.
She shifts her weight from one foot to the other; she squeezes the rock before letting it drop to the bottom of her pocket. She zips and unzips her coat.
When Grace finishes reading, she takes off her glasses and sticks them back into her pocket. “I can’t help you,” she says, returning the letter to Diana. “I know nothing about this secret or about what Tom says he did.”
The hope Diana had clung to disintegrates, desperation filling its place. “No, I’m sure you know something. If you can talk about the time he worked here, about the fire, too, it might be what I need.”
“I don’t talk about that time.” Grace starts walking, and Diana hurries to catch up.
“The only thing that will make sense of all of this is the truth, no matter what it is,” Diana says, so fast the words spiral and jump, making her voice thready and unfamiliar.
“I was so certain of Tom and of the life we built together . . . Now, I don’t know what to believe. I don’t know what my life is anymore.”
Grace stops abruptly, her back to Diana. She peers up through the brilliant winter light to watch a robin fly overhead. The air vibrates with its song, clear and welcoming.
Diana clutches the letter. “Whatever you can tell me. Any detail. Please.”