Her Father's House (13 page)

That night he went to bed without fear. It was as if some miraculous transformation had taken place, as if he had drunk some magic potion. It was as if a door had been opened, admitting light where there had been none. He had not yet stepped through that door, but it was there. The sight of it was in some way reassuring. For the first time in a long while, he fell into a comforting, easy sleep.

In the morning he got up cheerfully and made ready to go to work. He could not have explained how or why it came when it did, but suddenly as he walked across the room, as he reached the center of it, something struck him, hard. Something came ringing into his ears, commanding him.

Do it! Do it! Yes.

Chapter 10

F
irst of all, he had to accept that Donald Wolfe had no confidant. Except for those remote cousins in Wyoming, who would not recognize him if they were to bump into him, there was no one of his blood to whom he might appeal for shelter or advice. Nor could he confide in any good friend, such as Ed Wills, and involve him by even the slightest hint in an illegal act.

How to get away? Where to hide? It had to be someplace remote and untraveled by tourists or by any acquaintances whom he might accidentally encounter. The world was large, yet small enough for him to have once met on a windy, hilly corner in Edinburgh a client from Chicago whom he had not seen in four years.

In the corner of the den there stood a large globe on which he had liked to retrace his travels; it had been fascinating also to track the wanderings of that famous scoundrel with whose case the firm had for so long been connected. A man like him had had to have many contacts with criminals, several false passports, and a phenomenal memory to keep all these things in order. Donald had none of these, nor did he want to have them. So that far, empty corner of Canada that had first come to his mind was out of the question.

Next, then, he spread out on the table a folding map of the United States and studied it. Alaska was as far away as you could get, except for Hawaii. Hawaii involved an airplane, where notice would be taken and a record would be on file of a man traveling with a two-year-old girl. Alaska? It was too sparsely populated, even in its few cities, for the man and the child to melt away in a crowd. Where to go to find a place that was neither too crowded nor too empty, that could be reached without a journey of two or three thousand miles? It should be a rural area, perhaps with a little town tucked into a pocket between mountains, away from the stream of modern life. The obvious answer was somewhere in the mid-South, exactly where, he had no idea.

But wherever he might go, how was he to make a living? The only dollars he had ever earned had come to him from working on somebody's farm and from working as a lawyer. Impatiently, he thrust the map aside and went to the mirror that hung in the coat closet, there to stare at his reflection and demand aloud: “Can you possibly be crazy? Here you are in the midst of a case that Augustus Pratt has assigned to you—to you, Donald Wolfe, rather than to any of the others who have been in the firm twice as long as you have.”

Then, as he turned from the mirror, the first thing he saw was the framed photograph of his baby. She was sitting in the stroller with a half-eaten graham cracker in her hand and a merry grin on her face. All of his stalwart resolution came flooding back.

Do it! Do it!

On Sunday in the park, Maria reported that “the man come from France. She see him every day. Come every day, Mr. Wolfe. Big man. Good-looking. Mrs. Buzley very happy with him.”

No doubt she was, for however long that happiness might last. Scenes as on a reel of film flickered past Donald's eyes: the beds at that party—so long ago now—oh, she had been on her way to them, no doubt of that. Those people in Florence, Lillian lying rumpled on the sofa that terrible morning; all of these and so much more came flickering back.

“Daddy. Walk. Cookie wants to walk.”

She did not walk, she scampered, and he had to hold fast to her lest she get away. The “terrible twos” it said in one of Donald's books.

One of the first things he would do was to change her name because both “Cookie” or “Bettina” grated on his ears. They did not suit her, although he could not have given any reason other than that they represented the world from which he was about to take her.

   

From someplace in his mental storage room, Donald remembered having once come across a magazine with advertisements for books on changing one's identity. Number-one task, then, was to track down the magazine. This he did by inquiring for it in several neighborhoods where he thought it might most likely be found. Having done this, he ordered a book in which he learned what common sense alone should have taught him: He needed a birth certificate. With that he would turn himself into another man. And a child starting school would need one, too.

This sort of thing did not always work, he knew. It probably did work very, very seldom—and it certainly
should
work very, very seldom, or else what kind of world would we have? Yet sometimes, in desperate circumstances, might not one be forgiven?

Cash was his first need, cash that usually leaves no trace. He began to withdraw it from his various accounts, occasionally giving a casual explanation that he was traveling to Indonesia. He owned no valuables other than the silver tea set that Lillian had left behind because Buzley already owned two of them. To his surprise, he received ten thousand dollars for it, which he took in cash. Lillian had surely wound poor Buzley around her little finger! He sold for a very fair amount the engagement ring that she had no longer wanted because poor, foolish Buzley had given her a better one. Poor, foolish Donald, too, he thought, remembering that afternoon in London when he had been in such a panic that he might lose her.

He got a money belt and wore it every day. This alone made him feel like a hunted person, skulking with his secret along the familiar corridors of the splendid offices where he was known as Donald Wolfe, a highly respected citizen in the heart of Manhattan. Every once in a while, he had a frightening sense of hallucination, from which he had to bring himself up short and confront reality; soon he was to be an unknown, temporarily unemployed person in a place that was also as yet unknown.

What was to be his name? he asked himself. Where should he have been born? He must have been living in a city large enough for him to have gotten lost in the crowd. It must also be near enough for him to spend a few days there now to acquaint himself with it, if heaven forbid, he should ever have to undergo any serious questioning, such as where did you go to school, or church, or the neighborhood movies?

He decided on Philadelphia. In that case he could probably have been born in some nearby town where he might easily search the cemeteries for the name of someone his own age who, dying in early childhood, would probably be forgotten by now. With this information, he would be able to go to the registry of births and ask for a duplicate birth certificate to replace the one he had somehow lost. So for three Saturdays in a row, he rented a car, toured through five cemeteries in scattered towns, and ultimately came up with a name: Laura Fuller, beloved daughter of James and Laura.

For a few minutes, he stood there looking down at the unkempt grass on the grave. Died at the age of two! Poor little thing. What would her life have been if she had lived?

Yet, her name might be the means of giving a better life to that little girl in New York. And her father's name, Donald's middle name, might be an omen of luck (since when did I believe in omens?). Nevertheless, it was a good, plain name, drawing no attention to itself, and “Laura” would be a pretty one for James Fuller's little girl.

Through all this mental and physical turmoil, fitting the project into his crowded days, Donald managed to have one amusing thought: Howard Buzley, through his contacts, experience, and style of life, would very likely have possessed in this field all the expertise that Donald lacked.

   

“They ready soon.” Maria's voice was tearful. “Mrs. Buzley tell me they going soon. Her man taking her and Cookie. In France they have nice nurse for Cookie, so don't worry, Mr. Wolfe. But I am sad,” she wept, “sad, Mr. Wolfe.”

“When, Maria? When?”

“Next month maybe, I think.”

“But you'll stay till then, Maria?”

“Yes, yes, I stay. I miss Cookie. Like my own baby, she is.”

Next month. He had to get a little notebook right away and write down facts too important to leave to memory, details about clothes, toilet training, naps, and other things that he thought he already knew, but perhaps did not really know.

Most important, he had to buy a car. Accordingly, he called in sick for a few days, boarded a train to Philadelphia, and at the terminal asked a cab driver to take him to a used car lot. Instantly, he regretted the question. What if a countrywide search were to be made and this cab man should remember him? Then he scolded himself: You're ridiculous, you're as nervous as a cat on a rooftop. Stop it. You're just a citizen looking for a car.

The salesman was young and very eager. “Tell me what you need, and I'll find it. We've got some of everything.”

This much Donald knew: The car must be as inconspicuous as the jeans and sneakers he was wearing, not likely to stick in anyone's memory, therefore not shiny or smart, or shabby-sad either, or white, or red.

“No particular make,” he explained, “but low mileage and dependable. I'm taking it to western Canada, rough country.” He must leave a misleading trail. “And I'll need a big trunk, really big. I'm moving a lot of stuff.”

They were walking side by side through the rows. “That looks nice,” Donald said, stopping to look at a clean black sedan. “Let's see the trunk. What's the mileage?”

While appearing to hear all the facts and figures, his mind was spinning a story. Let it sound so distinctive that there would be no way in which this young fellow would ever associate him with Lillian's lost baby.

But it will happen, it's bound to happen. No it isn't, and you'd better get hold of your imagination, James Fuller.

“My wife just died, you see, and I'm taking a lot of her things back to her parents.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

“I'm not flying because they live out in the country, seventy miles from the airport, so this is easier. I could ship the stuff, but I really ought to visit them. She was their only child. Died suddenly.”

“Tough break.”

There was appropriate sympathy in the young fellow's eyes. How easy it was, after all, to lie and get away with it! He had passed the first test.

He explained that he would be paying with the cash he had received from selling his furniture.

“Sold your furniture? You moving?”

“Moving to a smaller place right off Spruce Street. Listen, I'll call you in a couple of days when you've made the transfer, got the plates and stuff. I had my phone pulled out right after the last bill, and the new one isn't in yet.”

“Tough breaks, mister.”

“Well, that's life. Thanks a lot. You've been a big help.”

He was a fraud now, sick with shame. But he was pursuing a greater cause than his self-esteem, so having planned to spend the next few days in Philadelphia, he took a hotel room, and armed with notebook and pen, set about on a walking tour to familiarize himself with the city. After that, with its map and a couple of pamphlets about its history and its historic places, he called for his car, the first he had owned since selling the jalopy in North Dakota, and drove back to New York.

   

He began to dismantle the apartment, destroying any object that might disclose his identity, such as a snapshot of Cookie—of Laura—in Central Park with apartment buildings in the background, or an album containing a picture of himself in law school with cap and gown. He tore up extra copies of the United States map, saving one for his pocket to be pored over again and again.

   

“Mrs. Buzley has great big trunk now,” Maria reported. “She put in front hall. I think they go very soon, Mr. Wolfe.”

Donald's heart was an engine, straining up the side of a mountain. There was still so much to be done! On the list were things still to be bought, a large suitcase for the baby's clothes and the clothes themselves. Every day after work he got into his car and visited small shops in distant parts of the city, buying a few items in each, so that no salesperson might remember a man who had bought a suspiciously large quantity of garments for a little girl. He bought a child-sized mattress to put on the floor at night, a proper car seat for Laura's safety, a cooler for food, and a variety of toys. Having done all these things, he prayed that no sickness, however mild, would befall his Laura, for might not a doctor sense something amiss?

The days came and went too fast. He felt like one who, pursued, was afraid to look back and gauge his distance from the pursuer, or like one afraid to look at a calendar and face the shrinking time that was left to do anything that still needed to be done.

At last only two days remained, this one and tomorrow, the Sunday on which he would take Laura away. His walk back and forth was a nervous habit that he knew he must get over. But it was only a recent habit and understandable, this constant rehearsal of things to come. The name being one of them, he would pause before a mirror to act out his part in a dialogue:
Hello, I'm James Fuller and this is my daughter Laura
. Up and down, up and down. Check the refrigerator for tomorrow's food: a chicken sandwich, bananas, her favorite graham crackers. Pack his own two largest suitcases; the doorman would assume he was off across the oceans again.

In the den he looked around at the shelves. Here were his luxuries, every book a precious object to be kept forever. On the topmost shelf, the red leather
Jefferson
glowed like the special jewel it was, the first book he could ever really afford to buy. On the bottom shelf were his latest acquisitions, the guidebooks on rearing a child. These must go into his suitcase. And the
Jefferson,
too? Donald asked himself, and answered yes, that too. Say good-bye to the rest.

On the wall hung the lovely prints of eighteenth-century Paris. Between the windows hung the landscape that Lillian had bought when their troubles had barely begun. Would it go back to her now? he wondered.

When he could think of nothing more to do, he went to bed, slept restlessly, and woke to a warm, windy Sunday morning. Shortly after noon, having for the third or fourth time checked the apartment, he went downstairs carrying a lunch box concealed in a paper bag and his own two suitcases with his clothes.