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Authors: Eric Walters

Tags: #JUV013060, #JUV039220, #JUV013050

Innocent (7 page)

BOOK: Innocent
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Eleven

I STOOD AT
the front door, waiting for Richie. No one had objected to my taking the time off. In fact, Mrs. Remington had not only agreed but had asked Ralph to pick two big, beautiful bunches of flowers. One for my mother and one for Mrs. Remington’s husband, Richie’s father. I hadn’t realized they were buried in the same place, but really, how many cemeteries could there be in Kingston, especially close to here?

“Are you going to be all right, dearie?” Mrs. Meyers asked.

“I’m fine.”

“Richie will take care of you.” She paused. “You also need to take care of him.”

I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to do that.

She added, “He’ll be fine, I’m sure. It’s just that sometimes strangers can be a bit off-putting. I know you’ll take care of it.”

I wasn’t so sure, but I appreciated the vote of confidence.

“And here’s Richie now,” Mrs. Meyers said.

He still had on the same stained shirt and tattered pants and was carrying his shovel, but he was wearing a tie now. It was much too short and hung awkwardly around his neck.

Mrs. Meyers straightened his tie. “You take care of Lizzy, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

He was always so respectful to Mrs. Meyers. He started walking away, and I hurried to catch up to him.

We came to the fence marking the edge of the cemetery. I could make out the headstones, stretching into the distance as far as I could see. It was a large cemetery. It had taken us less than fifteen minutes to walk here, and I was grateful, since we’d certainly been attracting a lot of attention. Cars slowed down so people could gawk at us—a large man carrying a shiny silver shovel, and a girl with two gigantic bouquets of flowers.

Of course, it would have been much worse if they hadn’t been friendly. Dozens of people in passing cars honked their horns and waved or yelled, “Hey, Richie” from open windows. People on their front porches called out greetings, as did the few people we passed on the sidewalk. It shouldn’t have surprised me that everybody knew Richie. He’d lived here his whole life, and he certainly was distinctive, maybe more so because his family was so prominent.

Richie hardly seemed to notice the attention. A couple of times he awkwardly waved a hand in response, but mostly it was as if he didn’t notice. I tried to fill in for him, smiling or nodding and waving a bouquet of flowers in reply. I was feeling uncomfortable enough for both of us.

I also got the idea that he hardly noticed me. I tried to start a conversation, but he didn’t seem to want to talk at all. I even asked him about his pigeons—which was usually good for a long conversation—but he didn’t bite. And as much as he didn’t seem to want to talk, I wanted to. I wanted something to ease the uncomfortable feeling in my stomach, which seemed to be getting worse as we walked. I was past nervous. I felt scared. Not scared like I was a kid going to a spooky cemetery. It was something more. I felt like I should have had more time to prepare—but prepare for what?

I kept looking to the side, through the fence. There were so many headstones, so many people who had passed on. Richie stopped, as did I. We stood at the gates. The plaque on the post said
Cataraqui Cemetery
. I wondered why we had stopped. Richie had his head down, his eyes closed, his lips moving slightly. He was praying again.

Richie said, “Amen,” and we walked through the open gates. Suddenly, my feeling of unease became a gigantic knot in my stomach. I didn’t want to follow him any farther.

Richie kept on walking, not noticing I wasn’t with him. Finally I ran after him, not stopping until I was right beside him. He looked over and gave me a little smile. It wasn’t much, but it was reassuring. I wasn’t doing this alone. I just wished I was with Mrs. Hazelton or Toni or Joe or, I guess, any of the girls. Of course, that wasn’t possible.

“The prime minister,” Richie said.

I looked around. I didn’t see anybody, and I couldn’t imagine why the prime minister would be here. Then I saw that Richie was pointing at a tall headstone behind a small black fence.

“A prime minister is buried here?” I asked.

He nodded.

“Which one?”

“Sir John Alexander Macdonald. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, January 11, 1815. Moved to Kingston at age five with his family. First prime minister, serving from 1867 to 1871. Second term from 1872 through 1873. Third and fourth terms from 1878 to 1887. Formed his fifth and sixth governments from 1887 until his death on June 6, 1891, at age seventy-six.”

I knew that everything he said must be correct because he was always right with his facts.

“His headstone is the second biggest in the entire cemetery,” Richie said.

“Who has one that’s bigger?”

“My father. In his will he asked that it be one inch higher and one inch wider than the prime minister’s monument,” Richie said.

I chuckled and then suppressed my laughter. “And nobody has built a bigger one since then?” I asked.

“Nobody is allowed to. My mother made sure that will never happen. It’s like a law because she’s on the cemetery board.”

That was strange, that old Mr. Remington wanted his headstone to be the biggest, even bigger than the first prime minister’s. Even stranger that it would always be the biggest. I shouldn’t have been surprised though. Mrs. Remington was kind, and she was also dedicated to the memory of her husband, and I knew there was real substance and power beneath that kindness.

“Should we go to your father’s first or my…” I let the sentence trail off. I couldn’t bring myself to say the word
mother
. It felt foreign to me.

“Your mother,” he said. “To visit Vicki.”

He led and I followed. The cemetery was well maintained. The grass was green and mowed. Many of the graves had tended flower beds or, at least, flowers that had been placed there. There had been nobody to put flowers on my mother’s grave all these years. That made me sad. I pulled the flowers close to my chest. I was glad I had brought them.

There were so many stones, so many graves. Some were large and magnificent. Others were just small stones lying flat on the ground. That’s what my mother’s would look like, I was sure. Some of the stones were so old that they were worn and weathered, and I couldn’t make out what was written on them. On others the writing was clear, and I could see dates of birth and death, inscriptions, a few words to sum up a life and a death.
Loved, Missed, Mother, Father, Gone on to Heaven
, along with a Bible passage and maybe a little saying. What would be written on my mother’s stone? Would the letters even stand out?

Richie stopped in front of a large pink headstone. I wondered why he was stopping here, and then I saw. It was my mother’s grave.

Victoria Audrey Roberts
Born July 12, 1925
Tragically Taken September 10, 1950
Daughter of Samuel and Doris Roberts
Mother of Elizabeth Anne

I felt my legs go weak. I hadn’t even thought about the inscription or known what I’d expected to see, but I hadn’t expected to see my name. There was one more line below my name, and I read it out loud.


An angel returned to Heaven
,” I said. “That’s so…so beautiful.”

“My brother wrote that,” Richie said.

“That was sweet of him.” I would have to thank him the next time he came for dinner. “I hadn’t expected the stone to be so big.”

“It’s not as big as my father’s.”

“Nobody’s is. I just meant, well, who paid for it?”

“My mother. She said Vicki deserved to have the best.”

I should have known. That act of kindness was so much like Mrs. Remington. I had to thank her as well.

The stone wasn’t just big but also beautiful. There were flowers carved in a delicate pattern and, in each corner, a small angel. It must have cost a lot of money.

“I wish I could have been here,” I said.

“You were.”

“I didn’t know.”

“I held you. We stood over there,” he said. He pointed off to the side.

I tried to remember but couldn’t. I wanted to remember. “Can you tell me more?”

“I can tell you almost everything. My mother and brother and James and Nigel and Ralph and Mrs. Meyers and some other people you don’t know were here. Reverend Simpson gave the eulogy. He was a nice man. He died the next year on August 23.”

“Is there anything more you can tell me?”

“It was cold and the wind was strong, so I took you where it was sheltered and I put you under my coat so that just your head was showing and—”

“I remember! Well…I think I remember some of it.”

“You put down a flower—a rose, the flower your mother liked best.”

I tried to picture it, and then I saw that there was a rose—the remains of a single rose—at the base of the stone. That couldn’t be it, could it? I looked closer. There were the faint remains of another flower, and then another and another. Little bits of flowers that had been placed here but couldn’t possibly have survived for almost fourteen years.

I kneeled down and gently placed a bouquet on the ground, leaning against the stone. I reached out and touched it. Cold and smooth. Here, beneath that stone, under my feet, was my mother. I felt a shiver run through my body.

I ran my hand over to the place where my name was written. With one finger I traced the name—my name. Elizabeth Anne.

“You did that,” Richie said. “You touched your name with your finger, just like that. You were learning to print your name, and you read it there.”

I burst into tears. Richie bent down and patted me on the back. “There, there…there, there.” The tears kept coming, and my whole body began to shake. I tried to stop myself, but I couldn’t. Richie kept patting me on the back and saying, “There, there.” He looked distressed, helpless, like he wanted to help me but didn’t know what else he could do.

Really, at that moment there was nothing anybody could have done.

Twelve

WE WALKED SLOWLY
toward the gates. I didn’t know exactly what time it was, but we were in the cemetery a very long time before I managed to regain my composure. Or maybe I just didn’t have any tears left to cry. I was drained. Richie had left me alone—at my insistence—to go visit his father’s grave. I’d stayed beside my mother’s, sitting on the grass, trying to remember and glad that I couldn’t. What good would trying to remember do anyway? All it could do was bring more tears.

“Thank you for bringing me,” I said as we left.

“You’re welcome. Did you wish your mother a happy birthday?” he asked.

“Um…no.”

“Do you want to go back?”

“No, I’m good. I’ll go back another day.”

Off to our side there was a funeral going on. A long line of cars was parked on the roadway, and a group of black-clad mourners huddled together. In some ways it was reassuring to have other people here, even if it meant that somebody had died. I couldn’t help wondering who it was. I hoped it was somebody old, very old, and not some child or a mother who had a young child.

I was close enough to hear a voice but too far away to hear the words. I’d never been to a funeral before—well, one that I remembered. This was as close as I had ever come, and I wanted to get farther away.

We exited through the gates and started back the way we’d come. Suddenly there was a short siren blast. I turned around. A police car pulled up to the curb beside us and came to a stop.

“Excuse me!” a man called, leaning out the window.

I stopped and turned toward him, but Richie kept walking, as if he hadn’t heard anything. The car moved forward until it came alongside Richie.

“Hey, you! Stop!” the officer ordered.

This time Richie looked right at him. There was no question that he had heard, but he didn’t stop. He just kept walking—same speed and same stride. I quickened my pace to get to where the police car was, but once again it moved forward. This time, rather than simply coming alongside, the car bounced up onto the sidewalk ahead of Richie.

The officer jumped out. He was big but young. He couldn’t have been that much older than me. He held up his hand.

“I ordered you to stop!” he called to Richie. His voice was loud, but there was a quiver in it.

Richie continued to move toward him. I rushed to his side and took him by the arm. “Wait,” I said, stopping him just before he reached the policeman, who looked relieved that we’d stopped.

“I need to ask you a few questions,” he said.

“Certainly,” I said. I tried to smile, but instead a few more tears came out.

“Are you all right?” he asked me.

I nodded, but as I tried to answer, my voice broke on the first word. Now he looked worried instead of relieved.

“I need to know your name,” he said to Richie, pointing a finger in his face.

Richie didn’t answer.

“And I want you to put down that shovel right now.”

I knew Richie wasn’t about to give up his shovel.

“Put it down now!” the officer ordered again, his voice much louder. “Put it down! ” This time it was a command.

“It’s my shovel,” Richie said. At least he’d spoken.

“I don’t care who owns it. Put the weapon down!” The officer put one hand on the holster of his gun. What was he doing?

“It is his shovel; it really is! My name is Betty…I mean, Lizzy…I mean, Elizabeth Anne!”

“Which is it?” he asked.

“Both—all of them. It’s hard to explain.”

“Knowing your own name is seldom difficult unless it’s a false name.”

“It’s not false, it’s just that, well, it’s really complicated.”

“Has he hurt you?”

“No. Of course not! We just came out of the cemetery and—”

“I saw you come out of the cemetery. That’s why I asked you to stop. Walking out of a cemetery with a shovel seems a little suspicious. I have a few questions and—”

Richie started walking again, moving around the officer and the car. The officer reached out to grab him, and Richie slapped away his hand and then, quick as a cat, swung the shovel. It went wide of the officer and smashed the police car’s headlamp. I screamed, and the officer staggered backward and pulled out his gun. I jumped forward, putting myself between Richie and the officer.

“He didn’t mean anything!” I yelled. “He doesn’t know any better! He’s different!”

The officer still held the gun at his side. He looked upset and, strangely, as scared as I was. He let out a big sigh, and slowly he seemed to relax. Then he slipped the revolver back into its holster.

“He can’t just ignore a police officer. He can’t just destroy police property, even if he is different,” he said.

“If you come back to the house, I know Mrs. Remington will pay for it.”

“Remington? Like the mayor?”

“That’s her son. Her
other
son.”

“That’s the mayor’s brother?” he asked as he pointed at Richie, who was walking away.

“His big brother. You can ask his mother. Just come back to the house, and she’ll explain everything.”

“I have a better idea,” he said. “I better radio this in.”

He jumped back into his car, and I rushed after Richie, who was already half a block away. As I reached Richie, the police car came up beside us again. The officer leaned out the window. “I’m sorry, really sorry, Mr. Remington…
really
sorry.”

Richie turned and nodded at him and gave a little wave. Before I could think of anything to say, the car sped off.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” I said.

“Done what?”

“Hit the car.”

“It shouldn’t have been on the sidewalk. Cars shouldn’t be on the sidewalk.”

“He just wanted to talk to you.”

“I didn’t know him. I don’t talk to people I don’t know. He’s gone now.”

He was gone. But I didn’t think we’d heard the last of it.

BOOK: Innocent
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