Final Rights (26 page)

“That house I built?” he asked.

Tate vividly remembered her first meeting
with Leland Howard. She had asked about 305 Chestnut Street, not the house he
had built, the one she now owned. So she lied. “Yes.”

“Why?”

There seemed no alternative but to answer
Leland’s questions directly, so Tate continued with the deception, convinced it
would eventually lead to some of the answers she sought. “I own it now.”

“You own the house I built for Ellie?”

“Yes.”

“Do you like it?”

“Well, yes. But I think it’s a lot different
now.”

“How’s it differ’nt?”

Leland’s questions felt a bit like an
interrogation, but his wavering voice and sad eyes eased her discomfort. “Mr.
Howard, I’m not sure how much to say. I don’t want to stir up anything for you
that you don’t want to talk about.”

“I do want. I been fergittin’ much too long.
It’s time to remember again.”

“Well, it’s different in lots of ways. It’s
been moved, for one thing.”

“What do you mean, moved?”

“It used to be on Cumberland, right?”

“Yes. We lived at Number 8 Cumberland. In
front of the old cabin, the workshop.”

“That was before they put the expressway
through.”

“What expressway?”

“I-240. It’s a huge
highway. It goes right through where your old neighborhood was and wiped it
out. But they moved your house over to Maplewood. That’s where it is now, where
it was when I bought it last year.”

Leland looked
befuddled. He put his head in his hands and rubbed his scalp along the
hairline, then pulled his palms slowly down over his face, covering his eyes
and massaging his temples with his thumbs before looking back at Tate. “They
moved my house?”

“Yes, sir. It musta been
a real sight to see.” Tate offered a smile, hoping to ease the shocking
information.

“Yes, it woulda been that!” Leland smiled
back, but behind the slight upturned curve of his lips lurked a tightness that
Tate read as a combination of disbelief and sadness. Leland reached for her
hand, and she pulled her chair closer to him.

“The workshop—did they move that, too?”

“I don’t think so.” Tate paused, dreading
what she had to say next. She gently squeezed Leland’s hand. “They probably
tore it down.”

Leland began weeping. “I grew up there.”
Tate could tell the news landed heavily on Leland.

Cally sat close by listening intently. “Are
you okay, Gampa? You don’t have to talk about this. We can come back another
time . . .”

“I’m okay, Cally.” He breathed a heavy sigh,
letting go of the sadness a bit, and turned back to Tate. “How else is it
differ’nt? Besides bein’ moved?”

Tate made a point of
speaking softly and slowly, hoping to minimize the impact of her message.
“Well, from what I can tell, the inside has been changed a lot, too. The
hallway was moved and it has three bedrooms. I think an old back porch was
closed in at some point to create the third one . . .”

“Is that front door still there?”

Tate’s mouth dropped open and she turned
wide-eyed to Cally, who also looked astonished.

“It has a beautiful door, with an old lock
and hinges and scroll work around the panels . . .” Tate could hardly believe
Leland himself had broached the topic that had been plaguing her for what
seemed like forever—why did her house and the one on Chestnut have such similar
doors? She held her breath, waiting for his response.

“Beautiful, maybe. But a big mistake.”

“What do you mean, a mistake?”

“That’s not a story I
can tell. I only did one mean-spirited thing in my whole life and that door was
it.” Leland hung his head and dropped his hands into his lap.

Tate and Cally simply stared at one another.
Tate shrugged her shoulders, a gesture that said “I don’t know what to do,” and
Cally did the same, as if to say “Me, neither.” They waited.

“You have questions, Mrs. Marlowe, and you,
too, Cally. I can’t answer no more of ’em right now.”

“Oh, of course.” Tate patted Leland’s hand.
“We can go. We’ll come back soon . . .”

“I can’t answer ’em, but Richard Price can.
He’ll tell you what I can’t if you want him to.”

“Are you sure, Gampa?”
Cally moved to stand behind Leland, her arms over his shoulders. She bent over
and rested her cheek against his hair, then rocked very slightly back and
forth, cradling him.

Leland cupped his hands around Cally’s
forearms and swayed with her. “Richard Price’ll tell you. Secrets need to be
told sometimes, and now’s the time for mine. You go talk to him.”

“He’s so tired,” Cally mouthed to Tate. “We
should go.” Tate nodded and said her goodbye to Leland, then stepped away as
Cally did the same.

Tate motioned for Dorothy, who had been
keeping an eye on them during their entire visit. “He’s exhausted, I think. He
told us a lot just now, stuff he’s kept buried a long time. I’m a little
worried that it may have been too much for him.”

“Don’t you worry. We’ll take care of him.”
Dorothy looked at Cally as she joined them. “You come back again soon, please.
He was so happy after your last visit. I know it means the world to him to see
you.”

“If it means even half as much to him as it
does to me, then that’s way more than a world! That’s a whole universe.” Cally
reached for Dorothy who pulled her into the kind of embrace a mother gives her
child.

Tate watched, perplexed.
How can anyone surrender to another so
completely? And Cally barely knows her.
No one could explain that to her, not even Richard Price. But
there were so many questions he would be able to answer, and Tate itched to ask
them.

FORTY-TWO

2004

“Oh
my god, Cally. That was amazing!” Tate sank into the driver’s seat of the truck
and turned the key just long enough to open the windows. A chill filled the
sunny November afternoon and it felt invigorating.

Cally leaned her back against the passenger
door and curled up in the seat. “Yeah! Astonishing. Incredible. Unbelievable .
. . I guess that’s enough superlatives, don’tcha think?” They both laughed.

“Do you have any more of those brownies? I
need a sugar fix!”
  

“Nope. But I could use a strong cup of
coffee right about now. Is there someplace close?”

“I think there’s a
little café in a strip mall just up the road.”

“That’ll do. Let’s go.” Cally straightened
herself and reached for the seat belt as Tate buckled up, cranked the key and
put the truck in gear. Tate had remembered correctly. She pulled into a parking
space at the front door of the coffee shop. With the lunch hour well behind
them, the café had only two other customers so they had their choice of
seating. They slid into a booth near the plate-glass windows and looked at the
menu.

“Did you see that display case on the way
in? Those pies look yummy.” Tate’s mouth watered at the thought of a slice of
the pumpkin or the Key lime pies she’d seen.

“Yeah, I did see them. But I think I’ll go
for some of that cheesecake. I can’t believe I’m hungry.”

While Cally seemed genuinely surprised that
she wanted food in the middle of the afternoon, Tate felt long overdue for a
snack even though she’d had a brownie so recently. The waitress took their
order and within a couple of minutes delivered fresh pastries and steaming
coffee.

Tate took a bite of pumpkin pie and found
its rich creaminess satisfying. “Um, this is good. Just what I needed. I know I
shouldn’t be eating this, but really, that was an emotional whirlwind of a
visit. I need sustenance!” Tate offered this editorial comment in a
lighthearted manner prompted by her belief that the best defense is a good
offense. It seemed to work, because Cally showed no interest in discussing
Tate’s eating habits.

“Whirlwind is right. He’s a sharp old man,
for sure. When we first got there, I thought he didn’t recognize me. He studied
me so intently, you know?”

“I saw that. I think he can’t quite believe
you’ve come back after all these years.”

“Well, he can’t be any
more surprised than I was to learn he’s still alive. Oh, Tate. I can’t thank
you enough. I don’t think I would ever have found him if I hadn’t met you. I
believed they were all gone for so long I don’t know if I’d have even thought
to look for him, really.”

“Your mom never talked
about the people here?”

“She mentioned her
mother sometimes. Nana—that’s what I called her. She’d send cards and presents
sometimes for my birthday and Christmas. I honestly don’t know what happened to
Mom’s dad. I think he left Nana not long after we went to California. Mom never
told me the whole story about anything.”

“What happened to Nana?”

“She died a long time ago, fifteen or twenty
years, maybe more. I tried to get Mom to come back for the funeral, but she
wouldn’t. Of course by that time she was pretty far gone herself, what with the
drinking and all.”

“I’m so sorry, Cally. You’ve had a tough
time of it.”

“Not any more so than
most other people. My hunch is you’ve had your own challenges . . .”

Tate felt the familiar clenching in her
stomach, the closing off.

“. . . I know. You don’t
like to talk about it, so I won’t press.”

The tightness eased. “Well, we have plenty
of other stuff to talk about. Richard Price for example. Do you want to go see
him?”

Not only did Cally want
to meet Richard Price, she seemed as eager as Tate to go that very afternoon.
Tate put in the call and Mr. Price offered the hoped-for invitation. They
finished their dessert and coffee. Less than an hour later, the housekeeper
escorted them to the library where their host greeted them.

“I called Forest Glen right after I spoke
with you, Mrs. Marlowe. The nurse, Dorothy, I think her name is, she checked
with Leland and he did indeed give me permission to tell you what I know. I
understand you have a lot of questions for me. But first, I want to hear from
this lovely young lady.” He turned his attention to Cally. “You’re Cally,
then?”

“Yes, sir. I’m Leland’s granddaughter.”

“Oh, I know who you are, my dear. Did you
ever get the note I sent?”

“Note? I didn’t ever get a note from you.”

“Not from me. The note from Ellie.”

Cally gasped and burst into tears. She
rummaged through her bag, found the note and handed it to Mr. Price. “This one,
you mean? You sent this to me?”

He took the tattered old paper from her and
turned it over delicately in his hands, but he did not open it. “Yes, this one.
I found it after . . . well, you know. I didn’t know what happened to you. I
gave it to your mother’s mother and hoped she would send it to you. I never
knew if you got it. I’m glad you did.”

“I didn’t know where it came from. I only
found it recently, after my mother died. She had it hidden away with some other
keepsakes. Will you tell me where you found it, how you found it?”

A pained expression filled Richard Price’s
face. He leaned forward, using his carved walking stick for support. “After
Ellie was . . . after she . . .” He paused, tears forming in the corner of his
eyes. “. . . after it happened, I brought Leland here. He was devastated, could
barely speak, wouldn’t eat . . .”

“He said you took care of him . . .”

“As much as he would let us do, we did. Part
of that was to clean up the house, his house. He never went back there, you
know.”

“I didn’t know. . .”

“Of course, how would
you? Well, I went to clean up the house, put things in order. I found the note
tucked under the pillow on the bed. I knew Ellie had written it, and I think
she had done it just before she died. So I figured it was important to her that
you get it.”

“Oh, I had that same feeling! Somehow I just
knew she had written it in her last minutes!” Cally barely controlled her
tears.

“So it did mean something to you. Good.”
Richard Price handed the note back to Cally.

“You never read it? You don’t know what it
says?”

“Certainly not. It was intended for you, not
for me.”

“Mr. Price, it means
more than I can say.” Cally choked back the emotions flooding over her as she
read Ellie’s last words aloud. “I think it refers to the old fireplace in their
house. It had a secret compartment, and she kept things in there, things she
said were just for me.”

“Ah, yes. Leland is fond of his secret
compartments. He put them in most everything he built. Your friend here knows
about them, too.” He gave a nod in Tate’s direction.

“And I love them! Can I show Cally the
desk?”

“Please do. I’d join you but I’m too
unsteady on my feet. Remember how to open it, do you?”

“I think so.” Tate took Cally to the desk
and after some initial confusion and a couple of hints from Richard Price, she
revealed the secret compartment.

“Oh, that is so incredible!” Cally clapped
her hands gleefully.

“You know, Cally, I think that desk belongs
to you.” Cally turned to Richard Price, mouth agape.

“What? No, of course not. It’s yours.”

“You’re right. It has
been mine for a very long time. But I don’t have that long left, and it should
go to someone who loves it as much as I have. I think that’s you.”

“Your children, your family—they should have
it.”

“There’s no one left who’d appreciate it for
anything other than its monetary value. It’s a work of art made with love, and
it deserves to be loved by someone who understands its true value, not the
price it would bring at auction. Will you take it?”

Cally looked at Mr. Price, then at Tate.
“Well, that settles it then. I have to buy a house and settle down here in
Asheville!”

“That seems a bit impulsive, Cally. Don’t
you want to think about it?” Even as Tate voiced her words of caution, she knew
Cally had already decided.

“I’ve been thinking
about it, Tate. Ever since I got here, I haven’t thought about much else,
except Gampa. What I should do, where I would be happy, how I want to live the
rest of my life . . .” She lovingly stroked the time-worn desktop. “Mr. Price,
I would be honored to own this beautiful desk made by my grandfather. Can I
leave it with you until we both agree the time is right for me to take it?”

“It will remain in my
safekeeping until you’re ready. Now, shall I tell you what I know about your
grandfather?”

“Yes!” Tate and Cally uttered
the affirmation simultaneously and they settled into comfortable chairs to hear
his story.