A Woman Named Mara
Chapter 02 - A Woman Named Mara
The hospital smelled of disinfectant, reheated coffee, and someone else's bad night. Ryan stood outside the pediatric examination room holding two paper cups he did not remember buying. Through the glass panel he could see Lily sitting cross-legged on the bed while a nurse showed her how the bed controls worked.
She had insisted on placing the stuffed rabbit at the foot of the blanket where it could watch the door.
Dr. Priya Shah spoke carefully. Lily was dehydrated and underweight; a few bruises needed documentation, but she had no immediately life-threatening injuries. A social worker and child protection investigator would be involved. Until a safe placement was arranged, Lily would remain in the hospital. “She may be frightened of closed doors,” Dr. Shah said. “Try not to ask her to retell what happened. We will handle the interviews.”
Ryan thanked her. He had built custom kitchens for people who complained if the maple grain ran the wrong way. He had handled bankrupt clients, lumber shortages, and a roof blown off the shop. None of those problems had prepared him to stand in a hallway wondering whether a six-year-old girl was his daughter.
Natalie arrived with Emma, who carried Captain Marshmallow. “She insisted,” Natalie said. “And there's nowhere else for us to go just now.”
Emma tried to press the rabbit into Lily's hands. The nurse put it on the bedside chair instead, explaining that everyone would have a turn at sharing things. Lily looked pleased by the arrangement.
Ryan asked Natalie to join him at the vending machines. He wanted to shout. He was afraid that if he started, he might not stop. “Three weeks,” he said. “You found out three weeks ago. You let a child sleep behind our walls.”
“I didn't know she was sleeping there until Sunday.”
“Today is Thursday.”
“I know.”
She said she'd discovered a locked cupboard in the pantry and heard movement behind it. Frank had appeared in the cellar a few minutes later, older and frightened, and told her Lily needed a quiet place until he could arrange to get her out of the country. Natalie had threatened to call police. Frank told her that Mara was alive and that involving the authorities would put Mara in danger.
“And you believed him?”
“I believed he knew something terrible. Then I saw Lily. I brought her food every night.”
“You should have brought her into the house.”
Natalie pressed her palms together. “He said there were cameras on the lane. He showed me a photograph of Emma walking to preschool. He said if I disobeyed, the same people would take our daughter.”
Ryan knew his wife could be frightened into silence. He also knew she could be brave. Five years earlier she'd driven through a snowstorm to find his mother when no one else had wanted to look. Both things could be true. Neither erased a little girl behind a wall.
At noon, Detective Helen Ortiz came to speak with him. She was a compact woman in her fifties who asked plain questions and wrote down the answers without embellishment. Mara Quinn, she confirmed, had given birth to a girl in an out-of-state clinic six years ago. There was no readily accessible record of the child in local school or medical systems. Frank's death certificate would be examined.
Ryan told her about the summer fair. He and Mara had been together for eighteen months. They were already discussing marriage when she fell pregnant. He was away working a three-week job in Massachusetts when she called to say she'd miscarried. She had refused his offer to come home. Two months later she left town, saying that everything reminded her of the child.
“Did you ever see medical paperwork?” Ortiz asked.
“No. I thought asking would hurt her.”
“Did your father know her?”
“They disliked each other.” He paused. “Actually, I think she was afraid of him.”
Ortiz asked for the addresses of Mara's friends. Ryan gave her the names of two people who still sent Christmas cards. One was a florist named June who lived in New Haven. June had once told Ryan, in a tired voice, that Mara was not as free to make decisions as Ryan believed. He had misunderstood it as a comment on their breakup.
Frank requested to speak to Ryan after meeting with his attorney. Ortiz said it was Ryan's choice. They sat across from each other in a hospital conference room with a glass wall. Frank had changed into a borrowed blue sweatshirt. It made him look absurdly ordinary.
“Why did you pretend to die?” Ryan asked.
“Because I was afraid.”
“Of whom?”
“A man I worked for. A man who kept accounts no one was meant to see.”
“You expect me to take your word?”
“No.” Frank looked at the water glass between them. “I expect you to hate me. But the girl is yours. I had a test done when she was a baby. You'll have to do another one. Don't trust mine.”
Ryan felt a dull pressure between his ribs. “Where is Mara?”
Frank's eyes lifted. “I don't know anymore.”
“Then tell me the last place you saw her.”
“St. Brigid's Clinic. Outside Providence. She was supposed to meet me with the records.” Frank swallowed. “She came alone. She was limping, and she carried a blue canvas bag.”
“Was that six years ago?”
“No.” Frank held his gaze. “It was eleven days ago.”
Ryan stared at him as the hospital heating clicked on. The woman he had mourned in a quiet, private way for six years had been close enough to reach their house last week.
Before Ortiz could escort Frank out, he leaned forward and said, “Ask Natalie about the key taped under the pantry drawer.”
On the drive home, Ryan passed the baseball field where his father had taught him to pitch. Frank used to say a boy learned character by throwing the ball back even when his arm was tired. The field was empty now, its chain-link gate locked against the rain. Ryan parked for a few minutes and recalled how Frank had celebrated his son's first home run with ice cream, how he had fixed a flat bicycle tire without being asked, how he had once sat through an entire school recital even though Ryan played the trumpet badly. Those things had happened. Whatever Frank had done afterward did not erase them, and their existence did not excuse him. Ryan found both truths difficult to bear.
May you like
He called the shop and told Theo he wouldn't come in. Theo asked no questions. At home Ryan opened the linen closet and took down a spare quilt, blue with white squares, made by his mother. He nearly carried it to the hospital before realizing Lily might not welcome another stranger's heirloom. He folded it back into its place. For the moment she needed adults who could respect the word no, not people who showered her with evidence of their feelings.
It was the first thing Frank had said that made Natalie look frightened rather than guilty.
