Chapter 5: The Son in the Middle
I didn't raise my voice.
I had learned, somewhere in the long middle of my life, that a quiet response lands harder than a loud one.
"I need you to listen to me very carefully," I said.
"Mom, she said she was worried about you.
She said you might be confused after everything, that someone could take advantage—"
"David."
He stopped.
"Ruth told your father that I was unfaithful to him.
She said she had evidence.
She used that lie to pressure him for over a decade."
The silence on the other end was different now.
"She what?"
"Your father wrote it down.
In a letter.
He left it with his attorney — not Mr.
Graves, a different attorney — because he knew Ruth would be watching everything connected to the official estate." I kept my voice level.
"He protected me from her.
He spent nine years doing it quietly, without telling me, because he knew that if I knew, she would find a way to use it."
"Mom, I — I didn't know any of that."
"I know you didn't." I looked through the windshield at the empty street.
"But you reported my movements to her this morning.
I need to know if you're going to keep doing that."
"No.
No, of course not.
I just — she made it sound like she was looking out for you."
"Ruth has never looked out for anyone but Ruth." I started the car.
"I need you to do something for me.
Don't tell her we spoke.
Don't tell her what I said.
Can you do that?"
"Yes."
"I mean it, David."
"I know.
I'm sorry.
Mom, I'm really sorry."
I believed him.
David had always been the one most easily managed by a confident voice and a reasonable-sounding concern.
Ruth had known exactly which of my children to approach.
"Come for dinner on Thursday," I said.
"Bring the children.
We'll talk properly then."
I hung up and sat for a moment.
Then I opened the second letter — the shorter one from Mr.
Harding's office — and read it there in the car, with the engine running and the heater just beginning to push warm air through the vents.
Walter's handwriting again.
Fewer words this time.
*"Eleanor.
If you're reading this one, you've already spoken to Harding and you already know most of it.
So I'll only say what I should have said years ago.*
*Ruth is not going to stop.
She never has.
The difference now is that she has nothing left to threaten me with, and everything she tries will be aimed at you directly.*
*You are stronger than she has ever given you credit for.
You are stronger than I sometimes gave you credit for, and I am ashamed of that.*
*There is one more thing she doesn't know about.
I didn't put it in the first letter because I wasn't sure you'd be ready for it immediately.
Ask Harding about the recordings.
He'll know what I mean.*
*I love you.
I have loved you every day of sixty-nine years.
I'm sorry I made you carry the last part of this alone.*
*— Walter"*
I folded the letter.
The recordings.
I hadn't asked about any recordings.
I reached for my phone to call Mr.
Harding back — and then I stopped.
A car had pulled up behind me.
Parked.
Engine off.
I watched it in the rearview mirror.
The driver's door opened.
A woman got out.
Ruth.
She walked toward my car with her handbag over one arm and that same composed expression she had worn in the lawyer's hallway the day before.
She stopped at my window and made a small knocking motion with one finger.
I lowered the window two inches.
May you like
"I thought that was your car," she said pleasantly.
"What are you doing all the way over here, Eleanor?"
