Unspeakable Read online

  "It's just that I could have saved him," said Holly. "You should have seen him, George. He was allbroken." She was so upset that she couldn't say any more.

  George reached across the table. On his right hand he wore a heavy silver ring with a profile of Chief Looking Glass embossed on it. "You're shaking."

  "I'm a little cold, that's all."

  "Holly you don't have to be braveallthe time. It's not an official job requirement."

  "It's just that Elliot Joseph I don't know. I feel like he's tainted me."

  George nodded as if he understood exactly what she meant. "The Nimipu have a saying, Holly: We all live in one another's shadow." He paused, and then he said, "Come on, you look beat. Finish your coffee and go on home. I can take the bus."

  "Mickey Slim" Brings Lilies

  At elevenA.M. the next morning, Holly was just about to go into a meeting with Doug and all the other department heads when Mickey appeared out of the elevators at the far end of the corridor carrying a huge bunch of white lilies wrapped in cellophane. He waved the lilies from side to side as if he were flagging down a train, and he shouted out something, but he was too far away for Holly to see what it was.

  Katie said, "MyGod. He must have stolen those from the cemetery."

  Mickey came jogging up to them, out of breath. "Hi! Holly!Fwoff!I just came by to see how you were! And to bring you these!"

  "Those are forme?"

  "Because of what happened yesterday. You know you getting attacked like that."

  "Oh."

  Mickey raised his hand and gently touched her forehead, close to her hairline. "That's a heck of a bruise you've got there. Did you put an ice pack on it?"

  "Frozen peas."

  "Well, here," he said, and handed her the lilies.

  "I'll catch up with you in a minute," she told Katie. Katie winked at her and went into the meeting.

  "You, ah, how do you feel?" asked Mickey.

  "Bruised. Battered. What do you think?"

  "I heard that Daniel Joseph made it through surgery."

  "Yes, he did."

  "So he's going to be okay?"

  "Probably not. There's only a twenty-five-percent chance that he's not going to suffer from some kind of physical impairment. Probably mental too. Cerebral edema."

  "That Elliot Joseph. What a piece of shit. Excuse my language."

  "Yes, well, I have to get into my meeting. Thank you for the flowers."

  Mickey narrowed his eyes. "Do I sense some lack of warmth here?"

  "Lack of warmth? I wouldn't call it that."

  "No? What would you call it?"

  Holly gave a defensive shrug. "I think I'm just surprised, that's all. Taken aback."

  "Oh, yeah?" said Mickey, with an exaggerated expression of bafflement. "Taken aback by what exactly?"

  "What you did to Elliot Joseph, what else?"

  "I'm sorry, I'm not following you."

  "You knocked his teeth out, Mickey. I couldn't believe it. You deliberately knocked his teeth out."

  Mickey laughed in disbelief. "Holly, the man is an irredeemable psychopath."

  "That didn't giveyouthe right to act like an irredeemable psychopath too."

  "Hehityou, for Christ's sake. If we hadn't got there when we did, he probably would have killed you. I lost my temper, that's all."

  "It didn't look to me like you were losing your temper. You looked completely calm."

  "I'm always calm when I lose my temper. Chilled- that's me. The only time I get excited is when the Beavers are two games down."

  "You still didn't have to knock his teeth out."

  "Holly, there's one thing you have to understand. That piece of shit hit you, he hurt you, and as far as I'm concerned, if anybody hurts you-anybody-they're going to get hurt back. In spades."

  Holly didn't really know what to say. All through her life she had always taken care of herself, and to have somebody else looking out for her was a strange experience. She didn't know whether she felt flattered or uneasy. Did Mickey feel protective toward her because he found her attractive, or because her deafness made her so vulnerable? Or an odd combination of both?

  "Listen," he said, "if I upset you, I'm real sorry. The last thing in the whole world I wanted to do was upset you."

  "No," she said, "I'm not upset. Not really. Not now. I can't say that I approve of what you did, but-well, I guess it was understandable."

  "You're sure?"

  "I'm sure. I could have ended up like Daniel, couldn't I?"

  Mickey pressed his fingertips against his forehead, as if he were having difficulty thinking of the right words. "I don't usually well, I don't want you to think that knocking people's teeth out is something that I'm in the habit of. But, you know, like W. C. Fields said, it's a hard world out there. It's amazing that any of us get out of it alive."

  He looked up to judge her reaction. She said nothing, because she didn't really know what to say.

  "By the way," he added, "Elliot Joseph comes up in court tomorrow. The DA is opposing bail, on the grounds that he's a continuing threat to his wife and son-and to child welfare staff too."

  "Good," said Holly. "We'll be making a preliminary application to have Daniel taken into care."

  Katie appeared in the doorway. "Holly, can you come in now, please? Doug's reading the minutes."

  Holly turned to Mickey and said, "I really have to go. Thanks for the lilies."

  "That's okay. You should have seen what they were charging for them, per bloom. Good thing I'm a cop and they give me a hundred-percent discount."

  Holly laughed. She had been telling him the truth when she said that she liked him, but whenever he came close to her, she always felt as if she ought to be cautious, although she didn't exactly know why. She had met him nearly two years ago at the Children's Welfare Department barbecue, when she was holding a hot dog in each hand, one for her and one for Daisy, and she had liked the look of him even then. But she often felt that his eyes never quite agreed with what he was saying. She sometimes thought that there was a hidden "Mickey Slim," a verywatchful"Mickey Slim," who very rarely showed himself.

  "I'll talk to you later," she told him.

  "You're really okay, though? I mean, Elliot Joseph hit you pretty hard, didn't he?"

  "I'm okay."

  "Okay, then. I'll see you later. Okay?"

  The Ghost Boy

  She was packing up her briefcase to leave when Katie came into her office. Katie was wearing a nubbly hand-knitted sweater in broccoli green and French mustard, and Holly knew that she was going to ask her something awkward because her head was tilted back and her glasses pushed right to the end of her nose. "Holly, I don't know if you're up to doing this. I mean, do tell me if you're not."

  "Depends what it is. I'm in no condition to have a fistfight with anybody just at the moment."

  Katie flapped a telephone message at her. "It's nothing much, just a backup call. A woman onSoutheast Boise called the police just after ten o'clock this morning. She said she could hear a child screaming in the first-floor apartment right below her. The police attended and talked to Mrs. Hannah Beale. Mrs. Beale has an eleven-year-old son calledCasper who is suffering from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. According to Mrs. Beale,Casper doesn't want to undergo any more chemotherapy, and he was kicking up a fuss about it."

  Holly checked her watch. Damn. She had promised Daisy that she would try to get home early.

  "What would you like me to do?"

  "I'd like you to check up on this situation, that's all."

  "You mean today? Now?"

  "It shouldn't take you more than twenty minutes. I wouldn't have bothered, normally, but one of the police officers reported that Mrs. Beale appeared to be very stressed-out."

  "Okay ," agreed Holly, reluctantly. She took the phone message and noted the address.Southeast Boise was over the river, on the opposite side of the city. She hoped that the afternoon traffic wouldn't be too clogged up.

  She buttoned up her
coat. On the windowsill beside her, in a tall sunlit vase, stood the lilies that Mickey had given her. She had been thinking of taking them home, but she decided to leave them in the office till the following day. She had been glancing at them all day and wondering what Mickey was trying to say to her:I like you? I respect you? I pity you?

  The sun was still shining when she drove across the Ross Island Bridge. By the time she reached Southeast Boise, however, it had been covered by a thin gray veil of cloud, and the street looked strangely nostalgic, like a photograph fromLifemagazine, circa 1965. The apartment block in which the Beales lived was a two-story building made of cream-colored brick, with turquoise-painted shutters and a dead lime tree standing in front of it. A gang of kids were skateboarding along the sidewalk using a homemade ramp. In the driveway, a short, fat woman in a headscarf was washing what looked like a brand-new Malibu.

  Holly parked and approached the woman washing her car. "Pardon me. I'm looking for Mrs. Hannah Beale."

  The woman kept her back turned to her, so Holly couldn't see if she was answering. She walked around the car until she was facing her, and said, "I'm sorry- do you know where I can find Mrs. Hannah Beale?"

  The woman looked Holly up and down. She was pale and puffy-faced, with eyes like raisins pushed into dough. She wore a bronze satin blouse and flappy white pants that were two inches too short for her, and strappy white sandals. A single hair grew from a mole on her chin and spiraled around.

  "I'mHannah Beale, for the second time. Who wants to know, for the second time?"

  Holly produced her ID. Mrs. Beale peeled off one of her pink rubber gloves and examined it closely. "Children's Welfare Department? What's this?"

  "The police department got in touch with us . It'sonly a matter of routine."

  "Jeez! Itoldthose cops-how many times did I tell them?-Casper's sick. He has to have his chemo, even if he doesn't like it, or else he's going to die." Holly could detect an accent, northern Minnesota or maybe southeastern Manitoba, with a rise at the end of every sentence so that it came out like a question.

  "We wanted to know if there was anything we could do to help," said Holly. "It can't be very easy for you, taking care of a child so sick."

  "I'm fine. I can manage. Did somebody say I couldn't manage?"

  "Is Casper your only child?"

  Mrs. Beale jerked a thumb toward the skateboarders. "That's Thomas-the one in the green T-shirt-and Kyra; she's the girl in the pink." Holly shielded her eyes against the gray afternoon glare. Thomas and Kyra both looked like their mother, squat and overweight. Kyra was only about thirteen, Holly would have guessed, but her stomach bulged over her cherry-colored jogging pants as if she were five months' pregnant. Thomas had tight ginger curls and more ginger freckles than face.

  "How aboutMr.Beale?" asked Holly.

  "Daah,"said Mrs. Beale disgustedly, flapping her glove.

  "But you're managing okay?"

  "I'm doing fine, thank you. I'm not saying it's easy."

  She dropped her sponge into her foam-filled bucket and waddled over to the side of the apartment block to turn on the hose. Holly stood back while she sprayed the Malibu from front to back.

  "Any chance I could see Casper?" asked Holly.

  "For what?" asked Mrs. Beale. "He's been real sick today. He needs his sleep."

  "Like I say, it's only routine."

  "Well, there's no need. He was howling this morning because he doesn't like his treatment, that's all it was. It makes him nauseous, you know?"

  "All the same, I'd still like to see him."

  "I don't think so, miss. He's too sick to see people today."

  Holly waited while Mrs. Beale polished her car with a chamois leather. "Can you tell me what hospital he's being treated at?"

  No reply.

  "Is it a local hospital? Providence St. Vincent, maybe?"

  "What do you want to know that for?"

  "It's just for my records."

  "As if I don't get enough busybodies poking their noses into my private business."

  "Well, I'm sorry, but Casper was screaming loud enough for somebody to call the police, and the Children's Welfare Department has a statutory obligation to follow it up."

  Mrs. Beale stopped polishing and snapped the wet leather in the air.Snap!andsnap!as if she were making a particularly vehement point about something. Her two children had stopped skateboarding and had come to join her, standing close to their mother with sullen, spoiled expressions on their faces.God,thought Holly.Talk about the Addams Family.

  "Hi," Holly said brightly. "You're Kyra, aren't you? I love your barrettes." Your cheap, nasty, pink plastic hair slides.

  Kyra wrinkled up her nose. "Who areyou?"

  "My name's Holly. I've come to see if your mom needs any help with your brother Casper."

  "I'm managingfine,as a matter of fact," snapped Mrs. Beale impatiently. "If I needed any kind of damn help, I would've asked for it long since, wouldn't I?"

  "That's terrific," said Holly. "So long as you're coping okay. Now, if I could just see Casper for a minute It doesn't matter if he's sleeping."

  "Well, I don't really think so," said Mrs. Beale. She pulled her children in closer to her side, and she shifted herself around so that she was standing in between Holly and the open door to the apartment block.

  Holly hesitated. "Mrs Beale, if you won't let me see Casper today, I'll have to make arrangements to see him some other time."

  "He's my son; he's sick but I take care of him good. I mean, what makes this any of your damned business?"

  "I just need to make sure that he's receiving the best care possible, and that you're receiving all the help you're entitled to."

  "Youtalkweird," sneered Thomas.

  Holly smiled and pointed to her ear. "That's because I'm deaf. I haven't been able to hear anything since I was a little girl."

  "You'redeaf?"said Mrs. Beale in disbelief. She lifted up her eyes to appeal to the sky. "She's deaf, for Chrissakes, and she thinks she can bring up Casper better than me! Do you hear that, Thomas? They'll be sending around a cripple next, to teach you how to skateboard!"

  "Mrs. Beale, you don't have to be so negative about this. I'm here to help you out, not to criticize you."

  Mrs. Beale jabbed a finger at her. "I don't want none of your help. If it isn't bad enough, bringing up a child who won't be doing nothing in his life but dying. Now, you just get back in your vehicle and leave me alone. I've got enough of a cross to bear without you climbing astride of it for the ride."

  "I'm sorry," said Holly. "It wasn't my intention to upset you, but I'll have to see Casper sooner or later. If it's not convenient now, maybe you can tell me when."

  "Are you going to leave me alone or what?"

  "All right, I'll leave you alone."

  "Then leave me alone. Get the hell out of here."

  Holly shrugged, trying to look indifferent, even though her heart was beating twice as fast as normal. "I have to warn you, I'll be back, with a police officer if necessary."

  Just as she was about to turn away, however, a small figure suddenly appeared in the doorway of the apartment block, like a ghostly apparition. It was a boy. A thin, chalk-white boy, wearing pale green pajamas. He was totally bald, and his face was shrunken in so that his eyes and his ears looked enormously out of proportion. He looked more like a sickly monkey than a human child. Holly was so shocked that she said "Oh my God" out loud.

  "Momma!" the boy called out. His voice was surprisingly clear. "Momma, I've puked in my bed!"

  Mrs. Beale glared at Holly and bustled up the drive. "How many times do I have to tell you not to come wandering outside? How many damn times?"

  "But, Momma, I puked in my bed."

  "Okay, okay, we'll get you cleaned up. Now, get back inside."

  Holly skirted around the other two children and went right up to the doorway. The boy looked up at her with no curiosity at all. One leg of his pajamas was soaked in sour, milky vomit.

 
; "Leave us alone," said Mrs. Beale. She spoke with her teeth clenched-"Reave us arrone!"-so that Holly could hardly understand her. "Can't you see how sick he is?"

  "Of course I can see how sick he is. I can hardly believe that he isn't in a hospital."