“ ‘Going to,’ dear,” Pix said automatically, thanking God her oldest son was safely in New Haven.
“This solves one problem, anyway,” Sam commented as the kids left the room for the phone.
“What?” Pix asked curiously. Something his lawyer’s mind had picked up on that she’d missed?
“Now we have something to do this afternoon.
We’ll be glued to the TV, watching the parade to make sure the kids are all right. Can we stay for lunch, Faith? I think we’re going to need nourishment.
The parade started from East Aleford at about two o’-clock and usually reached the green about three.
Promptly at 1:30, a gleaming turquoise-and-white 1955 Chevy Bel Air picked Samantha and Danny up.
Amy had gone for her nap and Ben was complaining about missing the parade. They usually watched from the front steps of the church.
“I’ll take you out when the clowns come,” Faith promised.
“And I want to see Samantha and Danny. I want to be in the parade. Why can’t I be in the parade?”
“You can when your legs get a little longer,” Faith answered. The Aleford Minutemen marched, all in their proper uniforms for the parade, wives and children behind them.
Tom had called again to report that there was nothing to report and said he’d be home soon. That had been an hour ago.
Faith looked in the refrigerator and decided on big overstuffed sandwiches. She had some dark rye and piled thick slices of smoky Virginia ham, sharp cheddar cheese, lettuce, with some spicy chutney on the bread.
She set the table, putting out bowls of cherry tomatoes and Cape Cod potato chips—an indoor picnic.
Sam was starting his second sandwich and finishing his first beer—Sam Adams lager, in honor of the day— when Tom walked in the back door. They all started talking at once.
“I’ll tell you everything; just give me a minute. If I don’t get out of these clothes, I’m going to develop a serious rash. Even with my long underwear, this wool itches like crazy. Now I know why our ancestors all have such pained expressions in their portraits. I thought it was ill-fitting teeth, but they were merely waiting for a break to scratch.”
From the way Tom was speaking, Nelson must be out of danger, Faith thought.
“Do you want a sandwich?” she asked.
“At least two,” he called back over his shoulder.
When he returned, the first person to demand his attention was Ben, who had been doing Legos in a corner of the kitchen.
“Mom says we can’t watch the parade from the church,” he told his father woefully.
Tom and Faith looked at each other over the little tyrant’s head. Guilt, guilt, guilt.
“I told him I would take him to see the clowns—and Samantha and Danny, if the senior-class car isn’t too far away from the clown contingent,” Faith explained.
“That’s going to have to be it for this year, Ben. You know Mr. Batcheldor is sick and we have a lot of grown-up worries right now.”
This plus a promise of cotton candy appeased the boy enough to send him back to his construction.
Faith set Tom’s food on the table and all of them looked at him expectantly.
“Chloral hydrate. But that’s not to leave this room.” Everyone nodded solemnly.
“A Mickey Finn,” Sam said. “Of lethal proportions.” He liked to read mysteries from the thirties and forties.
“Exactly. Nelson was regaining consciousness and I went in to see him. Charley and Dunne were both there asking him questions, which is how I found out.
It must have been put in something he ate at the breakfast, because it acts quickly and there was no trace of it in his flask. They were trying to get him to remember what he’d had, but he was pretty out of it.”
“It is still used to help people sleep, though,” Pix said. “My mother had some in the medicine cabinet from my father’s last illness, until I made her throw it out. It was in a brown bottle, a red liquid. Father used to complain about the cherry taste. That would be pretty easy to put into Nelson’s juice.” Faith thought of Ben’s bright red mustache. The cloyingly sweet juice would have masked the flavor of just about anything.
“But pretty hard to top up the man’s drink in a crowded room without attracting some attention,” Sam said.
“It also came in capsules, but those were too hard for father to swallow at that point,” Pix remembered.
She also remembered her children and jumped to her feet. “It’s after two o’clock; maybe the cable company will be televising the beginning of the parade.” They all crowded into the small room with the TV to watch. At first, all Faith could see were fezzes. The Shriners made up a good fourth of the parade—Shriners dressed as Minutemen, Shriners in tiny Model T Fords, Shriners playing bagpipes, Shriners on floats, Shriners on motorcycles, and her own favorite—Shriners playing snake charmer’s flutes dressed in
“There they are!” Pix cried. They had a fleeting glimpse of the car, now decorated with blue and gold streamers and other Aleford High insignia. Danny and Samantha were just visible, wedged in the midst of the other occupants. Everyone was smiling. The camera panned to the Aleford High Drum and Bugle Corps behind them and a group of pint-sized twirlers.
Two of them dropped their batons. The Patriots’ Day Parade had started. The screen went blank for an instant and then the morning’s reenactment appeared.
“They won’t show any more until they reach the center,” Faith said, staying to watch the reenactment, as she hadn’t earlier. She’d been too eager to tell the police to get a tape. Everyone else stayed, too.
It was like watching something that had occurred months or even years ago, Faith thought. Just as it had been that morning, the figures on the green were scarcely visible in the darkness; then as the day dawned and the action started, the players appeared.
Nelson had answered in the roll call, but the camera was on Gus Deane, so it was impossible to see how Nelson looked. His voice sounded a bit reedy and weak, but the sound quality was not the best. Faith saw him take his place in the line; then the musket fire started and it was impossible to see anyone. She wished she had thought to tape it herself. She wanted to go back over it.
Nelson didn’t look well when the smoke cleared and seemed to stumble as he obeyed Captain Sewall’s commands.
She left the room to call the cable company to find out when it would be broadcast again. She had a feeling it would be replayed often today.
Ben was sitting in the corner. With Tom home, she could take her son out to the celebration for a while.
Not that she felt like celebrating, but she definitely felt like getting out.
They walked across the green toward the reviewing stand, stopping to get Ben his cotton candy. He pulled gauzy pink pieces of it away from the cardboard tube it was wound around. Some was already in his hair.
Faith pulled a piece off, too, and for a moment the grainy sweetness on her tongue tasted good, a reminder of family outings—carnivals, the Jersey shore.
She swallowed. It was enough.
“Come over here by the curb. We’ll be able to see them and wave when they go by,” Faith told Ben.
They hadn’t missed the clowns, more Shriners. They hadn’t missed something else, too.
Millicent Revere McKinley, flag in hand, waving the other with practiced, stately mien, was standing on top of the reviewing platform. She was flanked by two state policemen and there was no mistaking the look of triumph in her eyes.
It had been a long day and it was a long night. The Millers and escort went back home after the parade, only to return for supper at Faith’s insistence. She would have liked to have stayed by Pix’s side until midnight, but Pix had declared that doing nothing was exhausting and she wanted to go to bed early. Devoted friend that she was, Faith could not see herself lying across the bottom of the Millers’ connubial four-poster. In any case, one or more of the dogs usually occupied that position. Dale was relieved by someone from the state police, and Faith tossed and turned all night, afraid the phone would ring.
