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Sweet Thyme Baby – 42

Written by Drusilla on November 17th, 2012

 

Copyright © 2012 by Drusilla Campbell. All Rights Reserved.

42

(Start at the Beginning of Sweet Thyme Baby)

(Click here to read Section 41 first)

 

“Well, good morning to you, Sleepyhead,” Maggie said as Dee walked into the kitchen the next morning. She handed her a cup of coffee. “I was going to send the National Guard upstairs to roust you.”

 

“That’s a lovely thought.” Dee took an ice tray from the freezer and banged it on the edge of the sink to loosen the cubes. She dropped one cube in her coffee mug. She put the tray back and closed the freezer with her shoulder. “What time is it?”

 

“Almost eight-thirty,” Pinkus said as he spooned creamed cereal into Sweet Thyme.

 

“There’s good news,” George said. “Hamish came home.”

 

Relief made Dee weak in the knees.

 

“Seems like he fell asleep somewhere.”

 

“Not a thing wrong with him,” Pinkus said. “He talked about some people from the Del Mar Fair but he was probably delirious or dreaming or something.”

 

“It’s not all good news,” Maggie said.

 

George pulled a chair away from the breakfast table and urged Dee to sit. “Janet Wexler called at seven. Seven a.m. can you believe it?”

 

“She was all set to charge right over,” Maggie said. “I managed to hold her off until nine.” She placed a dish of mango slices at Dee’s place. “The mood she was in, you better eat up. You need your strength.”

 

George shook a baby bottle on his wrist to check the milk’s temperature. Maggie whipped eggs for scrambling and Pinkus made a fuss over Sweet Thyme. Dee stared at the mango slices. She thought of peaches sliced by her grandmother and top-milk poured over them. She remembered Serena’s cheeks sticky with the juice of a nectarine.

 

Hamish. Hamish was home.

 

“That Wexler woman’s a land mine,” Pinkus said.

 

“Maggie put her on speaker phone. You should have seen my Sweet Thyme angel’s little face wrinkle up like a walnut when he heard her voice. I was sure he’d start in screaming.”

 

“Her voice’d scratch a diamond,” Maggie said.

 

Janet Wexler wants to ruin me, Dee thought, and wondered how she knew this so surely. She got up and poured another cup of coffee as her friends watched and waited for her to say something, but she was flat out of ideas.

 

Sweet Thyme smiled at her.

 

“Did you guys go to the police?”

 

“We did,” George said. “And an officer ran Sweet Thyme’s description through the computer and there’s absolutely no record. No missing infant his age, his coloring –.”

 

“He had to come from somewhere.”

 

“It’s a nationwide data bank.”

 

“Abandoned, I’d say.”

 

Pinkus said, “Someone probably came to the funeral and knew he’d be safe in the garden…”

 

Dee wondered why wishful thinking always ended in disappointment. Couldn’t the wildest dreams come true once in a while? Babies got lost, babies drowned or vanished. Couldn’t one of them be found? Couldn’t two? She looked at Pinkus with his sunny face and matronly hips. At George, a battered ex-con with gaps in his teeth and ink scarred into his arms: an upside down heart, an eagle rampant, Born to Lose. They were a perverse American Gothic and as devoted to one another as any couple Dee had ever known…

 

“I suppose you should call child welfare…”

 

A light flared in Pinkus’s eyes.

 

Dee had to laugh. “Don’t worry, I’m not saying do it. If no one’s looking for him, I guess it means no one wants him except us.” She put a finger on Sweet Thyme’s dimpled chin. “Welcome to the family, little boy.”

 

Sweet Thyme held out his arms to her.

 

Maggie said, “Go on, Dee, hold him. You never have.”

 

“I’m getting a cold.” She turned her back on them and rinsed her coffee cup in the sink. Just outside, Sissypuss prowled the window sill.

 

“Did anyone feed the cat?”

 

*

 

At just before nine Dee was at the workbench transplanting stock and snapdragon seedlings when Janet Wexler came into the shop. Dee’s first thought was that Janet had dressed for the occasion in her civic leader costume: navy blue blazer and slacks, red and white striped shirt, sensible expensive shoes.

 

“I feel like I should pledge allegiance.”

 

Oops.

 

“I wish I didn’t have to do this, Dee.”

 

Then why do you look so pleased with yourself?

 

Janet opened her oxblood leather briefcase and handed Dee a document. “This is an order for you to appear before the court to explain why your garden isn’t fenced and why there aren’t any signs warning people of the dangers.”

 

“It is fenced.”

 

“It needs to be enclosed all the way around. And locks on any gate.”

 

“People walk in the garden. They take picnics to the graveyard and watch the whales.”

 

“Hamish used the gate.”

 

“The garden is for people, Janet.”

 

“Well, then I think you’ll like what Lance has in mind. He and I’ve spoken and I know about your tax bill and I think there’s a fairly simple solution whereby we can all come away satisfied.” Janet Wexler smiled like a carnival barker. “Everybody wins if you just consent to sell the Sea Meadows to Lance and use the money to pay your taxes and fence the garden. Let me broker the deal for you and I’ll make sure there’s a little left over for investment –.”

 

“If Lance gets his conference center, Cabrillo Point will change completely, Janet. Have you thought of that?”

 

“Not everyone wants to hide out from progress.”

 

The words “hide out” made Dee wonder how much Janet knew about her. How much had Victor told Lance and what had Lance passed on to this woman? “The Sea Meadows are not for sale.”

 

“I’m certainly not suggesting you give up the whole garden. What would we all do without you, Dee? But you’re not thinking clearly. You owe back taxes, there’s going to be federal income tax on the inheritance and you never know, the Whitbys might want to sue. For pain and suffering. I advise you to give Lance what he wants and save yourself a whole lot of hassle. Juries award huge damages to grieving parents.”

 

“Hamish is home. His parents are rejoicing, not grieving.”

 

“You fight this, you’re fighting the inevitable. Give in. You can’t win.”

 

It was as if Janet were speaking from a script written while Hamish was lost in the garden, a script written by whom exactly? Without asking, she knew that Victor was in on it. She imagined the gut-knot anxiety from sunrise to sunset and screaming through her dreams. Last time the jury had taken away her freedom. This time they would take the only thing she had left, the garden.

 

Janet said, “Why complain about losing a few acres? For some reason the Ryans left you the best piece of undeveloped land in Southern California. You don’t need the Sea Meadows. You’re rich without them.”

 

“I don’t want to be rich.” Or famous or even popular. She wanted to be left alone.

 

Janet laughed. Everyone wanted to be rich! “I think this community was very tolerant of Con and Carlotta and all their strays. Can you imagine La Jolla putting up with the parade of bums that came through this garden? I never could understand how they put up with having them in their home. But you, you were different from the start, Dee. We all knew that and we wanted everything to work out for you. And we understood you maybe wanted to keep your own counsel, but there’s a limit.”

 

“I don’t ask you personal questions, I don’t shove myself into your private affairs. Return the courtesy, Janet. Leave me alone.”

 

“Hamish is fine today, but what about the next child who wanders into the garden? God bless me, it could be one of my own.”

 

“Go away. This is my garden –.”

 

“I wonder about that. I wonder why the Ryans left it to you. Who were you to them anyway? From what Lance tells me, you didn’t exactly come here from a nunnery.” Janet cocked her head to one side in a parody of curiosity. “Remember the man who carved animals out of soap and gave them away to children to encourage bathing? Why didn’t they leave the garden to him? Or to Maggie? Or the queers.”

 

*

 

Dee watched Janet stride across the gravel parking lot to her Volvo station wagon. Maggie, George and Pinkus rushed through the back door of the nursery shop.

 

“What did she want?” George asked.

 

Pinkus groaned. “To mess up our lives, of course.”

 

Dee said, “George, how’s the car running?”

 

“So-so. The a.c. doesn’t work but you know that.”

 

“Why do you care about the car?” Maggie asked. “You don’t have a driver’s license, do you?”

 

“When’re you coming back?” Pinkus asked.

 

“You never leave Cabrillo Point.”

 

Copyright © 2012 by Drusilla Campbell. All Rights Reserved.

 

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