Justin Cronin - The Summer Guest

She turned Kate around to show him, and Darryl bent at the neck to look. He gave a little admiring whistle.

“What do you call her?”

“Kate.”

“Well, hello, Miss Kate.” He touched her ear and shifted his eyes to me. “This have something to do with you, Joey?”

“You could say that.”

“Well, good for you. Though under the circumstances I’m afraid it doesn’t change a thing.” Darryl looked at my father then. “Joey says you’re not here. Good thing, because if you were, that would be aiding and abetting.”

My father folded his arms over his chest. “Cut the crap, Darryl. You want to arrest me, too, go right ahead.”

“Joe, if I’d wanted to arrest you, I could have done it long ago. Joey, I’m afraid you’re a different story. I’m guessing you know why these gentlemen are here.”

“Was I speeding?”

Darryl sighed impatiently. “I’ll say it to both of you, right now, and excuse me, Lucy, especially with the new baby and all. But you can just knock it the hell off. This isn’t a social call, and we’re not talking about a few mailboxes, Joey. I’ve got an outstanding warrant for you on the charge of desertion, and it’s my job to arrest you and turn you over to these nice fellows, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. Is that clear to everyone?”

“Nice speech, Darryl,” I said. I looked at the two MPs. “How about it, guys, you want some coffee?”

The taller one, whom I guessed was in charge, checked his watch. His face had a bit of acne. “We don’t have to be back on base until fifteen hundred.”

Darryl frowned. “A little coffee isn’t going to solve this, Joey.”

“Didn’t say it would. Just trying to be hospitable.” I turned to Lucy. “You think my father could mind the baby a minute?”

Lucy passed Kate to my father. Tanner cleared his throat and looked at me cautiously. “No funny stuff, all right, Joey? I would hate to see you make a run for it.”

I wanted to laugh. “Christ, Darryl, where would I go?” I showed the MPs where the kitchen was. “Coffee right through there, guys, cream in the fridge, sugar over the stove. Help yourself to some cookies too. We’ll be back in a minute.”

Lucy followed me upstairs to her room and shut the door behind us. “Joe, they’re going to arrest you.”

“I know.” We sat together on the bed. “I’ll tell you something. I want them to. Not for any reason other than to have this be over. A couple of years, probably. I’ve heard of guys who’ve gotten less.”

She began to cry. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

I took her hands and made her look at me. I’d never felt so certain of anything in my life. “Don’t be, because I’m not. Not anymore. I’m tired of running, Lucy. I need to come home.”

“I want you to, Joe. I think that’s all I ever wanted.”

“Good. Here’s the other thing. I’m sorry this is so fast, but it has to be. I’ll raise Kate, be her father. You can tell Harry, but not for a while, at least until we know what’s going to happen to me. I just want us to be together, a family. Agreed?”

I was prepared to tell her more, but I didn’t have to. She put her arms around me, nodding fiercely.

When we came downstairs five minutes later, everyone was waiting in the kitchen. One of the MPs was holding Kate in his lap while the other was doing itsy-bitsy spider for her. When they saw us the one who was holding her stood quickly, his face flustered with embarrassment, and handed her back to Lucy.

“Sorry, ma’am. Your father said it would be all right. She sure is a cutie. I’ve got a niece not much bigger than that.”

Lucy let the error pass. “I don’t think I got your name, soldier.”

“Samuels, ma’am. Corporal Samuels.” He tipped his head toward his companion. “That’s Hickock.”

“Well, you held her very nicely, Corporal Samuels. You ever want a job babysitting, you come by, all right?”

He nodded nervously, his face pink as a ham. “Yes, ma’am.”

Lucy and I sat at the table and told Darryl Tanner what we wanted to do. He listened to what we had to say, helping himself to Oreos from the open bag on the table as we talked.

“That’s a new one on me,” he said when we were finished, and scratched his head. “Problem is, the state of Maine says a three-day wait once you get the license. But I might be able to pull a string or two, assuming it’s all right with these fellows. What do you say, gentlemen? A little detour?”

They exchanged a look and shrugged. “As long as it’s on the way,” Hickock said. “One guy, we stopped at his mother’s house to help him move a sofa.”

Tanner went to the office to use the phone. A few minutes later he returned, rubbing his hands together.

“Well, you’re in luck. Woman who answered in the county clerk’s office knows my sister pretty well. French Catholic, so this is right up her alley. She says she can backdate the license, so long as we all keep it under our hats. The question of officiation is another issue. The county clerk is away in Florida, got stranded by the storm. But she’s looking around to see who she can scare up.”

Lucy, Kate, and I rode together in the back of Tanner’s cruiser, my father and the MPs following in the jeep. By the time we arrived in Farmington it was after two. We stopped in a diner across from the courthouse for hamburgers and Cokes while Lucy changed Kate’s diaper and the MPs phoned the stockade to tell them we were running late, and then we walked across the street, where the woman Tanner had spoken to on the phone was waiting for us in the clerk’s office. She was a woman in her fifties, round as a beachball and with hair frizzed by too many trips to the beauty parlor. When she saw the MPs she gave a startled look.

“Friends of the family,” I said.

Lucy and I filled out the paperwork, each of us holding Kate while the other one signed the license. Then we followed the woman into an empty courtroom.

“You all have a seat,” she said. “He’ll be along in just a minute.”

“Who will?” Lucy asked, bouncing Kate.

“Carl Hinkle, fellow who owns the shoe store around the corner,” she said.

A little while later the door opened and in walked a slender man wearing a parka over his brown suit, and shiny new loafers.

“Is this my happy couple?” His eyes found the MPs, then Kate, sitting in Lucy’s lap. “I see. I guess we better get a move on.”

“Is this legal?” Lucy asked.

He showed us his JP’s license, a slip of damp paper he produced from the folds of his wallet. Kate had begun to fuss, so we all waited while Lucy fed her, holding her inside her heavy coat.

“Do you want me to say a few words?” Carl asked me quietly. One of the MPs had brought a deck of cards, and the two of them and Darryl Tanner were playing a round of hearts. “Perhaps,” he offered, “given your situation, you’d like something quicker.”

“Take your time,” I said.

After the ceremony we signed some more papers and walked around the block to the shoe store, where Carl told Lucy and me to pick something out. Lucy selected a pair of black mary-janes, and little pink lace-ups for Kate. I tried on a pair of loafers, like Carl’s, but these seemed impractical given where I was headed, and I opted for a pair of steel-toed work boots instead. When we tried to pay, Carl refused.

“Comes with the service,” he explained. “Footwear is a living, but it’s the weddings that are my real calling.”

He kissed Lucy on the cheek, shook my hand and then my father’s. Outside by the jeep, Darryl Tanner officially transferred my custody to the MPs, and Hickock took out a pair of handcuffs from a compartment on his belt.