John Hart - Down River

He called every week. Sunday night. Eight o’clock. The phone would ring and the number would appear on the handset. Every week he called. And every week I let it ring. Sometimes he left a message. Sometimes, not. We got a letter once. It contained a copy of his divorce decree and a copy of his new will. Jamie still had his ten percent, but my father left control of the farm to Grace and me. He wanted us to protect its future.

Us.

His children.

Grace and I spoke regularly, and things got better with time. The relationship began to feel normal. We asked her to visit, but she always refused. “One day,” she said, and I understood. She was walking blind on a new road. That took concentration. She spoke, once, of our father. “He’s hurting, Adam.”

“Don’t,” I said, and she never raised the subject again.

Dolf came twice, but did not care for the city. We went out to dinner, hit a few bars, told some stories. He looked better than I thought he would, but refused to talk about what the doctors were saying. “Doctors,” he’d say, then change the subject. I asked him once why he’d taken the blame for Danny’s murder. His answer did not surprise me.

“Your dad had a fit when I told him that Danny hit Grace. In all of my life I’d never seen him that angry. Danny went missing right after that. I thought maybe your father killed him.” He shrugged, looked at a pretty girl on the sidewalk. “I was dying anyway.”

I thought about that often: the power of their friendship. Fifty years and more. A lifetime.

His death almost broke me.

I didn’t see it coming, and I wasn’t there when it happened. I went back to Rowan County for one more funeral, and my father told me that Dolf died with the sun on his face. Then he lifted his arms and asked me to forgive him, but I could not speak. I was crying like a child.

When I came back to New York, I was not the same. Not for days. Not for weeks. I dreamed three times of the white deer, and each dream came with more power than the last. His antlers were as smooth as bone, and a gold light shone between them. He stood at the edge of the forest and waited for me to follow, but I never did. I could not face what he wanted to show me, and was wary of what lay beyond the hard, black trees.

I tried to explain the dream to Robin, the power of it, the sense of awe and fear that all but choked me when I bolted up in the dark. I told her that Dolf was trying to tell me something, or maybe my mother; but she shrugged that off. She wrapped me up and said it meant that good still moved in the world. Plain and simple. I tried my best to believe her, but there was a hole in me. So she said it again, whispered with the voice that I loved, Good still moves.

But that’s not what it meant.

There was something behind those trees, some secret place, and I thought I knew what I might find there.

When my mother killed herself, she killed my childhood, too. She took the magic with her. It was too much for me to forgive, too destructive, and in the absence of forgiveness, the anger filled me up, twenty years’ worth, and only now was I beginning to understand. She did what she did, but hers was a sin of weakness, as was my father’s; and while the repercussions of his misdeed were enormous, the sin itself was one of human frailty. That’s what Dolf tried to tell me, and I knew now that his words were not just for my father’s sake, but also for mine. My father’s failing is where the anger started, that’s what set the glass spinning, and every day it seemed a smaller thing. So, I held my woman close, and I told myself that when next I dreamed, I would follow a flash of white. I would walk the dark trail, and I would look at what I feared to see.

Maybe it was magic.

Or forgiveness.

Maybe it was nothing.

At dusk the next Sunday, Robin said that she was going for a walk. She kissed me hard and put the phone in my hand.

I stood at the window and looked at the river. It was not the one I loved. Different color. Different shores. But the water moved. It wore things down and it restored itself, emptied into the same vast sea.

I thought of my own mistakes and of my father, then of Grace and of the things that Dolf had said; how human is human and the hand of God is in all things.

The phone would ring in ten minutes.

I wondered if tonight I would pick it up.

I would describe my books as thrillers or mysteries, but they revolve, also, around family. This is not by accident. We all have families. Good ones, bad ones, absent ones, indifferent ones. For my purposes, it almost doesn’t matter. The leap is easy to make, and readers can relate, regardless. I have often said that family dysfunction makes for rich literary soil, and it truly does. It is fertile ground, the perfect place to cultivate secrets and misdeeds, grow them into explosive stories. Betrayals cut more deeply, pain lingers longer, and memory becomes a timeless thing. For a writer, this is a gift.

So first and foremost, I’d like to thank my own family for putting up with it. My parents are not evil people-they are wonderful. So are my in-laws, my siblings, my wife, and my children. They have been incredibly supportive throughout this process, and I could not have done it without them. This is especially true of Katie, my wife, to whom this book is dedicated. I love you, baby. Thanks for always being there.

The good people at Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin’s Press have also come to feel a bit like family. Special thanks to my editor, Pete Wolverton, a tireless advocate and collaborator. Katie Gilligan, another keen-eyed editor, also has my sincere gratitude. You two make a great team. There are others whom I have come to know, and whose support has been invaluable: Sally Richardson, Matthew Shear, Thomas Dunne, Andy Martin, Jennifer Enderlin, John Murphy, Lauren Manzella, Christina Harcar, Kerry Nordling, Matt Baldacci, Anne Marie Tallberg, and Ed Gabrielli. Thank you all. Thanks also to Sabrina Soares Roberts, who copyedited the manuscript, and to the people who worked so hard in producing the book: Amelie Littell, Cathy Turiano, Frances Sayers, and Kathie Parise. It takes a lot of people to bring a book to publication, and I know that I have not mentioned everyone. Nevertheless, you have all been fabulous.

I would also like to give a shout-out to the VHPS sales force, hard-working, dedicated professionals who do more to ensure a book’s success than most readers will ever know. Thanks for your energy and support.

My agent, Mickey Choate, deserves a special place on this page. Thanks, Mickey. You’ve been a good friend and adviser. Thanks, as well, to Jeff Sanford, my film agent, who is knowledgeable and sure and not scared to tell a good story.

The town of Salisbury also merits a special mention. Like my family, Salisbury does not deserve the darkness I have inflicted upon it. It’s a great town, and I am proud to have been raised there. I do encourage all readers to remember that while the town is real, the people I create are not: not the judges or police officers, not the sheriff or his deputies. I did, however, borrow three names from real people: Gray Wilson, my brother-in-law, Ken Miller, with whom I once worked, and Dolf Shepherd, whom I knew as a boy. Thanks to Gray and Ken, for lending their names, and to Dolf’s family, who gave me permission to use his.

Thanks to the following people, who tried to make magic happen: Brett and Angela Zion, Neal and Tessa Sansovich, Alex Patterson, and Barbara Sieg. You went beyond the call, all of you, and I won’t forget you.

Writing a book requires a lot of time in isolation. Thanks to the following friends, who have gone out of their way to keep me sane: Skipper Hunt, John Yoakum, Mark Witte, Jay Kirkpatrick, Sanders Cockman, Robert Ketner Erick Ellsweig, James Dewey, Andy Ambro, Clint Robins, and James Randolph, who also checked my law.