Ann-Marie MacDonald - Way the Crow Flies

“Did you know Claire McCarroll?”

She feels hot again. “Yes.”

It’s Ricky’s lawyer. He is on our side.

“Were you a friend of Claire’s, Madeleine?”

“Yes.”

Then why didn’t you take care of her? Madeleine’s stomach goes gluey.

Mr. Waller says, “Do you know Ricky Froelich?”

“Yes.”

“Was that a yes?”

The judge says, “Yes, yes, it was a yes, the witness nodded, please proceed, Mr. Waller.”

“Were you in the playground with Claire and the other children on the afternoon of April tenth?”

“Yes.” She has to go to the bathroom.

“Speak up, please.”

“Yes.”

“Did Claire tell you—?”

The judge says, “None of that, Mr. Waller.”

Mr. Waller continues, “What did Claire tell you?”

“She told me she was—”

“Speak up, Madeleine.”

“Pardon?”

“What did Claire tell you that afternoon, the afternoon of the tenth of April, in the schoolyard?”

“She said she was going for a picnic with Ricky Froelich.”

Mr. Waller’s shimmering silk robe has begun to look like the uniform of the losing team. He says, “What exactly did Claire say?”

“She said, ‘I’m going for a picnic with Ricky Froelich.’”

“And what did you say?”

“I said — I sang — I hummed ‘Beautiful Dreamer.’”

“Why did you do that?”

“’Cause everyone knows—”

The judge says, “Only say what you know, Madeleine.”

“Because I knew she made things up. Not lies, just … her imagination.”

“Why did you think she made it up?” asks Mr. Waller.

“Because she wanted to go for a picnic with him.”

“No, let me — what I mean is, Madeleine, what made you think that it might just be Claire’s imagination?”

“Well, one time she told me they went to a dance together at Teen Town.”

“And had they?”

“No. Only teenagers are allowed. And she said she was going to marry him.”

Madeleine smiles to show that she isn’t criticizing Claire, but no one else is smiling. There is a table full of things over there in front of the jury. A jar of something brownish. A rag with yellowy spots. Bulrushes. Claire’s Frankie and Annette lunchbox. It’s like show-and-tell. What’s in the jar?

“What did you say, Madeleine?”

Did she ask it out loud?

The judge says, “Cover that table back up, and keep it covered.”

Someone coughs. Mr. McCarroll is sitting on the other side of the aisle from Ricky. He is wiping his lips with a hanky. Seeing him gives Madeleine the idea to call on Claire when she gets home this afternoon. Then something jumps behind her eyes — like when you turn a light switch off and on really fast — and her brain flicks on again and says, “You can’t call on Claire, she’s dead.” Madeleine knows that’s true, but there is something else underneath her brain that wants to walk her feet down the street and call on Claire. Something that knows Claire is still there in the green bungalow, if only someone would go and call on her.

Mr. Plodd covers the table with a white sheet.

“And who else was there when you said — hummed, rather—‘Beautiful Dreamer’?” asks Mr. Waller.

“Um. Colleen.”

“Colleen Froelich?”

“Yes. And Marjorie and Grace.”

“So they overheard Claire say that she had received an invitation—”

The judge says, “Mr. Waller.”

“My lord, I am establishing that Marjorie Nolan and Grace Novotny had a basis for concocting—”

“I know what are you doing, Mr. Waller, and you will refrain from it.”

Jack works through the logic of the two girls’ testimony this morning and finds it flawed. Their story hinges on the claim that Rick asked them to go to Rock Bass that day, presumably to do what he had done to them in the past — namely, molest them. And that when they refused, he asked Claire and she obliged — she must have, because she went with him. But Jack knows that Rick didn’t take Claire to Rock Bass. Therefore, it’s reasonable to conclude that he didn’t invite her. Thus the claim that he only invited her because the other two little girls turned him down falls apart. Rick never invited any of them, because he had no intention of molesting anyone at all.

His neck begins to tighten again. The idea that he could have breathed a sigh of relief at the notion of his friend’s son being a child molester — when did I become that kind of man? All the little girls had crushes on the boy, it’s that simple, and that innocent. Jack is relieved to have unflinchingly faced the most unpleasant part of himself. There is no necessity for Ricky Froelich to be guilty of anything. Besides, he will go free because Madeleine will say which way he turned. Jack reaches for Mimi’s hand and squeezes it to reassure her.

Mr. Waller says, “When did you last see Claire McCarroll that day, Madeleine?”

“Me and Colleen — Colleen and I went to Pop’s—”

“What is ‘Pop’s’?” says his Lordship. “I don’t recall ‘Pop’s.’”

“It’s where we got grape pop,” says Madeleine.

“‘Pop’? Is it Pop or Pop’s?” says the judge.

Pop goes the weasel!

“My lord, ‘Pop’s’ is a local variety store,” says Mr. Waller.

“Is it relevant?”

“No, I don’t believe it is, my lord.”

“Then keep moving through, Mr. Waller, you’re taking five steps when you could be taking two.”

Madeleine has tucked her chin in to keep from laughing, but that always makes her eyes bug out. There is nothing safe you can do with your face except forget about it.

“Where did you go after that, Madeleine?” asks Mr. Waller.

“We were going to the willow tree—”

“The willow tree at the inter—? Where is the willow tree, Madeleine?”

“At the intersection.”

“And which direction would you turn if you wanted to go to Rock Bass?”

“Right.”

The judge says, “Do you mean to say you would turn right to go to Rock Bass?”

“Yes, my lord.” She didn’t mean to use the English accent, but the judge seems not to have noticed.

“Good,” says Mr. Waller. “And you and Colleen were on your way to the willow tree at the intersection.”

“We were going cross-country.” She looks out and meets Colleen’s eyes.

“And you could see the willow tree?”

She looks back at Mr. Waller. “Yes.”

“And you had a clear view of the intersection.”

“Yes.”

“And what did you see?”

“We saw—”

“Only what you saw, please.”

“I saw Ricky and Rex and—”

“Who is Rex?” asks the judge, sounding exasperated.

“The dog, my lord,” says Mr. Waller. “Go on then, Madeleine.”

“And Ricky was pushing Elizabeth in her wheelchair, and Claire was on her bike and Rex was towing her up the road.”

“And they were travelling toward — in which direction were they travelling?”

“Toward the tree.”

“The willow tree.”

“Yes.”

The judge says, “The willow tree and the intersection are one and the same for your purposes, gentlemen.” He is talking to the jury. He turns back to Madeleine. “And then what did you see?”

“We — I saw, um”—Madeleine swallows—“a red-winged blackbird.” And her throat dries.

Mr. Waller doesn’t say anything. He is waiting for her to remember her lines. But Madeleine is silent. Like the frog in the cartoon, who can sing opera but, at the moment of truth, opens his mouth and says, ribbit .

You can hear the creak of the ceiling fan, but you can’t feel any breeze.

Mr. Waller says, “Yes, and what did you see then, when you looked at the intersection?”