The Unforgiven Read online

Maggie was only dimly aware of their conversation as she moved toward the file cabinet. She tried to concentrate on the simple errand she had to accomplish, but her mind was still reeling from what she had heard from the hallway. She should have known that it would get back. On an island like this, gossip would travel in no time. She was grateful that Jess hadn’t been in the room to hear it. Sooner or later, he probably would.

  At least Evy had defended her. She tried to hold on to that fact, knowing it should make her feel better. But it was not enough. She was trying so hard to be inconspicuous, but it seemed as if everything she did left the wrong impression.

  Right at her eye level, atop the cabinet, she saw the black strips of film, poking out of a tissue paper sleeve. Grateful that she would not have to hunt for them, Maggie grabbed the handful of negatives.

  It was not until she was in the act of jerking them off the cabinet that Maggie saw the coffee mug. It was resting atop the cabinet, steam issuing over the rim, its lower edge overlapping the negatives. Even as Maggie yanked at the film strips, she helplessly watched the cup spin, spill, and begin to roll. The burning hot liquid splashed over her hand, and she heard the crash of the cup on the floor.

  “Ahhh,” Maggie cried out and clutched her throbbing hand. The negatives fell to the floor and began to curl from the heat of the coffee.

  “Shit!” Owen yelled. “My film!”

  Owen scrambled for the negatives while Maggie squeezed and shook her aching hand.

  “What’d you do?” Grace asked angrily, coming over to them. Evy stood behind her, peering down. Grace reached for Maggie’s hand.

  “Don’t touch me,” Maggie hissed at her, drawing back.

  “Don’t worry,” said Grace. “I don’t intend to.” She began to mutter as she bent down to gather up the chips of the mug beside Owen, who was moaning and squinting up at the transparent strips in the light.

  Maggie clenched her teeth and tried to will the pain away. She looked up and saw Evy watching her, the faintest suggestion of a smile on her face.

  Maggie stared at her. “What’s so funny?” she asked angrily, shaking her throbbing hand.

  “Nothing,” said Evy in an injured tone. “You should put some cold water on that.”

  Maggie turned her back on the girl.

  “Come on,” said Evy. “Let me help you.” She took hold of Maggie’s arm and steered her over to the sink.

  5

  You’re taking a chance, Jess thought to himself as he eased the car into a parking space on Main Street. Maybe she’d rather not spend her Saturday with you. He switched off the engine and sat behind the wheel, staring at the dashboard for a while. He knew he should probably call her first, but he figured it would be harder for her to refuse him face-to-face. It had been a long time, he reflected, since he had felt so inept. For a moment he wondered if it wouldn’t be better to just spend the day alone, as usual. Then, purposefully, he clambered out of the car and slammed the door.

  As he walked up Main Street, glancing in windows, he tried to think about Sharon and what she had liked. All he was able to remember was the scrimshaw necklace he had brought home to her one day after she had been feeling low for weeks. She had lifted the lid of the box and stared at the pendant with a dull look in her eyes. The carving on it was of a ship, fully rigged, and Jess had thought it quite handsome. He waited for her to smile. Instead, she had picked up the neckpiece and rolled it around in her fingers. Then she had turned abruptly and hurled it across the room. It smashed against one of the kitchen cabinets and dropped into the salad bowl. Without another word she had turned and walked away from him.

  Jess sighed and peered unseeing into the window nearest him until the pricking behind his eyes subsided. Then he continued up the street.

  Physically, he thought, the two women were not at all alike. Sharon had been blond and diminutive, her skin brown in the summers when he first knew her. In the winters her color had faded into a sallow, yellowish hue. Maggie’s white skin reminded him of a polished stone, and he liked her red hair. Maybe he would get her a scarf to drape loosely around her white throat. He remembered Sharon, seated at her vanity, saying she was glad she was not a redhead. There were so few colors they could wear. Jess frowned and wondered if it were true. It seemed to him that Maggie would look good in any shade he could think of.

  He thought of flowers, realizing that it would mean driving out to the nursery on Eagle Rock Road. But flowers died so quickly and had to be thrown away. He wanted to give her something she would keep. Something that would make her think of him each time she used it. For a moment Jess stood on the curb, tapping his foot impatiently. “Perfume, maybe,” he said aloud. He looked up and down the street, then crossed over, in a loping gait, to the drugstore.

  Jess turned up the Thornhill driveway and pulled up beside the old black Buick. He chuckled, remembering Maggie’s description of it over lunch. “One automobile wreck included, no extra charge.”

  The house seemed unusually quiet, and he wondered if Maggie could possibly still be asleep. He looked at his watch. It was almost noon. Nobody slept that late, he reasoned, and he got out of his car and ran up the porch steps. He opened the screen door and pounded on the wooden doorframe.

  There was no answer. Jess knocked again and then called out, but no one came to the door. Leaning over the porch railing, he craned his neck to see into the kitchen window. Everything was neatly in place, but there was no sign of Maggie.

  I should have called first, he thought in annoyance. He turned and descended the steps. Just then he saw her, standing with her back to him, pulling shut the side door to the garage. She was wearing a bandanna on her head, her hands and forearms smudged with black grease.

  Jess grinned and called out to her. “Hello, there.”

  Maggie jumped and turned, staring at him in surprise.

  “Hi,” he said. “Didn’t you hear me drive up?”

  Maggie shook her head.

  “Looking over your estate?” he asked with a nervous laugh, starting toward her.

  She met him halfway between the house and the garage. “I just wanted to see what was in there,” she explained.

  “Find anything interesting?”

  Maggie glanced down at her greasy hands and then looked up at him, her face flushed. “Well, there’s a bike. It needs fixing, though. How long have you been here?”

  “Just a few minutes. When you didn’t answer the door I was afraid I’d missed you.”

  “Do you want to come in?” she said, avoiding his eyes.

  “You’re not angry that I came, are you?” he asked uncertainly.

  Maggie met his apprehensive eyes. She could not tell him that she had found herself thinking about him all morning. But now that he was here, she felt troubled. She had vowed to herself that she would try to steer clear of him. She could see that her silence was making him uncomfortable. “I’m glad you’re here,” she told him, pushing back a strand of hair, which had flopped on her forehead, with the side of her hand. “It’s just that I’m a mess.”

  “You look great,” he said eagerly.

  She tried to smile, but it resembled a grimace. “Come on in,” she said. She turned away and started up the steps toward the house. Jess followed her through the back door. “This is a great house,” he said, looking around the living room.

  “It is,” Maggie agreed. “Make yourself comfortable. I have to clean up.” Jess sat down. He heard the water running in the kitchen. Suddenly he remembered the package in his coat pocket. Maggie entered the living room wiping her hands on a dish towel. She had taken off the bandanna and her hair tumbled free around her face. Jess fished out the package and offered it to her.

  “I brought you something.”

  Maggie looked down at it, then looked up at him, a question in her eyes.

  “Open it,” he urged.

  He noticed that her fingers trembled as she unwrapped the paper, and that the sun streaming through the windows glinted gold through
the coppery hair that fell around her face. She held up the small, pear-shaped bottle, tied with a gold string.

  “Perfume,” he said. For one moment he remembered Sharon, silently fingering the necklace.

  Maggie chewed on her lower lip, then looked up and smiled at him, her eyes guarded but pleased. “Thank you,” she said. “That was so nice of you.”

  Relieved, Jess shrugged it off. “I thought you might like to take a look at some puppies. Some people I know have a new litter of mutts.”

  Maggie hesitated. “I don’t know.”

  “Oh, come on,” he said. “At least take a look. You don’t have to get one right away if you don’t want it.”

  “Well,” she said softly, “I do want a puppy.”

  “Get yourself a jacket,” he ordered. “It’s windy today. I’ll wait in the car.”

  Maggie stood at the door and watched him thoughtfully as he walked to the car. His step was springy and boyish, and the aimless tune he hummed drifted back to her on the breeze. She looked down at the bottle he had given her. It glistened in her palm, like an enormous teardrop, trembling there. When she looked up again, he was already at the car, leaning on the open door. He waved to her to hurry up. A cloud passed over the sun, casting a shadow on his gentle face and causing her to shiver.

  She walked over to the mantel of the fireplace and placed the bottle of perfume there, admiring its amber glow in the streaks of sunlight. She removed the top and smelled it. The scent was delicious to her senses. Then she replaced the stopper and arranged the bottle between two candlesticks. It was almost too pretty to use, she thought. With a happy sigh she headed for her bedroom and her dresser, in search of a sweater.

  Five fuzzy white and nut-brown rumps protruded from the side of the sad-eyed mother. The dog and her pups lay in a large, low-sided cardboard box, atop a dirty, faded quilt. The squealing and sucking of her offspring did not seem to faze the bitch, who stared at her visitors with languid eyes.

  “How old are they, Ned?” Jess asked the farmer, who was leaning against the doorjamb of the musty shed where the pups were kept.

  The dark-haired man rubbed his stubbled jaw and squinted at the beams of the small, peaked roof. “Nearly six weeks now, I guess.”

  “What do you think, Maggie?” Jess asked.

  Maggie watched in rapt attention as, one by one, the pups disengaged themselves from their mother’s teats and began to stagger around the quilt-lined box. The two largest ones curled up on top of each other in a heap in the corner and began to snooze. One of the others remained, sucking at the mother, and a fourth sniffed around the side of the box. The smallest wandered gamely toward the opening of the box, leaned over, and tumbled off the quilt onto the warped, straw-covered floorboards of the shed.

  Ned Wilson reached down and scooped up the tiny adventurer and replaced him by his mother’s side. “There you go,” he said.

  “I love them,” said Maggie. “Especially that little one.”

  “That’s the runt,” Ned informed her.

  “That’s the one I want,” she said.

  “Ned,” said Jess, “seems my friend here wants a dog. What’s the going price on one of these pups?”

  “Well,” said the farmer, “that I don’t know about. I’m gonna have to talk to Sadie about that. Livvy here is her dog, really.”

  “Livvy?” Maggie asked.

  “Yup,” said Ned. “Named after Olivia de Havilland in Gone With the Wind. Sadie’s upstairs vacuuming. Let me just run up and get her,” said Ned. “I’ll be right back.”

  As the farmer departed, Jess and Maggie crouched down to have a closer look at the pups. “Sadie’ll probably just give him to you,” Jess said, running a forefinger over the puppy’s delicate skull. “Nobody ever buys these mutts. Especially not the runt.”

  “Hey,” Maggie protested. “He’s the cutest one of them all. Besides, he’s going to be my watchdog one of these days. Aren’t you,” she murmured to the little animal.

  “Kind of a puny watchdog,” Jess observed.

  “He’ll grow,” she said. Then she looked up at Jess and smiled. “They’re perfect,” she said. “Thanks for bringing me here.”

  “I figured you’d like them,” he said. “Besides, I was glad for an excuse to come and see you.”

  Maggie shook her head. “Don’t say that.” She scrambled to her feet.

  Jess straightened up beside her. “Why not?” he asked. “It’s true.” A darkening in the doorway interrupted him.

  Ned cleared his throat. “Excuse me, folks. I brought Sadie.” A thin woman who only came up to Ned’s shoulder stood in front of him in the doorway. She wore sneakers, baggy gray pants, and a cherry-colored cardigan. Her graying hair was pinned in a severe topknot. The woman peered suspiciously into the unlit shed.

  “Sadie,” Ned went on, “you know Jess. And this here’s his friend, Maggie. They come up to see the pups.”

  Maggie anxiously extended her hand to the older woman. Sadie gave her a perfunctory grip with her thin, muscled hand, then wiped her palm on her trousers.

  “The puppies are beautiful,” Maggie said. “I’d like to buy that little one from you.”

  “I’m not selling ’em,” said Sadie.

  “I don’t understand,” Maggie stammered. “I thought…”

  “I’m glad to get rid of ’em,” said Sadie. “You can just take it.”

  With a beaming smile, Maggie bent down toward the pups.

  “Not yet,” Sadie yelped. “Didn’t Ned tell you they’re too young to leave their mother?”

  “Aw, Sadie,” Ned protested. “It’s just a matter of a couple of days.”

  “I said not yet,” the old woman insisted. “When they’re ready.”

  “I can wait a few days,” Maggie soothed her. “I’ve waited this long. I’ll come back whenever you say.”

  Sadie sniffed but seemed satisfied with this compromise. “You got to take care of him,” she warned.

  “I will,” Maggie promised.

  “Did you ever have a dog before?” Sadie asked.

  “No, I haven’t,” Maggie admitted.

  “Why not?” the old woman demanded.

  Maggie looked at her guiltily. “Well, I…”

  “Maggie never had the space before,” Jess interceded. “She used to live in an apartment.”

  Surprised by his response, Maggie suddenly remembered that that was the lie she had told him. Sadie chewed over the piece of information suspiciously.

  “Well, I guess we’d better be going,” said Maggie. “Let you get back to your cleaning.” She edged past the couple in the doorway and down the path. “Thank you so much.”

  “That dirt’s not going away on its own. That’s for sure,” Sadie complained.

  Jess caught up to Maggie in the Wilson driveway. “Hey, you were in an awful hurry to get out of there.”

  “I didn’t want to give Sadie a chance to change her mind,” she said.

  “She’s a slippery customer, all right,” Jess laughed.

  “I got a puppy,” Maggie exulted.

  “Keep it down,” Jess warned her. “You’re not safe until we’re out of the driveway.”

  “Weren’t they adorable?” Maggie cried.

  “They were. Yours especially.”

  Maggie threw her arms around his neck and squeezed him. “Thank you, thank you.”

  Jess wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close to him. “I’m glad you’re happy,” he whispered.

  Maggie pulled back, embarrassed by the impulsive embrace. Jess held onto her. His lips followed and met hers. His kiss was short but insistent. When he drew back, her lips felt as if they had been stung. They wanted to be stung again. Instead, she pushed his shoulders away lightly with her palms. “We’d better go,” she said.

  “That kiss will be all over the island,” he agreed wryly, glancing back at the Wilson farmhouse.

  Jess charted a meandering route back to Maggie’s, which included a stop for clam rol
ls down by the Clearview landing and a tour of some of the narrow dirt roads that wound surreptitiously through the island forests. The sun was already sinking into the ocean as they wended their way back toward Liberty Road.

  The salt breeze ran through Maggie’s hair like fingers and the rays of the sun, although weak, warmed her elbow as the car sped along. She turned her face from the window and studied Jess. He smiled at her.

  “Glad you came?” he asked.

  “Very.”

  “I was thinking about you last night.”

  “You were?”

  “Well, I was thinking about asking you to come look at the puppies today, and go for a ride, but I was worried that you’d had enough of the office for one week, and maybe that included me.”

  “No,” she admitted. “Not you.”

  “Owen Duggan called me this morning, by the way. He printed up those negatives last night, and he only lost about three shots. He asked me to tell you not to be concerned about it.”

  “That was thoughtful of him,” said Maggie, recalling for an instant the quizzical look on his face as he had shaken her hand, as if he were trying to place her. She tried to shake off the disturbing impression.

  “The first week is always a little rough, Maggie.”

  “I know,” she said after a pause.

  “How’s the hand?”

  Maggie flexed her fingers gingerly. “Better. It’s okay.”

  “I still don’t know how that happened,” he said.

  “I just wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing.” For a moment she remembered Tom and Grace’s scornful laughter as she stood in the corridor, and Evy’s fleeting look of amusement. She could picture Owen Duggan’s negatives curling under the heat of the coffee. A sigh escaped her. Nothing was going as it should, she thought.

  “There’s Evy’s house, on the left,” said Jess, gesticulating out the window. Maggie turned and saw the flash of gray, and a sign reading Barrington Street, as they slowed at the corner. “What’s the sigh for?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” said Maggie firmly. “That’s where Evy lives?”

  “Are you sure?” Jess asked, frowning at her.