Mother May I(74)

At the first sign of a pause, he put in, “Does Lexie have any close friends around here? Or in her old neighborhood?”

She was adding Dutch cocoa and sugar to her pan, again not measuring, but she paused to say carefully, “You know Lexie had some troubles.”

He nodded, grave. “I am familiar with her history.”

She went to work with a whisk, her dark eyes gleaming whenever she glanced at him. “Well, good, then. I wouldn’t want to gossip. When Coral Lee showed up six months back, I knew it was about Lexie.” Mariah Denton lived right behind her eyes, and every word falling from her crinkly pink mouth had the ring of gospel. If he could ask the right questions, she would tell him what he needed to know.

“Had you stayed in touch?” he asked.

“Not really. Just Christmas cards after the church split. I try to get my cards out by—”

“The church that you went to together split?” he interrupted. He needed to get a rhythm going with her. Question, answer.

“Yes. Over doctrine. The congregation simply shattered. Pastor Farley left town in the dead of night like a criminal, and the bank took the building. After that Larry and I got our preaching off the radio. Now that he’s passed, I take the shuttle bus to the Methodist church. It’s nice. They have a dedicated minister for seniors.”

He nudged her gently back on track. “The church you attended with Mrs. Pine, was it Methodist, too?”

That made her laugh. “Oh, Lord, no! Larry said the Methodists were full of nonsense.” Her whisk paused. “I hope that doesn’t offend you?”

“No, ma’am. Though I am a Methodist,” Marshall said, smiling. He liked her, overshares and all. But he did not have the time to indulge her much.

She smiled back. “We went to a nondenominational church called Christ Redeemer. That was Larry’s pick. He was a good, dear man, but he needed things a certain way. None of it bothered me enough to want to make it a bone of contention.”

“A certain way?” Marshall asked, to get a sense of it.

“Oh, he didn’t think there ought to be musical instruments in the church, and he didn’t hold with dancing or wine or mixed bathing or card games, even Crazy Eights. Larry used to say, ‘Give me a church that’s just plain Bible, nothing added, nothing took away.’” Her tone was wry but fond. “Never mind King David in the Psalms talking all about drums and lyres and dancing. If I pointed that out, though, he’d get all foamy and preach at me. And I like a cappella singing fine.”

She was drifting off topic again. “Mrs. Pine was like Larry in her beliefs?”

“I suppose,” she said, still whisking and whisking. “Except Larry was easy to live with. I love Coral Lee dearly, but that woman is Jesus-bit clean through.” Her tone made it plain that this was not a compliment. She must have seen Marshall’s surprise, because she added, “The Jesus that got his teeth in Coral Lee is not the Jesus I know. Even sterner than Larry’s. Truth be told, I felt sorry for Lexie. Coral Lee would put her braids in so tight you could see the hairs a-pulling at her scalp, like to pop.” She shot him a mischievous glance. “And that right there, young man, is a metaphor.”

It made Marshall chuckle, in spite of everything. “Were you a teacher, ma’am?”

“No, no,” she said. “Unless you count Sunday school. I just like a book in the evenings.”

“Maybe someone else from your old church would have better contact information?” Marshall prompted.

Her mouth turned down. “Might be so, but I mostly went there for Larry. I’ve lost touch with those folks over the years.”

Marshall was learning a lot, but not the right things. Nothing that told him where Lexie might be holed up now. “Did Lexie have a close friend when she was a girl? Someone she might be with now? So far my investigation indicates that she and her mother are not currently together.”

“Oh, no! I hope that doesn’t mean she’s back to her old ways?” She looked genuinely upset at the thought.

He reassured her. “I have no reason to believe she’s fallen off the wagon.”

She turned back to her cocoa. “That’s all right, then. No, Lexie didn’t have friends growing up. Not like you mean. I was her friend.” Mariah was musing almost to herself now as she turned the stovetop off and poured the cocoa into two ceramic mugs, filling both perfectly. “She was homeschooled until after her daddy died and Coral Lee had to go to work. I don’t mean in a co-op or group like they have now. Just her and her mama. That child had no idea how to socialize by the time she got to real school. She was like one of those puppy-mill dogs. She didn’t know how to play.”

He looked at her, very serious. “So you were her friend. But you haven’t heard from her directly? Just her mother?”

She came over and passed him one of the mugs. His said today i need a whole lot of christ and then in tiny letters under and a little bit of coffee. Hers was yellow and said blessed in curly script.

“I meant I was her friend when she was little,” she said, and sat down across from him. “Please understand, I hadn’t seen Coral Lee for years until she showed up here a few months back. I knew her at once, though she looked awful. She told me she’d just dropped Lexie off at a rehab. Sold her house to get the money, which shocked me. It was not Lexie’s first time through, you understand. But then she told me her own diagnosis, so I thought, well, why not sell the house? She hadn’t much time.”