Gray Mountain: A Novel(57)

When the kids were back in their rooms and the tea was poured, they sat in the semi-dark den and talked about their Monday. According to Annette, there were a lot of homeless people in the mountains. You don’t see them panhandling on the streets, like in the cities, because they usually know someone who’ll share a room or a garage for a week or so. Almost everybody has kinfolk not far away. There are no homeless shelters, no nonprofits dedicated to the homeless. She had a client once, a mother whose teenage son was mentally ill and violent, and she was forced to make him leave. He lived in a pup tent in the woods, surviving off stolen goods and an occasional handout. He almost froze in the winter and almost drowned in a flood. It took four years to get him committed to a facility. He escaped and had never been seen since. The mother still blamed herself. Very sad.

They talked about the Bookers, Phoebe Fanning, and poor Mrs. Crump, who didn’t know whom to give her land to. This reminded Annette of a client once who needed a free will. He had plenty of money because he’d never spent any—“tight as a tick”—and he handed over a prior will, one drafted by a lawyer down the street. The old man had no family to speak of, didn’t like his distant relatives, and wasn’t sure whom to leave his money to. So the prior lawyer inserted several paragraphs of indecipherable drivel that, in effect, left everything to the lawyer. After a few months, the old man got suspicious and showed up in Annette’s office. She prepared a much simpler will, one that gave it all to a church. When he died, the lawyer down the street cried at his wake, his funeral, and his burial, then blew up when he learned of the later will. Annette threatened to report him to the state bar association and he settled down.

Kim and Adam reappeared, now in pajamas, to say good night. Annette left to tuck them in. When their doors were closed, she poured more tea and sat on one end of the sofa. She took a sip and got down to business. “I know you’re spending time with Donovan,” she said, as if this were a violation of something.

Samantha couldn’t deny it; why should she? And did she owe anyone an explanation? “We went flying last Saturday, and the day before we hiked up Dublin Mountain. Why?”

“You need to be careful, Samantha. Donovan is a complicated soul, plus he’s still married, you know?”

“I’ve never slept with a married man. You?”

She ignored the question with “I’m not sure if being married means much to Donovan. He likes the ladies, always has, and now that he’s living alone, I’m not sure anyone is safe. He has a reputation.”

“Tell me about his wife.”

A deep breath, another sip. “Judy is a beautiful girl, but it was a bad match. She’s from Roanoke, kind of a city girl, certainly a stranger to the mountains. They met in college and really struggled with their future together. They say a woman marries a man with the belief she can change him, and she can’t. A man marries a woman with the belief that she won’t change, and she does. We do. Judy couldn’t change Donovan; the more she tried the more he resisted. And she certainly changed. When she came to Brady she tried hard to fit in. She planted a garden and volunteered here and there. They joined a church and she sang in the choir. Donovan became more obsessed with his work and there were repercussions. Judy tried to get him to back off, to pass on some of the cases against the coal companies, but he just couldn’t do it. I think the final straw was their daughter. Judy didn’t want her educated in the schools around here, which is kind of a shame. My kids are doing just fine.”

“Is the marriage over?”

“Who knows? They’ve been separated for a couple of years. Donovan’s crazy about his daughter and sees her whenever he can. They say they’re trying to find a solution, but I don’t see one. He’s not leaving the mountains. She’s not leaving the city. I have a sister who lives in Atlanta, no children. Her husband lives in Chicago, a good job. He thinks the South is inbred and backward. She thinks Chicago is cold and harsh. Neither will budge, but they claim to be happy with their lives and have no plans to split. I guess it works for some folks. Seems odd, though.”

“She doesn’t know he fools around?”

“I don’t know what she knows. It wouldn’t surprise me, though, if they have an agreement, some type of open arrangement.” She looked away as she said this, as if she knew more than she was saying. What should have been obvious suddenly became so, to Samantha anyway. She asked, “Has he told you this?” It seemed a stretch for Annette to merely speculate on such a salacious matter.

A pause. “No, of course not,” she said, without conviction.

Was Donovan using the married man’s favorite line: Let’s have a go, honey, because my wife is doing it too? Perhaps Annette was not as starved for companionship as she pretended to be. Another piece of the puzzle fell into place. Say she was having an affair with Donovan, for either lust or romance or both. Now the new girl in town had his eye. The tension between them was nothing but old-fashioned jealousy, something Annette could never admit, but couldn’t hide either.

Samantha said, “Mattie and Chester talked about Donovan. They seem to think Judy got scared when the harassment started, said there were anonymous phone calls, threats, strange cars.”

“True, and Donovan is not the most popular person in town. His work irritates a lot of people. Judy felt the sting a few times. And as he’s gotten older, he’s become even more reckless. He fights dirty, and so he wins a lot of cases. He’s made a bunch of money and, typical of trial lawyers, his ego has expanded with his bank accounts.”