Page 48 of A River Red With Blood
“I’ll show you out,” said Rakestraw.
“Goodbye, Mrs Rakestraw.”I said.
She continued to watch the sea, but I glimpsed my reflection in the glass, like a pale god rising above the waters.
“Aren’t you going to tell me you’re sorry for my loss?”she asked.
“Would you like me to?”
“Isn’t it the done thing?”
“Not for me,” I said.“Each loss is different.”
“How very profound you are.”
The level of misery and denial in the room was beyond measure.I had no desire to add to it by scoring points off a traumatized woman.I wanted only to get out, but first I made an attempt at conciliation.
“If it helps,” I said, “I’m not working for Ward Vose.I’m working for your son.”
“Then I have bad news for you,” said Hailee Theriault.“You won’t get paid.”
Jerry Rakestraw’s face was a mask, but behind it, his eyes were pleading with me not to engage further.I let him lead the way to the hall, where he opened the door and walked me to my car.
“Don’t leave here despising her,” he said.
“Was it her decision to send Scott to Spero?”
“Yes, but I could have argued more strongly against it.”
I didn’t bother asking why he hadn’t.Hailee was Scott’s mother, and Rakestraw might have seen the appeal of an easier life.If she was prepared to make the hard call, so be it.
“Would you consider it strange if I said I felt sorry for Santopietro and the staff up there?”Rakestraw asked.
“I have a high tolerance for strangeness,” I said.
“The school did exactly what it promised it would, and that didn’t include keeping Scott locked up in his room or chained to a radiator.When he ran away that last time, it turned into a tragedy for everyone.”
“For Scott, most of all.”
“I’m trying here, Mr Parker.”
I wanted to tell him it was too little, too late, but as with Hailee Theriault, those points were too easy to score.
“How much medication is your wife taking?”
“It varies between too much and not enough.Today, I’d say it’s closer to the first.”
I let my gaze pass over the neat house with Old Glory hanging from a pole above the porch, over the trimmed lawn and the beds of fall flowers, and heard the sound of the sea.
“Did Scott ever fit in here?”
“Not really,” said Rakestraw.“Our girls sort of looked up to him, but the age gap was too big for them to be properly close.We all might have gotten along a lot better had he been able to live with his father instead of us, but short of sharing a prison cell, that wasn’t an option.And once we sent him to Spero, any hope of a functioning relationship was blown to pieces.Maybe I was deluded.I had a vision of a happy multiracial family, but it was never that.”
“Would the happy multiracial family have been more politically saleable?”
“That’s quite the question to ask.”
“If you’re going to be all sensitive,” I said, “politics may not be for you.”
