But he already knows the answer. Growing up among Cajuns and the Creoles wasn't all that far a stretch from tending to the Acadians in his parish. The proof of that rests in his breast pocket, public records copied by a clerk at the Louisiana Vital Records Registry in New Orleans. Arthur Gwynne, born 10/23/43 to Cecilia Marquette Gwynne and her husband, Alexander Gwynne. Four years later, the marriage of Cecelia Marquette Gwynne, widowed, to Teodor Szyszynski. And in 1951, the birth of Glen.
Half-brothers.
Szyszynski's will was last revised in 1994; it is entirely possible that Arthur Gwynne is no longer a member of the Belle Chasse community. But it is a starting point. Priests don't go unnoticed in a predominantly Catholic town; if Gwynne had any contact at all with his neighbors, Patrick knows he can pick up a paper trail and track his whereabouts from there. To this end, there is another clue in his pocket, one ripped from the rear of a phone book. Churches. The largest one is Our Lady of Mercy.
He doesn't let himself think what he will do with the information, once he gets it.
Patrick turns the corner, and the cathedral comes into view. He jogs up the stone steps and enters the nave. Immediately in front of him is a pool of Holy Water. Flickering candles cast waves on the walls, and the reflection from a stained-glass window bleeds a brilliant puddle on the mosaic floor. Above the altar, a cypress carving of Jesus on the cross looms like an omen.
It smells of Catholicism: beeswax and starch and darkness and peace, all of which bring Patrick back to his youth. He finds himself unconsciously making the sign of the cross as he slides into a pew at the rear of the building.
Four women nod their heads in prayer, their faith settling softly around them, like the skirts of Confederate belles. Another sobs quietly into her hands while a priest comforts her in whispers. Patrick waits patiently, running his hands along the bright, polished wood and whistling under his breath.
Suddenly the hair stands up on the back of his neck. Walking along the lip of the pew behind him is a cat. Its tail strokes Patrick on the nape again, and he lets out his breath in a rush. "You scared the hell out of me," he murmurs, and then glances at the carving of Jesus. "The heck," he amends.
The cat blinks at him, then leaps with grace into the arms of the priest who has come up beside Patrick.
"You know better," the priest scolds.
It takes Patrick a moment to realize the cleric is speaking to his kitten. "Excuse me. I'm trying to locate a Father Arthur Gwynne."
"Well." The man smiles. "You found me."
Every time Nathaniel tries to see his mother, she's sleeping. Even when it's light outside; even when it's time for Franklin on Nickelodeon. Leave her alone, his father says. It's what she wants. But Nathaniel doesn't think that's what his mother wants at all. He thinks about how sometimes in the middle of the night he wakes up dreaming of spiders under his skin and screams that don't go away, and the only thing that keeps him from running out of the room is how dark it is and how far it seems from his bed to the door.
"We have to do something," Nathaniel tells his father, after it has been three days, and his mother is still asleep.
But his father's face squeezes up at the top, like it does when Nathaniel is yelling too loud while he's having his hair washed and the sound bounces around the bathroom. "There's nothing we can do," he tells Nathaniel.
It's not true. Nathaniel knows this. So when his father goes outside to put the trash cans at the end of the driveway (Two minutes, Nathaniel. . . you can sit here and be good for two minutes, can't you?) Nathaniel waits until he can no longer hear the scratch-drag on the gravel and then bolts upstairs to his bedroom. He overturns his garbage can to use as a stool and takes what he needs from his dresser. He twists the knob to his parents' room quietly, tiptoes inside as if the floor is made of cotton.
It takes two tries to turn on the reading lamp near his mother's side of the bed, and then Nathaniel crawls on top of the covers. His mother isn't there at all, just the great swollen shape under the blankets that doesn't even move when he calls her name. He pokes at it, frowns. Then he pulls away the sheet.
The Thing That Isn't His Mother moans and squints in the sudden light.
Her hair is wild and matted, like the brown sheep at the petting zoo. Her eyes look like they've fallen too deep in her face, and grooves run the length of her mouth. She smells of sadness. She blinks once at Nathaniel, as if he might be something she remembers but can't quite fish to the front of her mind. Then she pulls the blankets over her head again and rolls away from him.
"Mommy?" Nathaniel whispers, because this place cries for quiet. "Mommy, I know what you need."
Nathaniel has been thinking about it, and he remembers what it felt like to be stuck in a dark, dark place and not be able to explain it. And he also remembers what she did, back then, for him. So he takes the sign-language binder he got from Dr. Robichaud and slips it under the blankets, into his mother's hands.
He holds his breath while her hands trace the edges and rifle through the pages. There is a sound Nathaniel has never heard before-like the world opening up at the start of an earthquake, or maybe a heart breaking-and the binder slips from beneath the sheets, cracking open onto the floor. Suddenly the comforter rises like the hinged jaw of a white whale and he finds himself swallowed whole.
Then he is in the spot where he put the sign-language book, smack in the middle of her arms. She holds him so tight there is no room for words between them, spoken or signed. And it doesn't matter one bit, because Nathaniel understands exactly what his mother is telling him.
Christ, I think, wincing. Turn off the lights.
But Fisher starts laying out papers and briefs on the blankets, as if it is every day that he conducts meetings with a client too exhausted to leave her bedroom. Then again, what do I know? Maybe he does.
"Go away," I moan.
"Bottom line: He had a bone marrow transplant," Fisher says briskly. "You shot the wrong priest. So we need to figure out how to use that to our best advantage and get you off." Before he remembers to check himself, his eyes meet mine, and he cannot hide it: the shock and, yes, distaste of seeing me like this. Unwashed, undressed, uncaring.
Yes, look, Fisher, I think. Now you don't have to pretend I'm crazy.
I roll onto my side, and some of the papers flutter off the edge of the bed. "You don't have to play this game with me, Nina," Fisher sighs. "You hired me so that you won't go to jail, and goddammit, you're not going to jail." He pauses, as if he is about to tell me something important, but what he says doesn't matter at all. "I've already filed the paperwork requesting a jury, but you know, we can waive it at the last minute." His eyes take in my nightgown, my tangled hair. "It might be easier to convince one person that . . . that you were insane."
I pull the covers over my head.
