J odi Taylor and I flew to Louisiana the next day, catching the seven A.M. flight through Dallas/Fort Worth and arriving in Baton Rouge just before noon. We rented a gray Ford Thunderbird in my name and drove to Lucy Chenier's office. Jodi wanted to apologize, and I didn't argue. I phoned Lucy's office from the airport and told her assistant that we were on our way. Darlene said, "I didn't think we'd see you again."
"Miracles happen."
Darlene said, "Unh-hunh."
Lucy greeted us pleasantly at the door, offering her hand first to me, then Jodi. I was grinning as wide as a collie in a kibble factory, but Lucy seemed cool and somehow distant, and her handshake was professional. "Hello, Mr. Cole. Hello, Ms. Taylor. Please come in." Like that.
We sat, and Lucy told us that Sid had phoned and that they had discussed what had happened and why, and she said that she would certainly be happy to continue assisting Jodi in whatever way possible. She said it to Jodi and did not once look at or speak to me. I said, "Hi, remember me?"
"Of course. It's nice to see you again." Professional. Lawyerly. She refocused on Jodi.
Jodi said, "I knew Sid was going to phone, but I wanted to personally apologize for what happened. I should've been honest with you, and feel ashamed of myself."
Lucy stood and came around her desk. "Please don't be. Are you going to introduce yourself to Edith Boudreaux?"
Jodi Taylor shook her head and also stood. It seemed as if we had just arrived. "I don't want to meet these people, and I don't want to know them. I guess I just want to see them. Can you understand that?"
Lucy took her hand. "Of course, I can. We all have that curiosity. Seeing her is a way of seeing a part of yourself, even if you have no wish to know her."
Jodi said, "Yes. That's it."
Lucy said, "If there is any way I can help you, even if you just want to talk, don't hesitate to call."
"Thank you."
I told Jodi that I would be along in a moment, and she left. Lucy was standing at the door, still not looking at me. I said, "Is there something here that I'm missing?"
"I don't think so."
"Would you join me for dinner tonight?"
"That's very nice, but I can't."
"We could bring Ben."
She shook her head.
"Are you angry?"
"Of course not. I think Jodi is waiting for you."
"You sound angry."
She raised her eyebrows. "If Jodi requires my assistance she may call any time. She has the number."
"I'll tell her. Thank you."
I walked out of the office, and Jodi and I went down to the car. I got in behind the wheel and she climbed into the passenger seat, neither of us speaking. Jodi sat with her knees up and her hands clasped between her legs, staring out the window. She said, "What's wrong with you?"
"Nothing. Nothing is wrong with me."
She frowned at me and then she went back to staring out the window.
We crossed the Mississippi River, and pretty soon Baton Rouge was behind us. We made good time past Erwinville and Livonia and Lottie, and, at 1:36 that afternoon, we neared the exit for Eunice. I said, "Edith Boudreaux lives here with her husband and her family. She's married to a man named Jo-el Boudreaux. He's the sheriff. She has a dress shop in the center of town. Her father lives here, too. Leon Williams's sister is a woman named Chantel Michot. She lives fourteen miles north of here. You were born in a private home thirty miles north of here, above Ville Platte. What do you want to see first?"
"I want to see the woman." The woman. You knew she didn't mean Chantel Michot. You knew she meant Edith Boudreaux.
We left the highway, and Jodi put both hands on the dashboard and held herself with an expectancy that was a physical thing within the car.
I brought her to Edith Boudreaux's home first. Edith and her husband lived in a well-kept brick colonial ringed with azaleas bright with flowers and a large, neat yard. The street was quiet and slow; warm, with the smell of fresh-cut St. Augustine grass and scores of great black and yellow bumblebees lumbering around the azaleas. A shirtless black teenager pushed a mower along the side of the street, and nodded at us when we passed. I let the Thunderbird slow, and we stopped at the mouth of the drive. Jodi twisted in the seat, eyes wide. Neither the sheriff's highway car nor Edie's Oldsmobile Eighty-eight was present. Jodi said, "Is that where she lives?"
"Yes. She drives an Oldsmobile, and it's not here. She's not home."
"She's married to the sheriff?" She already knew that.
"Yes. His name is Jo-el." She already knew that, too.
"Does she have children?"
"She has three children, all in their twenties. I don't know if any of them live here."
"What are their names?"
"I don't know."
"Are they boys or girls?"
"I'm not sure."
She stared at the house as we spoke, tracing its lines with her eyes as if she was trying to read some truth there. When she had enough of the house we drove first to the small home where Monroe Johnson was waiting to die, and then to Edith Boudreaux's dress shop. Edie's car was neither at her father's nor at the dress shop. Jodi seemed uninterested in the old man, but when we cruised the dress shop she asked me to see if Edie was inside. I parked along in the square and looked in the window but there was only a dark-haired woman I hadn't seen before. I went back to the car. "What next?"
"The Michot woman." Jodi was frowning and her eyes were hard.
I said, "It's almost two. Would you like something to eat?"
"No."
"Do you need a bathroom?"
"Show me the Michot woman."
"She works. We won't be able to see her now." I hadn't eaten since the airplane, and my head was throbbing.
"Then show me where she lives."
I stopped at a 7-Eleven for two Slim Jims and a bag of peanut M amp;M's. Lunch. We took the old road north to Point Blue and Chantel Michot's shotgun house. Lewis and Robert were chasing each other around the Dodge, and an older girl was sitting on the porch, very near where I had sat, doing homework. I drove past, found a place in the road to turn around, then came back and pulled off onto the grass across from them. The older girl looked up from her homework and stared at us. I said, "The little guy's name is Lewis. The other boy is Robert. I don't know the girl. Chantel is Leon Williams's baby sister."
Jodi Taylor leaned forward in the seat again, eyes wide. "These are her children?"
"Yes."
"They're so poor."
I nodded. The girl had gone back to her homework, but kept glancing up at us, unable to concentrate. A fat Rhode Island Red hen stepped out from beneath the house, pecking at the dirt. The rest of the chickens followed her. Jodi said, "This is overwhelming. I can't believe this."
I didn't answer.
"These people are related to me."
I nodded. Robert ran in a circle around Lewis and Lewis tripped, bumping his head on the Dodge. He landed on his bottom and rubbed at his head, crying. Robert ran back to make sure his little brother was all right. The chickens scratched around them, undisturbed.
Jodi Taylor took a deep breath and let it out. The girl was staring at us again. She put her book aside and came to the edge of the porch and called to the little boys and all three of them went inside. An older boy maybe a year or two younger than the girl came to the door and looked out at us. Jodi said, "I want to see the woman." Edith, again.
"It's late, Jodi. We should head back to the city. We can come back tomorrow."
"I didn't come here to sit in a goddamned hotel. I want to see that woman." She was out at the edge, now, strung tight and fraying. Cheeks the color of milk.
I looked at her.
"Please." Her face softened and she took my arm. "Let's try her shop again. If she's not there, we'll go to the hotel."
I took her back to Eunice.
We got there just before four, and again I had to get out and look in the window, and again Edith wasn't there. I went back to the car, and got in shaking my head. Jodi said, "What do you have to do to get a break around here?"
We were just pulling away when Edith Boudreaux's metallic blue Oldsmobile passed us and parked at the curb and Edith got out. Jodi and I saw her at the same time. I said, "That's her."
Jodi came erect and stiff in the seat, her face almost to the windshield, both hands on the dash. Her lips parted, and there seemed a kind of electrical field flooding the car. I looked from Jodi Taylor to Edith Boudreaux and back again. Looking at Edith was like looking at an older, softer version of Jodi.
It took Edith maybe fifteen seconds to move from her car to her shop and then she was gone.
I said, "Are you okay?"
Jodi stared at the closed door. Her breasts rose and fell, and a pulse hammered in the smooth skin beneath her jaw.
I said, "Jodi?"
Jodi blinked twice and looked at me, and then she shook her head. She said, "I was wrong. I can't leave now. I have to go in there."