Chapter 17

The new year arrived, the holidays ended, and Peggy resumed her studies with a beefed-up class schedule. I rented her a room in a private home in Athens, near the university, so that on some weekdays she could sleep over, avoid the commute, and spend more time in the school library.

Most nights, though, she was back with us in Lawrenceville. And she religiously adhered to her two-nights-a-week performances at The Naked Truth.

The new schedule suited all of us. Peggy could focus more on her classes, but still had more time and energy while at home with her family. Sarah had more daytime company from her daughter and more help caring for Tad.

I was a big, lazy, unemployed freeloader, basically. But I helped around the house, took Tad on after-school excursions, and started working out more faithfully, and more systematically, in preparation for the upcoming baseball season.

Late in January, Sarah observed that it was only a little over two weeks before I had to report to Sarasota for spring training.

I hadn’t exactly forgotten.

“I’m still not sure what Peggy’s reaction is going to be,” Sarah said.

“No. I guess we’ve kinda let it slide, haven’t we?”

“She hasn’t shown much ... tension about your leaving for Florida.”

“She hasn’t shown any -- but I think it could just be that she’s in denial.”

“Yes. But she has to be thinking about it,” Sarah said.

“Why is it, do you think, that she’s so damned convinced that I’m trying to escape?”

“I don’t think it’s personal with you, Marty. I mean, she’s just convinced that no man is going to stick with her for the duration. She’s been that way for a long time.”

“What if I asked her to marry me?”

“Are you sure you’re ready to take that kind of step?”

“Hell, I’ve BEEN ready! I just wanted to try to build up a little more trust on Peg’s part first. Sarah, I’m ready to ask her any time. Today. Today would be fine!”

“I’ve got no idea whether that would be enough to ... solve this problem, Marty. I mean, married guys leave home, too.”

“I have got a little something else in the works too, Sarah. Something I’ve been working on for some time.”

“What?”

“On February 1, I’d like you to set an extra place for dinner. We’re going to have a guest. He’s coming by to see all three of us that afternoon. From Atlanta.”

“Why are you being so mysterious, Marty?”

“Because this one is all on me, Sarah. If it fails, or if it backfires and just makes things worse, I don’t want you to have to share the blame for it.”

February 1 was a Tuesday. In this new semester, it was the only weekday that Peggy had no classes. It was her one day of the week (outside of Sundays after she got home from work at 3 a.m.) that she was completely free of duties outside the home. It was a day for Peg to sleep late while Sarah and I got Tad off to school.

Peggy did, indeed, sleep late that morning. She awoke to the sound of the vacuum cleaner, being run by Yours Truly. She came downstairs, still in her robe, at 10:30.

“Sorry I woke you,” I said.

“It’s 10:30. Somebody ought to wake me!”

“It’s your free day. Why not sleep in? But I hope you haven’t got any plans for this afternoon. We’re gonna have company.”

“Who?”

“Man from Atlanta. His name is Fred Dow.”

“Who is he?”

“Your mom and I have invited him to dinner, but he’ll be arriving earlier: around four this afternoon.”

“Yeah, but, who is he?”

“Guy I met recently, the time I went down to Newnan, remember?”

“Your old friend from home?”

“No. This is another guy. He’s coming to talk to us -- you and me and Sarah. Tad’s going over to the Crandalls, going to have dinner with Charlie and his folks.”

“This guy is selling insurance or something?”

“Yeah ... something like that.”

It wasn’t lost on Peggy that this was the first day of February. Well before the first day of March, she knew, I’d be long-gone; off to Florida with the Orioles for the lengthy spring training period. After that, with no break in between, the even-more-lengthy new baseball season would begin. Already, Peggy was starting to show small signs of the return of the old angst that hadn’t been a problem for us since we’d started planning (and executing) our trip to Albuquerque.

“You’re leaving -- when? The 18th? For Florida?”

“Yeah. The 18th. Driving down in the pickup. When we head north in April, I’ll send the truck to Baltimore with a guy, works for the team.”

“I really wish you were a plumber or something.”

“I hear they make the big bucks,” I said.

“What? ... Who?”

“Plumbers! You ever hear that story? About the plumber? Guy does his plumbing job, then goes to the homeowner, tells him, ‘That’ll be $250.00.’ ... Homeowner guy says, ‘What? That’s ridiculous! My DOCTOR doesn’t charge that much!’”

Peggy interrupted me. “‘Yeah, I know, ‘ the plumber says, ‘I used to be a doctor.’ Jesus, Marty! That is the oldest joke...”

“Maybe I’ll hear some new ones, down in Sarasota,” I said.

“If I wasn’t working, I’d go down there with you,” she said. “Do they let you bring girlfriends down there with you?”

“It’s not a monastery, Peg. Just spring training. You could come down. Take a weekend off from the club, we could fly you down Thursday night after classes, you could cut classes on Monday, not come back until late Tuesday! A five-day vacation!”

“Yeah,” she said.

Not much enthusiasm, there. Not much verve.

Just before four o’clock, the doorbell rang and I jumped up to let Fred Dow in. I think Peggy had more or less forgotten he was coming, but Sarah had been preparing dinner and was setting the table in the dining room -- something we rarely did unless we had guests.

I made Fred comfortable in the living room, turned off the television that was tuned to a movie nobody had been watching, and went into the kitchen to ask Sarah to join us when she could. Peggy was upstairs and I called her down, too.

When all four of us were in the living room with glasses of white wine, I belatedly introduced Fred. “This is Fred Dow. Mr. Dow is a private detective.”

Sarah’s eyebrows went up a little. She smiled at our visitor. “I don’t think I’ve ever met a private detective before, Mr. Dow.”

“I’m just an old cop, Ms. Gabriel. Retired from the Atlanta PD. I have my own agency now -- a small one -- working out of Atlanta.”

“He’s a modest old cop,” I said. “Mr. Dow was Chief of Detectives when he retired. He was highly recommended to me when I made some inquiries about retaining a detective.”

“What’d he do for you, Marty? Investigate Mom and me?”

“Not hardly. I have the greatest possible faith in you, and in Sarah. No professional inquiry necessary. Mr. Dow has been investigating some of the men who have ... betrayed your trust, Peg.”

“Mr. Coggins provided me with three names,” Dow said. “My agency’s assignment was to bring you -- all of you -- up-to-date on the status of these three men.”

“Marty!” Peggy was visibly steamed. “Where do you get off, investigating men from my past? What did they ever do to you?”

“It’s not what they did to me, Peg. It’s how they hurt you. You ought to know by now that you’re pretty damned important to me. And we ... we’ve been doing so great! This whole time, since I got back last October ... it’s been amazing! But Peg, I’ve gotta leave soon, and I’ll be gone a long time, and, already, you’re showing signs of going back into that ... depression thing. You...”

“Why not just call in a shrink? Maybe a whole team of shrinks? Why a fucking detective? What’s this all about, Marty?”

“What I think,” I told her, “what I think is, when those men left you hanging, without any kind of ... closure, well, it did some damage...”

“Closure!” Peggy exploded. “I fucking hate that word! People throw it around like it was the most important thing in the universe, and nobody even knows what they’re trying to say!”

“I didn’t want to say ‘closure’ either, Peg, but I ... just listen, though, will you? You can be mad at me later. But let’s see what Mr. Dow found out, okay? I don’t know, myself, about everything that he’s found out. I asked him to just bring us up to the present time with a report about three men: Your old high school sweetheart; and Glen Cummings; and Denton Stratford -- the professor.”

“Glen Cummings! I never told you beans about Glen Cummings!”

“Your mother told me, Peg. She didn’t have anything to do with this -- with me going to see Mr. Dow -- but she told me, earlier, about Cummings.”

“You and my mother are like a couple of old gossipy women!”

“Maybe so. But when we gossip about you, it’s because we both love you, and want the best for you.”

Sarah had sat quietly through all of this, but now she spoke in her most conciliatory tone. “Peg, we have a guest. Maybe you’re not happy about it, but he’s here, and he’s been invited. This is Marty’s home, too. He can have someone come here and talk to us if he wants to. If you don’t like what you hear, you can say so -- to Marty. He already knows that could happen. He knows what you’re like. He won’t be too surprised if you have strong feelings about Mr. Dow’s visit. But how about we just hear him out!”

Peggy was red-faced with tears, and still a little hostile, but she turned to Fred Dow and said, “Go ahead, Mr. Dow. Tell us what you came to tell us.”

Dow, who’d calmly waited for the storm to pass, consulted his notes once more and said, “First, the young man from your high school days. Anthony Swinson, I believe. Mr. Swinson left Lawrenceville sometime in August of the year your son was born – later, in October of that year. Mr. Swinson has not returned here since that time. He did not graduate with your high school class the following spring.”

“Neither did I,” Peggy muttered.

Ignoring her interruption, Dow continued. “Mr. Swinson first settled in Little Rock, Arkansas, where he briefly attended classes at the local junior college. He dropped out during his first and only semester there.