A Sister's Forgiveness (42 page)

“Sadie?” Joseph was looking at her with a worried frown. The lawyer had become a good friend, someone she knew she could rely on to be there if she needed to talk.

“Thank you,” she said. “I don’t know how to thank…”

Joseph waved off her gratitude with an embarrassed but pleased smile. “Just doing my job.”

Rachel Kaufmann was waiting at the back of the courtroom, and when Sadie saw her, Rachel gave her a wave. “Let’s go,” her mother said. “Matt will be home from school soon, and the four of us can have a nice supper and then maybe just…” Tears of relief leaked from the corners of her eyes as she stroked Sadie’s cheek. “It’s over,” she whispered.

But Sadie knew that it wasn’t over for her mom either. While Jeannie had willingly agreed to participate in the process to craft a reconciliation contract, the fact was that Uncle Geoff had moved back home. No one could say for sure how that would affect things. Once again Jeannie’s loyalties had to be split, and that meant that the truce between Jeannie and Sadie’s mom was not exactly solid.

Somehow Sadie understood that her aunt still blamed herself. How could that be? It wasn’t her fault. Sadie promised herself that now that she could come and go freely, she would go over to Jeannie’s house—when Uncle Geoff was at school or football practice, of course—and spend time with Jeannie talking about Tessa, remembering Tessa. Rachel had told her that it was important to remember.

But first she wanted to sit down with Matt. Her brother had remained indifferent to the process, commenting to her the night before that some stupid contract wasn’t going to fix anything. She was only now beginning to appreciate how much she had hurt him, how much he had had to pay for her actions by living day in and night out with their parents always worrying about her. He was the one who had seen his life put on hold, who must have sat at many meals where the silence of their parents’ worry and fear had made normal conversation impossible. And then when she learned that Uncle Geoff had basically abandoned Matt—all because of her…

“Matt, we’re home,” her mother called out as soon as they were inside the house. “Matt?”

By the time they had finally finished up at the courthouse, it was past time for Matt to be home from school. But the house was the kind of quiet that said nobody was home.

“He must be out in the workshop sweeping up,” her dad said and headed for the back door. “Matt?” he called, but Sadie could see that the workshop door was closed, the padlock undisturbed.

A now all too familiar sense of panic gripped her. Something was wrong—terribly wrong. Her dad stepped outside and walked around the yard. “His bike isn’t here,” he said when he came back inside.

Sadie ran down the hall to Matt’s room. She opened his closet and checked on the top shelf. Matt had a special T-shirt that he wore only when he attended one of Uncle Geoff’s games.

It was gone. And she knew that there was no game scheduled for that night.

“Mom?”

“What is it?”

“I think Matt’s run away.”

“No. I’m sure not. Why would he do such a thing? Today of all days?”

Sadie showed her the box that Matt always hid the shirt in. It was the box of an old board game they had played when they were younger.

“Lars,” her mom called out. Then she took the box and headed back toward the kitchen. “He’s gone,” Sadie heard her say.

Her brother had run away, and it was all her fault. Sadie sat down on the side of Matt’s bed and wondered if the ripples of her foolish action would ever stop coming.

She heard the muffled sounds of her parents discussing what to do. But she was the one who needed to fix this. She glanced around Matt’s room, unsure of what she was looking for but certain that there must be something that would give her a clue. Neither of them was known for neatness, but there was a pattern to the way Matt stored his things. It might look haphazard to their parents. That was the whole idea. But to Matt—and hopefully to Sadie—the placement of his belongings made perfect sense.

Knowing that her brother did nothing without first making detailed plans, she began going through the papers on his small desk. She was mystified when she found several printed sheets from a computer about playing poker. The other side of the paper had material that showed it to have come from the Sarasota library. When had he gone to the library downtown, and how had he gotten this paper? He must be doing a report on the evils of gambling, she decided and put his schoolwork, including the notes on poker, back where she’d found them.

Next, she dumped out his wastebasket and started smoothing out the crumpled papers. On the third paper, she found a rough sketch that looked like a map.

“Dad?” she called out.

Both parents came at once. “What is it? A note?” her father asked hopefully.

“Better,” Sadie said. “It’s a map.”

The three of them gathered around as Sadie spread the wrinkled paper on the desktop then turned it sideways to see if that made more sense.

“It’s Payne Park,” her dad said. By the way he looked at Sadie’s mom, she knew there had to be a connection.

“What?” she asked.

Her mom told her about the night that Matt had gotten lost and had been brought home by the police officers. “We didn’t want to worry you.”

Sadie glanced at the paper again, realizing it was drawn on the back of a page from the day calendar that Uncle Geoff had given Matt. She read the date aloud.

“It’s the same date,” her father said, taking the paper from her and studying the map more closely. “He must have sketched this out that night, and the only reason to do that would be so that he could find his way back there again.”

When her parents headed for the door, Sadie started to follow them and accidentally knocked Matt’s schoolwork to the floor. The papers about poker spilled out from his notebook. Sadie had an idea. “Dad? There was this kid in my class who got in trouble last summer for playing cards… for money. He was slipping out to meet some boys from town.” She picked up the papers and handed them to her father. “You said something about Matt going out to meet friends after supper, and I found these inside Matt’s school folder.”

Her father’s already ruddy cheeks turned even redder. He passed the papers to her mother and headed down the hall still clutching the map that Matt had drawn.

“Let me go with you, Dad,” she pleaded, and to her surprise, he gave her a curt nod.

“Emma, stay here in case the boy comes to his senses and comes home.”

Sadie knew that there was not even a question of alerting others and certainly not the authorities in Sarasota. This was a private matter that her parents would try to handle alone. If the time came when they needed help, they would turn first to other family—usually Jeannie and Geoff—and then to Pastor Detlef and other leaders of the congregation. Calling the police would be an absolute last resort.

When Sadie got in on the passenger side, the map was lying on the seat. She picked it up and prepared to navigate for her father. “It looks like you turn left at the corner,” she said.

“I know the way, Sadie,” her father said, and then he softened his rebuke by patting her hand. “Sorry. I’m just worried.”

They rode in silence with Sadie scanning the side streets hoping for a glimpse of Matt or his bike. When they reached the park, her father stopped the car and got out. “Let’s see if there’s any sign of him or if there’s anyone around who might have seen him,” her dad said.

“I can search that area,” Sadie volunteered as she started off across toward the tennis courts.

“Nein! No Sadie, I nearly lost you once, and now your brother is missing. I need to know where you are. We’ll do this together.”

It amazed Sadie how these simple words touched her. A knot she’d carried in the center of her chest for weeks—a knot of her own making because she was so sure that no one in her family would ever be able to love her again the way they had before. She slipped her hand into her father’s and walked with him.

After they’d searched for several minutes without seeing anyone, Sadie caught a flash of color. “Dad, over there?” she whispered excitedly.

Her father followed her pointing finger then started striding quickly toward the lone figure bent over a picnic table, his back to them. Sadie had to practically run to keep up with him.

“Hello,” Lars called out.

The boy turned and quickly gathered whatever had been on the table and stuffed it into his pockets. Then he leaned back against the edge of the table nonchalantly and watched them come. “I’m not doing anything wrong, mister,” he said with a sullen frown when they were close enough to see his features.

“I did not accuse you,” Sadie’s dad replied. “I am looking for my son, and I have reason to believe that he might have come here to this park. Have you been here for some time?”

The boy cocked an eyebrow as he studied their plain dress. “This kid—he’s one of your kind?”

“He’s my son,” her dad repeated. “Have you seen him?”

“Maybe.” The boy took a sudden interest in a tree branch hanging over the table. “What’s in it for me?”

To Sadie’s surprise, her father actually smiled.

“Are you asking to be paid for information that you may or may not have?”

The boy shrugged. “Kid’s about my height but younger? He’s got hair like yours only not as white but still cut in that dorky way? Rides a bike that’s like a bazillion years old? That kid?”

Sadie felt her heart begin to hammer. “Yes,” she said, “that kid.” Her father squeezed her hand, silencing her.

“All right,” her father said, keeping his voice calm as if he and the boy were negotiating a price for a piece of his furniture. “It appears that you know my son. Did you also know that he is missing?”

“He’s not missing. I just saw him.”

“Ah. So he was here.”

The boy let out a sigh of pure exasperation. “Didn’t I just say that?”

“Where is he? Where did he go?” Sadie demanded, unable to keep still a minute longer. It pleased her to see the boy sit up a little straighter.

“I don’t know to both questions. He owed me some money. He paid up and then took off.” He stood up. “I gotta go. I got business.”

“Which way was he headed?” Sadie asked and noticed that her father seemed to have accepted that the boy was more likely to answer her questions.

The boy pointed toward the tennis courts.

“How long ago?”

“Do I look like I own a watch?”

“Thank you for your help,” Sadie’s dad said and then steered her in the direction the boy had indicated. When she glanced back over her shoulder, the boy was gone.

The tennis courts were deserted as was the area around the community auditorium. Her dad checked every nook and cranny of their surroundings. She also noticed how with every passing minute he seemed to lose hope.

“We’ll find him, Dad,” she said and prayed that she was right.

Chapter 45

Geoff

I
t was good to be home. Even though he hadn’t been moved out for more than one night and the day that followed, it felt like weeks. Of course, he and Jeannie had been heading in different directions ever since Tessa’s funeral. But now this house seemed more like the home they had established when he and Jeannie had first married. In his short absence, Jeannie had gone through the house packing up a lot of the things that served only to remind him of all their debt. She continued to dress in the plain clothes of her youth, and he found that somehow comforting.

He was even beginning to consider the wisdom of accepting the money members of their church—and Emma’s—had raised to help pay off the hospital bill. Jeannie had made a good argument for that. How many times over the years they’d been married had they done the same for those in need and never once thought about it?

Pride goeth before a fall
, he thought. He had allowed his pride to keep him from accepting the kindness of his neighbors and friends. He fingered the large brown envelope where Jeannie had placed all of the cash and checks people had left for them. “I’m going to stop by the hospital and set up a plan for paying that bill off,” he called up the stairs where he could hear Jeannie doing more cleaning.