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Les called my mother that time from the only public telephone of a one-horse New Mexico township; I stuck my elbow in his ribs and told him he was acting damn stupid — what’d he do if somebody else showed up and wanted to use the phone, started pacing and overheard him? But Les snapped, ‘Shut up, Cate,’ and he dialled. The booth stood between an adobe post office and the highway; I squashed next to him so I’d hear her replies, because this call was more important than any of the previous ones. ‘You don’t need to listen,’ he told me as usual, and scowled. ‘Not trusting me, huh?’ When I was little he’d lock me into the truck while he called, and anyway I’d no notion what the calls meant, but when I reached my teens he couldn’t do that.
The phone rang her end, a mangy palm tree outside our booth rattled and a truck zoomed by. The hot air sat around us and I said, ‘She’s not home.’ (With a wide grin to mean I didn’t care.) I pictured her like in a movie, watching the phone ring and not answering it; that’d be much worse. But after four and a half rings the ringing stopped; I pressed close and imagined I could hear her breathing.
Les said what he always says, in one form of words or another. ‘I got your kid here with me, you know. She truly is alive.’ He took a moment to glance past me, making sure we weren’t overheard, then he told her in that soft voice like he’s pleading, ‘Ma’am, I wouldn’t lie to you.'
I hate when he uses that soft greasy tone; every time after, I say to him, ‘Just talk ordinary with her, whyn’t you?’ And he frowns, says, ‘But I was.’ Never has realized he’s begging her — begging for what? For her to believe something that’s the God’s-truth, is all. But I pressed close past the grey desert dust and Les’s sweat and the roar of another truck, and heard her say (as she most often does), ‘Insane. Inhuman.’ Her voice not interested, not a bit caring. Which has always hurt me, though Les tried to say there was part reason. Reason, the hell. She sounded like a robot voice, ready to switch off. And the next thing she said, in her bitty accent which Les claims is British, was, ‘I’m hanging up now.’ Click, the buzz of the empty line.
Les cussed but he’d already stacked the coins for his next try; was less than half a minute before her phone rang again, and this time she picked it up at once. Les said, ‘You can’t put me off that way.’ Hoarse; he smokes too damn much. And breathless because he’d gotten jittery; after twelve years with him I can read his moods like my own. (Easier than mine, most often.) He said, ‘This here’s no nuisance call, ma’am.’ A car on the highway slowed, saw the booth was occupied, speeded up. ‘All these years,’ said Les, ‘I kept you informed, right, ma’am? Faithful I have.’ No sound from her; he must have wondered if he’d dialed wrong, for he said, ‘Hi there? This is Miz Janice I’m speaking with? Miz Janice Wingford that the daughter of got–’
Then she did answer, like talking from a clenched jaw, ‘Say ‘‘murdered’’, why don’t you? Might as well be honest.’
No matter how often Les has told her the truth, she’s never believed him. He chuckled, but I couldn’t view her as comic any more. Sick-minded or thick-brained or both, that’s how she sounded to me. Les changed hands on the phone, wiped his sweaty palm on his jeans and said cosy to her, ‘Thought I’d gotten the wrong number there for a second.’ A pickup truck pulled in near us and the guy went into the post office. Not highway patrol or sheriff, but Les got nervouser and said fast, ‘Ma’am, are you still there?’ She grunted and he got to the meat of his call. ‘Truth is, ma’am — and I do wish you’d quit fussing about a murder. They never found a body, right? Nor could they, seeing as she wasn’t killed. But the truth is, ma’am, I need your help.’
He held his breath and I did too. If she hung up again, refused to talk this over, we could drive east and find her address and just arrive — but she might act furious disbelieving and call the cops at once. Which both Les and I had our reasons for not wanting to chance; we needed her co-operation. So it was a relief when she spoke again. ‘You’ve a shitting nerve,’ she said, ‘my God, have you ever! You abduct my three-year-old daughter and do away with her, you spend the next twelve years tormenting me and then ask for my help? When the police catch you — and they will, I don’t doubt they’re much nearer now than you suppose–’
She paused for breath and I took a quick look from the booth in case she knew something we didn’t, but the dusty surrounds and highway were clear. Then I thought, This is my mother? Her that’s ranting on and not giving Les a hearing to put his side? So, I’m not saying him taking me away from that campsite was right, only — from what he’s indicated since — he was lonely and unhappy at the time and seemed to him there was reason for what he did.
My mother went on, ‘When the police take you in, I’ll give my evidence with pleasure and try to make sure you never kill anyone else’s child.’
I made a face at Les to mean, Same old stuff, and he nodded; he’s closer to me than I can imagine any dad ever being. He keeps on telling me I’ll for sure love my mother when I meet her, but I don’t know how to go about loving anyone except Les. Especially this woman I can’t even remember.
She said, ‘A death sentence on you–’ as if she could hardly wait — ‘will mean full death.
From the Hardcover edition.
Présentation de l'éditeur :
The phone rang her end, a mangy palm tree outside our booth rattled and a truck zoomed by. The hot air sat around us and I said, ‘She’s not home.’ (With a wide grin to mean I didn’t care.) I pictured her like in a movie, watching the phone ring and not answering it; that’d be much worse. But after four and a half rings the ringing stopped; I pressed close and imagined I could hear her breathing.
Les said what he always says, in one form of words or another. ‘I got your kid here with me, you know. She truly is alive.’ He took a moment to glance past me, making sure we weren’t overheard, then he told her in that soft voice like he’s pleading, ‘Ma’am, I wouldn’t lie to you.'
I hate when he uses that soft greasy tone; every time after, I say to him, ‘Just talk ordinary with her, whyn’t you?’ And he frowns, says, ‘But I was.’ Never has realized he’s begging her — begging for what? For her to believe something that’s the God’s-truth, is all. But I pressed close past the grey desert dust and Les’s sweat and the roar of another truck, and heard her say (as she most often does), ‘Insane. Inhuman.’ Her voice not interested, not a bit caring. Which has always hurt me, though Les tried to say there was part reason. Reason, the hell. She sounded like a robot voice, ready to switch off. And the next thing she said, in her bitty accent which Les claims is British, was, ‘I’m hanging up now.’ Click, the buzz of the empty line.
Les cussed but he’d already stacked the coins for his next try; was less than half a minute before her phone rang again, and this time she picked it up at once. Les said, ‘You can’t put me off that way.’ Hoarse; he smokes too damn much. And breathless because he’d gotten jittery; after twelve years with him I can read his moods like my own. (Easier than mine, most often.) He said, ‘This here’s no nuisance call, ma’am.’ A car on the highway slowed, saw the booth was occupied, speeded up. ‘All these years,’ said Les, ‘I kept you informed, right, ma’am? Faithful I have.’ No sound from her; he must have wondered if he’d dialed wrong, for he said, ‘Hi there? This is Miz Janice I’m speaking with? Miz Janice Wingford that the daughter of got–’
Then she did answer, like talking from a clenched jaw, ‘Say ‘‘murdered’’, why don’t you? Might as well be honest.’
No matter how often Les has told her the truth, she’s never believed him. He chuckled, but I couldn’t view her as comic any more. Sick-minded or thick-brained or both, that’s how she sounded to me. Les changed hands on the phone, wiped his sweaty palm on his jeans and said cosy to her, ‘Thought I’d gotten the wrong number there for a second.’ A pickup truck pulled in near us and the guy went into the post office. Not highway patrol or sheriff, but Les got nervouser and said fast, ‘Ma’am, are you still there?’ She grunted and he got to the meat of his call. ‘Truth is, ma’am — and I do wish you’d quit fussing about a murder. They never found a body, right? Nor could they, seeing as she wasn’t killed. But the truth is, ma’am, I need your help.’
He held his breath and I did too. If she hung up again, refused to talk this over, we could drive east and find her address and just arrive — but she might act furious disbelieving and call the cops at once. Which both Les and I had our reasons for not wanting to chance; we needed her co-operation. So it was a relief when she spoke again. ‘You’ve a shitting nerve,’ she said, ‘my God, have you ever! You abduct my three-year-old daughter and do away with her, you spend the next twelve years tormenting me and then ask for my help? When the police catch you — and they will, I don’t doubt they’re much nearer now than you suppose–’
She paused for breath and I took a quick look from the booth in case she knew something we didn’t, but the dusty surrounds and highway were clear. Then I thought, This is my mother? Her that’s ranting on and not giving Les a hearing to put his side? So, I’m not saying him taking me away from that campsite was right, only — from what he’s indicated since — he was lonely and unhappy at the time and seemed to him there was reason for what he did.
My mother went on, ‘When the police take you in, I’ll give my evidence with pleasure and try to make sure you never kill anyone else’s child.’
I made a face at Les to mean, Same old stuff, and he nodded; he’s closer to me than I can imagine any dad ever being. He keeps on telling me I’ll for sure love my mother when I meet her, but I don’t know how to go about loving anyone except Les. Especially this woman I can’t even remember.
She said, ‘A death sentence on you–’ as if she could hardly wait — ‘will mean full death.
From the Hardcover edition.
Raised by a homeless drifter in the American southwest, fifteen-year-old Cate has never known what it’s like to have a home or a loving family, let alone how it feels to buy new clothes. But this is the only way of life she’s ever been exposed to: travelling the dusty highway from town to town and living hand to mouth, stealing only when the welfare cheques or food stamps run out. Despite her hardscrabble existence and lack of education, Cate is intelligent, forceful and fiercely loyal to Les, the only parent she has ever known. She’s always been aware that Les kidnapped her from her parents’ campsite when she was just three years old, but can hardly imagine how different her own life would have been if she’d never been taken, or how traumatic her disappearance was for her mother. Les has even called Janice Wingford over the years, to let her know that her daughter is alive. Listening in, Cate has always interpreted her mother’s disbelief as a lack of love.
But as The Reckoning opens, Les is making a very different phone call than usual: he’s decided that it’s time to return Cate to her mother and tells the woman that he’ll be bringing her daughter home to Virginia. Les’s decision is not the result of remorse or wanting to do the right thing, but his realization that he may not be able to control Cate any longer — she’s committed a vicious crime, and his self-serving, fatherly love is not strong enough to survive such a test. Cate has mixed feelings, of course — she’s curious about what it will be like to meet her mother, but certain that the woman will take one look at her and demand they leave, whether because she doesn’t believe Les’s story or because she just doesn’t like Cate. She’s also scared that Les might abandon her with this stranger, and as they drive across the country to bring about the reunion she makes him promise not to leave her there alone.
The emotional heart of this novel lies in what happens when mother and daughter are brought together again, and DNA tests prove that Les is telling the truth. Cate must try to get beyond her resentment and learn what it means to have a mother, and to love her for that reason alone. Janice has to try to reconcile her memories of her sweet three-year-old with the reality of brash, difficult Cate. Complicating their uneasy relationship is the truth of Cate’s crime, which prevents both women from getting too close. But when Cate’s lies become unbearable, her mother determines that the facts must come out if there’s to be any hope they’ll truly accept one another. Together, they travel to the scene of the crime — a small town in the western desert — to confront the truth.
The Reckoning is a powerful and almost gut-wrenching exploration of what it means to be mother and daughter when horrific events of the past threaten to destroy that tenuous bond. Patricia Tyrrell’s use of Cate’s first-person perspective allows her to bring the conflicting emotions of her characters to the forefront, and the intensity of her writing suffuses the novel with suspense. But it is the stunning premise of this story that has gained Tyrrell the most attention. Asked how she came up with the idea, the author has commented: “I had read a newspaper account of how an American woman was deceived by phone calls into believing that her kidnapped daughter was still alive, although in fact the child was killed soon after the abduction. I thought: What if the child were alive? What if the abductor was desperate to return her? Why would he want to take such a risk? And the idea of the girl who committed a murder then came to me.” From there, Tyrrell drew on her experiences living in the United States to flesh out the narrative and created this dramatic meditation on the themes of loss and reunion, parents and children, and nature versus nurture.
But as The Reckoning opens, Les is making a very different phone call than usual: he’s decided that it’s time to return Cate to her mother and tells the woman that he’ll be bringing her daughter home to Virginia. Les’s decision is not the result of remorse or wanting to do the right thing, but his realization that he may not be able to control Cate any longer — she’s committed a vicious crime, and his self-serving, fatherly love is not strong enough to survive such a test. Cate has mixed feelings, of course — she’s curious about what it will be like to meet her mother, but certain that the woman will take one look at her and demand they leave, whether because she doesn’t believe Les’s story or because she just doesn’t like Cate. She’s also scared that Les might abandon her with this stranger, and as they drive across the country to bring about the reunion she makes him promise not to leave her there alone.
The emotional heart of this novel lies in what happens when mother and daughter are brought together again, and DNA tests prove that Les is telling the truth. Cate must try to get beyond her resentment and learn what it means to have a mother, and to love her for that reason alone. Janice has to try to reconcile her memories of her sweet three-year-old with the reality of brash, difficult Cate. Complicating their uneasy relationship is the truth of Cate’s crime, which prevents both women from getting too close. But when Cate’s lies become unbearable, her mother determines that the facts must come out if there’s to be any hope they’ll truly accept one another. Together, they travel to the scene of the crime — a small town in the western desert — to confront the truth.
The Reckoning is a powerful and almost gut-wrenching exploration of what it means to be mother and daughter when horrific events of the past threaten to destroy that tenuous bond. Patricia Tyrrell’s use of Cate’s first-person perspective allows her to bring the conflicting emotions of her characters to the forefront, and the intensity of her writing suffuses the novel with suspense. But it is the stunning premise of this story that has gained Tyrrell the most attention. Asked how she came up with the idea, the author has commented: “I had read a newspaper account of how an American woman was deceived by phone calls into believing that her kidnapped daughter was still alive, although in fact the child was killed soon after the abduction. I thought: What if the child were alive? What if the abductor was desperate to return her? Why would he want to take such a risk? And the idea of the girl who committed a murder then came to me.” From there, Tyrrell drew on her experiences living in the United States to flesh out the narrative and created this dramatic meditation on the themes of loss and reunion, parents and children, and nature versus nurture.
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- ÉditeurWeidenfeld & Nicolson
- Date d'édition2004
- ISBN 10 0297848925
- ISBN 13 9780297848929
- ReliureBroché
- Nombre de pages284
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Reckoning
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Weidenfeld & Nicolson
(2004)
ISBN 10 : 0297848925
ISBN 13 : 9780297848929
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