I Was Done Begging novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Eleven Dollars

She walks into the Everhart tower with eleven dollars and an old medal, and learns her husband never mentioned a wife to the man she says is her father.

The lobby of Everhart Marine was forty feet of marble, and I walked into it with a cane and eleven dollars.

Hattie had gone to her office to start on my papers.

I went to the desk alone.

The receptionist took in my coat, my cane and my hair, which was still thin from three years in bed.

"Can I help you?"

"I need to see Samuel Everhart."

"Do you have an appointment?"

"No. Tell him it's about his daughter."

The receptionist did not look surprised.

She looked tired.

"Third one this month," she said into her headset. "Send Mr. Trahan down."

Two guards moved a step closer to my sides.

I held onto the desk and waited.

The elevator opened a few minutes later.

The man who stepped out was tall and dark-haired, in a navy suit, and he walked across that lobby without hurrying.

His eyes were grey and they went over me once, top to bottom, and gave away nothing.

"Ma'am, I'm Lucas Trahan. I work for Mr. Everhart."

His voice was low and perfectly polite.

"I'm going to save us both some time. His daughter was taken from a church fair twenty-five years ago. Her photo has been in every paper in the state. Every few weeks someone comes in with a yellow dress and a sad story."

"I don't have a yellow dress."

"Then what do you have?"

I pulled the chain out from under my collar and held the medal in my palm.

It was a small silver guardian angel, worn smooth and black in the creases.

"I've worn this since I was three," I said. "A bus depot clerk found me wearing it. That's the only thing I've ever had that was mine."

His eyes dropped to the medal.

They stayed there.

"May I?"

I nodded.

He took the chain between two fingers and turned the medal over.

He read the back for a long time.

I knew what it said.

I had read it every night of my life, two small letters and a short date.

C.E. 6-14.

"Who told you to come here?" he asked, very quietly.

"Nobody."

"Then how do you know the name Everhart?"

"I woke up with it."

It was the truth, and it sounded insane.

He didn't laugh.

He didn't believe me either, not yet.

"Ma'am, there is a reason I'm asking," he said. "The papers printed the dress, the date, the fair and the picture of the medal's front."

"They never printed the back."

"No. The family held that back, on purpose, so that I could tell the real thing from a copy."

He let the medal go and it swung against my chest.

"Forty-one people have sat in that chair upstairs. None of them ever got the back right."

My knees picked that moment to go.

The cane slid on the marble.

Lucas had my arm before I hit the floor, one hand flat against my ribs, the other gripping my elbow.

He was warm and steady and strong, and he did not let go as fast as he should have.

"Sit," he said.

He steered me to a bench against the wall and crouched in front of me so our eyes were level.

"How long have you been out of the hospital?"

"Nine days."

"What do you want from this family?"

"I want to know who I am."

"Everyone says that."

"I have eleven dollars," I said. "Check my pockets. I'm not asking anyone for money."

The corner of his mouth moved.

It wasn't a smile, but it was the first thing his face had done on its own.

"There's a lab on the third floor that does a rush swab," he said. "Four hours. Will you give one?"

"Yes."

"Will you give your full name?"

"Celia Lacombe."

He stopped.

The two guards stopped too.

"Lacombe," Lucas said.

"My husband is Julien Lacombe."

For the first time his face changed.

It was small, a tightening around the eyes, and it was gone almost before I saw it.

"Mrs. Lacombe, I don't know if you're who you say you are."

"I know."

"Does anyone know you came here today?"

"My friend Hattie. My husband will find out when his driver stops lying for me."

"Then we'll go slowly," he said. "But I can tell you something that is not a guess."

He stood and held out a hand to help me up.

I took it.

"Your husband has sat across a table from Mr. Everhart three times this year, asking for a loan to keep Lacombe Marine open."

"He never said a word about it to me."

"I'm sure he didn't," Lucas said. "Each time, he left before the coffee came. And in three meetings, Mrs. Lacombe, not once did he mention that he had a wife."

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