He dialed the phone. To his great gratitude and relief, someone picked up on the other end. Someone else who was working late. "Joe, is that you? Can you come over to my office for a few minutes?"
He and Noelle chatted, mostly about the Ram Rebellion. Then a man came in. Noelle looked up as he entered. Not tall, very thick in the neck and chest. He looked more like a bullfrog than anything else she could think of.
Tony got up. "Noelle, I'd, uh, like to introduce you to Joe Stull. He's, um…"
She stood up and held out her hand. "The Secretary of Transportation for the state. Dennis' brother. My… uncle. I'm… I'm glad to meet you, sir."
Tony looked acutely uncomfortable. "He's got a key to Juliann's house. Where your stuff is. He can take you over there, if you'd rather. It makes more sense, in a way, than having you on our sofa, because you'll be in town for a while and that's where they put your things. But you're welcome to stay with us, of course…" His voice trailed off.
Joe was shaking Noelle's hand, looking at her. The girl didn't much resemble a Stull. Luckily for her. Medium height, maybe five-four, more blonde than anything else. Broader in the shoulders than Pat Fitzgerald. That might be Dennis' contribution to the finished product or it might just be modern sports. Otherwise, he thought, this was Pat's daughter.
"Sure. I'd be glad to take you over there. Show you where it is. Just let me get my coat. There are extra keys on a pegboard in the kitchen, once we get there, so you can come and go. If that's what you want, just let me call Aura Lee over at city hall. We'll need to stop there and pick her up on the way. Since we live to the east, right at the edge of the Ring of Fire, I had our pickup converted to natural gas early on. There's a natural gas furnace in Ma's house, too, so the place will warm up quickly enough."
"That's very kind of you." Noelle voice was a little stiff. She looked at Tony. "That might be better, really. For me to go on over there. I don't have much luggage with me and I'd love to get into some clothes tomorrow that I haven't been wearing for the last several weeks."
"I hate leaving you on your own."
"That's okay. I've gotten pretty much used to being on my own," Noelle answered.
Joe cleared his throat. "I guess it was pretty much a shock to you to hear that Pat and Dennis, ah, got back together this fall."
She smiled at him. "Not as much as you might think." She paused a minute. "I know where the house is. Actually, I've been there."
Both men looked at her in surprise.
"After Mom rented the trailer here in Grantville-after she gave up the house in Fairmont because Maggy and Pauly and Patty were all on their own and we didn't need another room and we did need money if I was going to go to college-I'd…" Her voice trailed off a little. "Well, I'd wonder more about Dennis, sometimes, than I had in Fairmont. And what he had been like. Because, well, because he was…"
"Your father." Joe Stull nodded.
Noelle nodded. "And I'd never met him, of course. Because…"
"Because he left Pat before you were born." Joe didn't really believe in circumlocutions.
She nodded again. "So I heard that house was where his mother lived. It wasn't that far off the route I took when I walked down to the strip mall. I walked by it several times. And finally, one afternoon-it was the semester I didn't have any classes on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons and Mom was at work, of course-I just stopped in front of it. And walked up to the door and rang the bell. She came to the door and I said, 'Hi, I'm…' Then I didn't want to say 'Noelle Murphy,' so I just said, 'I'm Noelle.' And she asked me to come in, so I did."
To say that both men were surprised would have been an understatement.
Not that Joe was surprised that Juliann had never mentioned to any of them that Noelle had come. Ma had been able to keep her own counsel.
"Actually, I, ah, went several times. She said that first time that I was welcome to come back, so I did. I didn't think she'd say it unless she meant it."
Joe nodded. "If Ma said it, she meant it."
"And she was the only person who ever sort of explained it all to me. I mean, you know, when Mom took the older girls to see Paul and Maggie Murphy, I had to wait outside. They wouldn't let me in their house, but nobody really bothered to explain how come. Until Keenan told me it was because I was a 'fucking little bastard.' "
Tony looked down at the floor. "Damn Keenan."
"Well, I was about eight then. And he was a teenager. I was sitting in the car out front while Mom took Maggy and Pauly and Patty in to see them. Wondering why I was always left behind in the car. At least he gave me an answer, which was more than anyone else would. Mom sure never did."
Tony and Joe just looked at her again, Tony thinking that there were probably a lot of things none of the rest of them knew about that had gone into the making of Noelle. Reasons that had contributed to making her so unexpectedly… resilient… as a field agent, considering how young she was.
Noelle was looking at Joe again.
"Juliann said that Mom and Dennis, over the years, had hurt each other just about as bad as two people could. More than once. That Dennis hurt Mom when he wouldn't believe her about what was happening when he came back from Viet Nam and then again when he wouldn't stay with her unless she divorced Keenan's dad. And she hurt him when she married Francis in the first place and then again when she wouldn't divorce Francis after she got pregnant with me."
Joe nodded, looking at her carefully.
"But she said, too, that they couldn't have hurt each other so much if it hadn't been that they loved each other so much and for so long. That she didn't think they'd ever be able to stop loving each other. And that she still wouldn't be surprised if they got together again if they ever had an opening. So that's why it wasn't so much a shock to me, when Steve and Anita told me what had happened."
She paused and turned to Tony. "Thanks for your letter, by the way. I didn't get it for a long time. It kept following me around Franconia, from one place to another. It was weeks before it caught up. At that, it got to me before Mom's note did. And it explained a lot more than Mom's note did."
All Tony had written was a summary of what Pat had said as she sat on the floor of the funeral home. If Pat had written even less… "I don't really know what went on between them the first time," he said a little uncomfortably. "I wasn't really old enough to know what was going on."
"Juliann played me a song," Noelle looked at Joe. "She had a lot of nice old 78s and a turntable that still played them. I hope nobody got rid of those."
"They're all still there. We haven't done anything to the house, yet."
Noelle bit her lip. "When you do… if you all wouldn't mind, of course… do you suppose that I could have that record she played for me? As a memento, sort of."
"I don't see why not. What was it?"
"It was on a collection of 'golden oldies' that she'd ordered from a television advertisement." Noelle started to hum.
I've got you under my skin.
I've got you deep in the heart of me.
So deep in my heart,
You're nearly a part of me.
"God damn it," Tony shouted, breaking the mood.
The other two looked at him, startled.
"A song with lyrics to match that one that Ron Koch keeps throwing at me. I've always told him that country music covers everything." He paused. "Never heard that one, though."
Noelle shook her head. "Well, it isn't country music. It's Cole Porter, I think. From some old Broadway musical. Way back in the 1930s."
"Hell," Tony looked disgusted. "Well, I guess a guy can't have everything. It ought to be country music, though. It's got the right spirit."
"It's not getting any earlier," Joe interrupted. "We'd better go pick up Aura Lee."
Aura Lee looked at Joe. "We can't just leave Noelle in that house with nothing to eat. I don't really want pizza. We'd better stop at Cora's for carry-out." She turned to Noelle. "Billy Lee and our Juliann both have things at school this evening. They won't be finished until nine-thirty or so. That's why Joe and I were both working late. Let's stop for something and we'll eat with you after Joe unlocks the house."