“Silk.” The cry came from deep inside Cilia’s throat.
“Eli made me feel. . . he made me feel things I hadn’t felt before with a man. Not like the other men I knew, the boys I knew. He—I suppose he seduced me. I can’t explain it any better than that. I don’t have the vocabulary. He asked me to meet him at his sister’s house. I did. He offered me alcohol. I took it. He asked me to go to bed with him. I said yes”
“Silk, oh, Silk,” Cilia cried again.
“Nothing happened, Aunt Cil. Eli’s sister came home before . . . before anything happened. I didn’t. . . I didn’t. . .” Silk hung her head. “It wasn’t until later that I realized just how fortunate I had been.”
Cilia wrapped her arms around Silk’s shoulders and hugged her from behind. There were tears in Cilia’s eyes.
Suddenly, I felt like an intruder, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave without hearing the entire story.
“What happened next?” I asked.
Silk answered even as Cilia held on to her. “Eli called a few times asking for a rematch—that’s the word he used, rematch. I turned him down. Over and over again.”
“You should have told me,” Cilia said.
“I was too embarrassed,” Silk said. “Anyway, when I went to deliver Mother’s check, he was there. It’s hard for me to tell you exactly what happened next. It’s all kind of blurry. He was drunk. At least he seemed drunk. He kept pawing at me. He kept telling me to take off my shirt. I called for my mother, but she didn’t answer. When I pushed him away”—Silk held up her hands—“my hands were bloody. He was bleeding very badly. I don’t know why. I couldn’t see a wound. I called for my mother again, only she never came. I tried to escape. Eli stopped me. I grabbed a softball bat—it was leaning against the wall and I just grabbed it. I didn’t even think about it, I just. . . I told Eli to leave me alone. He came at me anyway. He said he knew just what I needed. I swung the bat. I hit him. I hit him in the back of the head. He said, ‘Strike one.’ I hit him again. Harder. He fell. I dropped the bat and ran out of there just as fast as I could.”
“Okay,” I said.
Silk’s hands were folded on the towel in her lap. She was looking down at them as if she had never seen them before. They were dotted with tears.
“I believed you when you said you would have given yourself up to protect your mother,” I told her.
Silk nodded.
“So now what?” Cilia wanted to know. “So now you’re going to ruin her life? For what? For Jefferson? For that piece of filth? Silk has an incredible life in front of her. She’s going to the Olympics. Are you going to take that away from her? Silk was acting in self-defense. She was only protecting herself. Are you going to ruin her life over that? Answer me! What are you going to do?”
Nothing, my inner voice replied. I didn’t believe that Silk was responsible for Jefferson’s death. The best a prosecutor could argue was that conking him on the head was a contributing factor. Clearly not murder, and probably self-defense. No, Silk didn’t kill Jefferson. It was the booze that done him in. That’s what a good defense attorney would argue, and Cilia would hire the best that money could buy. So why bother? Why ruin Silk’s life? The law might be satisfied, but would justice be served? G. K. said it earlier. Justice belongs to God alone. Besides, Merodie would hate me forever, and I just didn’t want that.
I stood up and retrieved my cell phone from the table.
“I’m going home to get some sleep,” I said.
I began to walk away.
“Have a good life, Silk,” I called over my shoulder.
“Wait a minute,” Cilia said. She jogged to my side. She wasn’t pretty now—not for any age.
“Do you think you’re going to come back later and ask for money?” she wanted to know. “Do you think you’re going to blackmail me over this?”
She grabbed my arm with both hands and pulled it until I spun toward her. She had a strong grip, and she didn’t let go.