Free A Silence of Mockingbirds by Karen Spears Zacharias Page A

you know Karly?”
    “I knew Sarah for four years before I even knew she had a daughter.
Crazy, huh? I assumed Sarah didn’t have custody. She wasn’t much of
one to talk about personal things. She was the kind who’d ask you to
watch Karly for ten minutes and come back eight hours later. Sarah was
kind of a lost soul.
    “I feel sorry for what happened and all, but anybody who thinks
Sarah is a victim is a fool. Sarah put Sarah first, not Karly. Good mothers
don’t go out gambling. That gambling thing is a big turn-off.”
    “Is that why you never took up with her?” I asked.
    “Yeah,” Eric said. “I hired her as a cook but after a couple of months
I moved her to the bar. But then $300 to $400 came up missing. I
never came right out and accused her of stealing but I had to let her
go. She quit coming out for a while after that but then she showed up
again. She’d have a mimosa, gamble, golf, have lunch, drink, smoke and
gamble some more.”   
    “You ever see her use hard drugs?” I asked.
    “I’ve seen her smoke some pot. She was taking pain pills left and
right. She’d had some kind of surgery—I don’t remember what. But she
was popping those babies left and right. You damn sure shouldn’t be
taking those if you’re drinking.”
    “Do you think Sarah is an alcoholic?” I asked.
    “I don’t know. Maybe,” Eric said. He shifted around in the booth, so
he could see the ESPN scores better. “But she didn’t have the same kind
of addiction to alcohol as she did to gambling.” 
    “You think Sarah was involved in her daughter’s death in any way?”
    He pondered that question for a minute before answering.
    “It’s not too farfetched to think she could do this. Why would you
go off and leave your child the way she did all the time? I never saw any
signs of abuse but she sure had a lot of free time to spend here.”
    “How’d you learn of Karly’s death?”
    “A customer from HP told me. It was shocking, that’s for sure. I
don’t view Sarah as a victim. I think she ought to be accountable for
some of it. You should talk to those people over there.” Eric nodded
toward a round table back past the bar.
    “Friends of Sarah’s?” I asked.
    “Used to be,” he said.
    I looked out the window, too dark to see anything but the out-buildings. The sun had long slipped beyond the green velvet coastal
range hemming west Corvallis. I wasn’t in any hurry. There was a warm
bed waiting for me at Carlene Moorefield’s house. Come anytime,
Carlene said, and meant it.
    “No telling when I will be coming and going,” I had warned her.
    “No worries,” Carlene said. “Here’s a key. Come and stay anytime.”
This was the third or fourth of many such visits.
    “You think those people back there will want to talk to me?” I asked
Eric.
    “Sure, why not?”
    “Oh, I don’t know. If they are good friends of Sarah’s they might
find me intrusive.”
    “Not a chance,” Eric said. “People around here aren’t sorry to see
Sarah go. She can stay on the east side. Good riddance.”
    I was surprised by the curt tone in his voice. “When’s the last time
you saw Sarah?”
    “She was by here not long ago,” Eric said. “I gave her permission to
hang up the flyer.”
    “The flyer still there? I looked for one but didn’t see it.”
    “Nah. I heard that her ex was a pretty stand-up guy and I got to
wondering if he knew about this nonprofit of Sarah’s. I wanted to
know if he was involved in the charity. I had some reservations and my
immediate thought was, is this legit or is Sarah in Bend gambling all
this away? So I asked somebody who knows David.”
    That’s when Eric found out David didn’t know a thing about Karly’s
Angels. Just another get-rich-quick venture of Sarah’s, Eric figured. So
he ripped the flyer out of the window. He hasn’t seen hide nor hair of
Sarah since.
    Friendships formed over barstools can wear thin during the
drought