Mack's Progress Ch. 11 & Epilogue

"Christ, I'm sorry, Mackenzie."

"Why? It wasn't anything that you did. The Judge said that at the time he hoped that you and mother would get back together eventually but... Look, he never approached you when mother was first ill, because well... for one they weren't sure that you were my father. He didn't know why but mother always insisted to everyone that only you could be. Do you know why?"

I looked across at Mackenzie. "Opportune timing, I should imagine. I thumped the guy before..."

"Oh, god, you didn't catch them whilst they were..?" she interrupted me, with a shocked expression on her face, but didn't complete the question.

I nodded.

"Oh, my, no wonder mother's too embarrassed to face you. And that's probably why she had her breakdown. She loved you a hell of lot you know."

"I loved her at the time. But Codi had a strange way of returning that love!" I commented.

Mackenzie reached out and took my hand. "God only knows what goes on in mother's mind sometimes, father. Anyway by the time mother was right enough in the head for the Judge to approach you to tell you about me, you were married to Lindsey and she was expecting your first child. Louise, isn't it?"

I nodded.

"The Judge didn't think it was fair to risk damaging your marriage."

Mackenzie released my hand, then dug around in her handbag and pulled out some papers.

"Look, there's you listed as my father on my birth certificate; I have dual nationality, you know; the Judge insisted. The judge managed to have them name you as my father on my British birth certificate that he got from the embassy as well."

"I thought only British citizens could do that. The registration I mean."

"I think that the Judge can do just about anything he wants to, when he sets his mind to it, father," she said, handing some papers to me for me to read.

They were copies of two birth certificates, one American and one issued by the British embassy in Washington. Both listed Ellery Mackenzie as the father of Mackenzie Mackenzie and they gave my address as the Wherry.

"Mackenzie Mackenzie!" I read out loud. Probably with a shocked tone to my voice.

Mackenzie giggled, "Mother wanted to make sure that no one forgot who my father was. I think she was still a little... you know, at the time. The Judge didn't want to risk upsetting her, so he went along. I've always found it quite amusing myself. Grandfather's the only person who calls me Mack, by the way; but never when mother's around."

That was the only time that Mackenzie ever referred to her Grandfather as anything other than the Judge.

"So what made you decide to come and find me now, after all these years?"

"Mother and the Judge have always been worried about doing anything that might upset your marriage. They have never gone into details, but I assumed they had their reasons to believe that if my existence became known, it might have caused some trouble between you and your wife."

"I can't understand why."

"Who knows what they were thinking, father? Perhaps they worried you might try to take me from them when I was younger. But I insisted that I wanted to at least see you before I got married. I had always hoped that my real father would be present at my wedding."

"Your real father?"

"Yeah, mother has been married twice. And if you must know, I don't think they stood up to her idea of the perfect husband, or father for me. Neither of them lasted very long. Although I got on with them both pretty well."

"We came over last week and stayed in London. Mother has always wanted to see the Willows, so we drove up and went there for a meal last night. The ladies there, Beverley and Michelle, they were looking at us very strangely. Eventually Beverley... she kept staring at me, and well, she guessed who I was first when Joe called me by name, and then she worked out who mother was, of course. We stayed there last night and she sent us over here this morning.

"Yeah, I knew something was going on because she called Lindsey to warn her that you were coming, but that was hours ago."

"Oh, yeah, well, mother was very nervous about meeting you and your wife. Well, we both were, so we stopped in that little art gallery in the village for a coffee. Of course we had no idea that your sister Julia owned it. She worked out who we were quicker than Beverley had. Your sister's very nice; she came with us to your pub."

"And she's taken Codi back here to the Willows, probably so that we could meet on neutral ground," I replied, as the launch nudged up against the bank.

Beverley was waiting at the garden entranced to meet us. "She's upstairs in our lounge with Julia and Lindsey, Mack. Maybe you should have a word with Lindsey first."

As I'd hoped she would, Lindsey had driven over to the Willows herself as soon as Mackenzie and I had left the Wherry in the launch. She met me at the top of the stairs and gave me a big hug.

"Be gentle with her, Mack. She's very frightened and I think a little delicate as well."

"Yeah, Mackenzie has explained about her mental condition."

"Maybe that's got something to do with what she did in France," Lindsey offered. "You know, she's self-destructive or something. Anyway that was all a long time ago Mack, so please go easy on her."

"I'm more concerned that I wasn't told about Mackenzie than anything else, Lynn."

"Of course you are, but look at it from Codi's family's point of view. Their only daughter has a tendency to be... unstable. Mackenzie is their only grandchild and her father lives on the other side of the world. If you had claimed custody of Mackenzie through the courts, citing Codi's mental problems and won. Well... they'd rarely see her, would they, and what kind of effect could that have had on Codi? She's worried enough now that you'll take her daughter away from her."

I think I could understand the logic of what Lindsey was saying. Although I can't say that I've been happy about the way things had gone. Whatever, I decided that what was done was done and there was little point in arguing about it. It would surely just cause Mackenzie a lot of pain if Codi and I were at loggerheads.

"I can be magnanimous when I need to be, sweetheart." I winked at Lindsey.

"Thanks, Mack, and give her a hug when you get in there." I looked her in the eyes. "Don't worry, I know that you love me and I told her that I'd scratch her eyes out before she'd steal you away from me again." She laughed.

I gave my wife another hug before I entered Beverley's lounge. Actually it was Michelle's lounge but for some reason I've always thought of the Willows as Beverley's place. Lindsey following me to the door from where she gestured to Julia to leave with her as I entered.

The years hadn't been as kind to Codi as they had been to Lindsey; maybe that's why she didn't seem worried about this meeting. As Codi hurriedly jumped to her feet I could see that she'd retained her figure, but the skin of her face showed those all too obvious signs of a face lift. And inexplicably to me there was a look of real fear in her eyes.

"Hi, Codi, long time no see." Stupid statement, but the best I could come up with at the time. She didn't reply; she just looked even more frightened and took a step back. A rabbit caught in a car's headlights is about the most apt description I can give.

So I tried again. "Mackenzie's a beautiful girl. You must be proud of her."

"I'm sorry about Mackenzie. I... We... and then it was too late. I should have told you, but I wasn't..." Codi's words were only just audible.

Seeing Codi's reaction to my presence and knowing what Mackenzie had explained me about her mental condition, I had little choice but pretend that I wasn't upset about the situation.

"Codi, sometimes we do the wrong things with the best of intentions, Mackenzie's told me all about it and I think that I can understand the way the wind was blowing at the time. I'm not happy about it... Christ, I can never be happy about what happened back then. But I'm way too old to worry about that now, or let bygones risk any future relationship I might have with Mackenzie. Or you!" I added on reflection.

"But it was all so stupid. I loved you and I destroyed everything." Codi was crying by then and she looked so pitiful standing there. "They wanted me to abort her, you know. God, I was such a fool."

There's not much point in trying to repeat the rest of the conversation here because it got rather complicated and completely confusing even for me at the time; Codi was trying to apologise for not telling me about Mackenzie and at the same time for what she'd done with the Wanker in France. It took some unravelling, I can assure you.

Years later - and well after her mother's demise - Mackenzie and I came to some mutual conclusions about why Codi did some of the things that she did do, but they would take too long to explain here. I'll try and get back to them later.

Eventually that morning Codi and I signed a peace pact of sorts, and the past was never mentioned when she was around again. Oh and I did give her the little hug that Lindsey had asked me to.

-------------------------

"Codi's a very troubled woman," Lindsey said, later that evening. Which I took to mean that she agreed with me that Codi was balancing on a tightrope and was only just maintaining her sanity.

Codi appeared to relax a lot after our chat together, but of course it was awkward; I think we got through the rest of her, Mackenzie and Joe's visit without very much trauma.

I got to know Joe well during that visit and grew to like him very much. He was about to be discharged from the forces and under the Judge's guidance - I believe - he went on to take up Law. Eventually he finished up as a business attorney over there and a pretty successful one as far as I'm aware.

Strange though that Joe still seems unsure of himself around me; especially when he was so at ease around the Judge, in who's company I never did feel comfortable.

The three of them stayed in the UK for four weeks altogether, Codi and Joe lodging at the Willows, and Mackenzie staying with us at the Wherry. It was Joe's idea that he lodged at the Willows; he said it would allow Mackenzie to get to know Lindsey, our children and me better if he wasn't around all of the time.

Remarkably quickly really, Mackenzie bonded with her half siblings and the rest of her newly extended family: Julia, Billie, Brian and their families. Plus of course my parents and my other brother and his family came up for quick visits as well.

It was a sad day for all of us when they left to fly home. I missed Mackenzie much more than I expected I would.

It was early the following January that we flew out to the States for Mackenzie and Joe's wedding. The girls enjoyed being her bridesmaids and James tried his best to play the English gentleman usher; especially round the younger ladies present, several of whom he wrote to for some time afterwards.

Lindsey and I met the Judge and his wife, who I'd better point out wasn't Codi's mother. The tension between the Judge's wife and Codi was hidden quite well, but both Lindsey and I picked up on it very quickly.

It's an odd thing to try to explain but one thing I found very surprising was that Codi appeared to want to be with Lindsey all the time. Almost from the moment we arrived at the judge's house, if I found Lindsey, Codi would be with her. The two girls went on shopping trips and fussed around the wedding arrangements together as well. I mentioned it to Lindsey in bed one evening.

"Yeah, it's strange, isn't it?" Lindsey replied. "You know I was worried that Codi might make a play for you when we came over here. You know, that she'd feel that she had you on her home ground. But she's insisting that I have a say in everything about this wedding; strange, it's as if she's trying to push Mackenzie and me together."

Mackenzie and Joe took to coming over to the UK at least a couple of times a year, although until Joe was qualified I think the Judge financed their visits. They brought Codi with them a couple of times as well after they had their first child. They also attended all three of Mackenzie's half-siblings weddings, Mackenzie playing maid of honour at the two girls weddings.

Lindsey and I tended to spend a couple of weeks in the States every year, but usually during the winter months. As the Judge got older, I was to feel a little more relaxed in his company. I think I was pretty cut up when Lindsey and I had to fly out there at short notice for his funeral. He was getting on a bit, but he had always seemed a pretty tough old bugger; a heart attack took him at some formal dinner.

It was only just over four months after the Judge went, that I received an urgent call from Joe. That morning Codi's body had been found floating in the swimming pool of the Judge's house where she'd been living with her stepmother. We didn't arrive in time to attend the inquest and I sense there was a reluctance to talk about the Coroner's findings, which I believe found Codi's death to have been accidental.

Although later, I was to learn that the autopsy revealed that Codi's system was loaded with what were euphemistically described as prescription drugs, I took them to have been the antidepressants - that I was well aware she'd been on for years - and alcohol, which as a publican, I knew was not recommended. I gathered that some interesting questions had been asked about why Codi had been in the pool in the first place, because she was not in the habit of taking a swim late at night.

Lindsey and I had to rush back over to the States with the children for the funeral. Mackenzie as you'd expect was pretty cut up about losing her mother and she clung very tightly to Lindsey and me most of the time that we were there.

I think that that was when I realised that Codi's death couldn't possibly have been an accident, and that she had been planning it for sometime. I had always known that she couldn't abide her stepmother and I honestly believe she had delayed taking her own life until after the Judge had passed on.

I deduced from what the attorney who handled Codi's estate said, that she'd been very busy in the intervening months between The Judge and her own demise, making sure that Mackenzie was to get her fair share of the Judge's estate that had been originally divided between the three of them.

Codi's death hit me very hard, harder than I thought it would; although I tried not to show exactly how hard at the time. But I believe Lindsey and Mackenzie both knew. As did Beverley when we returned home again. Beverley and I spent a lot of time talking about the unwarranted - as Beverley termed them - feelings of guilt that I felt over Codi's death.

After Codi's death, I gathered that Mackenzie had little contact with the Judge's widow, who sold his house and moved down to Florida.

Mackenzie began to spend a lot more time in the UK, flying over several times a year. Always with her children and normally accompanied by Joe, who eventually bought a house in the village. It's a bit large to call a holiday home and I think that he might have ideas along the lines of settling over here. He seems to be doing a lot of work with American companies in London in the last year or so and that's increased the frequency of their visits to the UK.

Well that about brings you up to date; how things will go on from here is anybodies guess.

Life goes on

Epilogue

Well that just about brings things up to date, although it wouldn't hurt to add that Mackenzie and I have discussed Codi, and the weird things she did, very often since she's been gone. Mackenzie has come to her own conclusions about why Codi behaved as she did and has tried to explain them to me many times.

It appears -- or so Mackenzie has been trying to convince me -- that Codi really did love me, but she had always had a sort of self-destructive streak. She'd been an extremely rebellious child who'd driven the poor old Judge almost to distraction on many occasions.

Eventually She (Mackenzie) came to the conclusion that Codi's little tryst with the Wanker actor had nothing to do with me at all; it had more to do with the Judge being happy with her choice of me to marry, or rather his enthusiasm for the marriage.

Let me try to explain it as Mackenzie tried to explain it to me. Apparently it all went back to when Codi's mother had passed away and the Judge had remarried.

Codi had been about six years old and she had not taken her mother's death well. She had been even more upset that the Judge had remarried quite quickly, apparently within the year. What's more his choice of new bride had been a woman who Codi knew that her mother disliked intensely.

Mackenzie seems to have come to the conclusion that there might have been something going on between the Judge and his second wife, whilst her grandmother was still alive and what's more she's convinced that Codi was aware of the relationship. Mackenzie even went so far as to suggest that Codi's mother's death might not have been from natural causes, that the Judge's second wife might possibly have had a hand in things.

When I asked why Mackenzie would think such a thing. She replied that the thoughts came from odd comments that Codi had made over the years. None of which you could call a definite accusation, more a sort of inference.

Anyway, Mackenzie thought that in retaliation for what she believed, as she'd got older, Codi had purposely set about becoming a real pain in the backside to the Judge and her stepmother. She was always getting into trouble at school, although she was a reasonably good student academically.

Codi just appears to have gone out of her way, to do anything that she could think of to upset her father and stepmother. I won't bother to go into the list of Codi's legal misdemeanours committed in her younger teenage years, that Mackenzie reeled off to me. But take my word for it, it was extensive.

Then Codi had taken up with this guy she met at college, and had suddenly pulled her socks up and began to behave herself. Apparently she was in love with the guy who, it turned out, was quite conservative. Now, the Judge had never been -- lets say -- particularly enamoured with any of Codi's previous boyfriends, consequently he had been in no hurry to meet the guy.

That was fine, until the guy started talking to Codi about marriage and the Judge finally did have meet him. Much to his surprise, the Judge found that he approved of the guy, and that's when things started going wrong.

Three months later Codi was supposed to have found the guy in bed with her housemate. Mackenzie suspects that the reverse was actually true and the poor sod found Mackenzie in bed with some guy possibly a friend of his. He, of course, broke it off.

That's apparently when Codi went rushing home to the Judge and eventually joined him and her stepmother on their trip to Europe. It was in Paris where she met up with the little crowd that I found her hanging with.

"Sorry to tell you this, dad," Mackenzie told me, "But a barman bumming around Europe, isn't the kind of guy that the Judge had visions of mother marrying. And what's more you can bet your bottom dollar, she knew it."

"I don't know whether she took up with you in the first place to piss the Judge off. But I do know that she fell head over heels in love with you."

"If you're trying to say, what I think you're trying to say, Mackenzie. Then I doubt that somehow."

"No dad, whether she'd intended to or not, mother loved you more than anyone else in the world... and that includes me."

"Nonsense, kiddo; your mother loved you very much."

"Not as much as she loved you, dad, I can promise you that. I'm sure she had no idea why she went with the actor bloke that day. But I do know that she regretted it for the rest of her life. I think that the Judge giving her the green light to marry you sort of tripped a switch in her brain and she couldn't control what happened after that."