Chapter 4
The Winthrop Island School sits on a corner lot a short drive from the library, a short walk from the ferry landing, at the bottom of West Cliff Road.
We arrive while the kids are eating lunch in what Americans call a multipurpose room.
The meaty cafeteria smell hangs in the air. Punkin wrinkles her nose.
I’ve already spoken on the phone to the schoolteacher I’ll be replacing. Her name is Emily and she’s pregnant out to here. She starts maternity leave in three weeks; the baby’s due the week after that, she says, cupping her belly as if this will hold the kid upstairs until then.
Emily has a remarkable amount of enthusiasm for a woman so extremely pregnant. She leans down and opens her arms as wide as she can. “Elise! I’m so glad you’re finally joining us!”
Is it my imagination, or is there a tiny emphasis on the finally?
“It’s only the middle of September, Miss Flanagan,” says Punkin. “Also my mother teaches me at home. You don’t need to worry about my progress.”
“Oh, I wasn’t worried. Not one bit.”
I cut in hastily. “Aren’t you the brave one, though, having a baby at the start of winter.”
“Well, we were planning to have him in April, so I could have five months off, but we got off to a slow start, you might say.” Emily winks at me.
“This sounds like an adult conversation,” says Punkin.
Emily takes Punkin’s hand. “Now you just come with me, Elise, and we’ll show you your cubby and your desk so you’ll get off the ground running Monday morning.”
—
As we pull out of the school parking lot, Punkin stares thoughtfully out the window of the Volvo. “The cafeteria smells terrible. Is that how kids eat lunch in America?”
“I’m afraid so. I’ll try to get up early and pack you something nice.”
“That’s okay. I need to get used to my new situation.”
“Honey,” I say, picking my words, “you know we’re not going to stay here forever. Especially now that Grandad isn’t around. Just until the end of the school year.”
“I know,” she says. “But a school year is practically forever. At least to a kid.”
I glance at her reflection in the rearview mirror. She looks grave. Contemplating the eternal winter ahead, I guess.
“Trust me,” I tell her. “It’ll be gone before you know it.”
—
On the way home, we stop at the Winthrop Island Library and Historical Society, where we return all the overdue library books and pick up a haul of fresh ones for Punkin.
She settles herself on the sofa while I clear a place next to her and start sorting through Dad’s unopened mail. She was an early reader—it’s just the two of us, and I am a teacher—and like most early readers she gobbles books at a voracious rate, like cookies.
A demented chime echoes from the hall. We look at each other.
“Is that the doorbell?” asks Punkin.
I set the envelopes back in the bin and heave myself from the sofa. “And now you know why everyone uses the knocker.”
The man at the door is about forty, wearing a pink polo shirt and a tragic expression.
“Topher Dumont,” he says. “Friend of your dad’s? I’m so sorry for your loss.”
I open the door wide. “Come on in. I’m afraid I don’t have much to offer you. Glass of water?”
“No, thanks. I’m headed back to Boston on the three o’clock so I can’t stay long.
” He drags a glance around the parlor—the shabby furniture, the side table crowded with silver-framed photographs, lined up like soldiers in formation.
A brief peek through the archway to the study beyond, where Punkin curls up on the sofa with her books, surrounded by mountains of pirate research.
“Is there something I can do for you?” I ask.
He returns to me and assembles an apologetic smile. “I don’t mean to intrude. It’s Lucy, isn’t it?”
“Sorry. Yes. Lucy Cooper.”
“I remember when you used to visit your dad in the summer. You probably don’t remember me.”
“Not really, sorry. You were friends with Laura, right?”
“That’s right.” He runs a hand through his thinning hair.
A gold signet ring squeezes the pinky—kind of a flashy touch for a Winthrop Islander, I’m thinking.
“My dad and your dad were tight, though. Went to Belmont Hill together. Harvard. Sadly, he passed away a couple of years ago. My dad, I mean.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Cancer. Pretty brutal. I’m sorry I couldn’t make the service yesterday. I had a board meeting.”
There’s something obnoxious about the way he says board meeting.
A tiny emphasis, like he wants to make sure you understand that he’s the type of person who sits on boards.
I’m starting to feel some aversion, despite his attractive face and lean tennis body.
Him and his board meeting and his signet ring.
The casual educational name-dropping, all within the first few sentences.
It’s all a bit douchey and insecure, isn’t it?
A bit aspirational, when the whole point of Winthrop Island is that you don’t aspire to anybody. People aspire to you.
So what’s Topher Dumont compensating for?
His gaze shifts to the room behind me. “Hey, sweetheart. What’s your name?”
I turn my head. Punkin stands in the archway. From her expression, I’m guessing she’s experiencing the same aversion I do.
“Je m’appelle Elise. Qu’est ce-que vous faites ici?”
“Honey. English.”
“No, no, it’s okay,” says Topher Dumont. “I got a little French. She wants to know what I’m doing here, right?”
“Elise? Can you come here and say hello to our guest? Nicely?”
She stalks forward. “My name is Elise. Welcome to our home.”
He takes her hand and gravely shakes it. “Hello, Elise. My name is Mr. Dumont. I knew your grandfather. I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Excuse me, Topher,” she says. “I have to go to the bathroom.”
He watches her march off. “Precocious little kid. How old is she?”
“Seven.” I nod to the large brown envelope tucked under his left arm. “Is that for me?”
“This?” He looks at it like he’s never seen an envelope before. “Oh, yeah. Right. And you’ll excuse me for intruding. You don’t need to look at it right away. I know it’s a tough time for you. Just a few documents.”
I take the envelope. “What kind of documents?”
“Loan documents. Sorry, I know it’s a little awkward, but I wanted to bring it to your attention now. Before you start making any decisions about—you know.” He waves a vague hand to the room around us. “Disposition of assets and everything.”
“I don’t think my father really had much in the way of assets to dispose of.”
“No. No, he did not. Great man, your father, by the way. One of the best. Loved hearing his stories at the Club. He and my dad, they used to really go at it. Good times. But here’s the deal, Lucy.”
He glances again at the slice of study visible through the archway. Twists his ring—not the signet on his right hand, but the gold wedding band on his left.
I turn the envelope over. On the back, someone’s written in black Sharpie, all caps—COOPER LOANS. “Let me make it easier for you, Topher. I’m going to take a wild guess here. Your father was the one who loaned my dad the money, and not the other way around?”
He smiles with relief. “You got it. Quite a lot of money, I’m afraid, which is why I wanted to bring it to your attention earlier instead of later. So you’re aware of the situation. The, um. The urgency of the situation.”
“How much, Topher.”
Topher sticks his hands into the pockets of his mint-green chino shorts with the nine-inch inseams and says, “Two point two.”
“Two point two million?”
“When you add the individual loans all together, plus accrued interest.”
I feel a strong urge to grab the back of the sofa, which I resist.
Topher nods at the envelope in my hands. “It’s all in there. I added a handy little spreadsheet, to kind of lay out the math for you? Principal plus interest, compounded over twelve years.”
“Wow. I can’t even imagine what he spent it on.”
“I’m guessing real estate taxes? That kind of thing?
The principal wasn’t as much as you think.
A few hundred thousand. It’s just that he couldn’t pay any of it off, so he kept accruing interest, and my dad kept loaning him more, couldn’t say no to an old friend, you know how it is…
” Topher shakes his head in sorrow. “Anyway. You don’t have to pay it all back right away.
We can discuss when you’ve had a little time to grieve. ”
“Actually, Topher. Let’s discuss this now. Because I’m going to be frank with you. I don’t have your two million dollars. I don’t even have the point two.”
“And you don’t have anyone you can borrow the money from? Your mother, maybe?” He smiles hopefully, the asshole. He knows all about my mother, I bet. Everyone on the island knows. The husband and the ex-husbands and their total net worth.
“I’m afraid that’s out of the question, Topher,” I tell him.
“I see. Right. Well, like I said, we don’t need to discuss this now.
” He twists his wrist to check his smartwatch.
“Just—if I may. Plant a little seed before I go. And again, you know, this is all between friends. Last thing I want is any hard feelings taking place, here. That’s not what we’re all about, here on Winthrop. ”
“Oh, of course. Plant away.”
“So, here’s the deal. From what I can tell, the initial loan was probably considered a one-off, between friends. Kind of a handshake deal. They trusted each other. But when your dad needed a little more, my dad wanted some security. Obviously. Not that he didn’t trust your dad—”
“Topher,” I say, “he absolutely should not have trusted my dad to repay anything. Not that my dad didn’t intend to pay him back.
You know, someday. But he was a fantasist. That day was never going to come.
He was never going to have the money to pay back your dad.
I say that with love, obviously. But let’s be honest.”
“Yes. True. Which is why…” Topher takes a deep breath and raises his gaze to the magnificently coffered ceiling, stained a delicate tea brown. “Which is why the remaining loans were secured on this property.”