Chapter 9
I PACKED UP THE EXTRA FOOD FROM LUNCH AND STORED IT IN RUTH’S refrigerator.
There’s enough to keep her fed for a week.
When someone dies, that’s all we can think to do, flood the bereaved with food.
I remember the casseroles the neighbors brought over when my mom died.
More than I could ever eat, and I still feel guilty about throwing most of them out.
As the sun started to wane, Sunny looked over the leftovers and decided to order dinner from a restaurant in Evansport.
We sat with Ruth and ate; while Ruth picked at her food, Larry managed to make a good dent in the gourmet offerings Sunny procured.
As evening came on, Ruth told us she was all right and that we should go back to Spencer House and get some sleep.
The house is cold, my emotions raw, and I’m suddenly glad not to be here alone anymore.
Sunny walks briskly through the front room, her phone clenched between her shoulder and ear.
She throws open the door to Alex’s office.
I hear her talking, shouting almost, as she shuts the door firmly behind her.
Alex takes my jacket and hangs it in the hall closet.
“Sunny gets a little wound up when I have a book coming out,” he says, glancing toward his office.
“And now with Simon.” Alex’s eyes focus on me.
“But I’m really glad you’re here, Emma. Despite everything, I’m glad to have a chance to get to know you. ”
I nod. “Me too,” I mumble. “I feel so bad for Ruth.”
Alex’s gaze shifts to the floor. “Yes. I was afraid something like this would happen. In fact, when I was here a couple of weeks ago, I asked Ruth if we should consider putting Simon in a memory care facility, but she was having none of it.” He sighs. “I’m sure that’s weighing on her now.”
I don’t mention the proverbial elephant in the room.
Other than Aubrey when she cornered me in the hall at Ruth’s, no one has spoken about the cops and their probing questions.
It’s like these people are totally oblivious.
Or maybe they just see what they want to see, and not discussing a possible murder in their midst is a choice they have all consciously made.
Alex pats my shoulder. “But don’t worry about Ruth. She’s as tough a lady as I’ve ever known. She’ll come out of this okay.” He turns toward the dining room and I follow. “How about a drink? I could use a brandy.”
I join Alex with a brandy, although I don’t really want it. Alcohol this late doesn’t sit well with me, and I hope between that and what happened today, I can sleep without dreaming of the screaming woman.
We sit in the front room listening to Sunny’s muffled voice behind the office door. Alex built a fire and flames flicker in the fireplace; in their light, I notice a decorative panel set into the brick work just below the mantel. Three birds wheel in flight over the inscription:
Tempus Fugit. Memento Mori
I shudder. I remember enough of my high school Latin to be familiar with that phrase: “Time Flies. Remember death.”
Alex catches my gaze. “A little more sinister way of saying carpe diem I suppose.”
I swallow and sip my brandy. “Words to live by.”
“My great-grandfather,” Alex continues, “was quite the go-getter from what I’ve learned.
And he took great pride in building the house.
We’ve changed very little. His love of history and language can still be seen here in the décor and the things he left behind.
When I was a kid, I loved the library—my office now—and the books in his collection, especially Poe and the early crime novels.
” Alex smiles. “I was quite the nerd, still am, I guess.”
“We have that in common,” I say, and sip my brandy.
I think back to the years I spent with my mother, moving from one town to another.
It was difficult to make friends always being the new girl, so I took refuge in books and then my notebooks that I filled with stories when I should have been learning algebra or biology.
Still, I managed to keep my grades up knowing that if I wanted to go to college—and I desperately did—a scholarship was crucial.
Finally, I stand, trying to stifle a yawn.
Sunny is still in Alex’s office, still speaking on her phone in a sharp, strident voice.
Then I notice my laptop. I’d left it on Alex’s desk, where I’d been working on my novel.
It’s now sitting on an end table outside the office door. I pick it up and tuck it under my arm.
“I think I’ll try to get some sleep,” I say.
“Good idea.” Alex stands. “I’m going to have another drink, then probably hit the sack myself. Sleep well, Emma.” He raises his empty glass in my direction.
Despite everything, I sleep through the night, no nightmares, no bathroom trips in the wee hours, but when I wake up, I don’t feel refreshed, like I’d run a marathon in my sleep.
I briefly consider going on my usual morning run, but I feel too drained, and I don’t want to revisit the scene of Simon’s death either, which was cordoned off by crime-scene tape anyway.
So instead I dress for the day and decide to take a walk right outside to get some air.
The house is strangely silent, as if Alex and Sunny had quietly moved out in the night. But then I hear her voice, more subdued this morning behind Alex’s closed office door, and I wonder if she even went upstairs to sleep last night.
Just as I reach the foyer, Sunny emerges from the office and pauses in the front room doorway, coffee mug in hand. She’s wearing yoga pants and a long, baggy, cable-knit sweater but still manages to look chic.
“Need something?” she asks, her brow furrowed.
“No. I just thought I’d go outside, walk around a bit.” I’m crouched on the floor, pulling on my boots.
She purses her lips. “Just be aware that my father’s new book comes out soon and he’s got a lot on his plate. And now with Simon. Anyway …” She waves her hand in the air. “We’re all really busy right now.”
“I understand.” I turn and head out into the chilly morning.
I walk around to the back of the house, the breeze flipping dead leaves through the air.
No sunshine today and the atmosphere is close, murky and wet, as if rain is on the way.
I wander around the yard. There’s an old rope swing in the corner hanging from a huge oak and I wonder who used it last. I can’t imagine Sunny swinging on it even as a little girl.
There’s a row of spent flowers and that reminds me of my mother.
She was like a latter-day hippie, all earth mother and Birkenstock sandals.
Her love of growing things even helped provide for our dinner table.
No matter where we lived, she managed to eke out a little garden patch between apartment buildings or sometimes in a community garden.
I sniff and kick through the leaves, which have started to come down in earnest, and notice a narrow path as the yard gives way to the trees. I decide to see where the path leads.
From her cold reception, it’s obvious that Sunny doesn’t want me here, and of course, that was not what I had hoped for.
Still, a lot is happening at once and I need to give everyone time to get used to my presence.
The best thing I can do is keep to myself, be helpful when the opportunity arises, and hope things smooth over.
As I head down the path, the trees start to thin, and short wrought iron fencing comes into view. As I draw closer, I see headstones. I shiver. A graveyard so close to the house. A drooping old maple tree leans its heavy branches over the headstones like a protector.
I find the gate to the little cemetery. The latch is cold and coated with rust, and it takes me a minute to work it free. The gate swings open with a screech that is loud in the quiet morning mist.
Weeds and saplings have grown up around the graves.
The name SPENCER is carved on the first large stone.
Howard and Lydia. From the dates, I assume these are Alex’s parents.
And they both died on the same day, which would correspond with what Noah told me.
They died together in a small plane crash.
My grandparents, I think to myself, and reach out my hand to touch the shiny stone.
Nearby is a smaller stone with a clutch of roses carved at the top.
Mary, Alex’s younger sister. Dead at twenty-one.
There are other stones behind these, all with the name SPENCER carved at the top.
It seems to me that my father is alone in the world except for his children.
Sunny, her younger brother, Andrew, me, and a string of wives and ex-wives.
But the older generation is gone. Maybe that’s why he’s so close to Ruth. She’s a link to the past.
I run my hand along the carving of the roses on Mary’s headstone, the rough granite picks at my fingertips.
“What are you doing?” Sunny calls behind me. I startle.
“Nothing. Just walking and I wandered into the woods and found …”
“It’s just the old family cemetery, Emma. No need to be back here. Jeffrey takes care of it.”
I don’t want to say that he isn’t doing a very good job of it, but I say nothing and head back through the gate.
Sunny follows me up the path. “Anyway, I wanted to let you know that my father has a radio interview this afternoon, so it would be best if you found something to do, not in the house. He needs quiet.”
Like I’m going to make a racket?
“Fine. Maybe I’ll run into town.” I suddenly feel suffocated in this little neighborhood, as if I’m an intruder and everyone, even Alex, wants me out. I don’t belong, they seem to say behind their smiles and welcomes, letting Sunny articulate what they’re all secretly feeling.
“Good idea. Evansport isn’t that big, but I’m sure there’s enough to keep you occupied for a while.”