Chapter 15 #2
I enter the little cemetery. The latch moves more freely than it did the first time I was out here, as if I’d knocked off years of rust and neglect when I wiggled it free.
I stand in front of Mary’s headstone. I feel a strange sense of kinship with her.
How I wish I had met my aunt, and wonder what her life had been like here at Spencer House.
She lost both her parents while still a young woman, but she must’ve had every belief that she, herself, would live a long life.
According to Noah, she’d just graduated from college.
What were her plans? Was she going to stay here in her ancestral home, or was she leaving, off to someplace new and different?
I get the feeling that she was going to go.
I look back down the path, but the house is hidden by trees.
Only the turret is visible above them, the rabbit weathervane turned to the north.
From what I can surmise from the layout of the house, the turret is part of the master bedroom.
But the doors to the bedrooms besides mine have been kept firmly shut, so I have no clue what lies beyond them.
I close my eyes and listen to the call of a hawk as it rides the air currents overhead. Remembering my yoga training, I breathe deeply of the woodsy air and calm my thoughts.
“Emma? There you are!” Alex calls coming down the path. He’s handsome in his black suit and dark violet tie, striding toward me on long legs.
“I’m sorry. I just stepped out for some air,” I say as he draws near, pulling up at his parents’ graves.
“No problem. I saw you headed this way from the window. What are you doing here?” he asks, but he’s smiling, not an accusation.
My heart races anyway, as if I’ve done something wrong. “I discovered the cemetery the other day. I was just looking.”
Alex leans a large hand on the top of the nearest headstone. “Family. That’s what really matters, Emma. That’s why I’m so glad we’ve found each other.”
I nod, glance at Mary’s grave. I’m full of questions, but don’t have the courage under the circumstances to ask them right now.
Alex paces along the iron fencing. “Well, I suppose you’ve been wondering what happened between me and your mother. It’s probably time we talked about that.”
My eyes meet his. “Yes. I only have her side of the story, and she didn’t tell me much. Just that you left when you found out she was pregnant.”
Alex frowns and shoves his hands in his pockets.
“I guess I should tell you my side.” He glances up at the sky, the setting sun peeking through the treetops.
“I was young. She was even younger. Lana was so pretty, so much fun. I met her in Truckee. I’d just graduated from Harvard and was doing a cross-country road trip before settling down to a job working for my father in the fall. ”
“She told me that much.”
“Anyway, I met her at a little diner where she had a summer job. And she accused me of short-changing her. So, I ended up overpaying and giving her a big tip. Then I asked her out, and she surprised me by saying yes.”
I’m trying to be patient, hold my emotions in check. “But you left her when she told you she was pregnant?”
Alex shakes his head. “That’s what she told you?”
I nod.
“I didn’t know, Emma. I swear. I stayed in Truckee for only about a month.
Then I got back on the road. That was it.
A nice summer romance, but I didn’t think either one of us thought it was anything serious.
I’m sorry for what she went through, and you, too.
But I really didn’t know anything about it. ”
He walks closer to me and puts a hand on my shoulder. “I want to make it all up to you. I’m sorry that Lana isn’t here so that I could do the same for her.”
“So, what happened after you left Truckee?”
“I eventually made my way home. Started working for my father in the family business, which back then was mostly shipping and investments. He was adamant that that was what I was raised to do, and I had no say in the matter.” Alex grimaces.
“But all I really wanted to do was be a writer, and my father thought that was a waste of time, and he hoped the trip would get it out of my system. But far from it. Wandering the country only fueled my quest to be a writer. The trip was my version of Kerouac’s On the Road.
But by myself. I didn’t have a bunch of cool, literary buddies to go with me.
And I’ve always been interested in history.
I’d been fascinated by what happened to the Donner Party since I was a kid.
That’s why I went to Truckee. Anyway, when I got back home, I started working on my first novel late at night after spending my day in the office under my father’s suffocating wing.
That’s when I finished my first manuscript, which eventually became Killer on the Trail. ”
With the toe of my black pump, I push at a clump of weeds next to Mary’s headstone. Alex has filled in some of my history, but I wonder why my mother lied to me. Or is he lying? Who knows? I want to ask him about Mary, too. But I sense that this isn’t the time.
Alex clears his throat. “I’m getting ready to do a little road trip, research for the book I’m working on now. Like to go with me? I was waiting until after Simon’s service. I wanted to make sure that Ruth was okay. Just a day trip. But I’d like some company if you’re interested.”
“Where are you going?”
“Fall River. Just a couple hours south of Boston.” Alex steps toward the cemetery gate. “Think about it. What do you say we head inside?” He rubs his hands together. “Getting chilly. I’ll pour us each a brandy.”
Back at the house, the crowd has thinned, and I notice that Aubrey and Dale have left. I start to clear some of the empty or nearly empty platters from the table when someone squeezes my elbow from behind. I gasp, startled. I hate that I’m so easily startled.
“Sorry, Em,” Noah says. This is the first time he’s used the nickname that Ben always used, and I freeze.
“It’s okay.”
“I meant to get over here earlier, but I had a phone call from a magazine editor I’m working with.”
“Well, you’re here now.”
Alex walks over and hands me a brandy. I guess he thinks it’s what I favor after that first evening here when we had that drink together.
“Hello, Noah,” he says.
“Nice service,” Noah responds. “Ruth seems to be holding up well.”
“Yes. She’s a tough lady.”
I sip my brandy and actually enjoy the burn down my throat, let Alex and Noah continue their robotic pleasantries. I set my glass on the table and continue to clear. Alex plucks a plate from my hand.
“Sit, Emma. Finish your drink. Jeffrey is around here someplace. He can take care of the cleaning up.”
A tiny, elderly man walks over to us and claims Alex’s attention. The two of them move off to the front room.
“Why don’t we sit?” Noah says, and we find a spot in the now-deserted dining room. “You okay? You look a little wiped out.”
“Yeah. Just an emotional day,” I say. And it is. All these strangers. A murdered man remembered and put to rest. “It’s a lot.”
Noah sips a glass of wine, his gaze on the Persian carpet. “Sorry if I was intrusive the other day at lunch. I had no right to be poking into your personal business.”
“It’s fine.”
“Well, I won’t tell anyone anything you’ve told me. Unlike the rest of the people at Cheshire Lake, I’m not a gossip.” He turns in his seat, gazes into the front room.
Ruth is standing now, up from the armchair where she’d been ensconced all afternoon. She dabs at her eyes with a tissue. Alex and Sunny encircle her and there are hugs before they walk her toward the foyer, Larry in her wake.
After everyone leaves, Jeffrey seems to appear out of nowhere.
Eyes averted, he finishes clearing the long dining room table.
Alex retreats to his office and Sunny disappears as well.
The house is quiet except for the kitchen, where dishes clink and water runs.
I peer out the dining room window. Light rain is falling, and the light is on in Noah’s kitchen.
I wonder about Sunny’s warning. He seems nice enough, but Ben seemed nice, too.
I met Ben at an off-campus party senior year.
Through the loud music and throngs of students, Ben made his way to the corner where I stood with my roommate, whose idea it was to attend the party in the first place.
He brought me a drink and introduced himself.
My roommate had her eye on a handsome lacrosse player and soon left my side in search of him, leaving me alone with Ben.
He kept up a lively conversation and seemed so relaxed, so confident.
We talked about graduation and what our plans were for the future.
I had an offer from the city library, and Ben had already accepted a position with a local firm.
We seemed to fall into a relationship quickly after that, and since we were both planning to live in town, it seemed only natural that we would continue dating after graduation.
I met his family, who were all lovely, and I was looking forward to the future.
My mom wasn’t so sure. She liked Ben but was wary.
He was too nice, she said. I wasn’t sure how that was a problem exactly.
And I chalked it up to my mom’s general distrust of men, but it turned out she was more prescient than I was, and I learned the hard way that “too nice” could mask myriad character flaws.