Manor of Dying

by Kathleen Bridge

  “Want me to throw your skirt in the dryer? Now that the fire is cracklin’, I can loan you my robe.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” she said, laughing, holding up the bag of kelp. “You must think I’m a nutjob.”

  “Of course I do. That’s why we get along so well.”

  I took off my robe and handed it to her. She didn’t mention my I’ve been to Hell, Michigan, jammies, but I saw a slight upward curve to her lips. She slipped on my aqua fleece robe, took off her skirt, then handed it to me. While Claire took a seat at the card table, I went to the kitchen and opened a pair of louvered doors that hid my washer and dryer. I put her skirt in the dryer and closed the doors. When I turned, Jo was still lapping at her spotless plate. “Give it up, Josephine. Go say hi to Claire.” For once she listened and waddled out of the kitchen, her bushy tail in the shape of a question mark.

  When I came around the open counter area that separated the great room from the kitchen, I found Jo sitting at Claire’s feet with her head tilted upward, her nose twitching as if she could smell the kelp inside the bag at the edge of the table.

  Claire grinned. “I think she wants to eat some.”

  “She wants to eat everything. Everything but pet food with the words healthy, lo-cal, or weight-management written on the front. I swear, she can read.”

  I looked over at Claire’s still-pink nose and thin frame. I was surprised she’d made it over in one piece and wasn’t blown off the cliff into the Atlantic. Looking over at her raincoat on the chair, I said, “Think it’s time we went shopping for warmer clothing. Long Island winters are a far cry from California’s.”

  “Deal. It is a little colder than the Northern California town I grew up in. I just wanted to check on you.”

  “What’s that look in your emerald eyes, Ms. Post?”

  Glancing around the bare surroundings, she chastised, “When are you going to start decorating this place? I know you told me you want to savor every detail. But it’s time, young lady. My attic is waiting. What you haven’t used in Little Grey is all yours.”

  Claire’s beach house, Little Grey, got its name after it was discovered that the original architect had been the same person who’d designed the famous Grey Gardens in East Hampton—the former home of Jackie Kennedy Onassis’s cousins big and little Edie Beals.

  “I forgot to tell you that Dave’s Hamptons wants to shoot Little Grey in April, so get ready for Cottages by the Sea to have more clients than you know what to do with.” When Claire talked she always used her arms and hands in big sweeping gestures, her hands cupped ballerina style.

  When I’d first viewed it, Little Grey had been in deplorable condition. Since then the entire two floors had been renovated by D&D Construction. The only space that hadn’t seen the ravages of time was the watertight attic filled with antique and vintage goodies dating back to the early 1900s. On my initial visit and every time thereafter, its contents had made me swoon. Claire’s son-in-law, the owner of Little Grey, had given me carte blanche to decorate using what I wanted from the attic, but only after I talked to his mother-in-law, who would be living there. Claire’s aesthetic leaned more to the organic side, so I’d used the items from the attic sparingly. Luckily for me, I was promised the remainder of what was left to decorate my seven-room cottage—or eight-room, if you counted my hidden room. Seeing that Duke and Duke Jr. had only just completed our last construction project, I hadn’t had a chance to begin bringing in furniture and accessories. In the meantime, I’d been living with the bare necessities—my bed, dresser, sofa, a card table, two folding chairs, and of course my New York Times reading chair.

  “Yes, ma’am. I’ll get on it,” I said. “As soon as I finish with the Shelter Island project, you won’t be able to get me out of Little Grey’s attic. It’ll be just me and the bats. Coffee? Donut?”

  “Bats? What bats?”

  “Just the ones in my head,” I joked. Stepping behind the counter, I took out a plate and mug from the overhead cupboard. I snatched the last Dressen’s donut from a covered glass cake stand, put it on the plate, and filled the cup with French roast.

  She laughed and said, “I’m dying to know how yesterday went. In grad school, I once attended a writing sabbatical on Shelter Island sponsored by UCLA Berkley. We stayed at the old slave plantation Sylvester Manor. Even slept in the slave quarters to get an idea of what it must have been like. There were slaves at the manor until 1820. We always think of the South when it comes to slavery, not the Northeast. Some of my best poetry came from that sobering experience.”

  “Now, with the help of the Land Trust, Sylvester Manor is an educational farm.”

  “That’s wonderful.”

  “You went to Berkley? Don’t tell me you were a hippie back in the seventies. When you came to the Hamptons, did you hang out with all the bohemian writers and artists?” Claire was in her late sixties, so I knew the timing was about right.

  “No. We spent most of our time on Shelter Island. But I did spy Truman Capote and Kurt Vonnegut once in front of Bobby Van’s restaurant in Bridgehampton. We called ourselves the Nature Conservatory Poets Society. We were a very select group of poets, each writing our college thesis. NCPS still meets every couple of years. We use our poetry as a voice in stopping the development of land in secluded small oceanfront towns like the one I grew up in in Northern California.”

  “That’s one of the things I love most about our tiny hamlet of Montauk. It boasts six state parks and isn’t overdeveloped like the rest of the Hamptons.”

  “You’re lucky. My book Seldom Tweets the Bird might have won prizes in England, but alas, it barely made a dent in keeping the developers at bay in Southern California,” she said wistfully. “The good news is my Northern California hometown of Whitethorn remains untouched due to its remote location on the Lost Coast. The town is so isolated the government had to give up their plans to build roadways through the rocky terrain. Too expensive.”

  “Why’d you move to L.A.?”

  “After Berkley, I met my late husband and moved to Santa Barbara. We lived there for most of our marriage.”

  “I love Santa Barbara,” I said from the kitchen. I’d been to Santa Barbara a few times and always loved its cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean, similar to the view off my Montauk deck. After adding milk to her French roast, I brought the plate and coffee to her and took a seat at the card table.

  Claire took a sip of coffee, then continued, “When Brad got sick we sold our oceanfront house, packed up the contents, and put them in storage. Then we left Santa Barbara and rented a furnished one-bedroom apartment in Century City so Brad could get top-notch medical care at Cedars-Sinai. All our retirement money went to his health care. They were able to prolong his life, so it was worth it. But I never got used to L.A.’s freeways. Not to mention the smog, overcrowding, and no water view. That’s why I was so excited when my son-in-law handed me the keys to Little Grey. It’s so beautiful here. Reminds me of Santa Barbara, and I’m happy conservation seems to be a top priority. With my new gig as an editor and contributor to Prose & Poetry magazine and my small social security checks, it’ll be a struggle, but I should be able to make ends meet.”

  “And what about all the royalties from your books?”

  “Dearest Meg,” she said with a wry smile. “Poets make the least amount of money in the writing arts. We do it because we have to. Never for the money. Now, tell me about your assignment on Shelter Island.”

  “We haven’t started going through the contents at Nightingale Manor, but it was an interesting couple of hours.”

  “Nightingale Manor?”

  “The name of the house where they’re filming the 1930s period mystery series I told you about. It was a former sanitorium for the mentally ill.”

  “Oh. You’ve got my poet’s blood buzzing. There’s nothing like the tales an old insane asylum can tell.”

  I filled her in as best I could, making a quick mention of the old murder.

 
Claire didn’t own a TV, so she’d never watched Bungled. She popped the rest of the donut into her mouth. After licking her fingertips, she wiped her hands with a napkin and said, “These donuts are so good.” Claire reminded me of Jo after a satiating meal. “I curse you for turning me onto them. I think I’m beginning to see a paunch.” She rubbed her hand across her flat stomach.

  “Please, you have a perfect dancer’s body.” I realized what I’d said might come off the wrong way because of her accident, so I quickly switched gears. “Cole finked out. Again. So, it looks like it’s just you and me for the holiday festivities at the lighthouse tonight.”

  Claire leaned across the table and gazed into my eyes. In case I wasn’t wearing my hearing aids, she always made sure I was facing her when she talked so I could read her lips. My ex-fiancé, Michael, had tried to get me to wear them during my every waking hour. It was hard to explain how irritating they could be. Not that I wasn’t grateful for the wonderful hearing-aid technology that every couple of years made my hearing even better. My new aids were even Bluetooth capable. Someone could call me on the phone and the call would go right into my ears. Streaming music and audiobooks were another perk. I’d been lucky, because my hearing loss wasn’t progressive. It was caused by an ear infection in my early teens.

  “I know you’re disappointed. But I’m sure if Cole could be here, he would.”

  “You’re right.” Claire had only met Cole once, but they’d gotten on well with each other, seeing Claire was an avid sailor. Mention sailing to Cole and you’d see his blue eyes, the color of the Caribbean on a cloudless day, light up.

  “Looks like I might get a walk in yet,” I said, glancing out the window that looked to the south. The snow had stopped but the wind still rattled the cottage’s frame.

  “Yes, walking is great. I see a big difference since moving in. Before, I only did yoga. I feel years younger since walking the shore. So, when do you go back to Nightingale Manor?” she asked.

  “Tomorrow. Hold that thought.” I went to the storage closet under the stairs and took out the armless doll Max, or was it Murphy, had given me. I’d wrapped it in tissue paper. As I handed it to Claire, I explained how I’d gotten it.

  After unwrapping and examining the doll for a few minutes, she said, “Now you’ve really got my imagination boiling.”

  I watched her finger the area where an arm had broken off.

  “Wait! I think something’s inside.” She tried to stick two fingers in the left arm hole, but the opening was too small. “Do you have something like a barbeque skewer? Maybe I can push it out the other side? I know you’re allergic to cooking, but I’m also aware you have a built-in outdoor grill inside your walled garden.”

  “Ha-ha. My father insisted. I am able to do chicken and vegetable skewers marinated in my herbal vinaigrette. I may be a poor cook, however, I make a mean salad dressing with fresh herbs from my garden.”

  I got up and went to the kitchen, where I found a metal skewer in the drawer under my small center island. I brought it back to the table and passed it to her.

  “Thanks,” Claire said, then laughed. “I’m not a great home chef by any stretch, nothing compared to your father.”

  “Nobody can compare to him,” I added with a grin.

  I watched as she gently stuck the skewer into the arm hole. Once inside the doll’s torso, she carefully moved it around until a folded piece of paper poked out the other side. I took my thumb and forefinger to remove it as delicately as possible. The paper was thin, yellowed onionskin, like the paper secretaries used in their typewriters in the fifties and sixties. I fingered the folded square and felt a lump. “Looks like there’s something inside,” I said excitedly. Unfolding the paper, I exposed two vintage-looking train tickets from the Long Island Railroad. Both read Montauk to Pennsylvania Station, with a date of December 23, 1950. They were one-way tickets. On the onionskin paper was a short note written in pencil, the writing so faded all I could make out was the date of December 22, 1950, and a name.

  The note was addressed to—Marian.

  As in Marian Fortune? Arden Hunter’s killer?

  Chapter 7

  “I don’t like the look of that sky,” Elle said Wednesday morning after I parked my car in her driveway and hopped into her pickup. I was thrilled the heater was on full blast. Before pulling out, she moaned, “Just got a major weather alert on my phone. Not from weather.com but FEMA. FEMA! As in the government!”

  I pooh-poohed her misgivings after she told me about another one of her prophetic doom-and-gloom dreams, promising I’d talk to Captain Chris about the weather after we boarded the ferry. If anyone knew the dangers of a winter storm it would be him. Ten minutes later, when Elle had pulled up to the ferry, Captain Chris hurriedly beckoned us on board. He directed us to the same spot we’d parked in on Monday. I lowered the window to talk to him, but he was already scurrying to pull up the ramp.

  It seemed we were the only vehicle on the ferry, and for a moment I had my own misgivings about traveling across the water in a nor’easter, even if it was only a quick ride. Then I thought of the doll and the train tickets. Had Arden planned on giving the note with the train tickets to Marian? And if she did, it didn’t sound like they’d been enemies. Were they planning to flee Nightingale Manor together? And if so, what had happened to stop them? The hairs on the back of my neck stood at attention like the area at the base of Jo’s tail when she saw a real, or toy, mouse. I was being ridiculous. Marian was a common name in the time period Arden and Marian were at the sanitorium.

  Not that common, the irritating voice in my head said.

  Elle nudged me on the shoulder. “Hurry. Get out of the truck. You promised to ask Captain Chris about the weather.” The ferry started moving. “Go! Before it’s too late to go back.”

  It was a feat just to open the passenger door. Fighting the wind, I made my way toward Captain Chris. His long beard and mustache were flattened against his neck and face like a dog’s when sticking their head out a car window. He assured me the ferry would arrive at Shelter Island to pick us up at four on the dot. “I’ve told you before, Meg. We have a perfect record. Not once did we cancel because of the weather.” His words made me feel secure, but at the same time he kept glancing toward the horizon at the huge waves and black clouds, something I didn’t pass on to Elle when I got back inside the pickup. I was too excited about getting to work at Nightingale Manor to let a little wind ruin things.

  Luckily, I hadn’t received a call from Dr. Blake telling me to stay away from Nightingale Manor. I promised myself if we came face-to-face, I’d keep my chin up and avoid his gaze.

  Once upon the open water, Elle was too busy looking at the weather app on her phone to notice the snow that started to fall. Not light, fluffy flakes like Monday. Instead, the view in front of us was so opaque I couldn’t see two feet off the starboard bow. Buffeting gale-force winds caused huge white-capped waves, mimicking the ones I’d seen many times out my cottage window during a nasty nor’easter. But my cottage was on the ocean. We were on the bay.

  The ferry swayed, the pickup tilted, and my stomach lurched in unison. I seriously thought I might lose the Belgian waffle, egg, brown-sugar-crusted slab bacon and cheese sandwich I’d had at Paddy’s Pancake House with Doc only an hour before. Doc Heckler was my father’s best friend, who’d moved to Montauk after retiring from his job in Detroit as a Wayne County medical examiner. Doc was also my surrogate uncle and always had my back. However, he tended to be a bit overprotective when it came to me and my shenanigans, as he called them. That being said, I’d purposely left out any discussion at breakfast of old murders, madhouses or maiming doctors. Plus, he and his gal-pal Georgia, the owner of Montauk’s only bookstore, were leaving a few days after New Year’s for a serenity cruise. Whatever that entailed. Since meeting well-read and enlightened Georgia, Doc had changed from an occasional stick-in-the-mud to an adventurous reincarnated teen.

  We arrived at Nightingale Manor forty
minutes later than scheduled because of the near-blizzard conditions. I’d taken over the wheel of the pickup when the roads became too slick for Elle to handle. She’d wanted to stay on the ferry and wait until it headed back to Sag Harbor but changed her mind when Captain Chris told her he had to stay at the dock until he fueled up and fixed a minor problem in the ferry’s engine. Not to worry, he’d assured her. Elle didn’t believe the minor part, and after I encouraged her that everything would be fine, she’d thought she’d chosen the lesser of two evils.

  She hadn’t.

  Nightingale Manor didn’t look as dark and brooding under a mantle of white snow. If it wasn’t for the tombstones I noticed adjacent to the gatehouse when we pulled into the driveway, I’d say I’d been foolish to have any trepidation about working at the estate.

  I parked the pickup in the circle drive in front of the main house. It looked like someone was on top of plowing the now-accumulating snow. The next ferry wasn’t for three hours so we had to make the best of it.

  “See, they have a snowblower, no problem, Ms. Worrywart,” I said to Elle and saw an immediate relaxing of her shoulders. Secretly, I knew if the snow kept falling at the rate it was, we’d be hard-pressed to make it back to the main road, snowblower or not.

  Elle stuck out her bottom lip. “Said she, who almost skidded into a hundred-foot elm a few seconds ago.”

  There were four other vehicles parked in front, a black Range Rover, a white Mercedes, a navy BMW and a silver Prius. It seemed we weren’t the only crazy ones visiting Nightingale Manor in a blizzard. “Not even close to losing control,” I said, “And remember, if Dr. Blake answers the door, try to have my back. I was just looking for the bathroom on Monday. Wink. Wink.”

  “If you weren’t so curious, I wouldn’t have to have your back. But of course, I’d support you ’til the end of time.”