by L C Kincaide
“It looks good. Is that the color scheme you’re going with?” He asked looking at the color chart.
Emma had thought a long time on how to achieve the Gothic look she wanted using the simplest materials, without the decor feeling ominous. Creating painted Gothic-like panels would take too long and be cumbersome, so she opted for sheer fabric panels, and then got stuck on the color. Eventually, she decided on charcoal voile weighted on the bottom with a champagne voile overlay which would remain without weights and move in the stirred air creating movement with fairy lights strung in between. For the accent color, she chose the deepest burgundy mums she could find that were also on display at the Cloisters. The conical and fresh green Monterey Cyprus, also draped with fairy lights represented that color.
Gray listened attentively as she described her vision for the evening, surprising her. He was deceptively mature for his youthful appearance and seemed genuinely interested.
“I hope you will be there.” She said. If the answer was no, she would hand him an invitation right there.
“Of course. As far as I know, all the senior staff plan on it.”
“Thank you. I’m so glad. Sometimes I wake up worrying that nobody will come.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that. We all want the evening to be a success, and it is to honor your mother and a good cause. I’m sure you’ll have standing room only.”
“Thanks, Gray. Your confidence means a lot.”
”You’re welcome. And if you need anything, just call.” He gave her his wide disarming smile.
“I’ll let you get back to work.” She scooped up her papers and stowed them into her satchel.
“This suits you, if you don’t mind me saying so. You’re a different person from when you first walked in here.”
“You think so?”
He nodded.
“Oh, and don’t forget to wear a costume. As charming as you are, you can’t come as yourself.”
“Thanks for reminding me.” He laughed.
Rachel also approved the plan.
“Wow.” Matthew said over her shoulder. “You’ve given this a lot of thought. I’m impressed.”
“Thanks. I’m meeting with the caterers on Wednesday and the person doing all the sewing — I can’t even think of her name, and the photographer. I want it to be perfect and every day I get more nervous.”
“You’ll be fine. One thing at a time.” He bounced Ella in his arms.
“Do you ever put her down?”
“The odd time.” He grinned.
“Fatherhood looks good on you.” Emma smiled at her big brother.
“It feels pretty good too.”
“I’m so lucky.” Rachel said. “I never imagined I’d have free time, but now that mom’s gone back to dad, I’ll have to earn my keep again.”
“It does seem strange her not being here.” Emma agreed.
“Don’t despair, she left dumplings in the freezer.”
“Did she? Strawberry?”
“Peach.”
“Can I have some? Please?”
Rachel laughed. “Sure, if that’s what it takes to get you to eat.”
The dumplings with a drizzle of melted butter and a dusting of icing sugar were exactly what she needed. The contrast of the sweet dough and the tart peach filling had left her satisfied and content, and surprised at herself since she had never been a sweets person. Then again, she had not tasted Magda’s Hungarian treats before either.
“Feel better?”
“Much. That was good.”
“More tea?”
“No thanks. I’m good.”
“Adam must have really gotten under your skin. I’ve never seen you drink tea before.”
“I guess I never gave it a chance until I hooked up with an Englishman.” Emma winked.
“I will not pursue that line.” Rachel grinned at her.
“Changing the topic, I found mum’s keys to the warehouse storage. I’d like to check it out in the morning, see what’s in there. Interested?”
Rachel’s eyes widened. “You bet! Matt, would you mind watching Ella for a couple of hours? I’ll pump some milk so she’ll be okay.”
“Sure, no problem at all.”
“Thanks, babe. I could use a field trip.”
“It’s a plan.”
CHAPTER 19
~*~
“What’s wrong?” Rachel asked watching Emma squirming uncomfortably behind the wheel.
“These damned jeans. I haven’t worn them in a couple of months and now I can barely breathe in them.”
“That doesn’t make sense. You couldn’t have gained weight, you hardly eat.”
“I must be bloated or something. They’re so uncomfortable.”
“Undo the button. It’s just us. Nobody will see. I don’t fit into any of my pants. Thank God for elasticizes waistbands.”
“I’m not ready for buffet pants yet.” She unbuttoned. “Aah, that’s so much better!”
She started the engine.
“So, this is it?” Rachel’s eyes swept over the nondescript concrete block with beige stucco broken up with a steel security door and a large roll-up steel door that allowed a truck to back inside.
Emma parked in the shade in front of the building and glanced around. A security camera aimed at them from above the entrance, and motion sensor lights spaced four feet apart monitored the perimeter. Another camera watched over the area in front of the loading bay. It didn’t surprise Emma that Elinor had owned the building.
Several cars were parked on the far side of the shared parking lot of the industrial warehouse sector. Otherwise, no one else was around.
“It’s like Fort Knox. Where’s the armed guard and Dobermans?”
“On their coffee break?”
“What do you think she kept in here?”
Emma shrugged. “It could be anything.”
“And lots of it. The place is huge.”
They got out of the car and approached a reinforced steel door with a security keypad.
Emma referred to a sheet of paper she had written the codes on.
“Mum was not too keen on technology. She had all the locks changed to these pads, but she kept the keys.”
She punched in the code and the light flashed green. The lock mechanism clicked, and they stepped into the cool and silent building. Sensing movement, the banks of overhead fluorescent lights switched on casting the space into brightness.
Their storage area took up the entire floor of the facility, a series of roll-up doors breaking up the wall of the long corridor where it terminated at the loading bay.
“Where should we start?” Rachel looked at the dozen doors, each numbered and with its own keypad.
“It would help if she had written down what was where. It doesn’t matter, so we may as well start at this end and work our way down.”
“I don’t know why I’m nervous. It’s not like anything will jump out at us.” Rachel rubbed her arms suddenly cold with a chill.
“It’s probably a hundred-year-old collection of the Weekend costumes.” She pressed the numbers on the keypad and waited for the light to change. Again, the lock disengaged with a click, and the door rolled up automatically to reveal a dark and musty space. Running her hand along the wall, she found the switch and banks of fluorescent bulbs flickered to life revealing a twenty-foot deep room lined with shelves containing shoe boxes and hat boxes for the wigs and sunhats, and racks laden with garment bags.
“See? Like I said. Costumes. If you want something for the Ball, now’s your chance.”
Unzipping the garment bags, Emma recognized many of her gowns and her mother’s. A wine-colored beaded gown stopped her. Ivy had worn one like it, but it cou
ldn’t be hers, could it? Mum had never returned to the manor. Unless she hired someone to take items away, something that Elinor wouldn’t do, the dress should still be there.
“Do you want to see more?”
“No I can’t be gone too long. Let’s move on to the next one.”
That locker was filled with furniture, all of it hidden beneath dust sheeting.
“This gives me the creeps.” Emma admitted lifting a corner of a sheet.
“What’s under there?”
The large rectangle suggested a dining table, but once she turned over the cover, a green felt surface with corner pockets appeared.
“When did this get here? I could have sworn I just saw it in the drawing room.” Emma muttered under her breath.
“The last time you were there?”
“Yeah. Nobody could have moved it since then unless this is a spare.”
“Why would she have a spare pool table? Let’s keep looking.”
Opening the next locker, they realized that each compartment was storing items from a specific room. The dining room locker housed the table and chairs and the Hepplewhite sideboard their meals had always been laid out on. The Victorian wall clock was there too under its own sheet.
“I’m getting seriously spooked here! There can’t be duplicates of everything. It makes no sense.”
This time, she ran to another door and opened it to a locker full of more draped shapes. She yanked a sheet away.
“I don’t believe it! This is the settee from the parlor and look, there’s the drinks cabinet. I just saw them there! Or they appeared to be there.”
“Are you thinking they were just an illusion?”
“I don’t know what to think.” She covered the furniture and locked up and hurried to another locker.
“What are you looking for?”
“The portraits. If they’re here, then I’ll know something really weird is going on.”
Checking the next three lockers revealed more bulky shapes, including the Runabout, and not what she sought.
“Okay. They have to be here.” Emma peered at the remaining door.
“Good. My boobs are getting sore.”
“This is the last one then.” She had to punch in the code twice because her nerves had her hands trembling, and flipped the switch. The fluorescent glare flickered over rows of protected paintings.
“If these are what I think they are, then the manor is empty, no matter what we think we see.” She told a wide-eyed Rachel and held her breath as she pulled out the heavy frame. Beneath the protective sheet appeared the likeness of Margaret Everdon. Beside her, Reese Everdon. Emma counted the frames and retrieved the next. It didn’t surprise her to lift the sheet off Mason’s portrait. Beside him had to be Amelia, and sure enough, there she was. She pushed them back and turned away.
“I’ve seen enough.”
“How can this be? I remember being in the parlor when I was there with Matt. It was only months ago. Do you think Elinor had everything hauled into storage since then?”
“No.”
Their footfalls echoed as they hurried back up the corridor. Emma opened the door to a blast of heat and let it slam shut behind her. They got in the car and sat a while letting the air conditioning run.
“Adam was curious, and I showed him the portrait gallery. All the paintings were there, including the one of Amelia that was downstairs in the hall before. Unless you or Matthew hung it back up, it shouldn’t be in the locker. The furniture shouldn’t be here either.”
“So, the manor is empty and we just think we see things?”
“No. It’s worse than that. We see what it wants us to see. Very convincingly. Mum always said he was maintaining the illusion. It sounded crazy. I mean who’d believe it, right?” She pulled away and turned toward the road.
“He, meaning Mason.”
“I’d never believe it. It shouldn’t be possible, but he’s been messing with us, with our minds and with our lives for generations. He got what he wanted, yet it still goes on.”
“You’re right. It should be torn down. Maybe that will put an end to it. Don’t go back there.”
“I have no intention of doing that. Let’s get you home. You’ll find a better costume in a costume shop or order online. There’s still time.”
“Speaking of which, you need one too. We should look when we get back.”
“That sounds good.”
Emma tried to sound upbeat for Rachel’s sake realizing her sensitive sister-in-law had been right all those years ago when she first came with Matthew for a Weekend. She must have sensed it then and never returned for another. Lucky for her, she and Matthew had a choice where the rest of them did not.
“What did you see?” Matthew greeted them and handed Ella over for her feeding.
“A lot of what I didn’t expect to find there.” Emma sat down across from Rachel. “Have you ever been inside the lockers?”
“Maybe once. It was full of old furniture and things mom had grown tired of. I never saw the point of keeping everything instead of selling it. She could have made a fortune.”
“The warehouse is protected with motion sensors and equipped with security cameras. All the doors have keypad access only.” Emma told him.
“That is a new development. So, what did you see that was out of place?”
“Everything.“ Rachel looked up from the baby.
“What do you mean by everything?” He took a chair himself.
Emma looked at him. “The furniture, clothes, including the gown Ivy wore on the last night before she… and the paintings. I didn’t check them all, but they are there in storage.”
“She must have had them moved…”
“Matthew, I was there not that long ago and all the paintings were hanging in the portrait gallery. The furniture was there too, including the pool table.”
Rachel nodded in support.
“Wow, that is weird.” He shook his head. “I don’t know how to explain that. Maybe you shouldn’t go back there.”
“Where? The manor or the warehouse?”
“Both, actually. Especially now. It’s almost October and for the past two years in particular, all the strange goings-on happened at this time.”
“She must have known. Mum never left anything to chance. She was a stickler for details. Did you two ever talk about… things?”
“Not those things. I guess she felt that side of her family had nothing to do with me and technically she was right. If anyone, she should have talked with you.”
“No, not a word, only what I should and shouldn’t do and illusions.” She gave a heavy sigh. “What should I do?”
“For now, nothing. Besides you’re too busy. But if you want, I’ll go with you after and we’ll decide what to do with all of it.”
“Thanks. That would be great. I don’t see the point of holding on to all that junk. I’ll keep the portraits, but the rest can go. It’s of no use to anyone unless you’re in the mood to redecorate.” She winked in Rachel’s direction.
“And turn this place into a cheerless late Victorian mausoleum? No thanks!”
“I’m surprised mom didn’t mention anywhere what to do with the contents.”
“I still haven’t gone through her desk properly, nor the safe. It feels like I’m invading her privacy.”
Matthew gave her a kind smile. “I understand, but if she left instructions, it’s important that you find them if they weren’t left with the lawyer. It will bring you peace of mind, even simplify your life knowing the next steps.”
“You’re right. I’ll do that this afternoon. No more putting it off.”
“If you need help, call.”
“Thanks, Matthew.” She said grateful for his kindness and concern
. So often he reminded her of their dad. She rose to her feet.
“Do you have to go already? We haven’t looked for costumes yet.”
“We can do it tomorrow. I’ve put things off long enough. If I’m going to make any progress on that front and still have everything for the Ball, I’d better get on it. Besides, you look ready for a nap.”
“I won’t say no to that. Call me if you find any treasure or deep dark secrets.”
Emma laughed. “You’ll be the first to know!”
~*~
Emma recalled seeing the thick file in the safe and took it to Elinor’s bed. Inside were typed pages with handwritten notes in the margins, circled words and more notations squeezed between the lines. Had mum been editing a manuscript? She flipped through it looking for anything familiar to jump out and soon her patience was rewarded with a reference to the Everdon family. The page listed birthdates and death dates of the various members going back as far as Margaret Bloodwell and down to herself and also included the Kinsleys.
She noticed Clara Massie’s name and on the next page, Emma discovered a family tree which included the Everdons and Kinsleys, but ended with Martha Everdon-Langstone’s sons; both having died young and unmarried. Until this moment, Emma had not known she was no blood relation to the Langstones. Had it never occurred to mum to tell her this? Then again, why should it surprise her? Until recently, she hadn’t known about Matthew either. She paused afraid to continue lest she made more unsettling discoveries.
Elinor had circled two names at the bottom; hers and Adam’s. How long had she known about him? Years? There was no identifiable date anywhere among the papers. What did she find of significance in them being the last members of the family? The way she had spoken about Adam was as if he was of no consequence and held no claim to his heritage, but he had as much claim as she both being direct descendants of the two Everdon brothers, despite Mason’s son’s illegitimate status.
