The Lost Hours

by Karen White

  Tucker stopped in front of her, looking at her solicitously. “You shouldn’t be out in this heat. Women half your age would have had heat stroke by now.”

  She smiled up at him, seeing the dark smudges under his eyes and noticing that his hair needed cutting. “We’re from hardy stock. It would take a lot more than heat to knock me over.” She ran a curled knuckle over his cheek, trying to erase the lines that had no business being on the face of a man just past his thirty-second year. Quietly, she said, “You know I love having the girls, Tuck. It would just be nice to have a little advance warning, that’s all.”

  He glanced away. “Yeah, sorry. I just . . . Well, the new nanny—Emily—takes classes at night and couldn’t stay. I figured you and Helen could keep them entertained.”

  Lillian looked toward the row of sweet-smelling English lavender she’d coaxed into growing along the short fence lining the drive. “What the girls need is more time with their father.” She sensed his shoulders tightening. “You’re welcome to join us, you know.”

  He reached out a hand toward Lucy and tucked her pale blond hair behind her ear. She responded by leaning into him like a daisy toward the sun, pulling her little sister with her. “I’ve got plans.”

  Lillian tilted her head back to stare into his face. “Plans?”

  His lips tightened. “Yes, plans. That don’t involve children. And if you can’t watch the girls, I’ll find other arrangements.”

  She watched as Sara squatted to smell the lavender, the bow on her dress untied and dragging in the dirt. Lucy simply stood next to her father wearing the same unreadable expression, the color blanched from her cheeks like sun-bleached shells on the beach.

  Lillian kept her voice light, knowing Lucy was listening to every word. “That’s not necessary, Tuck. We’ll be happy to watch the girls.” She put her hand on Lucy’s head, feeling the warmth through the fine strands of hair. “Just . . . try not to be too late. Maybe you can join us for coffee when you return.”

  “Maybe,” he said, his eyes averted as he gave her a quick peck on the cheek before gathering both girls in a stiff hug.

  Only Sara seemed oblivious to the awkwardness. She held out a sprig of lavender to her father. “For you, Daddy,” she said, shoving it under his nose before kissing him heartily on the cheek.

  “Thanks, sweet pea,” he said softly as he straightened, tucking the sprig into the pocket of his starched buttoned-down shirt. His eyes met Lillian’s for a moment, and they recalled that he hadn’t called Sara by her nickname since Susan’s death more than a year before. It was as if that one event had renamed them all and taught them to speak in separate languages.

  “Good night, Lucy,” he said.

  Lucy kept her head down, her gaze firmly planted on the row of lavender.

  Tucker turned and began walking toward his Jeep, then stopped. “Oh, before I forget—Helen and I rented out the caretaker’s cottage. To a genealogist. She’s doing research on families in the area.”

  Lillian struggled to keep her composure. “But I thought . . .” She swallowed back the wave of anger. “I assumed that with Susan no longer here to handle the rental property that we could just close it up. . . .” Her voice trailed away, and she was aware that she’d said those very same words more than once.

  His hands fisted in his pockets. “I know,” he said, his words clipped. “But then this woman called, and when Helen told me she was a genealogist, I felt obligated to Susan to say yes.”

  Despair settled on Lillian like dusk in the marsh; suddenly and completely she found herself in darkness. “Tucker—what about your practice? And your girls? Wouldn’t they benefit from your time more?”

  He studied her for a moment before dipping his gaze to his daughters, who stood mutely together, their hands held between them.

  “I don’t think I’m a good influence on anybody right now.”

  Despite the pain in her back and the need to sit down, she raised her chin. “Perhaps you’re right. But don’t wait too long. You don’t want to give yourself something else to regret.”

  He glanced at her with what looked a lot like dislike in his eyes but she didn’t shrink back. “Good night, Malily.”

  The three of them turned to watch Tucker climb back into his Jeep and peel out of the gravel drive, throwing up dirt and rocks behind him.

  Lillian crooked each arm out, knowing the girls wouldn’t want to touch her ruined hands, and waited for each to take an elbow before leading them to the door tucked under the front porch between the twin curving sets of stairs that led upward. She’d had the elevator installed nearly five years earlier when she’d found herself unable to tackle the steps. As the door closed on the sunlight behind them, she missed being able to enter her own home from the front doors, and the old familiarity of the four Doric columns that had always seemed to embrace her and welcome her home.

  The sound of the television set blaring from the back parlor welcomed them as soon as they stepped out of the elevator. Sara skipped ahead, unable to curb her energy but Lucy held fast to Lillian’s arm, making Lillian feel much older and frailer than she actually was. It seemed to her that the end of her life had come much too quickly, that there was still so much to be done. And now Annabelle was dead. For the first time in many years, Lillian wished she were young again. She wanted to scream and shout and throw things, and curse at the vagaries and unfairness of life. But even when she had been young and had the body and the energy, she would never have outwardly shown any of those emotions. Despite dreams to the contrary, Lillian Harrington-Ross had never done anything that was not expected of a gently bred Southern woman. Except once, and seventy years later she was still living with its ghosts.

  Helen sat in the back parlor on the old settee with Susan’s yellow Lab, Mardi, at her feet. The old dog had mourned for his mistress for a couple of weeks, refusing to eat and wandering aimlessly around the stables and house looking for her. And then in resignation he had attached himself to Helen. Maybe he’d viewed Helen’s disability the way most people did, assuming that without her sight she was the most vulnerable of those Susan had left behind.

  Helen patted the cushion on either side of her to let the girls know she wanted them to sit. Sara raced over and bounced into her seat while Lucy took the more leisurely approach by sitting gingerly on the edge. With the remote control, Helen flicked off what appeared to be the Jerry Springer Show and patted each girl on the head. “I guess Malily and I have company tonight. It’s a good thing I put on my new dress.”

  Lillian eyed Helen’s red silk cocktail dress, overdone, as usual, for another evening at home. Although five years older than Tucker, Helen was still long, lean, and stunning, her hair as dark as it had been when she was a girl and without benefit of Clairol. Being blind since the age of fourteen had neither blunted her beauty or her wild streak. And Helen would have liked to make everyone believe that she’d inherited both from her grandmother. Only Lillian knew how much of that was true.

  Lillian sat carefully in her favorite stuffed armchair. “Your dress is lovely, Helen. Where did you find it?”

  Helen smiled as she reached for her cigarette case on the table in front of her. “Thank you. I do like it. The new nanny, Emily, took me into town this morning and helped me pick this one out. I wanted red, and she promised me this was the reddest red dress she’d ever seen.”

  “It’s definitely red,” Lillian said, trying hard to keep the disapproval out of her voice. But it was a lovely dress, and the silk was finely woven. It had taken Lillian a while to understand Helen’s reasons for the way she dressed but she’d eventually learned that it had everything to do with Helen’s sense of touch. It was as if instead of her hearing or taste becoming stronger when she lost her sight, everything had become focused on what she could feel at the end of her fingertips.

  “You shouldn’t smoke, Aunt Helen,” Lucy said somberly. “Daddy said it would make your lungs turn black and kill you. And he’s a doctor, so he knows these
things.”

  Lucy looked alarmed as Helen reached toward the coffee table for her lighter. Still smiling, she flicked the lighter and moved it to the end of her cigarette. “Sweetheart, that could be true for most people. But not for me because lightning never strikes twice. I figure being blind would be enough to make the hand of fate pass right over me when handing out bad news.”

  Lucy looked up at her aunt with eyes dark enough to be called black, and always appearing darker still when contrasted against her pale hair. “That’s not what Mama said. She said bad things happened to good people all the time.”

  Helen blew out a puff of smoke and put her arm around Sara. “Well, then. We’ll just have to try very hard not to be too good, then.”

  “Helen,” Lillian said sharply. “Please.”

  Helen’s smile faded, but not the light in her sightless eyes. “Sara, hand me the ashtray, would you please?”

  Sara did as she’d been asked and placed it in her aunt’s left hand while Helen stubbed out her cigarette with her right before sitting back against the couch with a heavy sigh. “I overheard your conversation with Tucker,” she said to Lillian.

  Helen recrossed her legs and settled her skirt. “I took the phone call from that woman who’s renting the caretaker’s cottage. Her name’s Earlene Smith. Which I think is very odd.”

  “How so?” Lillian shifted in her chair, trying to find a comfortable position where all of her bones wouldn’t ache. She could hear Odella in the kitchen preparing their supper but she couldn’t muster any appetite. She hadn’t had an appetite for a very long time.

  “Earlene is an old lady’s name. And the woman on the phone sounded very young.”

  “It must be a family name. That’s not so out of the ordinary around here, Helen.”

  “Obviously. But most younger people come up with a nickname so they fit in better. Like Tucker, for example. So for this woman to be using that name, well, it struck me as odd, is all.”

  Lillian fingered the charm around her neck. “You’re always seeing zebras when all we have is horses, Helen. Did the woman sound local?”

  Helen leaned back in the couch, a long, slender arm around each of her nieces. Her red fingernails matched her lips and her dress and her high-heeled snakeskin pumps that were made for a night of dancing instead of one playing Chutes and Ladders. “Now, Malily, that’s another thing that struck me as odd. Her accent was Savannah, born and bred, but she said she’s from Atlanta. She did say that her mother was from Savannah, which could explain it. But still . . .” Her voice trailed away, her forehead creased with speculation.

  Lillian shifted her position again. “Did you ask her what her mother’s name was?”

  “It didn’t occur to me. My generation’s not as obsessed with blood-lines as yours was, Malily.” She smiled in her grandmother’s direction. “Besides I was too busy answering all of her questions about the horses here and their proximity to the cottage. Apparently, she’s deathly afraid of them and doesn’t want to have anything to do with them while she’s here. I explained that she’d be able to see them in the pastures from time to time, but that all of the stables and riding rings are behind the house. She seemed okay with that.”

  Lillian absently rubbed the charm hanging from her neck and realized how much her hands were hurting. She glanced out through the narrow slats of the shuttered windows toward the pregnant gray clouds that were moving in from the low lands. Lord knew the pastures and her gardens desperately needed the rain but how she hated summer storms. Maybe, if she were lucky, it would simply be a cleansing rain, nourishing the earth without punishing her with memories she could easily push away except when lightning flitted across the sky.

  “How odd,” said Lillian, “that she would choose our caretaker’s cottage—in the middle of a horse farm—to come do her research if she’s so afraid of horses.”

  Helen nodded. “I said the same thing. So Earlene explained that the Rosses were the core branch of the family she’s researching, so it made sense to her to be here to have access to the family cemetery and any papers we were willing to share with her.”

  Lillian jerked her attention to Helen. “What did you tell her about the family papers?”

  “I explained that some were private—meaning your scrapbook—but that she would be welcome to most of the rest. And don’t worry, Malily. I wouldn’t ask you or Tuck to get involved. I’ll handle everything.” Helen rotated her ankle, the snakeskin of her shoe glowing softly in the gray light from the almost-shuttered windows. “Besides, I could use a diversion. It’s very hard for a woman my age to consistently lose at Chutes and Ladders. I need something else to focus on to lift my spirits.” She squeezed the girls on either side of her as they giggled.

  Odella walked briskly into the room, her soft-soled nurse’s shoes squeaking on the heart pine floor. She was about fifteen years older than Helen and just as thin, but her parchmentlike skin and graying hair made her appear years older. She’d been married and widowed three times and raised eight children, which probably accounted for the weary expression she normally wore. But there was no finer cook in the entire Lowcountry than Odella Pruitt and no softer heart, although she did her best to hide it behind a tart tongue and salty attitude, neither of which Lillian minded. It was a small price to pay for excellent food and a firm hand to help Lillian’s increasingly feeble body.

  “Food’s ready and it’s not going to eat itself,” announced Odella as she gently grasped Lillian’s elbow and helped her out of her chair. “Girls, grab hold of your aunt Helen and take her to the dining room, would you please? Don’t want her knocking anything over. Got enough to do as it is without having to clean up extra messes.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the girls said in unison, their eyes wide. They hadn’t yet discovered the secret that was Odella Pruitt, and that was fine with Odella. Because once they realized what a pushover she really was, they’d have her wrapped around their small fingers.

  “I’ll be careful, Odella,” said Helen with a deceptively meek voice. “You know how clumsy I can be.” This made Lillian grin since Helen moved with the grace of a ballet dancer, and except for that first desperate year of Helen’s blindness, she’d never knocked over a single thing.

  But Lillian’s smile quickly faded as she heard the first rumble of thunder. She grasped at the gold charm dangling from her neck and allowed herself to be led into the dining room. She kept her eyes focused in front of her and tried not to shudder with each flash of lightning that seemed to throw light into the forgotten corners of her memory, illuminating things she didn’t want to see.

  CHAPTER 6

  The handheld GPS that I’d stuck to the inside of the windshield in my grandfather’s Buick had long since announced that I was “off-road,” apparently in a place where even satellites couldn’t find me, my destination unknown.

  I paused on the old gravel road, knowing from the blank map on the GPS screen that the Savannah River was somewhere to my right and a large golf course was on my left. But somewhere, in the vast dark space on the screen, lay Asphodel Meadows, once the queen of the Savannah River rice plantations, but now operating solely as a horse farm and private residence, its land devoured by development and the encroaching river, its rice beds now a golf course.

  Just when I thought I should turn around, I spotted the small marker tucked into the brush on the side of the road announcing my arrival at Asphodel Meadows. It was a brown National Trust sign, but it was hidden so well that I was left to believe that someone had done it intentionally.

  As soon as I turned onto the road, I smelled the horses. Not the horses exactly, but their associated smells of cut grass, hay, and leather. Despite the heat, I turned off the air conditioner, trying to block the scent that never failed to rip through me with equal parts exhilaration and terror. I began to sweat in the stifling interior as the gravel crunched under the slowly rotating tires as I followed the drive to where it seemed to stop abruptly, disappearing into a steep green
embankment. Finding it hard to breathe, I lowered the windows, hoping to find sight of the road.

  To the right of the Buick, at a sharp angle, I spotted the continuation of the road as well as the turnoff I must have missed while staring straight ahead in the hopes of avoiding any sight of pastures. Gripping the wheel tightly, I angled the car and turned, finding myself suddenly enveloped in the canopy of an ancient live oak alley. I stopped the car, looking at the old trees that barely resembled the live oaks of Savannah’s squares despite the generous shawls of Spanish moss. These trees were darkened and withered, despite enough leaves to show that they were alive. But the limbs were bent and gnarled, the knobs at the forks like the bent shoulders of mourners at a funeral.

  Gulping the stagnant, humid air, I caught the scent of the river, too, and continued to drive forward through the short line of hulking oak trees toward the cream-colored columned house beckoning me at the end.

  When I reached the circular drive in front of the house, I released my hands on the wheel and wiped my sweaty palms on my white linen pants, then dug into the side pocket of the door for a fast-food napkin to wipe my face. I sat there for a long time, pressing the napkin to my face and listening to my heart pound while I stared at the house in front of me.

  The house wasn’t the typical antebellum Greek Revival architecture found in my history books of the Savannah River plantations. Instead, it had been built in the English Regency style, with a raised first floor, flat roof, and twin sandstone staircases flanking the lower entrance. The steps rose to the front porch with its four Doric columns standing sentry to the double front doors. It would have been beautiful if not for the odd alley of grieving oaks that led to the house.