Traces

by Betty Bolte

  “Max called the authorities.” Meredith moved into the room and perched on one of the matching flowered settees positioned to face each other. “They should arrive soon. What do we tell them?”

  “We’ll show them what we found.” Brock resumed his seat in one flanking overstuffed wingback chair, waving a hand at an identical chair across from him. “Max, have a seat.”

  Max sank onto the chair. “Right, and the ME will collect the remains.”

  Meredith looked shocked. “What? Why?”

  “They have to verify no crime has been committed and the remains aren’t Native American.” Max rubbed his hands on his pant legs.

  “But we know who was buried alive in that awful place.” Meredith glanced at Paulette. “Don’t we?”

  Paulette shrugged. “No, we don’t know for certain.” She shivered. “I can’t even let myself contemplate dying in such a way.”

  “What all did you find in there?” Max asked, relaxing back against the chair and crossing one ankle over his knee. He looked at Meredith. “What makes you believe it’s Grace?”

  “The blue dress, mainly.” Meredith twined her fingers together and shoved her hands between her knees as she darted a glance at Paulette. “And the honeysuckle.”

  “Honeysuckle?” Max asked.

  Meredith chuckled. “It will sound nuts to you all, I’m sure.” She took a deep breath and released it slowly. “I read that Grandpa Joe sent her perfume with rose and honeysuckle essence in it. If she was buried alive in the column, and thus has been haunting Twin Oaks ever since, it would explain why I smell honeysuckle so often. Wouldn’t it?”

  Max blinked and sat up straight. “Haunted? You think Twin Oaks is haunted?”

  Meredith nodded, her strawberry-blonde hair flowing around her excited eyes, dancing against her chin. “It explains everything. Seeing her ghost. Smelling her perfume. The inexplicable desire to go to the front porch, right where her bones waited to be discovered.”

  “But, Meredith, you can’t believe in ghosts.” Brock stood up and slowly paced across the oriental carpet boasting bold reds, blues, and golds. “Nobody believes in spirits these days.”

  “That’s not true, Dad.” Meredith rose and caught hold of her father’s arm, bringing him to a standstill. “Lots of folks believe in them, including me. There are many unexplained phenomena in this world.”

  Brock patted Meredith’s hand resting on his arm. “If it makes you feel better, honey, then believe what you will.”

  Did ghosts exist? Many times in his own life, Max had experienced an unexplainable occurrence. The feeling of being watched. An inexplicable coincidence. Motion caught out of the corner of his eye, but when he turned, he saw nothing unusual or that could explain what he had imagined. Objects seemingly relocating themselves when he wasn’t looking. But ghosts? Gremlins? Borrowers? Or simply a faulty memory?

  Meredith shook her head and laughed. “You don’t have to agree with me, Dad, but I do firmly believe the dress in the column belongs to Grace and that she wanted me to find her. But what I don’t understand is how she ended up in the bottom of it with Grandpa Joe’s missing silver tea service tied to her waist with ropes.”

  “You didn’t tell me about the ropes.” Max ran a hand over his chin. “We all know people hid their valuables during the war to protect them from the Yankees coming through…”

  “You think she was trying to protect the silver?” Paulette asked.

  “Most likely. The Yankees encamped on the front lawn in 1862 en route to capture Huntsville.” Max tapped his fingers on the armrest.

  “But she couldn’t have lowered herself into the column,” Dina said. “She’d need help.”

  Meredith sprang to her feet, snapping her fingers and drawing everyone’s attention. “Edith.”

  “Wonder if Anson helped as well?” Paulette jumped up beside Meredith.

  “Oh! What if the future husband and wife convinced Grace to deposit the silver in the column for safekeeping and then left her there?” Meredith mused.

  “Dropped her?” Paulette said, horror lacing her voice.

  “Even if the rope merely slipped from their grasp,” Meredith said, “if it were a crime of opportunity and not premeditated, they would still be guilty of abandoning her to a dreadful fate.”

  “Whoa. Slow down.” Brock ran a hand through his graying hair. “How would they expect to retrieve the silver once it was at the bottom?”

  “The same way we did. Cut it open.” Meredith roamed the room, mentally counting her steps from end to end of the carpet and back again.

  “It seems so drastic.” Dina stood and laid a hand on Meredith’s arm, stopping her daughter’s pacing. “I can’t imagine being desperate enough to resort to such measures.”

  “I know; it gives me the willies to contemplate.” Paulette shuddered to prove her point.

  “People were desperate during the war.” Max scanned the faces gazing at him expectantly. “Everything the Rebels believed in, worked for, and then fought for was at stake. So many died fighting their own family, it’s hard to fathom.”

  A knock on the front door interrupted Max’s explanation. As Meredith hurried to answer the summons, Max noted the others in the room had fallen silent, waiting. Perhaps worrying about what all of this meant to them. To the future of Twin Oaks. Had Mrs. O’Connell known about the ghost? She’d never mentioned it to him, if so. Would he have believed her, or thought her nutso? What of Meredith?

  * * * *

  After the sheriff and ME left with the skeleton and clothing, including pale blue silk slippers, Meredith hunched in a folding chair, elbows on knees, and stared at the enlarged hole in the column. They’d been forced to widen and deepen the opening in order to remove everything. Meg had carted the tea service to the kitchen to polish it. The authorities allowed the silver to remain at Twin Oaks, since even if a crime had occurred, based on the style of the dress and the maker’s imprint on the silver service, it had occurred so long ago the perpetrators had also died by now.

  Poor, poor Grace. Stuck in a vertical tomb, in the dark, alone. Left to die by her sister and the man they both loved. Or at least, that’s the story that made the most sense. The worst part of the situation was nobody would ever really know what caused Grace to be trusting enough to venture into the column. What might Edith have told her to convince her to be lowered into such a dark place? Especially with the “manipulations” of Anson Grace had commented upon to Grandpa Joe.

  What if Paulette had been Edith? Would Meredith have trusted her? Could she trust her now?

  Meredith reclined against the back of the chair, crossed her arms, and surveyed the valley beyond the six columns. The road cut through the fields at a fair distance from the porch. Grace’s cries for help would not have been heard unless someone chanced to approach the plantation. During the fighting, an improbable event except for the duration of the troop occupations. With no food or water, she wouldn’t have survived more than a few days. Days filled with terror and no hope of rescue, joined with the knowledge her sister left her to die.

  She rubbed a hand on her cheek. No matter how much conniving Paulette managed, Meredith would never allow harm to befall her. She held no ill will against her sister. She simply needed to protect herself from barbed comments at her expense. To keep Paulette at arm’s length. They’d get along fine that way.

  * * * *

  The Adirondack chair creaked when Paulette settled onto the wooden seat. She set her cold glass of lemonade—already sweating from the high humidity—on the small table beside her and opened her old diary. This volume started when she was thirteen and spanned until age sixteen, according to the dates in the front cover. She started reading, reliving the troubled, angst-ridden years of being a teen. The multiple crises of a young woman in hindsight appeared as nothing compared to her current predicament.

  Unmarried and pregnant with no good job prospects. Johnny, the one man she thought she’d spend the rest of her life with, no
longer in the picture. Nobody beating down her door asking for her unique decorating schemes for their houses. Her vision tended to be eclectic rather than traditional, a hindrance to pleasing clients and thus to receiving payment. A baby, growing inside, depended on her. As a result, the cries of unfairness and confusion in her diary seemed petty in comparison.

  She flipped a page and read the entry where she’d admitted to her diary she liked Brandon. How unfair that Meredith should like him first, so Paulette must relinquish him. A love triangle not unlike their ancestors. She closed her eyes, hearing the birds twittering in the trees, while imagining the intense emotions at play between Grace and Edith. Affairs of the heart and the associated emotions wouldn’t have changed very much over time. People fell in and out of love, hurting each other in the process. The depth of the pain of losing a lover would always be in direct proportion to the duration of the relationship. Thus, she still smarted from Johnny’s departure, though not as much as she might have if he’d been more demonstrative with his feelings for her.

  Despite the fact she carried his child, she was better off without his lukewarm love, if she could call it such. He’d supported her in many ways, but for him, emotions stayed buried inside. Not to be aired in public, or private for that matter.

  She sipped her drink, letting her gaze drift across the yard. The caretaker’s cottage, its cheery exterior surrounded by flowers and bushes, stood snugly against the edge of the open area behind the house. The rear porches, one on each floor, of Twin Oaks stood in shade so deep the country rocking chairs and sturdy tables on the first-floor porch were barely discernible. The upper porch held no furniture, the floor being the site where Meredith and Paulette slept on many hot summer nights. Sunlight sifted through the gathering clouds beyond the house, hinting at foul weather rolling into the area.

  Paulette turned the page and stared at the drawing she’d made thirty years ago. Two young women, each wearing a flowing prom dress, designed with colored pencil. The classic lines of the skirts reflected subtle tailoring that would make the fabric float and swish with each movement. So long ago she’d allowed her one real dream to fade into nothing more than distant memory.

  Closing the book, she leaned her head against the tall back of the chair. Now what should she do with her life? All her schemes failed. She’d been reduced to coming begging to Meredith for housing, feeding, and even buying her books. She had nothing but a widening girth to show for the years she’d spent with Johnny.

  She’d taken the first step by worming her way back into Twin Oaks. At least she had a welcoming roof over her head, unlike the cold atmosphere of the B&B. Here she could breathe, think. Her next step was to continue mending the rift between her and Meredith so they never ended up like Edith and Grace. They’d come to the brink, with their verbal sniping at each other and pushing each other farther and farther away. At least they’d not harmed the other physically. The emotional hurt would eventually ease with care, along with time and love.

  Meredith needed to heal from the loss of her husband, which would also take time and love to manage. While Paulette couldn’t agree with the demolition of this beautiful house, she grasped the extent of Meredith's pain if she’d been driven to the point of even considering such a drastic measure. Paulette’s sadness stemming from missing her boyfriend paled to the depth of grief stewing within Meredith. But she could help her sister work through this time in her life, to see a future without having a gaping hole inside.

  She rose, gathered her things, and walked across the yard toward the kitchen. She had barely enough time to help Meredith prepare for her big date with Max.

  Chapter 14

  The Navigator pulled into the high school parking lot; one of hundreds of other vehicles bringing families and friends to enjoy the annual concert. Meredith tugged on the bodice of the wrap dress Paulette had insisted she wear. She rubbed a hand across her neck to relieve the irritation of the unfamiliar fabric. She hadn’t packed any dresses when she left Maryland, being more comfortable in jeans and a polo shirt, or shorts and a tee, than in a skirt and heels. Paulette flatly forbade her to wear such a casual outfit when it came to a first date with a handsome lawyer. Even if said lawyer was Max.

  “Here we are.” Brock shifted to park and killed the engine. He opened the door to slide out of the truck. “I haven’t been to a concert like this since Paulette was in choir. When was that, seventh, eighth grade?”

  “Try tenth,” Paulette said, opening the driver’s side passenger door and carefully stepping down from the SUV onto the pavement.

  “I didn’t think it had been so long.” Dina emerged gracefully from the front passenger seat.

  Meredith pulled the snug skirt as far down as she could and then opened the rear passenger door and turned sideways. The asphalt seemed to be three stories below her high heels. Hopefully, she wouldn’t twist an ankle as she maneuvered out of the high vehicle.

  “That’s right.” Brock closed Paulette’s door. “She sang a solo too. ‘I Feel Pretty,’ wasn’t it?”

  “Yes, from West Side Story,” Paulette said. “Dang, that seems so long ago and yet not.”

  Meredith stepped onto the running board and then to the ground, clutching the door’s armrest the entire time. After both feet were steady on the pavement, she dared to let go and step back to close the door. She pulled on the silky fabric. Maybe she should have put on a long coat. Though the weather was muggy enough, she would have likely been too warm. She glanced at the darkening sky, the sun approaching the horizon. At least the threat of storms had lessened.

  Once they’d all located the auditorium and found seats, she gratefully sank into the hard-backed cushioned chair.

  “How do you walk in these things?” Meredith tugged on the strapped sandal, trying in vain to loosen where it dug into her ankle.

  “You must have fat feet.” Paulette gracefully sank into the seat beside Meredith. “If you’d brought your own, you wouldn’t have this problem.”

  “I don’t own shoes like this for a reason.” Meredith gave up and relaxed against the chair. Around her, people greeted one another, milling about as they located seats.

  “What’s that? You like feeling dowdy?”

  “Funny.” Meredith scanned the auditorium. Folding metal chairs and black music stands sat arranged into a semicircle on the stage. To the back right of the chairs stood a row of drums and other percussion instruments. In front of the stage, three rows of risers waited for the chorus. “I prefer having the means to run should the need arise.”

  “Paranoid, are we?” Paulette angled her head and glanced at Meredith. “Nobody messes with me, so I don’t worry about it. And if they did”—Paulette pointed to the stiletto heel of one shoe—“this would find a home in someone’s foot. Just sayin’.”

  “Look, here comes the jazz band.” Brock motioned toward the stage from where he sat next to Meredith.

  The student band filed onto the stage, dodging the empty chairs and stands as they took their places. The brass instruments caught the spotlights and reflected them to the crowd. The woodwinds gleamed as the boys and girls sat waiting for the conductor to take the podium.

  The chorus flowed across the front of the stage in their robes, pale green for the women, black for the men. They arrayed themselves across the risers, carefully lined up so they divided neatly into their sections: soprano women on the left, alto women next, then tenor men, and finally bass men on the far right. Meredith had attended enough of Paulette’s concerts to know how the choir was arranged. Indeed, her love of music stemmed from those events so long ago, when she’d watched her performing. Meredith’s pride for her talents had never wavered, but Paulette’s own sense of self-worth seemed to have faltered in recent years.

  Max walked onstage with a tall young man, presumably Sue’s grandson, Jeremy, carrying a trumpet tucked under his left arm. Meredith appreciated the way the black-and-white tuxedo accentuated Max’s physique and classic features, even from this distanc
e. He shook hands with Jeremy and then turned to sit at the grand piano. Once Jeremy reached his place with the rest of the brass section, the conductor and the choir director strode onstage, took a bow, and then assumed their places in front of their charges.

  The school principal, Mr. Burnett according to the program, hurried to the microphone and waved for silence. He gave a short welcome speech and then turned the program over to the musicians. First, the chorus sang a medley of show tunes, followed by a series of popular songs that had the audience singing and clapping. Meredith remained quiet, waiting to see if her sister would join in. She was disappointed with Paulette, who sang along, though not with her usual gusto. The choir finished their portion of the concert with a salute to local history by singing a set of folk tunes that originated in the county.

  After the chorus filed off the risers and out of the auditorium, Meredith’s anticipation heightened as Max flexed his fingers and the band warmed up their instruments. The lead oboe played a concert A and the rest of the band tuned to it. The sound of the sole note pulled together the entire array of instruments into a single harmonious unit, if only for the span of a long breath. Max had told her they’d play a mix of compositions, but the feature was Jeremy and Max playing a duet for trumpet and piano. A scout from Julliard waited to assess Jeremy’s talent. Max sounded nervous as he’d relayed that tidbit of information, his voice quavering ever so slightly as his fingers ghost played the piano on the kitchen table like a variation of air guitar. The audience grew quiet as the conductor stepped onto the box at the front of the band, tapped his baton on the music stand before him and, after ensuring he had the attention of both Max and Jeremy, lifted his baton.

  The first riff captivated Meredith, transporting her to a place she could no more describe than taste. A place where she floated, not sitting or standing, not touching anything but the emotion contained within the ephemeral notes. The trumpet and piano complemented and contrasted at various points, but always in such a way as to weave a world unto its own. The interplay between the two musicians amused and challenged her ears. Jeremy performed techniques she marveled upon. Subtle and varying sounds and textures to the music evoked an immense appreciation for the skill necessary for this young man’s performance. Max’s hands flew across the ivory keys and then attacked the keyboard before playing around with a humorous tone that contrasted perfectly with the beefier character of the trumpet. When the last notes faded into silence, applause exploded throughout the auditorium. The audience rose to their feet in a surge of enthusiastic congratulations. Pride flooded Meredith as she clapped and whistled her appreciation of their performance.