The Beach at Painter's Cove

by Shelley Noble

  “Well, it’s true.”

  “Still nice to hear.”

  “So what are you going to do with us?”

  “Uh, nothing for the moment. Wait for your mother to come back.”

  Steph flicked a look at Griff and Mandy. “I was thinking. We could live in one of those little cabins on the property. I’ll get a job and take care of them. You wouldn’t even know we were there.”

  “But I want to live here with Grammy.”

  “Shut up, Mandy. Do you want to go to foster care?”

  Mandy shook her head violently. “No, no,” she cried. “I’ll live in a cabin. I won’t be any trouble.”

  “I’ll live in a cabin, Stephie,” Griff said without taking his thumb out of his mouth.

  “Nobody’s going to have to live in a cabin,” Issy said.

  Griff’s thumb came out of his mouth. “Are you going to take care of us, Auntie Issy?”

  Issy looked at those three kids, the hopeful faces. She didn’t think “everything will be fine” would work in this case. But what could she say?

  Mandy looked up from where she was still clinging to her waist. “Are you, Aunt Issy?”

  Issy’s stomach turned over. “Of course I am.”

  Then all three were on their feet and hugging her and Issy wondered what she had just done. Actually she didn’t wonder at all. She’d just sealed her fate—and theirs.

  “How did it go?” Paolo asked as he handed her a glass of wine.

  “We raided the cellar,” Chloe said. “Hope that’s okay.”

  “Of course.”

  “So how did it go?”

  “I think I told them that they could live with me.”

  Paolo choked on his wine. “You mean like adopt them?”

  “I guess. I mean, what else could I do?”

  “Nothing,” Paolo said. “It’s what family does. But it’s hard to imagine you with three ready-made children. What will you do when you’re traveling? Cara, you do a lot of traveling.”

  “Hire a housekeeper?”

  Paolo just looked at her. They both knew she couldn’t afford a housekeeper on her salary. She could barely afford her one-bedroom unrenovated apartment.

  “Or . . .” From the moment she’d walked into Muses by the Sea last Thursday, she’d had a feeling. A feeling that she was home, that she was where she belonged, and that there was a reason she was back. “I could try to save the Muses.”

  “How?” Chloe blurted.

  “I don’t know. Turn the rooms on the first floor into a gallery. Art as it looks in the home where it was created. I haven’t really thought it out, because it seemed so farfetched. Not just hanging on a wall or numbered in a case, but in its historical context. With Leo giving the details. Not in person, it would be too tiring, but on video or a recorded audio tour.”

  “I doubt if the first few years would even pay your taxes,” Paolo said.

  “I know. I’d probably have to get a job.”

  “You could freelance,” Paolo suggested. “Leo and Fae could watch the kids while you were gone. Dell won’t like not having you around, though.”

  “Let’s not tell Dell.”

  “No worries with that one.”

  Issy frowned. “He hasn’t called you to apologize? That’s so unlike Dell.”

  “Oh, he’s called several times.”

  “Paolo! What did you say?”

  “I didn’t answer.”

  “Why not?” Chloe asked.

  “I’m afraid he might make me an offer I can’t refuse.” He smiled at her and Issy felt a pang of affection and an echo of envy.

  “Besides, how could I work for you if I go back?”

  “If I had a dime you’d be the first person I’d hire, but I don’t. You can’t depend on me.”

  “Everyone depends on you, cara. You never let them down.”

  Issy sighed. “I might this time.”

  “You know, the sun porch would make a perfect little tearoom,” Chloe said. “Come see the exhibit, stroll the grounds, have a light lunch. It’s perfect.”

  Issy laughed.

  “Or dinner,” Paolo added. “I can see it. A string quartet playing. Twinkling white lights in the trees and the ocean views from every table.”

  “The sun porch doesn’t look over the ocean,” Issy reminded him.

  “Not the sun porch. The conservatory. It would be magnificent.”

  “It would,” Chloe said, her eyes growing bright. “And weddings. People would pay a fortune to get married here.”

  “And an artist retreat,” said Issy, catching some of their enthusiasm. “Workshops and concerts and—it would take a fortune that we don’t have and Leo would have to approve it. I can’t imagine her okaying an idea that would have strangers tromping through the house. The amount of security needed would be staggering.

  “Please don’t even mention the idea to Leo. I don’t want her any more upset than she is.”

  Paolo leaned back in his chair. “I don’t know why everyone cossets Leo so much. When she’s in the groove she’s as with it and strong as anyone.”

  “I guess it’s because my grandfather always took care of her—like she was a precious, fragile work of art. Everyone else just picked up the habit, I guess.”

  “And now she’s used to it,” Paolo said. “I get it. So who wants dinner?”

  “You two go ahead. I think I’ll stay with the kids tonight. A chance to bond.”

  “With Jillian, too?”

  Issy made a sour face.

  “You’re going to have to talk to her, come to some kind of peaceful coexistence or something. You can’t just go about every day pretending she doesn’t exist.”

  “I don’t see why not.”

  Paolo shook his head and kissed her cheek. “I’ll just get my wallet.”

  For the next two days Issy did manage to ignore her mother. They all still met in the mornings for filming. Jillian consulted with Leo over wardrobe and put herself in charge of makeup and stage setting. Issy longed to ask her why, but didn’t. Maybe she was afraid of the answer.

  They worked with a vengeance, turning on extra lights when the clouds rolled in, taking a break and going down to the beach when the sun came out again. Steph and Paolo worked furiously to upload the video to the computer.

  Leo became more and more animated as she told the provenance of each piece of art. She retold the story she’d told Issy on her first day home from the hospital about Lois Long. Standing at the mantel and pointing gracefully to the dress as she laughed about the sight of Lois clad in her slip with her shoes in her hand as she ran to the car to take her back to Manhattan.

  “A clergyman’s daughter.” She laughed delightedly. “Before my day, of course.”

  She flirted with the camera, glowed with happy memories, grew introspective at the tragedies that were bound to occur.

  “He was such a young man. Heroin, they said. It was tragic. Such a talent and so senseless . . .” She trailed off, looked out the window to the sea.

  As the hours passed it seemed to Issy that it was taking Leo longer and longer to come back from her memories. And she didn’t think that was a good thing.

  Maybe they were doing more harm than good by asking her to dwell on the history and past of the Muses.

  They hadn’t heard from George. Jillian swore she’d gone after him to persuade him to rethink his intention to sell the Muses. Issy had to admit that she’d been more helpful in the few days since his visit.

  The weather continued to waffle between rain and sunshine. Whenever they weren’t working and the sun came out, Leo went out to the bluff to sit with Wes and Max. It was almost as if she were saying good-bye. That she knew before any of them were willing to admit that she would be leaving the Muses. Then Issy and Paolo and Steph would throw themselves into work more than ever, as if determination alone could keep the Muses alive.

  Until Saturday morning when Stephanie ran downstairs to report that Mandy and Griff weren’t
in their rooms. “I looked for them outside but they’re gone. Where could they go?”

  They divided up and searched the house. Issy took the west wing, thinking that curiosity might have led them to a part of the house that was no longer used. She looked in the first five bedrooms and was about to leave when she heard laughing and singing.

  She stopped, listened again. Heard squeals of delight. She turned back and saw an open door at the end of the hallway. The entrance to one of the attics. How on earth had they found it? It hadn’t even occurred to her to tell them what was off-limits. And the attic was bound to be dangerous.

  Issy ran down the hall and climbed the stairs two at a time, then stopped at the open door. A light was on. An old steamer trunk was open and Griff and Mandy were galloping around a standing figure who, at first sight, Issy thought was Leo.

  She was about to chastise her grandmother for climbing the steep stairs, when she realized that it was Jillian. She was wearing a ridiculously large-brimmed Ascot hat with a huge taffeta bow. A feather boa was wrapped around her neck and trailed nearly to the floor.

  “Look, Aunt Issy,” Mandy squealed. “Look what we found. A whole trunk of costumes. We’re going to wear them to story hour. Grandma helped—”

  She froze midsentence. The color drained from her face and her little body sagged. She exchanged a frantic look with Griff, then slowly turned her head to look up at Jillian.

  Issy held her breath. So help her, she would scratch Jillian’s eyes out if she snapped the kid’s head off for having fun and forgetting.

  “Well, we want to look our best for the parade to town, don’t we?” Jillian said, surprising them all. Mandy and Griff slumped even more, this time in relief.

  But Issy didn’t relax. She knew from experience that Jillian knew how to wait until you were an unsuspecting prey. “Then you’d better hurry down and get some breakfast. Fae will be back from her cottage to pick us up in just a few minutes.”

  Mandy and Griff hurried to the stairs.

  “Hold on to the banister,” Issy called after them, keeping her eye on Jillian. “Do you need help putting the rest back?”

  “Thank you, no. I can manage.”

  “Okay, then. I’d better go . . .” Issy couldn’t think of anything else to say. So she followed the kids down the stairs.

  When she entered the kitchen, Mandy, Griff, and Steph had their heads together.

  “Did she really call Jillian Grandma?” Steph asked.

  “She did.” Issy could hardly contain her smile.

  “Two thumbs up, sister mine,” Steph said. “You sometimes amaze me.”

  “Is she mad?” Mandy asked.

  Issy shook her head.

  “I’m not in trouble?”

  “No.”

  “Whew.”

  They just had time for cut-up apples and bran muffins before Fae came through the kitchen door. She was dressed even more flamboyantly than usual in a bright red ankle-length skirt. Her hair was tied back with a scarf filled with bronze- and silver-colored bangles.

  Now Issy understood Steph’s bright red harem pants and shiny silver tunic. She and Fae were color coordinated.

  Just as Issy was about to go tell Leo they were leaving, she and Jillian appeared in the doorway, Jillian still in her wide-brimmed hat and Leo wearing yellow Chinese pajamas left from an earlier era. And right behind them, standing between the two ladies, was Paolo, wearing black shorts and tee with a white silk vest and bow tie. He cradled a top hat in the crook of his elbow.

  Issy was feeling underdressed, when Paolo pulled his free hand from behind his back and produced a felt fedora, which he placed on her head.

  Fae went to the door, turned around, and cast her gaze over her ragtag followers. “Never say the Whitakers went out with a whimper.” She swallowed convulsively. “Onward and to the village.”

  They walked behind the red wagon, Paolo paying acute attention to Leo. But she seemed strong and they only slowed down once to parcel out the bubble mixture. Then they marched into town, bestowing smiles and bubbles on everyone they passed.

  “Leo, good to see you out and about,” called Howard Klein from the post office door.

  “Brava,” yelled someone else whom Issy didn’t recognize but who Fae and Leo seemed to know quite well.

  People applauded as they passed and Issy didn’t know if it was for Fae, Leo, or Jillian York.

  By the time they reached the square they had gathered quite a crowd. Almost as if they knew they were watching a final performance. Had they heard that the Muses was about to be sold, that the family would be turned out, and God only knew what would replace it. Condos and tennis clubs, restaurants that would send the Fisherman’s Den and most of the other local establishments out of business.

  For the first time in her life, Issy felt anger toward her grandfather, so consumed by his love for Leo and his desire to protect her that he hadn’t taken care of the one thing that could destroy her.

  Fae took longer than usual to find the spot for her drawing, but finally she pulled the wagon to the side, knelt on her gardening pad, and opened her chalk box.

  “Today I’m going to tell you the story of Idril and Tuor.”

  Everyone looked blank, including Issy.

  “Tolkien,” Paolo said. “She never ceases to amaze.” He moved closer.

  “It’s a story not often told. Tuor was born of man in the year 472 in the First Age of Middle-earth.”

  Murmurs from the crowd as they caught on.

  “Born of man but left by his grieving mother with the elves before she died.”

  A swaddled baby appeared on the sidewalk, and with a few flourishes of color, the face of a grieving mother.

  “He was raised by the elves of Sindarin and grew into a fine young man, fair of face and golden haired, tall and strong and valiant.” One piece of chalk was dropped into the box, another taken out. A few deft strokes revealed a head and shoulders, a face and waving blond hair that reached to his shoulders. Fae threw the kneeling pad to the side and scooted back as she carried his torso and legs to the next concrete square. A tunic of white and blue, dark tights, and knee boots.

  She spoke slowly and compellingly, mesmerizing her audience as her hand flew over the rough surface of the sidewalk.

  “He was captured by the Easterlings, from whom he escaped after three years. He roamed the earth until the Lord of the Waters made himself manifest and gave him a cloak of shadow to hide him from his enemies.”

  And a warrior rose from deep blue waves. A wild beard rippled across the concrete and spilled into the grass.

  “Together they went to the hidden kingdom of Gondolin, where Tuor fell in love with Idril, who returned his love.”

  She began drawing another figure, smaller and more delicate, who stood by Tuor’s side.

  “But it was not to be. She was already loved by another, an influential elf who turned others against Tuor. For she was elven and Tuor was man. She had eternal life, but he would age and die.”

  Under her fingers a woman appeared, also blond with hair wrapped around her head into a crown, her face turned toward Tuor’s. Fae began to define the picture, finish off lines, fill in empty spaces.

  No one left.

  “When Gondolin was attacked and pillaged, Tuor and Idril fled with a small band of survivors.”

  Beneath their feet she drew red and orange flames shooting through the unfilled spaces.

  “Tuor began to feel old and he built a ship to take him to the West.”

  Before their eyes and Fae’s hand, Tuor’s blond hair grew silver and longer, longer, until it reached his waist.

  “And though Idril remained young, her hair grew silver, too. They left together for the west and it is said that Tuor alone of mortal men was granted immortal life to be with his lady love.”

  During her last words, the fire turned into a brilliant sunset beneath their feet. Fae scrambled on all fours to a square above the story picture, and almost magically, two s
mall figures, hand in hand, turned their backs and walked into the future.

  “And that is the story of Tuor and Idril.”

  At that moment Steph, who had been kneeling next to Fae, looked up, convulsed, and started to stand. Fae grabbed her by the arm and stopped her.

  But their eyes met and held and Issy knew that some kind of communication passed between them, the eccentric great-aunt and the tween. Then they looked away.

  It was a gesture so fast and so efficient Issy wasn’t sure how to read it. Or if it meant anything at all.

  She looked into the crowd, half expecting to see Vivienne hiding there, but there was no one but the spectators, who broke into applause that grew into an extended show of appreciation.

  “Whoa,” Paolo said. “Just whoa.”

  They looked to Leo, but she had tears in her eyes and they looked away. Jillian was gone.

  Fae began putting her chalk back in the tackle box. There were broken pieces and bits rubbed down to the nub scattered around her. She’d drawn with a vengeance today and she was tired. When she took her supplies back to the cottage, she would stay there for a while.

  The story of Tuor and Idril was a story close to her heart, and if she had taken a little liberty with it, then so be it. Tuor and Idril deserved their life together. And Steph deserved a future filled with dreams and possibilities.

  But dreams easily turned to nightmares and possibilities to disappointments. Fae and Leo had been clueless when Issy and Vivienne had come to them. Two middle-aged women, one who had given birth to three children but was sometimes hardly more than a child herself. And Fae, who had been too wrapped up in her own life and her own disappointments to be much of a guiding force.

  But now she’d done her best for Steph. She’d sent her off with the others to get ice cream. It was hard to look into those blue Whitaker eyes and know that she might never see them again. It would all depend . . .

  No. It had been decided. She pushed to her feet. Slower today even than last week. She returned the tackle box to the wagon and pulled it toward home. She stopped to look back briefly at her drawing, knowing that already it was beginning to fade, that it would grow dimmer with the first raindrop, and dimmer still with the next.