by Ann Cook
She looked from the framed photograph to the bookcase beside it. He had a library, too. She knelt to read the titles——not the latest potboilers, either——Dickens, Melville, Conrad, Mark Twain. “Your place tells a lot about you,” she said. “Things I like.” On the lowest shelf she could see what looked like a high school yearbook with a worn cover and below it an old photo album. Maybe Able family history, the kind that wouldn’t be in the historical museum.
John set the steaming mugs and the bowl on the coffee table, and drew her down beside him. “Lots I like about you, too.” He pulled her against him with one arm, his lips brushing her ear. “I’m not so sure about Brenda Starr, Girl Reporter, though. A bit brittle. Not the real you.”
She patted his hand and wished he had not started to sound like Mack, who was always asking her to give up reporting and take care of him. Apparently being assertive wasn’t attractive. Where was her editor when she needed him?
She lifted the tea bag, studied the cup, and let it soak further. “I do get paid to do a job.”
John rubbed his forehead. “I heard something about my own job today. From Blackthorne again, this time indirectly. I had a call from the CEO who promised me an apprenticeship. Blackthorne’s one of his firm’s important clients. Blackthorne’s upset that I ignored his warning. Word gets around. Blackthorne insists he needs Sylvania’s lot for his development. The CEO politely told me not to interfere with Blackthorne’s deal if I wanted to intern there.”
Brandy frowned and nibbled a dry cracker. “What do you plan to do?”
For a moment John studied the contents of his mug. “Somebody’s got to try to save the county’s heritage. It’s too late to turn back now. I might as well find out what kind of folks I was planning to work for.” He gave her a half grin. “I’m taking the committee from the historical society to see the house tomorrow.”
She set down her tea and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Backbone. I like that.” Then she paused, eyebrows contracted. “About tonight——us. I wouldn’t want you to think that I sleep around.”
He squeezed her hand. “You were vulnerable. Maybe I took advantage. I’ll try to make it up to you.”
“If you really want to help me…” She stood, knelt before the bookcase, and pulled out the yearbook and the album. After all, Mr. Tyler said a reporter had to keep pushing. He would also say a reporter shouldn’t become emotionally involved. Too late for that now.
“Just quickly, you might show me these, tell me more about the family.” She glanced up, eager, her mind again on her story. She had to retrieve her car, and while she was at the house, to plumb Sylvania’s memory and try to talk to her husband.
She set the volumes on the coffee table and cuddled next to him. As she tilted up her face, she was scarely aware that he had withdrawn his arm. “You could take me along tomorrow with the architects. Sylvania won’t talk to me if I go back alone.” She glanced down at the two large books. “I’ve done research about Eva Stone’s disappearance. I think Sylvania knows more about that girl than she lets on. Maybe Blackthorne was a guest at the weekend party, too. I need to ask her some more questions.” She patted his arm. “I’ve got to get my car and things, anyway.”
Later Brandy would remember how John’s face darkened as she babbled on. He stared at her, one eyebrow raised, then carried his mug to the sink and spun around to face her. “I ought to have guessed what you were up to. Here I was blaming myself for taking advantage. I see now it was the other way around.”
Stunned, Brandy pulled the robe tighter around her. “What are you talking about?”
“Manipulation. Tonight was just like the last time. You’re good at getting what you want from a guy. Latching on to my album and yearbook. Enticing me to take you out there again after I said I wouldn’t.” He leaned against the counter and folded his arms. “You’ve got a big lug of a boyfriend who could buy and sell half the town. You even thought he’d come tonight instead of me. I hear he’s the town catch. What do you want with me?”
He turned to rinse his mug, the muscles in his jaw twitching. “What you want is your damned story, and you think I can help you get it. You don’t care if you hurt me and two families.”
Brandy shoved the volumes under the coffee table, blind–sided and confused. There was an element of truth in what he said, but until a few minutes ago he had swept the story completely from her mind. “No, I just thought…”
But John was not listening. He strode back into the bedroom, returned and held out a pair of women’s jeans and a woman’s shirt. “These ought to see you home. Take the damn books, too. That’s what you really want. This wasn’t the beginning of a relationship. You were softening me up.”
Hurt and indignant, Brandy reached for the clothes. In the bedroom, as she plugged in the hair dryer above his dresser, she peered at the photograph she’d noticed earlier. A young woman with windblown hair smiled saucily back at her. How had John suddenly come up with a woman’s pants and a fashionable name brand shirt? A woman’s brand of shampoo? Why would he have a hair dryer?
He lives here like a monk, Mack had said. Indeed. She gritted her teeth and stifled an impulse to run to him, to make excuses, to try to recapture the earlier mood. How many other women had he entertained in his little trailer on the canal? Savagely she slammed down the dryer. Now he was looking for an excuse to get rid of her. She was the one who had been used.
In the bath room she rolled her wet clothing into a ball and stalked into the kitchen where John silently handed her a plastic bag. The Mozart concerto was coming to its vibrant conclusion. Lips trembling, she snatched the damp bag and stood at the door, head high.
Within fifteen minutes John was driving her home. The ice man returneth, she thought. Not until he turned down her isolated block and pulled up before her mother’s house did he face her. “Like you said at the trailer, you have to get your car. You certainly owe Aunt Sylvania an apology. I’m going out there at ten in the morning. I can pick you up in front of the Beacon, but only if we have an understanding. I’m not involved in your so–called research, and you’ll not embarrass Sylvania or anyone else with your questions.”
Brandy longed to fling herself out of the car without a word, but she had to be practical. If she asked her mother to drive her, she would have to explain tonight. She couldn’t very well tell Mack what happened, either. Fortunately, the only light on in the house was at the kitchen door. Her mother had not yet raised an alarm about her absence.
She bit her lip. “All right. No favors. I’ll just see Sylvania and get my car.” She wanted to thank him again for pulling her to safety, to say she hadn’t meant to use him to get a story. But then she thought of the girl’s picture, looked at the grim set of his jaw, and shoved open the car door.
At the back gate Brandy checked her watch. After four. She rushed up the driveway toward the garage, unfastened the gate into the yard, and knelt to muffle Meg’s bark. Then she retrieved the extra house key from under a flower pot on the back porch and sneaked into the kitchen with Meg at her heels. Not until then did she hear John’s car pull away. At least he had waited until she was safely inside.
Meg slid under the bed, tail thumping in gratitude. As for Brandy, she undressed, crawled into bed, and imagined John chalking up one more conquest on his score card. She was conscious of her father’s portrait on the dresser and felt ashamed. She would not allow herself to become so vulnerable again, nearly drowned or not. Mr. Tyler and the textbooks were right: never become emotionally involved in your story.
But when she tried to stay angry, she thought of those hot brown eyes and her own grew wet. Maybe John was right. Maybe she was too bull–headed. Maybe she did allow her schemes to hurt others. Maybe she should tell Mr. Tyler tomorrow that there wasn’t a story.
SEVEN
In the morning Mr. Tyler leaned back at his desk, listened to Brandy’s account of her investigation, and flicked his cigarette into an ashtray with a sour look. He’d failed in his
effort to give up the habit, and that failure contributed to his crankiness. “So you found this witness to the ghost, but she won’t be quoted. All you learned is already a matter of record. There’s a weekend party. Then the girl walks out in the lake and drowns. Where’s your alleged ghost story?”
Brandy fingered her spiral note pad. Now was the time to toss in the sponge. Even so, she had been up early and recorded in her usual unsightly scrawl all the night’s events except one. She dropped her gaze. “I staked out the grounds myself, but I didn’t get a chance to see anything. The developer next door has Dobermans. Someone turned them loose on me. I had some very unpleasant moments.” She tried not to think of the pleasant ones that followed and looked up again.
“Maybe you were right. Maybe there isn’t a story. Not if no one will talk.”
Mr. Tyler studied the end of his cigarette. “Too tough for you, Miss O’Bannon? I figured you needed your spine stiffened, but I didn’t figure you for a quitter.”
Brandy closed the pad with a snap. “I do think there’s a story——if I can only find it.”
“First thing you’ve got to find is your focus. Is this about a ghost or the loss of an historic house? Maybe about a lost woman?” He glanced at her note pad. “One thing I’ll give you. You take complete notes.” He leaned forward and caught her in his sharp blue gaze. “Get out there. Use your eyes. Talk to people.” He flipped a page of his desk calendar. “It’s now Wednesday. You have until next Monday to come up with a story.” He sat back again, blew two perfect smoke rings, and watched them rise. “Don’t take those rings as models. Be sure you get facts.” His tone hardened. “And remember, there are laws about people’s property. I’d rather you didn’t get the paper sued for trespassing.”
A few minutes later Brandy stepped out on the sidewalk to wait for her awkward meeting with John. She’d have to learn more family history, get more physical details about the house, probe Eva Stone’s disappearance——all in a couple of days. Without a concrete ghost, the missing girl was the best angle. She’d make her the focus, then line up supporting facts.
At ten John’s ‘85 Mustang drew up in front of the Beacon office, followed by an impressive Chrysler and a Ford LTD bringing the committee. A boat ride across the lake would be quicker, but not suitable for the group. After Brandy climbed into the passenger seat beside John, he avoided her eyes. He’s embarrassed about last night, she thought bitterly, and so am I. She tried to imagine Mack sitting between them. Good old dependable Mack.
“I told the architects you’re writing a news story about the house,” John said as he pulled away from the curb, his eyes on the road. “Design and age make it eligible for historic preservation, even without the local family history.”
He glanced at Brandy, who had dutifully begun taking notes. “A nomination would put pressure on Aunt Sylvania, maybe make her delay the sale. It takes a few months to hear from the Review Board. The owner can still disapprove the nomination, but by then I hope to have a buyer.”
Brandy’s fingers clenched around her pen. Could John really pretend that nothing had happened between them? Not even the argument? She closed her note pad and spoke in an even tone. “I never meant to manipulate you or anyone else.”
The lines of his face tensed. “We called a truce last night. Let’s not talk about it. You can get your data without upsetting the family——or yourself.” That remark stung. Did he think she’d sleep with him to get a story? Her fingers trembled, while he stared ahead and went on talking. “You need to know that Curt Greene’s one of the architects. Blackthorne bought up the land west of Sylvania’s property, but Greene might be able to save wetlands to the east.”
If John was going back to square one, she could, too. She bit her lip and tried to concentrate on the facts John was giving her. He might have another reason for cultivating Greene. He headed the county’s most prestigious architectural firm, one with offices in more than one central Florida town.
“I saw Mr. Greene at the last Chamber of Commerce meeting,” Brandy said. “He ought to impress your great–aunt.” They rode in silence until he swung onto the dirt road leading to Sylvania’s house. As they passed Brandy’s abandoned hatchback, she tucked her note pad into her canvas bag, felt inside to be sure she had the extra key to her car, and snapped the bag shut.
The three cars parked in a lot covered with pine needles, John between a shabby sedan and a sleek white Mercedes. Probably, she thought, Sylvania’s car and an earlier caller’s. John led the way toward the lake for a front view of the soaring height of the house, its gray siding, its buff brick first floor bays, its dormer windows and high–pitched copper roof.
“Unique,” said Greene, lifting his camera and focusing on each feature. Brandy scanned the grass for her own camera. Gone. So were her white pumps. Across the padlocked gate to the west, she looked in vain for the dogs. Beyond the saw palmettos, a crew of workmen were sinking tall posts into the ground, nailing the planks across them about a foot above the grassy soil, and every few yards, interspersing wooden benches that faced the lake. A barge waited off shore. Along the water’s edge a board walk was advancing toward the boat house. She couldn’t see the developer’s black Cadillac, but near the first portion of the walkway a motorboat rocked at Blackthorne’s dock.
John walked the group back to the curved stair of the front entrance. When Sylvania opened the door, Brandy saw that she had dressed herself with more care than usual. Her snowy hair was pulled back in a severe but tidy bun, her face dusted with powder, her cheeks lightly tinged with rouge. Her lips were still a pale line. Over that awkward frame she had dropped a gray linen sheath, fashionable perhaps two decades ago. She had not abandoned her black oxfords. She bore down the stairs toward them, face thrust forward like a proud ship’s figurehead leaning into a storm.
Curt Greene, middle–aged, affable, neatly groomed in suit and tie, assumed the lead. “Mrs. Langdon, this is indeed a pleasure,” he said, and shook her hand.
Sylvania remained crusty. “We’ll see, gentlemen.”
After they stood in the broad second floor hallway, Greene spoke again. “For years we’ve admired this impressive house from a distance. We’re looking forward to really seeing it for the first time.”
While he introduced the others in his party, John and Brandy stayed discreetly in the rear. More than once Sylvania cast a sharp, knowing eye in Brandy’s direction, but for the moment her attention centered on the trio of architects. In the living room she introduced the earlier visitor, a frail woman with silver–blonde hair, lounging by the fireplace in an ivory crepe pants suit as stylish as Sylvania’s sheath was drab.
“My sister–in–law, Grace Able,” Sylvania said briskly, turning her eyes toward the mantelpiece portrait. “Brookfield’s widow. She asked to look for a little table of theirs before I sell the extra furniture.”
Mrs. Able rose with a shy smile. “Goodness, don’t let me interfere with these gentlemen. I was curious when I heard the old place was being destroyed, but Sylvania’s explained. I’m leaving as soon as my companion checks upstairs for a Duncan Phyfe end table we used to own. It’s the only piece I have room for now.”
Brandy stepped forward, ignoring Sylvania’s scowl. “Brandy O’Bannon from the Beacon, Mrs. Able. I’m doing a story on the house. How do you feel about seeing it sold and perhaps torn down?”
Grace pressed a dainty hand to her cheek. “Goodness, it’s no secret that Brookfield and I didn’t enjoy living here.” She looked around with a perceptible shiver. “It’s not what I would call a friendly house. No, I really shan’t care what happens to it.” She favored Brandy and the others with another genteel smile. “Goodness, perhaps that isn’t what you expected to hear.” She shrugged thin shoulders. “Talk to Sylvania. She’s the family historian.”
At that moment a stout, tweedy looking woman came struggling down the stairs, carrying a scarred mahogany end table.
Grace rose, waved a hand in her direction, and moved to
ward the hallway. “Here’s my companion, Mrs. Mabel Boxley. Like a dear, she drove me over this morning. Not that I couldn’t drive myself, of course. I’ve got to go now. It’s time for my morning swim. The pool at my condo won’t be crowded yet.”
“She’s still a marvelous swimmer,” said the loyal Mrs. Boxley.
Grace turned back with a patrician smile. “Thank you, Sylvania dear, for allowing me to come.”
While the committee members produced yellow pads from their briefcases and began examining the blue glazed tile on each side of the fireplace, the tile mantel, and the cast iron insert and wrought iron grate, Brandy slipped into the hall and caught up with Grace and Mrs. Boxley at the door.
“I’d very much appreciate talking again with you, Mrs. Able,” she said. “Is there a time I could see you?” In the newspaper account of Eva Stone’s drowning Grace had been the party’s guest of honor.
Grace Able held her fingers to her shapely lips, considering. “Well, of course, there’s the flower show tomorrow afternoon. I’m exhibiting. Mabel, would you give Miss O’Bannon the address? About four o’clock. The judging should be finished by then.”
The indispensable Mrs. Boxley dug a small card from her purse and handed it to Brandy. This woman must be the “keeper” Mack had mentioned, Brandy thought. But Grace Able seemed quite able to keep herself.
In the living room the trio were admiring the wide, irregular cypress floorboards. Brandy scribbled notes about the cornices and the chair rails in the hallway. When one man started up the steps, Sylvania watched with arms folded. “I don’t use the upper floors any more myself,” she said. “I don’t know what you’ll find there.”
Indeed, when Brandy followed him into the first two bedrooms on the third floor, she saw only tarnished brass headboards, a broken rocker, and a plain oak highboy. But through the half–open door of the last room, she was startled to spot an unmade bed, a closet with a man’s shirts and trousers on hangers, and a dresser drawer with a brown sock dangling over the side. Although the examiner did not continue up to the fourth floor, Brandy noticed an accumulation of dust on the steps above. Apparently the top floor with the dormer windows was unused. If John was correct and Sylvania herself was the reported “ghost,” how could she appear as a shadowy figure in the dormer window without making footprints on the stairs?
