by Angela Zeman
“We’ve also seen the last of your curse. I can positively reassure you that you’ve broken that curse and you may consider it no longer in effect against your entire family forever.”
Black Dan’s eyes widened. “Is that so?” He took a deep, relieving breath and gazed with pleasure at the people and scenery surrounding them. He smacked a palm flat against the bar. “Break out a bottle of our best champagne, Rick. I’m going to call my wife and ask her to join us. The curse is over!”
The witch accepted a glass. “Rest assured, Dan Harrington. I would’ve hated to see such a pleasant establishment leave Wyndham-by-the-Sea. And I will be most delighted to meet MRS. Harrington.”
THE WITCH AND THE ROCK STAR
“LET’S GET THIS meeting going, folks, we got business to attend, and then something I think you’re all gonna be interested in—” The gavel which Mayor Harold Harper had been banging on the scarred oak table in a steady rhythm, like percussion punctuation, slipped out of his hands. As he stooped with an ‘oof’ to retrieve it, none of the Wyndham-by-the-Sea Board of Village Trustees could distinguish the rest of his words, but they didn’t care. They were too busy twisting in their seats, eyeing the young man sitting towards the back of the large, mostly empty room.
Muscular youths in tight blue jeans, black motorcycle boots, and leather jackets with little chains on the pockets worn over artfully ripped white tee shirts were not an unknown item in tourist-ridden Wyndham. But they were rare at Village Board meetings.
Sensing the mood of his audience, the mayor raced through formalities and reports and stopped on a dime at the point: “This young man, uh Mark Daniels is his name, is the personal manager—” here he paused to garner the attention of all the board members. An unnecessary ploy—they were rabid with curiosity. “—the personal manager of…Phantom. You folks know that name, I’m sure…the rock star?”
Only nine ladies and gentlemen sat on the board this term, but the hiss of their accumulated intaken breaths would have brought credit to the entire reptile house at the Bronx Zoo. Only one hapless soul asked, quaveringly, “Who…?” He was ignored.
“We’re faced tonight with an opportunity, it seems. But I’ll let my friend Mark, here, explain. Mark?”
Skip Dolan rose, paused for an extra dose of oxygen and a last reminder to think of himself from here on in as ‘Mark Daniels’, and ambled to the front. He stepped up onto the plywood elevated platform that served to remind the board that the mayor—although short in stature—was a man of importance, and faced the Board members. He nodded a thank you and smiled warmly at Mayor Harper, and then at the nine. Then he spoke:
“My boss, as you probably heard, covers the entire world on his concert tours. He believes, you know, in doing his part for democracy, bringing other countries the message through his music, you know…like an ambassador. Only not paid by the government.” He smiled again. They beamed back, obviously taken with the idea of an unpaid ambassador spreading the message of democracy.
“Well, as much as he loves everybody, loves democracy and the world, he gets so worn down that he has to get away now and then. You know. Away from people who all want to—to shake his hand, that kind of thing. It gets so he’s like a prisoner of his fame. And so, a friend of his told him about this cute little village, being so pretty and right on the water of Long Island Sound and everything, and he thought it’d be a great place to have a house. A real home, where he could sorta hide away from everyone and get himself back together. So he can do more tours, more shows, you know. He sent me to look it over and talk to you guys…that kinda thing.”
“A house?” repeated one of the Trustees, a compact dark man with black and grey stubble on his cheeks. Doctor Villas. He looked doubtful.
A tall dapper man with sleek silver hair, named Mr. Harder, snapped to attention. He owned a realty firm.
“What about drugs, booze, screaming parties, that sort of thing?” put in a tall woman. Ms. Bellwood. She owned a bookstore and valued the peace and quiet of Wyndham.
“Oh, no, ma’am. He doesn’t even smoke, for his voice.”
A few people nodded to each other and commented on how nice Phantom’s voice really was.
Skip waited until they settled down. “You see, when I say he gets tired, I mean he gets dead tired. Almost like sick. He’d be more interested in healthy food, quiet breezes, swimming in Long Island Sound, and no noise to disturb him. His nerves get shot, ma’am.” He paused and everyone waited expectantly.
“If you and I can reach an agreement, I’m supposed to scout out and buy property for him, hire a contractor, and all that. Construct a place for him tailored to his special needs. He wouldn’t be interested in any house already built. Like, I’d have to fix him up a sound studio. Don’t worry about the noise, though, that’s sound proofed so even he couldn’t hear himself in the next room.”
The board members tittered at the thought that he couldn’t hear himself.
The mayor cleared his throat. “And, Mark, where would Phantom get these materials, these contractors, the workmen, supplies, and so on? His food and services?” he asked, speaking with a heavy significance.
“Why, right here in Wyndham, mayor. Like we discussed before the meeting.”
Mayor Harper turned to the board and smiled meaningfully. “Got that, folks? Here in Wyndham. Where unemployment’s been godawful these last two years. Even the tourists been stayin’ home in times like these. Think of it. First the land, then a mansion—with all the accouterments—” (His eyebrows wiggled gleefully. He owned a hardware store.) “—housekeepers, groceries, gardeners, landscaping, God only knows. Spreadin’ his money around here for years. Forever, if we keep him happy.”
“And how do we keep him happy?” asked the doctor sourly.
The mayor, who’d never liked the doctor, leaned forward ponderously. “By keeping our damned traps shut, my dear sir. No gossip. He wants privacy and plenty of it.”
“But the publicity!” a lady in the second row with suspiciously bright red hair cried out. She edited the village’s local weekly newspaper. “Tourism could explode here if we could take advantage of his presence.”
“Great,” said Skip with a grimace. “People’d be climbing his gates. He’d have to hire bodyguards to get him in and out of the house. He’d be just as much a prisoner here as on tour.
“Listen, folks. People get mad if he’s not good natured with them every second. They stick their noses in his lunch, then complain how stuck up he is if he tries to move over. I know, ’cause he has to do it every day on tour. Think about it. Wouldn’t that drive you people nuts? If he doesn’t find a place to go, a place just to be quiet and rest, he’ll go stark raving crazy. Do you know where he has to go to get away nowadays? Like a vacation? He checks into a hospital.”
“No.” Ms. Bellwood, was aghast.
“Yes,” insisted Skip. He knew it was true because he’d read all about it in the newspaper while eating a snack in Atlantic City. He’d been struck then by how sad that was. “He wants to stroll down into the village and shop, just live quiet, like everybody else.”
“Hear that?” put in the mayor eagerly. “He wants to shop!”
“But—” the red-haired lady began again.
A man in a suit of obvious foreign cut and astronomical cost, a Board member who hadn’t spoken before—Mr. Drexel—held up a single finger, which silenced her. It silenced everybody. He held the second highest executive position in Wyndham’s single industrial business—which paid the majority share of village taxes. He nodded. “Yes, I’ve heard that, about the hospital. It’s true.”
Mayor Harper grimaced at him. Deferring to others didn’t come easily to the mayor. “You’re right, sir. You’re a wonderful judge of character, as we all know. When you meet him, you won’t get over just how plain, down-to-earth Phantom really is,” continued the mayor expansively to the entire Board, draping one arm over Skip’s shoulder in a brotherly fashion.
“How would you
know?” asked the doctor skeptically.
“Why, Mark told me. True?” he asked Skip.
“Oh, true,” said Skip. He smiled again. His cheeks were beginning to ache.
“Well, great, but you can’t hide him here forever. People’ll recognize him. Word’ll get out,” said the doctor.
“If you don’t think you can do it…” Skip shrugged doubtfully.
“Now hang on. You know what? We won’t wait for people to find out, we’ll tell them.” The mayor leaned forward, bracing his arms on the table. “We’ll get the whole village in on it. He promises to spend his money here—well, we’ll promise to keep his presence to ourselves. Totally. It’s the only humane thing to do.”
“We could adopt him,” said Ms. Bellwood, standing in her enthusiasm. She had a kind face, thought Skip. And she was attractive for a middle-aged lady, he thought further. Nice body for a thirty year old.
“That’s a great idea,” declared the mayor. “We’ll adopt him. Phantom will be Wyndham’s Secret Son. I think people’ll like thinking about him that way. He needs us to help him rest and recuperate. We’ll make sure he gets his slightest wish fulfilled. We’ll make his life here…a joy. An absolute joy.”
“And he’ll pay for it,” said the doctor.
The mayor eyed him suspiciously, but the doctor seemed agreeable. Then again, Mayor Harper thought, doctors usually were agreeable about money. As were mayors, sighed Mayor Harper truthfully to himself, but only to himself.
A short man with white hair lifted a timorous hand as he rose from his seat and began making his way to the front. “You’ll be wanting to talk with me, young man.”
The mayor said, “Ah, yes. May I introduce Horace Arsdale—our banker, Mark.”
After more discussion, endless questions which Skip answered patiently, and then handshaking and introductions all around, he left with Mr. Arsdale clinging to his arm.
Skip’s facial muscles twitched all night in his sleep from strain, but he was at Mr. Arsdale’s bank early the next day, regardless.
Mr. Arsdale beamed as brightly as the spring sun as he retrieved Skip’s check for $45,000 from his desk, with Skip’s parting words ringing majestically in his ears: “This’s just a small token to open the account until the boss transfers building funds, and of course his living funds, from his regular bank.”
Mr. Arsdale had been positively thrilled to approve Phantom’s unsecured loan for a private residence. Everybody knew Phantom. In his mind, Mr. Arsdale feasted on the future delights of a friendship with this international celebrity. Horace M. Arsdale—banker to the stars. Harry and Phantom—pals.
To save time, Skip took Ernie Block, a local builder he’d hired on Mayor Harper’s recommendation, with him when his realty agent, Conrad Harder, Jr., (beloved only son of Mr. Harder the Trustee) drove him to see the first piece of property. Since the property didn’t border Long Island Sound, Skip rejected it immediately.
“I did think I’d mentioned it last night to your dad, Conrad. That we want to be on the water, you know?”
“Ah, you’re right, sir, you did, sir.” Since Conrad was at least twice Skip’s age, Skip had to conceal a grimace at the ‘sir.’
At the next location, Skip got out of the car. Conrad was practically quivering with excitement…not an attractive sight in an older man, thought Skip. Obviously, here was land Conrad ached to sell him.
A grassy twenty foot cliff overlooked a stretch of pristine beach and a view that could soothe the most ragged of nerves. Beyond the beach, the vast Sound stretched, disguising the distant Connecticut shore as a misty Camelot. On this side, the waves hushed and sighed serenely against the sand. The property was vacant except for a large deck made of age-silvered cedar that jutted out over the cliff’s edge and trailed ramshackle steps down to the beach—perfect for al fresco anything. From the vantage point of this deck, Skip turned his back on the water and scanned the property edges. Wide and deep, bordered on the east and west with wooded hills—this lot was within the price range outlined to Mr. Harder, Sr.?
But Conrad confirmed it. Conrad admitted it’d been on the market for years…recession, he explained with embarrassment. Well, Skip could certainly understand tough financial times. They shook hands and Conrad raced back to the office to begin the paperwork, leaving Skip and his builder pacing outlines in the grass.
That same afternoon, a check for earnest money to each of the builder and the realtor was exchanged for special permission from the absent owners to begin building right away, to accommodate Phantom’s pressing schedule. The transaction might have been unconventional, but no one minded.
On the day the bulldozers arrived to start digging the foundation, a tall thin figure, silhouetted against the morning sun, appeared on a hill to the east of the property. Wrapped in black robes being whipped by the breeze, he, or she, stood gazing down on the proceedings.
Eyeing the dark figure uneasily, Skip asked the builder who could this be? Ernie, an easy-going older man with a pot belly, possessed a shrewd intelligence that Skip had quickly learned to trust. He and Ernie had felt at ease with each other’s good sense right from the start.
Ernie grinned at Skip’s nervousness. “Just our local witch. Mrs. Risk. She’ll be your neighbor come the end of sixty days and we get this house finished.”
“A real witch?” Skip gave Ernie a sideways glance to see if he was being ragged.
Ernie removed his Giants cap and scratched at his thinning hair. “Well, that’s what some say. She does seem to know things nobody else’d even guess at.
“Nice woman, I think, although some’ll tell you different. The thing is, the ones who disagree are those I wouldn’t trust with a bent nail.” Ernie shot a glance at his young employer. “It’s been said that if people get into trouble—which, just about anybody alive does, y’gotta admit—she’s awful good at doing what needs to be done.”
Skip gave a short laugh. “For them, or to them?”
Ernie wagged his head side to side, “She is an odd bird.” He grinned at Skip, then picked up his sheets of plans. “Got a sharp tongue on her, too,” he added as if in admiration. “I got the idea that a long time ago, when someone first called her ‘witch’, they were thinking the word started with ‘b’. Some just can’t stand a woman smarter than they are who doesn’t hesitate to tell them unpleasant truths.” He chuckled to himself, then concentrated on his layouts.
Skip stared curiously at the figure until she suddenly turned and descended the rise, disappearing from his sight. Then he forgot her and began discussing stucco walls with Ernie.
He didn’t even remember her two days later when the carpenter was killed, picked off by a rifle shot from where he rested, perched on a piece of stone, while his buddy fetched more nails from the truck.
After the village constable called in the County’s Sixth Precinct homicide squad, and they finally allowed the carpenter’s body to be taken away, the shock was still severe. Skip cancelled everything for the day, even deliveries.
After buying the men a restorative beer at Murphy’s, he watched them hurry to their various homes. He thought about how someday he’d be hurrying home to Alexia in times of trouble…if he could pull this off.
It baffled him why anybody’d shoot the carpenter, who’d seemed to be a pleasant guy, a hard worker with a family. As he ordered himself another beer, he wondered uneasily if it had anything to do with his scheme…
He painstakingly re-examined the details of this last—his very last—attempt to solve his problem. The problem wasn’t a new one to mankind anywhere—he needed money. Lots of money.
At first he’d tried saving it, skimping on food and clothes. But as he lost weight and stuffed cardboard into his work shoes, he realized that even if he starved, it could take decades to accumulate the nest egg he needed. He’d tried investing in a small enterprise a school friend had started, and lost both his money and his friend. Other schemes had made him rich only in experience, but at least he’d kep
t the rest of his friends.
That’s when he’d begun working the lottery…buying hundreds of lottery tickets…until it became obvious that he wasn’t destined for any winning ticket—anywhere—anytime.
Then, down to the last of his savings and out of ideas, he’d driven to Atlantic City. In this final, desperate ploy, either he would win enough money to marry his angel, the female he ached for with every ounce of his being, or…he could think of nothing else to do…he’d jump into the cold dirty ocean that ran alongside the casinos and drown himself.
It would take a miraculous run of luck, but how else could he ever marry Alexia—gorgeous, laughing, light as air Alexia, whose parents had always provided her with the finest clothes and a luxurious home? Alexia, who, Skip never doubted, could choose any man she wanted…and she’d chosen him. How could he ask her to accept so much less than what she was used to having?
He remembered that last fatal day, the final day when everything had happened, when fate had brought the edges of his plan together…he’d gone to pick Alexia up from her job as a grocery store cashier. He remembered thinking as he’d stood to one side, watching her finish with the last customer of the day, how she was the object of his dreams, the future mother of his future children, the most breathtakingly beautiful female he’d ever seen in his life.
After pulling her jacket from under the counter and holding it for her, he’d swept her to his chest with one well-muscled arm. She’d giggled and squirmed out of his clutch. “Outside, Skip. Wait a second, will you?” he remembered her saying.
He’d yielded and followed her outside, but for the thousandth time he was dizzy with both bliss and despair as he watched her walk with dancing steps through the automatic doors.
When they reached his pickup truck, he opened the door for her. As she beamed at him, he remembered noticing how, when her pale hair moved in the cool breeze, it caught the light the same way that fishing line catches the sun on a sultry afternoon.
