Starlight on Willow Lake

by Susan Wiggs

  “I printed out the résumés of the candidates we’re meeting with,” he said. “You want to go over them now, or—”

  “I think I’d like to go out into the garden now.”

  He gritted his teeth, looking away so she wouldn’t see his annoyance.

  “You’re annoyed,” she said. “You can’t wait to leave. You’ve got one foot out the door.”

  Damn. Busted. He schooled his face into a pleasant expression. “Don’t be silly. I’m glad I’m here to spend some time with you.”

  “Right.” She nudged a lever on her chair and rolled toward the French doors. “Let’s go inspect the property you bought. You’ve never even seen it in the summer.”

  He stood aside, impressed by how nimbly she used her chair to operate the switch plate, which opened the doors. When he stepped out on the deck, the view and the cool clarity of the air stole his breath. “Wow,” he said.

  “You did well,” she told him. “I do appreciate everything you’ve done for me—moving me to Avalon, getting this house adapted for my needs, hiring a staff. If I’m going to be a cripple the rest of my life, I might as well do it in style.”

  “I thought we weren’t going to say cripple.”

  “Not when I’m being polite. I don’t feel terribly polite these days.”

  “Let me savor the view for a few minutes, okay?” The last time he’d seen the property, it had been blanketed in snow. The estate had been known as the Webster House, having been built in the 1920s by descendants of Daniel Webster himself. For Mason, the decision to acquire and restore the house had not been based on historical significance, prestige or even investment value. He wanted his mother to have a nice place to live, near Adam—aka her favorite—that could be quickly adapted for her special needs.

  During that process, he had come to appreciate the benefit of having a big extended family living in a small town. His cousin Olivia was married to the contractor who had restored the fanciful timber-and-stone mansion to its original gloss as a grand summer residence from days gone by. His cousin Ross was married to a nurse who specialized in adaptive living. Another cousin, Greg, was a landscape architect. Olivia was a talented designer in her own right, so in a matter of months, the place was ready for his mother and Adam, and their staff of live-in help.

  Mason had spared no expense. In his position, there was no need to. For the past decade, he had run his own private equities-and-lending firm, and business was good. He had all the money in the world. But of course, wealth had its limits. He couldn’t buy his mother her mobility. He couldn’t buy a way to make her smile again.

  He took a deep breath of the morning air. “It’s sweet,” he said.

  “I beg your pardon.”

  “The air here. It’s sweet.”

  “I suppose it is.”

  “The landscaping looks great. Are you happy with it?”

  “Your cousin Greg sent a crew to take care of the mowing and gardening,” she said, nodding in the direction of a long swath of grass sloping down to the water’s edge. There was a dock and a timber-and-stone boathouse, home to kayaks, a catboat and a 1940s Chris-Craft. When not on duty at the fire station, Adam lived in the upstairs quarters.

  A fringe of ancient willow trees dipped their budding branches into the placid, sunlit water. The word that came immediately to mind was unspoiled. Willow Lake was one of the prettiest lakes in a landscape full of pretty lakes. The green-clad hills, with a few puffy clouds riding on their shoulders, rose gently upward from the shore. On the north end of the lake was a grand old summer camp, a hundred years in the making—Camp Kioga.

  At the south end was the town called Avalon, as picture-perfect as a storybook setting, with its whistle-stop train station, old-fashioned town square, stone-built Greek revival library and shady shoreline parks. Its outskirts were equally attractive—a mountain road leading to a ski resort, a ball field for the local bush-league baseball team, white-steepled churches, their spires seeming to thrust through the new-leafed trees. The cliffs of the Shawangunks attracted climbers from all over the world. Somewhere not so far away, there was probably suburban blight—shotgun shacks and mobile homes, ramshackle farms and big-box stores. But he couldn’t see any of that from here. And more important, neither could his mother.

  The place he’d acquired for her was on the western shore of the lake, so it caught the sunrise every morning, something his real-estate agent had pointed out when he had bought the property. The agent had babbled on about the attributes of the historic mansion, not knowing Mason was already sold on getting the place. He was looking for security for his mother, not for a return on investment.

  “Why do they keep quitting?” he asked her, paging through the printouts of the candidates for the job of primary caregiver. “Is it the living quarters?”

  “Have you seen the living quarters?”

  He’d looked at pictures after the remodel was done. The living quarters, located in a private wing of the house, featured a suite of rooms with a view of the lake, new furnishings and luxurious fixtures. “Okay, good point. So?”

  “I haven’t been conducting exit interviews. I’m sure Adam gave you an earful. Nobody wants to live with a miserable old woman who can barely change the channel on The Price Is Right.”

  Oh, boy. “You’re not old,” he said. “Your parents would freak out if they heard you say that. And being miserable is optional. So is watching The Price Is Right.”

  “Thank you, Sigmund Freud. I’ll remember that next time I’m lying in bed, pissing into a plastic tube—”

  “Mom.”

  “Oh, sorry. I don’t mean to trouble you with the reality of my body functions.”

  Now he understood why they all quit.

  * * *

  “Where should I put your things, Mr. Bellamy?” asked the housekeeper.

  Mason stood glaring out the window at an impossibly serene and beautiful view of Willow Lake. Although he’d arrived late the day before, his luggage had been delayed—some mix-up at an airport between here and New Zealand.

  Now Mrs. Armentrout rolled the two large bags into the room. The suitcases wore tags marked Unattended Baggage.

  He hadn’t seen the luggage since dashing to the airport in New Zealand after getting the call about his mother’s accident. Now he realized he didn’t need the bags at all, since they were packed with winter clothes.

  “Right there is fine, thanks,” he said.

  “Would you like some help unpacking?”

  “Sure, when you can get to it.”

  “I can do that right now.”

  The housekeeper worked with brisk efficiency, hanging his bespoke suit in the antique armoire, carefully folding cashmere sweaters away in a cedar-lined drawer. She lifted a dress shirt out of the suitcase and put it on a wooden hanger, her hand moving appreciatively over the fabric.

  Philomena Armentrout actually looked more like a supermodel than a housekeeper. A native of South Africa, she was tall and slender, with creamy café au lait skin, wearing chic black slacks and a white blouse, shining dark hair and subtle makeup. Only the closest of inspections would reveal the tiny scars where the jaw wires had been surgically anchored after her husband had assaulted her. Mason had committed himself and all his resources to staffing the household with the best personnel available, and Mrs. Armentrout was definitely the best. That wasn’t the only reason Mason had hired her, though. Broken and battered, she had needed a new start in life, and Mason was taking care of her immigration process. According to Adam, she ran the place like a high-end boutique hotel, supervising every aspect of the household.

  His phone in the charging station on the desk murmured insistently, signaling another text message from Regina. She had not taken the news of his change of plans well. She’d peppered him with all the questions he’d already run throug
h with his brother and sister: Why did he need to come here in person? Couldn’t a staffer take care of hiring the new caregiver? Couldn’t Adam or Ivy change their plans and step in?

  No, they couldn’t. Both had commitments that couldn’t be broken—Adam’s training in arson investigation, Ivy’s art fellowship at the Institut de Paume. But Mason didn’t feel like getting into a big debate with Regina at the moment, and so he ignored the message.

  Last night he’d slept like a corpse in the comfortable guest room. It was so damned quiet here, and the air was sweet and the jet lag had finally caught up with him.

  “Is my mother up yet?” he asked.

  She glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. “In a bit. Lena, the morning aide, will bring her to the lounge room for coffee at nine. You can go see her in her room right away if you want.”

  He did want to see his mother. Just not...before she was ready for the day.

  One of the hardest things Alice Bellamy was having to adjust to was the loss of privacy. Needing another person to look after all her personal needs was a constant source of irritation. “I’ll wait,” he said. “The coffee is great, by the way. Thanks for sending it up.”

  “Wayan roasts his own. He gets the green coffee beans from his family in Bali. It’s got a funny name, tupac or leewalk, something like that.”

  “Luwak,” said Mason. “No wonder it’s so good. You should look this stuff up sometime. You won’t believe where it comes from.”

  “Right. That’s the stuff that comes from a civet cat’s arse or something, yes?”

  “It’s organic.”

  Like Mrs. Armentrout, the personal chef had been selected for his unique excellence as well as his urgent need to escape his dire circumstances. Wayan had been attending cruise ship school in the Philippines. The Balinese native had abruptly been cut from that program, leaving him stranded and nearly penniless in a foreign land. Mason had found him through a sponsorship program and brought Wayan—along with his wife and son—halfway around the world. The family lived above the old carriage house, now a four-car garage and workshop. His wife, Banni, served as an evening aide and personal assistant, and their son, Donno, was Alice’s driver, mechanic and general fix-it guy. Mason hadn’t met Wayan yet, but Adam sang rhapsodies about his cooking.

  Mrs. Armentrout held up a rash guard shirt. “It’s a shame you had to cut your vacation short,” she said. “I’ve heard the surfing in Malibu is the best in the world.”

  “It will keep,” he said simply.

  “And the skiing was good?” she inquired.

  “You bet.” It occurred to him to explain the trip wasn’t strictly a vacation, but a journey to fulfill his father’s last wish, followed by a work trip. He knew the explanation would make him sound less like a selfish prick who was avoiding his wounded mother.

  But it didn’t actually bother him to be regarded as a selfish prick. It just made things simpler.

  “How is she doing?” he asked Mrs. Armentrout. “She didn’t have much to say about her fall.”

  “The doctor said the collarbone will heal nicely. There was a surgery to repair it with plates and screws, and she was able to come home the very next day.”

  “I’ve spoken to the surgeon about her collarbone already. That’s not what I’m asking.”

  “She’s... It’s terribly hard, Mr. Bellamy. She is bearing up.”

  “Were you around when she fell?”

  “No one was around. You can look over the report from the EMTs.”

  “I’m sure Adam went over that with a fine-tooth comb,” Mason said.

  The mantel clock chimed nine. He felt Mrs. Armentrout watching him. He could practically hear her thoughts. She was wondering why he didn’t seem so eager to settle in. “I’ll let you finish here,” he said, wishing he could be a million miles away. “I’m going to see my mother. We’re starting the interviewing process today.”

  As he descended the wide, curving staircase, he wondered if this was where his mother had fallen in her chair. Had she called out in terror? Had she felt pain?

  He trailed his fingers over the silky walnut handrail. She couldn’t feel the texture of the wood with her fingertips. Physical sensation below the spinal cord injury was gone. Yet when he thought of the expression he’d seen on her face last night, he knew that she still felt the deepest kind of pain.

  * * *

  “Mrs. Bellamy?” Mrs. Armentrout came out on the veranda. “Your first appointment is here.”

  “Lucky him,” she said.

  “We’ll meet in there.” Mason gestured at the great room through the French doors.

  Thus began the work of finding the right individual to make life bearable for an angry, disabled woman with a major attitude problem. They met with the first group of candidates in quick succession.

  The back-to-back meetings were brief and businesslike. Mason watched his mother closely as she questioned the visitors. She gave up nothing, holding her face in a benign, neutral expression, speaking in controlled, icy tones that highlighted her crisp diction. Alice Bellamy had been educated at Harvard, and although she claimed she had spent most of her college years skiing, she’d graduated with honors. She’d had a successful career as an adventure travel specialist and guide, which had nicely complemented her husband’s job in international finance.

  Mason listened carefully to each applicant, wondering how the hell a person would go about helping someone like Alice Bellamy remake her life. Which candidate was up to the task? The military nurse built like a sumo wrestler? The motherly woman with a master’s degree in nutrition and food science? The spandex-clad personal trainer? The registered nurse with a rack Mason couldn’t stop staring at? The tough-as-nails Brooklyn woman whose last client had written a glowing three-page letter of reference?

  He was glad Brenda had provided photographs along with the résumés, because the interviewees were all starting to blend together. Each one of them had outstanding qualities. Mason was sure they’d met the right person. They just had to pinpoint which one.

  Afterward, he placed the résumés on the table and offered his mother an encouraging smile. “Brenda did a great job,” he said. “They were all excellent. Did you have a favorite?”

  She stared out the window, her face unreadable.

  He picked up the résumé on top—Chandler Darrow. “So this guy was great. He’s got an impressive list of credentials—top of his class at SUNY New Paltz, with references from grateful families for the past ten years.”

  “No,” said Alice, glaring at the photo attached to the résumé.

  “He’s perfect. Single, good personality, seemed really caring.”

  “He had shifty eyes.”

  “What?”

  “His eyes—they look shifty. You can see it in the picture.”

  “Mom—”

  “No.”

  Gritting his teeth, Mason arranged his face into a smile as he picked up the next one—Marianne Phillips, who also had flawless references, including the fact that she had worked for the Rockefeller family.

  “She smelled like garlic,” his mother said.

  “No, she didn’t.” Shit, thought Mason. This was not going well.

  “I’ve lost most of my abilities, but not my sense of smell. I can’t stand garlic. You know that.”

  “Okay, next. Darryl Smits—”

  “Don’t even bother. I can’t stand the name Darryl.”

  “I don’t even know what to say to that.”

  “I just said it—no.”

  “Casey Halberg.”

  “She was the one wearing Crocs. Who wears Crocs to an interview? They look like hooves.”

  “Jesus—”

  “I didn’t like him, either. Jesús Garza. In fact, you can cross all the men off the list
right now and save us a lot of trouble.” She paused to gaze thoughtfully at the display of family photos on the baby grand. “I’ve never had much luck with men,” she added softly.

  “What?” He had no idea what she was talking about. “Never mind,” Mason added, not wanting to get distracted. “Let’s go back over the female candidates.”

  She sighed impatiently, then glared again at the photo display. There were pictures of her parents—Mason’s grandparents—who lived in Florida. Immediately following his mother’s accident, they had worn themselves out trying to take care of her. Then her dad had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s, and Mason had stepped in. His mom’s brothers, who ran a seaplane service in Alaska, were too far away to pitch in.

  “Why is there a piano in here?” his mother demanded.

  “You’ve owned that piano all your life. You love piano music,” Mason pointed out. “Everybody in the family plays.” He’d taken lessons as a kid and used to be really good, but he hadn’t played in years. Why was that? He liked making music, but he just didn’t bother anymore.

  “Every time I look at that thing,” his mother said, “it reminds me that I used to be able to play a dozen Chopin nocturnes from memory. Now my piano is nothing but a display area for old photos.”

  “We thought you might like having someone in to play for you every once in a while.”

  “Like you?”

  Touché. “I’m pretty rusty, but I’ll try to play for you whenever I’m around, Mom.”

  “That’s just it, you’re never around.”

  “Hey, check it out,” he said, brandishing one of the résumés, “the woman named Dodie Wechsler says she plays piano and put herself through school giving lessons.”

  “She was the chatty one,” said his mother. “She talked too much.”

  “Mom, I get that you’ve lost your independence. We all wish you didn’t need a single soul to take care of you. But the reality is, you do. So we damn well better pick somebody, and soon.”