He turned away, striding to a bank of filing cabinets tucked in an alcove. Pulling a key from his pocket, he unlocked the top drawer and lifted out files, one after another, then swung around, his arms full, his face triumphant. “Henrie O, I haven’t forgotten how you work. I’ve got it all here for you. Everything that can be found out about each and every one of them.”
I stared at the green folders.
That they were full of information I didn’t doubt.
But it was information I hadn’t gathered.
I am always suspicious of facts gathered by anyone other than myself.
I learned that distrust in the real world. Words are, quite simply, weapons. How a person or an act or a thought looks depends entirely upon how—and by whom—it is described.
As an example, think for a moment about a presidential press conference. Do you describe the president as thoughtful or worried, as voluble or chatty, as combative or defensive, as vigorous or hyper? Think about it.
So I took the folders in my arms with considerable concern. Besides, I well knew that Chase had no scruples. He had proved that to me many years ago. So I had no way of knowing what slant he’d taken or, as it’s put today, what kind of spin he’d applied. Still, some information was better than none….
And I wouldn’t forget the source.
But I was still unhappy.
“That’s not the only problem, Chase. So I have records and people to talk to—but what makes you think they’ll talk to me? Why should they?”
He leaned against the mantel, once again the lord of the manor. His armor was in place. There was no hint of the troubled, fearful man who had looked at me moments earlier with pain-filled eyes. “You’re with me. I knew I could count on you. And it’s going to be easy, Henrie O. Here’s what we’re going to do….”
As I closed the study door behind me, I still had plenty of misgivings, but I knew Chase was determined. I knew, too, what that meant. No matter how dangerous and ill-considered I might see this venture, my choices were simple: I was either with him or against him.
Once, years ago, I was on a runaway horse. Even now I can hear the thud of hooves, smell the horse’s panicked sweat, feel the tremble of his muscles between my legs. I had no control and yet I was a part of a blurring, headlong race through time and space.
I was feeling the same way when I regained my room. I put the folders in the top dresser drawer, pushing aside my lingerie. There was a folder for every person on the island, including Chase and me. Our inclusion interested me. I well knew how wily his mind was. What did he want me to learn from his folder, and what indeed from my own? But I wasn’t going to read them now. Instead, I placed my purse on the desk and left. We were to gather for drinks at seven. It was a few minutes short of six. I wanted to take a preliminary survey of my surroundings. I felt an imperative need to flesh out my picture of this unique island.
I have a friend who is always sharing moments from her past lives. My standard response is always “So what?” I mean, so she was a discarded mistress of Louis XIV or a pioneer wife who died of a rattlesnake bite on the way to Idaho, what does that have to do with the price of computer disks today? Especially since she presently faces neither a rival for a king’s love nor snake-infested environs.
So I can reasonably attribute my customary restlessness until I have checked out my surroundings to an early enchantment with The Last of the Mohicans. But could I have once been a scout for a wagon train? Or long ago a shepherd tending an unruly flock? If so, no doubt next time I’m almost certain to return as a bloodhound. I believe in consistency.
In any event, I indulged my itch to look around.
I stepped out on my balcony, which overlooked the front of the house and the sweep of the rosebeds and the sound.
It was like stepping into a sauna.
Instantly I felt the press of the hot moist air against me. The sky had a copper-yellow glaze, and the air was sticky and still. The breeze I’d enjoyed as I crossed to the island in Frank Hudson’s boat had died away. Not a breath stirred the leaves of the magnolias and the live oaks or the fronds of the palmetto palms.
The tall slender cypress were like black cutouts against the glassy sky, making them even more ominous than usual. I’ve always found cypress to be cheerless trees. They remind me of the tombs along the Appian Way and the dust-choked heat of Rome.
As I surveyed the gardens, the luminaria-style lanterns around the pool came on and, faintly, I heard the strains of Hawaiian music, the splashing of water, and laughter. I was tempted to go for a quick swim before dinner. There was still time, and it would be enormously refreshing.
But that itch had to be satisfied.
Once out in the hallway I saw closed doors on either side. I wanted to know who was staying where. In fact, I wanted a plan of the house. So I set out to make one.
There were eight guest bedrooms on the second floor, four in each wing. The central portion of the second floor contained Chase’s study, a library, a music room, and a billiard room. On the ground floor the central portion held the dining room—with an elegant three-pedestal mahogany table accompanied by a set of fourteen Sheraton chairs—and the living room, where we’d had tea. The back portion of the ground floor was given over to the kitchen and a laundry. The kitchen was humming with activity. Rosalia, Chase’s housekeeper, was tall and slender. Too slender. She nodded shyly and didn’t look in the least surprised when I unexpectedly invaded her territory. Her face had a grave, deep sadness. I wondered what her story was. Most people have stories, especially those with unsmiling mouths. I found the maid setting the table for dinner. Betty’s black and white uniform was too right, and she looked haggard. Briskly she asked if she could help me, but I felt almost certain I caught a flash of fear in her weary eyes and I filed that away for future investigation. Enrique was selecting the wines for dinner. Chase’s valet was carefully polite when I spoke to him. I began to think the servants might have a much clearer idea of why I was a guest than anyone I’d met at tea. But why should they care? I persisted with my questions to Enrique until I had a good idea of the layout of the house. I learned that Chase and Miranda occupied all of the north wing’s ground floor. Their quarters overlooked—but at a nice distance—the swimming pool, he said. The south wing on the ground floor contained a movie theater and a small art gallery.
I took time to visit the gallery and was impressed by the collection of American pastoral art.
But the house was only a part of my quest. I stepped out onto the front porch. Struck once again by the furnace-hot heat, I walked slowly through the fragrant gardens to the pier. Just past the boathouse I came upon a lone figure, leaning on the railing, staring out at the sound. He didn’t turn at the sound of my footsteps.
I came up beside him. He was certainly a spectacularly handsome young man despite the perpetual scowl on his face.
“Where would you rather be, Haskell? Out on the water?”
That caught his attention. Chase’s stepson turned toward me. No mid-century matinee idol had ever looked better. With his thick chestnut hair, deep-set eyes with long dark lashes, smooth olive skin, firm chin, and sensual lips, he surely cut a wide swath among the ladies.
His look was half-surprised, half-skeptical. “How did you know?”
“There’s something about a man who loves water.” I looked beyond him, out to the sound, remembering languid seas I’d shared with Richard. It’s easy to tell when a man loves the sea. There’s something about the lift of their heads when they look out on the water, something about the way they stand. “And,” I added more prosaically, “you have a tan that you’ve acquired over a period of years and you’re wearing boaters.”
He glanced down at his shoes. A faint smile tugged at those sensual lips.
“You spend a lot of time on the water.”
That brought back his scowl. “Except when I’m at the fucking office.” His dark eyes slid toward me. “Sorry,” he said stiffly.
I felt a wrench of my heart at his youth. It has been a good many years since anyone apologized to me about language.
“If you don’t like the office, why do you go?” I leaned against the railing, listening to the water sucking at the pilings beneath us.
“Because he makes me.” His anger toward Chase crackled through his voice. “What business is it of his? It’s my money. It should be my money. Why did my mom put him in charge? Everything I do, he has to approve. He wouldn’t let me have a penny if I didn’t do things his way. And I’m running out of time.”
Time. Haskell couldn’t be a day over twenty-five. If that. Old? Ah, the perspective of youth. I kept my amusement out of my reply. “Too old? Too old for what?”
His dark eyes flashed. “To race.”
I understood. “Powerboat?”
The transformation of his face told it all. The sullenness and resentment were gone. His eyes glowed, like those of a big cat. He was fully alive, eager, excited.
I looked at him intently now, with no amusement and with sharp interest. Speed is an addiction. Racing takes exquisite timing and a certain kind of madness—and blindness to the consequences.
“Chase won’t let you race?” Why should Chase care?
Haskell turned back to stare out at the sound, his face once again heavy with anger. “He says weekend racing’s good enough. He won’t let me have the money to buy a superboat. If I had that kind of boat, I could go on the circuit.” Eyes brilliant with anger turned on me. “I could win the Gold Cup. I know I could.”
I said nothing.
“I could.” It was almost a shout. Then he turned and walked swiftly away.
I looked after him. Watched him stride, handsome head down, hands jammed in his pockets, through the lush gardens and into the big house.
I pushed away from the railing and began to walk back toward shore. I would have to talk to Chase about Haskell. There is nothing so dangerous as thwarting dreams.
Faintly I heard the cheery plink of music wafting from the pool. It was nice to return to lighthearted-ness. And I had, from this vantage point on the pier, the spectacular view I’d sought of the house and its gardens. Lights glowed in almost every window. I reached the steps, hurried down to the oyster-shell path, and headed for the pool. The luminarias still shone brightly and the saccharine music played on, but the pool was deserted now-. Probably the swimmers had gone to bathe and change for dinner. The pale green water reflected the spill of lights. There were a dozen or so white-webbed deck chairs and lounges. Thick white towels were crumpled on several. Stepping-stones led to the cabana. A nearby wooden hot tub was convenient both to the pool and to Chase and Miranda’s lanai.
I followed another oyster-shell path, this one heading due south, passed the front of the house, and reached a wide shell path that marked the perimeter of the cultivated property. I turned east. The shells crunched underfoot, and I smelled the winy scent of the motionless cypress sentinels always on my right.
Two big buildings sat about a hundred yards behind the main house, both thickly screened by pittosporum bushes. I guessed that the two-story stucco provided quarters for the servants. The square, single-story, cement-block building with two overhead garage-style doors had to be the storage facility. I tried a side door. It wasn’t locked. But, on an island with controlled access, why would it be? I stepped inside and heard the hum of a generator. The air was scented with gasoline. Of course, here was the supply of electricity for the island. I flipped a switch. Bright overhead lights beamed down on a collection of lawn and garden machinery: a tractor, a riding lawn mower, edgers, blowers. There were several rooms: one a walk-in freezer, another stocked with lawn and garden supplies, another a mini-warehouse for foodstuffs. All were superbly supplied and meticulously clean.
I came back out into the twilight. Behind the storage building I found a neat landfill and an incinerator. A wisp of smoke curled out of the incinerator chimney. A luxuriant herb garden flourished between the storage building and the servants’ quarters. The pittosporum and banana shrubs provided a lovely and aromatic screen between the service buildings and the main house. A wedge of pines separated the service buildings from two clay tennis courts. These, too, remained private, with a grove of weeping willows between the courts and a small cinder jogging track. Everything had been carefully designed so that it was possible to enjoy any aspect of the island in almost total seclusion.
Chase’s vacation retreat had all the appurtenances of the most elegant spa. But the springy grass and sandy soil couldn’t be disguised and, once I passed the cypress border, I faced the harsh reality of Dead Man’s Island: waxy-leaved live oaks, crackling-frond palmettos, prickly slash pines; sea myrtle, yucca and bayberry, yaupon, winged sumac, and Hercules’-club; cinnamon ferns, ebony spleenwort, and resurrection ferns; cordgrass, sea oxeye daisy, and cattails.
There was only one break in that exuberant fecundity, another oyster-shell track plunging into the untamed maritime forest. I took only a few steps, then knew this exploration would have to wait for daylight. Beneath the canopy of trees, it was already dark, a darkness that had never known electric lights. Leaves rustled, something seemed to slip beneath the bushes. I smelled rotting plants, pine resin, dank water, insecticides. Despite the latter, the whine of insects rose above the crackling of twigs.
I swatted a mosquito and turned to go, then stopped short and looked into the wary, intelligent eyes of a crouching raccoon. The masked face appeared amused, but I knew that was only an anthropomorphic reaction on my part.
But I carried with me a memory of that sleek, sardonic, uncaring face as I retraced my steps. I used the entrance, also unlocked, at the end of the south wing and ran lightly up the stairs to the second floor. I had satisfied the itch but only supplanted it with a different, less easily assuaged discomfort.
As I stepped into my pink room, I was trying to dispel the sense of alienation and menace my walk had given me. I was so preoccupied that I almost passed by the desk without noticing.
I suppose if I hadn’t been in so many hundreds of strange rooms in past years, sometimes in countries where the press is often perceived as an enemy, I might not have noticed. But I have been in those rooms … and I did notice.
My purse, which I had through habit aligned so exactly, was not where I had left it. Oh, it was only a matter of less than an inch. But purses do not move themselves, no matter how infinitesimal the distance.
Someone—either careless or hurried—had picked it up and, no doubt, rifled through it.
I did so myself. Nothing was gone.
I checked the dresser. The files were there. They were not in the same order.
Ah, that was careless.
Or, assuming a clever adversary, it might have been quite deliberate.
The overall effect was the same. I wasn’t afraid. But I was damned alert. The equation had changed. Someone was much too interested in me. But there was nothing in this room or among my things to reveal the truth about me. Thank God.
Dinner was exquisite: beef tournedos, asparagus and carrots, fresh raspberries for dessert, California Chardonnay. The service was flawless. Enrique moved on cat feet, always at the right place at the right time. The surroundings couldn’t have been more charming. Not even the Waterford crystal could match the glisten of the parquet de Versailles floors. But the conversations were tense and unilluminating. Roger Prescott provided the only flash of vigor toward the meal’s end when he passionately, despite Chase’s grim disapproval, persisted in debating his father about the tragedy of the homeless.
“You know why they’re out there, thousands of them—it’s because government stopped funding mental hospitals. We the people magnanimously gave the mentally ill their freedom. Jesus, how great to be free to walk the streets, frightened and helpless with no place to go and nobody to give a damn. Jesus, that was generous, wasn’t it?” Roger downed his second glass of wine, all in one gulp. “We’re not talking about bums, Dad. We’re talking about people
who are too sick to work. And the ones who are on the streets because of alcohol and drug problems, they’re sick, too, but society doesn’t want to treat them. And now we have the New Poor, the people who used to have jobs, good solid members of the middle class who have been discarded by a business system trying to recover from the ravages of Reaganomics. Everywhere you turn government’s cutting services, less money for drug treatment, less money for the mentally ill. Is it any wonder crime increases? Why don’t you cover that story?”
Chase glared at his son. “If you want a soapbox, Roger, earn it. Prescott Communications covers what I want covered because it belongs to me. It’s as simple as that. I earned my way in this world. That’s the American way. Take the proceeds from your latest book and buy yourself a newspaper.”
Roger’s plump cheeks flamed.
I wondered if his book had been self-published. Or was the dig merely that it hadn’t made money?
Lyle Stedman broke in. “We do cover the homeless issue, Roger. From all sides. Including the truth that people can’t expect jobs if they have no skills and if they aren’t willing to learn any. And if you’ve studied any history, you know Johnson’s Great Society didn’t work. So don’t come at us with a lot of re-treaded ideas.” The newspaperman’s eyes were cold and bored.
“That’s half an answer,” Roger retorted angrily. “Of course it didn’t work. Because all the money went into that stupid war. As for your coverage, it sucks. You carry wire news. That’s only the tip of the iceberg. You’re great on murders and society rape and business, oh, God, yes, let’s cover business. But business isn’t so much fun anymore, is it? IBM’s laying off. GM’s laying off. You pick up the paper, and it’s a new giant scrapping people and lives every day.”
A frown furrowed Valerie St. Vincent’s perfect face. The actress had chosen a rich floral silk chemise. “Even in times of economic woe, people must have art. All it will take to revive Broadway is one good show, one really good show. Chase, darling, after dinner, we must have a moment, just the two of us, to talk about the future. You’ve always been willing to gamble. I knew when you asked me to come here this weekend that something wonderful was going to happen.” She lifted her head. Her upswept platinum hair glistened.
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