Not Death, But Love (Quill Gordon Mystery Book 3)

by Michael Wallace

  Her journal for the next couple of weeks recorded several evening phone calls from the Secret Admirer and a Saturday lunch trip to Adams with him on October 10, in which they again avoided encountering anyone they knew. The tone of the journal entries was taking on an additional urgency and tension. Gordon had reached the slightly longer entry for Friday October 16 when El came up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder, startling him.

  “Doing all right?”

  “Huh? Yeah. I’m fine.”

  “I just made a pot of tea. Earl Grey. Would you like a cup?”

  “That would be nice.”

  Gordon realized that it was pouring rain outside, the large drops bouncing sharply off the deck outside like basketballs on a fast-break dribble. He’d been so focused on the journal he noticed nothing else. El brought a large mug of tea, which he accepted and continued reading.

  Homecoming night, and nearly everyone in town is at the football game. I believe mine was the only house on the street with lights on between six and ten o’clock. SA called at six and asked if he could come over. I thought that just for tonight it would be all right. He was tense and agitated when he arrived, and finally blurted out that he loves me. It was not unexpected, and from that declaration, one thing led to another, ending in the bedroom. To be honest, it was more a relief than a pleasure. The unspoken tension that had been building between us for weeks was finally broken, and we now know where we stand. That, at least, is something, and with any luck, there is greater pleasure ahead. One thing quickly became clear, however. We cannot continue to meet at my house. We lost track of time, as people do in such situations, and he barely got back to his car before the neighbors started returning from the football game. I shall have to insist that if we are to continue meeting, we need to find another place.

  Over the next couple of weeks, they went back and forth over that issue and did not meet in person. Finally, in a way that was never explained, SA found a cabin they could use as a love nest, and on the afternoon of October 30, after school was out, they met there for the first time.

  The place is three-quarters of a mile from the state highway on a well maintained dirt road. Turning into the driveway, I looped behind some concealing shrubbery and trees, where my car would be out of sight. I arrived first, got the key from under the doormat, and let myself in. It is a small, one-bedroom cabin with a loft for children, and it was chilly. But the heating system worked very well, and once I turned it on, the place quickly became comfortable. SA arrived 20 minutes later, and we wasted little time on conversation. Like Napoleon returning to Josephine, he was not there to talk. I am not as innocent as my father would like to believe, but neither am I greatly experienced. I can’t offer a measured judgment — merely my own sense of things. And that sense is that there was a level of passion and pleasure in our coupling today that was more than I have ever known. We did talk afterwards, and the conversation was good, for whatever that’s worth. I don’t want this to end!

  The cabin was well used over the next week and a half. Veterans Day that year was on a Wednesday.

  A rare mid-week day off during the school year, and we made the most of it. The Guv picked me up shortly after 9, and we set out for Spirit Lake, 15 miles outside of Adams. I have decided to start calling him The Guv because his admiration is no longer a secret (at least to me) and, besides, it suits him well and sounds like something out of a Victorian novel. It was a clear, sunny day that was trying to be Indian summer, but the sun is so far away it couldn’t properly warm things up. Still, it was cool and pleasant, in a crisp, autumnal sort of way. As we hoped, there was no one at Spirit Lake. The Forest Service had closed the picnic area for the winter, but we parked outside and walked in with the picnic lunch The Guv picked up at the store. I am normally a light eater, but the mountain air and the setting made me ravenous, and I think he enjoyed watching me overdo it. Later, we went for a walk on the trail around the lake. The erotic tension from just holding hands became so powerful that we ended up making love standing against a tree. A Ponderosa Pine, actually, and in full view of anyone across the lake — if there had been anyone. I have never experienced anything so passionately intense and will probably remember it as I lay dying. Our feelings and desire for each other have become so strong that we are utterly unfettered by propriety, convention, or any other form of restraint. Part of me recognizes this and wants to hit the brake, but an even larger part of me is pushing the accelerator to the floor.

  Six days later, back in the cabin after school:

  After a pleasant interlude this afternoon, The Guv said we needed to talk about his wife. I had been wondering when that would happen. He said he doesn’t love her; that their marriage was a mistake; that he wants out, but doesn’t know what to do. I felt a considerable sympathy for his position, but I do hate to see a man mope, and it was clear the matter wasn’t going to be settled today. So I told him he needed to take his time and think it over and do what he feels he has to do. And I added that in the meantime, we should enjoy the moment. That, in turn, led to yet another enjoyable moment, and the rendezvous ended on a positive note. Back home, I got out Anna Karenina and tried to look up a quote. I finally found it in Part II, Chapter 7: “You and I are one to me. And I see no chance before us of peace for me or for you. I see a chance of despair or wretchedness … or I see a chance of bliss, what bliss!” Then a couple of paragraphs later, “Friends we shall never be, you know that yourself. Whether we shall be the happiest or the wretchedest of people — that’s in your hands.” Of course, Vronsky was saying those things to Anna, not the other way around, but I suppose in this affair, I’m partly Vronsky. I must force myself to concentrate on now, rather than worrying about a future I can’t control.

  Gordon had finished his cup of tea and set it down on the floor by the chair. It was still raining steadily, but the storm was beginning to wind down. He tried to remember something Peter had said when they met Charlotte London for the first and only time. Finally, it came to him:

  “It wouldn’t surprise me at all if our Miss London turned out to have a reservoir of passion inside her that makes Lake Año Nuevo look like a backyard fish pond by comparison.”

  How did Peter know? In any event, it was obvious why Charlotte hadn’t turned the journal over to Gina, who had lost her husband to another woman. Gordon himself was beginning to feel like an intruder in Charlotte’s life, but he was far enough in now that he couldn’t stop. Thanksgiving that year was Thursday November 26.

  Up early this morning and over to mother and father’s house to pitch in on Thanksgiving dinner. Very cold day, with the first snow of the season supposed to be moving in tomorrow. An uneasy holiday this year. For the first time, I would rather have been with someone else, yet that’s impossible. Mother was overbearing and difficult, as usual, but I find that as the years go by, I can let it go more easily. Most of the time, anyway. Greg’s son, Michael, is a year and a half and cute as a bug. Pam is clearly showing child number two, and they seem so happy. Because of everything else, this is the first time in a couple of months that I’ve been with father for an extended period, and he is clearly worried. This Peninsulas land deal of his is clearly taking a toll. I don’t understand business at all, but it seemed that when he started in on it, he was much more optimistic. Greg hasn’t been as involved in it as dad, but even he seems worried, though he’s so solid, it’s hard to tell. I’m sure it will all work out.

  That was almost the only reference to the project in the journal. Then it was back to talk of school and the affair, which continued in its set path. On Friday December 11, it headed for a new level.

  Our first meeting since Monday, and we seemed to be making up for lost passion. Which is not a bad thing. During a break, The Guv dropped a surprise on me. He said he has to tend to some business in San Francisco right before Christmas, and he wants me to come with him. I’d like to know how he talked his wife out of coming, but won’t worry a good thing to death. Just two weeks ago, I wa
s thinking about how I’d like to spend Christmas with him. This won’t exactly be Christmas, but it will be a special holiday occasion, of sorts. When I was in college at Berkeley, I enjoyed going to San Francisco, but always had to come home right at the beginning of Christmas season, so this will be my first chance to enjoy the city at that special time of year. We’ll be staying three nights at the Mark Hopkins, and the best part is that we’ll leave Sunday morning. That means I can watch “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” Saturday night. I have become hopelessly addicted to it.

  GREGORY LONDON LIVED on the east side of the West Peninsula in a house twice the size of his sister’s. In fact, it faced across the cove between the two peninsulas toward Charlotte’s house — or rather where it used to be. The rain was falling steadily and heavily as Peter and Gina pulled up in her blue 1990 Camry.

  London answered the door himself. He was 58 (three years younger than Charlotte), but looked almost 70, with bags under his eyes, sagging jowls, and thinning hair that aligned itself in such a way it would always give the impression he had just gotten out of bed in the morning. He had the resigned look of a man who had endured, rather than embraced, his life. He showed Gina and Peter to a couch in a living room that opened onto a deck with a sweeping panorama east to the cove and rising sun, and south to the lake itself. Gina introduced Peter as a representative of Charlotte’s literary executor, which drew a frown and puzzled look.

  “Literary executor?” he snorted. “What’s that?”

  “A literary executor,” Gina said brightly, “is a person who assumes the stewardship of someone’s writings and literary output after their death. Because she was working on a family history, she appointed a man from San Francisco to carry on if something happened to her before she finished.”

  He took a few seconds to digest this.

  “Sounds like Charlotte,” he finally said. “Hope she’s paying him for it. Can’t imagine anyone would be interested in that book of hers.”

  “I gather books were very important in her life,” Peter said gently.

  “Oh, sure. Ever since I can remember, she always had her nose in a book. Made it hard to follow her in school. I guess it was only a matter of time till she tried to write one herself.”

  “Did she ever talk to you about it?” asked Gina.

  “All the time. I tried not to listen too hard. I’m more interested in now than then.”

  “A common sentiment,” said Peter. “My friend was wondering — and there’s no urgency or pressure about this — if you have any family documents in your possession that might help in completing the family history.”

  “Nah. Gave all that to Charlotte two years ago. Good riddance. Saved me the trouble of burning it.”

  “All right. That was easy. We also were wondering what you remember about the development of The Peninsulas and the controversy that surrounded it. Do you think you might be willing to talk to my friend later, if he needs more information for the book?”

  “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to talk to him, but I’m not sure what I could say. Dad really did most of that. I helped by running the office so he could work on his project, and since I was doing the work both of us used to do together, I was pretty busy. Sometimes I’d go with him to one of his meetings with the Paris family, but I didn’t understand half of what they were talking about.”

  “We’ll keep that in mind. Just one more question, then. Do you remember anything about how your father felt about it? Did he say anything that sticks in your mind?”

  Gregory London digested the question slowly.

  “No one thing that I can recall. What I do remember is that in the last month before it was approved, he was worried. More worried than I’ve ever seen him. He had a lot riding on it, I guess, but it somehow seemed more than that.” He paused. “It’s always bothered me to think he died worried and never lived to see that it turned out OK.”

  “You’ve been very helpful, Greg,” said Gina. “Could I ask you a thing or two about Charlotte. You’ve mentioned she always had her nose in a book when she was young and that she did well in school. Is there anything else you remember about her when you were growing up?”

  “No.”

  “Did she have boyfriends when she was in high school?”

  “No.”

  “Come on,” said Peter, his irritation barely suppressed. “She must have gone to the senior prom.”

  “I don’t remember if she did or didn’t, but if she did, whoever took her never came back. She was so smart she scared most of the boys around here. There may have been someone when she was in college, but I’m sure she never had a boyfriend when she was living in this town. It wouldn’t surprise me if she died a virgin.”

  Gina and Peter agreed with a glance that the interview was over. To be polite, however, she and Gregory traded reminiscences of Charlotte for another five minutes, but Gina had to do most of the work.

  Outside, the rain had eased to a drizzle, and the crackles of thunder had become less frequent and more distant. They got into her car and sat quietly for a minute.

  “Well,” she said, “in the books and TV shows, the police are always saying they have to eliminate possibilities. I think we’ve eliminated this one. He’s known her longer than anyone else and he seems to know nothing.”

  “It’s worse than that,” said Peter. “He knows things for a fact that just aren’t so. You’d think siblings who grew up together would know each other better than anyone else, and sometimes that’s the case. But a lot of times they form a first impression, then try to make everything else conform to that impression, so they know less and less as time goes by.”

  “All right. What do you think he knows that’s wrong.”

  “For starters, he thinks his sister died a virgin. I’d bet anything she didn’t. I only met Charlotte London that one time, but even on short acquaintance, she struck me as a woman who had a feeling for life. It’s almost impossible to acquire that feeling unless you’ve been deeply in love and intensely sexually involved at least once.”

  After a pause, Gina said, “That’s very perceptive, Peter. I suppose I’ve kind of thought the same thing, but I never articulated it that well.”

  She started the engine.

  “Back to Stanhope House?”

  “Actually,” he said, “It’s almost five o’clock. Are you hungry yet?”

  “Famished. I skipped lunch today.”

  “Well, I’ve been trying to get to Ike’s Lakeside since we got here. Would you like to have dinner?”

  “I’d like that very much,” she said.

  CHARLOTTE AND HER LOVER drove to San Francisco Sunday December 20, 1970, and returned on Wednesday December 23. Their getaway was described in two long passages in the journal. The first, dated Monday December 21, was most likely written late that afternoon, before dinner.

  Have been out all day taking in the spectacle of The City at Christmas. A cool, breezy, overcast day with showers from time to time, and nearly everyone on the street with a raincoat and umbrella. The crowds and bustle here bring Arthur into relief as the sleepy little town it is. The Guv has been tending to business (or so he says), and I had the day and the city to myself. It was like being a child in the toy store. In this morning’s San Francisco Chronicle, there was an ad that Ransohoff’s was having a sale on shoes (Regular, $18-55; sale prices, $12.90 to $28.90). I was there when the doors opened at 10, and bought a sturdy but stylish pair of pumps for work for $19.90. From there, I strolled to City of Paris, where I bought nothing, but goggled, like everyone else, at the enormous Christmas tree, several stories high, in the rotunda. Dipping in and out of stores, I found myself unable to resist an apricot-colored scarf at Gump’s. I’m being extravagant, I know, but I have been living frugally and exercising thrift in all matters for years, so I tell myself I’m allowed a little indulgence. Just this once. At noon, I noticed there was a choir gathered outside First Western Bank at Bush and Montgomery, and stopped to listen as they sang Christmas caro
ls. They were from one of the local churches, sang with ethereal beauty, and didn’t miss a note, even when a sudden downpour caught them, unsheltered. I was hoping they would sing “O Come, All Ye Faithful,” which is my favorite, and they concluded with it. Funny I should like that song so much. I am not particularly devout. Really, I am the epitome of a modern churchgoer. I feel the need to acknowledge that there’s something bigger than I am, even if I don’t know what it is; I get comfort from the fellowship of the spirit; and I don’t in the least feel I have to believe everything Father Michael says. I can easily imagine what he would say about my love affair, but I would like to believe that a just and loving God, who made this world such a trial at times, would be understanding and forgiving about human passion and frailty.

  I enjoyed a cup of tea and a sandwich at some small café near Union Square. Everyone around me was talking about how the San Francisco football team won yesterday and is going to the playoffs. Big city or no, it was like one of our local cafes the morning after the high school team played. Afterward, I hailed a taxi to the Opera House. I had seen in the Chronicle that the San Francisco Ballet would be doing a matinee of The Nutcracker tomorrow afternoon and was hoping there might still be seats available. As fate would have it, someone had just returned two orchestra tickets, and I unhesitatingly bought them. (The extravagances are piling up!) I’m not so sure ballet is The Guv’s cup of tea, but how he reacts to my plans for us should provide an added measure of the man. Returning downtown, I stopped at Roos/Atkins and bought him a tie for Christmas — navy with thin stripes of gray and light green. If his wife asks, he can say he got it himself, but when he wears it, he will think of me. Then, the cable car back to the hotel and a little quiet time before dinner.