by Jean Stone
Lester had opened the bottle and they shared the contents, and over by the file cabinet he kissed her and ran his hands over her breasts that he said were so big they must be juicy, ripe melons. She wanted more and told him so, but he turned red in the face and said he had to leave. He never spoke about it and for a long time she’d been convinced there’d been something wrong with her breasts, that he’d felt something foreign or weird or repulsive and that scared him off. She’d stood many nights in front of her mirror touching herself, trying to detect the unpleasantness he’d found, but they felt all right to her.
“Can we talk about him in something other than the past tense?” she asked. “I mean, we don’t know that he’s dead.”
Even Mary Beth grew quiet at that.
“Oh,” Sam said softly, “I doubt that he’s dead.”
“The son of a bitch is living the high life with our cash,” Mary Beth said. “Probably in Rio or some European hideaway.” She stood up and went to the fireplace, where she tapped her wineglass against the mantel. “This is getting us nowhere. I need my money back. And I need it fast.”
“I’m not sure that’s going to happen,” Sam replied. “At least, I doubt it will happen fast. Chances are, he’s covered his tracks.”
Carla dropped her chin. “You make him sound like a criminal.”
“Excuse me, my dear, but that is what he is.” Mary Beth wasn’t shouting, but her voice was not pleasant. She turned back to Sam. “Look, why don’t you start by going back to New York? Maybe you can trace his last steps or something.”
“I have a friend who’s already done it. Markham’s office is clean; in fact, a new tenant has moved in.”
An ache clawed its way into Carla’s heart. Someone had already moved into her office? Her and Lester’s office?
“His town house is empty; it’s not up for sale. It has a huge mortgage. Chances are, he’ll let it go to the bank.”
Mary Beth swirled the wine around in her glass. “You’ve been busy,” she said with what sounded almost like respect.
“It’s my job,” he replied.
They were quiet a moment, then Mary Beth sat back down. Sam’s presence, perhaps, had a calming effect.
“It’s so hard to believe,” Mary Beth said. “Aside from the upset about losing the money, it’s so hard to believe someone would do such a thing. We all trusted Lester. Hell, my aunt Margaret trusted him, and she didn’t like anyone.”
“That’s exactly what your cousin told me this afternoon,” Sam said.
Mary Beth looked up. “Nikki said that? That Margaret trusted him?”
Sam frowned. “No, not Nikki. Your other cousin said it. Your cousin Gabrielle.”
Though Mary Beth was holding the wineglass by its stem, the glass tipped to the side, its contents slowly dribbling onto the floor. “Gabrielle?” she asked. “You talked to Gabrielle?”
“Sure,” he said. “I have to talk to all of you.”
“But where—how—did you find Gabrielle?”
He shrugged and nodded his head toward the door. “She’s over at the lighthouse. She’s staying with Nikki.”
Carla noticed the shock on Mary Beth’s face: She had not mentioned that she’d visited Gabrielle in Italy. Carla, after all, was Lester’s trustworthy servant even to the end, if this was the end.
It was one o’clock in the morning, Tuscany time, but Gabrielle had not been able to stand another minute of not talking to Rosa. She no longer cared if Angelina answered; she could not have her daughter worried that her mother might have left her.
So she called the phone number of the villa, her home. As the ringing began on the other end of the line, Gabrielle realized that, despite her determination, she was holding her breath. After three rings, the telephone picked up. But it was not a woman who answered; it was the damn machine.
The answering machine?
At one o’clock in the morning?
There was a phone by the bed. Surely Stefano had heard it. Unless he wasn’t there. Unless …
She let out her breath to make room for the pain of the unknown.
“Stefano?” she called out. “Rosa? Honey, it’s Mama.” But there was only the beep, then silence.
She was still clutching the receiver when the banging started on the door.
“Gabrielle!” a voice shouted. “Open the door, I know you’re in there!”
It was Mary Beth. Ready or not.
She looked older than Nikki, despite the blond hair, despite the perfect makeup and the manicured fingernails. She looked older than Nikki because of the lines at her mouth and her eyes and across her forehead—not deep lines of age, but scratches of intensity, small creases of angst.
“It’s you,” Mary Beth said. “My God, you look just like your mother.”
Mary Beth did not look like Aunt Dorothy, because she did not look as happy as Aunt Dorothy always had.
“That’s what Nikki said,” Gabrielle replied. She waited for a hug that did not come. Instead Mary Beth swept past her and entered the lighthouse.
“I hope she also told you we’re keeping this quiet. About the trust funds, I mean. That no one is to know.”
Gabrielle laughed, grateful that Nikki had prepared her for her other cousin’s demeanor. “Mary Beth,” she said, “is that all you can say? Gosh, I haven’t seen you in twenty-seven years.”
Mary Beth stopped and turned. “I … I’m sorry. But this is such a shock. I had no idea you were here.… How would I know? No one tells me anything.”
It took a moment for Gabrielle to notice that Mary Beth was shaking. Then she saw big tears form in her eyes and a small quiver start on her lower lip.
“Oh, Mary Beth,” Gabrielle said and went to her cousin and put her arms around her and hugged her until the older woman let go and cried.
“I can’t believe it,” Mary Beth said. “I never wanted to let myself think of you. All these years …”
“I know, I know,” Gabrielle said, though she didn’t really know, but was slowly beginning to understand. Margaret Atkinson had wielded so much control over the family that her word and her wishes had never been challenged, and the reasons she’d wanted Gabrielle gone had not been questioned because she had not allowed it. “We’ll get through this,” Gabrielle said. “We’re together again.” But as she said the words, she was not thinking of Nikki and Mary Beth, but of Stefano and of Rosa and when—if—she’d be with them again.
16
For once it was a blessing that Mary Beth was so self-centered.
When Nikki and Mack finally parted ways—he to his red truck, she to her VW—she headed back to the estate. He had decided to go to the 1802 Tavern in Edgartown. The tavern was owned by his friend Ben Niles’s wife, Jill, and had an apartment with a spare bed upstairs that was often used by friends with no explanation needed. Mack hoped he could stay there as long as Gabrielle was on the island.
Nikki hadn’t agreed it would be for the best, but knew enough to let Mack be Mack. But when she opened the door to the lighthouse and saw Gabrielle sitting with Mary Beth, her heart seemed to make its way to her throat.
“Mary Beth,” she said as if she hadn’t expected her, as if her cousin didn’t own the property on which they stood and sat, and hadn’t said only yesterday that she’d be there today.
“You didn’t tell me,” Mary Beth accused, “that Gabrielle was here.”
Nikki leaned against the wall. She could not tell by the look on Gabrielle’s face if Mary Beth had revealed that Mack lived there. Thank God they’d always been discreet, living in separate quarters though often secretly sharing the same bed at night.
“I wanted to surprise you,” Nikki said now, pulling her gaze from Gabrielle, wishing she knew her young cousin better so she could have read in her eyes whether or not she knew that her father lived there.
“Surprise me or give me heart failure?” Mary Beth stood up. “Well, as long as we’re here we might as well have dinner together. I’ve got that Carla w
oman back at the house, so let’s all make nice and not unearth too many family skeletons.” She said it in jest, but Nikki half-smiled. Skeletons, apparently, were an Atkinson specialty.
“I’ll walk you to the house,” Nikki said and quickly led Mary Beth out.
When she shut the door behind them, Nikki put her hand firmly on Mary Beth’s arm. “Look, Mary Beth, I don’t care what you say or do or do not say or do about this whole mess with Lester. But you are not, absolutely not, to tell Gabrielle that Mack lives here. At some point I might, but only if I think she’s ready. In the meantime, Mack is staying in town. That’s how it will be, do I make myself clear?”
Mary Beth looked at her blankly. “To be honest with you, Nicole, I’m a bit preoccupied with more important matters, like a wedding in less than two weeks, and a seventy-eight-thousand-dollar bill I must pay my caterer in the next few days. The thought of Mack Olson, quite frankly, had not crossed my mind.”
Nikki would have kissed her, but Atkinsons did not do that sort of thing.
* * *
Dinner was a noisy, female affair with the three cousins, Carla, and Nikki’s assistant, Alice. They ate lobster and fried clams and the catch of the day at the Oceanside Restaurant in downtown Oak Bluffs, and mostly they listened to Mary Beth, who recited every detail of the impending wedding including much of the impressive guest list. Every so often she looked at Gabrielle and said, “I can’t believe you’re really here.”
But she was really there, though she missed being on the hillside in Tuscany, wrapped in Stefano’s strong arms, the soft sounds of Rosa asleep in the next room.
In between Mary Beth’s banter, Nikki announced that all those years they’d thought Gabrielle had been with Mack she had been alone.
“Except for visits from your mother,” Gabrielle said to Mary Beth, who seemed quite stunned.
“You absolutely must stay for the wedding,” was all she could reply.
But Gabrielle merely smiled and said she didn’t think so, thanks anyway. She glanced at her watch several times and wondered how much longer they would be, so she could get back to the lighthouse and call home again.
When the check arrived, Mary Beth picked it up and paid it with her American Express. As she signed the slip with a flourish she said to Gabrielle, “There’s no need for you to stay in that musty old lighthouse. Surely you’d like your old room at the big house.”
Gabrielle did not look over at Nikki. “Thanks, Mary Beth, but I’m fine where I am. Besides, I’ll probably leave in a couple of days.”
“You just got here.”
“My family will miss me.” She didn’t add that they couldn’t be missing her too badly if they weren’t even at home.
“But we’re your family, too. And we’ve been missing you for years.”
It was the nicest thing she’d heard Mary Beth say, the closest thing to heartfelt from a woman whose emotions were locked down—something Gabrielle recognized, because she had learned how to do it, and she’d done it well.
“Well, let’s go,” Mary Beth announced now and stood up. “I have a busy day tomorrow. One week from Saturday will be here before anyone can say ‘sterling silver bubble wands from Tiffany’s.’ ”
Gabrielle looked at Nikki, and Nikki looked at Alice, and Alice looked at Carla, who fell into step behind Mary Beth as she marched out the door.
Gabrielle said good night, then waited in her room until six in the morning, Tuscany time. She crept back downstairs and dialed the villa, but again heard only her own voice-recorded message on the answering machine. This time, she left the phone numbers of both the lighthouse and the camp; tomorrow she would do something to help Nikki, something to distract herself from worrying where Stefano and Rosa were, and if they were all right. As much as she’d like to board the next flight to Italy, Gabrielle sensed that she wasn’t ready yet, that her past hadn’t yet passed.
In the morning, Camp4Kids was buzzing. As Nikki pulled into the driveway, they were greeted with the welcoming sounds of a boisterous softball game on the makeshift playing field and the heartening laughter of belly flops echoing up from the pond. Gabrielle decided that whoever coined the phrase “bursting with joy” must have been near children and their gleeful innocence.
Children, she thought. Rosa.
She stuffed down her homesick feelings and followed Nikki into the registration cottage, which was a hubbub of activity. Alice was already hard at work rearranging furniture with the help of a volunteer, and Sam was installing a computer at a makeshift desk.
“A computer?” Gabrielle asked above the scrape of wooden desks across the wooden floor. “There goes our budget.”
Sam laughed. “It came from the mainland,” he said. “Complete with a law enforcement program to help us people-search the Web. We may need to weed through a few hundred thousand names, but one way or another, we’ll find the S.O.B.”
Gabrielle knew little about computers, though lately Stefano had said they should get a Web page. Stefano, she thought, his name close to her lips. Stop thinking about him. He will call soon.
“Actually,” Sam said, “I was hoping Carla would be with you. If she worked for Lester she’s probably familiar with a computer. I thought she might like to help me out.”
“Give her a call at the estate,” Nikki suggested.
“I tried. No answer. Do you know if there’s a separate phone number for the caretaker’s cottage?”
The caretaker’s cottage? Gabrielle was surprised. She didn’t know there still was a caretaker at the estate; she hadn’t seen one since she’d arrived. She vaguely remembered the old man who’d lived in the cottage when she was a kid. But her memory of him was fuzzy, as it was about most of those early years.
Nikki jostled everyone and moved to the computer. “I’ll find Carla, don’t worry,” she said. “Now tell me about this computer. You didn’t break the law to get it, did you?”
Sam poked at one key, then another, then fiddled with the power cord. “It was a gift. We have a new system at the station. The captain offered this relic.”
“You didn’t tell him—” Nikki began, but Sam held up a hand.
“Not to worry. I only asked if I could use it off-premises.”
“And he agreed?” Gabrielle interjected. “On top of giving you time off?”
Sam flipped a switch and, at last, the screen lit up with life. “All the guys have been good to me. My wife and I waited a long time to have Molly … and then there was the accident … and now …” His steady voice cracked a little and he lowered his head. “I know many women don’t believe it anymore, but there are a few good men left out there in the world. Guys who care about other people.”
Nikki crouched down, put her arm around his wide shoulders, and gave him a hug. “You’re one of them, Sam. And I, for one, feel lucky that we can now help one another.”
“Yeah,” he said, and Gabrielle was so moved she thought she’d cry again. Molly, she thought, Sam’s sweet, tiny girl, the same age as Rosa, too young to have such pain, too young to have to think about death.
“I’ll be on the porch,” Gabrielle said and quietly slipped outside so she could be alone, so she could breathe.
After lunch, the kids had their quiet time, “nap” being too childish a word to use on anyone over two, especially for the Camp4Kids kids, who were reminded too often of the differences between themselves and other kids their ages.
Gabrielle went down to the pond, where she skimmed the water’s surface with a cattail, counted her blessings, and hated herself that she took them for granted. Then, she went looking for Molly, who, on top of her illness, had lost her mother at too young an age. Gabrielle did not know what it was like to be sick, but she knew that empty, aching, motherless hole that could not be filled with friends or fun or even with family. When a child lost a mother, there was no Band-Aid. She knew it, because at age thirty-four, she sometimes felt it still.
Molly was stretched out on a towel on the porch of her cot
tage, wearing pink socks and sneakers, a pink ruffled shirt, and jeans. Gabrielle wondered if Sam picked out her clothes and if Molly told him what she wanted. As Gabrielle drew closer, she saw that Molly was intent on a picture of Barbie in a Mardi Gras costume. She was coloring the costume pink.
“What a beautiful picture,” Gabrielle said and sat down next to Molly. “I used to have Barbie. She was my favorite.” She did not say she’d had not one, but twelve or fourteen and all the clothes on the market at that time and the accessories, too.
Molly didn’t reply.
“Are those feathers on her dress? And is that a mask?”
Molly sat up and pulled back the red curls from her forehead. “She’s going to a ball,” the little girl said. “In Norlens.”
She said “New Orleans” as if someone had taught her, someone with a Louisiana accent who talked Bourbon Street jive. Gabrielle bit her lip to keep from smiling. Molly was so charming, a precocious child of a man with a heart. She wondered if the little girl would be a handful when she got older, and if Sam Oliver would be prepared.
When she got older. If she got older.
“I have a little girl just like you,” Gabrielle said and smoothed Molly’s hair because she couldn’t resist, because the little girl’s green eyes were so compelling, and because she missed Rosa so much right now she thought her heart might break.
“Does she have red hair, too? I bet she doesn’t. Not many do, you know. Daddy says it’s part of why I’m so special.”
Gabrielle smiled. “My little girl doesn’t have red hair. Or green eyes like you. She has black hair and blue eyes.” Atkinson eyes.
“What’s her name?”
“Rosa.”
Molly looked around her. “Is she here at camp?”
Gabrielle stiffened. She could not say, “No, my child is well, she isn’t sick.” With a small breath, Gabrielle replied, “No, she’s home. We live in Italy. Do you know where that is?”
