“Did you get a lot accomplished last night?” Mrs. Miller walked one slow step in her direction, then another.
“Yes. Everything I needed to.” Peyton backed up. She wasn’t sure how Mrs. Miller managed to look so threatening with her fluffy white hair and sack-like dress. It was the eyes, she decided, glassy and dull and yet not missing much.
“This morning Jayne Ella said that she didn’t think you came home last night.” Mrs. Miller took another step.
“I was working and I lost track of time.”
“So, you slept in the manor?”
“No. I just worked. I’m used to working long hours.”
Mrs. Miller stopped. She stared at Peyton as if she waited for her to confess to something.
“Did you notice anything unusual while you were here?”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, you know. This old house is unsettled. Like the manor itself isn’t at peace. It keeps secrets.” She ran a hand along the wall. “I thought perhaps it might have shared one or two with you. Twice I was here working late and I dozed off. Just for a moment. I dreamt of my Ruby. Heard her calling me just as clear as day. Mama!” Mrs. Miller called wistfully.
Mrs. Miller picked up the tintype of the wedding reception, the one with Beau standing under the white tent. She tapped the glass. “Isn’t that something…looks just like him.” She tilted her head and stared at the image through the lower part of her glasses.
“Did I ever tell you what Beau and I did on that last night of his? The night when he disappeared?”
A sick, drowning feeling dragged through the center of Peyton. As if the news she was about to get was bad. All bad. “No, ma’am. You didn’t.”
Mrs. Miller sucked on her teeth and her mouth made a wet whistle.
“Let’s get started on the new photos and I’ll tell you all about it.”
Peyton insisted on sensitizing the plates herself; she wasn’t going to take the chance that Mrs. Miller could mess something up. She hadn’t shown Mrs. Miller the double exposed plate from the day before. If indeed that’s what it even was. There wouldn’t have been any way to explain it. She wasn’t even sure she wanted Mrs. Miller to know.
Peyton showed her the wedding reception photo that she wanted to emulate. They set the stage as they had before, with lighting and furniture arrangement. Peyton’s palms were damp and tingly.
She let Mrs. Miller take her photo, several this time since they knew what they were doing now. Peyton developed the photographic plates as quickly as Mrs. Miller took the pictures. After each photo or two, Peyton changed dresses and they took pictures in a new setting to match an old tintype.
“He was worried,” Mrs. Miller finally said about Beau. “Apparently y’all had an argument that night and he wanted to prove to you that he loved you. He wanted to show you that he was joining your family—not just that you were joining his. He said he thought that he’d made you feel as though he and his family were calling all the shots. And he wanted to do something to make up for that. Some sort of gesture.”
“He did?” Her voice didn’t come out clearly and she cleared her throat.
“So, I made a suggestion.” Mrs. Miller said. “I had some of the original Alcott family clothing in my car, a few pieces from the museum that needed to go to the tailor for repairs. I also had Bertha Mae’s camera that we’ve been using. I thought it might be nice if he dressed in antique manor clothing and I made a tintype that he could give to you.”
“You took his picture with this same camera?” Peyton asked.
“Mm-hmm.”
“In the manor, while he was dressed up in Alcott family attire?”
“Bless his heart he was so worn down from that terrible argument that the two of you had. He was a bit drunk, too. I just had to find some way to help him.”
The camera, the clothing and the manor.
Peyton caved and mentioned the ghosted images of long-dead family members she had seen in the tintypes the day before.
“Any idea how that happens?”
Mrs. Miller sat at the wooden table in the center of the room, sipping tea. “I don’t know how it happens or why. Only that it can happen. Then we just have to wait,” she said.
“Wait for what?” Peyton answered. She slowly squeezed a fist full of taffeta.
“You don’t think I know, but I do.”
“Don’t know what?” Peyton asked.
“I know that you went into the manor’s captured memories.”
Panic darted around Peyton’s chest.
“I know because I’m the one who sent you there.”
12
Peyton stared at Mrs. Miller’s half smile. “What are you talking about?”
“Several hours after I took your picture, I came back to the manor. I spread most of the tintypes around the room and I watched them. It took a while. But then I saw you. You were there.”
Peyton swallowed quickly.
Mrs. Miller lifted her teacup with two hands and took a long sip.
“You were the one who left the tintypes on the table. You wanted me to find them,” Peyton said.
Mrs. Miller stared at her, her lined face expressionless. “You weren’t easy to find at first. But I’ve watched these photos for so many years, I nearly have them memorized. When I finally found you in one of them, I knew you would want to see it, too. And, of course, I wanted you to see how Beau had moved. I thought that would help me explain things.”
“Explain what things?” Peyton shook her head in disbelief.
Mrs. Miller nodded. Her feet were placed wide and flat on the floor in true old lady fashion. “That you’re the only one. So far.”
“The only one to what?”
“The only one to come back.”
Peyton sat down. She wasn’t sure if the dizziness that spun through her body was the result of Mrs. Miller’s news or the same thing she felt just before she found herself with Beau.
“Out of how many?”
“Dozens of people have died in the manor over the years. Only three people have disappeared. All of whom I’ve known personally—my husband Horace, my daughter Ruby and Beau, of course.” Mrs. Miller tilted her head back, seemingly enjoying a strange power that Peyton didn’t realize the woman had.
“He’s really—”
“Here. Yes.” Mrs. Miller’s features tightened then dissolved into her usual smile that set Peyton on edge.
“You came back. That means when you go again, you can bring them all home. Like you, Ruby Lee deserves to have a career, get married, raise her family.”
“Wait—you think Ruby Lee is in the manor?” Peyton’s words spilled out quickly, her tone high pitched.
“Oh, I know she is. I’ve seen her.”
Peyton let out a sharp exhale. “You’ve seen her?”
“Yes, that red hair is unmistakable. Are you alright, dear? You look pale.”
“I thought—I mean, we all thought something terrible…happened.”
“Yes, but I know where she is now. She’s in this house.” Mrs. Miller sipped her tea, oddly calm. At peace.
Had Beau been right all along? Had the blood on her childhood dress been from something that had nothing to do with Ruby’s disappearance? Why didn’t she remember what it was?
“Your mouth is hanging open,” Mrs. Miller said. “You’ll make sense of it soon enough. What’s most important right now is that you bring my family back to me.”
“I don’t know…what I did to get back here. I wouldn’t know how to bring anyone with me. I didn’t even see Horace or Ruby.” She couldn’t believe she referred to Ruby as someone among the living. She’d spent her entire life believing she was dead, thinking she had been involved in that death in some way.
Mrs. Miller put her cup and saucer on the table, the delicate pieces of china clinked against one another in the stillness. She folded her hands into her lap, and her eyes crinkled when she smiled. “I don’t get to see them that often, but when I do, they
’re usually in different tintypes. Different scenes. Usually Ruby is at the holiday gatherings. At the same time, Horace will be in another tintype altogether, playing poker or at the beach. Only once in all these years did I see Beau and Horace in a tintype together. I’ve never seen Ruby with either of them. I don’t know why they’re usually separate. Only that they are, and that they travel through the same tintypes, the same memories at different times.
“One day Beau will be at a wedding party, as you saw. Then, a year later, I’ll see Horace there. It’s as if the manor spins through a cycle of these memories, and our loved ones go along with them.”
“Why?” Peyton managed.
“Why does this happen, you mean?” Mrs. Miller asked.
She nodded.
“I think the manor is like a person in many ways—a living being. It started out with good intentions and a bright future. Just like the rest of us. Then things begin to happen. And sometimes those things are bad enough that we don’t get over them. We stay anchored to the past. You’ve felt it in this house, I know you have. It breathes. It lives.”
Just for a moment Peyton felt a wave of energy from the house, as if it really were a person who had endured too much. Like it was someone who had gotten stuck in the past, who had a secret to hide. She could relate.
“You’ve heard the saying—if these walls could talk?” Mrs. Miller stood slowly, shuffled to the far wall and ran her hand along its surface. Like she stroked a loved one’s face.
Peyton leaned against the far table, nauseous and wanting to get outside.
“It’s the manor, you see,” Mrs. Miller finally said. “The manor, the authentic clothing, the jewelry. There’s something about it all being reassembled here, they all sync together once again. Then there’s Bertha Mae’s camera. The tintype is made and it isn’t long before the manor takes ahold of them. Takes them prisoner.”
“The manor never lets go of anything,” Peyton whispered to herself. It was palpable. She felt it in the rooms, the furniture and the tintypes. As if the house were ruminating. The history lived on.
Mrs. Miller walked to the ballroom. Peyton followed her. Their heeled footsteps echoed in the stately marble hallways.
“My theory is that the manor has a secret. Something dark in its past that it hasn’t been able to let go of. Something we don’t know about. These tintypes where I see my family and Beau, those specific memories must be when something terrible happened. I think these must be the scenes the house keeps mentally touching. Thinking about. Otherwise none of this would be possible.”
They stood in silence with one another for a moment.
Secrets. Peyton hated secrets. There were the secrets her memory kept from her, the secrets she kept to herself, Jayne Ella’s lying about God knows what, and now the manor had more secrets. All of them probably too horrible to see.
She looked at the tintype of the wedding reception with Beau. Then several pictures of Bertha Mae that Mrs. Miller had placed in a grouping for the special celebration exhibit. She looked closely at Bertha Mae. Her smile was pleasant, but the eyes held the subtlety of something else. Some sort of emotion she had seen somewhere before but she couldn’t place it. Another secret.
She didn’t remember anything tragic happening at that point in Bertha Mae’s life or even in the manor’s history. She had read all the history books and diaries that mentioned the manor, but there was nothing disturbing in that particular era. In fact, it was one of the happiest times in Alcott family history.
She flipped through the tintypes, looking for a clue. But every tintype was filled with happy scenes—celebrations, parties, holidays. The air conditioner cut on, rumbling like constant thunder.
That was the nature of a secret, she thought. No matter what someone painted on the outside, the secret created a type of anchor—often in the heart, perhaps even in one’s soul. It left a part of you stuck in the past.
That’s why in her work, Peyton insisted that clients confess everything. Only then could they effectively move forward, create a new image. Otherwise, secrets literally ate a person up inside.
Ate them up.
“That’s what the house is doing,” she said. “Eating everyone up.”
“That’s what the desperate do,” Mrs. Miller agreed.
The manor had seen more than its share of murder, suicide, disappearances and tragic unfair endings in its existence, but none from that era. At least not that she knew about.
“You’ll need to uncover the manor’s secret, you have to solve whatever mystery lies hidden within these walls. Then, once the house has peace, my hope is that its hidden dimension will fade and my family will be set free.” Mrs. Miller’s moist eyes glimmered with excitement.
The truth hit Peyton and she could barely move, the fear so intense. She was on her way into whatever secret the house kept hidden. Knowing her ancestors’ home, it was something macabre. She would have to unearth it, solve it, in order to get everyone home again. She nodded to the camera and the boxes of tintypes. “Since those items are involved, the mystery must be something that was captured with her camera.”
Peyton hoped no one took pictures of Benjamin Alcott’s hanging or the hauntings that began immediately after his death. Hopefully no one took pictures of Anna Alcott when she lay bleeding to death from a gunshot wound. That was the beginning of the Alcott family tragedies that lasted for over a century. Last thing she wanted was to be trapped inside the house when it was haunted, reliving the same dark days over and over again.
“I would think so. Yes.” She shrugged.
Peyton realized that the woman didn’t care which memories she traveled through, she didn’t care whether Peyton lived or died. All she wanted was her daughter and husband back. Didn’t matter to her how many people she had to throw at that problem to get it fixed.
“Why did I make it back home, when Beau didn’t? He was right there with me.”
“I don’t know. You’ll have to figure that out. And that’s only fitting, too. Since it’s your doing that made it possible for him to go into the memories in the first place.”
Peyton spun toward Mrs. Miller. “What?”
“Oh, honey. If you hadn’t argued with him the way you did that night, then he wouldn’t have been so devastated. Never would have gotten so drunk. I never would have been able to get him dressed in historical Alcott attire, and I don’t think I ever would have been able to take his photo with Bertha Mae’s camera.
“I had tried and tried to get him to dress up and let me make a tintype of him. He wouldn’t do it. Until that night. You not only opened the door for me to send him into the memories of the manor, you paved the way.”
“I think you’re the one who pulled the trigger.”
Mrs. Miller settled into an upholstered chair, a slow smile of satisfaction spread across her face. “Yes, I did. But someone had to teach you a lesson. You needed to know what it felt like to have the greatest love you’ve ever known yanked away from you.”
The horror of what Mrs. Miller had done stirred her fury. “You’re a horrible old woman.”
Mrs. Miller threw back her head and cackled. Her wide open mouth revealed grayish back teeth covered in silver fillings. “Me? You’re the one who sent my Ruby away.”
“I did not—”
“Yes, you did!” Mrs. Miller leaned forward and screeched.
Peyton jumped.
Mrs. Miller drew in a deep inhale and smoothed her short white hair. “Don’t you remember?” Her voice was softer. “You insisted that the two of you play with those cameras. You begged for me to make a tintype of you and Ruby, but at the last minute you backed out.”
Memories from that day at the manor with Ruby and Mrs. Miller struggled to become clear. The house was in the midst of one of its earlier restorations, one that was doomed to fall apart yet again. At that time, no one knew why. Several rooms had been restored to the point of new flooring and paint and repaired windows. “I didn’t back out. Ruby wanted
the photo all to herself.”
The images were fuzzy and few, but they rushed toward her. She heard laughter, distant conversation, plates clinking together. Party noises. “Someone was having a party on the back lawn,” she said.
“That’s it, Peyton. Remember,” Mrs. Miller coaxed.
She could hear the chatter and the laughter. Her mother complained about the heat and the air conditioners they had installed weren’t pumping enough cool into the lower level of the house.
Caterers with white shirts, white aprons and black ties bussed platters and dishes and other supplies from their vans and into the kitchen area. “It wasn’t our family that had the event. Because it was catered, our family always did a potluck.”
“You’re right.” Mrs. Miller’s gaze held steady as if she shared the same memories. “The party was put on by Beau’s daddy and his bank. He threw the employees a big Christmas bash on the great lawn. Jayne Ella gave her permission for it and she even collected a fee.”
“They decorated the magnolia trees out back with white lights.”
“That’s right, darlin’. It’s all coming back now, isn’t it? Keep goin’.”
Peyton had forgotten this entirely. She didn’t think she would ever have remembered it if Mrs. Miller hadn’t encouraged her to do so. And maybe not at all if she hadn’t been in the manor.
“The manor never forgets.” Mrs. Miller’s gaze scanned the walls, like she connected with the manor’s soul.
As if a switch had been flipped, memories spooled through her mind like old film through a projector. She saw Ruby’s long, red hair, the sparkle from the necklace she always wore, her flower print top and matching pants. A white ribbon tied around her ponytail.
They played hide-and-seek at the side of the house. They spied on the party guests. “Ruby and I played outside.” The chill Peyton often felt in the manor crept along her back, as if fingers danced along her skin, pushing her to remember.
Every cell in her system pulled away from the memory, but the manor was too strong. The memory pushed its way into the blank, dead places in her brain, the spot that kept the memories secret.
A Stranger in Alcott Manor Page 11
