A Stranger in Alcott Manor

by Alyssa Richards

  Austin’s line of sight left the numbers in front of him and landed hard on her. She had crossed a line, one she had promised she never would. His wife was off limits to her. That had been their agreement.

  “Good to know,” he said. “Is Peyton the person in your organization who has the most business experience?”

  “No, we have a few relatives on our board with business experience. But she is by far the one who has the most marketing and promotion experience. She’s up for a partnership with a prestigious firm in Boston.”

  The other men nodded, still glued to the numbers in front of them.

  Jayne Ella looked at her phone screen, hoping to find a text from her daughter.

  Howard, the tallest, thinnest and most frugal looking of the three bankers, with his long face, wire-rimmed glasses and uber-short, dark hair, asked if the Alcott family trust was really prepared to execute this plan. Could they really show revenue potential by executing an organized business plan?

  “We are, Howard. I can assure you. Peyton is the best at what she does. She’s in very high demand in that city.”

  “How is she going to execute this plan while she’s in Boston?” Austin asked while looking at the prospectus in front of him.

  Jayne Ella paused, she knew where Austin was taking this. “We’ll execute locally. My plan is to sell my salon and focus on the manor exclusively. There’s quite a bit of money to be made in the manor, we’re sure of it. I think you know that, too.”

  Austin jerked his head toward her. “Running this organization is quite different from running a hair salon, Ms. Alcott.”

  “I’m aware of that, Mr. Spencer. With all the support behind me, I won’t have any trouble. And I hope you realize this is more than a houseful of pretty finishes and furnishings. By investing in us, your bank has played a role in preserving history. United States presidents and senators have stayed here. Lived here, even. You remember that Benjamin Alcott, Senior and Junior were both senators for our fine state. Not to mention that we’ve made all of our payments on time. We’ve never defaulted, even when times were difficult.”

  Austin inhaled slowly. He looked at the surrounding area skeptically, as most people who knew its history did. Jayne Ella silently scolded the house to behave. She didn’t want any strange drafts or noises. At the moment, the manor’s beauty belied its tragic past.

  “This is a lovely home you have here,” Austin said. “But the truth is that the Bank of Charleston invested heavily in several large commercial real estate projects that went belly up earlier this year. We’re not sure we can keep this loan.”

  Adrenaline surged in her chest. She cleared her throat and sat tall. “We’re very close to making some real money here. As you can see from our projections, we will be able to pay back the loan in full.”

  “Our research shows that you have borrowed heavily from family financial resources after you obtained the bank loans. Technically, that is a violation of the terms of our agreement. Frankly, it has given us cause for concern.”

  “You will need to show a ready amount of revenue, and your other loan amounts. Those amounts aren’t reflected on your projections.” Harold tapped the report. “You’ve overextended yourself. We can’t afford to take the loss, you understand. We’re just circling our wagons.”

  Frank, the banker with the deepest tan, cleared his throat. “Hedging our bets.”

  “It’s not a personal decision as to which loan accounts we keep and which ones we call. It’s a numbers game. We’re just doing our due diligence,” Austin said.

  “I understand numbers, I’ve run a business for the last twenty years. But this is our family home. It’s our past and our future, you can’t just rip it away from us. We can make a go of it this time, I’m certain.”

  “I can give you thirty days. That’s it,” Austin said. “At that point we have to see actual revenue coming in. Otherwise we’ll have to call the loan.”

  “Mr. Spencer,” Jayne Ella said. “Might I have a word with you in the kitchen? Privately?”

  Austin waited, then nodded once. He whispered something to the other two men who immediately stood, as if by command. They shook Jayne Ella’s hand and left through the front door.

  When she and Austin were alone in the kitchen, she closed the door behind them. “You and I both know that our family is not going to default on the loan. We’ve fought long and hard to get this house up and running again, we’re obviously not going to do anything to screw things up at the eleventh hour. So, lay off of this loan nonsense or else.”

  “Jayne Ella.” Austin’s tone was patronizing as it often was when he thought he had the upper hand. “This isn’t entirely my bank anymore. Your loan isn’t within my control, so don’t threaten me.”

  She shook her head. “You realize that Mrs. Miller wants the manor open and doing business. She could choose to tell Blair, show her the photos. Or the video. Not to mention that I still have something of yours that you want. In a way, I hold your future in my hands.”

  “Or maybe it’s the other way around now.” He raised an eyebrow at her and she remembered that look. It was not just the one that said he had a plan, it was the one that said he had nothing to lose.

  “Frankly, I’ve had enough of being held at the wrong end of the leash. I decided it was time that things turned around.”

  Jayne Ella’s teeth clenched and pain shot through her jaw. “So, you’re just going to take the manor away from me now? Because you’re fed up? That’s what you get to do?”

  He pointed his finger at her. “That’s exactly what I get to do. I’m taking the manor and everything that goes along with it—the land…and our past.”

  Jayne Ella smacked his accusing finger away. “If you break our agreement, Mrs. Miller will send those pictures to Blair. I don’t think your wife will take that kind of humiliation lightly. She’ll divorce you. She’ll turn her father against you and then where will you be without your bank?”

  Austin leaned against one of the side tables. “You see, that’s where you’re wrong. I negotiated quite a bit of stock for myself in this recent bank merger. So, I have a lot more control now. I’m not as beholden to my father-in-law as I used to be. I also negotiated a large sum of cash when I agreed to this new position, and I’ve decided to take a portion of those proceeds and invest them in myself. My future.”

  Jayne Ella’s body sagged. The fire drained from her temper. “What are you talking about?”

  “I had a meeting with Mrs. Miller early this morning and I’ve made her an offer that I think she’s going to accept. Assuming she does, she’ll be a very wealthy woman and my life will finally be my own again.”

  “What have you done?” Jayne Ella whispered.

  “Mrs. Miller has some health issues. Because of the hardships she’s endured, her life expectancy is probably less than yours or mine. So, now that I can, I’ve made her a lump sum offer to put this matter to bed once and for all. So to speak.

  “We’ve more than paid the price for our indiscretions and I simply suggested to her that, at this stage of her life, she might be happier on a beach somewhere. Or, if she chooses to stay in town and with the museum, that she would enjoy the unique privileges that come with wealth.”

  “Why would you think she would be happy giving up this hold she’s had over us for so long?”

  “Because I think we all reach a certain age when the security of money calls to us more loudly than leveraging the grievances of our past. I think she might be there. She has the hip problem, she’s not aging well, she’s alone. I think I may have gotten her to see that wealth is the best revenge of all.”

  “What makes you think she’ll give you all of the photos and videos that she has of us? Why wouldn’t she take your money and send Blair copies of what she has?”

  “She might. If that happens I have control of my bank now. I’ve made enough to retire on. Because of the merger, it won’t affect me as much as it used to. Blair can divorce me. My father-in
-law can refuse to speak to me again. Ultimately, it won’t matter. Not like before.”

  “It would still matter to me. If Blair finds out about our affair, she and her group won’t support the manor. They’ll make sure that I’m ruined!”

  “I can’t help you with that,” Austin whispered. “You should have let me take the gold from the manor a long damn time ago. It’s mine anyway.”

  “It’s ours, don’t you mean? And I couldn’t. You know that. There was no way to dig it up without getting caught. Not the way you buried it. And not with all the publicity surrounding it. I’ve had people in here day and night for years. Not to mention security cameras. And security guards and the local police patrolling the house and the grounds. Don’t you think I would have taken it out if I could have?” Jayne Ella caught herself chewing her cheek and stopped.

  “I wasn’t the one who poured cement over the hole. And I’ve told you that I would do everything for you,” he said. “If you had just given everyone a few nights off.”

  “How would my family have responded to that? With all the theft and trouble we’ve had over the years? Suddenly I’m just going to cut the security detail, the security cameras? How will that go over?”

  “You could have found a way. Maybe you still can.”

  “Did you see the piece that the A&E Network ran on the theft just last week? It’s the twenty year anniversary of the great Charleston gold theft. Stolen from your bank, Austin. They included original footage of your interviews: ‘Someone managed to break in and take the gold right out from under our noses. I don’t know how, we have state of the art security systems.’” Jayne Ella lowered her voice to make it sound like Austin’s.

  “My family has paid your bank hundreds of thousands of dollars in loan payments, doesn’t that mean anything?”

  “I couldn’t have predicted that my bank would have merged with my father-in-law’s bank, the one that held the manor’s loan. Now that we have, everyone is taking an honest look at its assets. Truthfully, the bank is in an awkward situation. It has to call a few loans to get them off the books, that’s not my doing. However. If you were to give me unfettered access to the manor for one night, without a security detail, I might be able to persuade the bank to, say…shift its attention from your loan account to some others for a while. Give you an opportunity to turn a profit.”

  Jayne Ella crossed her arms, leaned against the table. He finally had her cornered.

  “How am I supposed to get rid of all the security cameras? The company monitors the feed. They’ll not only alert me when there’s a problem, but texts and calls go out to two other family owners, as well. The owner group is serious about protecting its investment. The banker side of you should be happy about that.”

  “I’ve told you this before. Tell the company that you’ve found a new monitoring system, and you have to cut their service. When I’m done in here, call them back, tell them the new company didn’t work out and reinstate the service.”

  Jayne Ella shook her head. “I wish you had never brought me into this.”

  “You’re lucky I did bring you into this. Do you know how much gold has gone up over the last twenty years? It’s—”

  “Two hundred and fifty percent,” Jayne Ella said. “I’m aware.”

  “That means we have—”

  “Four point three million. I know. I did the math.”

  Austin raised his eyebrows as if he were impressed. “It’s time to take it out.”

  She stared at him for a long moment, remembering the night when the gold disappeared from his bank. They had been in his office after hours, which wasn’t unusual back then. It had been a convenient place for them to be alone together. Twenty years ago there weren’t any security guards for his community bank and no one stayed to work late. Except for him.

  He had been so excited to impress her, to show her the gold that a customer had momentarily parked in his bank vault. Had she ever seen one thousand pounds in gold? He ran his finger down her neck when he asked her. As if he knew his words were an aphrodisiac.

  One of the bank’s elderly clients had recently passed. Not a particularly wealthy one, or so they thought. He only kept a few thousand in his accounts. But when his son cleaned out his father’s house, he found one thousand pounds of gold stored in plastic containers in the basement.

  “He lived through the depression, didn’t trust banks,” Austin said when he showed Jayne Ella the gold. “Neither did he trust cash or stocks. Started buying gold when he was young. Kept trading up and buying more over the years. Just kept sticking it in his basement. His son is leaving it here for about a week until he can arrange to have it converted into cash.”

  Jayne Ella ran her fingertips over the cold, thin bars. She’d never seen so much gold before. “Are the security cameras on?” she whispered. “I want to be with you, right here with the gold.”

  “I checked. The security tapes are rewinding.” He looked at his watch, took a long swallow of his scotch. “We have twenty-two minutes.”

  “What if a couple of bars went missing?” Jayne Ella asked some time later with a giggle. She pretended to tuck one in her waistband. “Oh, they’re heavier than I thought they’d be.”

  “Where would you hide the gold if, say, a few bars went home with you?” Austin buckled his belt, checked his watch and guided Jayne Ella from the vault.

  “That’s easy,” she said. “The manor. Considering the fact that everyone is too terrified to go in the place, the gold would be safe for years. Depending on how well you buried it, I guess.”

  They stopped in the hallway and stared at one another. Shortly thereafter, they had their plan.

  Under normal circumstances the security tapes recorded nine hours of video at a time. Then someone had to rewind them and any activity was recorded for the next nine hours. But on this night, Austin rewound the security tapes every thirty minutes so that, if some techie checked, it would look like a glitch in the system. Just to be safe, he rewound the tapes again before they left.

  They pulled a few bars from every stack but mostly they took the gold from the rear stacks so that from a front view, it didn’t look like anything was missing. With the dollies they used, it only took two trips each to remove two hundred and fifty pounds of gold.

  They put half in his trunk and half in hers. Then they drove to Alcott Manor and buried all five hundred pounds beneath the side of the grand staircase. Workmen had left their tools lying about, and Austin was handier with them than Jayne Ella would have guessed. Turned out he had spent several summers as a teenager helping out on a construction crew.

  The hardwoods hadn’t yet been lain near the outer wall behind the grand staircase, and the subflooring panels weren’t difficult for him to lift. He worked the gold bars deep into the black dirt, keeping them in short, neat piles. After he covered them, he replaced the subflooring. “No one will be the wiser,” he said. When he kissed her, the scotch was still strong on his breath. His blue eyes sparkled in the low morning light. She felt exhilarated and yet ashamed, she knew she would have done anything he asked.

  It wasn’t until the next day, when she was fully sober, that she came to grips with what they had done. They had gotten away with it.

  “The twenty year anniversary of the theft is getting a lot of press,” she said.

  “They’re just doing that as an interest piece for ratings. The police aren’t focusing on it as an active investigation, neither do they have any new information. The timing is right, just like we planned, remember? If we’re careful, we can make this work.” He dragged his index finger along the bare skin of her arm.

  Jayne Ella knew she could have gotten the gold out a long time ago and probably safely. But she liked keeping it in the manor. For one, the location gave her a measure of control. During one of the earlier renovations, she instructed the workers to pour a thin layer of cement over the subflooring to keep out the moisture. And so Austin couldn’t take the gold and run, as she often suspected
he might. And, if ever she needed to keep him in line, all she had to do was remind him about the gold. Not that he ever forgot.

  Two, it wasn’t her personal home. Lots of people had come in and out of the manor over the years. If the authorities found the gold, it wouldn’t be hard for her to plead ignorance. But now, if he managed to take the manor, he would have access to the gold without her.

  “I’ll give you some advice on how to convert the gold to cash without raising any suspicion. I have contacts I could share with you.”

  Austin leaned harder against a table and several glass canisters clinked against themselves. His eyes softened and she caught a glimpse of the man who used to love her, too.

  “It’s risky,” she said softly. “If anyone sees what’s down there, you would be implicated. If you remem—”

  “Oh, I remember, Jayne. Not a day has gone by in the last twenty years that I’ve forgotten how I could be implicated.” His fingertips rubbed his left wrist where he used to wear the platinum, diamond-studded watch his father-in-law gave him on his wedding day.

  He was the only one to ever call her Jayne. The sound of her name on his lips made her remember the many nights they shared together in their hideaway at the beach.

  “The watch was a thoughtful gift,” she’d once told him.

  “It was a threat,” he’d said. “The back of the watch is engraved with Welcome to the Family. He capitalized the F in family. I have no doubt that if he discovered I cheated on Blair, I’d be wearing cement shoes at the bottom of the ocean by next week.”

  Apparently, Blair hadn’t fallen far from the proverbial tree.

  Two weeks after he buried the gold beneath the manor, he called Jayne in a panic. He needed to dig everything up, break through the cement she’d just laid down. “My watch is down there,” he’d said. “It must have slipped off.”

  But three teenagers had broken into the manor that week and one fell to her death. Police were crawling through the manor like cockroaches.