A Stranger in Alcott Manor

by Alyssa Richards

  Bertha Mae took a step toward her. Peyton backed away, knocking the chair behind her, and she stumbled.

  A half smile cracked Bertha Mae’s face, as if she were pleased.

  Hasseltine tucked her hands into her white apron and looked at the floor.

  Bertha Mae turned toward her daughter. “You’ll take your medicine and then you’ll go back to your room.”

  “Noooooo,” Rachel wailed. She dropped her head back and tears slid from her eyes.

  Bertha Mae pulled her shoulders back, like she concentrated on becoming the better version of a caring mother. She stroked her daughter’s hair, gently kissed her forehead. Her tongue darted over her lips as if she didn’t like the taste.

  Shockingly it reminded Peyton of Jayne Ella. The love and care she had given to her and her sister in later years had been measured, slightly distant and never enough.

  “You need medicine because you’re sick.” She poured an oily liquid the color of tree bark into a spoon and poked at the girl’s lips until she opened her mouth and swallowed.

  “There, there.” Bertha Mae’s tone softened and she held her daughter’s head to her hip. For a brief moment she appeared to be the person Peyton suspected she was—the truly giving, long-suffering matriarch of Alcott Manor. The woman Peyton had always wanted her mother to be.

  Hasseltine stirred a pot of boiling potatoes, her lips folded into a tight seal.

  Bertha Mae left the room.

  Rachel held her stomach, appearing worse after her dose of medicine.

  Hasseltine waved at her to go upstairs.

  The little girl didn’t move. “I want to go outside,” she cried.

  Hasseltine kept her head low and focused on the potatoes. Her eyes shifted toward the doorway where Bertha Mae had disappeared. Watching.

  “I won’t go near the water,” Rachel said.

  “That’s never my concern with you,” Hasseltine said.

  “I just want to be outside.”

  Peyton kept still.

  “Go on,” Hasseltine said to Rachel and shooed her toward the stairs.

  The girl stood and vomited onto the floor. The wet scent of heated sick filled the room.

  “Oh!” Hasseltine grabbed a towel and rushed toward the girl. “Baby, baby, baby.”

  Rachel cried, wiped her mouth with her hands. “Every time! Why does she make me take that horrible stuff?” She threw up again, coughing brown liquid down the front of her red dress.

  Peyton grabbed a towel from the long table next to her, wet it and wiped Rachel’s arms and hands. She didn’t know what Bertha Mae had given her, but it didn’t agree with her. It must have been one of the many harebrained medicinal remedies doctors gave in this era.

  Peyton wondered if Rachel’s death was the mystery that needed solving. Maybe Rachel snuck out to swim, but the medicine made her sick while she was in the water. Or maybe her death wasn’t an accident. Could someone have drowned her? If there were foul play involved with her death, that could be what kept the house’s memories on repeat.

  “Did she get sick?” Bertha Mae appeared in the doorway with a teapot wrapped in a white cloth.

  “I’ll take her upstairs, ma’am,” Hassetine said. She grabbed another towel and ushered Rachel out of the room. The little girl’s cries could be heard all the way up the stairs.

  “I’ll have to go check on dear Rachel.” She said it like Jayne Ella. Wore her mothering responsibilities like a badge of honor and sacrifice, and yet she didn’t seem to do mothering all that well.

  “I’ll make you some tea first.” She mixed her smile with an exacting stare. Examining Peyton’s dress. Looking for flaws. Peyton felt increasingly uncomfortable in Bertha Mae’s presence.

  “Mothering may be the most important thing I’ve ever done. Everything I learned about mothering I had to come up with on my own. I had a difficult mother.”

  She watched Bertha Mae bite her bottom lip while she spooned two heaps of white sugar into the teapot. Peyton chose not to tell her that she didn’t take sugar in her hot tea. She didn’t even want tea now that she had seen Rachel get sick. And why wasn’t she tending to her daughter? Maybe she was accustomed to letting Hasseltine take care of the cleaning and the bathing.

  She gave Beau a wide-eyed look.

  “Mrs. Alcott, I can finish the tea. I know you’re busy,” Beau said.

  Bertha Mae waved him off.

  Hasseltine returned, scurried across the kitchen and threw a towel over the mess on the floor. “She’s in her room, ma’am. I’ve changed her clothes.”

  “Thank you, Hasseltine. I think I’ll go check on our guests first. Finish Miss Peyton’s tea, would you?” Bertha Mae pointed to the iron teapot on the table. “Just needs water.”

  Hasseltine nodded a long, slow yes.

  When Bertha Mae was out of sight, Hasseltine ushered Peyton and Beau from the room and onto the porch. “Go on, now,” she whispered. She seemed to know that no one wanted tea or food or even to be in the kitchen. Not after everything that had just taken place.

  “Come on. I know some place where we can go.” Beau looked at the sunny skies. Checked the gold watch that hung from his vest. “We’ll get some snacks from the reception.”

  Halfway across the lawn, Peyton turned to find Bertha Mae Alcott approaching them with a young blond girl at her side, the same girl Peyton had seen in a tintype with Beau. Maybe at this very same reception, in this same location.

  Bertha Mae stopped, spoke to a man setting up the camera and tripod. It was a different photographer than Peyton had seen the night before. Bertha Mae gave him instructions, pointed to the gathering under the tent. She waved at Beau with her picture-perfect smile.

  Peyton was bothered that Bertha Mae showed no outward sign of concern for her daughter, that there was no frantic rush in her step to get back inside to comfort her.

  Peyton wanted to call the doctor herself, but she had seen how the remedy the doctor prescribed seemed to do more harm than good. Plus, she reminded herself, these were memories. They couldn’t be changed, what’s done was done. Rachel would drown soon, no one could prevent that from happening. Maybe this was how parenting was done in this era and if you had help in the house. Or was the manor’s secret that Bertha Mae wasn’t the good mother that history painted her to be?

  “Mrs. Alcott,” Beau said when she arrived. “Beautiful wedding, you’ve outdone yourself. And such a lovely day for a celebration.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Spencer,” she said and eyed Peyton cautiously. “I hope you enjoyed your tea, Miss Peyton.”

  She nodded, smiled with her lips pressed firmly together, and crossed her arms in front of her.

  “Then I’d like to introduce you to my niece, Martha, whom I’ve told you about. She arrived this week from Virginia.” Mrs. Alcott ushered the young woman closer to Beau.

  “Pleased to meet you, Martha. I hope your travel was pleasant,” Beau said.

  “The scenery was the most beautiful I’ve ever seen.” Martha’s blue eyes sparkled and her smile was slow and budding with interest. It was clear that Mrs. Alcott had handpicked Martha as a match for Beau, and she was quite pleased with her selection.

  “Even more so than your trips abroad?” Beau asked.

  “I don’t think anything compares to the beauty of one’s own country. Do you?” Martha swayed and lowered her chin such that her gaze fixed on Beau.

  A twinge of jealousy tweaked Peyton’s heart. If this exchange had happened in her current day, she knew that Martha would be wearing a low V-neck blouse with a tight skirt. Had they been seated together, Martha would have found the occasion to gently rest her hand on Beau’s thigh. Maybe after laughing at one of his jokes.

  In this era, one she might have thought innocent if she had seen it in a picture, now seemed more competitive than her current day. Peyton realized women here weren’t playing for boyfriends. They were playing for keeps, they were playing for life and livelihood, they were playing for marriage.
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  “I agree, Martha. No land is as beautiful as one’s own country,” Beau said.

  Peyton smiled and nodded, carefully studied her surroundings. There had to be some reason why the manor held on to this memory, as well as the one where Rachel got sick in the kitchen. She searched for Horace and Ruby.

  Bertha Mae’s eyes narrowed on her. A chill shot down Peyton’s back. She had seen this calculating expression before, with Jayne Ella. Possessive, competitive. Her mother didn’t deal kindly with a threat. Perceived or otherwise.

  “Beau, I wonder if you might do me a favor and bring me a glass of champagne? The heat is too much for me,” the blond said and cooled herself with an elegant fan printed with yellow roses.

  “I would be delighted, Martha,” he said. Beau slipped his hand around Peyton’s and pulled her toward him.

  Bertha Mae eyed Beau’s fingers on Peyton’s waist. “Beau, do tell me how you met Miss Peyton.”

  “Yes, ma’am. Martha, Mrs. Alcott, allow me to introduce Miss Peyton Smith. My fiancée.”

  Peyton spent the entire reception glued to Beau’s side, listening to his conversations, watching the surroundings carefully. Though she didn’t want to, she ate the wedding cookies and small sandwiches that Beau handed her. As he had said, there was no way to know when they would eat again.

  Beau knew everyone at the gathering, and, curiously, they knew him. Peyton pieced together her recollection of family history and Beau’s introductions to form a pretty solid understanding of who everyone was. Nothing odd happened at the reception at all. Other than the fact that Peyton thought Bertha Mae should have checked on poor Rachel. Instead, she flitted around the reception like a new bride, while her precious daughter lived what would be her last few months. Her callousness had to be tied to the mystery they needed to solve.

  Beau played his part well. She watched him laugh effortlessly at jokes he must have heard all twelve times he had attended this event. She remembered that laugh, full of life and full of joy. That sound was one of the many things she missed after he disappeared. She wondered if that was what was happening here. Was the house also remembering precious details?

  “Smith?” she whispered to Beau when he handed her another glass of champagne. She knew the answer as soon as she asked the question.

  “Your Alcott name wouldn’t have worked. I told her the truth about us because she’s always trying to set me up with someone. She needs to understand why I’m spending time with you, so she’ll leave me alone. Here, follow me. I think we can scoot out of here now.” He glanced over his shoulder at the thinning crowd, took her hand and led her to the beach.

  Joy unfolded in her heart at the feel of his hand around hers. They fit together as they always had, as if no time had passed between them. She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. She shouldn’t be holding another man’s hand. Not Beau’s or anyone’s. Ira was waiting for her at home, they were getting married.

  She slipped her hand from his and shared her theory with him that these scenes must be leading up to something—the real secret they had to uncover. Possibly something to do with Rachel’s death.

  “We’ll find it,” he said. But his tone was only half-assuring and she wasn’t sure if he believed what she said.

  She bent down and unbuckled her shoes. When her balance wobbled he held her at the waist. It was a simple move, a kind gesture. There was no reason why fireworks should explode in her chest. But they did. She looked into those blue eyes she once thought she would wake up to every morning, and she thought she might fall in.

  She looked away and dug her bare toes into the sun-warmed sand.

  Beau put his hands in his pockets.

  She held up her hand to block the glare of the setting sun, estimated the time to be about six o’clock. She figured she had been with him for about an hour before she was sucked home the last time. An hour must have passed by now. They walked in silence.

  “There was no sign of Horace or Ruby Lee today,” she finally said.

  He pointed to the wedding guests. “I know from experience that they stay up there for the rest of the night. No new guests come in or out. Maybe tomorrow, or rather the next scene.”

  She looked around at the area: various sections of Alcott Manor land, bordered by the sea and separated by the black gaps. Like pieces of a strange skin held together by black adhesive. She studied the manor and the room she knew to be Rachel’s, feeling badly that she was up there all alone and sick.

  The ocean waves crashed hard and sent a salty spray over her skin in a fine mist.

  He stared at the sand as they walked, and she looked at him out of the corner of her eye, drank him in. His tall stature was clothed in an expensive but ill-fitting suit, and he was still sexy and beautiful. He took her hand again and she let him, once again feeling that they were home, together. She slid her hand against his, her heart soaring. The feel of his touch mended the broken places of her heart, made her want more of him beneath her hand.

  “When you left last night, where did you go?” he asked.

  She wiped the water spray from her face. “I went back. Completely. All the way home.”

  He stopped, owl-eyed and mouth partly open. “Back to the reality we know?”

  She nodded. “I don’t know how I did it. But I do know that it happened, that I was able to do it. I think once we have Horace and Ruby with us, we need to repeat the steps that I did last night.”

  “Except that nothing repeats right away in this world. We’d have to wait about a year to see that particular scene again.”

  She looked at the sun that was rapidly dropping from view and knew more than an hour had passed. Disappointment and worry crept up like a building wave. What if she couldn’t figure out how to get them home? What if they were stuck here forever? Her confidence that she would quickly return home with Beau had shrunk dramatically in the last few minutes.

  She went over the events of the night before, ending with how she was caught in the making of the tintype. “I’d say that we need to have our picture taken in order to get back, but—”

  “I’ve had mine made numerous times.”

  “And that obviously didn’t work.”

  He shook his head. “Unfortunately not.” He took his jacket off, along with the elegant cravat that was tied at his neck. He unfastened several buttons on his starched white shirt. He picked up a sand dollar, side-pitched it into the ocean such that it skipped seven times along the water. His body and movements were strong and fluid. She flashed back to watching him pitch at high school baseball games. She was often the one to hold the radar gun. His pitching speed came in at 86 mph. Which was another reason why he and his father didn’t get along. Austin, being the overbearing father he was, thought Beau ought to have tried to play professionally. He wanted his son to do high profile work, or high paying work, but not photography.

  She looked at the ocean that wasn’t really there, thinking of those days that felt like another lifetime.

  He stroked her cheek gently with the back of his hand. “We can do this. Don’t worry. We’re always a force together.”

  He’d read her mind, he always did. Knew when she worried, knew how to calm her. He knew everything about her. She had forgotten until just then how he never let her suffer alone.

  “We always did manage to sort of part the Red Sea when we were together.”

  His smile dropped by half, as if he had just gotten bad news from some inner report she couldn’t hear.

  Were together, she figured. Past tense. It was only past tense to her. She would have to tell him about Ira. She tugged at the corset that dug into her ribs and wanted nothing more than to exchange it for an old sweatshirt and a pair of jeans.

  The ocean appeared real enough, it smelled of seaweed and fish, the briny mixture that reminded her of home.

  “I remember feeling what you’re feeling right now. Lost. Trapped. Angry. Come on. Put your toes in the water.” He helped her gather her wide skirt until the hem w
as up around her knees.

  The cold saltwater washed over their feet in the cadence of a normal tide. She was having a hard time believing any of it.

  “Feels good, doesn’t it?” He squeezed her hand.

  Except for him. She could believe it was him, she had no trouble with that. It was stereotypical to think it, but he had been her knight in shining armor. He had always shown up whenever she needed him most.

  They stood there hand in hand, facing the horizon. Or at least the moving photographic version. “Have you been swimming?”

  He shook his head. “Too afraid in this place. God only knows what would happen if I swam out there and stumbled on to one of those black lines. I assume there’s one out there. Probably a lot of them. I figured I would drown or something. Not the way I want to die.”

  A sob came up and she stopped it in her chest. For years she’d thought Beau was dead, or worse. She cleared her throat. “You’ve fallen through them before?”

  “In the beginning I did. I’d been here for a couple of weeks. I didn’t know what was going on when the ground shifted and I fell right into one of those black spaces. I got separated from everyone I had become familiar with. I ended up in an entirely different set of memories.

  “I think I’ve traveled through all of them now. There are some I’d like to avoid, but all in all, I find that order helps when you’re stuck in a place like this. It gives me familiarity. A way to predict. Which means something to me while I’m in a world I can’t control.”

  “How did you figure out that these were photographs?”

  “Mrs. Miller told me.”

  “She did.” Peyton nearly gasped. “After she took your photo?”

  He nodded. “She shot me with that antique camera, had me convinced that if I did those photos that you would appreciate them. She said, ‘Beau, you’re asking her to give up so much—her job with the magazine—everything is a sacrifice for you and your family. Show her that you’re joining her family as well.’ Of course, if I hadn’t been three sheets to the wind I wouldn’t have done any of that.”