Monarch Manor

by Maureen Leurck

  “Anyway, so we are on Highway Fifty, near the lake, just before you get into town. And as we are waiting for the light to turn green, this huge flock of seagulls flies overhead.” She leaned forward, palms on the table. “And right before the light turned, one of the birds pooped all over the guy in the fancy car. He started sputtering and cursing, bird poop all over his head, as we went on our merry way.”

  She laughed again, her bellowing, boisterous laugh that sounded like giant effervescent bubbles popping in the air. I didn’t have the heart to remind her that she had told me that particular story no fewer than four times before. I turned to Gerry.

  “Thanks so much for meeting us here. I thought this would be a good halfway point for everyone.” I clicked my phone, illuminating the time. I had just over two and a half hours before I had to be back at Will’s school to pick him up and drive him to group speech therapy. In it, he was supposed to be learning how to socialize with others, but three sessions in and all he had done was throw a tantrum each time he didn’t win one of the games the therapist set up. So I would have to haul him out of the room each week in front of the other parents, whose children I never saw have a problem in the group.

  “Well, I was quite excited after I discovered that letter from Louisa to her sister, Emily. All this time, it was sitting up there in Milwaukee, and I had no idea it had a connection to Lake Geneva. I wonder how many other things are out there of that nature.” A faraway look passed across his eyes from behind his glasses.

  Before he could mentally travel to another state and time, I said, “Yes, of course. So I really wanted all of us to meet, then, and figure out our next course of action. Where do we go from here? We have evidence that Emily and her mother, Eleanor, kept up with sign language, but for what purpose? It’s worth investigating, but what next?”

  Gerry nodded carefully, studying his coffee cup, as my mother said, “What about in your neck of the woods, Gerry? Any chance that there is something at your place, or maybe the library, with something on Emily or Eleanor? We’ve been looking at Amelia, but I think we should look at those around her, to see if there are any bread crumbs.”

  Gerry took a sip of his coffee, which I noticed was a light caramel color, like he had dumped an entire carafe of cream into it, and then smiled as he leaned back in the red booth, the staccato sound of the plastic shifting under his weight. “Yes. Of course.”

  “Great.” My mother pulled out her wallet and threw down a twenty-dollar bill. “Let’s go.” She made a waving motion for me to get out of the booth.

  “What? Now? Go up to Lake Geneva now?” I stayed in place and checked the time on my phone. We had met in Richmond since it was the halfway mark for me, wanting to avoid having to drive all the way into Wisconsin again. “I can’t. And besides, even if I did, I could only stay for about thirty minutes, with all the driving back and forth.”

  “Then we’ll go for thirty minutes. What do we have to lose? Adventure time,” she said. I saw the same glint in her eyes as when she pulled up to church on her motorcycle for the first time. When I still didn’t move, she added, “Now it’s twenty-nine minutes, kiddo.”

  * * *

  We met Gerry outside of the Lake Geneva Public Library, after a protracted battle with a family trying to get across Highway 50 to the public park on the lake, with them dropping various things like their picnic basket, a blanket, and a child trying to make a run for it.

  Twenty minutes, a voice in the back of my head whispered.

  Gerry stopped before we walked into the building, admiring the structure. “It always takes my breath away, no matter how many times I go inside.”

  I looked up at the Frank Lloyd Wright style A-frame building. Through the front windows, I could see that the back of the building was almost entirely made of windows, showcasing the sparkling blue lake just outside.

  I smiled. “I can see why.”

  “You should see the library at the University of Wisconsin in Mendota, where I went to school,” my mother said as she held open the door for us. “Now, that is a place. You have Lake Madison just beyond, and you can’t go more than ten paces without finding somewhere to serve you a cold beer. This place is nice, but it doesn’t compare.”

  Gerry pressed his lips together as he walked inside, and I gave my mother an admonishing look. “Can it,” I hissed to her as I followed Gerry into the library.

  “Back so soon?” a pretty redhead with big brown Bambi eyes said from behind the circulation desk.

  Gerry’s head turned and his back stiffened. “Oh yes. Hello there, Haley.”

  My head snapped back and forth between them as the name sounded familiar. I remembered he had said it before, on the phone, with a stammer.

  “What did you think of the book? Yay or nay?” Haley put her elbows on the table, letting her wavy red hair fall around her shoulders, framing her tiny face.

  “Ah, yes. I’m really enjoying it. Thanks so much for the recommendation.” Gerry nodded again, quickly adjusting his glasses.

  “Great,” Haley said. “So what can I help you with today?” Her eyes slowly moved over to me and my mother. “And your friends?”

  “Right. Well, we are doing a bit of historical research,” he said with a smile. He glanced at us, almost surprised that we were there, as though he and Haley were on a secret date. “A possible historical mystery, in fact.”

  Haley stood up. “Mystery? Well, I’m in.” She walked around the circulation desk and held out her hands. “Where do we begin, folks?”

  * * *

  “Ah, yes, and here we have the obituary for Mary Hoppe,” Haley said. Her voice was strong, confident, as she adeptly maneuvered the microfiche machine.

  The rest of us were gathered around her chair, with Gerry standing and my mother and me sitting in rolling chairs we had stolen from nearby empty desks. To our right, the lake sparkled from outside the window. As on Powers Lake, most of the docks had been pulled in for the season, signaling the upcoming freeze when the ice-fishing season would begin. I was sure the lake temperature was far below swimming temperatures, yet all I wanted to do was dip my feet in the water and feel the lake pebbles under my toes.

  We leaned forward and silently read Mary’s obituary. It was fairly straightforward, mentioning her three daughters and grandchildren. The last line asked that, in lieu of flowers, Mary requested donations be made to the Irish Woods School.

  “That was a school that was established for the children of the Irish immigrants who came to the area to help build the railroad. Some of the society women realized these children were in need of an education, and helped to establish a year-round school. You can still see part of the original farm off of Highway Fifty, just west of town,” Gerry said.

  “That’s wonderful,” I said quietly.

  “One would venture a guess that she had a soft spot in her heart for children,” Gerry said, “considering what happened to her grandson.”

  “That’s good to see. I’m sure she felt like it was at least one thing she could do,” my mother said quietly.

  I didn’t look at her and kept my head forward. I had tried to talk to her about my ever-changing feelings on Will but had never gotten past the thin surface stage. The stage where I said: It’s hard. And then I would quickly change the subject or make a joke about it. I had never told her about the endless nights I cried myself to sleep, the nights even Luke had pretended to be asleep out of fear of saying or doing the wrong thing. The thoughts that horrified me, that destroyed me, the thoughts that I couldn’t tell anyone. The things that I thought in the midnight of our struggles. Of course, as things often do, the clouds would break and a ray of light would shine through the next day, inflicting more shame and guilt on my soul, while lifting me out of the darkness. Yet I wished I could share some small piece of that with my mother, to have her share the burden of all the ways I doubted myself and my ability to be the mother that Will needed.

  Haley clicked through a few more pages with expert
ease and stopped at an article after Mary’s death. It was a small blurb on her funeral, mostly detailing the famous names who attended and where her estate would go. “Looks like she also gave money to relatives in Ireland. In Adare Village,” Haley said.

  I turned to my mother. “I never realized we were that close to our Irish ancestors. I wonder if there are some still living over there, in the same place.”

  My mother nodded. “My mother talked about it once, and said that her cousins still lived in the same village, and owned a hardware store. ‘Humble, kind, warm people’ is how she always described them.”

  “Very neat,” I said. “And also neat that Mary included them in her will. Although how much was really left at that point? I wonder. Didn’t you say that Prohibition killed a lot of their fortune?”

  She shrugged. “I would think—”

  “Actually,” Gerry interrupted with a polite hand in the air, “if I may, from what I understand, the Hoppes did lose money in Prohibition, but they had diversified their investments in things like real estate so that they still had something. Of course they didn’t keep the estate up, but maybe that was because of what happened.”

  “It was too painful,” I said quietly, and my mother nodded.

  Gerry continued, “A lot of estates weren’t kept up at some point, though. Like, take for example, Otto Young’s house, called first The Younglands and then Stone Manor.”

  Haley stifled a laugh. “Ah, yes. The famous—or, I should say, infamous—Otto Young.” She swiveled around in her chair, her eyes bright. “After the Great Chicago Fire, he bought up half of the city for a song, and made a fortune, and built a huge house up here. And when he tried to join the country club, he was denied access since the properties he had bought once belonged to the current members, so he basically made his fortune off of them, selling back their real estate at a huge increase.”

  Gerry waved his hand around excitedly. “So then, when the members denied his application, listen to what he did: He built a barn in the exact same architectural style as the country club, and then named all of the farm animals after the club members. Like Mrs. Hutchinson, and so forth.”

  My mother let out a bellowing laugh that echoed across the library’s tall ceiling. “What a great guy. I wish I could have shook his hand. Genius,” she said as she wiped her eyes.

  I saw Haley and Gerry exchange a triumphant glance. “What a great story. You should put that in the museum,” I said.

  Gerry raised his eyebrows. “It’s more of a local legend than historical fact,” he said. He looked down at Haley.

  “He’s the gatekeeper, that’s for sure.” Her tone was light, teasing, and I had the sense that this was part of an ongoing inside joke.

  Way to go, Gerry. Make your move, I thought with a smile.

  Haley swiveled back around and clicked the machine again. She stopped briefly on the article that quoted a Georgina Lindemann, who said she had seen Amelia on a train to New York the next day, which we already knew.

  “Well, guys, I think this might be—” She started to turn around but stopped as a new headline came into view.

  NANNY FOR CARTWRIGHT BOY CLAIMS FOUL PLAY

  We collectively leaned forward and skimmed the article. The first part was the nanny crying about how John couldn’t swim in the lake and how she was always so careful that he not go in past his ankles.

  “ ‘He could never swim. I told Mrs. Cartwright so, and pleaded with her not to take him on the yacht,” the nanny claims,’ ” I read aloud. I looked at my mother, and she raised her eyebrows.

  My mother squinted at the screen and pointed to the third paragraph. “ ‘A guest, who asked to remain anonymous, but was a passenger on the steam yacht when Amelia and John went overboard, claims that she saw Amelia jump and pull the boy with her, as he cried out. She claims they went under and never appeared again. Sources say the lake’s surface where the crash happened was illuminated from the party, from the Chinese lanterns that were released earlier, despite the rain. Two other passengers report the same: that everyone scanned the water for them, but saw nothing. Even the captain is certain that they perished in the lake.’ ”

  I stood up slowly and let out a breath. I could feel my mother and Gerry looking at me as Haley clicked a button to print off the article. The printer whirred to life next to her and spat out a black-and-white copy of the newspaper page. I lifted it and read it once again before I looked up.

  “So it sounds like they died?” Haley slowly twisted around in her chair, and her smile faded when she saw my face. “Oh. I didn’t realize you guys were pulling for a certain outcome.”

  “That’s the thing about research. Sometimes it leads you in directions you don’t want to go in, or never thought were possible,” Gerry said.

  “Or maybe those rich people on the yacht were wrong. Or maybe they had some kind of grudge against the family. We should all know by now that just because someone says something doesn’t make it true, yes?” my mother said. She took the paper from my hand. “It’s just another piece; we still don’t have the whole puzzle.”

  I tried to keep my mother’s words at the forefront as I raced home to pick up Will for his after-school speech therapy. When I was about a half hour from home, my phone rang and my heart sank as I saw it was his elementary school.

  “I’m so sorry to bother you, but I was hoping to grab you for a quick chat.” Miss Ball’s voice came out light.

  “Of course,” I said, swallowing hard. The only times she had ever called, rather than e-mailed, were never for a good reason.

  “Great. I just wanted to give you a heads-up that Will had another tough day today. He seemed agitated from the beginning, likely because another student was making a lot of noise, and stimming near him, and spinning near Will’s desk.” She paused, and I couldn’t help but think, Can you really blame him?

  “Thank you for everything,” I said finally, my voice cracking. “We really appreciate it. I know it’s been a rough start to the year.”

  “Of course. I do want you to know that I think Will is an amazing kid, and will do everything I can to help him,” she said.

  I hung up the phone and thought of how awful Will must have felt all day, alone and scared. And how that morning I had to drag him to the car to go to school. He had collapsed down on the ground as I held his hand, turning into a jellyfish. After several unsuccessful attempts to lift him off the ground, I finally picked him up and carried him to the car, all while avoiding the fists flying at my face. By the time I reached school, both of us were red-faced and shaking.

  All I had ever wanted to do was help him, to see him happy, to see him grow and learn. It was time to make a change. And so before I could stop myself, I left a message for the administrator of Lakewood Academy, asking to set up a tour. I held the image of Will smiling, walking into school, learning, engaging, being part of a community. Maybe even, someday, making a friend. I was still aware of how small and how sad the goals probably looked to someone who didn’t live in our world, but they were ours. And they made sense.

  By the time I reached Will’s speech therapy clinic, the sun had gone down over the horizon, shrouding everything in darkness. While I waited in the waiting room, listening to him cry, I thought back to the library, and of Amelia and John, in the literal darkness of night on the lake. I knew that my own demons came out in full force when the sun fell below the horizon, and wondered just what she might have been thinking when she took her child, who couldn’t swim, on a boat in the middle of a thunderstorm.

  CHAPTER 23

  AMELIA

  By the time the last of the lanterns had been released over the lake, the cake was served, and the guests had settled in for the last part of the evening, the dark clouds had moved closer to the party, covering the sky and blanketing the stars. In the distance across the lake, near Fontana, occasional flashes of lightning peppered the sky, like the flashbulb of the wedding photographer’s camera.

  None of the guests
seemed to notice that the storm approached, or if they did, they didn’t care. The brandy still flowed from the crystal decanters by the bar, the waiters lifting them to pour more liquid into the guests’ glasses. Champagne glasses were drained quickly and easily, with gloved waiters rushing around to refill the empty ones, held out with a flick of a wrist. The noise of the crowd grew, dotted with laughter a bit too loud and a bit less proper.

  Amelia watched the party from an empty table on the edge of the lawn, John next to her, finishing the last of his cake. He ate around the raspberry filling, having tried it and crinkled up his nose, pushing it aside, before he eagerly dug his silver spoon into the custard dotted with chocolate chip pieces. She absentmindedly ran a hand through his soft blond hair, admiring the way it fell back into place after she ruffled it. He had the same hair as his father: fine and straight, always falling correctly into place, whereas she had to use sheer will and determination and more styling products than she cared to admit to tame her curls.

  On the edge of the party, on the dock, she saw Captain Scott dock the Monarch Princesses and let a group of guests off the boat. The dockhands helped them off with outstretched hands, steadying their footing on the white wooden dock. The captain got off the boat, too, and stood on the dock, arms folded, shaking his head as he looked up at the sky. He gave a hand signal to the workers, and they began to pull the canvas cover over the bow, preparing the boat for the storm.

  Amelia’s heart beat faster, and she quickly stood, her chair nearly tipping over behind her, as she grabbed John’s hand. He looked up in surprise, and she signed, “Come,” and pulled him to standing. She walked over to the dock, ignoring the guests who tried to get her attention and congratulate her on the party. More than once, she heard a request to find another waiter for more drinks.

  “Captain, I would like you to take the yacht out for one more ride around the lake,” she said breathlessly when she arrived at his side. She ignored the way her chest constricted, as though her body was telling her with everything it had not to go.