“Oh.” His face fell a little. “They are?”
“Were you hoping to find a work of lighthouse art?”
“No, well … It’s that we’ve just bought a whole collection of lighthouse paintings and photographs.”
“Oh dear … I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“Finn, I wouldn’t use sales in the Haven Point show as a way to gauge the worth of your art,” she said, surprised to see him so distressed.
The look of sorrow disappeared and he grinned mischievously. “Sorry. Couldn’t resist.”
She laughed, but took a discreet step away when she saw that Harriet was still watching them from under her ridiculous hairdo. Fortunately, Gilby chose that moment to tap Harriet on the shoulder and whisper in her ear. It was time for the presentation.
Harriet approached the little podium. She looked toward the bar, nodded imperiously, and waited for someone to hit a glass with a spoon. The room was slow to quiet, but eventually people gathered loosely.
Maren did a quick inventory. Mary Pat was on the periphery of the crowd, monopolizing the attention of a noted local watercolor artist. Pauline had taken up a spot a few yards from Harriet, her back to the staircase that led to the country club’s attic storage.
“Hello, everyone. I am Harriet Barrows,” she began. Harriet used her public voice. It had a distinct modulation, a twinge of Katharine Hepburn’s film accent, so “Hello” sounded more like “Hallow.” “I want to welcome you to the Haven Point art show. As you have seen, we have a marvelous group of artists represented here tonight. I am sure you will all find something you simply can’t live without.” She looked around and beamed as the crowd responded with obligatory laughter.
Finn nudged Maren. He rolled his eyes toward Tilly’s sculpture and raised his eyebrows encouragingly. Maren laughed then glanced toward Mary Pat, but she was whispering to the artist.
As Harriet droned on, Gilby stood mutely at her side. Eventually, Harriet got around to acknowledging her.
“I also want to thank Gilby, who pulled everything together this year. It’s a thankless job with hundreds of little tasks, and she’s been such a sport.” In thanking Gilby, Maren noticed, Harriet also managed to denigrate her work by making it sound menial. Harriet looked down with a kind of maternal pride, as if Gilby were a kindergartener who had just tied her own shoes for the first time.
It was at this moment that Maren noticed with alarm that Sassafras had left Pauline’s shoulder. Though she had not strayed far from Pauline, she had climbed onto the banister, her attention drawn up toward the attic storage. She was a monkey, after all, a climber.
Pauline was still blithely watching Harriet. The banister was only waist-high where she stood, but Sassafras had begun a slow ascent. If she continued, she would soon be behind Harriet, who would be furious at being upstaged.
Maren considered trying to get Pauline’s attention, but she was horrible at reading nonverbal cues and would probably end up making a spectacle of them both. She could walk over and grab Sassy from the banister herself, but that would be even more conspicuous. Maren could not recruit Georgie to step in. She was working the checkout table, and was hidden from view behind one of the temporary walls. All Maren could do was cross her fingers and hope for the best.
Sassy continued to climb, but she slowed a little when she reached a spot behind Gilby, where the banister was shoulder-high. Maren looked around to see if people had noticed anything. A few guests smiled and pointed, but Haven Pointers who knew Sassy were not paying attention. Maren prayed the monkey would stay put.
“All the proceeds from the tickets and a portion of the art sales will go to the Ladies Auxiliary…,” Harriet continued.
To Maren’s dismay, Sassy was soon on the move again. She climbed a little higher until she was over Harriet’s right shoulder. Worse, her eyes were no longer trained toward the attic. From what Maren could tell, the shiny pink bow on top of Harriet’s beehive had caught the monkey’s attention. She cocked her little gray head left and right, which Maren recognized with utter dread as a sign of curiosity.
“And we have continued our efforts at beautification of the entrance to the beach club.…” Harriet’s head bobbed enthusiastically as she spoke, Sassy’s head now bobbing right along. This was a favorite game, one of the few the children still liked to play with her. They would shake their heads back and forth, and Sassy would mirror their movements.
Maren picked up a shift in the room as the crowd began to recognize something more entertaining, or perhaps more treacherous, in Sassy’s behavior. Maren stood paralyzed, not wanting to make a move, but fearing what would happen if she didn’t. She prayed Sassy would resume her climb up the staircase toward the attic, Harriet none the wiser.
It was not to be. One minute, Harriet was talking, beehive and shiny bow bobbing along, Sassy clinging to the banister and mimicking her. Then came the streak of gray, as Sassy leaped onto Harriet’s shoulder and reached her long fingers into her hair, trying to get the bow.
Harriet let loose a shriek. She kept her arms glued to her sides, not wanting to touch the creature. She tucked her chin, pulled her head as far away as she could, and tried to jettison Sassy with a violent shimmying motion.
Sassy grabbed on to the beehive with her nimble fingers and held on, seeming to enjoy the ride. She looked like a water skier, little arms straight and little knees bent, moving to and fro with Harriet’s movements. She finally got hold of the bow and managed to extract it from Harriet’s hairdo, unraveling in the process what was left of the beehive’s construction. Pins dropped to the floor and great chunks of heavily sprayed hair stuck out in every direction.
When a few people moved toward Harriet, Sassy saw it as a sign of danger and jumped from Harriet’s shoulder to the podium, then to the floor. She scampered toward the refreshment table, causing a great movement in the crowd, as half tried to escape and the other half tried to reach down and grab her.
Maren remained glued to her spot, vaguely aware of Finn Donnelly laughing heartily beside her. When Sassy turned and moved in Maren’s direction, the crowd listed again, setting up the next great catastrophe of the night.
It was like watching a movie in slow motion. Billy Chambers, jumping out of Sassy’s way, knocked someone into Tilly’s Greek column pedestal. The sculpture teetered and began to roll off. Tilly’s mouth formed a perfect O of terror.
With lightning reflexes Maren would not have expected from such a large man, Finn darted forward and managed to grab the sculpture with one of his giant hands. One of the four bars of the bell buoy broke, but he got his other great paw under the base and kept it from hitting the ground.
Sassy was near enough now for Maren to reach out and grab her. The monkey, evidently ready for the adventure to end, took refuge on Maren’s shoulder.
A din of both laughter and alarm remained, but the crowd mostly stopped its motion. As it quieted, Maren felt dozens of eyes on her. Standing with Sassy, she realized, had the effect of making her look complicit.
She wanted to point at Pauline and scream, “This infernal monkey belongs to her! My husband’s mother!” But her acting abilities were spent after their week of exercise, and she found she could only look back mutely. She had no idea how to behave.
Harriet shot Maren a murderous look as Gilby led her toward the ladies’ room, presumably to try to repair the catastrophe that was her hair. Maren knew Harriet would find a hundred ways to retaliate.
What’s more, Pauline was now threading her way through the crowd toward Maren, a hazy look in her eyes. Somehow, in all this, she had managed to get drunk.
“Pauline, I think we’d better be going,” Maren said, her voice quavering.
“Hello, Sassy, you naughty little monkey,” Pauline said, not a shred of remorse in her tone. She held out her arm. Sassy climbed on, and up to her shoulder.
“Pauline, it’s time to go,” Maren repeated, the effort to control her voice and expression now hercule
an.
“Um, excuse me.” A voice came from behind her. It was Tilly, irate, holding the bell buoy in one hand, its one broken arm in the other.
“Oh … Tilly…”
It was the final insult. Overpowered by her week of indignity, anguish, and humiliation, Maren felt tears threatening. A number of people continued to stare, either blatantly or stealthily.
I must get out of this room, she thought.
“I … I … I will buy…” She wanted to say she would pay for the sculpture, anything to end the scene, but she couldn’t form the words.
“Mrs. Demarest, you can’t have this sculpture. It’s mine!” Finn said in a voice filled with hearty good nature. “I’ve had my eye on it since I got here. I have just the place for it.”
Tilly looked skeptical. She thought her art belonged in deserving homes, and clearly assumed this brute was no aficionado.
“Really,” Finn said, pulling out his wallet. “I’ve been wanting a…” He looked at the thing, stumped.
“Bell buoy,” Maren whispered.
“Bell boy,” Finn said, covering the error with a charming smile. “All the better for the little imperfection. I love it.” He looked at Tilly with great enthusiasm.
“Well, all right, then.”
With Tilly somewhat assuaged, the last of the gawkers lost interest, and Maren felt she might breathe again. Finn pulled a wad of bills out of his wallet.
“Finn, you pay over there,” Maren said. The episode had finally aroused her sense of the absurd. The thought of Finn’s “bell boy” sculpture made her smile.
“Come show me what to do,” Finn said. He caught her eye, and she saw something in his expression. Concern? Compassion? Maren led him to the table by the door where Georgie and Maude took payments, Pauline and Sassy trailing behind.
While Georgie prepared a receipt, Maren turned to Finn.
“Thank you,” she said in a quiet voice.
“I should thank you,” he said with a smile. “I might have bought a lighthouse if you hadn’t steered me right.”
* * *
When Maren finally got ready for bed, as exhausted as she ever remembered being, she heard a sound from Pauline’s room. It had an odd quality, almost like coughing. She crept into the hallway and listened at Pauline’s door.
The sound was muffled, as if into a pillow, but after a second Maren was able to identify it.
It was laughter.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The next morning, half-awakened thoughts swam in Maren’s mind. Her first reaction was to groan at the memory of Sassy clinging to Harriet’s hair, but she shook it off and tried to objectively measure the night’s events against what she had hoped to accomplish.
The Sassy disaster notwithstanding, she decided it had not been all bad. She hadn’t planned to become the center of attention, but she did not think she had behaved in a way that would confirm any chatter about her and Oliver.
She did regret allowing Finn Donnelly to buy Tilly’s ghastly sculpture. She could only imagine how Mary Pat felt about his act of chivalry. She recalled the incident years before when Finn had picked her up on the side of the road during a thunderstorm. She doubted Mary Pat was aware that this was the second time her husband had saved Maren from a difficult circumstance, but it unnerved her to again be in his debt.
I should buy it back, she thought. Even if he demurred, she could at least thank them. Doing so in person, and immediately, would surely dampen any suspicion Mary Pat might harbor.
She rose, dressed, and quickly got the kids fed and off to their various destinations before heading down the hill. It was low tide, so she walked down the nearly empty beach, past the rocks, and onto the Donnelly property. She took the flagstone path that ran alongside their great lawn, around the house to the front door.
The noise and disruption during the construction of their house had not been the end of the Donnellys’ payback. The huge house was also magnificent retribution. It was hard to imagine a structure less in keeping with Haven Point architecture. Maren had not seen the inside of the house, and as she rang the doorbell, her curiosity began to conquer her flat mood.
She expected to hear barking and children, but no sound came from inside. Just as she was about to turn around, Finn opened the door.
“Maren Demarest,” he said, a look of curiosity in his intense blue eyes. “Please come in.”
“Hello, Finn.” She stepped into the foyer. It was obvious at a glance that the interior was every bit as incongruous with Haven Point as the exterior. No unfinished panel walls or over-painted doors, this house was all gleaming surfaces and hanging lamps. The first floor was an open plan design, built out over several levels, likely a workaround to the oddly shaped lot.
The furniture was sleek and low. Built-in cabinets with glass shelves flanked a great fireplace. A spiral staircase in the corner led to the floor above. There was plenty of color, but lines were crisp and the overall effect sterile, precise. Other than a tennis racquet in the front hall and a jacket over a dining room chair, there were few hints of family life. Surprising, considering the size of the family. Mary Pat apparently ran a tight ship.
Finn gestured toward the sunken living room. She stepped into it and took a seat on a red leather love seat with a low back.
“May I get you a drink?”
“No, thank you,” she said, looking around. “This is quite a home. I can see you all put a lot of work into it.”
“Mary Pat told the decorator to watch the movie Pillow Talk and take it from there,” he said as he sat opposite her, in a black one-armed chair that made him look even larger. He looked around, too, as if seeing it for the first time.
Her perch offered a glimpse out sliding glass doors to their expanse of lawn and stretch of beach below. A great portion of the view was dominated by the rocks that separated their property from Haven Point. They looked even darker and craggier from up here. Haven Point kids had agitated for a path through the thicket above the sea wall, but the Haven Point Association was not interested in easing access to or from the Donnelly compound.
“I came by to thank you, and Mary Pat, too. You saved us from an awkward moment last night, as I’m sure you know.…” She looked around again.
“Mary Pat took the kids to Peaks Island,” Finn said, as if reading her mind. “We’re alone.”
Maren felt herself flush involuntarily. “Oh, well, I am sorry to miss her. I had hoped you and Mary Pat would let me buy the sculpture from you. I know you can’t possibly want it.”
A sly smile spread across his face. “Actually, I have plans for it.”
“You do?” She glanced around. He couldn’t possibly mean to keep it in this house.
“Oh, not here, of course. I plan to donate it to the Haven Point Yacht Club.”
Maren smiled. “So, I assume you know Tilly Barnsworth is a member?”
“You can assume that, yes.”
“And of course you know how much she would love for her great work to be displayed there.”
“Yes. Indeed, I do.” He seemed pleased with himself. “And I can’t imagine they could find a reason to turn her down.”
Maren laughed out loud, and Finn’s smile broadened, as if he was happy to have amused her.
“I thought you’d appreciate it,” he said.
She did admire the good cheer with which he continued to stick it in Haven Point’s eye, but she had always found it odd that Finn treated her like a co-conspirator. While hardly the core of Haven Point society, until this week Maren would not have considered herself the outsider Finn seemed to think she was.
Now Khaki’s words echoed in her mind. She didn’t belong with Oliver, Khaki had said. Perhaps it was common knowledge that she was trying to live above her station, so obvious even Finn had picked up on it.
“That was quite an incident with that monkey last night,” Finn continued.
“It was awful,” she said.
“For you, no doubt, but I have to adm
it, it was rather entertaining. I seem to remember your mother-in-law putting you in a bad spot a few years back.”
She felt at a disadvantage now that he’d pointed out her double indebtedness.
“Yes. Your timing was impeccable yet again,” she said with a polite smile. “Thank you.”
To her relief, he waved it off and changed the subject. “That girl of yours, Annie, she’s a favorite of my Patrick’s.”
“Yes, I’ve seen a lot of Patrick this summer. He’s very well mannered.”
“Mary Pat’s whipped them in shape. She won’t have anyone there saying the kids aren’t raised as well as the others.” He gestured in the general direction of Haven Point.
Maren was sure people had indeed said that about the Donnelly kids, but she hadn’t and wouldn’t. She despised Haven Point’s tendency to ascribe sins of fathers onto children, how the worst-behaved child of an old Haven Point family wore a halo, while the best-behaved Donnelly child was suspect.
“Annie’s full of it, isn’t she?” he asked, smiling.
“She’s got a lot of spirit,” Maren replied, then added with a small laugh, “I know I might be understating the case.”
“Well, I like a girl with spirit.” Finn looked at her pointedly and paused to let his comment sink in. When she didn’t say anything, he continued. “So, you’re here all summer.”
“I am,” Maren replied. “Middle of June through Labor Day.”
“How do you like that?”
“Considering our alternative is summer in Washington, D.C., what’s not to like?”
“Oh, I could think of a dozen things not to like,” he said with a small laugh. He was on his turf now, safe and sure.
“It’s lovely for the children,” she said, though without much enthusiasm.
“How often does your husband come up?”
“Not often.”
If possible, Finn’s gaze was even more intense now. Maren felt as if she were crossing a stream on small, slippery stones.
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