The Vanishing Expert

by David Movsesian

  “I’m selective about the people I choose to have in my home,” Ben finally said. It took James a few seconds to remember the question Ben was answering. “I invite people I trust, people who can appreciate this place.” He regarded James and waited until their eyes met. “Obviously, you’re one of those people, James. But, no, I don’t have a lot of guests.”

  “You don’t get lonely?” James asked him.

  “If I want to be around people all I have to do is go into town,” Ben said. “I know where they are. But this is my sanctuary. I like to have it to myself.”

  James laughed to himself. “You’re not making the best argument against the recluse theory,” he offered.

  Ben smiled. “I suppose not.” He looked down at William, whose eyelids were growing heavier. In a moment, the boy was asleep in his arms, and as Ben gazed down upon him, a temporary repose washed over him as if William was pulling Ben with him into his dreams.

  The truth was that Ben hadn’t known real peace since Rose’s death some forty years earlier. He’d lived these last four decades tortured by the questions of what more he might have done to protect her. That he hadn’t been able to remained the great failing of his life. It overshadowed all the others— there were many, he knew, but they were all trivial by comparison. At times, he found himself concentrating on the events of that day and the horrific months that followed with such single-minded focus that he almost believed he could will himself back to that time and alter one event that would change everything else for him. But even if he could, what was that one event?

  It wasn’t the light switch. Deep down, he knew that to be true. Even if he’d turned on the light and discovered what Rose had done, it would have been too late. He might have saved her from herself that night, but the damage had already been done months earlier. By the time she took the pills, she wasn’t Rose anymore; someone had already stolen that from her, from both of them.

  James observed the change in Ben’s expression as he watched William sleeping. It started as peaceful and grew suddenly darker. Then Ben looked up and gazed out toward the water. James said nothing, silently studying Ben’s face as he slowly returned to himself. When Ben finally glanced over at James, he seemed to have returned from whatever dark place he’d briefly visited. He was Ben again.

  Ben looked again in the direction of the harbor. “I planted those Rose bushes on Rose’s birthday in 1968, the year after I bought this place.”

  James realized then that it wasn’t the view of the pristine harbor that had restored Ben a moment earlier; he’d been looking at the roses.

  “She loved those wild rose bushes that grow on the coast, and whenever we walked along the shore, she used to love to pick one of the flowers and carry it with her.” His voice was soft, and he never looked at James. He seemed to be speaking as much for the benefit of the breeze and the water and the roses as he was to his companion. “Sometimes she’d put it in her hair and she’d just smile at me, all pretty and satisfied with herself, as if anything could have made her more beautiful.” He smiled faintly as if he were picturing his young wife standing before him, beaming, a pink rose tucked neatly behind her delicate ear.

  James looked out at the rose bushes. They’d bloomed in the spring and the flowers had since withered and fallen away. James wouldn’t have recognized them as roses at all, certainly not from there on the porch, had Ben not told him. He saw only a lush green hedge that separated them from the long slope leading down to the rocky shore.

  “Whenever I’m thinking about my Rose, I come out here and I just sit and look at those rose bushes and I think about how happy they’d make her.” He turned and looked at James again, his peaceful expression having returned. “They calm me.”

  It was the most Ben had ever said to James on the subject of his late wife, and James didn’t want to spoil the moment by speaking. Instead, he reached out and placed his hand on Ben’s shoulder, giving it a pat, and then letting it go before it could be mistaken for pity.

  Ben looked down at William, still sleeping soundly in his arms, and he smiled. “We never got to have one of these,” he said. “We both wanted to, but—” He stopped, thinking back on the year they’d tried to conceive a child.

  As he always did whenever he considered that other great failing of his life— his failure to give Rose the child she so desperately wanted— his thoughts found their way back to the Filipino prostitute. He could still picture her face, dark and exotic, and the almost childlike smallness of her body as she nimbly stepped out of her dress. ‘Cheap, cheap,’ she’d told him earlier in the street, and she was, but she’d cost him so much more than the few dollars he’d given her. If he’d been able to give Rose a baby, perhaps she would have stayed home that afternoon in 1952 and that animal would never have found her. Could it be that the one event he would have to change to save Rose went as far back as the thirty minutes he spent with that prostitute in that squalid little room over the butcher shop in 1943, three years before he’d even met his wife? She’d taken his virginity and his cash, but had she somehow managed to take his Rose as well?

  “You don’t usually talk about her,” James finally said. He was careful not to speak her name, as if it might insult his friend to hear that sacred word coming from anyone else’s lips but his own.

  Ben continued to look down at William. “Some days she’s all I want to talk about,” he said.

  James wondered what it must be like to love one person so completely and for so long, for a lifetime. Was it even conceivable to love someone so fervently for that long, or was that only possible if they’re taken from you too soon? Their imperfections fade away, leaving only a falsely immaculate image of them, so that your love is based on an incomplete, and thus imperfect, memory of them.

  It was how James remembered his mother, so perfect in his memory that she very nearly glowed in his random images of her. He’d kept only two photographs of her— one of her with his father on their wedding day, squinting into the sun; in the other she’s smiling as she places a birthday cake with a single candle before him on the table. Whenever he looked at those photographs, he was often surprised that she only marginally resembled those luminous images of her that he held in his mind, his perfectly imperfect memory of her.

  Ben abruptly stood up. He turned and placed William into James’s arms and, without a word, quickly disappeared into the house, the screen door slapping shut behind him, punctuating his departure. James could hear the clinking of glasses inside, and when his host returned, he carried two glasses, handing one to James.

  “Scotch,” Ben announced. “You don’t have to drink it if you don’t want to, but I suddenly needed a splash and I didn’t want to be rude.”

  “Thanks,” James said. He smiled awkwardly, cradling his son in one arm and holding the glass of scotch in the other. “I probably shouldn’t. I have to drive.”

  “Of course,” Ben said, apologetically. He took the glass from James and placed it on the low table before them. “It’s there if you change your mind.”

  “I’m sorry to waste it,” James said.

  “It won’t go to waste,” Ben assured him. “Good scotch never does.” He raised his glass in front of his face and swirled the liquid, breathing in its aroma. Then he took a healthy sip, holding it in his mouth, savoring it, before closing his eyes and finally swallowing it. He raised the glass again, studying the amber liquid. Once he’d emptied his glass, Ben reached over and patted James on the knee. “Why don’t you come inside?” he said. “I’ll show you around the place.”

  It occurred to James for a moment that an invitation into Ben’s house had to be earned. He wondered if some of Ben’s guests never made it past the porch. He didn’t know what he’d done to prove himself worthy, but he was grateful for the invitation, so he followed Ben inside.

  Passing through the screen door, he found himself in a large room with a high ceiling. The light streaming in from the large windows and splashing
over the dark wood showed the room to be rustic and inviting. The floors were a wide-planked wood that looked well-worn and still somehow well-kept. On the wall to the left was a large stone fireplace that appeared to have been made with the same stone he’d seen on the foundation when he arrived. The fireplace was so large he would barely have to stoop to step inside it. Directly in front of it, two large leather sofas faced each other a few feet from the stone hearth; beneath them, a large braided rug. On the plaster walls, which were painted an off-white, hung paintings that were distinctly Maine— a lighthouse upon a rocky ledge, a three-masted schooner moored in a peaceful harbor, a lobsterman hauling traps.

  James’s gaze followed the paintings until they led him back to the wall nearest him. To his left, a few feet from the door through which they’d just entered was the bar where Ben must have poured the glasses of scotch a short time earlier. Over it hung a framed navigational map of the waters surrounding Mount Desert Island. Just beyond the bar was a long mahogany trestle table that rested beneath a large window overlooking the same view of the harbor they had just been observing from the porch.

  “This is where I spend most of my time,” Ben said. “It’s my favorite room in the house.”

  To the right, through a wide doorway with two French doors splayed open, was the formal dining room. Compared to the somewhat rustic look of the great room where they were standing, the antique dining room table, hutch and server seemed out of place.

  “The previous owner left the dining room furniture,” Ben offered as if he knew what James was thinking. “It doesn’t get much use.”

  As they walked from the dining room to the kitchen, they passed through a butler’s pantry. James remarked that it was actually larger than the kitchen in his former apartment at Ruth Kennedy’s house.

  The kitchen itself was spacious. It was originally a servant’s kitchen that was typical of many of the old mansions— the once summer “cottages” to the privileged class who originally built them— large and practical and without pretense since no one but the servants ever set foot in there. With the exception of some new appliances, it appeared that Ben had done little to update the kitchen. Everything else— the cabinets, the counter, even the floor— appeared to be original to the house. Some of the cabinets actually appeared to be in need of repair.

  What was just as apparent was that Ben used the kitchen not only for preparing his meals but also for dining. At the center of the room was a sturdy yet simple maple table with a single placemat where he frequently dined alone. At the center of the table were glass salt and pepper shakers and a white porcelain sugar bowl with small pink flowers painted on the top— it was one of the first things Rose had purchased when they first moved into their house in Portland some forty years earlier.

  “This all looks original,” James remarked.

  “It is,” Ben said. “The way I see it is that too many people buy these old beauties and then try to make them new. I want this place to always look like it did at the beginning. I’ve upgraded the plumbing and the electric and the heat, but I never want to change the feel of the place. I like it the way it is.”

  James shared Ben’s sentiment about old buildings; it was why he loved what he did for a living. It was why he enjoyed Ruth’s cozy kitchen and the little market on Main Street in Southwest Harbor, with its old fixtures and its wooden floor worn smooth by the trampling of the heavy shoes of generations of customers. But he’d expected that a man of Ben Jordan’s extraordinary wealth would have surrounded himself with the finest things, so he was surprised to see how simply Ben lived.

  When James thought about it, he realized it shouldn’t have come as a surprise at all. Ben had never flaunted his wealth. He’d never seemed to give it a second thought, and if anyone had ever considered that Ben’s casual attitude toward his vast fortune was an affectation, seeing his home would have immediately dispelled that notion. Ben was exactly who he seemed to be.

  “There’s two more floors, and a bunch of rooms up there, but most of them are closed off. I have a bedroom up there and a bathroom, but often as not, I’ll sleep down here on one of the couches.” It sounded sad to James but he saw that Ben was wearing a peaceful smile. “On hot nights, I might even sleep in that old hammock out there on the porch.”

  They were back in the great room standing near the impressive stone fireplace. Everything about the house seemed big, and James decided that Ben suddenly appeared very small, if only in relation to the enormous space in which he lived.

  “It’s a lot of house,” James finally said. He regarded Ben with a look of concern. “I know you said you’re not, but I can’t help but think you must get lonely.”

  Ben shook his head slightly, but his expression, which had been relaxed and light a moment earlier, was suddenly darker. “I know what lonely feels like,” he said. “And most days I’m not.” Ben glanced down at William who stirred slightly in James’s arms but remained asleep. “But anytime you want to come by with this little guy, you know you’re welcome.” He lightly touched William’s tiny arm, and smiled at James. “Bring your lovely wife with you sometime. It’d be nice to get to know her.”

  James brightened. “She’d like that, too,” he said. “And she’d love to see the place.” He scanned the room again. “Of course, she’ll think it needs a woman’s touch.”

  “She’d be right,” Ben said.

  They spent the next two hours where they’d started, on the porch overlooking the harbor, in the very same chairs. At one point, they walked down to the hedge to get a closer look at the rose bushes— Rose’s roses, Ben called them, though she’d never lived there; she’d never seen them. Ben pointed out a narrow path that led down to the rocky shore, but they decided not to venture down it while James was holding William. Another time, they agreed, as James was eager to see it.

  He’d get his chance the following Sunday morning when he returned, this time with William and Ruth Kennedy. When, on his first visit, James had mentioned his Sunday morning ritual in Ruth Kennedy’s kitchen, and Ruth’s delicious blueberry muffins, he’d seen Ben’s expression brighten. It took very little convincing for Ben to extend an invitation to move that ritual, at least for that week, to Ben’s home.

  It took even less to convince Ruth, who was delighted by the idea. She’d always been curious about Ben Jordan, and although they’d met briefly on one occasion, years earlier, they hadn’t exchanged more than a polite greeting. Seeing his home, particularly after James had gone on about it after his visit, was too great an opportunity to resist.

  Arriving at Ben’s home, James carried William toward the front steps while Ruth carried a basket filled with her muffins, fresh out of the oven. Knowing where Ben was likely to be, rather than ring the bell, James ushered Ruth along the porch, turning once toward the sea, and a second time to find Ben in his familiar chair overlooking the harbor.

  Ben gave no indication that he’d noticed their arrival. He seemed particularly preoccupied by something on the horizon, and from where James stood, he couldn’t be sure if it was the harbor or Rose’s roses that had his attention. James waited a moment before announcing himself, not wanting to startle their host, particularly if it was the roses that had engaged him.

  “There’s a pretty two-masted schooner coming into the harbor,” Ben offered, as if they had already dispensed with their greetings. It was the first indication that Ben was aware of their arrival.

  “Hi, Ben,” James said, approaching him. “This is Ruth Kennedy.”

  Ben stood quickly and turned to face his guests. “Of course,” he said. He took her free hand in both of his. “We’ve met, I think, but it’s been some time.”

  Ruth glowed with the suggestion that Ben Jordan had remembered their one brief meeting. “You have a beautiful home,” Ruth offered.

  “You’ve hardly seen it,” Ben said cheerfully. “I’ll give you a proper tour in a bit. But first—” He extended his arms to James who placed William
in them. With his free hand, Ben touched William’s hands and then his feet, as if he were taking an inventory of the boy’s fingers and toes. He raised the boy up and sniffed the top of his head, the same euphoric expression appearing on his face that James had witnessed a week earlier when Ben had done the same with his glass of single malt scotch. “Is it just me or does a baby just have the most wonderful smell?”

  James chuckled. “You might change your tune about that in a few minutes,” he suggested. “He had his breakfast just before we came over here.”

  Ben directed his guests to the small round table just on the far side of the screen door. The table had been clear on James’s first visit, but this morning there were three place settings neatly laid out facing the harbor. While James and Ruth took their places at the table, Ben hurried inside, returning a moment later with an urn of coffee and a tall pitcher of orange juice.

  With each bite, Ben sighed with pleasure, and James observed Ruth’s delight in watching their host consume a second muffin and then a third. James knew by her expression that there was no greater compliment he could have paid her.

  “I was meaning to apologize to you for intruding on your Sunday routine,” Ben said to Ruth, “but after tasting your wonderful cooking, I’m not the least bit sorry.” Ruth beamed and Ben reached out and touched her hand, giving it a gentle pat.

  After breakfast, James and Ben set out down the path that led to the rocky shore; Ruth was content to remain behind with William.

  The path wasn’t visible from the porch. There was little more than a narrow entrance at the right edge of the rose hedge and then the path turned quickly back on itself and dipped behind it. It became a narrow curving slice amid the scrub leading gradually downward until it yielded to the rocky shore. The first stones were smaller and jagged and would have been difficult to walk on were it not for a path that only Ben could see, having walked it so many mornings on his own, every day for decades, until it was as much a habit as it was a path.