The Sense of Reckoning

by Matty Dalrymple

  It was an article about the Golden Age of Bar Harbor and the summer “cottages” that the fabulously rich—the Vanderbilts, the Pulitzers, the McCormicks—built there. She scrolled through images of summer homes the size and opulence of extravagant city halls. In one, two women in Victorian garb sat down to an al fresco tea at an enormous mahogany table that must have been transported with backbreaking effort from the dining room. In the background were gardens that would have required an army of caretakers to maintain.

  It had all come to an end in 1947, when fire swept across the eastern side of the island, burning many of those estates to the ground. She happened upon a series of before-and-after photos—mansions reduced to nothing but their chimneys and the pillars that had flanked their entrances.

  One article included a photograph of a man and woman standing in an elegantly decorated mid-century room. The caption read:

  Jardin d’Eden, the summer home of Mr. and Mrs. James Furness, was one of the casualties of the fire. The cottage, first thought to be out of danger until a shift of the wind drove the flames toward Bar Harbor, burned to the ground along with Mr. Furness’s priceless art collection, including this recent acquisition ...

  Ann zoomed in on the painting. The reproduction of the photograph was poor and the original had likely been grainy to start with, but she felt the thud of recognition—this was the painting in the secret compartment. Garrick wasn’t on his way to resolve a sibling dispute over a father’s inheritance. He was going to reveal the location of a priceless masterwork to a desperate woman who might do anything to save her family’s legacy.

  Chapter 37

  1947

  Even with the fire roaring at the crest of Great Hill and the evacuation sirens wailing from Bar Harbor—even with the glass of the window gone where he had crashed into the room, the drapes puddled at his feet—a stillness presided in the library of Jardin d’Eden. Chip kicked the drapes away.

  He crossed the room to The Lady and her eyes followed him. Those eyes were quiet and sad—her life had been difficult and people cruel, he could tell. But he wasn’t a child anymore, and he could protect her.

  What would be the best way to get her away? The painting was a little more than three feet tall and a little less than three feet wide, surrounded by a carved, gilded wooden frame. He though briefly of trying to remove the painting from the frame, but he was afraid that he might damage it in the process. Furthermore, although the frame would make the painting more awkward to carry, it would provide some protection. He wished he knew what had become of the crate he was sure the painting had been shipped in, but he didn’t have time to go looking for it. He needed to wrap it in something—he needed a large cloth.

  He crossed to the door to the hallway. Despite the fact that he remembered carrying the boxes of Mrs. Furness’s china and paperweights out to the truck without Pritchard relocking the library door, he still heaved a sigh of relief when it opened. But his relief was cut short when he looked across the hall through the open doors of the dining room and the large arched windows beyond. Flames were creeping down the hillside like soldiers crossing no man’s land on elbows and knees. The air was thickening with the advance guard of the smoke.

  Chip crossed the hallway to the dining room. He expected to have to search through the stack of linen tablecloths in the breakfront, but there was a tablecloth on the table. He snatched the corner and gave it a yank, sending a large brass candelabra and a pair of Oriental-looking porcelain dog statues crashing to the floor. Returning to the library, he lay the tablecloth on the floor, then lifted The Lady carefully off the wall.

  “It’s going to be okay,” he murmured, trying to convince himself as much as his helpless charge.

  He lowered The Lady onto the cloth and folded it around her. His hands shook, but he tried not to rush—it would be no good to come this far to rescue her and then have himself rather than the fire be the one to damage her. Once she was bundled into her cocoon of cloth, he would have liked to have found twine to tie up the package, but the stillness of the library was now being overtaken by the sounds of alarms and destruction coming from beyond the broken window. He tucked the corners of the tablecloth into the bundle to hold it in place.

  He gathered up the awkward package and headed down the hallway to the front door.

  When he opened the door, the heat hit him like a physical blow—he could feel his exposed skin shrinking from the onslaught. The creeping vanguard of flames he had seen from the dining room had turned into an all-out assault, fire rolling from tree to tree like a crashing wave. Now the howling wind was carrying not just ash but burning cinders that pricked his skin.

  He ran down the drive, The Lady turned away from the flames, keeping his body between her and the scorching heat. He managed to scramble over the downed tree without putting her down. When he got to the truck, he eased her into the passenger side, then skittered around to the driver’s side. His heart was hammering and his lungs ached to take deep gulps of air, but he forced himself to breathe shallowly, every breath singeing his throat. The truck started on the first try, as if it were as anxious to escape Jardin as Chip was. He got the truck turned around in a frenzied series of back-and-forths. He hit the gas, but then almost immediately slammed on the brakes.

  The fire had progressed down the hill more quickly here than directly above the house. Partway down the drive, fire burned on both sides, flames licking up the trunks, the tops of the trees torching. He saw movement and realized that small animals—a rabbit and several squirrels—were making their escape from the flames down the drive.

  The fire-born wind was shrieking. Chip heard a crack and saw a tree fall, its top brushing the border of the drive. He hit the gas and shot past the burning tree just as he heard another crack and crash, accompanied by the fingernails-on-a-chalkboard screech of a branch on the truck’s back window.

  At the bottom of the drive he turned to look back at Jardin. Flames were licking at the eaves and smoke boiled off the roof. Red-hot cinders spun out of the woods and a carefully manicured bush next to the front door burst into flame. He turned back to the road and accelerated, and narrowly missed a deer that shot out of the woods just yards ahead of the flames and bounded down Great Hill.

  When Chip reached the bottom of the drive, the smoke and flames forced him back to Eden Street and into Bar Harbor. He made his way back into Bar Harbor on Mount Desert Street and then turned right onto Main Street. At the fork south of the village, most traffic turned left to follow Schooner Head Road along the shore, but Chip took the right fork onto Otter Creek Road, hoping the faster progress enabled by fewer cars would compensate for the fact that its more westerly route would take him nearer to the fire.

  Abetted by the smoke that his headlights barely cut through, late afternoon turned to a livid dusk as the slow caravan made its way through Otter Creek and Seal Harbor, past Asticou and up Sound Drive. When they reached the top of Somes Sound, most of the cars turned right to make the dash across Mount Desert Narrows via the only bridge to the mainland, but Chip turned left, passing through Somesville and then cutting across the western “claw” on Pretty Marsh Road.

  It was dark by the time he reached the turnoff to Lynam’s Point, although the sky to the east glowed orange, like a ghastly sunset in some backward version of the world. The howling wind had died down to a light westerly breeze, so the air held only a hint of the tang of the fire.

  Chip wended his way around the peninsula toward the hotel. Now that he had, at least for the moment, escaped the fire, the subject of his anxiety switched to the reception that would greet him when he reached home. Had his father gotten Chip’s message from Eliot? Perhaps Eliot had decided to take his belongings to the airport on the mainland after all. His father had never hit him, but then Chip had never committed a transgression of this magnitude—disappearing with the truck for so long when it was no doubt badly needed at the hotel.

  He decided that his father hitting him would not be so bad. H
e was taller than his father now, and broader—he could track the weight his father had lost in the last few years by the markings on the notches of his leather belt. He realized that he was not so concerned about any physical damage his father might inflict on him—or about the humiliation of the tongue-lashing he likely faced—but what about The Lady? What if his father found her before Chip had a chance to hide her?

  Chip had just reached the stone pillars that marked the edge of the Lynam property and was considering turning around to find a hiding place for the painting outside the hotel grounds when his headlights picked out a shape moving into the road. It was his father.

  He had to keep his father away from the truck until he had gotten The Lady out. Chip jumped out of the truck and walked quickly toward where his father stood, ready to accept his punishment as long as he could keep The Lady safe.

  In the glare of the headlights, Chip could see that his father was even more pale than usual, his posture more stooped. There was something wild in his eyes.

  Chip stopped in front of him. “I’m sorry, Dad, I had to help at Jardin.”

  His father’s mouth worked and at last he choked out, “You ... where ... I thought ...” and then burst into tears.

  His father covered his face with his hands, his shoulders shaking, as Chip stood before him, mouth agape. Long moments passed, punctuated only by the sobs his father was trying to hold back. Finally, his father made some jerky motion with his hands that Chip thought was intended to shoo him back to the truck, then he turned away and began a stumbling walk back toward the hotel.

  Chip stood rooted to the ground until his father’s figure had faded into the darkness, then he turned and made his way slowly back to the truck. He climbed in, feeling like an old man himself. He rested his hand on the bulky package beside him.

  “I think he ...” But he didn’t know what to say.

  *****

  When Chip got to the hotel, having parked the truck as far from the house as he felt he could without arousing suspicion, he found their small band of evacuees, increased by a few since he had left, in the kitchen making pies. This past summer had been the first since the war that sugar wasn’t rationed, and there had been a frenzy of pie-baking, as if the island’s bakers were making up for lost time.

  They said his father had gone out for a walk a few hours ago, but they were sure he would be back soon.

  Eventually, the group drifted onto the veranda and Chip seized the opportunity to carry The Lady up to his room, the same room he had occupied as a child. He had little immediate fear that he would be displaced—unless there was a huge influx of evacuees, they could house any additions in the guest rooms without having to resort to using the family quarters on the top floor. He slipped The Lady under his bed, hidden behind that same board that had protected Timothy until his father had moved the bed. He didn’t like the unceremoniousness of her position, but he knew it would be only temporary—he knew where he was going to hide her.

  He didn’t see his father until the next morning, in the second floor hallway, carrying an armload of sheets. His father wouldn’t meet his eyes, and eventually gave him some chores to do which kept him outdoors for the day. Chip stayed close to the hotel, not wanting to invite a repeat of his father’s reaction of the night before, and plotted how he would keep The Lady safe.

  Chapter 38

  Pushing away her iPad, Ann glanced at her watch—a little after ten. Garrick was likely already at the hotel, but she dialed his office number nonetheless. No answer. If Garrick carried a cellphone, she didn’t know the number.

  She dialed Scott’s cellphone and was eventually greeted by his voicemail: “Hello, this is Scott, please leave a message and I’ll get right back to you.”

  “Scott, it’s Ann. I need to get in touch with Garrick right away and I need you to drive me. Can you come back? Call me if you get this message.”

  She stood and paced into the living room, where she stared into the now-dying fire. Should she call the police? But what if Garrick, rather than being in danger, was complicit with Ellen Lynam—it sounded as if they were friends, or had been at one time. She paced back to the dining room. But if Garrick was in collusion with Ellen, wouldn’t it have been risky to involve Ann? On the other hand, if both Garrick and Ellen needed information from Loring, and Loring wouldn’t provide it to Garrick and couldn’t provide it to Ellen, maybe involving Ann was the only option they had.

  She shook her head. She just couldn’t see Garrick being involved in a scheme involving stolen artwork—it wouldn’t have fit with his sense of propriety.

  If she could get to the hotel, where she assumed Garrick and Ellen were, she could come up with some excuse about the wedding—it didn’t even have to be a believable excuse, just anything to get Garrick away from Ellen.

  She walked to the front window, pushed the curtain open, and looked out into a black night lit only by the almost-full moon. It must have rained earlier, but the temperature had evidently dropped—she saw a car make its slow way down the road, its headlights illuminating the black sheen of ice. She began to turn back to the room when something caught her eye and she returned to the window. Audrey was in the parking lot of the inn. Evidently Mace and Scott had taken Mace’s car to the jazz club.

  Ann hurried up the stairs to Scott’s room and tried the door—unlocked. She went to an armoire and opened it. Scott’s extra pants and shirts were hung inside, a pair of hiking boots arranged neatly on the floor. She patted the pockets of the pant guiltily, listening for the jingle of keys. Nothing. Closing the armoire, she scanned the dresser tops and the bedside table—it only held the book of Mt. Desert trivia and the book Garrick had loaned Scott. Why would he have taken the keys if he wasn’t driving? She looked through the drawers of the dresser and even peeked inside the toiletry bag in the bathroom—still nothing. With a rising sense of panic, she started back downstairs to put in another call to Scott, then paused and retraced her steps to his room. She went to the bedside table and flipped open the Mt. Desert book. Scott’s keyring was marking his place—a photo that the caption identified as Great Hill looking toward Bar Harbor, a stripe of red autumn foliage running from the hill to the town.

  She returned to her room and replaced the shoes she was wearing with her hiking boots and pulled on her parka, stuffing her gloves and cap into her knapsack. Back downstairs she tried Garrick’s and Scott’s phones again—still no answer. She sent a text to Scott—“Pls call me”—and paced the downstairs for five minutes waiting for a response.

  Finally, stuffing her iPad into the knapsack, she let herself out the front door of the inn and began to make her way to the parking lot. She had to slow her pace when she barely recovered, arms pinwheeling, from a slide on the icy walkway.

  She got to the car without mishap, adjusted the seat, and started it up. Then she turned it off.

  What trouble might she get into if she drove to the hotel? She tried to push her concern for Garrick to the back of her mind and open her senses to her environment. Was there any indication of Biden Firth, or any other spirit, in the car with her? She couldn’t sense anything other than her own agitation. She was suddenly angry—Garrick couldn’t even tell if what was surrounding her was a spirit at all. Maybe all the caution about having Scott drive her was a farce; maybe she wasn’t suffering from anything more serious than clumsiness. She was sick and goddamned tired of being afraid of a ghost that might not even exist.

  She started the car again and, taking a deep breath, backed it out of its parking space and began her slow drive to Lynam’s Point Hotel.

  In the daylight, she might have been able to find the hotel on her own, but the darkness distorted the distances and hid road signs. After a few minutes, she pulled to the side of the road to plug the hotel name into the GPS on her phone. She hardly needed to pull over—hers was the only car on the road.

  Finally, she saw Lynam’s Point Road and carefully made the turn. During the drive she had been able to submerge he
r concern for Garrick with a single-minded focus on her driving, but now, feeling her goal to be near and with the sense of urgency to reach Garrick returning, she sped up a bit, forgetting the hard left turn that the road took to follow the south portion of the peninsula.

  She realized her error as she saw the turn approach and was correcting when a stabbing pain shot from her right hand up her arm. She reflexively jerked her arm back just as a spasm clamped her hand onto the steering wheel and the front of the car obediently veered to the right while the car as a whole continued its trajectory across the intersection, slamming sideways into the embankment at the T in the road.

  Chapter 39

  Garrick sat in the lounge with Ellen, in their accustomed seats. Ellen looked at him intently, the pencil gripped in her hand, the tip, pressed onto the notepad, creating a little spray of graphite on the paper. Garrick barely contained his impulse to reach over and snatch the implement out of her hand.

  Loring was later than usual and Garrick thought that perhaps he was elsewhere looking for Ann—based on Ann’s reports, it sounded like Loring was quite smitten with her. He decided he had waited long enough.

  “He’s here,” he said, tracking his gaze from the lounge entrance to the empty chair. Inconveniently, at that moment Loring did, in fact, appear at the door of the lounge. Garrick sighed. Why must anything related to the Lynams always be more annoying than necessary?

  “Tell him this is it, we’ve run out of time,” said Ellen raggedly.

  “Yes, Ellen, I know,” said Garrick, making a shushing motion, trying not to let his gaze flicker from Loring’s usual chair back to the actual Loring, who was still standing in the doorway. Ellen put the pencil crossways in her mouth and bit down on it.