The Lost Hours

by Karen White

  Anyway, he began to make these little visits to his friends on our way out to Asphodel, and sometimes he brings them things in bags or just papers and such. I haven’t told Justine or Papa because I remember them telling Freddie to drive me, and technically didn’t say to take me there without stopping. And I somehow know that Freddie is testing me, and I don’t want to disappoint. Freddie’s grown into a real handsome young man and he’s got beautiful manners that he must have learned in England and I guess it’s natural for me to want to impress him.

  Sometimes Josie comes with us and I’ve noticed that when she does Freddie takes us right to Asphodel. I guess because she’s his little sister the rules are different. And maybe if she spilled the beans to their mother it would mean an end to his visits. So don’t say anything, Josie, when you read this!

  But I get to ride nearly every day and I’ve become a really good jumper. Mr. Harrington, Lily’s father, said that if I got any better he might feel compelled to start the first female equestrian team for the Olympics. I know he’s just teasing me because that will never happen, but I like to dream about it sometimes and I like the compliment just the same. I like being good at something, and when I’m on the back of Lola Grace, I feel as if I could do anything and the world is open to a million possibilities.

  For the first charm I’m adding to Lola, I’ve chosen a horse for Lola Grace and all the horses at Asphodel for all the joy they bring us.

  My eyes scanned to the bottom of the page. Two yellowed photographs, curled at the corners like a baby’s finger, were glued to the paper. I leaned forward over the first one. I recognized the dun with the striped legs as Lola Grace. Astride her in breeches and tall boots was a girl with a long blond plait peeking out of her riding helmet. I recognized my grandmother but only from other pictures I’d seen of her. This girl had nothing in common with the grandmother I’d known. From her open-faced smile to the light in her laughing eyes, this girl was foreign to me.

  She was laughing and looking down at the young man holding the reins. He was very tall and lean, with straight oiled hair parted on the side. His face was smooth and olive-skinned and I wondered if that was Freddie. He was smiling at the camera, but his eyes were looking up at the girl as if he were trying not to laugh, too.

  The next portrait was of the same horse, but this was a different rider. I recognized Lillian with her straight, elegant nose that even as a very young girl made a person look twice at her. Her eyebrows were raised over an impish smile as if she’d just said something outrageous but was trying to pretend that she hadn’t. The young man—Freddie—was also holding her reins, but he was closer to the horse and had his hand on her boot as if to make sure that the tiny rider wouldn’t get hurt. And underneath the two pictures my grandmother had written Best Friends Forever.

  A drop of moisture landed on the first picture and I wiped at it absently with the hem of my shirt. It wasn’t until I’d closed the pages and shoved them away from me that I realized my cheeks were wet. I placed my hands over my eyes in surprise, until I remembered what it was that had made me cry. My grandmother had loved to ride and had her own horse named Lola Grace. And in my sixteen years atop the back of a horse, she had never mentioned it to me. And I had never thought to ask.

  CHAPTER 9

  Helen swayed in the golf cart as Odella took a turn, listening as Mardi’s claws struggled to find purchase on the vinyl-covered backseat. Odella drove the golf cart like she did everything else: full speed ahead, using a straight line because it was the quickest, and not paying any attention at all to curves in the road.

  Odella jerked to a stop in front of the caretaker’s cottage, then came around to assist Helen from the cart and up the front porch steps to the door. Helen didn’t need the help but she’d long since discovered that Odella’s need to do for others stemmed from a questionable youth spent in places too far from home with people her family didn’t approve. She’d once told Helen that she’d woken up one day next to her second common-law husband in a squatter’s flat in Berkeley and decided it was time to go. Odella had returned to her roots in Georgia, finding Jesus and husband number three along the way and had been making amends for her misspent youth ever since.

  It took Earlene a long time to finally answer the door, and when she did, she was out of breath. “Sorry. You’re a bit early and I had to . . . clean up a bit.” Mardi brushed past her and into the house.

  “Get back here, boy,” shouted Odella.

  “He’s fine,” said Earlene. “I like dogs.”

  Helen listened to the frantic click of his paws as he searched from room to room. “He’s looking for Susan. She used this house as her office space when it wasn’t rented out and would bring Mardi with her.”

  “Poor thing.” Earlene clicked her tongue. “My grandmother had a little dog. He adored her. And when she . . . went away, he missed her so much that he stopped eating.” The door hinges squeaked as Earlene opened the door wider. “Would you like to come in? I’m not quite ready.”

  Helen felt Odella push her forward over the threshold, where Earlene took her arm. “Sorry we’re so early. I can never be sure how long it’s going to take to get somewhere when Odella drives. You remember Odella Pruitt, don’t you? She’s the real boss at Asphodel.” Helen smiled in the older woman’s direction. “We’ll be happy to wait until you’re ready to go.”

  “Just for a minute. I need to run a brush through my hair and find some shoes.”

  Earlene led them into the sitting area at the front of the house and waited while Helen found a seat. Mardi came up to her and settled on the floor on her feet. “So what happened to your grandmother’s dog?” Helen asked.

  “He died. Less than a month after my grandmother left. And it was odd because . . .”

  Helen felt Odella settle onto the couch next to her as she waited for Earlene to continue. “Because why?”

  There was a long pause. “Because I hardly knew that she was gone.” Her voice was soft, as if she hadn’t intended for the other occupants in the room to hear her. “I’ll be right back,” she said, her voice recovered as her footsteps moved across the small braided rug and then to the hardwood floors that led to the single bedroom.

  As soon as she was out of earshot, Helen turned to Odella. “What do you see?”

  She could hear Odella rubbing her hands on her polyester slacks. “It’s all as neat as a pin and only one place mat on the table, so we know she’s at least been eating alone.” She paused, her tongue clicking against the roof of her mouth. “She’s got one of them fold-up computers sitting on the kitchen table, but there’s something else I can’t figure out what it is. It looks like an old metal box.”

  Earlene called out from the bedroom. “I spilled toothpaste on my blouse, so I’m going to have to change it. It’ll just take a minute.”

  “Take your time,” Helen answered, then turned back to Odella. Lowering her voice, she said,“Don’t be too intrusive, but could you go over and get a better look?”

  She felt Odella leave the sofa, her tread light as she crossed the small room. “I can’t believe the things you make me do for you on account of you being blind. And it’s not ’cause I feel sorry for you, neither. You’ve got more hold of your faculties than most people I know with both eyes.”

  Helen, satisfied that Earlene wasn’t finished changing, turned her face toward where she knew Odella was. “So what do you see?”

  “Like I said, it’s a metal box—a rectangle one like you see in the banks. You know, like a safety-deposit box. The lid’s closed.”

  “Look inside, Odella. Quick.”

  “Lordy, Helen. If Miss Lillian finds out, she’s going to skin me alive. And I got to hurry—the corn bread has to go in the oven about now if we’re going to eat at seven. You know how your grandmama gets when her supper’s late.”

  “Hurry!” Helen hissed, the fear of being caught reminding her of the time she and Tucker had hidden in the trunk of their parents’ car in the hopes th
at they might be brought along on one of their trips. They’d figured that after they were discovered at the airport it would be too late to turn back. But they hadn’t even made it out of the drive because their mother had opened the trunk to place one more bag inside and discovered them sweating profusely and almost out of air. It didn’t matter that she’d probably saved their lives by finding them when she did; their disappointment at being left behind seemed to them a much worse fate.

  Odella paused for a moment. “It’s a bunch of old scrapbook pages with just a ratty cover. Looks like something the cat dragged in.” Something jangled against metal. “And there’s a necklace in here, too. With a bunch of those little things you hang from a bracelet.”

  “You mean charms?”

  “Yeah, those. Like that angel Miss Lillian wears around her neck.”

  Helen grasped her hands into a fist, listening to Earlene opening the closet door in the bedroom. “Open the pages and read something.”

  Odella’s sigh was accompanied by the sound of rustling pages. “There’s a bunch of old pictures—they’re all black-and-white. Mostly of some girls—and one of them looks like she might have been your grandmama from way back when. Lots of pictures of horses, too.”

  “But what does it say?”

  Oblivious to Helen’s urgency, Odella said, “Well, on the inside cover it says, ‘This book is the property of Annabelle O’Hare, Lillian Harrington, and Josephine Montet. Unauthorized persons snooping inside this book will be shot.’ ” Odella snorted. “And there’s a loose picture here of three girls—they’re sitting on top of the fence in what looks like the north pasture. On the back it has those same names again and then some foreign language that I can’t read.”

  “Can you sound it out?” Helen cocked her ear again in Earlene’s direction, relieved to hear the water running in the bathroom.

  Painfully, Odella sounded out the words with her South Georgia accent, brutalizing each one. By the time Odella had reached the fourth or fifth word, Helen sat back against the sofa cushion, recognizing Cicero’s Latin words of wisdom. Dum vita est, spes est. They were the words her grandmother had taught her when a much younger Helen lay in her bed, sick with fever, on the first day she realized she could no longer see.

  Helen heard the cover being slapped on top of the pages and then the faint metal sound of the box closing. She felt Odella’s weight shift the sofa cushion at about the same time as she heard Earlene’s footsteps approaching. Mardi let out a bark of warning just in case.

  Earlene reentered the room, smelling of soap. “Sorry to keep you waiting.”

  Helen smiled as Odella helped her stand. “No problem at all. I just apologize for being so early.” She turned to Odella. “Oh, and before I forget, we brought some more supplies—paper products and dishwashing soap—that I noticed you were low on when we stocked the refrigerator before you arrived. We left them out on the cart, so don’t let us leave without us bringing them in. And I also wanted to tell you that you should give your weekly shopping list to Odella every Monday. She does a town run every Tuesday for groceries and she can pick up what you need then.”

  “Great, thank you. After this morning’s incident I’m not in such a hurry to get back in my car. Odella, while you’re helping Helen back to the cart, why don’t I grab the bags and bring them in?”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Odella said as she took Helen’s elbow, then led her out the door and down the porch.

  While Earlene was putting the bags inside, Helen turned to Odella on the seat, still curious over the comment Odella had made earlier. “So if it’s not my blindness, why is it that you think I can get you to do things you normally wouldn’t?”

  Odella grunted deep in her throat. “Because you’re too much like your grandmother. It’s not worth telling you no.”

  Helen smiled distractedly, her mind on something Earlene had told her in the cemetery. You should talk to your grandmother now, before it’s too late. Ask her to tell you her stories. Her words had been nagging at her like poison ivy every since. Her grandmother’s life had always been a taboo subject, one Helen had been warned about by her own mother. And now, as Helen thought about the scrapbook and the pictures of the three girls, she wondered if her grandmother’s unwillingness to share her past had nothing to do with privacy, that the darkness Malily sought in her house mirrored something from her past.

  Earlene returned and settled herself in the rear-facing seat of the golf cart next to Mardi. As they jostled side to side on the bumpy road, Helen thought of the scrapbook on the table that had her grandmother’s name and picture on it, and why Malily’s Latin words had reappeared in a place she least expected.

  “Thanks for offering to bring me to dinner. I could have walked.” I held on to the side of the cart, trying to press my teeth together so I wouldn’t chip them. The movement didn’t seem to bother the dog, whose large head was resting on my pink floral skirt, his nose making a wet spot on my thigh. With no place for my other hand, I let it rest on Mardi’s neck.

  Helen turned her head, her beautiful dark green eyes reflecting the golden sunset behind her, matching the color of the silk shantung dress she wore. On anyone else, the dress would have looked out of place on a golf cart. She smiled. “It’s no problem. We had the supplies to bring to you anyway. But I have to confess to an ulterior motive, too.”

  I stiffened, and Helen raised a brow as if she sensed my wariness. “Really?” Even to my own ears, my voice was too casual.

  “My brother, Tucker, will be joining us for dinner with his two girls, Sara and Lucy. If you wouldn’t mind, please don’t mention Susan. He hasn’t . . . well, he doesn’t talk about her. Especially in front of the girls.”

  I tried to hide my relief. “Thanks for letting me know.”

  Helen faced forward again and we rode the rest of the way in silence, as if to pay homage to the watchful oaks as we passed under their hovering branches, a canopy of old men protecting what was theirs.

  Odella jerked to a stop in front of the front garden I’d noticed before. “If you don’t mind, Miss Smith, could you take Helen inside? I got to run to the kitchen to stick my corn bread in the oven.”

  “Of course. Don’t let me keep you.”

  I helped Helen out of the golf cart and put her hand on my arm. She held up a finger and we waited until Odella had disappeared around the corner. “Thank you, Earlene, but I’m fine. It makes Odella feel better if she’s babying me so I let her. I don’t have my cane, so if you’ll just take me to the bottom step, I’m good to go. Unless you’d rather take the elevator inside?”

  My chin seemed to jut out of its own volition, just like I remember doing whenever I was told I wasn’t expected to win a ribbon at an event. “No,” I said. “I’m fine with the stairs.”

  I tried to set a slow pace as we headed toward the steps but I found myself almost jogging to keep up with her long strides. She pulled away as soon as we reached the hand railing.

  “I love your dress,” I said as I executed a lopsided jog up the stairs behind her. We reached the landing and I was panting from the exertion, my knee beginning to complain. “I’m curious about how . . . well . . .” I stopped, realizing that I might be treading in sensitive territory.

  “I shop by touch. If I like the way the material feels, I’ll ask a sales-person or whoever I’m with to describe the color and design. But it has to feel good first.” She headed up the last flight but went slower this time and I had a strong suspicion that she was doing it for me.

  “Malily will be waiting in the parlor, where you saw her before. If we’re lucky, she’s already had a couple of drinks. And if Tucker’s already there and he’s playing bartender, definitely ask for a martini. He makes the best.”

  I nodded as I followed her into the darkened foyer and then down the dim hallway beyond the stairs to the room I remembered from before. When I entered I had the impression of a queen and her court. Lillian Harrington-Ross was seated in the same gilt chair she’
d been in before, but on the floor flanking her were two blond girls, their hair the color of moonlight. They wore matching yellow sundresses and were each playing with a gold-and-diamond bangle bracelet. The younger girl was holding her small arm up to the light, watching the stones reflect the greedy ray of sun that had strayed into the room, the diamonds throwing drops of light onto the walls and furniture. The older girl simply stared at hers, as if willing it to do something more useful than just be beautiful. I noted Lillian’s arm was bare at the same time I noticed the man standing by the open armoire.

  I paused behind Helen in the doorway, wanting to back out of the room unnoticed, and suddenly aware that my skirt didn’t completely hide the scars on my knee. I felt Helen pulling me forward and I inwardly groaned as she propelled me into the room. We greeted Lillian first before Helen introduced me to her nieces, Lucy and Sara, and then she turned toward the man.

  “Tucker, I want you to meet Earlene Smith. She’s the genealogist I was telling you about who’s renting out the cottage for a few months. Earlene, this is my younger yet less good-looking brother, Dr. William Tecumseh Gibbons—otherwise known as Tucker around here.”

  His eyes held the same haunted expression I remembered from the horse pasture, but his lips were definitely twitching themselves into a smile. “We’ve met, actually, although I didn’t catch her name before. She was making friends with the new horse.” His lips broadened into a smile and his skin seemed strained from the effort.

  Helen turned to me. “I thought you were afraid of horses.”

  I flushed with annoyance and mortification, remembering how I’d lain supine on the ground as the horse had searched my pockets for a treat. “I wasn’t ‘making friends.’ It was after my car got stuck and I was trying to find my way back to the house to get help by crossing through the pasture. The horse . . . surprised me and I tripped.”