by Karen Harper
“Filmed? I didn’t know about your talents in that area.”
“Purely amateur compared to my large-format landscape work, but I am an old film buff. Everybody’s an amateur filmmaker these days with their phone cameras, YouTube and all—which I pretty much ignore. Have you seen some of the stuff on there that gets millions of hits?”
He ignored YouTube but had watched it? Contradiction. And off the topic again, but then she’d given him the opening. No, she figured Win Jackson, PhD, just liked to show he knew about anything and everything, not that he was trying to distract from her intent here. He’d given his take on Francine, but now it was time to see what he thought about Neil Costa.
“So,” she said, “have you seen that little film museum Neil Costa has in the estate’s old kitchen block? He said he’d be glad to show it to me.”
“There won’t be a crowd. It’s a little creepy and pretty dusty. Of course, he would lose what he has there if the place goes public. I can’t see someone else wanting that so-called museum focusing on that old B-grade movie, Creature from the Black Lagoon and its sequels, for heaven’s sake.”
Ah, she thought, there’s something not right between Win and Neil Costa. More importantly, he’d just subtly given her a motive why Neil might want to stop Francine from going public. But maybe it was just that the snobbish Win looked down on Neil’s shoddy collection. As if to back up her suspicion, Win was nervous talking about Neil. He had crossed one ankle over his knee and was bouncing his foot. If Heck didn’t write that down, she’d add it later.
“You know,” Win went on, “the truth is Francine and Shadowlawn remind me of another old movie, not a B-grade cheapie like Creature and not Gone with the Wind, like you mentioned yesterday. Have you heard of the noir classic, Sunset Boulevard? It’s a 1950 Billy Wilder black-and-white with Gloria Swanson and William Holden, about an aging silent film star who lives in a decaying mansion and thinks she can still have her fame and fortune. Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying Francine was over the hill, but there’s a murder in the film.”
“No, I haven’t heard of it. How fascinating. Are there other parallels?”
“You might be more familiar with the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical of the same name that was made from it in the early 1990s. But the point is, the Gloria Swanson character has a loyal butler/chauffeur who reminds me of Neil Costa. It all ends badly, too. I have the film if you ever want to see it.”
“Does the grande dame of the film die? Who kills whom?”
“Oh, it’s nothing like Francine’s life in that respect. The aging diva, Norma Desmond, shoots her young lover when he tries to leave her. She’s living in the past and is quite demented, which, of course, Francine was not, although I think Jasmine thought Francine was off her rocker to let Shadowlawn slip from family control, despite financial problems.”
“Do you think Neil Costa did a good job for Francine?”
“He’s quite the chef and loyal as the day is long, as they say.”
When the interview ended, Claire had a new piece of the puzzle but she had no clue where it fit. Win Jackson resented or mistrusted Neil Costa. And he was well informed about the differing opinions of Francine and Jasmine over Shadowlawn.
As they were leaving, Win warned her to beware of Bronco Gates because he was a loose cannon. So did Win suspect either of her employees had harmed her? After she questioned them, she’d interview Win again.
Well, she told herself, as they walked back toward the hotel on the dimly lit streets, she already knew this case would not be a walk in the park—a walk she’d agreed to have with Jasmine tomorrow in the local Fountain of Youth Park after she saw the doctor about her bullet wound. Right now, she had to take her night meds and get some sleep, if she could only stop everything she’d learned so far from rioting through her brain.
On St. George Street, she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when a large van passed them with the words on the side, St. Augustine Ghost and Graveyard Tour: Come Get Acquainted With the Night!
9
Claire heard a sharp sound. She tried to drag herself from sleep. A siren? The emergency squad was here? She’d found her mother on the floor and called the squad. No, that was years ago. A fire alarm? She had to save Lexi!
Oh, she remembered now. She wasn’t home but in a hotel on assignment. With Nick. Nick, who was a stimulant to her whole system in a way the meds and caffeine never could be.
She realized the sound was the hotel alarm clock. Groaning, she rolled over and hit it off. Her alarm app on her phone started to sound. She sat up and reached for it, shut it off. Groggy. Almost dizzy. At least she’d had no nightmare as she fought her way from sleep to reality.
Then came the courtesy wake-up call on her hotel phone. She fumbled for the receiver, picked it up. Not a live person, a mechanical voice. She hung it back up to silence it. All her alarms were working, but she’d wanted to be sure she woke up for her second dose of her night medicine.
She used to dread the dark. Feared nightfall. When she was first diagnosed, she’d set three alarm clocks to wake up for her night meds, but she’d had to improvise when she went away from home. When she was pregnant, she’d stopped taking the strong night medicine at all, and her mild cataplexy had made a comeback. When she got excited or overly emotional, she’d get weak in the knees, sometimes stumble or collapse. Then the half-waking, dreadful dreams returned, too.
But now, something was wrong, because she felt exhausted and hung over, and she thought she’d conquered that. She’d awakened easily lately. Too much activity, too much thinking, too much stress—a dangerous emotion. Never again did she want to hallucinate about those horrible, dead people trying to touch her, take her.
Then it hit her: she’d slept through until now when she should have taken the second dose of her medicine last night. There it was, waiting. The daytime narcolepsy pill stimulants were easy, but the second middle-of-the-night dose from that horrid orange bottle with its syringe to measure out the amount—ridiculously expensive stuff—needed to be taken not only when she went to bed but four hours later, too. When she was married and Jace was home, it was a real trick to take the second dose without rousing him—worse, making herself wake up to take it.
No wonder he’d left her. Though he wasn’t home much, he must have felt he was living with a secretive madwoman at times. She should have told him about her disease, should have told him before he swept her off her feet and they practically eloped.
“Ugh!” she greeted the day, putting her head in her hands. Without that second night dose, she’d have to really concentrate to keep on an even keel. Nick was taking her to a local doctor to look at her bullet wound, then she was meeting Jasmine for lunch nearby in a wide-open park Jasmine had insisted on, though why they couldn’t just walk down together by the river at Shadowlawn, Claire wasn’t sure. In the afternoon, she and Heck were going to interview Neil Costa back at the mansion. So she had to get herself together, plan her questions for Jasmine and Neil.
Claire got up, steadied herself and headed for the bathroom to work a miracle on how she must look.
* * *
Nick drove Claire into the parking lot at the Fountain of Youth Park where she was going to meet Jasmine. “You know,” he told Claire, “there’s a guy in Goodland who claims he has the real Fountain of Youth in an old cistern on his property there.”
“In that little, old-fashioned enclave between Naples and Marco Island?”
“Right. It’s in old Spanish records that Ponce de Leon did stop there for water and named the area Good Land, in Spanish, of course. So this guy wants me to take a lawsuit case against a big pharmaceutical firm that’s been advertising bottled water called Youth Do and a related cosmetics company promoting Youth Dew, which uses the water in its lotions. Both brands claim they use ‘a hidden secret from times past.’ It brings
him visitors but very little money, because he doesn’t know how to market himself. I told him I’m a criminal lawyer who specializes in capital murder cases and not corporate lawsuits and that I’m tied up, but he’s adamant. I’ll take you down there to meet him sometime.”
“All right. I suppose, if the people behind this park thought he was a threat or if he bugs those businesses too much, you might have another murder case on your hands—just kidding. But it’s very brave of him to try to stand up to the big boys, so maybe you should help him.”
“I don’t like to lose cases. But what I’m really thinking about,” he said, as his voice became quieter, and he touched her shoulder once, lightly, “is the good news about your arm.”
That was the second time he’d said that after leaving the doctor’s office, she thought, as if he had to reassure himself instead of her.
“And good news I can quit taking the pain pills. I don’t need those mixing with my other meds. I am so glad to lose the sling and just have this bandage and wrap, but I still don’t have the use of this hand without discomfort. It’s tough to even dress myself without Lexi’s help.”
He returned his right hand to the back of her passenger seat. She hoped he didn’t think that comment was a plea for help. He’d insisted on taking care of her co-pay at the doctor’s. He hadn’t gone in with her to see the doctor, but he was hovering like a—a worried spouse. But then, of course, he needed her to help Jasmine.
“Thanks for going above and beyond the call of duty,” she told him as she unlocked her door and took her purse off the floor. That was a phrase Jace often used, the call of duty. This moment felt both comforting and awkward: it was as if Nick were her man, dropping her off at work and they’d been lingering, chatting in their car. It reminded her of when she and Jace were first married and she’d take him to the airport, wishing he wouldn’t be gone for so long. Lexi had said on the phone last night they were having a great time, but that “Daddy misses you and wants to see you.” Now, wouldn’t that be all she’d need?
“Good luck with Jasmine in round two,” Nick said as she unlocked her seat belt. “If she can’t drop you back at the hotel, call me.”
“It’s not a long walk. I could use the exercise. Things are laid out pretty close near the Old Town area.”
He reached carefully for her left hand. “Still, be careful,” he said. “And go easy on Jasmine—if you can.”
“I will,” she said, getting out. “After all, she’s Francine’s daughter.”
* * *
Jace was pleased that Darcy trusted him enough to let him bring Jilly with Lexi to the Sun-N-Fun Lagoon water park today. What Darcy thought always went a long way with Claire and vice versa. He felt bad Drew was in school and couldn’t come, but then he might not want to hang out with squealing little girls anyway—no, not a big first grader. As much as Jace loved Lexi, he wasn’t sure he wanted to hang out with them either as the three of them floated along in a big tube on the lazy river in their swimsuits. The girls kept whispering and giggling. Their chatter almost sounded like a foreign language. He wished he had Claire here to translate.
“Not lots of people here like on Saturday.” Lexi finally said something that made sense. “I like it. Starting in January, too bad Jilly and me are gonna be in preschool and can’t come weekdays.”
“I know,” Jace said. I’m paying for it, or most of it, he thought, but didn’t say so.
There were still some families here. He’d noticed one set of parents where the woman reminded him of Claire, not red hair but slender build, kind of tall. And graceful. The one time he’d seen Claire off her meds, having a hallucination, collapsed on the floor, he thought he’d seen an alien.
The girls were talking about something called Frozen, probably some kind of ice cream treat they sold here. He had to admit he sometimes tuned them out. He kept thinking of Claire being shot, of Claire off in the boondocks with some silver-tongued guy—silver-eyed, too. He’d looked up his picture online. Expensive-looking suit, probably custom-made. Would Claire go for that over a pilot’s uniform?
Yeah, maybe he would call in to see if he could fly out of Jacksonville instead of Miami to head back to LA. St. Augustine was close to what the pilots called “Jacktown.” He wanted to see Claire again before his next assignment, and he’d better not tell Lexi or she’d tip her off. He’d just show up, so she wouldn’t tell him not to come. He could say St. Augustine was just on his way to JAX en route to LAX.
“Daddy, can we go to that water fountain place here that squirts people?” Lexi’s shrill voice cut through his thoughts. “Me and Mommy like that part best, and we keep laughing all the time!”
“Yeah, that sounds good. I like to laugh all the time,” he said and tickled both girls until they squealed and tried to splash him. So why was he still sad—and mad?
* * *
Claire and Jasmine walked into the spring house at the Ponce de Leon Fountain of Youth Park where the underground aquifer burbled with water that supposedly gave eternal youth, though the sign said Spring of Eternal Hope.
“That’s more like it,” Jasmine said, pointing at it. “My hope springs eternal this nightmare is going away. By the way, they sell bottles of this water at the gift shop. But I’ve drunk it more than once over the years, and you can see it’s not doing much for me. So—we can either walk way out past the Ponce statue to the inlet or sit at one of those umbrella tables by the café. I just don’t seem to have much strength in my legs today, and I could use some coffee.”
“I’m with you on that. Are you sleeping all right at night?” Claire asked the question she’d been asked by doctors over the years.
“Not really,” Jasmine admitted as they went inside the Five Flags Café to order sandwiches and colas, then sat at one of the round tables with the white umbrellas. “I keep replaying things in my mind. Of course, I deeply regret the falling-out I had with Mother that everyone is making so much of to try to blame me for her death. I regret we argued in front of a local historical preservation committee. But I could not believe she even considered letting outsiders—supposedly altruistic bidders, or government, no less, the way it is today—control our family heritage. It’s bad enough to open it up to ‘the paying public,’ as they say, if we kept control.”
“So that’s how you would propose to fund it?”
“Yes, that and maybe donations. Or maybe I should marry again, a very rich man,” she said with a bitter laugh. She went on, “Anyhow, the state of Florida already has Kingsley Plantation up near Jacksonville on the same river, for heaven’s sake, so isn’t that enough to control? Mother should have seen we should remain private.”
“So you can’t keep the house and land if you don’t get some sort of additional financial support?”
“Not for long. Restoration and repair bills loom. Legal fees and all that, which will get worse if I’m indicted. I refuse to let Nick do my case completely pro bono. By the way, how is it for you, working with him under counsel, as they say?”
Hopefully, she didn’t mean that as a double entendre, Claire thought. She answered carefully. “Our team of Nick, his data guru Hector and I is working well, though we’re just getting started.” And wasn’t she supposed to be the one asking searching questions?
They both jumped when one of the peacocks wandering the ground screeched at a squirrel which skittered past. “Well,” Jasmine said, “who needs watchdogs with peacocks around? They used to use them on grand estates for that. If we walked a little farther here we’d listen to reenactors, you know, people who re-create the old days. Claire,” she said with a sudden sob, “I keep reenacting, replaying in my mind finding my mother dead. Can you understand the horror of that, finding your mother on the floor, dead?”
Claire almost blurted out that she had done exactly that, but she needed this time to focus on Jasmine, not herself. “I—it
must have been terrible for you,” she said, putting her good hand on Jasmine’s arm. The older woman brushed a single tear from her cheek under her sunglasses.
“Truly,” Claire said, trying to comfort her, “I can’t imagine anything worse. Well, except losing a child,” she adding, suddenly missing Lexi terribly.
“Claire, it’s just that, besides fearing I’ll be arrested, I would hate to see Shadowlawn go to the state by default if something happens to me. I mean, if I’m sentenced for a crime I didn’t do and sent away...like prison, damn it, or the death penalty.”
“Nick won’t let that happen. They would never go for the death penalty.”
Jasmine whipped off her sunglasses and leaned closer to Claire. “Don’t bet on it. You haven’t met local law enforcement yet. Kent Goodrich, the county sheriff, is a cowboy, kind of like Bronco Gates, only pushy. I admit I’m afraid. Goodrich is politically ambitious and arresting me would raise his profile. I have to ask permission from his office to go out of the county, even just to drive here for the day. It’s almost like bed check from the old dorm or sorority house days. I feel I’m under house arrest already. And here both Neil and Bronco are depending on me, and the estate needs them, too.”
“I understand,” Claire tried to comfort her, but she needed to get back on track. “You’re living under a lot of pressure. So your mother lived there supported by Neil and Bronco? Not financially, I mean. Did Neil do the housecleaning, too?”
“Oh, that was a bit below Neil, though he’s excellent in the kitchen and with repairs,” Jasmine said, taking a lace-edged handkerchief out of her purse and wiping her eyes. “Lola did all that as well as serve, more or less, as Mother’s maid.”
Claire twisted her paper napkin on her lap so hard her left hand ached. She sat up straighter. “Who is Lola? Where is Lola?”