Midnight Voices

by John Saul

  As Ryan once more began telling the tale of how he had managed to get suspended from school, Caroline sat down in front of Claire’s computer. Until now she had used it only for things connected with work—hunting for specific pieces such as the Regency card table she’d located for Irene Delamond in a shop in London, which Irene had promptly air-freighted at a cost that was almost as much as the table itself. Though she was far from expert, she had a sense of how at least to start, and the first thing she did was bring up a site called AnyWho, which she’d come to depend on not only for her business, but for anything else she might be hunting for as well. She started out by typing Melanie Shackleforth’s last name into the blank on the “Find A Person” page, then tried to remember where Melanie had said she was from.

  Had she said anything at all?

  If she had, Caroline couldn’t remember. But she’d had a drawl—the kind of southern drawl you had to be born with. Georgia, maybe? Caroline typed the state’s abbreviation into the box, and clicked on the find it button.

  Nothing. She tried Florida, then Louisiana, and finally went through every state in the south. Still nothing. No Shackleforths, Melanie or otherwise.

  Could she have spelled it wrong? She tried a couple of variations, still found nothing, then switched to Google.

  Typing in the name Shackleforth once more, she hit the search button. Most of the sites listed referred to an old Twilight Zone episode.

  Which is pretty much where I feel like I am, Caroline thought. Giving up on Shackleforth—at least for the moment—she went back to AnyWho, this time typing in the name ‘Albion’ along with the state of New Mexico.

  Nothing.

  She swore softly, then decided maybe it was the site that was the problem. Going back to the main page, she changed the state to New York, and hit the button again.

  A stream of Albions appeared, so she narrowed it down to New York City.

  There was only one: Max and Alicia, at 100 Central Park West.

  So she hadn’t been able to find any listings for Virginia Estherbrook’s Shackleforth relatives, or Max Albion’s brother in New Mexico—but did it mean anything?

  Now she shifted her attention to Virginia Estherbrook herself, typing the actress’s name into the form on the Google page. Dozens of pages came up, most with reviews of plays the actress had appeared in, and a half a dozen others that were sites maintained by fans. Clicking on one, Caroline found herself gazing at a picture of Virginia Estherbrook that had been taken at least thirty years ago, when Virginia Estherbrook had been in her prime. The resemblance to her niece was almost uncanny—change the hairstyle and the makeup, and she could have been looking at a picture of Melanie Shackleforth.

  She scrolled down from one picture to another, then paused when she came to a brief biography of the actress.

  Brief, indeed. According to this site, Virginia Estherbrook had appeared in New York seemingly out of nowhere. She had never divulged how old she was, and variously claimed to have grown up in Europe, Australia, and Argentina. ‘I am a simple player of roles,’ she had once been quoted as saying. ‘My life consists not of real people, but of made-up ones, and for my work to be believed, I, too, must be no more than a role. It is perhaps why my relationships have failed, but it is why my career has succeeded. I am nothing more than those I play on the stage; there is no one else. Do not search for my past nor predict my future, for neither of them exist. Nothing is real except what you see beneath the lights.’

  Caroline read the quotation twice more, then began moving through the other sites devoted to Virginia Estherbrook. Everywhere it was the same—no hint of where she’d come from nor when, no mention of any family at all. But the quotation was always there.

  ’. . . do not search my past or predict my future . . .’

  She went back to the search engine, this time broadening the search to the single name of Estherbrook. Other than Virginia, there were very few references at all.

  Then the answer came to her, so obvious that Caroline felt like an idiot. If everything about Virginia Estherbrook was a fiction, then why wouldn’t her name be a fiction, too? She was an actress, for heaven’s sake—didn’t they all change their names? Or at least hadn’t they in Virginia Estherbrook’s heyday? Frances Gumm had turned into Judy Garland. What if Virginia Estherbrook’s real name had been something like Hortense Finkleman? Who wouldn’t have changed it? But even if she had, someone somewhere must have known. She went back to all the sites carrying information about Virginia Estherbrook’s career, not sure what she was looking for. One of the sites—by far the biggest—held not only all the information Caroline had seen half a dozen times before, but a compilation of reviews of nearly every play in which Virginia Estherbrook had ever performed. One of the earliest was a production of Romeo & Juliet from nearly fifty years ago:

  ’Seldom have Broadway audiences been treated to a Juliet of the depth presented by Miss Estherbrook, who succeeds brilliantly in her first attempt at a role in which several more experienced (and far better known) actresses have failed; one must reach back nearly four decades to the incomparable Faith Blaine in order to find a Juliet of such strength. Indeed, it appears to this critic at least, that Miss Estherbrook may well be the heir to the mantle of Blaine, who retired some five years ago, vanishing from the stage into her apartment in The Rockwell.’

  The Rockwell?

  What on earth was going on?

  She searched the web once more, this time hunting for more information on Faith Blaine, whose name rang a bell in her head, but stirred no memory at all of what the actress might have looked like.

  When an image popped onto the screen a few moments later, Caroline was certain she’d made a mistake, that she was back at one of the sites devoted to Virginia Estherbrook. But the caption beneath the picture was very clear: Faith Blaine as Juliet in the legendary 1914 performance that made her a star.

  The picture was a vignette, everything about it testifying to the date of its origin. The actress was wearing a diaphanous costume—one that would have been considered perfect for a dramatically tragic death back in the days of melodrama when performances were far less realistic than now. Faith Blaine’s hands were clasped over her breast, and her face was tilted up as if she were gazing into paradise itself, and finding her lost love there. The image was faded and slightly out of focus, but even under the heavy makeup the actress wore, Caroline could see the resemblance not only to Virginia Estherbrook, but to Melanie Shackleforth as well.

  Coincidence?

  Or had Faith Blaine and Virginia Estherbrook been related?

  Melanie Shackleforth’s words echoed in her mind: ‘. . . there are times when I suspect I’m really Aunt Virgie’s daughter . . .’

  Was that it? Was Melanie really Virginia’s daughter?

  Could Faith Blaine have been her mother? That had to be it—nothing else made sense. And it would account for the mystery in which Virginia Estherbrook had shrouded her past. It wasn’t all the mumbojumbo about ‘living the roles’ at all—it was keeping the family secret that certainly would have destroyed her mother’s career, given the time.

  And the pictures Ryan had seen—they must have been old pictures of Faith Blaine.

  She felt a great wave of relief flood over her, but as quickly as it came, it ebbed away.

  What about the pictures of Tony?

  Tony, wearing ‘old-fashioned clothes.’

  Was it possible that Tony looked as much like his great-grandfather as Melanie Shackleforth looked like her grandmother?

  If Faith Blaine was her grandmother, Caroline corrected herself. Which was a very, very long reach. Simply the fact that both Blaine and Virginia Estherbrook had lived in The Rockwell didn’t mean a thing. And the resemblance could as easily have been a function of make-up as anything else—how many actresses had she seen who could make themselves look so much like someone else as to be utterly unrecognizable?

  Or was she once more simply being paranoid?

/>   So Rebecca Mayhew and Virginia Estherbrook had gone on trips, and the niece who was staying in Virginia’s apartment looked a lot like her? So what?

  But even as she tried to dismiss it, she kept coming back to the pictures Ryan had seen.

  The pictures that were in an album on the low shelf of the lamp table by the fireplace. The shelf upon which she herself had seen a dust-free rectangle where something the same size and shape as a photo album had been.

  If the album truly held nothing but old family photographs, why hadn’t Tony simply put it back on the shelf?

  Why had he hidden it?

  Why had he locked it away in the desk that was in turn locked away in the study from which he’d banished not only Ryan, but herself as well?

  Her eyes went to the huge ring of keys that hung on the wall next to the door to the main shop. There were at least a hundred keys on the ring; keys of all description, some so large that Caroline could barely imagine a lock they might fit into, others so tiny they must have come from a doll’s house. “Lord only knows where they all came from,” Claire had explained on the first day Caroline had worked for her. “Whenever I find a key, I add it to the ring. Most of them came in with furniture, and you’d be amazed at how often I’ve had to use them to unlock something when the owners lost the key. I doubt there’s a drawer in Manhattan—desk, dresser, or anything else you can think of—that I couldn’t open with something on that ring. Not if it’s over a hundred years old, anyway.”

  The desk in Tony’s study was a lot older than that.

  Making up her mind, she took the key ring off the wall and dropped it in her shoulder bag.

  “Come on, Ryan,” she said. “We’re going home.”

  “Aw, Mom,” Ryan groaned. “Do we have to? Can’t I stay here and help Kevin?”

  “No, you can’t,” Caroline snapped. “And don’t argue with me—just do what I tell you!”

  “Well, that was charming,” Claire Robinson observed acidly after Caroline had vanished through the front door without so much as a nod to her employer.

  “Come on, Claire, give her a break,” Kevin said, emerging from the back room. “She just lost one of her best friends—”

  Claire gazed coldly at Kevin. “And she just got married, had a honeymoon on Mustique, and moved into one of the most fabulous buildings in town. Why am I having such a hard time feeling sorry for her?”

  Kevin dropped his voice into a perfect parody of the kind of insincere concern Claire usually offered her customers. “I’m so sorry, darling—I forgot! In order to know how it feels to lose a friend, you have to actually have a friend, don’t you?”

  Claire’s jaw tightened, and for just a moment Kevin wondered if she was going to fire him. But as the seconds ticked by he could almost see the wheels turning in her mind, and finally—when she realized that if she fired him she’d have to close the shop just to go to lunch—she forced her lips into what he supposed was her idea of a sympathetic smile.

  “I suppose you’re right,” she offered. “She does look at the end of her rope, doesn’t she? I suppose I can be patient with her for another day or so.”

  But no more than a day or so, she added silently to herself. Then she’s gone.

  CHAPTER 28

  Caroline found her step slowing as she and Ryan emerged from the park and turned northward until she finally came to a complete stop as they approached 70th Street. Across the street, The Rockwell stood just as it always had, its turrets and cupolas silhouetted against the sky, its tall windows gazing like sightless eyes into the park across the street. Yet something looked different.

  Somehow, the building looked—what? Lighter? Cleaner? Caroline ran through half a dozen words in her mind, but none of them seemed quite right. She frowned, studying the stone of the building’s façade. Was some of the grime that had built up over the decades gone? But that wasn’t possible—only the lowest level of the building could be cleaned without scaffolding being erected, and the buildup of grime that covered the building seemed just as dark on the ground floor as on the floors above.

  The windows, perhaps? Had they been washed? But she didn’t remember them being dirty, at least not in their apartment.

  “Mom?” Ryan asked, tugging at her arm. “What are you looking at?”

  Caroline hesitated, then shook her head—she was imagining things. Either that, or it was just a trick of the light. The building couldn’t look any different now than it ever had—no work was being done on it. “Nothing,” she said, giving his hand a reassuring squeeze. Yet, as a break in traffic appeared and she stepped off the curb to hurry across the street, she suddenly remembered the strange sensation she’d had earlier that morning, when she and Ryan had passed through the lobby on their way out of the building.

  She’d had the same strange feeling that things looked different, that the furniture wasn’t as shabby and everything was somehow brighter. But of course it hadn’t been different—it had just been a trick of the light, But as she pulled open the heavy front door and stepped into the lobby, it happened again.

  The mural on the ceiling seemed to have brightened, and the shadowy forest glen it depicted looked sunnier, as if the sky above the forest had cleared. That was impossible, of course: it was nothing more than a painted image; the only way to change it would be to repaint it.

  Or turn up the lights? She scanned the sconces on the walls, but the light emanating from them seemed no brighter than ever, though their brass gleamed as if it had just been polished that morning.

  Her gaze shifted to the furniture. That, at least, hadn’t changed: the sofa and chairs around the fireplace looked the same as they had this morning.

  Which was probably the same as they had looked yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that.

  Suddenly Ryan was tugging at her arm again, and when she looked down he was tilting his head toward the doorman’s booth. Her eyes followed the tilt of his head, and she thought she saw Rodney look away just as her eyes would have met his. “Rodney?” she asked. “Is there something wrong?”

  Did he hesitate just a fraction of a second before shaking his head? “No, ma’am. Everything’s fine.” Now his eyes shifted to Ryan. “Just fine. Glad to see you and the boy back.” He turned his attention back to the newspaper that was spread out on his desk, but as Caroline started toward the elevator with Ryan staying close at her side, she suddenly felt as if he was watching them again. Turning around suddenly, she thought she caught a flicker of movement as he shifted his gaze back to the newspaper. “What is it, Rodney?” she asked.

  He looked up at her, his thick brow lifting slightly. “Ma’am?”

  “You were watching us, Rodney.”

  “Beg pardon?” the doorman said, his expression so blank that Caroline wondered if maybe she’d only imagined that she’d caught him looking away too quickly.

  She hesitated, then shrugged. “Nothing,” she said. “I guess I was wrong.” But as she pressed the elevator button and they waited for the cage to come down from the upper floors, she watched the doorman out of the corner of her eye.

  His head was tilted down, his eyes on his newspaper.

  The elevator clanked to a stop, and Caroline pulled the door open, Ryan scurrying through the gap as soon as it was wide enough. She stepped in after her son, slid the door closed, and pressed the button for the fifth floor. The elevator jerked, then started upward, but just before they disappeared from his view, Rodney looked up, and nodded to her.

  Then, as Caroline disappeared from his view, Rodney’s gaze shifted and his eyes fixed on Ryan. A smile came over his lips, a smile so cold it made Ryan shiver as if he’d been struck by the blast of a winter wind.

  “How come he does that?” Ryan said as they got off the elevator and she fished in her bag for the key to the apartment. “How come he stares at me like that?”

  “I’m not sure he was staring at you,” Caroline said as she found the key and fit it into the lock. But she wasn’t sure R
odney hadn’t been staring at Ryan, either. And for now, she wasn’t sure it mattered. She twisted the key, pushed the door open, and stepped inside. Then, even though the apartment had the feel of being unoccupied, she called out anyway.

  “Tony? Tony, are you here?”

  When there was no answer, she closed the door behind her, and glanced at the clock. Only a little after eleven.

  Tony had said he wouldn’t be home until after lunch, and she still had an hour until noon.

  Her eyes fixed on the door to her husband’s study, but out of the corner of her eye she could see Ryan watching her.

  “You’re going to go in there, aren’t you?” Ryan asked.

  “I—I’m not sure,” Caroline replied, not wanting to lie to her son, but not quite willing to tell him what she was planning, either. “Tell you what—why don’t you go up to your room?”

  “I want—” Ryan began, but Caroline cut him off more sharply than she’d really intended.

  “I said go to your room!”

  His eyes turning suddenly stormy, Ryan scurried up the stairs, but when he got to the top he suddenly turned back. “I hope Tony catches you!” he shouted. “Then maybe you’ll believe me!” He vanished from the top of the stairs, and a moment later Caroline heard his door slam shut. Now, alone in the hall, Caroline faced the locked door to the study. Up until this very moment, she had been certain of what she was going to do. But now that the moment had come, and she had a ring of keys in her bag that she was certain would unlock not only the study, but everything inside as well, she found herself hesitating.

  Did she really want to do it?

  Did she really want to know what was locked away in his desk?

  But she knew the answer to that question even as she asked it—if she didn’t search the desk, didn’t find out what it was he’d locked away in its drawers, all her questions would fester inside her until they destroyed not only her sanity, but her marriage as well. Her mind made up, she pulled the key ring she’d taken from the shop and began hunting for the one that would open the study door.