“Quick, let's catch them before they go out,” Jack said, suddenly nudging me. I shook myself from my reverie and realized that the mourners had begun to file out of the church after the coffin. As it passed us, I stared at my reflection in the black box, and the white, turbid expression stared back at me uncertainly, but Jack tugged my arm and pulled me into the aisle right behind the deceased's family.
“Those are her parents?” I asked him lowly, nodding to the couple a few steps in front of us. The man was tall and thin, with gray hair and sunken eyes that seemed more accustomed to looking at fine print than what was actually in front of him. His wife appeared to be several years younger: her hair was still blonde, though I rather thought that it had been dyed, and she walked with a sluggishness that took over a former sense of grace.
“Yep, and their remaining son,” Jack replied, indicating to the boy trailing behind them. He must have been a few years younger than us, though he was taller and pinched-looking due to the strange combination of traits that he had gotten from either of his parents. As he walked, his dark, flattened hair fell into his eyes, and I subconsciously swept mine from my forehead to keep from mimicking the expression.
“Fuck – we missed them,” Jack muttered, watching as the crowd swept around us to follow the pallbearers out into the cemetery. “We'll have to get them at the after party.”
“I don't think we're invited to the after party,” I told him, my eyes still fixed on the closed doors of the church that everyone else had gone through.
“Course we are: it's a small town. Everyone's going.”
“You make it sound like a social event.”
“It is a social event,” he countered. “Same as the summer fair or winter carnival. I've gone to more weddings and funerals in the past four years than ever – and the after parties for both are equally as much fun.”
“Don't be morbid.”
“It's true – honestly. But to be fair, the funerals were all for old people, so the parties were celebrations of their lives.” He paused and pushed his hands into his pockets. “Which means way better alcohol.”
“Well, in that case.”
“Ah, come on, Nim,” Jack said. “Lighten up. I'm just telling you how things are around here.”
We set off down the street in the direction of the Perennas' house, taking our time while the burial took place so that Jack could show me around. Most of the shops had been closed for the afternoon so that their owners could attend the funeral, though there was still a woman in the bakery taking tarts off of a cookie sheet to arrange on a platter. Jack waved me over and we ducked inside.
“Hello, Mrs. Coffey,” he said cheerfully, his eyes glinting in the light as he eyed the pastries behind the counter. “Still open?”
She was fairly old, though her gray, curly hair was mostly hidden beneath a scarf that was tied about her head, and she was so short that she barely reached Jack's shoulder, but was heavy and appeared far stronger than either of us.
“Not officially,” she replied, wiping her hands together to rid them of excess flour. “Isadora wanted food for the after party – finger-food, she says, because she doesn't want to get the china out. And nothing too buttery or sticky or else there'll be fingerprints all over the upholstery.”
“These look good,” Jack said, leaning over the table of mini-quiches.
Mrs. Coffey gave him a look.
“You can have the broken ones if you help me carry it all up there. Eliot was supposed to, but I don't trust him not to drop the whole plate on the sidewalk.”
Jack selected one of the pastries with a broken shell and popped it into his mouth.
“Nim and I can carry them.”
Mrs. Coffey was pulling out a sheet of parchment paper to wrap the tea sandwiches in, but paused to look over at me.
“You'll make sure he doesn't eat them all, will you?” she said.
“I'll do my best,” I said.
“You're not from around here,” she went on, waving me forward so that I could hold the roll of parchment for her. “From away, are you?”
“Connecticut,” I replied. “I'm just … visiting Jack.”
“Thought you said you were from Massachusetts,” she said, throwing a glance at Jack as he searched the platter for any more misshapen pastries.
“I am. Nim and I know each other from school.”
“You can have one, too,” she said, handing me one of the tiny sandwiches with a look as though she disapproved of my thinness. “That's chokecherry jam from Tim Robbins – you won't get anything fresher.”
I eyed the sandwich warily before taking a nibble to be polite; the name of the berry was oddly off-putting.
“Such a tragedy,” Mrs. Coffey went on as she continued to wrap up the plates. “Anna used to come in here for a loaf of raisin bread every week; I used to give her the ones with extra cinnamon. She loved the smell.”
“Yeah, it's pretty surprising, isn't it?” Jack asked, taking a seat atop the table as the conversation turned to the dead girl. “Can't believe she's dead.”
“Me neither. But she was broken up over Tommy's death, wasn't she? It's no wonder: we all loved that boy.”
She disappeared to the back as the oven timer went off, but returned a moment later with another tray of food.
“But that was three years ago,” she said. “I guess when you're young, it hits you harder.”
She sighed and began to lift the next batch of quiches onto the platter, smacking Jack's hand away with her spatula as he reached for another one.
“I said just the broken ones, Jack,” she scolded.
“That one's crooked,” he argued, then scooped it up and put it into his mouth when her back was turned.
“His funeral was the hardest,” Mrs. Coffey went on. “Such a tragic thing – and right before he was eighteen. I'll tell you, sometimes I used to be jealous of that family: now I just feel sorry for them.”
She made a face as she finished transferring the food, then gave both me and Jack a look in turn.
“Do you know Isadora asked me for a discount on the catering?” she asked. “She wanted ten-percent off – said it was the equivalent of a party-package.”
“Guess that's what happens when your husband runs the town's finances.”
“Or when you don't have any motherly instincts,” she replied, but then waved her hand through the air as though hoping it would negate the sentence. “I take that back. She loved Tommy, after all. And Anna – in her own way.”
“What about the other kid?” I asked. “The other son?”
“Eliot? Well, she loves him, too, I suppose,” Mrs. Coffey decided. “And I give her credit: I don't think I'd like the boy very much if he were my son.”
“Yeah, he's a bit of a weird one,” Jack commented.
“He doesn't talk much,” Mrs. Coffey explained. “When he was younger they thought he might have a problem – you know, an impairment of some sort. But he's ... just Eliot, I suppose.”
“Right,” I said.
She glanced at the mostly uneaten sandwich that was still in my hand.
“Finish that up – I don't want my food going to waste. Then you two can bring these trays up to the house for me. Best to have them laid out before the burial's over.”
The Perenna residence was a large Victorian house situated at the top of the hill just off the main road, and was by far the nicest in town. Once it came into view, I wasn't sure how I had missed it on my initial walk, for even through the thick snow that had been pelting down, it was so distinct against the skyline that the rest of the buildings seemed small and inconsequential beneath it.
It was painted in a pale blush color with stark-white trim that looked like icing dripping down from the roof and windows, and even beneath the snow the slate-gray roof was still glistening and dewy. With its asymmetrical design and octagonal tower, it looked like some sort of elaborate dollhouse that had been abandoned by a child who had outgrown it, and as we drew nearer, I
could just make out the forms of rose bushes lining the perimeter that had been covered over in snow.
Shifting the trays in his hands, Jack stepped sideways up to the porch and set them down on the bench below the window so that he could open the door to let me through.
“They just leave it open?” I asked, noting that he neither had a key nor had to pick the lock.
“It's Kipling, Nim.”
By comparison, the inside of the house was rather dark. The hardwood had been left unpainted, and the deep mahogany and drawn curtains were barely touched by the brass lamps on either end of the hall. As Jack looked about to find the kitchen, I peered into the living room where a lone wing-back chair sat by the fireplace. The furniture looked both overly-used and not lived in given the rigid, formal nature of it all, and even Karl's immaculately kept apartment seemed more inviting.
“Should we stick them on the counter or the table, do you think?” Jack asked.
I pulled myself into the kitchen and scanned the area. The glass-front cabinets showcased the fine china that Mrs. Perenna hadn't wanted touched, and the floors seemed to have been recently polished. I stepped out of my boat shoes before going any further, though Jack had already trailed snow into the middle of the room.
“The table, probably,” I said, considering that that would be more formal.
“The table it is, then.”
He dumped down the trays and then took a seat in one of the chairs, rubbing his hands together to get them warm again. As I set the platters that I had been holding down beside his, he turned and gave me a mischievous look.
“It's empty,” he said.
“Everyone's at the burial.”
“I know.” The impish look in his eyes grew. “Should we take a look around, then?”
I folded my arms together.
“Is that why you offered to bring the food up? Because you wanted to snoop around their house?”
“Of course not,” he said, but his expression countered the indignant note in his voice. “I wanted to help Mrs. Coffey. This is just a bonus.”
He stood and exited the kitchen before I could think to talk him out of it, and by the time I had reached the hallway his footsteps were already audible on the stairs. Sighing, I retrieved my shoes and hurried after him.
“Jack, what's going to happen if someone comes back early?” I said, following him over to the first room that he was looking in.
“We'll just tell them we were bringing the food up.”
“And sneaking around their bedrooms?” I asked, crossing my arms again as he peered into what must have been Mr. and Mrs. Perenna's room.
“We might've had to use the bathroom.”
“At the same time?”
“Nature calls when it calls, Nim.”
He shut the door and moved on to the next room, which, judging from the dark blue walls and questionable poster over the dresser, belonged to the son.
“This must be Tommy's room,” Jack said, picking up one of the trophies on the desk and eyeing it.
“What? The one who died, you mean?”
“That's the one. He was into sports – and good at them. Eliot's more likely to have a voodoo doll or something.”
“They kept his room the same? I thought he died a few years back.”
Jack shrugged.
“They probably didn't want to clear it out. Would you?”
“Sure,” I said, giving the room another look and making a face. “It's not like he's coming back.”
Jack threw me a look.
“Exactly. Which is probably the reason they kept it the same.”
He replaced the trophy and looked around the room again before deciding that there was nothing of interest and moving on to the next one down the hall. Upon opening the door, a strange smell hit the air and we both wrinkled our noses, though after a few more moments it dissipated into a light chemical one that hung between the walls.
“What is that? Paint thinner?” Jack asked, removing his sleeve and taking a careful sniff.
“Just paint, I think,” I said, eyeing the room. It was messier than the previous two had been, though not in the way that Jack's was with clothes strewn about and discarded cigarette packs lying about. There was an easel in one corner and a half-painted picture of something dark and unrecognizable, and dozens more scattered throughout the room. An open case of brushes was lying on the bed, and a few more were sitting in cups of liquid to be cleaned.
“God, he should crack the window or something,” Jack said, waving his hand in front of his face to get the smell away. “No wonder he's messed up – imagine breathing this all day.”
We edged back into the hallway and shut the door, though the smell had worked its way out after us. Continuing to wave his arms about, he circled around the stairwell and we passed the bathroom to get to the last bedroom.
Anna's room was brighter than her brothers' had been. Two large windows filled it with pale winter light, and the walls were a dusty pink that matched the circular carpet by the bed. There were several sweaters left out on the window-seat as though she had tried them on but decided not to wear them, and her closet door was open to reveal a mess of belongings that had not been properly put away. Jack crossed his arms.
“See, if you were going to kill yourself, wouldn't you clean your room a bit?” he asked, turning to speak to me over his shoulder. “You know, get rid of a few things that might be embarrassing or something?”
He was looking at an open magazine with some sort of mindless quiz on the page that claimed to tell her what type of profession she would have based on her astrological sign. I eyed it for a moment to note that it was half filled in before looking away and giving him a shrug.
“My room's always clean.”
“Right, but let's say that it wasn't. Wouldn't you clean up before you offed yourself?”
I stared at where her sweaters were gathered on the cushion and then to the hat and scarf lying at the end of the bed, wondering if she had been deciding which one matched the colors best, and the sight of them was eerily similar to how Miss Mercier had laid her dress out in her own bedroom the night before she had been killed. They were rather nice looking sweaters made of a thick wool, though the sleeves had already begun to felt and the weave had tightened a bit as though whoever had washed them had not cared for them properly.
“I don't know,” I said. “Like I said, my room's always clean. Would you clean yours before you killed yourself?”
“No, but I wouldn't –” He broke off unexpectedly and an odd noise escaped the back of his throat. Clearing it, he finished, “– clean my room. Ever.”
Quite certain that that had not been what he had originally planned to say, I chewed the insides of my mouth as I looked at him.
“Right, well, not that I'm an expert or anything, but I don't think whether or not you clean your room is an indication of whether or not you killed yourself,” I said blandly.
“That's not what I – I wasn't talking about you, Nim.”
“Right,” I said again, no less annoyed. “Well, in that case, I don't remember my mother cleaning her room or doing anything differently before she tried to kill herself, either.”
Jack let out a sigh and shoved his hands into his pockets, seemingly frustrated at my response. He was still waiting for me to jump in and agree with him as adamantly as I might once have done, and every moment that passed without my doing so was eating at his mood.
“I wasn't talking about her, either,” he said. “I just meant, seeing as you care about neatness and whatnot, that you might think it was weird that she left stuff lying about. If I was going to slit my wrists in a bathtub, I think I'd do something differently – you know, leave a cigarette burning so the smoke would ruin the walls or burn the place down. I wouldn't just eat my breakfast then grab the butter knife and head upstairs.”
“It wasn't a butter knife.”
The third voice cut through the room and we both jumped and turned wildly arou
nd to see who had spoken. Mr. Perenna was standing in the doorway, his arms crossed and brow pulled down over his squinted eyes, and he was looking at each of us with utmost distaste.
“It was a razor,” he went on, his voice both matter-of-fact and highly disparaging. “Now, if you two wouldn't mind following me downstairs, I have a few questions of my own that need to be answered.”
He stepped back out of the room and waved us forward, his short, rigid movements making him seem like something robotic that had been made only to look like a human, and Jack and I threw one another a glance before following him down the stairs.
Several people had already arrived for the after party, though Jack and I had evidently been too busy arguing to hear them come in. As they went to pour themselves drinks in the kitchen, we circled to the back of the house after Mr. Perenna, feeling every bit like schoolchildren who had been caught vandalizing the property as we had back at Bickerby. As we stepped over the threshold into his study and he shut the door behind us, I almost expected to see Karl standing off to the side of the room waiting to hear what I had done to get into so much trouble this time. And though I was relieved that it wasn't Barker's office that we were in, I was also disappointed that Karl would not be able to sign a check to get me out of the situation.
“You may stay standing.”
Mr. Perenna took a seat behind his desk but held up a hand as Jack made to sit in one of the chairs opposite him. Removing his glasses, he rubbed at his eyes for a moment before raking his hands through his white hair, seeming to decide where to begin with us.
“You were in my daughter's room,” he said at last, his hands still pressed together in front of his face. His eyes darted from me to Jack. “Why?”
I ran my tongue over my teeth, certain that there wasn't a reasonable answer to the question.
“We brought the food over from Mrs. Coffey's,” Jack said. “No one was home yet, so we let ourselves in to set it up for her.”
“And then?”
“We were just looking around,” Jack said with a shrug.
“In Anna's room?”
He was glaring openly at Jack who, in turn, was doing a very good job of pretending that he was unfazed.
When I Am Laid in Earth (Damnatio Memoriae Book 3) Page 7