Letters on the Table

by Pattie Howse-Duncan

  Lily Mae observed the seriousness in his eyes and nodded. So, they talked over pie and tea, and Doc told Lily Mae the ugly truth of what went on at Beechwood. But she already knew. Katherine’s version was almost verbatim.

  The last time Lily Mae saw Doc talk with such sadness was when he told her of the seriousness of his wife’s cancer and asked if she would stay with them over the next several months and help provide palliative relief from her pain until the end. And Doc never forgot the peace Lily Mae brought with her. It seemed to fill up their home from corner to corner and seep into the walls. His wife took her last breath with one hand in his and the other in Lily Mae’s. Of all the deaths he had attended during his more than fifty years of practice, he’d never witnessed a death so full of hope and promise. Forming a circle of three, Lily Mae asked the Lord to take His good and faithful servant. And it was then that Doc’s wife spoke her final word, “Home,” and just that quickly she was gone. Doc had revisited that memory at least a thousand times since Mary Nell’s death, and he never ceased to feel the peace of it all.

  When Murphy arrived just minutes later, he carried a heaviness about him. Katherine stepped out to give them privacy because she could tell with just a glance that the day had been difficult for him. Listening from across the hall Katherine heard the thickness in Murphy’s voice as he told it like it was to Lily Mae, every bit of the ugliness and nastiness.

  “I guess it sounds like I’m looking for a miracle, and I’ll understand if you decline my offer.”

  “Here are my conditions, Mr. McGregor. I’ll work hard and I’ll work long and I’ll even stay the night if you need me to now and then. You can trust me. I won’t share with anyone what goes on. Your business is none of anybody else’s business. But I’d prefer not to stay past 5:00 on Wednesday nights, and I won’t work Sundays. Those are times I need to be in church. I do believe in miracles, and I’ve seen one or two in my life, but I’m no miracle worker. No, sir. Only the Lord works that way. If all that suits you just fine, I’ll take the job. If not, I trust you’ll find the right person.”

  And there they stood. A huddle of three. An old doc, a beaten down husband, and a wise woman who was willing to wrestle the devil. Katherine knew the magnitude of the moment. This mighty woman had rescued her once, and she was convinced Lily Mae could do it again for the McGregors. God willing.

  Murphy didn’t know if he should hug Lily Mae or genuflect. Instead, he gently shook her hand and warmly said, “Welcome to my world, Lily Mae. It will be an honor to have you at Beechwood.” And so their journey began.

  From then on, as the months rolled on, Murphy was able to join Doc and Katherine for coffee most mornings each week. He shared delightful stories of how Lily Mae set up camp and barked orders to all of them, himself included. He then reported back to Lily Mae any comments from Doc and Katherine, which elicited her distinct chuckle, a rumble that started deep down in her gut. He felt progress was being made in his household. A layer of heaviness lifted from within the walls of Beechwood.

  One morning, about six months after her arrival, Lily Mae approached Murphy with an idea. “I’ve been sitting on this for a while, but it feels right so I’d like you to consider it. Don’t know if you’ve ever heard of Clarence Daniels around Kingston. I was fifteen when he was born, and I’ve been bossing him ever since.”

  Murphy was intrigued. “Tell me more.”

  “He might just be the strongest man in these parts, even now, as he’s getting on up in age. I think you could use him around here. We both could use him. Don’t know exactly if he’d accept the job, but I think I could convince him.”

  “What kind of job is he looking for?”

  “Well, that’s just it. He’s not looking for any job.” Lily Mae laughed aloud, tickled with herself. “He just retired from thirty years with the railroad. He thinks he’s going to like being retired, but I know good and well he’s not. Ask Katherine about him, she’s known him since she was seven. He’s a mountain of a man, about as tall as that doorframe. Makes the word “big” look little, if you know what I mean. Skin’s the color of a smooth hazelnut, and it made some folks call him Nut when he was young. When he grew to his big size, he cut out that foolish nonsense name. Our people paid attention.”

  “I’d like to meet him. Think you could arrange that?”

  So, she did and he was hired immediately. Clarence’s head was as bald as a freshly laid egg and the shine on it seemed to intensify the sparkle in his eyes. He had the strength of several men his size, but it was his laugh for which he was best known. It started deep down within and left his mouth in a full-throttle boom. Lily Mae could sometimes hear the laughter from far away and see the gathered heads bobbing in the distance, enjoying the lightheartedness Clarence brought to Beechwood and the surrounding area. He looked like a lumberjack among the trees and he could eat anyone under the table, as long as Lily Mae had cooked the meal.

  With Lily Mae’s presence, along with Clarence’s insistence, Murphy had time to fulfill more of his philanthropic responsibilities. Serving on the national boards for the American Red Cross and the National Forestry Commission required frequent travel, and for the first time in a long time, he was able to keep his commitments of time, energy, and expertise.

  Murphy was always eager to see the next day’s dawn after returning from one of his trips, anxious to walk the land of his ancestors and then be in the company of his two treasured companions, the coffee drinkers, the ones who brought balance to his life. The ones who had never judged his worthiness based on wealth or heritage. And they didn’t let his miserable life at home count against him. In their eyes, he was just a man with a faithful dog.

  Fire

  By the time Murphy and Baxter reached the turnoff to Beechwood’s long and winding driveway, he already knew there would be death. He felt it deep within, as though all the McGregors who had cultivated the land before his time collectively sent the message, and he heard it clearly spoken in his head. Death he was certain of, but not sure how many. The one thing he knew for certain when he left that morning was the two living beings inside were Marianne and Lily Mae.

  The smoke was thick and black and seemed to cover every inch of what had been a blue sky just moments before. He saw cataclysmic flames shooting upward from the back half of the house, and he knew they would devour the entire majestic structure. The flames strengthened as they taunted the limbs of the magnificent trees outlining the back lawn and gave off such unbearable heat that the windows began shattering one by one.

  He raced to the back of the house, getting as close as he could manage, and saw the woman kneeling on the ground. Her arms were outstretched as if intending to catch something that might be falling through the air. A torrent of deafening wails rose from deep within her. She rocked back and forth in uncontrolled hysteria. When Murphy heard her wail, he knew who she was.

  Pulling her away from the intense heat and smoke, Murphy saw her eyes were almost swollen shut, and her lips and ears were already blistered from the heat. She must have been using her hands to claw her way in or out of the house because they were bloody and already oozing. She didn’t resist when he pulled her away. She knew. She already knew the only other person in the house would not get out alive.

  When Lily Mae looked into Murphy’s eyes through her own, now no more than thin slits, she could tell he knew the enormity of this tragedy on his family’s hallowed ground. And she was right. Murphy knew Marianne was either already dead or was taking her last breath, and he would not be able to rescue her this time. This very last time. Her death wish had come true.

  As the urgent news frantically passed from quadrant to quadrant, employees began arriving, and many daringly dashed into the bottom floor trying to retrieve any belongings they could carry. The flames seemed predestined to destroy anything of importance to Murphy, as though Marianne had instructed the diabolical inferno what to devour and what to leave
behind smoke-ridden and ruined.

  There was no hope of anything else surviving by the time the fire trucks arrived from town. At Murphy’s request, the firemen spent their adrenaline wetting down the trees encircling the house, trying to prevent the loss of the last remaining glorious reminder of Beechwood Manor. The crowd, growing by the minute, watched as the grand old house began to disintegrate before their very eyes.

  Doc and Katherine arrived soon after the first fire truck. Jumping from his car, Doc ran directly for Murphy and took him squarely by the shoulders, shouting, “Are you hurt, son, are you hurt?”

  “Find Lily Mae, she’s hurt bad, Doc. Her hands and face are…”

  Both men turned simultaneously and saw Clarence cradling Lily Mae’s head with his enormous lumberjack hands as she lay outstretched on a quilt. Katherine squatted beside her, and a small crowd was hovering at the perimeter of the quilt. Baxter lay whimpering at her feet. Katherine had Doc’s medical bag beside her, pulling out bandages. Murphy recognized the familiar bag and knew this time it didn’t contain a single thing capable of saving his wife.

  Doc ran over, and together he and Katherine began the triage needed to get Lily Mae stable enough to withstand the car ride to Doc’s clinic. Clarence drove while Doc and Katherine squeezed in beside her in the back seat trying to cushion some of the bumps and bounces along the route back into town. It would be hours later before Murphy would see any of those four again.

  The night sky was full of stars by the time he and Baxter left the smoldering ashes and drove into town, the same sky that had played a trick on him just hours before. When he departed Beechwood earlier, he was struck by the clouds’ swirls of white nestled here and there in the morning’s blue sky. The next time he fully noticed the sky it had turned black with a wicked smoke that overpowered anything white against the blue. And now the night sky was majestically beautiful again, a reminder that there is light to be found after darkness. But Murphy wasn’t ready to ponder that thought.

  He drove to Doc’s clinic without realizing where he was headed. His mind was numb, he was exhausted and in shock, but his heart knew where to take him.

  He saw the clinic lights and entered through the back, following the trail of hushed whispers. Lily Mae was sitting upright in Doc’s favorite old slipcovered chair. The lamplight cast a glow on all four of them, side by side, lined up like turtles sunning on a log. Her arms were covered in gauze from her armpits to her fingers. Her face was improved but with blisters still apparent. Eyes closed, her head was resting on the back of the chair, and she was humming. Doc’s, Katherine’s, and Clarence’s eyes fell on Murphy as he took in all that was before him in that small room. Lily Mae felt his presence and with blistered lips tried to form a smile. Even the attempt brought her pain.

  It was more than Murphy could handle. He’d been stoic throughout the day, answering the endless questions from the sheriff and obediently thanking the friends and neighbors and Beechwood staff who’d arrived by car and truckload throughout the day. For the first time since he had spotted the smoke, he allowed the intensity of the tragedy to hit him. He knelt in front of Lily Mae and wept.

  Lily Mae struggled to speak. “You told me you needed a miracle when you asked me to come work for you, and I told you I didn’t do miracles, but I prayed hard for one as I was trying to bust that door down to get Mrs. McGregor out of the fire.” Her voice faltered, but she knew there was more he needed to hear, “but the Lord must not have thought the same way I did. He sure didn’t perform any miracle today.”

  Murphy looked into her reddened eyes and tried to speak. His bottom jaw quivered, making it difficult to utter a response. “You’re right. I told you I needed a miracle, and I know you don’t believe one was performed today, but I disagree. It’s a miracle you made it out of that house alive. No one should have made it out of the top floor with all the heat and smoke and angry flames and busted glass, but you did. God could have taken you today just as quickly as he took Marianne.”

  Saying aloud his dead wife’s name shot a bolt of sadness through Murphy’s entire body. A reminder of a life that would be no more. A wife who was miserable living the life she’d been given and wanted no part of it any longer.

  It would take Murphy time to grieve. He had lost not only his wife, but his home and all the possessions passed down through generations of McGregors. It was the home in which he grew up, and, as he was often reminded during his childhood, he was the fifth generation of the McGregor clan to live within the walls of Beechwood Manor. He felt responsible for the death of the house. The sense of loss he bore on his shoulders was heavy. He knew, and had been told by many, that material possessions could be replaced. But he also knew the things important to his mother—the silver used by all the McGregor women—and things meaningful to his father—the photographs of three American presidents who had visited their home over the decades would be no more. And Beechwood’s private collection of art, once described as an American treasure, was now merely dust mixed with the rest of the debris. The enormity of pain numbed him. More than the death of his wife and the destruction of his home, it was the painful realization it all had been destroyed under his watch. The grandeur of his family home had been erased. Forever.

  The investigation into the cause of the fire was straightforward. Law enforcement talked to just about everyone in town before issuing the official statement, which quickly became the talk of every beauty parlor, barber shop, poker game, golf game, and bridge tournament. A variety of people were interrogated and most testified they had never heard Murphy McGregor say an unkind word about his wife or her habits. Most of those same people testified they had witnessed Marianne McGregor in varying degrees of rage aimed at anyone within her sight, and it was no secret she was a drunk. Everyone knew she was, but it went unspoken.

  The final report specified the cause of the catastrophic fire was electrical, beginning in the master bedroom on the west wing. No one ever knew for sure how it started, including Lily Mae, but everyone certainly knew how it ended.

  After

  “I have no right to ask you this, and I fully expect you to turn me down, but I wonder if you would consider staying on with me, here at Beechwood, although Beechwood Manor technically is no more.”

  Lily Mae nodded as she answered, “I wondered if you might need me to stay on. I’ll be right here to help with anything you need.”

  Wanting, needing really, her companionship more than anything else, he said, “I don’t even know where to begin. Maybe help me figure out how to set things straight if you think you’re physically strong enough.”

  “Doc said these bandages will be off in a day or two.”

  “So you’re alright with this idea?”

  “I’d already decided. I knew before you asked me. You can’t do this alone, no matter how strong you think you are. We’ll travel this together and figure it out, piece by piece. Clarence and I both had decided you need us, even if you hadn’t already reached that same conclusion.”

  Although Murphy’s ancestral home was now destroyed, he still had several options if he wanted to continue living on McGregor land. The two original guesthouses and the vacant caretaker’s cottage were still operable, as well as the barn house that once housed the equestrian staff. Even the chauffeur’s cottage was an option although it had been a great while since it had seen occupancy. In the end, he chose as his temporary residence the larger guesthouse designed and built by his parents only three decades earlier. Its warmth and peace gave him the solace he ached for while grieving the death of the big house and everything within it.

  It was much larger than he needed but miniscule in comparison to Beechwood Manor. The entire back wall of the two-story cottage was framed in tall windows, opening to the vast expanse of Murphy’s favorite of all the lakes on the property. Massive old trees encircled the fieldstone and shake-shingled guest house, tempting many an artist to try to capture
the charm of the house among the trees. The interior woodwork—the mantels, crown molding, paneled ceilings and ceiling-to-floor bookcases—were all works of art, envied by all visitors. Never in his wildest dreams could Murphy have expected to one day leave Beachwood Manor and live in the guesthouse, but he had learned that life’s journey could sometimes push one down an unexpected path. And such was his life now.

  He spent hour after hour, for a considerable number of weeks, penning heartfelt thank you notes to the infinite list of those who did what friends do in times of disaster. It was a tedious task, but it kept him busy and compliant as he wrestled with his emotions.

  He felt culpable as he internalized how much easier life was without Marianne. But in time he accepted that being alone wasn’t a bad thing at all. His mind was eradicating the pain and skepticism that had slowly seeped into every cell of his being during his days of living with an angry addict. Bit by bit, he was now unexpectedly discovering a more relaxed, tranquil version of himself. One he did not expect.

  He avoided town entirely, with two exceptions. He found great solace in his weekly appointments with Father Drew at St. Thomas, just as Doc had suggested. Murphy was drawn to Drew’s wise counsel, and he depended on it like salve to a wound.

  And he and Baxter joined Katherine and Doc at the clinic for early morning coffee five days a week. Other than his homestead, it was the one place where he could count on just being himself. There he felt no pressure to disentangle his emotions or to explore any plans for the future. He was simply one of three people enjoying the early dawn hours of another day of life. He depended on their simple wisdom to help him maneuver around the obstacles in his path. Doc and Katherine felt a responsibility to provide a serenity that would aid his recovery. Doc provided the humor and wisdom, while Katherine was gentle and nurturing, and Murphy absorbed all they had to offer like a sponge. It was his daily nourishment; fueling his strength and charting his course. And although he didn’t know it, one day shortly it would become very clear exactly where that course would take him.