Torchlight

by Lisa T. Bergren

  Ben nodded and lifted his coffee cup to his lips, pretending to be unmoved by the news. Tara was always here, always ready to cheer him up, make him smile. It disgruntled him that she would leave the restaurant to pursue her lofty dreams of a cookbook. What a waste of time, of money! She should stay where she was meant to be, which was here, at her restaurant, ready to pour him a cup of coffee and talk over the latest about Mike, or …

  He frowned at his own explanation. He was miffed because Tara wasn’t here, waiting on him like she always had. What right had he to be so presumptuous? To assume she’d stick around just to see him? They were just friends! He chatted with some locals sitting down the counter from him, then left a dollar under the saucer. Pausing outside, he debated between going home and going to see Tara.

  He decided to head home. No sense giving her the wrong idea. It was only a short walk to the docks. Directly before him stood a large group of cottages that faced the sea. This was where he had been raised. After Sharon had died, he had given up the house on the hill and settled Mike back in the little cottage of his youth. It wasn’t much, but it had given him a sense of security that nothing else could.

  Mike was outside, sitting with the old-timers on boxes at the dock and working with Henry Abrahms, nailing oak laths and frames into lobster pots. The boy loved to listen to the old-timers talk fishing, and he spent hours with them, building pots or painting buoys the DeBois colors of red, gold, and purple. Each fishing boat had its own distinctly colored buoys, which were attached to the traps on the ocean floor, making it easy to decipher whose pots were whose.

  “Ben,” Henry nodded in greeting.

  “Hi, Dad.”

  “Hi, Mike. Done your homework?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Better get to it.”

  “Dad …”

  “Better get to it.”

  Mike stomped off. Unfazed, the old-timers just kept on with their talk about the weather.

  “Least it wasn’t so bad as las’ winter,” Henry said.

  “Yep. That was a lousy trap-bustin’ winter. Practically had to start from scratch with new pots. Even had the missus working on ’em with me.”

  “With these prices, a body can’t afford to be short one pot.”

  “With these prices, I can’t afford to eat lobster. I’ll have to eat steak.”

  “Prices don’t matter much when you catch half what we used to,” Ben broke in.

  “The bottom is crawlin’ with snappers,” Henry said. “It’ll be better this season.”

  “Don’t think so,” Ben said. “We take too many because we all have families to feed. But a lot of them are first generation. We’re going out farther and taking more. How long can it keep up?”

  “The snappers will always be there,” Fred Nearing said gruffly.

  “Fred, you told me yourself that you remember gathering the lobsters on shore at low tide. When’s the last time you saw that? When’s the last time you caught anything less than a thousand feet down?”

  Ben looked around at the group of honest, straightforward men who had spent a lifetime doing difficult, backbreaking work. The men were silent. They had braved heavy seas and gale-force winds and spent their lives in pursuit of the great clawed vermilion, Homarus americanus.

  I’ve spent half my life doing the same. And for what?

  Feeling defeated, he followed Mike into the house.

  The old-timers resumed their conversation, picking up with the raising of Danny’s boat that had sunk in the severe sou’easter of last season.

  Tara watched the sea become an inky gray, scalloped with whitecaps from the spring breeze as the sun faded from the sky. From her kitchen window, she could nearly see the fishing village in which the DeBoises now lived, and she wondered again if Ben had come into the restaurant looking for her.

  She turned back to her easel, willing herself to focus. Humph. Would serve him right not to find me exactly where he always thinks I’ll be. She debated calling Sally to check but decided against it. No use anyone thinkin’ I’m unduly interested.

  Sharon had been a fine woman, a dear friend. But this thing that had developed over the last few years between the deceased woman’s husband and Tara had come to a head. Like Julia said she was trying to do with Miles, Tara had to do the same with Ben. Fish or cut bait, Benjamin DeBois, she thought angrily. If not for her, for Mike! The boy needed a mother and clearly adored Tara. Was Benjamin a blind idiot? Or just a stubborn nor’easterner, set in his ways and unwilling to change?

  If he continued on, refusing to acknowledge what had happened between them—love, was it?—then, well, Tara would just move on. She would. And this project was her first step away from him, out into the world on her own. Maybe she’d meet a handsome bookstore owner, or a chef who had his own show and invited her on as a guest host …

  Cherries jubilee. This border will be fun to paint. She dipped her brush into a bright red wash and set bristle to paper to create a design far merrier than she felt inside.

  “Julia!” Miles’s voice greeted her across the crackling telephone line. Just another thing that needed work, Julia ruefully mused. “I was worried when I couldn’t reach you last night.”

  “Oh yes, I’m fine,” she said, not feeling like explaining herself. “Thanks for the roses, Miles,” she added, hoping to change the subject. Wearily, she sat down in an old padded chair. “You really don’t have to send them every three days. It’s too generous.”

  “Nonsense. If you were here, I’d be taking you to dinner every night. It’s the least I can do to help you remember what you’ve left behind.”

  “Believe me, sweetheart, I remember. It’s not easy being away, doing this alone.”

  “Maybe you won’t be alone for long.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m checking into some career opportunities in Boston.”

  “You are?” She leaned forward, then frowned. “You said you hated the East Coast.”

  “Let’s just say that it got a lot more attractive when you moved there. And since your heart is set on staying there awhile, I thought I could at least see what might be available for me. It’s obviously what you want, and I want whatever will make you happy.”

  She paused over his words. This is new. “Any leads?”

  “A few. I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, may I come and visit?”

  “Yes! I’d love that, Miles. Come and see Torchlight.”

  “And you.”

  She paused a beat. “Of course. Yes. I think it would be good.”

  “Consider it done, darling. You can show me your little project, and I can take you out for a well-deserved dinner or two.”

  “Oh. Yes, okay.”

  “Julia? Are you all right?”

  “Fine, fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “There’s just something odd in your tone of voice. Would you rather … prefer I not come?”

  “No, no! Miles, please come,” she encouraged him. But as they said their good-nights and she hung up the phone, she heard only his words—your little project—and Julia was overwhelmed with a sense of foreboding. Did he think her coming to Torchlight was merely a temporary distraction, a hobby to keep her busy for a few months?

  Because the longer she remained here, the clearer it was: She was home. And what she needed was a man who could call it home too.

  Two weeks later Miles Beckley arrived. And Trevor immediately disliked him.

  The feeling was mutual.

  Trevor was on a ladder tacking the shutters back into place when a white sports car screeched through the front gates. Placing his hammer in his tool belt, he watched as a tanned, healthy-looking man jumped out of the car and swung Julia into his arms. Trevor fought off a pang of jealousy.

  “Trevor? Trevor!” Julia looked up at him, her eyes alight, her hand in Miles’s. “Come down and meet my boyfriend.”

  “On my way!” He forced a note of cheerfulness into his tone and pushed aside his fee
lings of competition. This is the guy Julia chose. There must be more to him than meets the eye.

  Miles watched as the man descended, his own smile fading as he realized that the contractor Julia was so relieved to have found was not a doddering old genius, but a man young enough to be trouble. I don’t like this. Was he the reason that he couldn’t reach her on the phone every night?

  Trevor smiled and raised his hand to meet Miles’s. Julia introduced them, and Miles shook the handyman’s hand, checking out the competition with steel-gray eyes. Commoner. Out for something other than work. Julia’s money? Julia herself? I’ve seen his kind before.

  Trevor made his own assumptions. Schmoozer. Out for himself, not Julia. She works well into his plans and looks good on his arm. What a leech.

  They chatted idly, then quickly parted ways.

  Miles wasted no time in talking with Julia about him over dinner. They sat at one end of the huge dining room table, lit only by the candelabra, eating off century-old Wedgwood china that had just arrived from Aunt Linda.

  “I’m so happy things are going well, darling,” he purred. “Life in New England, despite being so far from me, seems to be agreeing with you. You’re more beautiful than ever.”

  “Thank you, Miles.”

  “Have I lost you? Will you be here forever? Or will you get your little inn up and running and then come home to me?”

  “You never seemed to be overly concerned with having me around when I lived in San Francisco. You’re gone half the month on business. We agreed on this, Miles. I need my own life.”

  “An entire continent away?”

  “I love this old place. I’m going to make it my home. And you could follow those leads to Boston, if you want to be closer to me.”

  “I just may do that.”

  His second affirmation astounded her. A part of her had assumed he had only been testing her, that he wasn’t really serious about moving. In the four years they had been dating, he had never made her his priority. They both assumed they’d marry eventually, after Miles pushed his law practice to the top. Their families came from the same circles of San Francisco society, and as everyone said, they seemed made for each other. They laughed at the same jokes, liked the same authors. Both enjoyed theatre and dining out.

  The problem was that when she turned thirty, Julia was not at all sure that those commonalties were enough. She wasn’t sure “everyone” was correct.

  Julia looked over at Miles, smiling at her in the candlelight. He was handsome and a successful lawyer. Her mother, Eleanor, was crazy about him, and Jacob, her father, got along with him. But there no longer seemed to be the zing she thought should be there; had it ever been there? That pause in her heartbeat, the electric bolt she sensed every time Trevor came around? She dismissed the thoughts even as they passed through her mind. Miles would always be here for me—he’s even willing to move for me! He’s the right one. Trevor will be here a few months, then leave. She smiled back at Miles.

  “Look, darling, I know I’ve only been here for several hours and have just met the man, but what do you know about this Kenbridge? I don’t like it that a man we barely know is living in the cottage right next door to you.”

  Julia took a bite to cover her feelings of guilt and any risk of a telling glance.

  “What if he’s some mass murderer or something?” Miles went on. “Have you checked him out?”

  She stifled a laugh at his intimation. “I’ve called four references. He comes highly recommended. And I’m sure our local sheriff is on top of any wanted posters coming through the fax machine; there’s not a whole lot of crime here to distract him.”

  “There’s just something about Kenbridge I don’t like.”

  “Maybe you’re jealous,” she teased.

  “Do I have cause to be?”

  Julia covered his hand and gazed up into his eyes, willing her soul into the words. “Of course not.”

  Miles stayed for the weekend, then left to meet a potential law firm associate in Boston. Before he departed, he sought out Trevor and found him in the kitchen taking apart the pipes to install a disposal.

  “Kenbridge?”

  Trevor ducked out from under the sink and looked up at Miles, dressed elegantly in an expensive olive-green suit, perfectly contrasting tie, and a camel’s-hair overcoat. Trevor stood, wiped his wet, grimy hands on his jeans, and met the other man’s eyes.

  “Look,” Miles said shortly. “I’ll make my point so I can get out of here and back to civilization.”

  Trevor watched him calmly, not saying a word.

  “I don’t want you anywhere near Julia. You are her hired man and nothing else. You touch her and you’ll pay.”

  “Worried?” Trevor baited him.

  “Not at all,” Miles lied. “Just a warning in case you ever think of making a move. I plan on Julia being my wife someday. I know it’s hard on a man like you to be near such an attractive woman. But don’t touch. She belongs to me.”

  “Julia doesn’t strike me as a woman who likes to be owned.”

  Miles moved within an inch of Trevor’s face, but Trevor did not budge. “Don’t mess with me, Kenbridge,” he warned.

  “Something tells me that I’d take distinct pleasure in ‘messing with you.’ We’ve just met, but I know you. I know your kind. And from what I’ve seen of Julia, you’re not the man she needs.”

  “Miles?” Julia called from the entryway. “Miles, you’d better get going if you want to make your train.”

  He turned on his heel and stalked to the kitchen doorway, then faced Trevor once more. “You don’t know anything. Cause any trouble between us, and I’ll personally boot you out of here.”

  Trevor could hear Miles speaking with Julia in low, earnest tones as they stood in the entry, and he could not resist peeking around the corner to look at them. Miles bent his head to kiss her good-bye, and Julia quickly gave him a perfunctory peck on the cheek, not the passionate, warm kiss Trevor assumed would be natural between a couple in love.

  He went back to his work, whistling a bright little tune he had heard Tara humming the day before.

  “Julia!” Trevor called from the southwest corner bedroom. “Julia!”

  She hurried up the stairs, wondering what had happened now. After patching the roof temporarily, Trevor had moved on to the task of expanding the two existing water closets into full bathrooms and adding a third.

  She walked through the doorway and almost into Trevor, who was on his way out to get her. “There you are!” he said. “Check it out …”

  He walked to the corner of the room and paused beside a wall panel that had not yet been removed. Reaching behind an exposed wall stud, he pulled a wire, and a hidden door popped open.

  Julia gasped. “A hidden doorway! Where does it go?”

  “I don’t know,” Trevor said with a mischievous twinkle in his eye. “Let’s explore.”

  “I’ll go grab my flashlight!”

  “Grab mine, too, while you’re at it. It’s downstairs by the kitchen sink.”

  Julia returned within a minute, slightly out of breath after running up the stairs. She smiled at Trevor. “Let’s go.”

  Trevor nodded excitedly. “Ladies first.”

  Acknowledging his dare, she passed him smugly, accepting the challenge. The passageway was tiny, dusty, and full of ancient cobwebs. Scrunching up her face, she plunged forward with Trevor close on her heels.

  “What do you think old Grandfather Donnovan wanted with a hidden passageway?” Trevor asked.

  “Who knows? I don’t think he was into anything illegal. Weren’t hidden rooms the thing when this old house was raised? Maybe he just liked having secrets.” The passageway turned sharply and plunged down a cramped, steep stairway. “Going down,” she warned.

  At the bottom, they turned to the right and then right again. Straight ahead, the upper half of the passageway was blocked, forcing them to duck as they crawled through the narrow opening. “I think this space mus
t be one of the dining room windows,” Trevor said. “I thought they were unusually deep.”

  “I bet you’re right! Here’s the other one!” Julia ducked, crawled through, and moved on. She was so excited she didn’t wait for Trevor. Julia reached the end of the passageway and scanned a series of shelves that held volumes of leather-bound books and sheaves of paper. Several were too high for her to reach. “Trevor, could you reach those?”

  There was no answer.

  “Trevor?” Julia turned and flashed her light back down the passageway. It was empty. He’s trying to scare me. She ignored Trevor’s silence and looked back at the shelves, grabbing the nearest book. She blew the dust from its spine and coughed at the resulting cloud. “Whew!” Julia opened the pages.

  Anna Serine Donnovan, 1839

  “Oh! Trevor! Come quick! I know you’re there! Look what I’ve found.”

  He crawled through the last window frame space and stood behind her, holding the flashlight beneath his chin to light up his face eerily. “I’m coming,” he said in a monotone. Getting only a distracted giggle from Julia, he gave up his game, and his voice returned to normal. “You won’t believe what I found.”

  “Look what I’ve found! My great-great-grandmother’s diaries. Think of the family history stored in these. And look! She wrote a ton of them! This was Anna’s passageway, not Shane’s.”

  “And if this works like the dining room passageway …,” Trevor began, searching the walls. He found an exposed wire and pulled, and an entire bookcase swung outward into the library, letting in the afternoon light.

  Julia’s jaw dropped. “How in the world …”

  “The dining room china cabinet moves the same way.”

  “You’re kidding. None of the china was hurt moving it, was it?”

  “No. Whoever designed these was ingenious. Check out the tiny lips that hold the books in place. It’s the same in the china cabinet. And the way these swing—so level and so smooth—nothing budges, even with the weight and momentum of the pieces.”

  “That’s amazing. I would think that the settling of the house over the last hundred years would have thrown them off-center or something. Here, help me take some of these diaries into the library.”