5 Death, Bones, and Stately Homes

by Valerie S. Malmont

  Maribell Morgan, the present owner, has made it her life's work to restore the home to its original beauty. This included getting all twelve closed-off fireplaces to work. Although much of the original furniture was sold during the Great Depression, Miss Morgan has spent her entire lifetime collecting appropriate period furniture to make the house as authentic as possible.

  Morgan Manor is rightly listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The term "Manor" does not refer to the house, but was the word used to designate land awarded to the descendants of William Penn.

  The present property includes the house of native limestone, a frame bank barn built in the late 19th century, and a one-and-one-halfstory stone springhouse, which still supplies water to the Manor house. The springhouse will not be open for the tour.

  I stopped typing, leaned back, and closed my eyes. The memory of what we'd found today in that springhouse was haunting me, and I couldn't write any more. I decided I'd done enough, without going through the boxes of scrapbooks and diaries I'd found in the attic, and I turned off my computer before my conscience led me to pick up the telephone and call the police.

  Earlier, as soon as the meeting at the Thrifte Shoppe was over, Alice-Ann had suggested we start visiting the houses, so I could begin writing the tour-book. "We can do Morgan Manor first, since nobody's living there, and I have a key. We'll take my car," AliceAnn said, leading me to her beige Volkswagen Beetle, which had carried us to many an adventure during our college days. "It still runs," she said, noticing my doubtful smile. "And I can't afford to replace it. Not until I get Richard's debts under control."

  Richard had been her husband, the last surviving member of Lickin Creek's founding family, and a scumbag of the first order. When he was murdered, leaving Alice-Ann to raise her small son alone, he also left her with myriad debts. Because Lickin Creek "takes care of its own," as I'd heard often enough, she had been given a lot of leeway and extra time to pay back the money he owed. And she'd been allowed to keep the historic family home, which Richard had mortgaged to pay for some stupid land scheme he'd been involved with.

  "Is your house going to be on the tour?" I asked her, as the engine sputtered and refused to start.

  She shook her head. "Come on, baby, you can do it." The Bug must have liked the tone of her voice because it started instantly. "You have to know how to talk to them," Alice-Ann said with a grin. "In answer to your question, no. Since the theme of the Humane Society tour is June and romance, it doesn't seem appropriate to show my house. Not after what happened to Richard. But it will be shown on the AAUW historical home tour in the summer."

  "Another house tour? How many are there?"

  "There were four last year. Every organization in the borough jumped on the bandwagon when they saw how successful ours was." After a moment's thought, she said, "More like three and a half. The Garden Club only lets visitors wander around the outsides of the houses, so I guess that shouldn't really be called a house tour."

  "Everyone acted surprised when they heard the Morgan house was going to be on the tour," I said. "What makes it so special?"

  "It's never been on the tour before," Alice-Ann said. "Maribell Morgan was asked a dozen times, but always refused."

  "Why did she agree this time?"

  "She didn't exactly" Alice-Ann's grin was wicked. "She's been in the Sigafoos Nursing Home for a couple of months, and her nephew is the one who authorized its use. Evidently he's her conservator or trustee, or something like that. He's planning to put the house on the market this spring, and I think he's hoping someone on the tour will see it and make an offer. That happens quite often, and owners like it because it saves on realtors' commissions."

  We were driving on one of Lickin Creek's notoriously confusing one-way streets, when Alice-Ann swerved to avoid a stove in the street. "People should be more careful," she muttered, but she didn't seem particularly surprised by finding a stove in the street.

  Now, I began to notice that there were many large objects sitting on the sidewalks: refrigerators, rolled-up carpets, old wooden dressers, chairs, complete dining room sets, even an iron gate or two. When I saw a woman dragging a leather sofa out her front door to the edge of the curb, I asked, "What's going on with all the furniture on the sidewalk?"

  "Bulky Trash Pickup," Alice-Ann said. "Once a year the borough schedules a pickup of all the big stuff people don't want anymore. It gives everyone a chance to clean house. Look." She pulled over to the curb and pointed to a truck that was slowly cruising down the street behind us.

  "They're sidewalk shopping," she said. As we watched, the truck stopped, two men jumped out, and a moment later the leather sofa was in the bed of the truck.

  "By the time the borough actually gets its pickup trucks out, most of the stuff is gone. It's a great way to furnish a house for nothing. And antique dealers from miles around stock their stores from what they find here."

  Another odd local tradition for my Lickin Creek journal, I thought, as I watched a brand new SUV pass us, slow down, and then stop. A little boy climbed out, ran directly to a bicycle propped against a telephone pole, and screamed with delight. Within seconds, he and his mother had stowed the bike in the backseat of the SUV and resumed their cruising. It wasn't such a bad tradition at all, I thought. If I had a place of my own, I might have been tempted to do some sidewalk shopping myself.

  Morgan Manor was on the edge of town, and even with the slow-moving trucks and vans clogging the streets, it didn't take us very long to reach our destination. Alice-Ann slowed down before pulling into the driveway, so I could get a good look at the house.

  Morgan Manor was an enormous structure of gray limestone, built in what I'd come to recognize as the Federal style. It sat well back from the road, about halfway up the side of a hill. Between the house and the road ran a small brook. We drove across a one-lane bridge spanning the water to get onto the property.

  "Not a bad little shack," I commented, after we'd gotten out of the VW.

  "It was built by Matteus Morgan, one of Lickin Creek's earliest and wealthiest settlers. Local lore claims he was a descendant of William Penn."

  "Undoubtedly someone who was in the wagon with your former husband's great-great-something-or-other when the wheel broke," I laughed, recalling a local legend about the town's founder who, when he couldn't fix his broken wagon wheel, decided it would be easier to stay put and build a town instead.

  Alice-Ann nodded agreement. "I believe Matteus was in the second wagon, but apparently he was no better with his hands than Great-great-grandpa MacKinstrie." I laughed again, and she joined in. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "Let's go inside."

  I followed her up three steps to the front porch, which had a roof supported by a row of Ionic columns. "Obviously the porch isn't original," Alice-Ann murmured. "Be sure to mention that in the booklet."

  While she unlocked the front door, I pulled my notebook from my fanny-pack and began to make notes.

  In the front hall, dust motes swirled in the rays of sunlight coming from the fanlight over the door. "We'd better get a cleaning crew in here before the tour," Alice-Ann remarked. "Isn't it amazing what happens to a house when it has been vacant for a few months."

  Noticing the tattered plaster that hung from the front wall in three or four places, I nodded.

  Alice-Ann followed my gaze. "That can be fixed easily. It even happens in my house-something about the plaster reacting to the limestone in the walls. But dear old J.B. is going to have to pay for it. Our committee can absorb the cleaning costs, but not repairs."

  "J.B.? Is that J.B. Morgan, president of the Old Lickin Creek Bank?"

  "And charter member of the Old Boys' Club," Alice-Ann chuckled. "You can count on him to try to save a few bucks on the realtor's commission."

  I followed her voice into the living room, which was large and sunny and filled with beautiful furniture. "The clock's supposed to be an heirloom," she said. "J.B. wanted to be sure that was mentioned in t
he tour-book. Just in case an antique dealer comes through carrying a wad of money."

  We entered the dining room, which was almost as large as the living room. "Nice antiques," I commented. "Are all these original to the house?"

  "For the most part, no. Maribell collected period furniture. Had to, after some loser ancestor sold everything off to pay his gambling debts."

  The kitchen was as small and gloomy as the public rooms had been large and cheerful. It did, however, feature a stone fireplace big enough for me to stand upright in. A small room off the kitchen had been turned into a den, complete with knotty-pine paneling. "Forties redux," Alice-Ann sniffed. "My house had the same stuff in it. There must have been a hotshot pinewood salesman in this area sixty, seventy years ago." A quick peek into the small, dark adjoining bathroom told us it should not be shown on the tour.

  "That's the service staircase." She pointed to a narrow door beside the kitchen fireplace. "It's so narrow, I doubt that most of the Lickin Creek community could squeeze through. We'll keep the door shut and use the front stairs for the tour."

  I followed her back into the front hall, scribbling madly in my notebook as I went.

  She was halfway up the stairs when she warned, "Hang onto the railing. The whole thing sags to the left. Makes you feel like you're going to fall off."

  Climbing it was a little like being in a fun house; the list was enough to throw my balance completely off-kilter, and I fought the strong gravitational pull all the way up. "I'd better put a warning about this in the booklet," I said. "It wouldn't look good to lose a visitor."

  "Good idea." Alice-Ann had reached the relative security of the landing and began opening bedroom doors. The first three were elegantly furnished alike with mahogany four-poster beds, highboys, Oriental carpets, ladder-back chairs, and enormous quantities of silk and lace. "Lots of dusting and vacuuming needed up here," was Alice-Ann's only comment. Adjoining each bedroom was a bathroom, which apparently had been created by chopping up other bedrooms. In the bath next to the largest bedroom, AliceAnn chuckled, "I'll be darned. Maribell had a hot tub. Who'd have guessed."

  Alice-Ann opened a fifth bedroom door. We stopped in the doorway, surprised at what lay in front of us. No period furniture or original oil paintings here. Instead, it was filled with cheap furniture from the sixties: beanbag chairs, a sofa bed heaped with orange and turquoise pillows, an unpainted bookcase untidily filled with books, posters, and a shaggy orange-and-red rug.

  "Oh my God," Alice-Ann said. "It's never been touched, like a shrine-she never changed it after..."

  "After what?" I had stepped into the room and was looking at the contents of the bookcase. Amid the biographies of classic composers and stacks of yellowed sheet music I noticed several books of photographs. I pulled one out, opened it, and hastily replaced it. "Come on, Alice-Ann, tell me what you know about this room. Was erotica Maribell's secret vice?"

  There was no answer, and I turned around to discover AliceAnn was gone.

  "I'm in here," came her voice. "In the closet. The stupid door slammed behind me. Can you pull from the outside?"

  I had to brace one foot against the wall while I pulled to get some leverage. Even with Alice-Ann pushing from the inside, it took several long minutes to get the door open.

  Her face was flushed and her blond hair was streaked with cobwebs when she stomped out of the closet. "The house must have sagged to make that door swing closed like that."

  "Anything interesting in there?" I asked, peering into the dingy interior.

  "Some very dated clothes on hangers, and a box. Way back in the corner. Let's see what's in it. Hang onto the door while I pull it out."

  With the cardboard carton now on the bedroom rug, Alice-Ann gingerly folded back the top flaps. "Hope there's no spiders in there," she said, poking it open with one foot.

  "Or snakes," I added, mentioning my worst fear.

  "Sneakers," she said, staring down into the box. "It's full of old sneakers."

  I looked in, too, and noticed something odd. "There only seems to be one of a kind."

  Alice-Ann dumped the contents onto the floor. "You're right," she said. "Why do you think someone would save one sneaker out of a pair?"

  "They're different sizes, too." While all were men's shoes, the sizes ranged from small enough to fit my size-seven foot to something in Michael Jordan's size.

  Alice-Ann put the sneakers back in the box and shoved it into the closet. "Maybe he was a collector," she said.

  "A sneaker collector? And who is it you are talking about? Who lived here? It looks like a teenager's room. Did Maribell have a son?"

  "No, she never married or had children. This must have been the room she rented to the high school music teacher. I think he lived here for about ten years. Back in the sixties, I believe." She read his name from the framed Penn State diploma on the wall. "Rodney Mellott."

  "And Rodney up and left without taking any of his belongings? Didn't anybody think that was odd?"

  "Not really. He left on his wedding day, and everyone assumed he'd developed cold feet. Emily Rakestraw, the poor bride-to-be, was left standing at the altar in the most expensive wedding dress this town had ever seen."

  "How dreadful. But why do you know so much about it?"

  "Because of the Bride's House being on the tour for the last ten years. That's where Emily Rakestraw, the deserted bride, lived. And the story is now part of local folklore."

  "What a sad story."

  "Not as sad as you might think," Alice-Ann said. "Rodney came back a few weeks later, and they eloped."

  "So this is one legend that has a happy ending."

  Alice-Ann grimaced. "I only hope their marriage was happier than mine. Maybe it was, because they stayed away from Lickin Creek. Settled in Texas, I think."

  "Still," I said, "it does seem strange he wouldn't have taken his belongings with him."

  She shrugged. "Maybe they wanted a fresh start. Her parents never really approved of him. I heard it broke her mother's heart when they ran off together." She looked around the room and giggled. "Maybe Emily wouldn't let him bring this tacky stuff. She was an art teacher and probably had halfway decent taste."

  "You're not going to have this room open on the tour, are you?" I asked.

  Her eyes opened wide with surprise. "Of course we will. It ties in so nicely with the Bride's House Legend. People will love to see it.,,

  We left the bedroom, and I followed Alice-Ann to the foot of the narrow steps, which I presumed led to the attic. I was still thinking about Rodney Mellott. "Why did he live here? Did Maribell Morgan need money badly enough to take in boarders?"

  "Are you still talking about the music teacher? I've heard that there weren't any apartments available, and Maribell graciously offered to let him stay here until he found a place. He was very popular in town, and evidently she decided he was worth keeping. She must have been in her fifties back then and not too bad-looking, and he often was her escort to parties and concerts. I guess she liked having a younger man around as a companion. We should all be so lucky in our middle age."

  Alice-Ann started up the stairs. "Aren't you coming?" She looked down at me, over her shoulder.

  "Do we really need to check the attic? Visitors won't be going up there, will they?"

  Alice-Ann shook her head. "I want to make sure there haven't been any leaks. Or birds trapped up there. One died in my attic once. It smelled-"

  "Never mind the graphic details," I interrupted. "I'll wait here."

  She smiled, and I knew she was thinking I was being lazy and didn't want to climb any more stairs. Let her assume what she wanted, I thought, it was my private business that I was terrified of bats, and I knew all the old houses in Lickin Creek had attics full of the nasty mammals.

  After a few minutes, the attic door swung open, and Alice-Ann came out carrying another cardboard box. "It's an antique dealer's paradise up there. I'd better tell J.B., so he can start getting some quotes. I found some
boxes full of really old scrapbooks and notebooks in an enormous walnut wardrobe. I brought one down for you to look through. Maybe you can find some juicy tidbits for the tour-book."

  After putting the box in the trunk of the VW, we strolled down the hill toward the springhouse. Flagstones had been laid to create a narrow path and even steps where the hill grew steep. The little limestone building had a slate roof, and one shuttered window on the side facing the manor house. The door was on the left side, facing away from the road. Weeping willows and cattails grew along the water's edge.

  "How charming." I paused at the top of the steps to take in the view, while Alice-Ann gingerly climbed down the flagstone steps.

  "Ooops!" Alice-Ann's feet slid out from under her.

  "Are you okay?"

  "Yes, but be awfully careful. The stones are covered with slippery moss." She picked herself up, determined that nothing was broken, and stretched a hand out to me. With her help, I climbed down safely.

  Alice-Ann unlocked the door and we entered a dim room. Little light was admitted by the louvers of the shuttered window, but Alice-Ann found a wall switch, and in a moment a carriage lamp that swung from an overhead rafter brightened the good-sized room. Above us, it was open to the slate roof, with exposed beams showing. The walls and floor were of the same limestone as the exterior, but only the floor was softened by a worn and dusty Oriental rug. In one corner stood an old cast-iron wood-burning stove. Seven or eight folding chairs stood in a semicircle. Metal music stands stood before the empty seats as if waiting for a sepulchral orchestra to enter.

  "I think I heard that Rodney taught private music lessons here," Alice-Ann whispered. For some reason, it seemed right to whisper, although there was nothing there to be disturbed except a few spiders.