Strangers

by Mary Anna Evans

  “All of the art was chosen by Raymond’s wife Allyce, who was a talented painter in a day when women of her class weren’t ill-mannered enough to compete for gallery space or public attention. Since Allyce and her husband were the second generation to live in this house, and since Allyce as an artist was drawn to the new and avant-garde, she chose expressionist paintings that seem like anachronisms in this late nineteenth-century room. But I like the unsettled feeling they give, and the rich wood paneling sets off their stark colors. See the painting on that far wall that’s mostly red and black?”

  Faye saw it, dead center between the staircases, glowing like an ember.

  “It was painted by Edvard Munch. You know…the man who painted The Scream.”

  “The Scream gives me the creeps,” said the gray-bearded tourist.

  “It’s nothing but some pigments smeared on cardboard,” was Harriet’s breezy response. “If it gives you the creeps, that’s because the artist knew how to tap into your soul. Allyce could recognize that kind of talent. Munch isn’t the only painter represented in this room who went on to be recognized for his genius. Allyce had the eye of an artist and she had money. My undergrad degree is in art history. I’d dearly love to give a tour of this house, top to bottom, just for the art. The owners won’t let me, because they’re afraid I’ll disturb their guests.”

  The over-air-conditioned air in the atrium was chilling Faye to the bone. It was time to leave Harriet and her tourists to their ghost tour. As she stepped through the door, the light changed subtly. She supposed the atrium’s stained glass ceiling was lit by a collection of skylights, and perhaps they had brightened because the setting sun came out from behind a cloud. Or maybe the streetlights outdoors had flipped on as dusk settled. In any case, the whole room changed before Faye’s eyes.

  The shadows shifted under the staircases and Faye was suddenly hyper-aware that she was looking at the very spot where Raymond and his mistress, Lilibeth Campbell, had once stood. And above them, his wronged wife had strode up the staircase to have a word with the bandleader, probably because his musicians’ work didn’t meet the standards of an artist who was forbidden by society to share her own art with the public.

  At that instant, Suzanne appeared on the second floor landing, heading upstairs. She was so preoccupied that she never acknowledged Faye standing below her, or even noticed that she was there at all. Suzanne’s face was drawn, and she fingered her collar nervously with a pale, white hand. She couldn’t have looked less like the photo of her great-great-aunt Allyce, who had strode confidently up that same staircase to chastise an errant conductor, but Faye still felt like she’d seen a ghost.

  The moment passed quickly, and the bored mumbling of the tourists behind her told Faye that they’d seen nothing, felt nothing. She became aware of a hand gripping her arm, and she knew that Harriet had felt something. Rationality told her that she and Harriet had seen the photograph of Raymond and Lilibeth and Allyce in this very room, and that they’d both experienced a split-second of déjà vu, for the simple reason that they had both been here before, in a very real sense.

  Nevertheless, Faye did not linger in the atrium, and she didn’t tarry as she made her way toward her room. Joe would be back soon with their supper, and she wanted nothing more than his comforting presence and the humdrum taste of run-of-the mill takeout food. Then she wanted to put on her voluminous pregnancy nightgown and a pair of cotton gloves, planning to forget the betrayed Allyce and lose herself in the story of a long-ago renegade priest.

  In the quiet of the dusty, dun-colored hall, her bedroom waited. It hadn’t occurred to Faye before, but she heard nothing from the other archaeologists at night. No television noises seeped through the walls, not even the beeps and blats of an evening game show. Even little Rachel didn’t make enough noise to invade Faye’s nighttime privacy, and that was impressive, considering how much noise the child could make in the daylight. This house’s interior walls must be of the same concrete as its façade, even here in the servants’ quarters.

  When she opened the door, she noticed how distinctly the little watercolor painting stood out against the faded wallpaper. She supposed Allyce Dunkirk had even chosen the art in the servants’ quarters. Perhaps she’d painted it.

  Faye walked toward the painting, intending to check the painter’s signature. Halfway there, she realized there was no need. The lissome woman walking in profile down a deserted beach had the same mannerisms as the wronged wife in Harriet’s photo—the downturned face, the upturned eyes that looked at the world through a heavy fringe of lashes. She even had the determined stride that seemed so incongruous in such a delicate creature.

  Had Allyce intentionally painted herself? Had she walked past a mirror, time and again, just to see how she did it? Or did her brush just naturally paint a woman who moved the way Allyce thought a woman should move? Did it matter?

  Just to be sure, Faye checked the signature and saw that it did indeed give the name of the lady of this grand house:

  Allyce Dunkirk

  From the journal of Father Domingo Sanz de la Fuente

  Translated from the Spanish by

  Faye Longchamp-Mantooth, Ph.D.,

  and Magda Stockard-McKenzie, Ph.D.

  On the morning after our first encounter with the French, a storm arose so great that we feared to remain on the open sea, and yet we also feared being driven ashore and wrecked. There was yet more to fear, since we could suffer an attack if the French should return with reinforcements. The decision was made to retreat to the Seloy River, below the French colony, where we would build our own fort.

  Two companies of infantry were sent ashore to greet the natives living along the Seloy, and they were graciously received. The gift-giving commenced in earnest and, as a result, Father Francisco and I each found ourselves in possession of a piece of property no priest should own. My gift was a woman whose name was a mellifluous thing that sounded something like Ocilla. The Timucua had no notion of the written word, so I am forced to write her name as it sounded to me when she spoke it.

  Ocilla looked some years younger than I. As I have said, I myself was but two-and-twenty. Father Francisco’s gift-woman was hardly older. I looked to the father to see how he responded to this startling event.

  Father Francisco came from a family with far more wealth than mine, and he knew well how servants were to be treated. He handed his woman, Yaraha, his prayer book to hold, then looked at her no more. Anxious to behave well, I did the same.

  The Indians also gave our commanders a large house belonging to a chief, which was blessed with a most felicitous location on the river’s shore. A smaller house was given to Father Francisco and me, and also to a third priest we did not know named Father Esteban, who had traveled across the ocean on one of the other ships. It was presumed that Ocilla and Yaraha and Father Esteban’s serving woman Chulufi would live there with us.

  I have heard it said that Timucua women use only enough woven moss in their skirts to keep them honest. Their exposed skin and free-flowing hair would be considered an abomination in Spain, but it suits the native women in a way that I cannot explain. Their nakedness is innocent, and it did not often put me in doubt of my sacred vows. Ocilla and Chulufi and Yaraha settled comfortably into a life as our servants, and I soon considered them an ornament to my own life.

  Father Francisco was accustomed to having servants to chop the wood that kept him warm and to fetch the water he drank, and he had learned from the cradle to speak in a voice that servants instinctively obeyed. On that first night, he showed Ocilla and Yaraha and Chulufi where to spread their sleeping mats, in a spot as far from our beds as possible within that small house. They slept there that night, and every night, without questioning him.

  Later, Ocilla told me that she and Yaraha had discussed the odd disinterest that Father Francisco and I showed for the pleasures of female flesh. I found it noteworthy that Father Esteban was absent from their conversation. From the bruises on Ch
ulufi’s arms and the dead calm in her eyes, I soon came to believe that our brother priest had displayed no lack of interest in the things our women discussed in our absence.

  Yaraha, older and more experienced, was of the opinion that Father Francisco was simply too old for such things, but she had no explanation for my celibacy. After watching me sleep for some period of time, she declared to Ocilla that I was assuredly not too old, and she ventured an opinion that perhaps there was someone I longed for, silently, late at night. Perhaps, she suggested, it was thoughts of Father Francisco himself that disturbed my sleep. Or perhaps my unspoken desire was for Father Esteban.

  Yaraha could think of no other explanation for my lack of interest in my servant Ocilla.

  When Ocilla made this revelation, I laughed until my belly was sore. In all my time with Ocilla, I never convinced her that my feelings were those of a normal man, but of a man who had made a most sacred promise. Anxious to preserve my dignity when in public, she sometimes laid a soft hand on my forearm and looked into my eyes like a lover. While this may have preserved my dignity among her people, it did little for my reputation among mine.

  Nevertheless, I could not bring myself to stop her from making those little ministrations. The other men in our expedition would have made their obscene presumptions in any case. I found that I preferred their ribald suggestions to the prospect of hurting gentle Ocilla.

  Father and I did not display the amorous energy our serving women expected, and neither did we have the warlike energy of the two infantry captains who were given the larger house. Immediately upon receiving it, they ordered a trench and breastworks to be installed around the house.

  From this distance in time, I see their sin in taking a generous gift and making it a thing of war. At the time, I congratulated the commanders on their initiative, which was significant given that their men had no tools with which to work the earth. The Captain-General, Don Pedro, congratulated them upon his return from surveying the countryside, also, and his approval was worth far more than mine.

  The Captain-General’s return to the village on the banks of the Seloy was lauded with trumpets and artillery. Father Francisco took up a cross to meet him, while Father Esteban and I followed behind, singing Te deum laudamus. The Captain-General, followed by all in his procession, knelt and embraced the cross. A large number of Timucua imitated them, in a way that reminds me to this day of the power of a Christian’s example.

  The Captain-General took formal possession of all this country on that day, and his captains swore their allegiance to him yet again. Father Francisco celebrated mass, to my knowledge the first such sacrament performed in La Florida. To his everlasting credit, Father Francisco then counseled Don Pedro to allow the troops to rest for the winter and delay his conquest of the French until the promised reinforcements arrived from Spain and Dominica.

  But the Captain-General was a man who kept his own counsel, and Our Lord encouraged him in his pride by giving him success after success. Or perhaps He did not. It depends upon how you read the omens and whether you are Spanish or French. Or Timucuan. When it comes to your opinion of omens and events, much depends on whether you were born in this new world, or whether you are a stranger here.

  In any case, the Captain-General shortly sent two vessels away, one to Spain and one to Havana. Neither was captured by the enemy, which was seen as a very great omen. And God soon showed his favor in a yet more dramatic way, by sending another great hurricane, one so severe that few French ships survived. Perhaps they were all destroyed. I do not know.

  The great faith of our leader told him that the French were without naval defense, so he set out with an expedition of five hundred men, despite the objections of a majority of them and of Father Francisco. And of the humble priest writing this account.

  Each man was supplied with a sack of bread and a supply of wine and my feeble prayers. They were guided by two Indian chiefs, who both joined our leader in his implacable hatred of the French.

  Father Esteban did not object to this expedition, which seemed so foolhardy to the unbiased eye. In fact, he asked Don Pedro’s leave to join him, so that he might pray to the Lord for victory within the very sight of the infidels. The Captain-General gave his permission.

  Neither Chulufi nor I were sad to see him go.

  This army had hardly walked out of my sight when they were punished with the most horrible tempests I ever saw. The next day, Father Francisco’s merciful heart told him to send men with more bread and wine for our soldiers, but I had no faith that they would receive it. Father also sent his prayers for the destruction of the heretics from France.

  While we waited for word, a Frenchman approached our camp, bearing a white flag. He was made a prisoner and brought for interrogation. Father Francisco asked if he were Catholic, and he proved his faith by reciting some prayers, so Father consoled him by promising that we would not hang him. He then told us that seven hundred men awaited our troops in Fort Caroline on the river Mai. One-third were Calvinists, including two Calvinist priests.

  Eight or ten Spaniards who had been found among the Indians, naked and painted, were also among their number. They had been shipwrecked long before and had despaired of ever seeing their home country again.

  When we heard of the number of enemy troops awaiting our men, I retreated in prayer so earnest that time did not seem to pass, until I heard the sound of bells ringing and men shouting in celebration of victory. The French fort, Fort Caroline, was ours.

  Concealed by darkness and torrents of rain, our soldiers had surprised the enemy in their very beds. Some of them, quite naked, had arisen and begged for quarter, but more than one hundred and forty were killed, including a great Calvinist cosmographer and magician. Within an hour, the fort, six vessels, much weaponry, and a gratifying amount of food were all ours. But Father assured me that the most gratifying advantage of this victory was the Lord’s triumph.

  He foresaw this as the means of the Holy Gospel being introduced into this country, a thing necessary to prevent the loss of many souls. He anxiously awaited the return of Father Esteban, so that he could hear more about the vanquishing of the Calvinist heretics.

  I confess to you that my thoughts were not on our great victory. They were with the souls of the men killed in their beds that morning. It had been but two months since our departure from Mother Spain and I had already learned that I would be worth nothing as a soldier. Since I knew that many of those poor men were not Catholics and still I grieved their suffering and death, I presume this means that I am also worth very little as a priest.

  The night after we took the French fort, I lay awake in the darkness. I looked across our comfortable house with its sturdy mud-daubed walls, and I sought the shadows where Yaraha and Ocilla and Chulufi slept. I could not make myself wish them dead merely because I had not yet succeeded in making believers out of them.

  __________

  I, Father Domingo Sanz de la Fuente, attest that the foregoing is a statement of actual events.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Harriet sounded amazingly ordinary on the phone for someone who’d been dressed like a vampire with ample cleavage just the night before. Well, she sounded ordinary but extraordinarily enthusiastic. And Faye felt that it was extremely early in the day for enthusiasm, since she’d been up past midnight reading Father Domingo’s memoirs. Joe had been so happy about her late-night work that he’d smoked two cigarettes.

  “Did you feel it last night, Faye? I know you did. I saw your face.”

  “Feel what?”

  “The atmosphere in the atrium last night. The unnaturally cold air. The sense of something…other. It was Allyce. You know she was there.”

  “I know that the air conditioning system was running.”

  It was running now. No vibration from the central air conditioning unit penetrated Dunkirk Manor’s stout construction. Or was that “air conditioning units?” Faye had no idea how many units it took to cool the monstrous house. Neve
rtheless, the cold air pouring out of the vent over her head was proof enough that the system was on.

  “You think that was the A.C.? You are such a scientist, Faye.” Harriet didn’t sound offended by Faye’s disbelief, but she left no room for doubt as to her own opinion. “You didn’t look like a scientist last night. Your eyes were big as saucers.”

  “Thank you. I am a scientist. And those eyes didn’t see anything that couldn’t be explained by regular old science. That wasn’t Allyce on the staircase. It was Suzanne, and there’s nothing very spooky about seeing a woman climb the stairs in her own house. You and I got creeped out because we’d just seen the photo of Allyce and Raymond and Lilibeth in that very room. The tourists hadn’t seen the old photo of the atrium and they didn’t notice anything odd at all.”

  “Tourists are so…” Harriet paused to grope for the right word, which wasn’t coming, probably because she was a nice lady who depended on those tourists for a portion of her livelihood. “Well, they’re not real perceptive. Okay, they’re pretty clueless. They expect their vacation experience to be wrapped up in a neat package and tied with a bow. They expect Disney-style ghosts that look like regular people, only they’re green and grinning and see-through. Anything less than that, and your average tourist will just yawn and head for the gift shop. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. If I take my tours into a gift shop and they buy a lot, the owner will usually give me a cut. Or some free merchandise.”

  “Is that how you got your fangs?”

  “Absolutely. I may be a fake vampire, but I’m a very real businesswoman, and one of my businesses is publishing. I want to give you a copy of one of my books. I think you’ll enjoy it and I think you’ll be able to use it in your work.”