“Yes, ma’am, I am.”
“Good, she was asking for you and your brother. I’m glad one of you made it so quickly.” With a polite smile she grabbed her clipboard and walked toward the open door.
“Wait. I don’t have a brother.”
Her smile vanished, and she looked from me to Ashland as if this were some kind of joke. Consulting her clipboard, she read a note. “I wrote the names down. Umm…Carrie Jo and Chance Jardine.”
“I’m Carrie Jo, but as far as I know there is no Chance Jardine.”
She shrugged it off. “That’s odd. I’ll let the doctor know about this. I’ll come back soon to help move her up to third.”
Before I could question her further, she was gone and Ashland and I were left alone. I walked to my mother’s bedside and watched her sleep. “Momma? I’m here. Can you hear me?” She didn’t move a muscle, and I gazed down at her face as if I’d find the answer I wanted written in the tiny lines around her eyes. There were no answers there.
She was the picture of peace, except for the bandaged wound on the left side of her head. Her dark brown curls were shiny except for where the blood had dried and crusted. For the first time I could remember, she appeared frail and vulnerable. I wondered what she was dreaming about right now, if she dreamed at all.
And who in the world was Chance Jardine?
Chapter Twelve – Carrie Jo
Two hours later Ashland returned with my overnight bag. He and baby AJ would stay home until it was time to release Deidre. She’d been in and out of consciousness but hadn’t said much beyond “I’m okay” and “I love you, Carrie Jo.”
Ashland hugged me and convinced me to grab a bite to eat in the cafeteria. “She’ll be up for a visit once the medication wears off, and I don’t want to go home wondering if you ate today. I can just about bet you skipped lunch.”
“How did you know?” I whispered guiltily as we walked out the door.
“First full day on a new house? It’s kind of a no-brainer.”
There wasn’t much left in the Springhill Memorial Hospital cafeteria, so I opted for a cup of the least offensive-looking soup and a half sandwich and sweet iced tea. Ashland grabbed an apple, and we headed to a quiet corner near the atrium. We didn’t talk for a long while. I moved various vegetables around in the broth with my plastic spoon and removed the cling wrap from my club sandwich. I didn’t feel much like eating.
“You think it could be possible? Could I have a brother?”
He squeezed my hand and kissed my forehead. “If you have a brother, we’ll find him. But remember what the nurse said. It’s not unusual for people to think crazy things when they have had a head injury like hers.”
“That’s not exactly what she said.”
“Have you ever heard of Chance Jardine?”
“Never. Not once. But then again, I don’t even know my father’s name. Granted I haven’t asked in the past year, but she’s never been very forthcoming about her past. I used to make up stories about him when I was a kid. I got tired of the other kids asking.”
“What kind of stories?”
“You name it. I told my fourth grade teacher that he played in the NFL.”
“I like the idea of making up a dad story. I wish I could have gotten away with something like that. But then I was never that creative, and everyone in Mobile knew my father. And most people didn’t like him.” He munched on his apple absently.
“That’s the thing. I would like to know something—anything—about him. If he was an awful person, I would want to know about it. As it stands now, I know he had green eyes like mine because my mother’s eyes are brown. I don’t know squat.”
He didn’t say anything else. What could he say that would make me feel better? I ate a few bites of the sandwich, tried the soup and declared myself full. “Ready to go back?” After depositing the trash in the can, we took the elevator back upstairs.
“Almost forgot. Rachel left some papers at the house. Said they had to be signed and faxed first thing in the morning. You forgot them today. She said she would have waited, but as there was no fax machine at Idlewood, she figured you’d need to send them from the office or home. I told her where you were and what was up. Said she’d cover for you if you needed her to.”
“Ugh, I forgot about those. Yeah, I’ll sign them. Would you mind taking them back and sending them for me? She’s right. They are time-sensitive documents.”
“I think I can handle that.”
“No word from Detra Ann?” I asked him cautiously. I missed her. It was weird having a crisis without her blond head all up in the middle of it.
“Nothing, but I know she’s still in town. I’ve seen her car at her mother’s house.”
“I have a big mouth,” I said as we stepped off the world’s slowest elevator.
“Maybe, but you have a big heart. She’ll come around. I promise.”
I threw my arms around him and buried my face in his shirt. He smelled like fabric softener and baby lotion and expensive cologne. I breathed him in and kissed his neck once. “You better go.” I glanced at my watch. “Can you believe it’s eight o’clock already? AJ is probably wailing for his bath. I’ll sign the Idlewood papers and let you go take care of our rug rat.”
“I think I can handle that too,” he said with a smile.
“I know you can.” I unzipped the bag and pulled out the manila envelope. I flipped through the stack of familiar papers—requisition forms that Mr. Taylor’s office required, a few special order forms from Zagfield in Atlanta related to the lights in the house and a few other miscellaneous papers that required my signature.
Underneath the stack to be signed was a paper clipped bundle of articles printed from various webpages. In Rachel’s neat handwriting, the sticky note on top read: “For Carrie Jo.”
“I think that’s all that needed to be signed. I’ll text you later when she wakes up. Unless it’s late.”
“Knowing our son, I’ll be up anyway. I love you, Carrie Jo.”
“Love you, too,” I whispered as he walked out with the papers. I glanced at my mother, who hadn’t moved. There was a Naugahyde recliner in the corner. That would be my bed for the night. I turned the main light off and flipped on the track light over the chair. Let her rest while she could. I pulled out some socks from the overnight bag. Ashland was so thoughtful to remember the small things. I had perpetually cold feet, and it was cold in here. I pulled my hair into a ponytail and leaned back to read what Rachel sent me. On each page she’d put sticky notes pointing out different things.
I was kind of familiar with what I was reading, but it hadn’t been put together so succinctly before. To be honest, I wasn’t sure why she was sharing all this with me: articles about the missing children, the interview with Beatrice Overton, the photos of apparitions that were supposedly the ghosts of Idlewood. When I took this job I hadn’t believed there would be anything like this to consider, and having heard Desmond Taylor’s warning I knew I shouldn’t encourage Rachel in her curiosity to get to the bottom of this. True, I had dreamed about the children, and I was curious too, but I’d dreamed about places and people before. That didn’t always mean I had to do something about it. Momma stirred a little on the bed and moaned in her sleep as if she were having a bad dream. I’d even dreamed about her when I was little. When she was in the middle of her breakdown or whatever it was when I was a child, I could see her dreams. They were dark, knotted and often full of snakes and other creepy things. I’d done my dead level best to avoid napping with my mom from then on.
I wondered what it would be like now, now that she was taking her medication and getting the help she needed. And if I did dream with her, would I find the answer to the question I wanted to uncover most right now? Who was Chance Jardine? That was something to consider. Maybe I would do that tonight. She couldn’t object because she’d be out of it. But then again, we were at a new level in our relationship. We’d worked to repair some trust between us, and I wou
ldn’t be the one to break it.
But who was Chance Jardine?
I sighed and continued to flip through the pages as quietly as possible. I found a handwritten note from Rachel. Thought you should see these. Let me know what you think. She’d found a photograph of a family oil painting, but I didn’t need to read the inscription to know who they were. This was the Ferguson family, in happier days, presumably before Percy’s marriage to Aubrey. I couldn’t help but stare at the face of the youngest one, Trinket. She seemed so vulnerable. Her eyes were so large compared to the rest of her, and they were like two smudges of sadness. They pleaded with me. I could almost hear her voice.
Find her.
Find me.
Help us.
Chapter Thirteen – Trinket
I screamed as Bridget chased me down the garden path. She held one of her vicious-looking hatpins in her hand, and her intentions were clear. She thrust it at me, and I felt the evil tip poke my flesh. My scrawny legs pumped faster underneath my flimsy dress as I managed to race ahead of her, and I scrambled down the steps of the sunken garden. Today’s weapon was the prettiest one in her collection, my favorite, the one with the butterfly wings. The enamel wings were lovely, but make no mistake, this was a tool of torture. My sister enjoyed piercing me to make me bleed. How I howled and screamed, but she was merciless in her pursuit of blood, which had become much more frequent a demand of late.
Especially since the death of our Golden Sister, Tallulah. She would never have approved of such vicious bloodletting.
But Bridget needed the blood, she explained, to summon the fairies. They loved the taste of innocent blood—and she needed the fairies’ power to resurrect Tallulah. At night, when the house was dark and quiet, she would remind me that Tallulah would linger in purgatory for all eternity and needed freedom. Her whispers filled my heart with fear and deep sadness. The kind my heart had never experienced before, even as familiar as I was with sadness.
I dipped behind a short wall. I had to stop and try to catch my breath. Then she found me. Bridget stood over me, her pin raised high above her head like I was a fish ready to be spiked and she the fisherman. I screamed as tears streamed down my face. I’d quit begging for mercy. She wasn’t listening.
“Why all the fuss, Trinket? I am not going to kill you. I want to bring our sister back. Why won’t you help? You are so selfish! Always so selfish! Give me some of your sweet blood!”
“Use your own blood!” I screamed defiantly.
“It must be innocent, sister. I won’t kill you—now be still.”
With that meager hope, the hope that she would not kill me, I gave up. I let my body sag and prepared for the piercing blow. I was crying so hard my chest was shuddering. I found it hard to breathe.
Even the oversize bow on the top of my head sagged. How I hated Mother for insisting that I wear these. If I survived this involuntary offering, I vowed to myself that I would never wear another one again. What could Mother do to me that was worse than what Bridget, the Queen of the Fairies, was about to rain down upon me? My hand went up defensively, but the blow never came.
I hid behind my raised arm and decided to beg for mercy one last time. “Bridget! No! Don’t do this! Tallulah wouldn’t let you! Tallulah!”
Maybe my words struck her heart, for Bridget stepped back. Her feet dragged on the dirt floor as if she were frozen to the spot and could move them only with the greatest of personal force. “Sss….” was the only sound she made as her body shook. She sounded as if the air had been let out of her, squeezed out by an invisible hand. She dropped the long, slender pin; it fell in front of me, and like a madwoman I grabbed it before she could retrieve it.
I watched Bridget turn to run from the unseen interloper, and that moment felt like an eternity. Her arms were akimbo like a heathen dancer who worshiped around a fire. My sister’s thick brown hair swirled about her shocked pale face, kept in place only by the wreath of flowers upon her head. She left me alone to fight whatever she feared so completely. I leaned against the damp block wall in the sunken garden to collect my wits. Still clutching the hatpin, as it was my only defense, I peeked out from around the corner of the blocks.
In an instant I recognized her.
Tallulah!
I leaned back with a gasp, still unable to breathe. Who or what could that be? Yet the image of her—her once cheerful yellow gown, the white skin of her arms, her blond hair—was ingrained in my mind. I had to be mistaken. “Bridget!” I whispered through hot tears. This had to be a trick! A cruel trick of the fairies. Yes, that had to be it. Or the fear of my sister had made me lose my mental faculties. I was very close to losing my bladder now.
Holding the butterfly-topped pin in my hands like a sword, I swung around the corner again, ready to face the hideous doppelganger. But the thing had vanished. In its place, a thick green field of grass filled with yellow butterflies mocking me as they fluttered about carelessly. I would never love a butterfly again.
I walked home, and it seemed much farther than I remembered. I didn’t realize how far I’d run. I was tired now and hungry. My stomach rumbled its complaint. I went to the kitchen house, and Mr. Lofton gave me a sweet roll. At least there was one kind soul in this place. And Mrs. Potts, she was another kind one, although she was nowhere near as kind as Mr. Lofton. He was my favorite. And not just because he gave me baked treats whenever I asked for them.
I didn’t come into the main house but entered through the servants’ quarters and tiptoed up the stairs. A neat trick in my noisy new shoes. I hated shoes and would have much preferred wearing soft slippers every day. I heard someone weeping, but someone was always weeping now that Tallulah had died. And I was often among them. I had no more tears at this present moment, however, and I felt tremendous guilt over that. My sister had been dead for less than a month, and I couldn’t muster up one more tear, although my heart hurt so much at times I was sure it must be bleeding. Did hearts bleed? I stuffed the remaining bit of my treat into my mouth and dug in my pocket with my sticky hand. Yes, I still had the pin. I held my breath as I passed the door of the bedroom I shared with Bridget. She watched me approach, and I closed it against me. No bother to me. I would not stay with her again. I would sleep in the nursery; I was still a child, after all. And nobody would miss me.
“No, I will not be quiet! You have no right to be rifling through her things. If you want dresses or purses or hats, I will buy them for you, but stay out of here.”
“What is wrong with you? I was only putting her things away! I do not want your sister’s clothing! This is the way things are done, Percy. When someone dies, you put their things away.” She was trying to calm him, but it wasn’t working. I could have told her she was wasting her time. “It helps preserve the things that were the most precious to the deceased, and it gives the grieving some relief. I would think you would want to give your mother some relief. She spends all her time crying over your sister. Have you no heart, Percy?”
I peeked through the crack in the doorway and saw that Percy towered above her. I knew that look. He wanted to push her down, just as he used to do to Michael when Michael was cruel to me or, God forbid, cruel to Tallulah. He would push him down and stand over him in a threatening way until Michael agreed to behave. But he could not push Aubrey down. She was his wife, and husbands did not do such things to their wives.
In a stilted voice he said, “I do not care what other people do. I do not want her things touched or plundered through. Leave it be, Aubrey.”
“Even in death you love her more!” she began but soon hushed her mouth.
“Be careful what you say to me, Mrs. Ferguson.” She opened and closed her mouth like one of the goldfish in the pond and looked away. Percy stormed out of the room and moved so quickly that he nearly tripped over me. “You shouldn’t be here, Dot.”
“I know,” I said, unafraid of my brother. He would never push me down. “Look!” I waved the pin at him. “Look what I took from Bridget.” I sho
wed him the pin in an attempt to take his mind off his adult troubles. He waved me away, uninterested.
“Not now.” He stomped down the hall and then down the stairs. I turned my attention back to the door. Aubrey was folding something. A piece of paper. So that was what she was after. She lit a match and crumpled the paper, tossing it in the fireplace. I pushed on the door to get a better look, but it squeaked loudly and betrayed my position.
“Percy?” she called.
I pushed the door open, anxious to see what exactly she planned to do with the paper she seemed so concerned about burning. I didn’t answer her but walked into Tallulah’s room confidently and smiled at her as she froze. The match extinguished in her fingers, but she did not blow it out. She sat up nervously and fussed with her skirts. Then offense crept over her plain face. “How long have you been spying on Percy and me and lurking outside our door? That is very rude, Dot. Do not spy on married couples.”
“Only Percy calls me Dot. You may call me Trinket.” I felt the sharp pin in my pocket. It gave me confidence. Surely that feeling was some kind of fairy magic.
“Very well—Trinket. Let me be perfectly clear. It is very rude to go about spying on married people. You might see something you cannot unsee.”
“I shall remember that. You may go now, Aubrey. This is my room.”
“No, it isn’t. This room belongs to your dead sister.” I hated seeing the smirk on her face. She was plain, very plain. Bridget secretly called her “horse face” behind her back. I tried not to giggle about it. I decided right then and there I would fix this problem. I’d been bullied enough today. It was time to do some bullying of my own.
“She will share it with me.” I looked around as if I could see Tallulah right now. I took a step toward Aubrey, my eyes fixed on her face. “And lost souls lurk at Idlewood. They always have, and now there is one more,” I lied. My skin crept up in goose bumps as I spoke, as if by saying these things I did indeed have the power to make them true. “Tallulah will not like you being here in our room. She likes her privacy.”
The Ghosts of Idlewood Page 10