Peyton Place (54 page)

The next morning, the child of a pair of shackowners from out on the Meadow Road came into Buck McCracken's office carrying a newspaper-wrapped parcel. The two men from the Navy Department were very interested in the contents of the package, but Buck McCracken, feeling sick, turned away from the articles spread out on his desk. There were the burned remains of a Navy pea jacket, with its round buttons still intact, and the scorched shreds of what had apparently been a woman's bathrobe. Even from where Buck stood, a good six feet away from the desk, he could see the rusty stains of blood on the sprigged, feminine-looking fabric of the robe. The child, a boy of about twelve, who had brought the parcel into town claimed that he had found it just as the men saw it now, in a pile of rubbish at the town dump. The boy's next remark had to do with the question of a possible reward.

“Beat it,” Buck McCracken told him savagely, and from the waiting room, outside the office, came the whining voice of a shack woman.

“I tole you, sonny,” she whined. “I tole you ‘n’ your Pa both, that it wa'nt no good at all, gettin’ mixed up with what's none of our business.”

One of the navy men poked at the burned pea jacket with the tip of a pencil. “Looks as if Lucas Cross must have had a good reason for being A.W.O.L. after all,” he said.

A good officer, recited Buck silently, never eliminates the possibility of foul play. “Lucas musta been keepin’ a woman that none of us knew about,” he said aloud.

“I'll settle for the girl,” said one Navy man.

“What girl?” demanded Buck, innocently.

“Selena Cross,” replied the second Navy man.

It was still early when Buck and the two Navy men drove up in front of the Cross house. Selena had not left for work, and Joey was still in his pajamas. Selena let the men into the house and led the way to the living room. She acted as if she had not seen the package under the arm of one of the Navy men. The man put the parcel down on the couch, opened it and spread out its contents. Then he straightened up and looked Selena straight in the eye. She neither moved nor spoke, and for all the emotion which showed in her face, she might as easily have been examining a line of dry goods which did not particularly impress her.

“We know you did it,” said the man.

Joey Cross hurled himself across the room and stood in front of his sister.

“I did it!” he screamed. “I did it! I killed him and I buried him in the sheep pen, and I did it by myself. I did it alone!”

Selena pressed his head to her side and rumpled his hair for a short moment.

“Go into the other room, Joey,” she said. “Go get dressed like a good boy.”

When he had gone, she turned to face Buck McCracken.

It's a small world.

In later years, Buck McCracken used to say that he wished he had a nickel for every time he heard those words spoken during the weeks before Selena Cross came to trial.

Those were the short weeks of long days during the late spring and early summer of 1944. In years past, these had been the weeks of the spring hop, of graduation, of vacation for some and of work in the fields for others, but in 1944, these were weeks of excitement of such pitch that all else paled, including the war.

Peyton Place was overcrowded during the weeks preceding and during the trial. Newspaper reporters walked streets where only Seth Buswell had walked, as a newspaper man, before, and the summer people who usually by-passed Peyton Place in favor of the better known, more highly advertised sections of the state, came to town in streams of expensive cars, all bearing out-of-state license plates. It was unlikely that the case of Selena Cross would ever have drawn much attention if it had not been for a brash young reporter who worked for a Hearst-owned Boston newspaper. The young man, whose name was Thomas Delaney, had a talent for attention-getting headlines. The day after Selena was arrested, the
Daily Record,
for which Delaney worked, bloomed with a headline of three-inch letters. PATRICIDE IN PEYTON PLACE. These words were hastily picked up and flung across front pages by other newspapers throughout northern New England, so that by the time three days were gone, they had appeared and been read by practically everyone in four states. Editors dispatched their best reporters to cover the trial of Selena Cross, and Peyton Place took on the aspects of a large, open-air, lunatic asylum. The town was without either hotel, inn, tavern or rooming house, so that the reporters and tourists who had come to write or stare, each according to his own vocation, were forced to use the inadequate facilities at White River. Every morning these people flowed into Peyton Place, and every evening they left, but they wrought havoc during the hours in between. For the first time since anyone could remember, the old men who peopled the benches in front of the courthouse were forced to flee and scatter against the onslaught of photographers and reporters who insisted on taking pictures of these “picturesque old characters” and on buttonholing them with questions which always began with: “What do
you
think about all this?” The only one of the old men who did not run was Clayton Frazier, who had developed a liking for Thomas Delaney, the Hearst reporter from Boston. This strange alliance had begun on the day when Delaney had arrived in Peyton Place, and had been discovered by Clayton in Hyde's Diner, sitting unconcernedly in the old man's favorite seat at the counter. Clayton had been furious, and everyone else in the diner who was from Peyton Place had watched eagerly to see what the old man would do. Clayton sat down on the stool next to Delaney.

“Newspaper reporter, eh?” asked Clayton.

“Yes.”

“Who for?”

“The Boston
Daily Record.”

“Oh, one of them Hearst papers.”

“What's the matter with the Hearst papers?”

“Nothin’, if you go for that kinda thing. Read somethin’ once by a feller named Arthur J. Pegler. Reckon he's dead by now. He's got one of his relations workin’ for Hearst now. Anyhow, this Arthur Pegler told how ‘A Hearst newspaper is like a screaming woman running down the street with her throat cut.’ Now, I reckon there's nothin’ wrong in that, if a body's got the kinda mind that goes for that stuff.”

Without an eyelash flicker, Delaney picked up his coffee cup. “I'd be inclined to go a step further than Mr. Pegler,” he said. “I should describe it as a
naked
woman running down the street, and so forth.”

“Of course,” said Clayton, “I'm not sayin’ it don't take imagination to work for Hearst. What you don't know, you have to make up, and that must take some imagination.”

“Not so much imagination as nerve, Mr. Frazier,” said Delaney. “Plain, brassy nerve.”

“Who told you my name?” demanded Clayton.

“The same fellow who told me I was sitting in your seat when he saw you approaching this place.”

Clayton and Delaney became friends, although to listen to the insults which they hurled at one another, one would never have suspected it. The reporter remained in Peyton Place during the time before Selena's trial. He wrote reams of background on the town and its people with the idea, so he told Clayton, of eventually using this material for the basis of a novel.

“But why Peyton Place?” he asked Clayton Frazier one day. “Crazy damned name. Nobody around here seems overly eager to talk about it, either, except to say that the town was named for a man who built a castle. What about this man and his castle?”

“Come on,” said Clayton. “I'll show you the place.”

The two men walked along the tracks of the Boston and Maine Railroad line with Clayton leading the way. The sun beat down, hot and bright, on the treeless strips of rocky ground along the tracks. Soon, Delaney removed his suit coat and necktie and carried them slung over his shoulder. At last, where the tracks curved slightly before reaching the bridge which crossed the Connecticut River, Clayton stopped walking and pointed to the highest hill of all. On top of this hill sat the towered and turreted gray pile of stone which was Samuel Peyton's castle.

“Feel like walkin’ up that hill?” asked Clayton.

“Yes,” said Delaney, making a mental note of the castle's sinister, dark look, sinister and secretive looking even in the hot, open-faced sunlight. “Who was this Samuel Peyton?” he asked as he and Clayton trudged up the steep, bramble-covered hill. “An exiled English duke, or earl, or something?”

“Everybody thinks that,” said Clayton, pausing to wipe his face with his sleeve. “Fact is, that castle was built—and this town named—for a friggin’ nigger.”

“Oh, now listen–” began Delaney, but Clayton refused to speak another word until they had reached the walls of the castle.

The walls were high, so high that standing in front of them one could not see the castle as it was possible to do from a distance, and thick, with the gates which broke them at intervals securely locked and barred. Clayton and Delaney sat down, resting their backs against one gray wall, and Clayton uncorked a bottle of whisky which he had been saving for this moment. It was almost cool, up on the hill, with the trees shading the two men from the sun.

Clayton took a drink and passed the bottle to Delaney. “Fact,” he said. “A friggin’ nigger.”

Delaney drank and returned the bottle to Clayton. “Come on,” he said. “Don't make me pull it out of you one word at a time. Tell it from the beginning.”

Clayton drank, sighed and adjusted his back against the stone wall. “Well,” he began, “quite a spell before the Civil War, there was this nigger down South someplace. He was a slave, and he worked for a plantation owner by the name of Peyton. Now this nigger, whose name was Samuel, musta lived before his time, or out of his element, or whatever you want to call it. Anyhow, he lived a long time before anybody ever heard of a feller called Abraham Lincoln. The reason I say he lived out of his time was that Samuel had funny ideas. He wanted to be free, and this was at a time when most folks looked on niggers as work horses, or mules. Anyhow, Samuel decided to run away. There's some say he done it on gold stolen from his owner, this feller by the name of Peyton. Don't ask me, ‘cause I don't know. Nobody knows. No more than they know how he done it. Samuel was a big, strappin’ young buck. He had to be, ‘cause I don't imagine it was an easy thing for a nigger slave to escape from the South in them days. Anyhow, he escaped and got on a boat goin’ to France. Don't ask me how he done it, ‘cause I don't know that, either. There's some say the captain of the boat goin’ to France was one of them half-breed fellers. Whaddya call ’em?”

“Mulattoes?” offered Delaney.

“Yep,” said Clayton, drinking and passing the bottle, “that's it. Mulatto. Well, there's some say that the boat captain was a mulatto. I don't know. Nobody knows for sure. Anyhow, Samuel got to Marseilles, France. It couldn't've been easy, like I said, ‘cause Samuel was big and strappin’ and black as the ace of spades. But he got there, and in a few years he had made a fortune out of the shippin’ business. Nobody knows how he got started, although there's plenty who say he still had a pile of this Peyton feller's gold when he got over on the other side. Anyhow, he made money, plenty of it and no mistake. But over there in France, he got another one of his crazy ideas. He musta been a great one for crazy ideas, Samuel. He got the idea that since he was free and had plenty of money, he was as good as any white man, and he went and married a white girl. French girl, she was. Her name was Vi'let. Not the way we spell Vi'let, but with two
t's
and an
e
on the end. French. There's some say she was pretty—frail lookin’ like a piece of china. I don't know. Nobody around here now knows, ‘cause this was all such a long time ago. Anyhow, Samuel decided to come back to America. It was durin’ the Civil War when he came back. That lady from Massachusetts named Stowe had already wrote that book about the slaves, and there was plenty of people who started lovin’ niggers overnight. At least, they loved ’em with their mouths. Well, Samuel and Vi'let got to Boston. Reckon Samuel musta thought that with all his money, and everybody lovin’ the niggers, that he was gonna be able to move right onto Beacon Hill and start in entertainin’ the Lowells and the Cabots. Well, the upshot of it was that Samuel couldn't even find any kind of a house anyplace in Boston. If he'd of been in rags with welts all over his back, and if Vi'let had been black and had looked like she was all pooped from bein’ chased by bloodhounds, maybe they'd of had an easier time of it. I dunno. I reckon Boston wa'nt too used to seein’ a nigger wearin’ a starched frill and a hand-embroidered waistcoat, and boots that cost forty dollars a pair. Forty dollars was a heap of money, in them days. Well, with all his money, and his white wife and bein’ free and all, Samuel couldn't find a place in Boston. There's some say he went into one of them black rages niggers are supposed to have. I dunno. All I know is he came up here. There's some say he wanted to get far enough away from Boston that he'd never set eyes on a white man again as long as he lived. Anyhow, he came here. There wa'nt no town here, then. Nothin’ but the hills and the woods and the Connecticut River. Course, there was towns and cities to the south, but nothin’ up here back then. Well, Samuel picked the highest hill of all and decided to build him a castle for him and his white wife named Vi'let. They lived in a cabin, because it took a long time for this place to be built. Gimme the bottle.”

Delaney passed the bottle to Clayton, who drank. “See this?” he asked, slapping the flat of his hand against the stone wall behind them. “Imported. Every stick and stone, every doorknob and pane of glass of the castle was imported from England. I dunno, but I'd still be willin’ to bet that this here is the only real, true, genuwine castle in New England. All the furniture inside was imported, too, and the hangin's, and the paneling for the walls. When it was done, Samuel and Vi'let moved in and neither one of ’em ever set foot outside these walls again. It wa'nt too long before a feller by the name of Harrington came along and built them mills down alongside the river, and after that there started to be a town here. Pretty soon, the B & M put in the railroad line to White River through here. Folks ridin’ on the train used to look up here at Samuel's castle and say, ‘What's that?’ and the conductors would lean down and look out the windows of the coaches and say, ‘Why, that's the Peyton place.’ And that's how the town got its name.”

“But what happened afterward?” demanded Delaney.

“Whaddya mean ‘afterward’?”

“The story can't end there,” said the young reporter. “What happened to Samuel and Violette?”

“Oh, they died,” said Clayton. “Vi'let went first. Some say she had the consumption, and there's others say she just faded away from bein’ cooped up in the castle. I dunno. Samuel buried her out in back of the castle. There's a tall, white stone marks her grave, made outa Vermont marble. When Samuel died, he was buried right next to her. But the stone over Samuel's grave is short and squat, and made out of that black marble that comes from Italy, or one of them foreign countries. It was the state buried Samuel, on account of he left ’em all this land and the castle besides. There's some say this state ain't fussy about takin’ presents.”

“But what does the state get out of this place?” asked Delaney, looking at one of the barred gates in the wall.

“Nothin’ from this place,” said Clayton. “But Samuel wa'nt dumb. He owned forest land to the north of here. Lumber is what the state gets, or used to get anyway. Now they got one of these forestry places up there. In return, they got to look after this place ’til it falls apart. Make sure the gates stay locked, keep people outa the place and like that. There wa'nt nothin’ in Samuel's will about lookin’ after the inside of the place, though. And inside, things has rotted away. The drapes hang all torn and crooked, and rats have et holes in the upholstery of Samuel's imported furniture, and the wooden paneling is cracked and fallen apart. The big chandelier in the front hall got torn loose of the ceilin’ back durin’ a storm we had once. The glass is still layin’ on the floor in Samuel's castle.”

Delaney eyed Clayton suspiciously. “From the way you describe the interior of the castle, I'd say that you had been in it at one time or another.”

“Sure,” admitted Clayton. “There's a way to get in, or at least there was when I was a boy. There was a tree grew around at the other side, and there was a branch of this tree hung right over the wall. You used to be able to climb the tree and go hand over hand along the branch. Then, if you didn't think too much about breakin’ a leg, you could drop off the end of the branch right into Samuel's back yard. It was hell gettin’ back over the wall, as I remember, but I done it once. You want to try?”

Delaney stood up and looked at the blank-faced wall before him. He thought for a long time. “No,” he said at last. “No, I don't think so. Let's start back. It's getting late.”