Remember Me (3 page)

It was Adam. “Hi, love,” she said joyously. “Have you found us a house?”

He ignored the question. “Hi, sweetheart. How do you feel? How's the baby?”

Menley paused for a moment. She knew she really couldn't blame him for worrying, still she couldn't resist taking a little jab. “I'm fine, but I really haven't
checked on Hannah since you left this morning,” she told him. “Wait a minute and I'll give a look.”

“Menley!”

“I'm sorry,” she said, “but Adam, it's the way you ask; it's as though you're expecting bad news.”

“Mea culpa,”
he said contritely. “I just love you both so much. I want everything to be right. I'm with Elaine. We've got a terrific place. A nearly three-hundred-year-old captain's house on Morris Island in Chatham. The location is magnificent, a bluff over-looking the ocean. You'll be crazy about it. It even has a name, Remember House. I'll tell you all about it when I get home. I'll start back after dinner.”

“That's a five-hour drive,” Menley protested, “and you've already done it once today. Why don't you stay over and get an early start in the morning?”

“I don't care how late it is. I want to be with you and Hannah tonight. I love you.”

“I love you too,” Menley said fervently.

After they said good-bye, she replaced the receiver and whispered to herself, “I only hope the real reason for rushing home isn't that you're afraid to trust me alone with the baby.”

H
enry Sprague held his wife's hand as they walked along the beach. The late afternoon sun was slipping in and out of clouds, and he was glad he had fastened the warm scarf around Phoebe's head. He mused that the approaching evening brought a different look to the landscape. Without the bathers, the vistas of sand and cooling ocean waters seemed to return to a primal harmony with nature.

He watched as seagulls hopped about at the edge of the waves. Clam shells in subtle tones of gray and pink and white were clustered on the damp sand. An occasional piece of flotsam caught his eye. Years ago he had spotted a life preserver from the
Andrea Doria
that had washed ashore here.

It was the time of day he and Phoebe had always enjoyed most. It was on this beach four years ago that Henry had first noticed the signs of forgetfulness in her. Now, with a heavy heart, he acknowledged that he wouldn't be able to keep her at home much longer. The drug tacrine had been prescribed, and sometimes she seemed to be making genuine improvement, but several times recently she had slipped out of the house while his back was turned. Just the other day at dusk he'd found her on this beach, waist-deep in the ocean.
Even as he ran toward her, a wave had knocked her over. Totally disoriented, she'd been within seconds of drowning.

We've had forty-six good years, he told himself. I can visit her at the home every day. It will be for the best. He knew all this was true, still it was so difficult. She was trudging along at his side, quiet, lost in a world of her own. Dr. Phoebe Cummings Sprague, full professor of history at Harvard, who no longer remembered how to tie a scarf or whether she'd just had breakfast.

He realized where they were and looked up. Beyond the dune, on the high ground, the house was silhouetted against the horizon. It had always reminded him of an eagle, perched as it was on the embankment, aloof and watchful. “Phoebe,” he said.

She turned and stared at him, frowning. The frown had become automatic. It had begun when she still was trying desperately not to give the appearance of being forgetful.

He pointed to the house above them. “I told you that Adam Nichols is renting there for August, with his wife, Menley, and their new baby. I'll ask them to visit us soon. You always liked Adam.”

Adam Nichols. For an instant the murky fog that had invaded Phoebe's mind, forcing her to grope for understanding, parted. That house, she thought. Its original name was Nickquenum.

Nickquenum,
the solemn Indian word that meant “I am going home.” I was walking around, Phoebe told herself. I was in that house. Someone I know—who was it?—doing something strange . . . Adam's wife must
not
live there . . . the fog rushed back into her brain and enveloped it. She looked at her husband. “Adam Nichols,” she murmured slowly. “Who is that?”

S
cott Covey had not gone to bed until midnight. Even so he was still awake when the first hints of dawn began to cast shadows through the bedroom. After that he fell into an uneasy doze and woke up with a sensation of tightness in his forehead, the beginning of a headache.

Grimacing, he threw back the covers. The night had turned sharply cooler, but he knew the drop in temperature was temporary. By noon it would be a fine Cape day, sunny with the midsummer heat tempered by salt-filled ocean breezes. But it was still cool now, and if Vivian were here he'd have closed the windows before she got out of bed.

Today Vivian was being buried.

As he got up, Scott glanced down at the bed and thought of how often in the three months they'd been married he'd brought coffee to her when she woke up. Then they would snuggle in bed and drink it together.

He could see her still, her scrunched up knees supporting the saucer, her back against a pile of pillows, remember her joking about the brass headboard.

“Mother redecorated my room when I was sixteen,” she'd told him in that breathy voice she had. “I wanted one of these so much, but Mother said I didn't
have any flair for interior decoration and brass beds were getting too common. The first thing I did when I got my hands on my own money was to buy the most ornate one I could find.” Then she'd laughed. “I have to admit that an upholstered headboard is a lot more comfortable to lean against.”

He'd taken the cup and saucer from her hand that morning and placed it on the floor. “Lean against me,” he'd suggested.

Funny that particular memory hitting him now. Scott went into the kitchen, made coffee and toast, and sat at the counter. The front of the house faced the street, the back overlooked Oyster Pond. From the side window through the foliage he could see the corner of the Spragues' place.

Vivian had told him that Mrs. Sprague would be put in a nursing home soon. “Henry doesn't like me to visit her anymore, but we'll have to invite him over to dinner when he's alone,” she had said.

“It's fun to have company when we do it together,” she'd added. Then she had wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him fiercely. “You
do
really love me, don't you, Scott?”

How many times had he reassured her, held her, stroked her hair, comforted her until, once again cheerful, she'd switched to listing reasons why she loved him. “I always hoped my husband would be over six feet tall, and you are. I always hoped he'd be blond and handsome so that everyone would envy me. Well, you are, and they do. But most important of all, I wanted him to be crazy about me.”

“And I am.” Over and over again he had told her that.

Scott stared out the window, thinking over the last two weeks, reminding himself that some of the Carpenter family cousins, and many of Viv's friends, had rushed to console him from the minute she was reported
missing. But a significant number of people had not. Her parents had been especially aloof. He knew that in the eyes of many he was nothing more than a fortune hunter, an opportunist. Some of the news accounts in the Boston and Cape papers had printed interviews with people who were openly skeptical of the circumstances of the accident.

The Carpenter family had been prominent in Massachusetts for generations. Along the way they had produced senators and governors. Anything that happened to them was news.

He got up and crossed to the stove for more coffee. Suddenly the thought of the hours ahead, of the memorial service and the burial, of the inevitable presence of the media was overwhelming. Everyone would be watching him.

“Damn you all, we were in love!” he said fiercely, slamming the percolator down on the stove.

He took a quick gulp of coffee. It was boiling hot. His mouth burning, he rushed to the sink and spat it out.

T
hey stopped in Buzzards Bay long enough to pick up coffee, rolls and a copy of the
Boston Globe.
As they drove over the Sagamore Bridge in the packed
station wagon, Menley sighed, “Do you think there's coffee in heaven?”

“There'd better be. Otherwise you won't stay awake long enough to enjoy your eternal reward.” Adam glanced over at her, a smile in his eyes.

They'd gotten an early start, on the road by seven. Now at eleven-thirty they were crossing Cape Cod Canal. After howling for the first fifteen minutes, an unusually cooperative Hannah had slept the rest of the trip.

The late morning sun gave a silvery sheen to the metal structure of the bridge. In the canal below, a cargo ship was slowly steaming through the gently lapping water. Then they were on Route 6.

“It was at this point every summer that my dad used to shout, ‘We're back on the Cape!' ” Adam said. “It was always his real home.”

“Do you think your mother regrets selling?”

“No. The Cape wasn't the same for her after Dad died. She's happier in North Carolina near her sisters. But I'm like Dad. This place is in my blood; our family has summered here for three centuries.”

Menley shifted slightly so that she could watch her husband. She was happy to finally be here with him. They had planned to come up the summer Bobby was born, but the doctor hadn't wanted her to be so far away in late pregnancy. The next year they'd just bought the house in Rye and were settling in, so it didn't make sense to come to the Cape.

The next summer they'd lost Bobby. And after that, Menley thought, all I knew was the awful numbness, the feeling of being detached from every other human being, the inability to respond to Adam.

Last year, Adam had come up here alone. She had asked him for a trial separation. Resigned, he had agreed. “We certainly can't go on like this, Men,” he
had admitted, “going through the motions of being married.”

He had been gone for three weeks when she realized she was pregnant. In all that time he hadn't called her. For days she had agonized about telling him, wondering what his reaction would be. Finally she had phoned. His impersonal greeting had made her heart sink, but when she said, “Adam, maybe this isn't the news you want to hear but I'm pregnant and I'm very happy about it,” his whoop of joy had thrilled her.

“I'm on my way home,” he had said without a pause.

Now she felt Adam's hand in hers. “I wonder if we're thinking the same thing,” he said. “I was up here when I heard her nibs was on the way.”

For a moment they were silent; then Menley blinked back tears and began to laugh. “And remember how after she was born Phyllis carried on about naming her Menley Hannah.” She mimicked the strident tone of her sister-in-law. “I think it's very nice to keep the family tradition of naming the first daughter Menley, but please don't call her Hannah. That's so old-fashioned. Why not name her Menley Kimberly and then she can be Kim? Wouldn't that be cute?”

Her voice resumed its normal pitch. “Honestly!”

“Don't ever get mad at me, honey,” Adam chuckled. “I hope Phyllis doesn't wear out your mother.” Menley's mother was traveling in Ireland with her son and daughter-in-law.

“Phyl is determined to research both sides of the family tree. It's a safe bet that if she finds horse thieves among her ancestors we'll never hear about it.”

From the backseat they heard a stirring. Menley looked over her shoulder. “Well, it looks like her ladyship
is going to be joining us soon, and I bet she'll be one hungry character.” Leaning over, she popped the pacifier into Hannah's mouth. “Say a prayer that holds her until we get to the house.”

She put the empty coffee container in a bag and reached for the newspaper. “Adam, look. There's a picture of the couple you told me about. She's the one who drowned when they were scuba diving. The funeral is today. The poor guy. What a tragic accident.”

Tragic accident. How many times had she heard those words. They triggered such terrible memories. They flooded over her.
Driving on that unfamiliar country road, Bobby in the backseat. A glorious sunny day. Feeling so great. Singing to Bobby at the top of her lungs. Bobby joining in. The unguarded railroad crossing. And then feeling the vibrations. Looking out the window. The conductor's frantic face. The roar and the screech of metal as the braking train bore down on them. Bobby screaming, “Mommy, Mommy.” Flooring the accelerator. The crash as the train hit the back door next to Bobby. The train dragging the car. Bobby sobbing, “Mommy, Mommy.” Then his eyes closing. Knowing he was dead. Rocking him in her arms. Screaming and screaming, “Bobby, I want Bobby. Bobbbbyyyyyyyy.”

Once again Menley felt the perspiration drenching her body. She began to shiver. She pressed her hands on her legs to control the trembling spasms of her limbs.

Adam glanced at her. “Oh my God.” They were approaching a rest stop. He pulled into it, braked the car and turned to wrap his arms around her. “It's okay, sweetheart. It's okay.”

In the backseat, Hannah began to wail.

Bobby wailing. “Mommy, Mommy.”

Hannah wailing . . .

“Make her stop!” Menley screamed.
“Make her stop!”

I
t was quarter of twelve, Elaine realized, glancing at the dashboard clock. Adam and Menley should be arriving any minute, and she wanted to check the house before they got there to make sure everything was in order. One of the services she offered her clients was that a rental property would be thoroughly cleaned before and after a tenancy. She pressed her foot more firmly on the accelerator. She was running late because of attending the funeral service for Vivian Carpenter Covey.