The Family Beach House (22 page)

Friday, July 27

Charlotte's memorial service was held at St. Peter's-by-the-Sea on Shore Road in Cape Neddick. Founded in 1897 by Nannie Dunlap Conarroe, in memory of her husband George, St. Peter's was an Episcopal chapel for summer residents and visitors. It was a beautiful stone building that sat atop Christian Hill. Per George Conarroe's wishes its cross was visible to fishermen at sea. Dignified St. Peter's was one of Maine's most popular locations for baptisms, weddings, and memorials of all sorts. Charlotte's funeral had taken place there, too.

The weather was good, with bright skies and no forecast of rain. At a little before ten o'clock the attendees of the memorial service filed into the church. Tessa Vickes, standing at the door, gave each person a red rose to hold. Not surprisingly, red roses had been Charlotte's favorite flower. Tilda was touched that Tessa had remembered.

Tilda wore a lightweight, cream-colored silk pantsuit she had bought years and years before at Talbots. Under it she wore a dusty blue silk blouse. She was thankful it wasn't a brutally hot day because she already felt warm in the small, un-air-conditioned church.
Maybe,
she thought,
I should reconsider dresses and skirts. At least my legs could breathe.
Had she ever seen her mother look uncomfortable in the heat? She didn't think that she had. Charlotte had always been self-composed.

Jon and Jane sat to her right. Jon wore a navy blazer, white shirt, no tie, and chinos. Jane had on a flowery chiffonlike top in pinks and purples and a darker pink skirt that came just above her knees. Adam, sitting in the pew directly across the center isle in a dove gray suit and pale yellow tie, seemed to have abandoned his idea of reading a passage from Ayn Rand's work. Maybe he had forgotten. He looked distracted. Kat looked grim. In honor of the occasion she had chosen to wear a little sweater over her sundress. She didn't exactly look modest but Tilda appreciated her effort at looking appropriate.

Hannah, to Tilda's left, was wearing a pair of enormous sunglasses. Tilda had not seen them before on her sister. She guessed they were protection against more than the bright sun, which was why she was wearing them in the church. Susan's crinkly cotton dress was a vibrant pattern of pinks and oranges. She carried a straw clutch with a faux-jeweled clasp. Craig sat alone in the pew behind them. He was wearing his best clothes. His expression was inscrutable. His hands were folded in his lap.

Sarah, sitting in the row behind Adam and Kat, wore her consciously dorky glasses and four strands of wooden beads around her neck. Cordelia was adorable, also consciously, in a black and white flower print dress and black patent leather shoes. Cody looked massively uncomfortable in a blue Oxford shirt buttoned almost to the neck, and tucked neatly (for now) into pressed jeans. It was good of Sarah to have come. Tilda smiled over at her sister-in-law. She was glad they were still friends of a sort, no thanks to Adam.

Her father, in a sober suit and tie, sat in the first row, just in front of Adam and Kat. Ruth, also in a sober, well-cut suit, sat to his right. The Vickes and Bobby Taylor were to her right. Bobby had worn a tie for the occasion, but no jacket. Tilda wasn't sure he owned one.

Tilda looked behind her. The pews were empty. She wondered why her mother's special friends weren't in attendance. Carol Whitehouse, the woman who had been with her when she died, had called with a valid excuse not to be there. But where were—Tilda stopped short. Where were who? She tried hard then to recall her mother's friends but she couldn't recall a single one other than Carol. Maybe her memory was bad. Maybe her mother had not really had personal friends, like her father had Bobby and Teddy. For the first time Tilda wondered if Charlotte had even liked Tessa Vickes.

Tilda looked over at Tessa. Outwardly, she was the antithesis of Charlotte McQueen, in her sensible flat sandals and voluminous sundress that looked as if it dated from the seventies, and her hair in a braid down her back. Charlotte had always been perfectly groomed and coiffed. She had worn tailored clothing. She had not cared for flats. And inwardly? A few moments spent with each woman would prove that Tessa Vickes and Charlotte McQueen had been as unlike as two women could be. Tilda doubted there had been a close friendship between them.

Tilda tried to pay attention to what the minister was saying but her mind continued to wander. Who had been at her mother's funeral? Tilda couldn't remember. She had been in shock. She had nodded and shaken hands and accepted condolence cards and then, mercifully, it was all over. She could ask Ruth about the attendees. She was sure to remember. But Tilda wasn't sure she wanted to know that her mother had died virtually friendless.

The minister's tone changed. He was winding up his talk. Tilda realized she had missed everything he had said about her mother. Had he said that she was loved and popular? Had he said that she was universally missed?

“Almighty God,” he was saying now, “we entrust all who are dear to us to your never-failing care and love, for this life and the life to come….” The words, Tilda thought, were most likely from the Book of Common Prayer. She wasn't sure that she believed in God, but now she found herself silently repeating those words of entreaty and thinking of her beloved and much lamented Frank.

 

The party was held at Larchmere in the early evening. Bill had sent an invitation to everyone he knew, no matter how slightly, in the towns of Ogunquit and Wells and Cape Neddick. Tilda wondered how many of the guests had really known or cared for her mother. She suspected that many if not most people had come for her father's sake.

Once again the gazebo was lit with strings of tiny white lights. Food was set up on a long table inside, and on smaller tables on the front porch. Adirondack chairs, painted white, sat in small groups around the lawn. Other chairs, a variety of styles, were stacked against the house for the use of whoever wanted one. In the front hall of the house, on a wooden easel that had once belonged to Charlotte (she had taken up painting for about a month one summer), sat a formal portrait of her, taken the year before she died. Charlotte had liked to have formal portraits taken. In this one she was wearing a crisp, white cotton blouse with the collar upturned. Around her neck was tied a small navy silk scarf. She wore pearl studs in her ears. Her face was captured as if she were gazing off into the distance in contemplation. Her hair was slicked into a classic French twist, showing her firm jawline. The photograph had been retouched, but not by much. The Charlotte of the portrait looked expensive and self-contained and utterly self-satisfied. It was, Tilda thought, a very good picture of her mother.

Tilda wandered the lawn for a while, drink in hand, listening to her father's guests in conversation. She passed a very old man, someone whose name she couldn't immediately recall. He was talking to another very old man. Tilda knew him as Turkey Mike but had no idea why he was called that. “I remember when Bill's father was still alive,” the nameless old man was saying. “My own father helped him build that guest cottage back in, oh, it must have been 1930 some odd, I'd say.”

“Lots changed since them days,” Turkey Mike replied, with a shake of his head. “Lots changed.”

Tilda walked on, determined to ask her aunt how Turkey Mike had come by his name.

“I don't see that nice Jennifer Fournier here, do you?”

“No. That seems a bit strange, don't you think? With she and Bill such an item.”

The speakers were the elderly Simmons sisters. Martha and Constance lived together in a tidy white farmhouse that had belonged to their parents. Neither had ever married. They were very nice and, as all “spinsters” were said to be, a bit batty. Both were wearing white cotton gloves and straw hats with silk flowers around the brim.

Tilda vowed to pay the sisters a visit and moved on.

“Poor Bill looks a bit worn out. The memorial must have been a strain for him.” That speaker was a longtime member of the zoning board. Tilda couldn't remember his name, either.

“I wonder when Matilda is going to find herself a new man. A woman shouldn't be alone like that. It isn't right.” And that was Mrs. Reed, who had been married four times and who now was rumored to be looking for husband number five.

Tilda smiled again, and wondered if Mrs. Reed had ever tried to snag Bill McQueen. That, she thought, would have been a disastrous match!

“Remember when Charlotte wanted to put that god-awful addition on the house?”

Tilda paused at the mention of her mother. She was behind the speaker and his friend. She recognized them as more Ogunquit old-timers. One had worked in local construction. The other had been a house painter. She wanted to hear what they would say. She grabbed her cell phone from her pocket and pretended to study it, as if she were reading a text message.

“She fought the zoning board like a, well, like one cat fights another cat invading his turf. But she lost in the end.”

The former house painter laughed. “I remember Bill was pretty embarrassed about the whole thing. That addition wasn't his idea, I heard tell. But no one ever blamed Bill for any trouble his wife caused. That time or any other. He needn't have worried that anybody would turn on him.”

Tilda snapped the phone shut and hurried away from the men.

Adam had left Kat sitting by herself near the gazebo. She had been out of sorts all day, cranky when she spoke and sullen-faced when she didn't. He did not like her this way. He wondered what had happened to change her usually placid, good-natured personality so abruptly. It was probably something hormonal, he decided. Well, if this is how she got from a bad period, there was no way in hell he was going to let her get pregnant!

He was hunting out his father's lawyer. He spotted him on the front porch and strode rapidly ahead. He was still in the suit he had worn to the memorial service. He was the only one at the party formally dressed.

“There you are,” he said, bounding up the porch stairs. “I want to talk to you.”

Teddy, drink in hand, looked at him with some amusement, which Adam interpreted as confusion. “You do, do you?” Teddy said. “What about?”

“I want to know the contents of my father's will.”

“And I want my hair to grow back but that isn't going to happen either.”

Adam frowned. “This is not a joke, Teddy. I need to know before things get further out of hand.”

“Things seem to be just fine to me. Except,” he said pointedly, “for Jennifer's not being here, that is.”

“Forget about her. If she knows what's good for her, she won't be coming back.”

Teddy took a long sip of his drink before saying, “Adam McQueen, your behavior is appalling. I thought your father raised you better.”

“My father was too busy working to raise anyone. My mother was responsible for everything. But that's beside the point. Tell me what's in my father's will. I have a right to know.”

“Son,” Teddy said, drawing himself straight and tall, “you aren't going to get a word out of me about your father's personal business so you might as well save your breath on trying.”

Teddy went off to get himself another gin and tonic. For all he cared, Adam McQueen could go to Hades.

 

Tilda opened the door to the restaurant and peered into the bar area to the left and ahead. Dennis waved. He was sitting at the very end, by the back wall. He had saved the stool next to him, no easy feat on a busy summer night.

Tilda walked rapidly to the back of the bar. “Thanks so much for coming,” she said. Almost without thinking she had called him on her cell phone soon after overhearing those men talking about her mother. She had asked if he was free for a quick drink. She had told him that she felt stifled by the crowd at home and needed to slip away for a while. He had said that, yes, he was free. They had agreed to meet at Five-O.

“I'm glad you called me,” he said. “I'm glad I can be of some help.”

“I can't stay long.”

She felt a bit reckless being there with Dennis, like she had snuck out of her parents' house—which, in fact, she had—when she was supposed to be in bed. She felt as if she was breaking a law. It wasn't a bad feeling.

“Just too crazy back there?” Dennis asked.

“Mmm,” she said and sipped her drink, which he had thoughtfully ordered for her before her arrival.

“Emotions must be riding high. A memorial is meant to bring back memories, good and bad.”

“Yes.”

“They're meant to be cathartic somehow. Though I'm not sure they always are.”

Tilda managed a smile. “I wonder if they ever are. Thank you again for meeting me. I hope I didn't spoil your evening.”

“Not at all. This is the highlight of my evening.”

They talked a bit longer about not much at all and then Tilda said that she had to get back to Larchmere and the party. Dennis walked with her to her car, which she had parked in the lot behind the restaurant.

Without premeditation they kissed. It was passionate. It went on for some time.

Tilda eventually pulled away, but with reluctance. “I feel like a teenager,” she whispered, “kissing out back in the dark.”

Dennis stroked her face with his thumb. “So do I. Thank you.”

“Thank you, too. I had better get back….”

“Of course,” he said. “And by the way, I was wrong when I said back at the bar that that was the highlight of my evening. This was the highlight, right here with you in this parking lot.”

Tilda got behind the wheel of her car. In the rearview mirror she saw Dennis watching her until she was out of sight.

 

Tilda got back to Larchmere a few minutes later to find the party still in full swing. No one seemed to have missed her. Hannah and Susan were chatting with the Simmons sisters. Craig was lighting sparklers for the children at the party, careful to keep them away from danger. Jon and Jane had reunited with some people they had worked with in past summers and were chatting and laughing happily. Tilda had noted, earlier, that Adam had made no effort to talk to her children since their arrival at Larchmere. Greetings had been exchanged and Kat had been introduced, but, as far as Tilda knew, there had been no further involvement. She was not surprised. Adam had never been a particularly attentive uncle.

Tilda now spotted Adam and Kat over by the gazebo. They were arguing. Anyone could see that from their quick and abrupt hand gestures, their bent shoulders. She wondered if the argument was about starting a family. She felt bad, again, for having interfered in their relationship and turned away from the unhappy pair.

Sarah and the kids had already retired to the guest cottage. Ruth and Bobby were still at Bill's side. It seemed that neither had wanted to leave him alone that night. His sadness was obvious. Tilda wondered how much of her father's grief was for his dead wife, Charlotte, and how much was for the fresh loss of his girlfriend, Jennifer. She thought that she knew the answer to that question.

She walked over to where Bill, Ruth, and Bobby were sitting in a grouping of Adirondack chairs. She leaned down and put her hand on her father's arm. “How are you, Dad?” she asked. She hoped he believed in her concern.

Bill smiled feebly but gamely. “Just fine, thanks, Tilda.”

She opened her mouth to say something comforting, anything, but just at that moment a big, wide man came lumbering up to the group. It was Pete Strout, former owner of a successful musical venue in York Beach, now comfortably retired.

“Bill McQueen,” he bellowed. He always bellowed. “Sorry I got to the party so late but let's make up for lost time!”

Tilda stepped back from her father. She had lost her chance.

 

It was almost one in the morning before the last party guest had gone home. What food was left—not much—had been hastily put away and the McQueen family had retired for what was left of the night.

Tilda was in her room, preparing for bed. She knew she would have trouble falling asleep. She felt all wound up after the events of the last few days. She felt as if her emotions were bouncing against the walls. The memorial. Jennifer's defection and her own complicity in it. The boisterous crowd at the party. Her dates and excursions with Dennis. The time she had taken his hand. Their unexpectedly passionate kiss. Her father's strained face and palpable sadness. Her aunt's, and her daughter's, accusations of bad behavior.

And what she had overheard at the party about her mother had upset her. She knew her mother had not been perfect—who was?—but to speak ill of the dead at their own memorial seemed wrong. Not that the two men had really said anything that bad or insulting. They had simply been recounting an episode that clearly had stuck in the memory of the town. It was an episode that showed her mother in an unflattering light.

It was that nostalgia problem again, Tilda realized. For some people death seemed to erase a loved one's every flaw and raise him to the status of saint. But should it? No. Well, maybe not.

Tilda got into bed and yawned. Suddenly, she felt that sleep was, indeed, possible. She was just about to drift off when she heard a strange noise from downstairs. It had sounded like something large falling…. Tilda threw off the covers and raced into the hallway. Hannah and Susan were a few steps in front of her and Ruth's door was just opening.

“Dad! Craig!” Hannah called as they hurried to the first floor.

“In here, in the kitchen!”

The four women crowded through the doorway to find Craig kneeling over his father, who was prone on the floor. Bill was wearing his pajamas and a robe. One slipper had fallen off a foot.

“I was in the library. I heard a noise. I've called an ambulance.”

Craig began to check for a pulse and signs of breathing. Ruth rushed to his side and put her hand lightly on her brother's head. Susan and Hannah clutched each other, staring. Tilda's hands were over her mouth.

Only when the ambulance was gone and Bill was off to York Hospital did Adam emerge from his room, annoyed and hungover.