Time Out of Mind (61 page)
Authors: John R. Maxim
Tags: #Horror, #General, #Psychological, #Suspense, #Memory, #Thrillers, #Fiction, #Time Travel
“
Where was Lesko standing, Lawrence, when you
looked out from the elevator? Was it in front of Tilden
Beckwith's portrait?”
“
You still can't be sure.”
“
Then why don't we ask him, Lawrence? Please go let
him in.”
”
I certainly will not. Not until you tell me what you
intend.”
“
To reduce my concerns, Lawrence,” she told him.
“
And why, by the way, did you tell Burke to arm himself
and wait? You can't possibly mean to shoot Lesko in this
house. There are servants just out over the garage.”
The house is quite soundproof, Lawrence. But never
fear. I will try to avoid any extravagant behavior in your
presence.”
“
What then?”
“
The man is clearly here to bargain. I intend bargaining
with him. He does so resemble Mr. Bigelow.”
The Bloody Mary was good. Just the right thing. As a rule, Corbin didn't like drinking before evening, let alone before lunch, not even drinks that were invented for the purpose.
They tended to put his afternoons in soft focus. But at least,
he noted, he felt no preference for any more arcane drink
such as hot buttered rum or peppered ale. Maybe that meant
he was back in full control. Maybe it meant only that the
Victorians hadn't figured out any excuses for boozing in
the morning yet. Whichever. There were better things to
think about.
Bigelow.
he'd known it all along. But he didn't really want to think
about Bigelow, either. Or why Bigelow and Bigelow’s still
nameless friend jumped him in the Drake garage and did
what they did to him. Corbin would only start fantasizing,
as always, about what he would do to them—what he
did
do to them—but those fantasies would not make him feel
better for very long. He'd just end up ashamed that he
couldn't give as good an account of himself in real life as he does in his dream world.
Tilden could have handled them.
Tilden would have ground them into hamburger.
I'm sorry, sweetheart.” Corbin touched Gwen Lea
mas's hair.
where she had sat him down. Her cheek rested against his
knee as she watched the fire.
Forget it.” She squeezed his leg. “You didn't mean
it.”
“
You could never ruin anything for me,” he told her. “If anything, you could make it even better.”
“
How is that?”
“
You could live here with me. You could marry me.”
She looked up at him.
“
I'm serious.” Corbin forced a smile.
“
You mean live here? In this house?”
For a while, I guess, until we find a place we both like
better.”
to hers. “Are you sure there is such a place, Jonathan?”
”
I don't get you.”
“
If.this is a place where you feel so at peace ...”
I visited. One of Margaret's friends lived here.”
“
You've tried to find the house where Tilden and Mar
garet actually lived?”
“
That's not what I had in mind. For us, I mean.”
“
But what if you find it?”
“
It's gone, sweetheart.” Corbin was certain of that. If it
still stood, he would have found it. “I've spent all kinds
of hours just walking the roads. I'd see a house that seemed
familiar, or that stirred some kind of feeling in me, and I'd stand there staring at it, trying to see through the walls.”
Corbin chuckled. ”I think a couple of those people got
nervous and called the police. Police cars have stopped me
twice to make sure I live around here.”
“
It could have been remodeled.”
Corbin shrugged. “There's not a whole lot you can do
to remodel a turreted Victorian. Anyway, for every Victo
rian still standing, there must be five that have burned down
or been bulldozed down to make room for Cape Cods and
colonials. The fact is, I think I know where it was. Right
up the road here”—he used his thumb—“on North Street.
There's a split ranch there now and all the landscaping has
changed, so it doesn't even begin to move me. But from
the street outside, the shape of the land and the view down
the hill toward town were so right that I could look back
and actually see the house the way it was. I'd see it in
summer when everything was green. Summers were the
best times.”
“
Finish your drink, Jonathan.” Gwen touched his glass.
“I'll make you a fresh one.” He was getting into that
dreamy and talkative state. Which was better than dreamy
and silent, as he'd been all morning.
“
You know when all this started, don't you?” he asked.
”I mean, looking at houses and getting good feelings? It
started with the Homestead. I knew that house from the
front. The inside didn't really do anything for me, maybe
because of all the changes to make it a restaurant, but when
you and I played croquet on the lawn it seemed as though I'd done that there before. I could taste pink lemonade and
little finger sandwiches with watercress and minced ham. It
might have been at a lawn party there back when it was a
private house. I can't envision the owners. When I try I
just see them as shapes way up on a dark porch while
Margaret and I—Margaret and Tilden—are”—Corbin paused to clear his throat—“passing it on the road.”
sneaking
past it. Corbin had had a
glimpse of a hot summer night, and felt there were more
than one, when Tilden and Margaret would make their way
down to a little sandy cove where they'd swim Indian
style.
Gwen didn't need to hear about Margaret and him being
nude. Nor was Tilden giving Corbin much of a look any
way, it seemed. But it must have been delightful. To reach
the end of an August day, the kind you spend trying not to
move except in slow motion, sitting on a porch in a rattan
rocker, the only breeze coming from the fan you keep in
front of your face, waiting till the sun was almost down and then getting a cold bird and a bottle from the cooler
and wrapping them in a blanket and driving down to a little wooded area where you hide the horse and rig before going
the rest of the way on foot. It wouldn't do to drive all the way. People like the Culbertsons, the family that lived in
the Homestead, would be out on their sleeping porch and
know where you were headed and the children would fol
low you down there and peek. Or the adults might see you and tongues would wag. Better to play Union spy and slip down there through the gathering darkness with Tilden try
ing to get Margaret to step quietly and to stop giggling.
Then to peel off all those layers of cotton and hold each other's hand as they waded out neck-deep in cool salt water
that had a layer of mist across its surface. They'd just sit
there, soaking, Margaret at first trying to keep her hair dry
and then not caring, making more mist as the steam rose
from their bodies, cooling until they knew that the night air
would chill their skin deliciously, and then wading back
ashore to wrap themselves in their blanket and sip their
wine as they watched the moon and the distant flickering
lights of Long Island.
The dark mass a few hundred yards offshore was Great
Captain's Island, another favorite place for Indian bathing. But not at night. Too many other young blades had row-
boats. The island was best on foggy days when no summer visitors were abroad, when you could barely see your row
boat's wake, and Tilden and Margaret would grope their
way to a stretch of empty beach and pretend they were
Adam and Eve. Tilden would never quite pretend all the way. He would talk in whispers or in hand signals, but
Margaret would run laughing through the surf, sometimes
chasing crabs, sometimes picking them up and chasing Tilden with them. It was such fun. So much better than going to the beach in daytime and dressing up in those ghastly bathing costumes which, for the women at least, had nearly
the fabric they wore on land and in which it was impossible
to swim freely and gracefully. Women who tried looked like bobbing corks for all the air their baggy costumes
trapped. Thick, shapeless corks because now there were no
corsets to hide a soft or spreading waist. Margaret could
swim like a seal as long as she was equally unencumbered.
And she was pleased with her own waist, returned or nearly
so to the size it was before young Jonathan swelled it and
hardly marked at all save for a few shining lines where her skin had been stretched beyond the limits of its elasticity.
These saddened her at first, and she tried to hide them from
Tilden until he told her of his relief that she finally had a
woman's body and not that of a silly girl and that he loved
her all the more for them.
Tilden would hand Margaret his compass and she would
pilot as he rowed back through the fog to his waiting buggy
and then they would drive back to her house where they
would play in the freshwater shower a while longer. The
shower was a godsend in summer, especially for bodies
crusted with salt, and a convenience to be envied at all other times. Tilden was sure there were no more than a half dozen
showers, indoors at least, in all of Greenwich. Still, for all
its pleasures, it could not compare with the forbidden de
lights of sneaking off on one of their bathing adventures.
Lucy Stone, the large and laughing black nurse who had
assisted in Jonathan's delivery, was there almost full time
now except when Dr. Palmer needed her for special assis
tance. More, she was fast becoming Margaret's friend. And
she seemed to have an almost mystical talent, Tilden noted
appreciatively, of making herself invisible and unheard whenever Tilden and Margaret wished to be quietly alone,
or of discovering some urgent errand whenever Tilden
looked into Margaret's eyes in a certain way and then Mar
garet took Tilden’s hand and led him to the stairs.
Corbin rubbed a hand across Gwen's shoulders. “You
know, I don't think Tilden ever spent the night there.”
she asked.
“You don't mean they stopped being lovers after the baby
was born.”
“
No, they were very definitely lovers. But you had to
be very careful of a woman's reputation in those days.
Given Margaret's background, Tilden was probably more sensitive than most.” Corbin tickled his fingers down her
back. “While I think of it, how about taking a shower to
gether before your uncle gets here?’'
“
What?” she laughed.
“
It just seemed a nice idea.”
Well, I have my own reputation to think about. At least
until after dinner.” She put her mouth to his knee and bit
it. “Where would he stay?”
“
Who? Tilden?”
He didn't go back to New York every evening, did
he?”