He smiled. “I’m sure you don’t. Thank you.”
As he bent to read his newspaper, he realized that all conversation had ceased. The farmers at the other table had swiveled in their chairs so that they could watch him. The moment he smiled at them, however, they turned away, hunched over and began to speak softly.
As a stranger moving to a small town, he’d expected to be checked out, but this was ridiculous.
He ate his breakfast, paid his bill, tipped the waitress generously, nodded to the farmers and left.
In Manhattan, piles of dirty snow still lined the streets. Here fifty miles east of the Mississippi River, the March wind was chill, but it smelled of fresh grass and newly turned earth. He’d been warned that west Tennessee summers were brutal, but he was ready to endure almost anything for this gentle early spring. Besides, he planned to install central air-conditioning in his new house.
At some point between the end of the Civil War and prohibition, Rossiter must have been prosperous. The small plaque that leaned against his front steps said that the Delaney house had been built in 1890. A dozen similar mansions along Main Street looked as though they dated from the early 1900s.
The railroad still ran along the far side of the open square that separated the town from the Wolf River bottoms on the north side, but the trains no longer even slowed to acknowledge the existence of the town.
Once there must have been a station. Probably it had stood where the small park with the shiny, ornate Victorian bandstand now perched across the parking lot from the café.
The café stood on one corner of what remained of the town square. About the time the Delaneys decided to build a fine house and move into town from their plantations, the area must have been a crush of mule-drawn wagons piled high with bales of cotton. Probably the café hadn’t existed then. He doubted the high-and-mighty Delaneys would have chosen to build their mansion next door to a café.
The pickup trucks and stock trailers parked haphazardly in the area now were not nearly as romantic.
Bank, mom-and-pop grocery, and dingy pool hall sat on the south side across the street from the café. Three handsomely restored row houses formed the west side. The lower floor of the first held his real-estate agent’s office and the second a florist shop. On the front porch of the third building, a twelve-foot black wooden grizzly bear advertised something, but Paul couldn’t begin to guess what.
Those few small stores constituted the entire business district of Rossiter. The nearest shopping mall was more than twenty miles away, on the road to Memphis.
Paul checked his watch and sauntered along the sidewalk toward his house. His house. He still couldn’t believe he’d done such an insane thing. He didn’t generally operate on impulse.
The sidewalk was dangerously buckled and broken by the roots of several giant oaks and magnolias in his front yard. Didn’t the city council, or whatever passed for government in this village, pay attention to things like dangerous walkways? Perhaps nobody in Rossiter actually walked.
When he reached the snaggle-toothed brick path that led up to his front porch, he simply stood and gloated. His house was younger, smaller and less splendid than Tara, but it must have been imposing in its day.
Unfortunately, at the moment it looked like an aging whore trying to cadge money for her next drink.
“I own your house, Daddy, you bastard,” Paul said louder than he’d planned.
Behind him he heard tires squeal. A squad car with the Rossiter seal slid to a stop by the curb. A man climbed out of the driver’s seat.
Paul had met Buddy Jenkins only once before, just after his bid to buy the house had been accepted. At the meeting in his real-estate agent’s office, Buddy had worn jeans and a University of Tennessee sweatshirt. They’d spoken on the telephone a number of times while Paul was winding up his affairs in New Jersey and storing his few possessions, but Buddy had never mentioned he was the chief of police.
In a town like this, being chief of police probably wasn’t a demanding job. No wonder he’d started his renovation company.
At first Paul had been reluctant to give the restoration contract to a local construction firm. How could anybody working out of a town the size of Rossiter be any good?
But when he’d inquired about renovation and restoration experts in the Memphis and west-Tennessee area, Buddy Jenkins’s name had come up repeatedly at the top of the list. After Paul checked out the mansions, theaters, government state houses and private homes that Jenkins had restored, he’d decided to hire the man.
“Don’t know if you can get him,” Mrs. Hoddle, his real-estate agent, had said. “He’s usually booked up pretty far in advance. But because the house is in Rossiter, you may be able to convince him to do the job for you.”
Buddy’s preliminary estimates on doing the job had taken Paul’s breath away until he found out what his New York friends were paying to renovate their brownstones.
Paul wanted the job done right. Now that he had committed to this crazy charade, this crazy crusade, being able to resell the house for a profit would make his victory even sweeter.
“Hey, Mr. Bouvet,” Buddy Jenkins said as he came forward and stuck out his hand. In uniform the man looked even larger. His starched shirt was perfectly pressed and tailored to his barrel chest and broad shoulders. His boots were spit-shined. What little hair he had left was cut in a gray fringe that barely showed against his tanned skin.
Jenkins probably carried 250 pounds or more on his six-three frame. God help the drunk driver who gave this man any lip. At six feet even and 175 pounds, Paul felt almost small by comparison.
“Ready for the bad news?” Jenkins said happily.
“Not really, but there’s no sense in putting it off.”
“First the good news. In three months or so this old place can look better than it’s looked since the day the Delaneys first moved in.”
“Three months?”
“Maybe five.”
“And the bad news?”
“Come on, I’ll walk you through.” Buddy reached into his pocket and drew out a key.
“If you don’t mind, Buddy, I’d like to use my key.”
“Sure.” Buddy grinned. “First time you’ve used it?”
“Since I had the new locks installed.” The front door was original, complete with an etched-glass oval in the center. Although the original brass lock remained, the shiny new Yale lock was the one that worked. Paul thought he’d feel a surge of triumph when he stepped into the house again. He felt nothing.
“Let’s start in the basement,” Buddy said. “We’ve got a temporary permit for the electricity, so we can see while we replace the wiring.”
“All of it?”
“Every whipstitch,” Buddy said. “Phone lines, too.” The old oak floors echoed their footsteps. “Watch your head.”
Over the next hour Paul listened to Buddy’s litany of disaster. Maybe the house hadn’t been such a bargain, after all.
“Need to jack up at least one corner of the house to replace sills,” Buddy said. “Termites.”
“The house has stood this long with termite damage. Why disturb it?”
“Because it may decide some night in a storm that it has stood plenty long enough and fall down around your ears. Besides, you won’t get any inspector to sign off on the renovations unless we do.”
Paul nodded.
“I’ll show you when we get to the attic. Needs a new roof and decking, of course.”
Another hour of crawling through attics, poking into bathrooms, peering up fireplaces, left Paul even more dispirited.
When at last they moved into the kitchen, Buddy said, “You need new appliances and stuff. I got a kitchen designer working on a plan for a whole new kitchen.” Buddy looked at him. “How you holding up?”
“I’ll survive. At least I think I will.”
“Now we get to the restoration part. Come with me.”
Buddy shoved the pocket doors aside and ushered Paul into the back parlor. Buddy pointed at the Steinway grand piano in the bay window.
“It’s not quite a concert grand,” Buddy said, “although Miss Addy used to tell her students it was.”
“It’s a beauty.”
“It’s yours.”
“I know, but I don’t understand why it was built into the house that way.”
“The Delaney who built the house in 1890 thought any daughter of his ought to be able to play the piano. He bought this one and literally had the music room—that’s what this is officially—built around it.”
“But I was under the impression that the man who built this house had only one son.” Paul could have bitten off his tongue. At this stage, he wasn’t supposed to know anything about the Delaneys except their name.
“Had a daughter died of the yellow fever when she was no more than four or five, so I’ve heard.” Buddy looked at Paul curiously. “How come you know about the son?”
“I, uh…after I bought the house I did a bit of checking with the historical society about it. Just curiosity, you know.”
“Uh-huh.” The chief seemed satisfied, but Paul knew he’d have to be more careful in the future.
Buddy walked over to the piano and plinked middle C with his index finger. “Needs tuning. Ann thinks she can restore the strings and pads and the ivory on the keys.”
“Ann?”
“Ann’s the restoration part of Renovation and Restoration. She’s the one who’s going to strip all that paint off your fireplaces and re-create the old crown molding that’s missing. And a bunch of other stuff.”
“I see.”
“Mostly she redoes the cosmetic stuff. Like that mural in the dining room. It’s a fine Chinese rice paper old Mr. Delaney imported. You weren’t thinking of stripping it and throwing it away, were you?”
“Not if it can be restored.”
“If it’s possible, Ann’ll do it. It’s amazing what she can do. She worked as an art restorer in Washington and New York for a while.”
“Then Ann it is.” Paul turned to look out the dirty bay window. “What’s that old building down there behind the house?”
“Summer kitchen. It may be too far gone to save, but we might be able to salvage enough old wood to rebuild the gazebo so you could use it for a pool house, maybe, if you ever put one in.”
“No pool, thank you. Maybe eventually a fountain.”
“When you going back to New Jersey?”
“I’m not. I’ve sublet my apartment.”
“You’re not expecting to live in the house, are you?” Buddy looked horrified. “Not until it’s finished, I mean.”
“Actually, I am. I’m used to camping out. If the plumbing works, I can make do with a cot in the back bedroom.”
“Son, it still gets very cold at night. The old water heater may hold up until we replace it or it may not. Plus the dust and the noise. You sure you want to stay here?”
“I’ll give it a try. If I get uncomfortable, I can always spend a night in a motel.”
Buddy scratched his balding head. “Your choice, but I wouldn’t advise it. You surely don’t plan on cooking, do you?”
Paul laughed. “Not with the café next door.”
“Good, ’cause that old stove might blow up the first time you try to light the pilot.”
Paul followed Buddy to the front door and opened it for him. He was, after all, the host. Odd feeling. He’d never owned a house or even a condo in his life.
“My crew will be here first thing tomorrow morning,” Buddy said. “I got to get back to police work.”
“Fine.” Paul closed and locked the front door of the house behind the man. He planned to absorb the atmosphere of the place. Maybe meet a ghost. Weren’t ghosts supposed to be troubled spirits doomed to walk the earth to pay for their crimes in life?
If that was true, then he knew of at least one ghost who ought to be walking the halls of the Delaney mansion in torment. His father.
CHAPTER TWO
PAUL’S SHOULDER ached. He drove back to his motel using only his left hand. His right arm would never be really strong again. Even with all the physical therapy and the operations he’d endured, he’d been warned the pain might never completely leave him.
The damp chill in the Delaney house wasn’t helping. He probably shouldn’t have explored the place again after Buddy left. He hadn’t uncovered anything worth noting, anyway. The dirt floor in the basement, which hadn’t been disturbed since the house was built, was as hard as concrete, and the attic seemed to hold no hidden spaces. He decided he’d explore further when he was rested.
Another night in a good bed was more necessity than indulgence.
Time enough to organize his camping equipment tomorrow. And if he hated staying at the house, he could always check back into the motel.
He shut the door of his room behind him, tossed the key on the dresser and collapsed onto the king-size bed. In his years of flying he’d spent too many nights in anonymous rooms like this. Sometimes when his wake-up call came, he’d have to check the notepad beside the telephone to remember where he was. He never thought he’d miss those days, but now if he had his right arm and shoulder back the way they’d been before the attack, he’d never complain about his crazy flight schedule again.
Not going to happen. But at least he’d managed to pass the physical for a Class III commercial pilot’s license. He could still fly his own small plane and would be flying a cropduster for the local fixed-base operation in a few weeks. So in some sense, he still had the sky. Doug Slatterly and Bill McClure would never be able to fly again. Doug still had memory lapses and tremors. Bill had lost the sight in his right eye and along with it, his depth perception.
And all because one of their colleagues had decided to crash the L-10 transport they were flying so that his family could collect double indemnity on his life insurance.
They’d all had military experience, but even so, the attack was so sudden, so unexpected, that they’d all been badly hurt before they’d fought back. It was a miracle Doug had stayed conscious, keeping the man at bay to give Paul a chance to turn the plane and keep it level.
In the end, they’d managed to disarm the man and land the plane safely with no loss of life on the ground, but at a horrific cost to their bodies. Paul smiled ruefully. The lunatic was the only one who got what he wanted. After he’d tried to escape from the plane, a police sniper had shot him, and the insurance company had been forced to pony up the double indemnity.
The three survivors—Bill, the navigator, Doug, the co-pilot, and Paul himself, pilot-in-charge—had been paid off handsomely. The company hadn’t wanted any lawsuits with the attendant publicity. They’d settled generously.
But he’d be willing to bet that both Doug and Bill would give back the six million bucks they’d each been awarded if they could still qualify for their old jobs. Paul certainly would.
The last he’d heard, Doug was planning to open a seafood restaurant in Coral Gables. He didn’t know what Bill was doing. Both their marriages had survived, although Bill and Janey had separated for a while.
Maybe Bill and Janey wouldn’t have come through if they hadn’t actually been legally married with children. Certainly Paul and Tracy hadn’t. Tracy had stuck with him in the hospital and for the first month of physical therapy after he came home, but in the end she’d broken their engagement.
He didn’t blame her. Tracy had been a flight attendant long enough to have her pick of the prime runs. She’d expected to marry a transport pilot, not a bad-tempered man with a bum arm and no idea what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. She wasn’t the one who changed. He had.
They’d taken no marriage vows, no “for better or worse.” The breakup had been nasty. They’d both said terrible things that could never be unsaid.