A Stillness of Chimes (9 page)

“You’re too modest.” Gary walked to the door. “About the house, you want me to go ahead and run the comps so we can talk about price?”

“No, I hate to waste your time with it.”

“It wouldn’t be a waste, but I hope you’ll finish overhauling the place first. Why don’t you sleep on it and let me know.”

“Will do. Thanks for doing the walk-through.”

“My pleasure.” Gary stepped outside, scaring a mourning dove out of the bushes in a flurry of whistling wings.

As Gary’s gleaming black Cadillac disappeared around the corner, Sean
remained in the doorway, thinking. If he told Laura he’d heard about the party, she would feel obligated to include him in the invitation. If he kept quiet, she’d be free to decline the invitation or accept it. With or without mentioning it to him.

Funny, how a kindergartner’s birthday party could be fraught with such significance.

Back in the living room, he picked up the mandolin and tweaked the tuning to perfection. Elliott had taught him that, along with a million other things.

A good man, Elliott Gantt. He’d had his moods, but he’d loved his family and friends. Loved them with his whole heart. Sean had envied Jess and Laura, except when Elliott’s temper got loose. But the man had never laid a hand on anybody but Dale, who’d richly deserved it. And Gary, Sean corrected himself. Just once. Gary hadn’t deserved it. He’d never been anything but a loyal and supportive friend to Elliott.

Sean closed his eyes, turning his fingers loose on the sweet-sounding strings. A little one-man jam session. Before he knew it, he was playing one of the tunes Elliott taught him.

Elliott had loved old songs and poems and stories. He’d often used archaic words just for the fun of it. After a while, the quaint speech had become his unconscious habit even in everyday conversation.

As Sean started humming along, the lyrics came to him.

Many a one for him makes moan
,

But none shall ken where he is gone
.

O’er his white bones, when they are bare
,

The wind shall blow forever mair
.

Sean couldn’t help but wonder how many skeletons lay at the bottom of how many deep lakes across the county, across the state, across the country.

He returned the mandolin to its case. All the music had just gone out of the morning.

Laura and Cassie exited the convenience store, Laura with peach iced tea and Cassie with her old favorite, an orangesicle slushie. With her first sip, Laura recalled her hankering for a hot drink in the middle of the night—and the tall, lean figure sweeping across the yard in the moonlight.

“Thanks,” Cassie said. “Next time it’s on me.”

“You’re welcome.” Laura climbed behind the wheel and carefully fitted her plastic cup into the cup holder. “It’s great to see your face again. How long has it been since we were both home at the same time?”

“Three or four years, probably. I don’t remember. It’s funny. Every time I come home, I remember why I was so desperate to leave. But I also remember how much I love the place.”

“Me too.” Laura backed the car out of its space, headed for the road, and glanced over at Cassie. Her hair was lighter than it used to be. Whether it was bottle-bleached or bleached by the California sun, it would be a different shade and style in a few months. Cassie had always had fun with her hair.

“That nail polish is a pretty color,” Laura said. “Reminds me of Sunset Boulevard Red.”

The name didn’t seem to jog Cassie’s memory. “I don’t know what the shade’s called,” she said, examining her nails. “I borrowed it from my mom’s bathroom.”

“Like old times. Remember the day we left Tigger by the tracks and ran off to play with nail polish and makeup?”

“Yeah, not ten minutes after we told your dad we’d keep an eye on her. I guess he never snitched on us, because my folks didn’t come crashing down on my head.”

“My dad threw a fit, though. Not because we left Tig—he never mentioned that part—but because I came home wearing nail polish.”

“Parents never make sense.” Cassie fiddled with the air conditioning. “Do you mind if I crank up the air?”

“Go ahead. I can’t believe how hot and humid it is. Yesterday was so cold and rainy.”

“That’s north Georgia for ya.” Cassie turned the fan on, full blast, then took a slurp of her slushie.

Once Laura was on the main road heading out of town, she stole another glance at Cassie. She looked as cheerful as could be expected for a girl who had once deserved to be called Eeyore. Maybe Sean was right and everything was fine between her and Drew, but it wouldn’t hurt to ask. Cassie could handle frank questions.

“Everything okay out in California?”

Cassie let out a little snort. “Yeah, except I got laid off. We love living there, but we can barely afford it even on two incomes.”

“I’m sorry about your job. That stinks.”

“Something will turn up.”

Laura nodded, remembering Cassie’s old dream of being a stylist to the stars. Instead, she’d bounced from one job to another because she had an uncanny talent for finding work with businesses that were about to go under. Hairstylist—but not to the stars. Waitress. Admin. Day-care worker.
Meanwhile, Drew’s techie start-up company wasn’t bringing in much money yet. He probably couldn’t take any time off, while Cassie had all the time in the world.

“I hope you’ll have a nice visit with your folks,” Laura said.

“It’s not exactly a pleasure trip,” Cassie said. “My dad asked me to come. He says there’s something wrong with my mom.”

Laura’s heart plummeted as dire possibilities ran through her mind. Some debilitating disease like Parkinson’s or MS. Cancer. Alzheimer’s. “What do you mean?”

“I wish I knew. She’s always been a neat freak, but Dad’s afraid she’s going all OCD on us. Or maybe she’s depressed. He can’t get anything out of her. So I’m here for a couple of weeks to help him figure out what’s going on. Without letting Mom know that’s why I’m here.” Cassie made a face. “It’s loads of fun.”

“I’m sorry, Cass. When did your dad start noticing a change?”

“Around the time of your mom’s funeral. Makes sense. They were best friends.”

Only in Ardelle’s mind. Laura couldn’t say it out loud, but her mom had never seen Ardelle as a bosom buddy. Their longstanding friendship had been lopsided.

“Do you see the same things that are worrying your dad?”

Cassie shrugged. “So far, I don’t see much of a problem except the uber-neatness, but she’s always been that way. You know, wiping down the counters all the time and making sure the corners of the napkins match up exactly when she folds them. That’s nothing new. On the other hand, she’s all … fidgety, and she has this new habit of repeating herself.”

“Like she can’t remember what she said already?”

“No, she remembers. It’s more like she’ll start talking about something and then she just can’t leave it alone. She’ll come back to it over and over, using the same words. It’s like … like picking at a scab.”

“I wonder if this is related,” Laura said slowly. “I noticed she went to extremes when she was watching the house for me. I only asked her to take care of the basics like the mail and the cat and the houseplants, but she vacuumed and dusted and straightened. All over the house. In rooms she didn’t need to go into.”

“But is that OCD behavior, or is it just a bored grandma with too much time on her hands?” Cassie said, apparently asking herself as much as Laura. “Anyway, I’ll find a way to bring it up. Delicately.”

“No, don’t. Now that I’m in town, it doesn’t matter anyway. She won’t need to pop in anymore.”

“You’re right.” Cassie squirmed around in her seat to face Laura. “Okey-doke. My tough subject’s out of the way. Time for yours. Do you think your dad is at the cabin?”

Hearing it spoken aloud made Laura’s heart lurch. “I can always count on you to be blunt.” She sighed. “I don’t know, but I have a few reasons to think there might be some truth to the rumors.”

“Like what?”

“For one thing, I’ve started wondering why my mom hung on to my grandparents’ property and paid taxes on it all these years. She should have sold it.”

“You think she kept it so your dad would have a place to go?”

“Maybe. Or she thought she’d get a better price if she waited. I don’t know.” Laura swung the car wide to give room to an old woman picking her way through the roadside weeds. Frail as a spider, the woman held a faded
blue parasol upright above her head. “Granny Colfax,” Laura said, glad for the distraction.

“I can’t believe she’s still alive and kicking.”

“Me either.”

Nobody’s granny, everybody’s granny, Ruby Pearl Colfax knew everybody and their business and didn’t hesitate to express her opinions. Laura had always tried to give her a wide berth, but her parents had loved Granny, so it hadn’t been easy to avoid her.

“Does she still live in that teeny-tiny house on the west side?” Cassie asked.

“Your guess is as good as mine. I haven’t been around much either. No idea what she’s doing out here.”

Last in line at a red light down the road, Laura checked the mirror for the gray-blue of the parasol, but the shoulder lay empty, edged with green brush and trees.

Such an old woman to be walking alone in the boonies, although it wouldn’t be the boonies for long. Prospect was sprawling in all directions, with new homes going up as fast as the builders could tuck them into hollows and scatter them across hilltops. Many of the For Sale signs bore Gary Bright’s picture and his corny slogan: “The Bright team, prospecting for a bright future in Prospect, Georgia.”

Good old Gary. He was rolling in dough. He’d earned it.

The light turned green, and half a dozen vehicles crawled forward with Laura’s in the rear. When she’d left for college, the road hadn’t had any traffic lights. It wasn’t even paved, and there’d been more cows than houses.

Just in time, she spotted the wrought-iron post, minus its mailbox for
years now. She braked sharply. Cassie shrieked and steadied both drinks as Laura swung the car into the driveway of the old Gantt home place.

The tires crushed masses of kudzu that blanketed the gravel. Long stretches of vacant land on either side of the property separated the cabin from its nearest neighbors, and a newly plowed field lay across the road.

Vines engulfed the tiny log home where her dad grew up. The roof sagged. The windows were black voids with no glass in them, curtained with big, heart-shaped leaves. If the barn and the shed still stood behind the house, they’d been buried too.

“Wow,” Cassie breathed. “It just hit me. This is all yours now. You’re rich, girl. Well, not exactly rich, but you do own some property.”

“It’s just starting to sink in,” Laura said, careful to keep her voice on an even keel.

She’d inherited everything, of course. Her mom’s personal effects. Her SUV. Her bank accounts. Her house and this property that had belonged to Grandma and Grandpa Gantt. But the cluttered bungalow was desolate and empty without her mom there, and this tumble-down cabin was a sad reminder that time had claimed her dad and his parents too.

Sure, she was rich in terms of real estate, but in terms of family, she was flat broke. She had nobody.

Battling a wave of loneliness, she climbed out of the car and faced midday heat that made yesterday’s cold rain seem like a bad dream. She didn’t know what she hoped—or feared—she would find under that ruined roof or in the outbuildings, if they still stood. Everything, even her grandma’s red roses, had disappeared under those greedy vines.

“There’s nothing left to do but bring in a bulldozer,” Cassie said.
“Nobody’s been inside lately, that’s for sure. You can’t even see the porch steps.”

“I have an old photo of this place when it was new, with Grandpa and Grandma Gantt standing on the steps, a little black dog sitting beside them. They must have been in their early twenties or so.”

“That’s cool.”

“Yes, Mom gave me all the old pictures from the Gantt side of the family a few years ago. Once I find the Flynn pictures, I’ll put everything together in an album.”

“Just don’t get obsessed with it like my mom’s obsessed with her scrapbooks.”

“Settling things up here before school starts … I don’t have time to get obsessed. Later, maybe. I do love digging into family history. Part of being a history teacher, I guess.”

“History geek, you mean,” Cassie said with a smile.

Laura smiled too and started walking. “Let’s poke around a little. That’s why we came.”

“Yeah, terrific.”

Laura led the way to the side of the cabin. Wishing she had a long, strong stick, she gingerly parted the curtain of leaves to peer through a window that long ago lost its glass. The interior was smothered in greenery too.

“Nobody in his right mind would hide out here,” Cassie said.

“But my dad isn’t necessarily in his right mind.”

“He wasn’t stupid, though. He’s not here, Laura.”

“He might have been, not long ago. Kudzu grows incredibly fast. It could have covered up any signs that somebody has been here.”

“You’re dreaming. This spot isn’t very secluded anymore. People drive
past all the time, especially with my dad putting in a new subdivision just around the bend.” Cassie held up a finger. “Listen.” Beyond the bees droning nearby, heavy equipment growled from farther down the road. Metal clanked on metal. Men shouted at each other, their voices softened by distance.