The Last Refuge (26 page)

Eddie had heard enough and decided to trot off to the beach to check for encroaching sea life. I found myself looking over at WB as if the dense tree cover was about to open up and disclose another stunning revelation. You think you know a place.

“So who’s got the trust document?”

“I’m guessing Milton Hornsby.”

“I’m back to him.”

“I’m afraid so. But don’t be discouraged. We’ll find everything out, eventually.”

He took a sip of his drink.

“One more thing. Regina Broadhurst. No assets we can find, unless you consider Social Security. There’s so little on her, she almost doesn’t exist. Hasn’t filed a tax return to the IRS, or to New York State, since 1976. The last year she received a W-2. There are two points of interest here, in my mind.”

“She worked.”

“That’s point one. She did indeed. As a floor supervisor. Essentially a foreman, watching over manufacturing, assembly or materials handling.”

“In a factory.”

“Yup.” He gestured again with the Harmon Killebrew bat.

“WB?”

“Yup.”

“How ’bout that. Walked to work.”

“Nineteen hundred seventy-six was the year they closed down. Never got another job. At least, nothing she shared with the IRS.”

“I’m trying to remember her husband. What he did.”

“You’ll be trying a long time.”

“Meaning?”

“Regina got her Social Security number in 1938, when she was 16. Under the name Regina May Broadhurst. Just to be sure, the researcher found her in the Suffolk County birth records. Born at Southampton Hospital, June 5, 1922. Regina May Broadhurst.”

“There was no Mr. Broadhurst.”

“We’ll keep looking. You never know.”

“You’ve already done too much.”

“So get me another drink.”

We moved on to other topics while we drank and gazed out at the waning sunset and the steel blue water, now uniformly roughed up by the freshening winds. His boat looked great, now a backlit shape rocking comfortably at anchor and casting a shadow across the water, a formless reflection of the dark blue hull and towering mast.

The sun was just starting to light up the oaks and scrub pines of North Sea. I’d started running before dawn, and had already covered about ten miles. I’m not very fast, but I can run a long way when I’m in the mood. I’d been up to Long Beach and back, toured the sea fowl refuge on Jessup’s Neck and stopped at a deli for coffee. The day was cold and overcast, a sample of
the coming November. On the way back I ran along the bay coast up to the WB peninsula. I cut back inland and ran along the sand road that ran parallel to WB’s cyclone fence. At one of the sharp turns in the road, I ran straight for it and leaped. I stuck about halfway up and climbed the rest of the way. I pulled a pair of wire cutters I’d brought along out of the back pocket of my shorts and snipped the barbed wire. Then, very carefully, slipped over the top and dropped into the WB grounds.

The landscape had completely reverted to weedy grass and first growth—pin oak, cedar and sumac. But the asphalt driveway looked almost new. Evidence of teenagers was piled next to rusted machinery that lined the driveway. I trotted up to the main entrance and tried the door. Locked. I circled the building looking for unboarded windows. I found a busted-out basement window half obscured by broken bricks and cinder block. I cleared a space and shimmied through into an icy black depth. I had a miniature Mag light, but it barely cut through the darkness. I felt my way along while my eyes adjusted enough to see glimmers of light above me. I searched, and finally found, a staircase up to the ground floor. The door opened.

I was in a corridor. The walls were a faded pale green and the woodwork clear pine stained to simulate mahogany. Behind the doors, some of which were paneled with translucent glass, were office groupings—a block of four with secretaries in the middle. Little departments. At one time they’d been identified by removable placards that slid into chrome holders mounted to the wall. Most had been removed.

I moved methodically from office to office, opening desk drawers and file cabinets. There was almost nothing there. A few empty hanging folders. Cracked and stained coffee mugs. Empty steno pads and a rusty hole-punch.

I found what looked like a common area. There were two linoleum-topped folding tables with a few chairs, and an area for vending machines. There was a bulletin board with some yellowed safety posters and a few regulatory notices. On the other wall was a glass trophy case, long smashed into particles and stripped of its trophies. Still stuck to the disintegrating cork-board were three curled and yellowing eight-by-ten-inch black and white photographs of bowling teams and softball players. I popped them off and stuck them in the rear waistband of my shorts.

I worked my way through the rest of the offices and out to a shop floor. Attached to the ceiling were long I-beam rails that supported sliding chain hoists used to transport raw materials and assembled parts. Huge incandescent lights were caged overhead at the end of galvanized conduit. In the center were a half dozen benches, each about forty feet long, lined up in neat parallel rows. Around the perimeter were machine tools and pressure vessels of various shapes and sizes. It looked naked without the distributed control equipment—computer automation—that I’d been working with for the last twenty years. No sensors, controllers, activators, big red coil cords, keyboards or CPUs. None of the signposts of late-twentieth-century manufacturing.

There were three other interconnected areas
where things were made. It looked like WB was ready to make almost anything, and probably tried to in its relentless pursuit of market redemption. I was able to identify compressors, hydraulic lines, conveyors, centrifugal sorters, parts bins and machines that cut, stitched, folded, wrapped, stacked and packed. There were large empty spaces where equipment was once bolted to the floor. Either salvaged or purloined long ago.

I went back outside, squinting in the hazy sunlight. There was one building left to look in. It was red brick like the others, but unattached. I jogged across the overgrown lawn and looked for a way to get inside. The front door was locked, but there was an open window on the east side. I jumped up and grabbed the sill, and pulled myself over. I dropped into a janitor’s closet. It was still stocked with buckets, mops and assorted cleaning utensils. Nothing worth pilfering. The door was locked, but gave away easily with a solid kick. On the other side was a big open warehouse. I waited for my eyes to adjust again to the dim light. As expected, the room was almost empty. There was one rusted-out wreck of a forklift, stacks of splintered skids, a lot of metal shelving racks and a few dozen ten-gallon drums. Plus a lot of seagull shit and the mildewed smell of a dark, damp place.

I’d worked up a sweat during my run, so my body temperature dropped quickly as I walked around the cold rooms. I needed to start running again, so I scaled the main fence and took up my regular route where I’d left off. By now the day was fully underway, though the diffuse sunlight did little to warm things up.

I began to picture hot coffee and toasted sesame seed bagels.

And the way Amanda Battiston looked that day walking away from me across the sand, her hair blown off to the side, her back straight and her face filled with thwarted plans and threadbare expectations.

She called me when I was in the shower. I stood in the kitchen with my parents’ Western Electric handset at my ear watching the water puddle at my feet.

“Roy’s in the City and it’s my day off,” she said.

“Really.”

“What do you think I should do?”

“Go to the 7-Eleven.”

“That’s where it’s happening?”

“That’s where I’ll pick you up.”

“How will I identify you?”

“Gray hair, bent nose.”

“What time?”

“Half an hour.”

“What should I bring?”

“Suspended disbelief.”

I thought I should shave and put on a clean shirt. I worried about the Grand Prix a little. I’d cleaned the blood off the back seat, but it hadn’t done much to reduce the dog smell. Eddie liked to lie around in the car even when it was parked in the driveway. Hearing the jingle of car keys always threw him into a frenzy of joyous anticipation.

“Okay, but you got to sit in the back.”

Amanda stood on the sticky sidewalk outside the 7-Eleven in a blue windbreaker, yellow skirt and Reeboks. Her hands were clasped in front and she was looking out into the world as if expecting something wondrous to suddenly appear. All she got was me and my dog. I pulled up and she hopped quickly into the Grand Prix. I noticed for the hundredth time her lovely tanned legs.

“Right on time,” she said.

“Had all morning to practice.”

She reached back and ruffled up Eddie’s ears.

“Guard dog?”

“Freeloader.”

She looked very bright and enthusiastic. I felt the need to catch up.

“Coffee?”

I’d had a thermos filled at the corner place.

“Sure,” she said, like I’d offered her a ride on my private jet.

“You’re in a good mood, Mrs. Battiston.”

“I’m not at the bank. That’s enough to put anyone in a good mood.”

“I thought you liked your job.”

“I love my job. It’s just Wednesdays are so nice.”

I felt her presence fill up the inside of my car. She poured us coffee.

“Where to?”

“Where thou goest.”

I took her up to North Haven where we caught the South Ferry over to Shelter Island. For a few hours I just let the Grand Prix rumble around the easy hills and shady curves of the island, pausing for a spell at the
wildlife preserve so Eddie could flush out endangered species. Then we stopped at Ram’s Head to see the last and hardiest cruisers of the season anchored out in Coecles Harbor. Then finally worked our way over to Sunset Beach, where we ate lunch at the rooftop place.

When the salads arrived I finally got around to asking her.

“So, where’d you live when you grew up out here?”

“North Sea,” she said, without hesitation. “I thought you knew that.”

“Maybe I did. Memory’s not what it used to be.”

“North North Sea. Almost Noyac. Right near you. Why?”

“Maybe that’s why we get along. Shared North Sea sensibilities.”

“More sensible than the rest of Southampton, if you ask me.”

“Did you sell the house?”

She shook her head while she chewed on a mouthful of salad.

“No, Roy thought we should try renting it. He’s been good about it, though. He hasn’t pushed. I have to clean it all out and I can’t face that yet.”

“I shouldn’t be reminding you.”

“That’s okay.”

We got off on other things over the rest of lunch. But after the check came, she had an idea.

“We drove right by there on the way up here,” she said. “Want to go look?”

“It’s not upsetting?”

“I’d like to see it. Someday soon it’ll all change forever. Everything does.”

“Entropy.”

“Whatever you say, Mr. MIT.”

The ferry loaders were a little challenged by the scale of the Grand Prix, but managed to get it on board. All that sheet metal can intimidate a younger person. I thought they might try to charge me a premium for the effort. The guys in the electrician’s vans and pickups were more appreciative.

“389?”

“400. Quad, posi, Hurst 4-speed. Out of a ’67 Goat.”

“Yowza.”

Amanda seemed to enjoy the attention.

“No one ever slobbers over my little Audi.”

“Not until they see the driver.”

I was a little unsure about the right turn off Noyack Road. So was Amanda.

“Yes. No. A little further. Turn. Wait a minute. Okay, go down that way.”

I drifted up to the single-story white house. There was a short white pebble and gray gravel driveway, but no garage. The siding was the old-style asbestos shingling formed to look like cedar. There were some gangly old yews planted along the foundation, a slate path to the front door and no mailbox. I braked and crunched up into the drive.

“What do you think?” she asked me.

“A North Sea classic. Could use a little fix-up.”