The Man Who Would Be F. Scott Fitzgerald (19 page)

A local scholar had compiled a nine-volume history of the town, which contained an exhaustive site-by-site account of each home in the historic district — its architectural history, the sequence of its ownership, family trees of those owners, births, marriages, careers, deaths. Nice light reading. The volumes were organized by street name and house number, not by family name, since those changed so many times through the years. I didn’t know the house number of Cam’s home on High Street, but the Baker and Tilden 1869 Atlas of the Inner Village was included to show me how High Street had looked then. There had been a hotel on the westside corner of High and Farmington, the William Whitman. Four residences had existed on the west side of High, belonging to Hurlburt, Gallager, Manion, and Westcott. The Congregational parsonage was at the other end of the block at Mountain. Across from it was the E. L. Hart Boarding School for Boys, and homes belonging to Whitman, Miles, Badwell, Cahill, and Porter. No Knott residence. Apparently, it had been under a different name then — a Knott daughter who had married. So I plowed through the history of each of those historic homes on High Street. Followed the family trees of all of those families, read of their prosperity, their sickness, their joy, their sorrow. The Revolution. The Civil War. The First World War. The Second. There was enough there to make for a James Michener novel. Certainly the prose was just as turgid. I read and I read. I read until my eyes were bleary and my temples throbbed.

I read until I was quite certain that no home on High Street in Farmington had ever belonged to or ever been associated with the Knott family.

I kept searching. I looked through book after book about the founding and development of Farmington, its prominent citizens past and present. I examined indexes and maps. I stayed in that damned room four hours, and here is what I learned: There had been no local clerics named Knott. There had been no chief justice of the Connecticut Supreme Court named Samuel Knott. There had been no family in the entire history of the village of Farmington named Knott. Period.

Dazed and confused, I reeled back over to town hall and down the steps. It was a discreet town. The town clerk wouldn’t let me look at the birth records. Insisted they were confidential. I suggested they were public record. Public record or not, I couldn’t see them. I asked if there were any vital records I
could
see.

Deaths.

Through the vault door I went. Into the chilly fireproof records room … Noyes, Sawyer, who had hung himself in the cellar of the old house on High Street …
Don’t take this the wrong way
,
Son
… Noyes, Jane Knott, who had flown off to have dirty fun with Smilin’ Jack and crashed in the White Mountains.

There was no record of either death.

I went outside and got in the Jaguar and sat there. Now I knew why the note had told me to come to Farmington.

Cameron Sheffield Noyes didn’t exist.

Merilee and Lulu were still out when I got back to the Bee and Thistle. I went straight up to my room and stretched out on my bed. I wanted to get off my feet — the sands under them were shifting too rapidly.

Who was Cam Noyes? Why had he made up his life story? Had anything he’d told me been true? Who had sent me here? What did this have to do with Skitsy’s murder?

I phoned down to the bar for a mug of Double Diamond dark English draft. Then I called Cam. Vic answered.

“How is he?” I asked.

“Pretty well, Hoag,” Vic replied in his droning monotone. “We did five miles this morning. Attended Miss Held’s funeral. I’ll put him on. He’s been anxious to —”

“Coach!” cried Cam, wrenching the phone away from him. “Coach, I want to do it. I want to tell the truth. All the way, just like you said.”

“Glad to hear it, Cameron,” I said quietly.

“You were right,” he went on, sounding boyish and up. “As long as I hide from what I did that night, I’ll never be able to get on with my life and work. I’ve got to come clean.”

“That you do. And what does Boyd say about this?”

“Haven’t told him. I’m the one who’s in charge of my life, not him. Some cop came by today after Skitsy’s funeral.”

“Was he short and muscular?”

“Very.”

“That’s him.”

“Huh?”

“What did he want?”

“To know how well I knew Skitsy. Where I was when she died.”

“Did you tell him?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I just didn’t feel like it.”

I sipped my ale. “I’ll be back tomorrow afternoon, Cameron. We have lots to talk about.”

“Where are you, anyway?”

“Connecticut,” I replied, waiting for his reaction.

“What are you doing out there?” he asked, trying not to sound uneasy. He failed.

I wanted to say who the fuck are you? Why have you been lying to me? I wanted to say that friends don’t do that to each other. I stopped myself. I wanted more facts first. I hoped I’d get them in the morning. “Working some things out with my ex-wife,” I answered.

“Ah, good,” he said cheerfully. “Coach?”

“Yes, Cameron?”

“Are you proud of me?”

“Proud doesn’t begin to describe it.”

I hung up and called my apartment. Charlie Chu answered.

“Oh, hi,” she said warmly. “I was just doing some sketches, and they’re going great. It’s really helping my head being here, Hoagy. I appreciate it.”

“No problem.”

“I love your skylight. If you ever decide to move, let me know. It’s a darling place.”

“That’s one word for it.” I pictured her there, sitting by the phone with her glasses sliding down her nose. I liked picturing her there. “Any messages?”

“Very.”

“Very what?”

“He called a little while ago. Lieutenant Very. He seems real nice. We talked about his ulcer for a while.”

“And … ?”

“I told him he should eat a lot of rice.”

“No, what did he want?”

“For you to call him.” She gave me his number. Then she lowered her voice. “I … I’ve been thinking about you, Hoagy. I mean, being surrounded by your things and sleeping in your bed and everything. I feel like I’m getting a special guided tour of you.”

I left that one alone.

“I like what I see, Hoagy. A lot.”

“Careful, or you’ll turn my head.”

“What do you think I’m trying to do?” she said. Then she giggled and hung up.

Romaine Very was mad at me.

“What the fuck ya doing in Connecticut, dude?” he demanded harshly when I got through to him.

I could hear the din of the precinct house in the background. “Working. Why?”

“I like everybody at arm’s length, that’s why.”

“I had no idea, Lieutenant. I still have a book to turn in, you see.”

“Ya shoulda said something to me about it.”

“I apologize. I had no idea I’d be hurting your feelings.”

“You’re not hurting my —”

“I understand you phoned.”

“Yeah, I phoned,” he replied, popping his gum. “Your honeypot sounds supernice.”

“She’s not my —”

“A lot of ladies, they find out you’re a cop, they talk to you like you’re some sack of shit. Not her. Said she’s an artist. Doesn’t Cam Noyes live with an artist, too?”

“What was it you wanted, Lieutenant?”

“We found Miss Held’s dress this morning. The yellow one.”

“Where was it?”

“Stuffed in a trash bin three blocks away with her bra and panties. That makes it official — it’s now a murder investigation. Thought you’d wanna know.”

“Thank you. That wasn’t very smart, was it? Ditching the clothes nearby like that.”

“No, it wasn’t,” he acknowledged. “They were wet.”

“It rained last night,” I pointed out.

“I know, but they were inside a plastic bag and the trash bin had a lid on it. None of the other trash around it was wet. Lab’s checking ’em over. We’ll see. Coroner’s office thinks she died from the fall, period. They didn’t find nothing to indicate a struggle. No scratches or finger marks, nothing under her nails. You got anything for me?”

“Me?”

“Thought maybe you was tracking something down out there.”

“Nothing to do with this, Lieutenant.”

“I don’t know about you, dude,” he grumbled. “I really don’t. I mean, my head hears ya but my stomach don’t.” He burped. “And my stomach’s usually right. When you coming back?”

“Tomorrow.”

“See that ya do,” he ordered. “Connecticut. I went there once.”

“Oh?”

“Didn’t like it. Stay with me, dude.”

Merilee still wasn’t back yet. It was nearly seven. I didn’t know whether to be concerned or not. I decided not to be. I’d been careful not to tell anyone where we were staying.

I had another glass of draft outside on a bench by the river. The sun was setting over the tidal marshes. I watched it, and found my thoughts straying to someone fresh and cute and talented. Someone Chinese.

When the sun fell, I went inside. Miss Nash had returned. I made a dinner reservation and went upstairs. Her shower was running. Lulu was waiting for me in my room, incredibly happy to see me. Of course it was dinnertime. I put down her mackerel, had a quick shower, and stropped grandfather’s pearl-handled straight-edge razor. After years of going through packages of disposable razors, I’d decided there was already enough plastic waste in the world. I now make less of it, and the shave isn’t terrible as long as the blade is sharp and my hand is reasonably steady. I dressed in my double-breasted white Italian linen suit, a lavender broadcloth shirt, and a woven yellow silk tie. After I’d doused myself with Floris, I headed downstairs, where I was shown to a candlelit table on the dining porch.

Merilee joined me a few moments later. I could tell the second she entered the dining room — heads everywhere turning at the sight of her that something was very wrong. She looked beautiful enough. Her hair was up, and she had on a high-throated Victorian silk blouse, a cameo brooch, paisley skirt, and her Tanino Crisci shoes. When she sat, her cheeks glowed in the candlelight. But her back was stiff and she was chewing on her lower lip. Her eyes carefully avoided mine.

I ordered dry martinis with extra olives, and asked her if everything was okay. She said everything was absolutely, totally fine. I let it go. I learned long ago that I couldn’t dig anything out of Merilee. She spills only when she’s good and ready to spill. So we ate our baby lamp chops and new potatoes and pecan pie in sphinxlike silence. As soon as we were done, she said she was very tired and went directly up to her room. Lulu joined her. I had a large calvados before I headed up, too. When I got to my door, I could hear Merilee weeping behind hers. I tapped lightly on it. She told me to please go away. I went away.

Her time to spill was three a.m. That’s when she and Lulu came in my room and got on my bed, and she said, “I bought a Land-Rover today.”

“A Land-Rover?” I yawned and rubbed my eyes. The moonlight was slanting through the window and across the foot of the bed. She looked lovely in it as she sat there in her red flannel nightshirt, hands folded neatly in her lap.

“A dear, battered old one. It looks like something out of a Stewart Granger movie. Super for hauling things and it runs like a — ”

“Hauling what things, Merilee?”

Her forehead creased. It does that when she’s trying not to cry. “I-I bought an eighteen-acre farm today.”

“You did what?”

“In Hadlyme. The house was built in 1736.” Her words tumbled out quickly now. “It has nine rooms. Exposed beams. Wide-oak floors. Seven fireplaces. The one in the dining room has a baking oven. There’s a three-story carriage barn and a duck pond and an apple orchard and the dearest, sweetest little chapel with stained-glass windows and … ” She came up for air. “I took one look and said I’m home.”

“But when did you — ?”

“I got to talking this afternoon with the folks at Goodspeed about how much theater there is around here now — them, the Ivoryton Playhouse, the National Theater for the Deaf in Chester … and I started thinking how nice it would be to be involved in something so decent and non-Hollywood. I could teach, direct a little. And I’ve always adored this area. So I drove around with a local realtor and she showed me this place and I bought it. I was afraid to say anything about it at dinner because I knew you’d tell me how impulsive and impractical I am.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“You would. You’d get all male on me. Want to go out and survey the place yourself, strut around with your hands on your hips and —”

“I don’t strut around with my —”

“And cluck at every little —”

“I don’t cluck.”

“And try to talk me out of it. You can’t. I’m going through with it. I got a good price, and before I did a thing I checked it out first with my lawyer and my agent and my manager and my accountant and my psychic, and they all told me to go ahead.” She sighed. “It’s
time
, darling. To settle down, and live, and not worry anymore about meaningless things like Tony Awards.” Her eyes found mine in the moonlight. “I thought the chapel would be lovely for you — in case you ever wanted to come up and … ”

“Pray?”

“Write, you ninny. It’s wonderfully quiet, and has a wood stove, and you could stay as long as you like.”

“Thank you, Merilee. That’s very kind.”

She took my hands. “Please tell me I’m not a fool.”

“You know you’re not. It sounds … well, it sounds fantastic. Truly.”

We sat there holding hands a moment on my bed.

“I have something to tell you, too,” I said. “It’s about Charlie.”

Merilee dropped my hands. “Charlie?”

“I may start seeing her.”

Merilee frowned. “I thought she was living with —”

“Moved out on him. She’s staying at my place while I’m gone.”

“And when you get back?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “All I know is she’s the first woman I’ve felt something for in a long, long time. Present company excepted, of course.”

“I see,” she said very quietly.

“Do you have a problem with it?”

“Of course not, darling.”

“Would you tell me if you did?”

“Of course not, darling.” She stretched out across the bed with her head on my feet. “Oh, God, are we through?”