The Vanishing (7 page)

Twenty minutes later, I was waiting for Mrs. Sinclair at the back door leading out of the kitchen toward the greenhouses and stables beyond. I had changed into a pair of jeans, a heavy sweater, and my sturdiest boots. Over that, I put the cozy red parka and mittens I had found in the closet in the foyer earlier in the day.

She burst into the room in full western riding gear—chaps, boots, leather duster, cowboy hat, and all, over a thick woolen sweater and pants. I stifled a grin.

“Oh, come on, darling.” She laughed at me. “You didn’t think I’d show up with a riding crop and helmet, did you?”

I shook my head and let the grin loose. “You are full of surprises, Mrs. Sinclair.”

She pinched my arm as she walked past me. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. Now, my dear, it’s on to the horses!”

We skimmed through the dusting of new snow down the pathway to the stables. Inside a fenced pasture, I saw a man of about my age tightening a saddle on one of two horses, both a deep shade of auburn with black manes and tails. Something about the scene stopped me in my tracks. As I stood there watching this man, that same sense of déjà vu I had felt earlier wrapped itself around me again. I had seen him before. Stood here before. And yet I knew that was impossible. I was beginning to think I was right about having seen a movie that was filmed at Havenwood—that would explain everything.

“Hello, my boy!” Mrs. Sinclair called out to him. Upon seeing us, he dropped the bridle he was holding. I couldn’t see his eyes because he was wearing sunglasses, but somehow I knew he was staring at me. I could feel the force of it on my skin, an intensity that made me shiver.

He shook his head, as if to dismiss whatever he was thinking. He turned to Mrs. Sinclair. “What, may I ask, are you doing?”

This stopped her short. “Whatever do you mean?”

“You’re dressed for riding!” he said, putting his hands on his hips.

“How observant of you,” Mrs. Sinclair cooed, sliding up to him. “When I mentioned riding to you this morning, you didn’t think it would just be you and Julia, did you?”

“I bloody well did,” he said, a Scottish accent making music of his words. “Adrian gave me strict orders to keep you off these horses. He said—”

“My son is not here, unless you know something I don’t.” She smiled, taking the reins of the larger horse. “Hello, my lamb.” She nuzzled her face against the horse’s great head. “You were planning to ride Sebastian, I take it?”

The man threw up his hands and turned to me. “Is this your doing? You should know full well she’s not supposed to be out here.”

I didn’t quite know what to say. But his sheer frustration in the face of Mrs. Sinclair’s amused calm was tickling at my funny bone. She winked at me, a devilish look in her eyes, and I stifled a grin. Mrs. Sinclair laughed out loud.

“Oh, now it’s funny, is it?”

Mrs. Sinclair cleared her throat. “Julia, this is Drew. He’s our vet, stable hand, and all-around worrywart, who, unfortunately, is making a very poor first impression. I assure you he can be quite charming. At times.”

He rubbed his hand clean on his parka and extended it to me. “Welcome to Havenwood.”

Even through my mitten I could feel a spark when his hand
touched mine. I drew it away quickly. Before I got a chance to say anything, he turned back to Mrs. Sinclair. “You know that if you insist on going out riding, I’m going with you.”

Mrs. Sinclair glanced mischievously me. “I wouldn’t have it any other way, my darling. Saddle up Nelly for Julia. I’ll take Sebastian today.”

Drew disappeared into the stables. Mrs. Sinclair easily swung up into the saddle and I waited for Nelly, hoping she’d give me a more gentle reception than her vet had.

“All right,” Drew said to me, emerging from the stable leading a horse. “Do you remember the last time you rode?”

I shrugged, eyeing Nelly. “It’s been a long time.”

“Not to worry.” He smiled at me. “Nelly is as gentle as a kitten, and I’ll be right by your side.”

He helped me get a foot in one of the stirrups—there was that spark again—and gave me a shove upward. I swung my leg around Nelly’s back and sat down as delicately as I could, holding the reins with both hands.

“That’s the way!” Mrs. Sinclair sang out to me, as her three enormous dogs bounded out of the stables. “Look, Julia, we’ll have an escort party through the woods to town! We won’t have to worry about wolves with these girls by our side!” She cackled loudly then, and clucked for her horse to start moving. “On, Sebastian!”

“Now all we have to worry about is keeping up with Barbara Stanwyck there,” Drew said under his breath with a chuckle, nodding his head in the direction of Mrs. Sinclair. “Not too fast!” he called out to her as we began to follow along.

I snorted. She did sort of look like Barbara Stanwyck.

“I’m sorry about this,” I said to him, trying to keep my balance in the saddle as my horse sidled up beside his. “I didn’t know she’s not supposed to be riding.”

“Adrian would prefer she didn’t,” he said. “But if you know anything about Amaris Sinclair, you know she’s not one who takes direction easily.”

I chuckled. “I’ve only been here for a couple of days, but I have figured that out.”

“He’s worried she’ll fall and hurt herself or worse,” Drew said, his eyes on Mrs. Sinclair. “But look at her. Sheer joy. And she’s an expert, better than you and me combined. She loves these horses but I can’t remember the last time she rode.”

With Mrs. Sinclair in the lead and Drew next to me, we fell into an easy rhythm as the horses walked along the river, which was not yet frozen over by the cold temperatures though the trees were dotted with snow. I took in the landscape around me. This was the wilderness, no doubt about it. Not a car or house or telephone pole as far as the eye could see. Only enormous, age-old pine trees, rolling hills, and clean, crisp air. There was an ancientness that was hard for me to define. The trees themselves seemed to be holding secrets within their ramrod-straight trunks, their pine needles swaying gently in the breeze. It seemed as though they were signing a message to us as we passed.

I could see why Andrew McCullough had wanted to build Havenwood on this land.

We crested a ridge and I saw a lake before us—not Lake Superior, which was still some distance away, but an inland lake. Its surface held a thin layer of ice that glinted in the bright sunshine, and its rugged, rocky shoreline was covered with more enormous pine trees. I held my breath as a massive moose appeared from within the forest, broke the ice with its hoof, and lowered its great head, enormous rack and all, to take a drink.

Drew pulled his horse to a stop next to mine. “Ever seen that before?” he whispered, lifting his sunglasses to get a better look.

I just shook my head, watching until the moose had drunk its fill and disappeared back into the pines.

I looked at Drew, my heart beating hard and fast in my chest, and knew my eyes were as wide as saucers. He smiled with the pride that comes from showing the wonders of one’s home to a newcomer.

“We have a lot of them up here,” he said, clucking for his horse, and mine, to resume walking. “Not as many as in years past, but we still do see them, especially in the winter. It’s a great treat, isn’t it?”

“This is what it must’ve looked like here, hundreds of years ago,” I mused, knowing I was seeing the land just the way Andrew McCullough had. “Civilization hasn’t yet crept in, with its paved roads and telephone poles. This is how the native peoples saw it, back before…” I suddenly felt a bit ashamed when I thought of the end of that sentence. Before my ancestors came and destroyed life as the natives knew it.

Drew nodded. “You’re exactly right. Not everybody picks up on that. This view hasn’t changed much in hundreds of years. It’s just as rugged and beautiful and harsh as it was back then.”

We rode in silence for a while, listening to the wind whisper to us through the pine needles. I had never heard such a thing before. The world around me was utterly devoid of the sound of civilization—no planes flying overhead, no car noise from any nearby street, no radios blaring, no voices. Just the soft hoofbeats of the horses’ feet crunching through the snow, and the whispering pines. It was a wispy, almost human sound that seemed to convey welcome and wisdom and warning.

My body swayed in time with Nelly’s gentle gait. I couldn’t pinpoint the last time I had ridden a horse and had been nervous about attempting it, but it was almost as though my body remembered what my mind couldn’t grasp. The movement felt as natural and calming as breathing in and out.

As we rode, Drew kept turning toward me, as though he wanted to say something.

“What?” I said finally.

“What do you mean, what?”

“You keep looking at me,” I said. “I was just wondering why.”

He opened his mouth to say something and then closed it again, seemingly fumbling for words. “I was just monitoring how you’re doing on Nelly,” he eventually said.

I knew that wasn’t it, or all of it. But I wasn’t going to push it. Everyone at Havenwood seemed to have their quirks, and I supposed this man was no exception. We rode along in silence for a while, until Mrs. Sinclair turned and called out to us. “I’m just going on ahead a few paces, dear ones!”

“Now, listen, lassie,” Drew began, but she circled around us and cut him off.

“I’m not the one in this riding party who needs your watchful eye, I’m afraid,” she said, winking at me.

“It has been a long time since I last rode, but I think I’m getting the hang of it,” I said, holding tight to the horn on the saddle. “I’ll be fine.”

Her eyes danced. “I know you will, my dear. Nelly won’t go faster than a whisper and you seem to have taken to her quite well. The problem is poor Sebastian wants to stretch his legs.”

“Why do I have the feeling you set this whole thing up?” Drew said, taking off his sunglasses and squinting at her.

“
Moi?
” She laughed. “Never! I’ll take the dogs with me and meet you at the edge of town. Who knows, maybe we’ll go wild and get a cappuccino. Or a glass of wine!”

“But—” Drew protested.

“Nonsense. I’ve got the dogs. If we come upon anything that frightens Sebastian, the girls will take care of it. Right, girls?”

She didn’t wait for a response. She was off at a trot, the dogs leading the way. It was quite a sight, Mrs. Sinclair in her cowboy getup, surrounded by a posse of giant malamutes.

I turned to Drew and grinned. “You can’t make this stuff up.”

He chuckled. “Oh, Julia, just you wait.”

“You don’t have to babysit me back here, you know,” I said, clutching the reins and trying to look more confident than I felt. “If you’re worried about her—”

He held up a hand to cut me off. “It’s a game we play, she and I,” he said, smirking. “I protest, she goes right on ahead and does
whatever it is she wants. We both know she will. But I’ve got to make a good show of it.”

As I watched Mrs. Sinclair loping off into the distance, I was beginning to see what he meant.

“Besides, she’s a better horsewoman than she is a driver, I’ll tell you that.”

“A driver?” I asked.

“You do not want to be anywhere in the vicinity when that woman decides she’s going to get behind the wheel of a car. Trust me on that.”

We lapsed into silence again, broken every once in a while by Drew giving me gentle instruction and pointers. The horses made their way up and down a steep embankment, and we found ourselves in a field of rolling hills. I could see Lake Superior glittering in the distance and a town perched on its edge.

“This is the golf course,” Drew said.

This surprised me. “You’ve got a golf course here?”

“We’re not all wilderness, all the time here, lassie. We have refinements. Besides, a Scotsman founded this town. Of course it’s going to have a golf course.”

I laughed. “Cappuccino, a golf course—what’s next, a yoga studio?”

“Wednesday afternoons in the high school gym.”

“Okay, so my expectations are duly squashed.” I chuckled. “I understood that we were in the middle of nowhere.”

“ ‘Nowhere’ is a relative term,” he said. “By Chicago standards, it’s nowhere. But for me, it’s got everything I need.”

So, he had been informed I was from Chicago, too. I wondered what else Adrian had told him about me. “And what do you need, apart from cappuccinos, yoga, and golf?”

“In addition to all of this”—he gestured widely at the landscape—“which for me is nearly everything, there are a couple of fantastic restaurants serving local fare that I love, my favorite watering hole
in the entire universe, a movie theater with a full bar attached, a grocery store with gourmet selections, and very nice people who are friendly but don’t ask too many questions. Some might call what we have a small existence. I call it perfect.”

I gazed toward town. “It sounds lovely,” I said, meaning it.

Our horses quickened their pace and soon we saw Mrs. Sinclair waiting for us on the crest of the next hill, dogs lying around Sebastian’s feet.

“There’s the old girl now,” he said, his face breaking into a wide grin. “Thank goodness.”

I gave him a long look. “She’s really lucky to have you,” I said. “You care so much about her.”

“Of course I do.”

“So, where did she find you? I’d ask if you were a local, but your accent betrays you. I don’t know of too many northern Minnesotans with Scottish accents. Canadian, yes, but yours, no. What brought you here?”

“I came with the place,” he said, looking straight ahead. “I’m Andrew McCullough.”

I nearly fell off Nelly when he said that. What could he possibly mean? Before I could ask him to explain himself, Mrs. Sinclair charged toward us on Sebastian at a full-on run. “Goodness me, you two are slowpokes,” she said, her horse circling us as she spoke. She was in complete control of the animal and obviously an expert horsewoman.

“Listen, children, I’ve had an idea. It’s the middle of the month and I haven’t heard from Tom.” She looked at me and explained, “He’s my land manager. He handles collecting all the rents in town. We own the town, Julia. I’m not sure if you are aware of that.”

I nodded. “Adrian said something about it, yes.”

“Anyhoo, I thought, since we’re headed toward town, I’d just stop by and pay him a visit. See what’s up, so to speak.”

Drew’s mouth hung open for a moment before he said, “You’re going to pay him a visit.”

“Yes! Whyever not?”

“No reason,” he said slowly, eyeing her. “In town, though? Are you sure you don’t want me to ask him to drop by the house?”

“No! We’re right here, and I thought I’d save him a trip, and…” She looked at Drew and threw her head back and laughed at his expression, which was a mixture of bemusement and downright horror. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, boy. Don’t get all worked up. My wanting to go into town is not evidence of the apocalypse. We’ve only got three horses here, not four!” She let out another great
laugh. “I’m just going to pay a little visit to an office in town to transact some business.”

With that, she was off. “I’ll meet you at the Laughing Otter in an hour!” she called over her shoulder. “We’ll have cocktails!”

“The Otter is it, now?” Drew said, shaking his head and giving me a look. “For cocktails? I don’t quite know what to make of this.”

“I’m guessing she doesn’t go into town much?” I said, watching her disappear over the horizon, dogs at the horse’s heels.

“Very rarely. Almost never. I can’t remember the last time.” He scowled in the direction of town before calling out: “You’re meant to be lying low! You’re dead, remember?”

This made me chuckle. Dead, indeed. He turned to me. “Do you think you can make it to town alone?”

I eyed the distance. It wasn’t far and on relatively flat ground. “Of course!” I said, not knowing quite where my confidence was coming from. “Nelly and I are old friends by now.” I patted the horse’s neck and hoped she felt the same.

“I’m after her, then,” he said, picking up his pace. “Meet me at the Otter. It’s on the main street. Can’t miss it.” And then he was off, too.

It wasn’t until he was out of sight that I began to wonder what I was supposed to do with Nelly when I got to the bar. Or when I got to town, for that matter. I had never ridden a horse through city streets. How would she react to the cars?

But when I got there, I saw it was really no problem at all. Only a couple of cars were parked on the street, and I didn’t see any people, either. Adrian had been right: this place really did seem to wind down when summer tourist season was over.

The long main street curved with the Lake Superior shoreline. All the buildings on it faced the lake, and there were several cross streets of just a few blocks in length. None of the buildings was more than two stories tall. I rode on Nelly past a department store, a drugstore, a bookstore, and a smattering of shops. I saw the movie theater on the next block, several small restaurants, and a
wilderness outfitter. The courthouse stood on the hill a few blocks away, next to a building I presumed to be the library.

Simple, as Drew said, but delightful all the same. There wasn’t a strip mall or a fast-food restaurant in sight. I hadn’t been in too many small towns like this, where the main street was still the hub of activity. It was like a slice of life from another time.

I found Drew waiting for me in front of a building with a wall of windows overlooking the lake. The colorfully painted sign of a very happy-looking otter told me this was the place. I jumped down from my saddle as Drew took the reins and tied them to a hitching post on a side street, where three other horses stood, along with a young boy of about fifteen years of age.

“Give them some water, will you, Ben?” Drew asked him, slipping a few bills into the boy’s palm. “We’ll be about an hour or so.”

I stumbled a bit as I followed Drew inside—my legs felt wobbly from hanging on for dear life on the ride—and found the Laughing Otter to be a Northwoodsy place with tongue-in-groove pine-paneled walls decked out with bright paintings of whimsical-looking woodland creatures. Wooden booths with fabric seats in a bright mosaic pattern lined the wall with floor-to-ceiling windows facing the lake. The opposite wall was dominated by a long, wooden bar with rows of interesting microbrews on tap. Several tables stood in between.

Drew unzipped his parka, pulled off his glasses and hat, and took a seat in one of the booths facing the window. As I slid in across from him, a tall man with long blond hair pulled back into a ponytail appeared with a beer in hand.

“The usual for you, I’m assuming,” he said, setting the beer down in front of Drew with a smile.

“Scottish ale,” Drew said, and took a long sip. “There’s nothing finer.”

“Unless it’s an icy shot of aquavit.” The server turned to me and raised his eyebrows. “What can I get you?”

“I’ll have a chardonnay, please,” I said.

Sitting across from Drew, I got my first good look at him. Curly auburn hair with just a hint of gray dancing throughout it. Bright blue eyes. An easy smile. Something about his face was familiar and yet distant at the same time. And then, as the realization of where I had seen him before washed over me, my entire body began to shake.

“You
are
Andrew McCullough,” I said, remembering the painting above the fireplace—those same blue eyes, that same jawline. Put a kilt on him, and he’d be the same man.

He held my gaze, and in that moment, the room seemed to fall away. I no longer saw the paneling or the whimsical artwork; I no longer heard the chatter of other patrons. I only saw a man who had lived forever, a living curse.

Then the server came back to the table with my glass of wine and broke whatever spell had overtaken me. I felt completely foolish for saying what I said, and for even thinking it, as Drew exchanged jokes with the server. Immortal, indeed.

“So,” I said tentatively. “You look pretty good for a guy who died more than a century ago.”

“It’s the cold northern air.” His eyes twinkled at me over the rim of his glass.

“So, you’re a descendant, I take it?”

He looked at me, silent for a bit longer than it would take most people to respond to a question like that. “Fourth generation,” he finally said, twirling his glass on its end. “Havenwood is part of my family’s history, and I had heard stories about it my whole life. A proper manor house, just like ours, built in the middle of the American wilderness by a rather eccentric ancestor making his fortune here but longing for home. My grandmother had told me the tale so often, it seemed more like a legend than reality.”

“You never visited as a child?”

He shook his head. “No, my family—my grandfather’s brother—sold it to Mrs. Sinclair before I was born, but she extended an invitation to us to visit whenever we liked. When I was old enough, I took her up on it. I just had to come and see the place for myself.”

“And you stayed.” I smiled.

“And I stayed.” He smiled back at me. “Havenwood has a way of getting under your skin.”

“And so you take care of the horses?” I wanted him to tell me more; I was so enjoying listening to the music of his words and the softness of his voice.

“And the dogs,” he said, taking another sip of his beer. “About a week after I arrived, one of the horses went lame. The vet in town wasn’t available and Mrs. Sinclair was frantic, so I took a look. I had spent a lot of time as a lad in our own stables at home, learning from our stable hand, who was miraculous with animals. Had a real gift. But Mrs. Sinclair had some clown from the village looking after the horses, and I could see right away that he was useless. The stable was a mess, for one thing.” He wrinkled his nose at the memory of it. “I spent an afternoon cleaning and organizing, brushing the horses and filling their water troughs. Mrs. Sinclair was very keen on having me stay on after she saw what I had done.”

“She offered you a job?”

“She did indeed. I knew my mother wouldn’t be too thrilled about the McCullough heir being a stable hand, but somehow that didn’t matter to me. I had already fallen in love with the place, and working with the horses was so natural, it felt like breathing. It was like Mrs. Sinclair had found my true calling, here, so far away from my home.”

“If it’s working with the horses that you love,” I said, “why not just do that back home in Scotland? Why stay here?”

“Oh, it’s not only the horses,” he said, downing the last of his beer. “I’m invested in Havenwood. This place goes to me when she passes on.”

I coughed on my sip of wine. “You? Not Adrian?”

“It was more like a long-term rental arrangement than an out-and-out sale. If Amaris Sinclair owned it for a while, fine. But it had to revert to family after she died. That’s something the first Andrew McCullough made very clear.”

I blinked a few times and looked at him. “What do you mean, family?”

“Family,” he repeated. “The McCulloughs.”

“But she is family,” I said. “She told me so.”

“Oh, did she now?” Drew said, amused.

“She did! She told me she was first here as a little girl, and a cousin owned it. When he came into financial difficulties, she was a successful novelist and able to buy it to help him out. She said she’s always loved Havenwood.”

“Well, I suppose that’s true.” He smiled. “Her mother’s sister married one of my great-uncles, or some such thing. She’s on an outer limb of the family tree, you might say. Not related to us by blood, in any case.”

“So Havenwood will be yours one day,” I said. “Forgive me for asking, but how does Adrian feel about that?”

At the mention of Adrian’s name, a vision of flames shot before my eyes and extinguished just as quickly. I toyed with the idea of bringing up the fire to Drew, but thought better of it. If I was supposed to be starting a new life as another person, I might as well begin with him, I reasoned. I had no desire to tell him who I really was, even if he might have some insight to share about the fire. No, I’d keep quiet about that for now.

The server appeared with another round of drinks and Drew took a sip as he considered this.

“I’ve never asked him. He’s always known about it, so he’s under no illusions. When she does pass away—and I pray it’s a good many years from now—I don’t think anything much will change at Havenwood, other than it’ll be emptier without her. I’ll go on as I have been, Adrian will go on as he has been, Marion and the rest of the staff will go on as they have been. Nothing much ever really changes there.”

Something about the way he said that sent a chill up my spine. Lightening the mood, I said, “So you’re not going to kick everyone out and turn it into a nudist colony, then?”

He laughed. “That hadn’t crossed my mind. But now that you mention it…”

“Of course, that would extend to the town as well”—I looked around the bar—“but somehow, I don’t think these folks would mind.”

“I’ve got big plans for the town, once it’s mine.” He smiled. “I’m planning to change the name to Drewville, where there will be free drinks for ladies on Wednesday nights, no beets sold anywhere in the city limits, and cell phone use in public will result in immediate death.”

“I think you should outlaw rude people as well. And the truly nasty ones should be exiled.”

“We’d make a fine pair of rulers, you and I.” He chuckled. “We can joke about it, but it’s really not like that, you know. It’s more of a rental situation, in the name of the estate. Havenwood, for all intents and purposes, is the town’s landlord.”

“All the merchants pay rent to Havenwood?” I asked. “What about the homeowners?”

“Merchants, yes, homeowners, no,” he explained. “Mrs. Sinclair terminated that contract a long time ago at great personal expense. She didn’t want any homeowner beholden to her. Gave them their land. The merchants, that’s another matter. They’re doing business, a great deal of business during tourist season, and they can well afford to pay the rent she charges.”

I took a sip of the oaky wine and lowered my voice further. “Does anybody know who she is? I mean, Adrian told me she dropped out of sight and…” I paused for a minute. “The whole world thinks she’s dead.”

He nodded. “Indeed. If any people here know who she is, they don’t say. I think it’s part of the arrangement she has with the town—they don’t ask, she doesn’t tell. But the thing is, Julia, she never shows her face here. Well, let me think,” he backpedaled a bit. “Not never. But rarely. I’ve seen her in town rarely. And now she’s running off to Tom’s office like it was nothing. And in that getup, yet!”

“As though that won’t call attention to her.” I tried to stifle a giggle.

He grinned. “What do you think old Tom will do when she shows up in his office, dressed like that? Call the paramedics?”

“For her or for him?”

We laughed together about that for a bit, and I marveled at how easy it was to talk to this man. It was like we had known each other forever.

“Do you know why she did it?” I asked.

“Did what? Dressed like Barbara Stanwyck and paraded through town like a lunatic?”

“No. Dropped out of sight in the first place. Stopped writing. Let the world think she was dead.”

A cloud passed over Drew’s face and he folded his hands on the table. “That’s something you’re going to have to ask her.”

“I did. She changed the subject.”

“How about those Vikings?”

“Very funny,” I said. “Do you know and just won’t, or can’t, tell me?”

He shook his head. “Whatever it was happened a long time ago. Because of it, she said she’d never take pen to paper again.”

I sighed and shook my head. “It’s truly bizarre.”

He nodded. “One of a myriad of bizarre things swirling around Havenwood.”