“I tried your house, but nobody was home.”
“That still does not excuse your breaking in.”
He held up the key. “I didn’t. I remembered where the key was kept. My family used to stay here during the summer. I don’t know if it rings a bell, but my name is Jack Koryan.” He pushed down the impulse to extend his hand because he did not expect the woman wanted to take it nor did he want to give Brandy a target.
“I don’t recognize the name,” the woman said. “And that doesn’t explain why you’re here.”
Wish I knew myself.
“You may recall someone nearly drowning out here last August. The Coast Guard found him and he ended up in a coma. It was in the papers.”
“Yes.”
“Well, that was me.”
“Oh. Well, I’m glad you survived.”
But he could see that she was still wondering what he was doing in her cottage. “I’m just trying to put some pieces together,” he began. “I don’t know if you remember the story, but thirty years ago the woman who was staying here disappeared one August night and was never found. That was my mother. She had stayed here a lot.”
And Jack explained: How he was found the next day by a groundskeeper who had shown up to assess the damage from the storm, only to discover Jack sitting in dirty diapers on the floor clutching his stuffed mouse. How he was rushed to a hospital in New Bedford, where he was treated for dehydration and shock and released two days later to his aunt and uncle. How he was unable to relate any of the events of the evening even in the most rudimentary baby talk, so it was assumed that he remembered nothing that had happened that night in the cottage—if anyone else had been there or the circumstances of his mother’s disappearance.
“That’s an unfortunate story, but I still don’t understand why you’re here.”
“It’s crazy, but I was hoping that something would come back. I’ve been having dreams of her.”
The woman looked at him in bewilderment for a moment. “My father sometimes took in odd sorts and occasionally let them stay here.”
“Odd sorts?”
“Oh, I didn’t mean it that way.” She had stepped into the room and was now standing with her foot on the stone lip of the fireplace. Brandy settled beside her, panting and looking bored. “Special people interested him. Artists, writers, naturalists … Did your mother paint?”
“No. She was a biochemist.”
The woman’s face suddenly opened up. “Oh, good heavens. The sea-creature lady.”
Sea-creature lady?
“From Harvard.”
“Yes.”
“Well, I’ll be. She had something to do with a joint lab at MIT.”
“Yes.”
The woman’s eyes expanded, and as if a valve had been turned open, turned effusive. “Yes, yes, yes. You see, Thaddeus was a trustee of the institute, which explains how he met your mother. She must have written a paper or given a talk or something which caught his attention. I think I was maybe ten or twelve at the time, but I remember her—a quick little lady with lots of energy. Yes. She used to come out and gather specimens, wade in the water with a face mask and net.”
Jack could barely breathe as he took in her recollection.
“I don’t know if you’re aware,” she continued, “but the waters out here are very special, because every twenty years or so the Gulf Stream brings in some odd creatures from the tropics—beluga whales and sunfish, Portuguese men-of-war, and smaller things. Sharks, too, even had a hammerhead caught just beyond the cove. But I remember her.”
“Rose.”
“Rose. Oh, yes: Rosie.” And she pronounced the name with warm recollection. “A lovely woman. Wore her hair in a bun. She had a whole collection of things in jars she put on the shelves over there. Even set up a little lab in here of sorts with a microscope and things. She used to show me her collection—little starfish and crabs … and jellyfish. Such a lively, lovely woman.”
“Jellyfish?”
“Yes. She must have been a marine ecologist—you know, someone who fought to save the whales or whatever, because Thaddeus was a great proponent of the save-the-sea movement, of course, and a charter member of the Cousteau Society, but that’s before your time … ,” and she went on.
Then she looked around the room and nodded at the corner. “She even had some mice, a cage with half a dozen or so. And a little maze she had built. She let me play with them.”
“Mice?”
“I don’t know what the connection was …”
Just then her cell phone chimed, and Brandy let out a reflexive bark. The woman produced a phone from her pocket and explained that she was down at the cottage talking to a visitor. She clicked off and stuck her hand out. “And, by the way, I’m Olivia Sherman Flanders.” She checked her watch. It was time to leave.
Jack handed her the key as they walked outside. She locked the door and dropped it in her pocket, probably thinking about calling a locksmith. They headed up the steps, Brandy ranging ahead on the leash. As they reached the top, Olivia said, “You said something about having dreams of her.”
“Yes, just dissociated images, nothing that makes sense.”
“But you must have been a very young child when she drowned.”
He nodded. “I can’t explain. But I apologize for letting myself in like that. I was just hoping that something would jar my memory.”
“Humpf,” she said with a shrug, and offered him a ride to the ferry.
But he refused. He could use the exercise to build up his leg muscles, in spite of the ache.
“I understand,” she said.
He dry-swallowed a Motrin and limped away.
The sun had broken through, warming his shoulders and turning the cove into an open bowl of green mercury. His eyes fell on the Skull Rock, drying to a dusty gray.
Jesus, jellyfish.
68
TO SAVE HER MONEY, THE CABBY had driven René directly to Logan Airport, where she caught a shuttle bus to Dover Falls, New Hampshire, where, on a call from the shuttle driver, another taxi met her to take her home. It was well after two A.M. when she had finally climbed into bed, drained and wondering if she had overreacted. Wondering how far it would have gone if she hadn’t reacted. No, every instinct told her she hadn’t overreacted.
On Sunday morning, René was at her dining room table working on the trial data for Nick in preparation for the Utah conference. At little after eleven, her doorbell rang, startling Silky from his sleep on the chair beside her. Outside was the black Ferrari. And the sight of it set off a small burst of adrenaline in her chest. Jordan was at the front door with a huge bouquet of flowers.
She couldn’t pretend she wasn’t home because her car sat in the driveway, and Jordan had spotted her looking out the window.
She opened the inside door, but not the screened storm door.
“I just wanted to stop by and apologize for the other night.” He was dressed in chinos and a sleeveless polo shirt and looked as if he were heading to a golf course. Except on his feet were boat shoes.
“I don’t remember half of what happened, but I think I acted badly. Really. I’m terribly sorry.”
She could still feel the heat from his eyes as he gripped her arm and swore at her with hot conviction. Maybe he was just a bad drunk. “Accepted.” Maybe she had overreacted, for she could still see herself in the middle of the living room with the fireplace iron raised like Uma Thurman in Kill Bill. Bull-shit ! Jordan was tall and athletic, and he was gassed. Who knew what he was capable of? Besides, she felt in peril.
Jordan looked at her through the screen with a supplicating expression. It was clear that he wanted to come inside. She opened the door and took the flowers. “Thank you,” and she closed the door again.