Devonshire

The Manor House: Chapter 12

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 12: Ghost Writing

            Teresa shivers.  The bedroom is chilly and damp.  She supposes it’s the sea air.  She pauses to go downstairs to make some tea and get her sweatshirt from where she left it on the sofa.  When she returns to her desk, as is her habit, she rereads the last paragraph she wrote.  She sucks in her breath.  The words on the screen now read:

            I waited until YOU the sound of his footsteps receded WRITE  into the echoing MY tunnel. STORY

            Teresa sinks down until her head rests on the back of the chair.  She holds her hand over her pounding heart, takes a deep breath. 

            “OK, Margaret.  I assume you’re in here and you are listening.  You want me to write your story?  How do you propose I do that?” 

            A chill runs up Teresa’s arm, as if it passed into a dewy spider’s web.  Her eyes dart around the room.  She sees nothing unusual, no mysterious shadow, no floating mist.  Teresa puts her head in her hands, rubs her eyes, stares at the screen.  It hasn’t changed.  The words are still there in caps between her own.  YOU WRITE MY STORY.  She thinks about the August deadline for this article about her father.  She goes back over the events of the past two days, the locked doors, the tricks with the electricity, the heavy sorrow hanging in Margaret’s room in the Manor House.  It would be a sad story to write, but the plot is compelling: danger, romance, loss. 

            “I can’t believe I’m even considering this,” Teresa thinks.  She deletes Margaret’s writing from the last paragraph and saves the morning’s work on the hard drive.  Then, just as a precaution against a meddling spirit, she saves everything on a flashdrive.

            Teresa takes in a long breath, blows it out so that her gray-streaked bangs spray up and stay feathered across her crown.

            “Margaret, if you’re listening, here’s the deal.  I’ll think about writing a story, but you must find a way to get the facts to me.  I’m sure you don’t want me making it up.  And for the last time, stay off my computer!”

            Teresa shuts down the laptop.  She has a quick lunch of leftover spaghetti, grabs her Michelin guide and steps out into a mizzling rain.  It’s not quite drippy enough to require an umbrella, but not light enough to be categorized as fog off the ocean.  Outside, on the way to the car park, Teresa meets the Dutch family carrying their luggage.  Stefan gives her a curt nod.  He is scowling, holding a duffel bag in each hand.

            Teresa comes up beside Rhoda.  “You’re leaving?  I thought you were here for five days.”

            Rhoda’s expression is solemn; there is a glint of fear in her eyes.  Stefan turns.

            “We cannot stay here to be molested at night.”

            “Molested?”  Teresa’s eyes widen at the strong word.

            “Yes, in the night, we could not sit up in our bed.  The girls were crying, and we were pushed down into the pillow.”

            Rhoda continues, “Then, when finally I could get up, I went to the girls’ room.  They were uncovered and crying in their sleep.  I covered them and two hours later they were uncovered again and shivering.” 

            “And you think that it was the gh—“

            “SSSHH!”  Stefan gestures to Teresa with his finger over his lips.   “The children!”  He indicates Tom and the little girls with his chin.

            “Oh.  Well, I’m sorry to see you go,” Teresa says after an awkward silence.

            “I hope you have a more pleasant stay than we have had,” Stefan says.

            Teresa just nods, not knowing how to respond.  Instead of continuing to the car park, she turns onto the path to the Tea Shop to buy a scone and a cup of tea to go.  Ted is sweeping up under the picnic tables.

            “Good morning, Ms. Salerno.  Where are you off to on this misty morning?”  Ted is a tall fellow with a beer belly that bulges out over his jeans.  He affects a cowboy look.  The buckle on his leather belt is a brass buffalo head, and he wears a cowboy shirt with snaps, a neckerchief, and boots with worn-down heels.

            “I thought I’d go to Killerton House.  But I just saw the Dutch family leaving.”

            “Aye. The gentleman demanded his money back.  Miss Micklewhite was quite put out.  She thinks Margaret took offense at the guy’s remarks.”

            “About there being no scientific evidence for the existence of ghosts?”  Teresa cannot help smiling.

            “Exactly.”  Ted smiles too.  “Herself is particular about the folks who stay here.  Mostly she just plays with the utilities, but she can do worse.”

            “Has she ever caused serious harm?”

            “Unh.”  Ted reaches under a table with his broom.  He turns away from Teresa and leaves her staring at his back.

            “Hmm,” Teresa narrows her eyes.  Was that a yes or no?  Obviously, the topic is closed as far as Ted is concerned, but later she’ll see if Trish is more forthcoming.

            With her tea and scone in hand, Teresa sets out again for the car park.  The Dutch family is gone.  The dry rectangle where their car had been is turning dark with the damp.

            As Teresa drives, she keeps confusing the turn signal with the lever for the windshield wipers.  It’s hard enough, Teresa thinks, to be driving a stick shift on the wrong side of the road.  Add in rain and windshield wipers and she feels like she needs two more hands. 

The Manor House: Chapter 11

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 11: Mother

            After Junior died, my father was never the same.  He had Junior’s Purple Heart medal framed.  It hung above the living room mantle with a photograph of Junior in uniform.  I was still living at home, attending college.  I remember feeling such relief each morning when I shut the door on that sad house.  I’d stay in the library studying, hoping that my parents would be asleep or out when I got home.  Sometimes, I’d smell my father’s cigar when I was taking off my coat in the foyer.  He would be sitting in the living room, slumped in his recliner.  A half-smoked Cubana between his fingers, he’d swirl port in a glass and stare at Junior’s picture.  He appeared bulky and toad-like hunched in his chair, a bit reminiscent of Winston Churchill.  I tiptoed past the doorway, loathe to disturb him, even though I knew in truth he wouldn’t notice me if I stomped through like an elephant.

            About six months after Junior died in Vietnam, I discovered that my mother was having an affair with Cousin Alberto.  It happened like this.  I had stayed late at the library.  My friend, Larissa, and I took the subway downtown.  I got off at my stop and waved to Larissa through the closing train door.  I started up the long flight of stairs to the street.  In my mind I was still going over the points of the essay I was writing about The Brothers Karamazov.  I saw the couple at the top of the stairs, embracing shadows backlit by the neon lights of Mario’s Pizzeria.  Something about their posture tugged me out of my Russian musings.  Then I recognized my mother’s red burnt-out velvet scarf with the long fringe.  My heart halted, jumped, and pulsed in my throat.  I stood in the darkness of the stairway waiting, watching.  They kissed, drew apart, kissed again.  I saw the man’s face: Cousin Alberto.  My thoughts came in disjointed fragments.  Cousin Alberto!  He had to be at least a decade younger than my mother.   And what a creep, after all my father did for him, bringing him over from Italy, giving him a job at the company.  He even rented an apartment to Alberto, cheap. 

            Finally, the two went their separate ways.  Mother clicked off down the street in her four-inch heels.   Cousin Alberto turned and came slap-slap-slap down the subway steps.  I froze against the tiled wall.  It was cold on my back.  Our eyes met.  He recognized me, then cut his eyes away.  I waited until the sound of his footsteps receded into the echoing tunnel.  Then I followed my mother home.

The Manor House: Chapter 10

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 10: Night

            Teresa looks at the clock on her laptop.  It is late, 11:40.  She has been writing for over two hours.  She rubs the back of her neck, rolls her shoulders.  With the computer shut down, Teresa gets ready for bed.  She makes sure the flashlight is on the nightstand before turning off the bedside lamp. 

            Sometime before dawn she is awakened by a dream.  Unlike most of her dreams, this one is clear and realistic, not murky with nonsensical events.  At first in the dream, she is at the park with her father, a stocky, swarthy man with thick black eyebrows.  Then the man changes into a taller, leaner person with brown hair and piercing blue eyes.  He is holding the reins of a small tan horse.  The Teresa of the dream knows him as her father.  His love for her lights up his eyes like small flames.  He lifts her up onto the butterscotch pony and begins to lead her around the circle of green grass. 

            “Oh, Da,” she says to the man.  ‘Is she mine to keep?”

            “Yes, my little love, she’s yours to keep.”

            Teresa awakens with her cheeks wet with tears.  She feels for the light switch.  Her chest is aching with yearning for this man, this dream father she adores whose eyes are alight with love.  Oh, how she longed to see that look in Father’s eyes.  Teresa wipes her face on the edge of the sheet. 

            I tried so hard, she thinks, but Junior got it all.  She recalls Junior as he was when he joined the Army.  He was a head taller than Father, with smoldering black eyes and a shock of wavy brown hair.  When not in uniform, he always stood with an attitude, hips cocked, thumbs in his belt loops.  He’d been a handsome man.  His death drew a dark curtain over all their lives.

            Teresa lies awake until she hears the birds begin their dawn symphony.  Two cups of tea help to chase away the night fog, yet the heaviness of loss is hard to dispel.  She decides to walk about the grounds before her morning work session.  The wrought-iron garden gate is open, and the gardener is kneeling on one of those kneepads avid gardeners like to use.  He is wearing the same crushed felt hat, but the pipe is absent.

            “Good morning,” she says, even though the morning still feels soggy and disjointed. 

            “Ah, good morning to you.  A fellow early bird, I see.”

            “Yes.  I’m Teresa.  Staying in the Garden View Suite.”

            “Yes, yes.  The writer from America.”   He removes his earth-smudged right glove and holds out his hand.  “Names Braithewaite.  Morris Braithewaite.”  His fingers are calloused and dry; it’s like holding stale toast.  In the bright morning light, Teresa makes him out to be at least seventy-five, maybe much older.  He has that leathery look of folks who have spent years in harsh weather.    Teresa is startled by the name he offers. 

            “Braithewaite?  As in the smuggler family that Margaret belonged to?”

            “The very same.  My grandfather bought back the property during the Great Depression.  Land was going for a song then.”  His eyes twinkled.  “But we’ve given up the wrecking, at least for the time being.”

            Teresa smiles with him.  “Did you grow up here at the Manor House?”

            “Oh, no.  Just spent holidays here.  It was a bit too rustic for my taste.  That was before the museum, before the cottages were added on.”  Mr. Braithewaite pulls his pipe and a lighter out of his breast pocket. Teresa watches as he sucks the flame into the tobacco until it is well-lit.    Mr. Braithewaite raises the pipe.  “My only vice,” he says.

            “And Margaret, the ghost.  Have you encountered her?”

            “Never.  But I keep my dress sword underneath the bed.  Deters intruding spirits.”

            “I’d like to hear more about the Manor.  Sometime.  If you’re willing,” Teresa says.

            “Certainly. You can find me here most mornings.  It’s good for me to take a bit of a rest and have a chat.  These old knees are not what they used to be. “

            “Thanks.  Well, I should go back to my work.  It’s nice meeting you, Mr. Braithewaite.”

            “Likewise.  Ta.”  He salutes her with the stem of his pipe, then lowers himself back onto his gardener’s knee pad.

The Manor House: Chapter 9

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

*

Chapter 9: Junior

            I had to be perfect.  If I were perfect, my father would love me again.  I obeyed my teachers to the letter.  I got top grades, even in math, a subject that caused great agonies once I reached sixth grade.  But King Olive spent less and less time at home.  He went to Italy two or three times a year, often for several weeks.  Sometimes my mother went with him.  After the twins were born, we moved into a big apartment on Central Park West.   We children always had a governess to look after us and a housekeeper to cook and clean.  The little girls, Dahlia and Deborah, barely knew Father at all.  On his part, he could never put the right girl’s name on the right face.  Junior and I called them Dolly and Debo.  Junior liked to tease them by holding a treat or a teddy bear out of reach until they wailed in frustration.  I became their protector, especially if the governess at the time proved to be too harsh.

            One governess, a young French woman named Monique, was our favorite.  She was kind and patient.  She never hit anyone, not even Junior, and he used to get into terrible mischief.  He liked to throw bags of garbage on to the people below our sixth story window.  While I was at the library, he tied the twins to their bedpost.  Once he locked them out on the fire escape when it was raining.  

            One day we were walking with Monique in Central Park.  I noticed some mothers watching us and whispering as we passed by.  Their eyes traveled up and down, evaluating our clothing.

            “Monique,” I said, “is Father rich?”

            “Yes, I think he would be considered rich,” she answered.

            “Very rich?” I persisted. 

            “I would say so.  He has the company Salerno, and the car dealerships.  He owns your apartment building and some others, too, yes?”

            It was true. I glanced again at the staring women with their narrowed eyes and felt my cheeks get hot.  The little fur-lined hat that I loved for its softness suddenly felt itchy and conspicuous.  I took it off.

            The society section of the newspaper began to show photographs of my parents at concerts and gallery openings.

            “Anthony Salerno, known as King Olive, and his lovely wife, Adela, attended the opening night of Don Giovanni at the Metropolitan Opera House.”

            “Anthony Salerno, King Olive, shakes hands with the president of General Motors.” 

            “Adela Salerno, wife of Anthony Salerno (King Olive) cuts the ribbon on the season’s latest model Fiat just arrived at Salerno’s Fine Cars.”

            Junior was in sixth grade and I was in tenth grade when he was kicked out of the public school.  The upshot of that was Catholic school for all four of us.  It was devastating for me to start anew in my second year of high school.  At this point in our lives, Junior and I fought constantly.  I was convinced that the girls at our new school avoided me because I was Junior’s sister, and his reputation had preceded him.  Yet, after some weeks, I made a few friends and showed myself to be a star pupil.

            Father believed the nuns would straighten Junior out, but they didn’t.

            “Why can’t you be like Teresa?” Sister Margareta asked Junior every time he was caught. 

            Junior just scowled and mumbled and concocted a worse transgression.  He peed out the window of the boys’ bathroom, plugged up the toilets with paper towels to cause floods, and started food fights in the lunchroom.  Junior never lied about what he had done. He admitted guilt with a cold glitter in his eyes.  When Father was home, he would yell at Junior in English and Italian.  Then he’d spank Junior with a belt, but after a few whacks he’d drop the belt and take Junior in his arms, both of them weeping.  “You’re my only son, my right eye.  Make me proud of you, Junior.  Be a good boy.”

            My mother no longer worked in the Salerno office.  Father had rented space in a building on Fifth Avenue.  He had a secretary, Mrs. Romano.  He brought one of Uncle Gio’s sons, Alberto, from Italy, and trained him to be his assistant.  Without secretarial work to do, Mother played bridge, ate out with friends, or went shopping.  She did not spend more time with us.

            When I was a senior in high school, Junior did something seriously bad.   He was fourteen.  All I knew at the time was that it involved a girl in tenth grade, alcohol, and the police.  He did it on the day of my graduation.  I remember sitting on the stage in my white polyester robe and mortarboard, searching the faces in the audience for my father.  My mother sat with the twins in the third row, her coat on the back of the seat beside her.  I was, of course, the valedictorian.  After the principal, Mother Mary Alice, gave her speech, it was my turn.  The seat next to my mother was still empty.  Swinging between rage and sinking disappointment, I managed to say the words I had memorized.  For me, the day had gone as gray as cardboard, and as flat.  At the end, I thanked the faculty and my parents for their support.

            After the diplomas were handed out, we took a cab back to our apartment.  Father had insisted on throwing a party for me. 

            “After all, you are the first person in my family to go on to university.”

            Some of my friends stopped by.  No one stayed long because they had celebrations of their own at home. 

            My best friend, Bridget, asked, “Where is your father?”

            “Junior got in trouble.”

            “Again?”  she rolled her eyes.  “What a jerk.  What’d he do this time?”

            “I don’t know.”  Tears threatened. I refused to cry until later, when I retreated to my room after most of the guests had left.  All those who remained were part of my parents’ inner circle, along with Cousin Alberto.  I heard my father come in.  He knocked on my door.  I pretended to be asleep.

            In the fall I began Columbia University.  Junior was sent to the New York Military Academy. 

“If the nuns can’t straighten him out, maybe the military can,” said Father.

            Somehow Junior lasted for all four years.  It was probably my father’s generosity that kept him enrolled that long.  There’s a Salerno Gym and a Salerno Science Complex on the campus.  Junior’s grades were barely passing, but they were high enough to get him into the Army as soon as he graduated.  He died in Vietnam, by stepping on a land mine.

The Manor House: Chapter 8

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 8 Tricks

            The summer sky in England remains light until late into the evening.  Teresa arrives at the Manor House as the stars appear.  In the kitchen, she puts a pot of water on to boil for spaghetti. 

            “These electric stoves take forever!” she mutters.

             Teresa goes upstairs to turn on the computer and check her email.  She stops in the doorway, brows furrowed.  Books are upended; papers and tourist pamphlets are strewn across the floor as if scattered by a gust of wind.  The window is closed and has been since last night.  Teresa frowns.  She is sure that she stacked the books and papers before leaving for lunch.  She looks around the room with narrowed eyes.  Everything else is as she left it.  Had Trish or Ted come in to straighten up?  Perhaps one of them left the door open and…

            No.  Teresa shakes her head.  Papers whisked to the floor, maybe.  But not heavy books.  She turns on the laptop and goes back to the kitchen.

            The water in the pot is not boiling yet.  In fact, it’s still cold.  The burner is off.  Perhaps she turned on the wrong burner?  No, all the coils are cold.  Teresa blows her bangs up in a huff.

             “OK,” she says to the empty kitchen.  “You win, Margaret.  But please listen.  I’m here on a holiday.  Well, part holiday, part writing assignment.  I don’t mean you any harm.  The Manor House is a lovely place to stay.  So would you please, please stop playing tricks on me and let me enjoy my vacation?” 

            Teresa stops.  She is whining like a five-year-old.  Her face flushes.  Here she is, begging a ghost.

            Teresa makes her spaghetti without leaving the kitchen.  While she waits, she reads the first chapter of Jamaica Inn, glancing up every few minutes to make sure the stove is still on.  She eats and washes up.  Before taking her tea upstairs, she checks the stove burners.  If Margaret can turn them off, she could conceivably turn them on.  Margaret might be able to start a fire. Teresa shivers at the thought.

            In the bedroom, the computer screen is on, displaying a new blank page.  Three letters hang in the middle of the blue-white rectangle:

                                    Y

                                                            O

                                                                                    U                                                                                                                                                                                                        

            Teresa flops down on the side of the bed.  The room feels chilly, almost damp. 

            “Now what?”  she says into the cool air.  “Do you want me to leave?”  Teresa feels a surge of anger.  “Listen, Margaret, the tricks are one thing, but that laptop is my livelihood.  I have to write this memoir about my father by August.”  She stands up and goes to the desk.  “Look, I’m saving your page.”  Teresa clicks on “Save as” and types in Margaret.  “And anyway,” Teresa continues, “you died too long ago to know about computers.  So let me be.  I have to work.”

            Teresa opens a new page on the laptop.  After typing for a while, she realizes that the room is no longer damp and cool, but warm, as it should be, on such a summer night.

The Manor House: Chapter 7

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 7: Jamaica Inn

            With the windows rolled down to let in a breeze–rental cars in England don’t have air conditioning–Teresa carefully drives between hedgerows until she comes to a signpost.  She loves these posts.  Each signboard points out its singular direction with such assurance: Bideford–Witheridge–Lynmouth.  Teresa checks her map and follows the arrow south toward Bideford.  At Trefarnon in Cornwall, the road to Bodmin Moor rises up from the low coastline.  The car tops a hill and there is the moor.  It is so perfectly bleak, like a brooding brown and green nubby carpet stretching out under the late afternoon sky.  Cirrus clouds make thin shapes that reform like amoebae casting indigo shadows below. 

         Only one road, the one Teresa is following, crosses the moor.  There are no more houses, no more stone walls dividing pastures, no more sheep.  Teresa drives on, trying to remember the plot of Daphne du Maurier’s novel.  She read Jamaica Inn so long ago that all she can recall is the presence of smugglers and the main character suffering a terrifying isolation.  And then she goes over another hill and the Inn is there.  Although the gray stone building is surrounded by a large car park with a scattering of cars and two tour buses, the essence of the place is sinister, more brooding than the moor.  It is stark.  The garden patio is less garden than brick, offering only a few frightened, wind-twisted bushes. 

         Teresa soon has her fill of the place.  The smugglers’ museum is the most interesting part with its maritime paraphernalia and accounts of the most notorious smugglers and wreckers.  Jamaica Inn was the only coaching house between Bodmin and Trefarnon on the coast.  Smugglers brought their barrels of brandy and boxes of tea here to be distributed all across England.  The constabulary, it seems, were often on the take, and punishment for possessing stolen goods was infrequent.  The Inn has its own ghost story as well, about a man who was murdered in the bar.  Photos of ghostly apparitions taken by guests at the Inn are displayed.

         Teresa skims through Daphne du Maurier’s exhibit.  She buys a paperback copy of Jamaica Inn.  It is a relief to get back in the car and drive away.  The place felt thick and heavy to her, as if the air were full of the angular remains of harsh, drunken, bellicose voices.  Once she is out on the moor again, she pulls off the road and stops in a lay-by.  Standing beside the car, she notices a ragged path that leads over the moor.  She follows it.  The heather, in small clumps, has a few purple-pink bells still blooming.  She picks a sprig, sniffs it, and pockets it.  She’ll press it between the pages of Jamaica Inn.  The sun comes down in shafts of light; the air is sweet.

         “Whew!”  She takes in deep breaths all the way to her navel, stretches her arms and feels the weight of the Inn leave her chest.

         As there is not a soul in sight, Teresa starts to run as fast as her sixty-three -year-old legs will move.  She sprints out across the moor until she has to stop because of a stitch in her side.  Then she flops down on her back in the scratchy, fading heather.  When was the last time she lay like this, and looked straight up at the sky?  She can’t remember. 

         Soon the rocks poking into her back force Teresa on to her feet.  She walks back to the car, thinking about how she used to race her brother, Junior, when their father took them to Central Park.  She was older, taller, and therefore faster until Junior passed her up at age fourteen.  No matter how many times Teresa beat her brother in a race, her father would say, “Good, good, Junior!  You run like Man o’ War, like a champion!”

         And Teresa would stand panting, and feel hot tears burn, and swallow the words that pushed from her mouth. “But I won, Father!  I won!”

The Manor House: Chapter 6

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 6 : Town

Teresa pushes back her chair and stretches her arms above her head.  The time on the laptop says 1:24 pm. She is hungry.  After saving the text once more, she straightens up the books and pamphlets on the desk.  She turns off the computer, picks up her cup and goes downstairs.

            The fare in the refrigerator looks paltry today.  She had boiled eggs and toast for breakfast.  There is nothing more to eat but apples and biscuits.  Sandwiches in the Tea Room?  Why not?  Teresa takes her backpack that serves as a purse and steps out into the sunshine.  The menu in the tea shop is brief: fish and chips, ham sandwich, or ploughman’s lunch. 

            The couple from Manchester is sitting at one of the picnic tables.  When Teresa picks up her tray, the woman waves to Teresa to join them.  As she slides on to the bench, Teresa realizes that she has begun to miss the company of others.    The man is Charles and the woman is Edna.  Charles drove a delivery truck and just recently retired.  Edna leans forward to confide, “It was his heart, you know.”  Teresa looks at their plates of greasy fish and chips.  If this is the way they eat, it’s no wonder, she says to herself.

            “’At’s right,” Charles agrees.  “The old ticker was on the blink, but it’s right as rain now.”  He thumps his chest for emphasis.

            “Now Edna here, she still works part-time as a receptionist in a doctor’s office,” Charles says.

             “We have two sons.  Charlie lives in Australia, and Michael lives in Dublin,” Edna says.  “And we have three grandchildren.”

              All Teresa tells them is that she is from Baltimore, divorced, and on holiday for the summer.

            “What she should I see in the area?” Teresa asks.  This is the best way to learn about the treasures in a new locale.

            “Oh, you must visit Killerton House.  The costume exhibit is delightful,” Edna says. 

            “And there’s Jamaica Inn,” Charles adds.  “A bit overrated, but still worth seeing.”

            “Have you been out on the moors yet?” Edna asks.  “They’re something as well, though the heather is at the end of its season.”

            “I just got here last night,” Teresa says.  “I’m booked for a week.”

            “We thought we might take a room here, too, but Edna isn’t fond of ghosts,” Charles says, nudging Edna in the ribs.  “So we’re off to Cornwall today.”  The two pick up their trays.  “Nice talking to you, Teresa.  Have a good holiday.”

            “Yes, thanks.  You, too.”

            Teresa takes another bite of her sandwich.  She has forgotten about the encounters one has when traveling.  Back in her twenties, she might meet a fellow traveler, have a deep, self-revealing discussion, and part ways forever.  The journey itself was a unifying thread linking young wanderers.  Teresa finishes her sandwich.  Leave it to the English to combine cheddar cheese with Bramston pickle.  Must have been the influence of Indian chutney.  She gazes at the facade of the Manor.  She can now identify the window of Margaret’s room.  The dark beams of the Tudor-style building frame all four windows on the upper level.  Grateful for the brief conversation with Charles and Edna, she decides that today she’ll see the town below and find a supermarket, and then perhaps she’ll drive out into the countryside.

            Half an hour later, Teresa is strolling in a small seaside park, watching children ride on a vintage carousel.  A sign at the ticket booth states: The Walston Family presents for your enjoyment a traditional Victorian Carousel with galloping horses and golden cockerels. 

            The music is perfect: loud, tinny, and dated.  She smiles as the platform begins to turn.  The pink and white horses plunge forward and slide back, while the cockerels move more sedately up and down.  The younger children hold on tightly; the older ones do tricks on the horses’ backs, turning around in circles.  One boy tries to ride standing up, but the attendant soon stops that performance.

            Between the two concrete jetties is a small, rocky beach.  Teresa picks her way over the slick rocks, peering into tide-pools.   Not much sea life exists in them: some brown seaweed, a snail or two, a few crusty barnacles.  It is an unusually hot day.  Teresa returns to the park and buys an ice cream cone at the polka-dotted vending cart. 

            A voice behind her says, “Hallo.  Aren’t you staying at the Manor House?”

            It is Rhoda with the two little girls. 

            “Yes, hello.  I’m Teresa.  You’re Rhoda, aren’t you?”  They shake hands.

            The older girl, Elsa, is pushing Susannah in one of those fancy European strollers.  A basket of strawberries is on the stroller tray.  Susannah has one strawberry in each hand.  She alternates taking bites from each.  Teresa is tugged by a memory of Marco, her son, at the same age.  He had started as a blonde, too, but his hair had gradually darkened until it was auburn brown.  It would have been his birthday next month.

            “We’re having pleasant weather,” Rhoda says.  She takes a blue-striped tea towel and wipes strawberry juice off Susannah’s cheeks.

            “Yes, it’s been lovely,” Teresa agrees.  “How long do you plan to stay?”

            “Five days, maybe more.”  Rhoda smiles.  “You have children?”

            “I did, but my son passed away when he was young.”

            “I am so sorry.”  Rhoda squints into the afternoon sun.  “Oh, there is my husband with Tom.  Please, excuse us.  Nice to meet you,” she adds.

            “And you.”  Teresa waves a greeting to Stefan and Tom.

            Along the main street she finds a Sainsbury’s supermarket.  She wanders along the aisles looking at unfamiliar foods.  She collects some in her basket: pickled beets in a shrink-wrapped plastic bag, creme fraiche, crumpets.  She tosses in some staples like spaghetti and sauce, chicken, lettuce.  To carry it all back to the car, Teresa buys two canvas bags.  One has a picture of the carousel on it and the other says, “Devonshire has it all.”

            Back at the Manor, Teresa sets the Devonshire bag down on the stoop in front of her door so she can negotiate the lock.  She enters and sets the carousel bag and her keys on the counter.  She steps outside to pick up the second bag of groceries.  The door slams shut behind her.  Strange, she thinks, there’s no wind today.  She tries the knob.  It won’t turn.  The door is locked.  Teresa blows her bangs in an exhale of frustration.

            At the Manor House door, the sign says “Closed.  Next tour at 3:00.”  The counter clerk at the tea shop tells Samantha that the caretakers are doing the rooms.  Trish or Ted should have a key.  Teresa finds Trish by the maid’s cart stationed outside another cottage door.  Trish is a chunky woman of about forty with a head of overprocessed blonde hair.  She has a wide smile with crooked, nicotine-stained teeth.  When Teresa explains that she is locked out, Trish clicks her tongue.

            “Tsk.  Second time today.”  She stumps along the path to Teresa’s door, which she unlocks with one of a couple of dozen keys on a ring.  Trish pushes open the door, standing aside to let Teresa pass with her bag of groceries.  Then she leans her head into the living room. 

            “All right, Margaret!” she shouts. “Twice is enough for one day.  I got me work to do, you know.  Can’t be unlocking doors all day long!”

            Teresa listens, eyes wide.  “You’re talking to the ghost?” she says.

            “Damn right I am.  Up to her tricks, locking’ doors and messin’ with the electric.  Thinks she’s funny, she does.”  Trish starts to step out and then turns and smiles.  “Are you liking Devonshire?”

            “Oh, yes, very much.  I went into town after lunch.  The carousel is lovely.”

            “Yes, it is that.  Where will you go this afternoon?”

            “I thought I’d drive out to the moor.  What do you think of Jamaica Inn?  Is it worth a stop?”

            “Oh, yeah.  It’s a bit of a tourist attraction now, what with their paranormal evenings and all.  But the building is almost as it was three hundred years ago.  Nice day for a drive, too.”

            “Then it’s settled.  I’ll do that.”  Teresa says.

            Trish jangles her keys in farewell and heads off down the walk.  Teresa puts her own keys in her pocket.  She’ll keep them on her person from now on, and a flashlight in her backpack.  She considers this ghost business as she puts away the groceries.  Is she going to accept that there’s a ghost in the Manor House?

The Manor House: A Tale of Two Ghosts C. 5

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 5: Puccini

            Until the scandal hit the news, I never thought anyone would be interested in my life.  Growing up with King Olive as a father did not seem so out of the ordinary to me, since I was in the middle of it.  After everything collapsed, the press sought me out.  Publishers wooed me.  Friends and slight acquaintances kept asking me questions: What was it like to be in the Salerno family?  Was King Olive a good father?  What really happened?  When my cousin Alberto died last year, I was released from my enforced silence.  And so I begin the story:

            The earliest memory I have of my father is auditory.  We had an African gray parrot named Puccini.  He was a wicked bird who would bite everyone but Father.  I was terrified of Puccini, but my father adored the nasty thing. He tried to teach the bird the aria from La Boheme that begins–“O soave fanciulla, o dolce viso…” That is the first music I can recall.  My father held me on his lap in the rocking chair and sang the same verse over and over.  His deep voice reverberated in my body.  The sound seemed to go directly from his heart space to mine.  He called me his little bird, “mia piccola uccellina.”  I felt completely safe during those times, probably the only time I ever felt safe with my father. 

            I was perhaps four years old when I overheard someone call my father “King Olive.”  I went to my mother and asked her, “Why did that man call Father ‘King Olive?’”

            My mother was a petite woman with black, curly hair.  The only make-up she wore was fire engine red lipstick that left stains on whatever it touched: a wine glass, a cigarette, or my cheek.  At my question, she blew smoke out of her nose in a gray cloud.  “They call your father King Olive because he is the biggest importer of olive oil in the whole country.”

            “What’s importer?”

            My mother took another drag on her cigarette and blew the smoke out the side of her mouth.  “You know Uncle Gio?”

            “Yes.”  I nodded.  Uncle Gio was my father’s brother who lived far away in Italy. 

            “Well, Uncle Gio buys olive oil from the farmers in Italy, and he sends it to your father in big containers.  Then your father’s trucks pick up the olive oil and it gets put into bottles and he sells it to the stores.  That’s being an importer.”

            “Oh.”  The word “importer” was very close to the word “important.”  This made sense to me.  I knew that Salerno Olive Oil was the best.  Father had shown me the bottles of golden-green liquid on the shelves in the supermarket.  I liked the label with the picture of the lady holding a basket of olives.

            Before my mother’s attention could turn away from me, I said, “But Father sells salami and those little cookies, too.”

            “Yes, Teresa, he also imports salami and amaretti.  Now off you go,” she said as the telephone rang.

            My most constant memory of my mother is how she looked when I stood in the doorway of the downstairs office.  She would be sitting at her desk, a cigarette drooping from her mouth.  The telephone would be against her ear and a pencil in her hand.  In those early days, she was the main secretary for Salerno Imports.  As she talked on the phone, the cigarette bounced up and down.  The ash grew longer and longer until it fell off, landing either on the desk or on her lap.  She’d brush it away with a flick of her hand.

            When I turned six years old, my brother was born.  His name was Antonio, like my father, but everyone called him “Junior.”  “He will be my right eye,” Father told the visitors who came bearing blue baby clothes and toy trucks.  Father was transported with joy at the birth of a son, and my world imploded.

            I would hear my father singing to Puccini, while he rocked Junior.  I’d tiptoe into the kitchen and try to climb onto Father’s lap.  He would push me away.  “No, my little bird, you are too big for this.  Go help your mother.”

            He always said that, “Go help your mother,” even if my mother was on the telephone or out shopping.  So I would go sit with Loretta, our housekeeper, and watch her while she cooked or ironed.  I was old enough to know that I couldn’t turn into a boy, so I determined to be the best girl possible to win back my father’s attention.

The Manor House: A Tale of Two Ghosts C. 4

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 4: Margaret’s Room

Teresa and the others step through to the adjoining room cautiously, as if they might see a dead body on the bed.  The room is much like the master bedroom, though smaller.  It has a narrow four-poster bed with blue brocade curtains, a vanity and a wooden cradle.  Despite the summer sun shining through the window, the air in the room is cold and heavy.  The old woman from Manchester slides her arm through her husband’s.  Tom scrunches up close to his father.  For the first and only time since she left Baltimore, Teresa wishes that she weren’t traveling alone.

            Miss Micklewhite smiles and her eyes glitter with relish at the effect her tale is having on her audience.  “Here you see the room just as it was when it was discovered almost seventy-five years later.”  She smiles again, and adds, “Without the skeleton, of course.”

            The gentleman from Manchester makes a huffing noise through his nose.  Teresa stares at the bed as Miss Micklewhite continues.

            “The year was 1865.  The tenant at that time was making some repairs to the roof.  He noticed that there were four windows outside but only three on the inside.  He got his carpenters to break down the wall.  The room they found was untouched, with Margaret’s desiccated remains on the bed.  In the top drawer of this little bureau was a written confession signed by George Braithewaite.  The tenant gave Margaret’s bones a Christian burial at the parish church.”

            Miss Micklewhite turns to Tom.  “Young man, the infants of that time would have slept in a cradle like this one, usually in the parents’ bedroom, unless the family was wealthy enough to have a nanny.”  She cocks her head and asks, “Any questions?”

            The couple from Manchester walks to the window, murmuring to each other.  Tom stares at the bed as if Margaret’s bones were still on it.

            Teresa says, “And the ghost?”

            Everyone stops and all eyes are on Miss Micklewhite.  This must be the highlight of her day, Teresa thinks. 

            “Ah, yes, the ghost.  Although Margaret had a proper burial, people say her spirit still haunts the Manor House.”

            The Manchester woman speaks up.  “Has someone seen her?”

            “There are those who claim to have done.  I myself—” 

            Stefan interrupts her.  “You English are so superstitious,” he says.  “All this talk of ghosts!”  He waves his hand as if brushing the whole idea aside.  “We Dutch are practical.  I am a chemist.  There is no scientific proof that ghosts exist.”

            “Yes, well–” Miss Micklewhite begins.  Behind them, the door swings shut with a soft click.  Miss Micklewhite shakes her head and makes a tsking noise.  She takes a key from her skirt pocket and unlocks the door.  “Shall we go down?  There are lovely gardens for you to stroll in, and paths through the woods if you enjoy a longer walk.  Sandwiches and cream teas are available in the Tea Room across the courtyard.  I hope you enjoyed the tour.”

            She steps aside as the group leaves.  Stefan and Tom exit first.  The father’s shoulders are stiff, but Tom’s are hunched over.  He holds his father’s hand.  Teresa is the last to go.  She looks around the room once more, at the bed, the bureau, and the cradle. 

            Miss Micklewhite gestures to the cradle.  “We like to keep the cradle here by the hearth, so our visitors have room to stand,” she says.  “But always after a big storm during the night, we find the cradle has moved close to the bed.”  The guide purses her lips.  “Of course, our Dutch gentleman wouldn’t believe that.” 

            Teresa nods, then points to the door.  “Miss Micklewhite,” she says, stopping at the top of the steps.  “This door–“

            “”Oh, yes,” Miss Micklewhite nods.  “Margaret likes to lock us in.  I always carry a key in my pocket.”  She pats her skirt where the wrought-iron key makes a slight bulge.  “After you, dear.”

            Teresa is thoughtful as she returns to her rooms.  In the daylight, she sees the sign by her door: Garden View Suite.  She stops in the living room for a long look.  The couch, coffee table, and end tables are vintage 1950s.  The kitchen appliances, except for a new combination washer-dryer, are about thirty years older.  Teresa fills the electric kettle with water and clicks it on.

            “Time to get to work,” she says aloud.  While the water is heating, she goes upstairs.  It is brighter in the bedroom, thanks to the large bay window.  I’ll work up here, she decides.  She takes her laptop from its case.  A few minutes later she has rearranged the bedroom.  The little desk is now under the window where she has a glorious view of the gardens and the woods beyond.  The bed is against the wall opposite the door.  With her laptop turned on, Teresa settles herself on the chair.  She opens a blank document and begins to type.

The Manor House: A Tale of Two Ghosts C. 3

/ tangledmagic / Leave a comment

*

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

*

Chapter 3: The Legend

            “Sometime during the 1700s, the Manor House passed into the hands of a farming family.  Life was far from easy for the farmers here on the coast.  They often turned to wrecking or smuggling to supplement the meager crops they could grow in our rocky soil.” 

            As she speaks, Miss Micklewhite stops from time to time so Stefan can relay the story to Tom.  “If you have been down to the sea, you have seen how jagged our coastline is.  There are rocks strewn offshore that are hidden at high tide, very dangerous to ships passing by.  And there are many coves and stream outlets ideal for hiding contraband.

            “In the late 1790s, a farmer and his wife lived here in the Manor.  Their name was Braithewaite.  John Braithewaite struggled hard to make ends meet.  Finally, he took to wrecking.  Now the regular wreckers were folks who took goods from the cargoes of ships that had smashed up on the rocks.  But there were also wreckers who put out false lights to lure ships to their destruction.  John Braithewaite joined up with some of these unscrupulous men.

            “Now Braithewaite had a son named George.  George worked the farm with his father.  He had a wife, and a little girl named Margaret. George discovered his father’s nefarious business.  He was so unhappy about it that he moved away to live with relatives in Somerset.”  At the mention of the ghost’s name, Teresa shivers.  She is no stranger to apparitions, yet still she can feel the hairs rise on the back of her neck.

            “George Braithewaite adored his little daughter, and she loved him dearly.  Later, George and his family went to live in Ireland.  Unfortunately, George did not fare well in Ireland.  When Margaret was in her early teens, George had news that his father had died, and he left his family in Ireland and moved back to the Manor House.  Being short of funds, he took up wrecking like his father. 

            “Margaret grew up and married an Irishman. Some years passed and Margaret longed to see her father again.  She took her youngest son, a babe of nine months, and boarded a ship for England.  Perhaps Margaret meant to surprise her father, or perhaps her letter went astray.  In any case, she was aboard the ship that her father, George, and his fellow wreckers lured onto the rocks with their false lights.

            “It was a moonless night, and the rain poured down.  The wreckers stripped the ship, hid the goods in caves.  One of the wreckers found a young woman among the rocks on the shore.  Her face was swollen and bruised from the tossing she had received.  The wrecker called George over and they divided her jewelry between them.  But then the woman moaned, and they realized she was still alive.  Thinking of asking a fine ransom, they piled her on to George’s cart with the barrels and boxes.  At the Manor House, they laid her out upon a bed in an upstairs room.  She died before morning. 

            “The following day, George was shown a list of the passengers on the ship.  He realized then that the young woman was Margaret, his daughter.  His grandson had also perished in the wreck, but his body was never found.  George was horrified and distraught with guilt and shame.  He blocked up the room with Margaret’s body still inside, sealing it off with bricks.  The window to the room was blocked up as well.”

            Miss Micklewhite gestures toward the closed door on their left.  “Please follow me into that room.”  She steps over to the door and opens it with a flourish.