“She slipped.” CeCe heard the rushing of water in her ears, and pushed the thought away.
“CeCe, you nearly drowned,” he said. “Dad said they had to put your mother in a hospital for a while.”
“That was unfair.”
“The doctors said—”
“Stop,” CeCe nearly shouted. The families at the other tables were looking over at them now, and the teacher on duty, Mrs. Wentworth, was looking concerned. “The doctors don’t know her.”
She had been six. Her mother had taken her swimming at the beach. She remembered the dark, damp sand between her toes, the slap of cold water. Watching the waves come and go, making the sand look slick as glass as the water receded. She’d touched it over and over, after every wave left, trying to feel the hardness of the sand-glass, watching the water curve around her fingers. Nothing else. She didn’t remember her mother telling her to come into the water. She didn’t remember the sky, or the voices of the other people on the beach, or the sound of seagulls calling, or the water rushing into her mouth. She only remembered touching the smooth sand, then looking up at Mother through the water.
And then someone was shouting, and she’d opened her eyes to see a man with a huge mustache looking into her face. Little girl, are you all right?
Her mother had slipped, holding her in the water. She’d slipped and fallen and pinned CeCe beneath her by accident. But the police came, and though CeCe had no memory after that, just flashes of images here and there—a strange house she’d stayed at that had a puppy, a man who had made finger puppets sing a song and made her laugh—she knew what had happened. Her mother had assured her, years later. It had been an accident.
Her father hadn’t been there; she and her mother had gone to the beach alone. Had he been involved when her mother went into the hospital? Had he had her locked up? She hadn’t known that. It was unfair. Her mother had never had the chance to defend herself. She’d never gone back to work for the Ellesmeres after getting out. She’d gone to Boston and her father had dropped CeCe off at her first boarding school, the one that took younger kids, the one she’d been at before her father had come to get her again to move her to Idlewild.
“Dad was looking out for you,” Joseph said. “He got your mother that job after she got out of the hospital, and he sent you to school. He says that now I’m grown, I have to look out for you, too.”
“My mother looks out for me,” CeCe said numbly.
“Gosh, I’m sorry,” Joseph said. “I didn’t come here to upset you.” He did look rather sorry, his eyes sad and his chin drooping. “I just know things have been hard for you—you know, harder than they are for me. So I wanted to meet you and bring you a present. I wanted to let you know I’m here. If you ever need help, just let me know.”
She blinked hard. She wanted to shout at him, wanted to stomp from the room. If she were Katie, she’d know some profanity she could say, something that would shock him and make him stop feeling sorry for her. No one ever felt sorry for Katie, while everyone always felt sorry for CeCe. She was sick of it.
But she stared at him, and she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t be mean. He’d tried to be nice to her, and he’d spent quite a bit of money on her radio. So she heard herself say, “Thank you for the present.”
“Okay,” he said. “Can I visit you again?”
She said yes, and he shook her hand and left. She took the radio back to her room and slid it under her mattress in its box, thinking she would forget about it, that she would never listen to it. I don’t need his stupid radio, she thought. But late that night, when all the girls were in their nightgowns and lying in bed, she rolled over and looked down at Katie on the bunk below her. “I got a present today,” she said, unable to help herself. Unable to stop herself from trying to please Katie, with her pretty black hair and mischievous tilted eyes.
Katie yawned, as if presents were old news. “What is it?”
“A radio.”
“That’s a lie,” Katie said immediately.
“It isn’t,” CeCe said. She was smiling now. Maybe the radio would be useful after all. “My half brother came to Family Visit Day and brought it for me. He bought it. He has money.”
“If you had a radio,” Roberta said from her bunk across the room, “we’d be able to see it. Radios are big.”
“Not this one.”
Katie was watching her steadily from her witch dark eyes. “Fine, then,” she said. “Show us.”
So CeCe pulled the box out from beneath her mattress and climbed down. She took out the radio, flipped the switch, and rotated the dial, just as Joseph had shown her. “We can listen to music and everything,” she said. “The news. Joseph said there are concerts.”
The other girls got out of bed and huddled around, even Sonia, all four of them in white nightgowns like ghosts. “Keep the volume low,” Roberta whispered, her braid flung over her shoulder. “If Susan Brady hears, she’ll take it.”
They were silent. CeCe turned the dial, and a twist of noise came out of the little box, a spike of unintelligible static. Then there were voices.
“What do you say, Charlie?”
“I don’t say much!”
“That’s not what I said. I say, Charlie, what do you say?”
“What’s that?” Sonia whispered. “A radio show?” The voices drifted away, and CeCe turned the dial again. Violin music rose over the static and wafted tinnily through the room.
“Bach,” Sonia said.
It was the last word they spoke for a long time. As the cold descended and the wind howled outside, they sat cross-legged and rapt, staring at the small square of metal and plastic in the center of their circle, listening. CeCe thought about the world far away, waves through the air moving through the little box and turning into music. About her brother traveling back to Baltimore, her unknown sisters somewhere out there. She did not think about her mother’s arms pushing her under the water. It’s all out there, she thought. If only I could go.
Chapter 15
Barrons, Vermont
November 2014
Fiona arrived at Margaret Eden’s home at Mitchell Place, a gated community of expensive townhomes built during the boom years before the 2008 crash. Even then, the neighborhood’s existence had hinged more on hope than on actual local wealth; there wasn’t much demand for “executive” homes for wealthy professionals in Barrons, and the houses had taken years longer to complete than planned.
Now Mitchell Place was stuck between the wishes of its few remaining residents and the reality of a community with not enough tenants. The homes were well kept, but the security guard at the entrance gate was a cheap rental from a local outfit in a polyester uniform, and the sign on his booth clearly stated that the gate was manned only by camera and alarm systems after seven p.m. The weeds on the grass leading up to the gate were overgrown, and past the wrought iron, Fiona could see the covered remains of a pool, drained and empty this time of year and possibly not reopening come summer.
Margaret Eden’s door, however, was opened by a maid—a white girl in an immaculate uniform, her hair pinned back. Anthony must have called ahead, because the maid let Fiona in. The front hall was marble, its small confines chill and harsh, and Fiona felt like the wayward help as she handed the maid her coat. She rolled up her hat and shoved it into the sleeve of her coat self-consciously before the maid took it away.
She was led into a parlor, also marble. It was empty except for a few pieces of furniture in stark modern style. There was no sign of Margaret Eden, so Fiona circulated through the room, using her journalist’s instincts without thinking. There were no books, no clutter. No personal items lying around. On the mantel over the fireplace was a framed photo of Anthony, much younger, wearing a graduation cap and gown and smiling. There was a second photo, this one of a man with distinguished white hair, obviously Anthony’s father, standing on a golf course.