The Fate of Mercy Alban Page 9

  I was about to ask Carter to offer her a ride to the door—peculiar though she was, it was raining heavily—but before I could get the words out he veered around her and sped the rest of the way so aggressively that I thought he might hit the building’s stone foundation. He jerked to a stop and hurried out of the car, unfurling an umbrella as he did so.

  Opening the back door, he leaned in to us and said: “Ladies?” He was smiling but his eyes had a hint of fear behind them, and I noticed beads of perspiration on his brow.

  I looked out the rear window at the woman, who had been joined under her umbrella by a young man, who was leading her away. I turned back to Carter. “Is everything okay?”

  “Fine, miss. Fine.”

  Reverend Parker stood to welcome us at the church door. In the midst of that storm, he seemed to me to be an oasis of serenity, smiling that warm smile, his blue eyes shining. Upon seeing him, all the tension I had felt during the morning pooled onto the ground in front of me and I stepped over it, just like one of so many puddles.

  He held out his hands and I slid mine into his.

  “I’m going to get you through this day, Grace,” he said. “I’ll be right here, next to you, with the widest shoulder you’ve ever seen. You are not doing this alone. I’m asking you to do me the favor of leaning on me.”

  I managed a smile.

  We had timed our arrival so that most of the people coming to the funeral would have been seated before us. Avoiding the throng, that was the goal. I saw that the parking lot was full and cars were snaking out onto the side streets. Fleets of official-looking limos lined one side of the lot—the vehicles of the governor, senators, and various congressmen. Satellite-laden vans from the three local news stations stood just past the limos. Adele Alban’s funeral would be the lead story on tonight’s news. I had asked reporters to stay away from the reception following the service—I had no wish for my grief to be on display—but there wasn’t anything preventing them from filming here in the parking lot. It was a public place, after all. Cameramen and dark-suited reporters with microphones had jumped from the vans as we arrived, but I knew the rain would hamper their ability to get a clear shot. Good, I thought. Still, they called out to me.

  “Grace! What’s it like to be home after all this time?”

  “Any comment about your mother, Miss Alban?”

  “Amity! Over here!”

  I ignored them and turned to the minister. “Is everyone in place?” I asked.

  “They are,” he said, scowling across the lot at the newscasters. “The beginning hymns have started, so you’re right on time. When you’re ready, the three of us will walk up the aisle together. You’ll take your seats in the front pew, I’ll go up to the pulpit, and we’ll get this started. Then, after the service is over, I’ll lead you back down the aisle. Your driver will be waiting right here to take you back to the house so you don’t get caught in a line of well-wishers.”

  “Got it,” I said.

  “Grace! What’s it like—”

  We stepped inside, leaving the reporters and their questions behind. As we stood in the vestibule, I pushed that same stray curl from Amity’s forehead, my palm lingering on her cheek. I saw that the church was packed, every seat filled, with even more people spilling out into the side aisles and standing in the back.

  “Are you ready, honey?” I asked my daughter. She looked into my eyes and nodded. I put my arm around her shoulders and we followed Reverend Parker up the center aisle as every head turned to see the last two surviving Albans.

  CHAPTER 12

  I sang the hymns, listened to the readings, cried at the eulogies delivered by the governor, the mayor, and an old friend of my mother’s, and was utterly grateful I had decided not to get up and speak myself. I knew I’d never be able to get the words out. I felt as though I were seeing it all from a distance, that I wasn’t really sitting there, that I was removed somehow. Before I quite knew what was happening, Reverend Parker was standing at the side of our pew. Oh, I thought. It’s over? It’s time to go?

  As I stood up and turned around, I glanced at the people sitting in the pews behind us. Their features seemed hazy and distorted, as if I were outside peering in at all of them through an old and weathered pane of glass. As we walked down the aisle, I could see a second set of mourners overlapping the first: wispy, spectral figures dressed in black. Long dresses, high collars, top hats. They were nodding at me, smiling sad smiles, holding out their hands toward me. I gasped and clutched at Matthew’s arm to keep from stumbling when I recognized the faces of my ancestors—John James Alban, his wife, Emmaline, his children, and others, all there to pay their respects to my mother. I stopped and looked around wildly—Jake? Jimmy? Dad? Where were they? They had to be here!

  “Grace?” Matthew’s soft voice brought me back to reality.

  I shook my head and looked around me—there were no ghostly mourners after all. No dead ancestors. Only a church filled with people staring at me. It must have been some sort of hallucination brought on by the history of this place, each stone, each pew, each stained-glass window steeped in the lives and deaths of my family. I held Matthew’s gaze and nodded—I’m okay now, really—and started down the aisle once again. I wanted nothing more than to get out of this church and into the light of day.

  Back at the house, I rushed up to bathroom of the master suite and splashed water on my face. I’d have to reapply my makeup, but I didn’t care. I just wanted to feel something cold and wet and real.

  “Mom?”

  I snapped my head around to find Amity hovering in the bathroom doorway. I hadn’t known she had followed me upstairs. “Are you okay?” she asked.

  I blotted my face dry with a fluffy towel and smiled at her. “I’m fine, sweetie,” I said, trying to quiet my racing heart. “It’s just—I’m sorry. It was hard getting through the service, but everything’s fine now.”

  Amity put her arms around me and held me tight. “I don’t want to go back downstairs to the reception,” she said. “Do I have to?”

  I stroked her hair the way I used to when she was a child and needed comforting. “People are expecting to see you, honey,” I said. “They want to pay their respects. The governor is coming. So are our two senators. And the mayor. The chief of police. So many others.”

  She pulled back and leaned against the doorframe. “I don’t care,” she said, sighing. “They’re just a bunch of strangers.”

  I didn’t blame her for that. Truth be told, I felt the same way.

  “Listen, I’ll make you a deal,” I said as I fished my foundation out of my travel kit, squeezed a bit onto my fingertips, and began smoothing it over my face. “We’ll wait up here until most everyone has arrived, and then we’ll walk down the stairs together. I’m going to ask you to stick around for a half hour. Make an appearance. Let people pay their respects to you. Eat something if you want. And then if you’d like to slink off and come back up here or go outside if it ever stops raining, fine. Maybe you can find Cody and watch a movie or something with him.”

  Then another thought occurred to me. “Just let me know what you’re doing, where you’ll be,” I went on. “I don’t want to lose track of you today. Okay?”

  She considered this as I stared into the mirror and rubbed some cream blush onto my cheeks. “Okay,” she agreed. “I saw Heather and her parents in the church, so maybe they’ll be here.”

  “Heather? Is she the girl you met when you were here last summer?”

  Amity nodded. “Grandma signed me up for tennis lessons. Heather was on my team.”

  “Well, good,” I said, silently hoping Amity would cement a friendship with this girl. If I was going to seriously consider moving back to Alban House, it would be nice if my daughter had a friend waiting for her in this town.

  I peered out the window and saw row upon row of cars lining the parking lot where the ticket booth stood. The house was filling up. I smiled when I saw Matthew’s old green Volvo parked next to a s
parkling new Mercedes.

  Staring at my reflection in the mirror, I said: “How do I look?”

  “As good as can be expected for an old lady,” Amity teased, smiling at me in the mirror.

  I put my arm around her shoulders and took a deep breath. “I guess now’s as good a time as any to head downstairs. The sooner we start, the sooner we’ll be finished.”

  And we walked down the long hallway, listening to the amalgam of voices wafting up from the living room below, and descended the grand staircase into the fray.

  I steered Amity through the sea of faces, stopping to speak with this one and that one, accepting sympathies and sad smiles. The caterers had laid a spread of hors d’oeuvres on the dining room table; several bottles of wine were open on the sideboard. Servers in black-and-white uniforms were circulating throughout the rooms, refilling glasses, scooping up used plates and silverware, offering trays of canapés and cheese and finger sandwiches to the attendees.

  Flowers were everywhere, orchids and lilies and complicated arrangements of pink and white and lavender blooms. An enormous bouquet of fiery-colored tulips, red and orange and yellow, stood in the center of the dining room table. Next to sunflowers, tulips were my mother’s favorite flower. Fires were burning in the living room, dining room, library, and parlor; candles flickered on the tabletops. Everything seemed to be humming along as it should.

  I saw the governor and the two senators huddled with their heads together in the parlor. The image made me smile, knowing how many political campaigns were forged and funded in that very room.

  As I mingled, I noticed a couple of uniformed officers standing at the bottom of the grand staircase, where a velvet rope had been draped across the stairs after Amity and I had descended. Apparently Jane had positioned them there to prevent any curious guests from venturing up to the second and third floors. That hadn’t occurred to me, but I was glad she thought of it. I wondered, not for the first time, what sort of pandemonium would overtake us if not for her steadfast presence in this house.

  I spied Reverend Parker across the room talking to a group of ladies from the church and made a beeline for him through the crowd, smiling and patting people on the back as I went. He excused himself from the brood of hens and steered me toward the sideboard, pouring a glass of wine for both of us.

  “I’d like to say the service was lovely, but truthfully it was a blur,” I said, taking a sip of wine.

  “Understandable,” he said. “Are you getting through this okay?”

  “I am.” I exhaled, seemingly for the first time that day. We chatted for a few moments about nothing in particular until the mayor pulled me away, wanting to pay her respects.

  And so the afternoon went on. More hugs and reminiscences, more condolences and well wishes, each of them melting into the others until I couldn’t distinguish between them. I would never remember anyone’s name or whose story about my mother was whose. But the one thing I did take away from the reception was the knowledge that my mother was well and truly loved and respected by the people of this town, and for that I was grateful. As much as I hadn’t wanted to come downstairs after the funeral and face this crowd, I was glad that I had.

  As the reception was winding down and the throng was thinning out, I caught sight of Amity across the room. She was talking to a woman whose back was to me, and I saw one of her arthritic hands clamped around Amity’s upper arm. I locked eyes with my daughter and saw a look of panic, a pleading sort of expression that I had never before seen on her face.

  She opened her eyes wide and mouthed: “Mom!” I excused myself from whomever I was talking to and hurried across the room toward her, but before I could get there, the woman turned around to face me. It was the same woman we had nearly run down on our way to the church, bright red lipstick, heavily made-up eyes, and all.

  “What a lovely party, isn’t it, Adele?” she said to me, smoothing the front of her black dress, which I saw was worn and threadbare in spots. “Will we be playing croquet later? You know how I love croquet.”

  Adele? This woman thought I was my mother? I held out my hand to Amity and she slipped away from her and in behind me.

  “Hello,” I said slowly. “I’m Grace Alban.”

  “Grace Alban?” The woman’s ashen face cracked into a wide smile. “But there’s no such person! Unless you’re some long-lost cousin I didn’t know about. People are always coming out of the woodwork here at Alban House. Out of the woodwork!” She winked at me.

  I was at a loss. I saw Matthew crossing the room toward me—bless him, coming to the rescue again—and I also saw the uniformed officers move closer.

  “I’m the Reverend Matthew Parker,” he said to the woman, moving slowly toward her as though she were a wild animal he was trying to snare. “May I get you some punch?”

  She dropped her chin and batted her obviously false eyelashes at him. “Punch? How lovely, Reverend. I adore punch!”

  He held out an arm to her and she slipped hers through his. “My, aren’t you handsome!” she chattered away. “Adele always has the most handsome men around her. Don’t you, Adele? The most handsome men.”

  I thought I detected a faraway fire behind her cloudy, weepy eyes. Matthew began to lead her away when Jane appeared in the room carrying a tray of wineglasses.

  “Jane, will you bring us some punch?” the woman called to her, waving her arm in a wide arc. “I’m in the mood for punch, Jane. And then we’re going to play croquet.”

  Jane took one look at her and cried out as the tray she was carrying clattered to the ground, glasses shattering everywhere. A stunned silence fell over the room.

  “My goodness, Jane, whatever has come over you?” the woman wanted to know. “You’re looking at me like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  CHAPTER 13

  As the servers scurried into the room with mops, brooms, and dustpans to clean up the tray of glasses Jane had dropped, a man whom I had never seen before—midfifties, tall, wearing a black suit—slipped into the room and held out his hand to the woman.

  “Now, now,” he cooed. “Didn’t I tell you to stay in the wing chair in the parlor until I could talk to our hostess?”

  The woman huffed and pouted. “I didn’t want to stay in the wing chair. I wanted to find Adele.” Then, looking to me, her eyes brightened and she said: “Let’s go upstairs and change out of these ridiculous black clothes. This party is dreadfully dull, don’t you think? Maybe we could go for a swim!”

  Jane had regained her composure and was helping guests with their coats and umbrellas, trying, it seemed, to usher the stragglers who remained at the reception out the door. I agreed with her. Everybody out. As she held the door, I saw that her face was gray and lifeless, a mask of confusion and questions.

  A chill ran through me as I looked from the obviously old woman to her younger companion, who stood ramrod straight, chin jutted out, a slight smile on his face. Cockiness, that’s what he projected. I shot a glance toward the officers, who were slowly approaching.

  “I’m Grace Alban,” I said to the man. “And you are …”

  He held out his hand to me. I hesitated a moment before crossing my arms over my chest.

  “I’m Harris Peters,” he said, smiling broadly. But there was no warmth in his smile or behind his steel-gray eyes. “I’m here to pay my respects. I had an appointment to meet your mother the day she died.”

  “You’re the journalist.” I narrowed my eyes at him.

  “That’s right,” he said, brushing a bit of lint from his lapel. “I’m writing a book about your family. I was so looking forward to meeting your mother.”

  “I specifically didn’t invite any journalists to this reception, Mr. Peters,” I told him. “I didn’t want the press intruding on our grief today. So I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

  “I thought you might say something like that,” he said, still smiling that broad smile. “So I brought along a guest. I think she’ll change your mind ab
out my being here.” He gestured toward the woman, who was now batting her eyelashes at him.

  “Miss Alban,” he said to her. “Isn’t it lovely to be back home?”

  “Miss Alban?” I furrowed my brow. “There is no Miss Alban other than myself.”

  “Yourself?” The woman laughed, a gurgling, throaty sound. “Adele, have you gone mad? You’re no Alban, although you’re certainly around here enough to be part of the family.” She smiled up at Matthew and sniffed, “Herself. Who does she think she is, claiming to be an Alban?”

  Harris crossed the room and put his arm around the woman’s shoulder, leading her slowly away from Matthew. A proprietary gesture. “Of course she’s a little confused,” he said to me in a stage whisper. “Being in an institution for fifty years will do that to a person.”

  Time slowed to a crawl, groaned, and stopped. I looked around to the fire crackling in the fireplace, the candles burning low on the table. I noticed the hors d’oeuvres were nearly gone; several wine bottles were emptied. The heavy, deep red curtains in the parlor swayed ever so slightly, as if they were being blown by an unseen breeze. I could hear the rain still pounding away outside, and I smelled the particular spicy scent of my mother’s perfume. And then, overpowering that, the fresh aroma of lake water that had accompanied my father’s visit a few days earlier.

  I locked eyes with Jane and there was something about her expression that told me, in that instant, who this woman was. I took a few steps toward her and held out my hands.

  “You’re Fate Alban, isn’t that right?” I said to her. “I’m Grace, Adele and Johnny’s daughter.”