Necessary Evil (29 page)

The corner of the room with Uncle
Michael’s old chair seemed to have been devoted to code-breaking, for it was
piled high with old hymnals, devotionals, copies from Mary’s old diary and
Alexander’s letters, well-covered with Gregory’s penciled notes.

There were more books than I remembered
Uncle Michael having, and I wondered how many Gregory had brought into the
house. I loaded them onto the nearby shelves, double-stacking them in some
places.

With the books out of the way, I went to
work on the paper. I couldn’t help but start reading snatches from the letters
as I cleaned, reading until eventually I was sitting on the floor, paging
through their correspondence. I noticed how similarly Mary Chase and Alexander wrote
– they worried the same way, thought the same way, and expressed their concerns
with rich detail. The pages that Randall had copied out of her diary were
filled with concern about her only son and her loneliness, while Alexander
wrote about the war and the country and his growing discontent. It was touching
to see how they cared for each other.

Know that my thoughts are with you, my
best friend on this earth,
Alexander wrote to his mother.

(Alexander) misses his books, though he
will not say so. I am arranging to send him a parcel with a few volumes in it,
including a new copy of the little prayer book that has brought me so much
comfort – God willing, it will reach him without damage,
Mary had written
in her diary about a month before. She then went on to lament how hard it was
to get good books in her area, a further indication of her willingness to go
without for her son’s sake.

Sitting on the office floor, surrounded by
the remnants of their relationship, I felt their bond almost as strongly as if
they had been in the room with me. I couldn’t help but wonder about Mary Anna
McInnis, and the conclusions that Gregory was coming to. But how could a man
who worried so about the youth in his regiment steal from a woman he was
leading on? How could he, who seemed to understand his mother’s isolation so
well, take advantage of a spinster like Mary Anna? I was convinced that he
couldn’t. Gregory had to be wrong. But, if Alexander hadn’t been romancing her,
then how did Mary Anna McInnis fit into this story?

“This is impossible,” I grumbled, looking
down at the copies spread across my legs. With a frustrated sigh, I got up and
began, again, to collect the scattered pages.

How can we solve a case that’s been dead
for a century and a half? How can we ever understand what was going on in the
heads of people who wouldn’t write it down? It’s impossible. This whole thing
is just too-

Suddenly, my mind wrenched itself from its
spiraling pattern. I had just placed an enlarged copy of Alexander’s last
letter on top of the pile, when my eyes fell upon a sentence that I knew by
heart, but had never actually noticed before:

…I al-

So wish to thank you for your kind words
of

Blessing – they are dew-drops to my soul…

Dew-drops…

I’d wondered before why the words were hyphenated,
but today it jumped out at me, almost as violently as the emphasized lettering
had jumped out on me the other night.

The papers fell from my hands. I nearly
slipped on them in my haste to get to the bookcase, frantically scanning it for
the book I placed there only moments ago. It was still there, the worn cover
bearing the remains of a gilt pattern, a tiny volume that my uncle had bought
on a whim at an antiquarian book fair years ago. Its faded orange binding was
pulling away from the pages and there were only traces of the gold that once
adorned the page edges. It was an elegant, but practical book with a Bible
verse for every day, and it was obvious that my copy had been well used by one
of its owners. Despite its wear, the print was crisp and clean and the title
page was as bold as ever:

Dew-Drops.

My speech shall distill as the dew. Deut.
32:2

Published by the American Tract Society,
150 Nassau Street,
NEW YORK
.

I held it in my shaking hand. This had to be
it. This book had to contain the key word that Alexander was trying to convey
to his mother.

Gregory.

I needed to call him. I had to let him
know what I’d just found.

I dashed for my desk, looking for my
phone. It wasn’t on top, so I cast about, rummaging through his desk, the
shelves, the piles of books, and even under the rocking chair. It wasn’t until
I sat down on the chair that I realized my phone was where I always left it –
in my back pocket.

I pulled up his contact information and
was about to call when the doorbell rang suddenly – almost causing me to drop
the phone.

No, not now!

I was on the cusp of a great discovery,
about to solve a mystery that had tormented my family for generations. The last
thing I wanted was an interruption.

But curiosity is a powerful influence. No
one I knew ever rang the front door, and ignoring it might mean losing a new
client. Reluctant as I was to leave the office, I locked
Dew-Drops
in my
desk drawer, and shut the office door behind me.

The bell rang again and I grit my teeth.
No matter who it was or what they wanted, I was determined to rid myself of
them quickly so I could call Gregory and get started on the cipher. I imagined
the look on his face when I told him what I’d discovered.

“Darn it!”

I wrenched the door open, fully intending
to send the visitor packing. But when I saw who it was, I froze.

“Hello, Maddie.”

Joe Tremonti leaned against the door jam,
his phone in his hand, and his BMW convertible just visible in the driveway
over his shoulder. He was dressed in immaculate casual wear: jeans, rugged
shoes,
a
polo shirt that strained to contain his
shoulders, and cologne that wrapped around my senses and held them hostage. He
was just inches from me, looming so large that there seemed to be nothing else in
the world but him.

I gasped, gripping the door tightly,
fighting the feeling of unreality. He couldn’t be here. Not now.

“Joe! You’re here. But – you’re in
California!”

Thank God Gregory is in Charleston
.

Joe smiled at me, an assault that sent my
brain reeling. The effect doubled when he stepped closer.

“So I was,” he said. Then he bent down to
whisper in my ear, “Let’s just say I decided there was more fun to be had back
here.”

His lips were so close I could feel the
warmth of his breath on my cheek, and it sent waves of fire through my system,
burning away whatever vestige of interest in codes and ciphers that might have
remained. I was completely taken.

When he kissed my cheek and murmured, “I
couldn’t stop thinking of you, Maddie, and your offer of a ride… Today a good
day?” it was all I could do not to throw myself in his arms and give him
whatever he wanted and more.  

My memories of that afternoon have an
ethereal quality to them.

I don’t remember if it was Joe who
suggested we start with a ride around the property or if it was me, but that’s
what we wound up doing. I had the dubious pleasure of re-introducing Joe to
Aunt Susanna, whose frosty exterior was quite at odds with her normal demeanor.

“What brings you to Chase Farm?” she
asked, after the normal pleasantries were exchanged. She was alone in the
stables. Lindsay was out back, watching Jacob lead the girls in a run around
the paddock. Aunt Susanna’s eyes ran up and down Joe, but she showed nothing
but a casual disinterest.

I didn’t know how tense I was until Joe
wrapped his arm around my shoulder and tugged me into a one-armed hug.

“Oh, several reasons,” he said. “Some of
them… Sentimental.”

My heart did a little backflip, but Aunt Susanna
was not impressed. She leveled a cold stare at me, which I had to brush off.
This was not the time to discuss my choice in men.

I helped Joe select a horse and tack and
met Aunt Susanna again when I went back into the barn for my helmet. She hobbled
up behind me and tapped me with her cane.

“What is
he
doing here?” she asked,
in a whisper that nearly echoed in the empty room.

I shrugged, trying to push away my own
concerns. “He said he wanted to ride. I told him to stop by whenever. Is there
something wrong with that?”

“We’re in the middle of an investigation,”
she protested. “We’re hardly in the position to entertain guests. I thought you
said that he was in California.”

“He was, but now he’s back. And the
investigation is stalled until Randall gets back,” I said, faltering at the
name. Somehow, it was difficult to mention Gregory in the same breathe as Joe.
“Besides, don’t you think I’ve earned an afternoon off?”

I brushed past her to join Joe outside. I
found him surrounded by admiring little girls, while being watched by a
confused Jacob and a bemused Lindsay. When I introduced Joe as my friend, one
of the smaller girls asked if he was my boyfriend.

Joe answered the girl, looking at me with
a twinkle in his eye.

“I’d say that was up to the lady,” he
grinned.

The girl was confused, but thankfully
Colleen was on hand to stop her from asking what had happened to my
other
boyfriend.
Lindsay and Jacob herded them back into the stables, allowing Joe and me to
ride off without further explanation.

It was a glorious ride. Joe wanted to see
everything, to refresh his memory of the old days, and his memory was sharp. He
took the lead, and we went everywhere - down the old trails, across the old
fields, and dismounted to walk alongside the narrow river that bordered part of
the property.

I was tongue-tied, but Joe was witty and
charming, maintaining a steady stream of conversation that had me laughing and
blushing the whole time. We walked and rode and wandered and I remember
thinking,
This
must be a dream.

But like any dream, reality tugged at the
edges of it. When Joe asked about the hole-digging and the encounter in the
woods, I left out Gregory’s part in it. When Joe asked how I was holding up, I
didn’t tell him that I was doing much better, now that I had help. I just told
him that I was managing.

He was obviously worried, but he let it go
and spoke instead about his trip to California, about how uninteresting it now
seemed to him, and how glad he was to be back on the East Coast. He talked
about the kind of place he wanted to settle in and write, because he had
decided that he wanted to devote less of his time to academic politics and more
time to writing.

“I need a retreat to work in,” he said.
“You know, some place quiet and calm, peaceful but with a history. Kind of like
what you have here.”

I laughed. “With everything that’s been
going on around here, you could hardly consider Chase Farm a peaceful retreat.”

He regarded me sympathetically. “It’s been
bad, has it?”

We
were on our way back home at this point. It had been a long and full afternoon
and our mounts were hungry, tired, and ready for the stables. I was buoyant,
feeling both satisfied and eager to see what was going to happen next, but not
so much so that I was unable to feel hungry. I was going to invite him to have
dinner with Aunt Susanna and me, hoping to avoid answering his question, but
Joe had drawn up and was waiting for my answer.

I
drew up, too, patting my mount as she impatiently whickered at me.

“It’s
getting better,” I said cautiously. “There hasn’t been any activity since the
incident in the woods.”

He
shook his head impatiently and looked around, as though looking for someone.

“I
just can’t believe their blatant disregard for you and the farm,” he said.
“It’s unbelievable! I thought when that Beaumont letter came out that it would
take care of everything. We talked about that and it should have worked. What
did we get wrong?”

I
could have told him, but I didn’t, of course. He’d asked about Gregory, still
thinking that he was a harmless romance writer, and I’d told him that he was
away on a research trip, which was the truth. But it had made me uncomfortable
nonetheless. Gregory was a specter that lurked on the edges of the entire
afternoon, despite my best efforts to banish him. I wasn’t about to bring him
up now.

“Some
people,” I said, “just don’t want to let go of the dream of treasure. They
insist that there’s something out there, however unbelievable it is.”

He
nodded and sighed heavily. He believed me. But then, he had to. There was too
much risk in believing the treasure story and we both knew it.

“People
will believe the strangest things,” he said. “I just hope that this is the last
time we’ll have to deal with them. I’m worried about you, Maddie. I’m worried
about your safety. If anything ever happened to you… Or to your aunt…”

A
cold chill made me shiver. The usually gentle woods once again assumed a
sinister look and the gathering dusk turned ominous. I found myself wishing I
was safe inside the stables or in the farmhouse.

But
when he turned back to me, his grin had returned and the somber moment was
broken.

“How
about inviting me to dinner?” he asked.

There
was nothing I’d like better; but in spite of all the potential, dinner wasn’t
the success I was hoping for. Lindsay and Jacob had gone home and Darlene had
an engagement - so it was just Aunt Susanna, Joe, and myself around a plate of
store-bought lasagna and a salad that Joe and I put together. I even found a
bottle of wine in the pantry that Joe declared was just barely drinkable, and
we buried it in a bucket of ice until Aunt Susanna emerged from her room.

At
first, she seemed ill-disposed to talk. She sat with a preoccupied expression
on her face, pushing her noodles around on her plate and refusing the offered
glass of wine. I felt awkward - but if Joe did, he didn’t show it. He
effortlessly split his conversation between me and my aunt, until even she
couldn’t withstand his charm and began to soften.

We
were nearly finished when Joe asked Aunt Susanna about how she was holding up
against the trespassers.

“We’re
holding our own,” she said cautiously. “Of course, we’re going to beat them to
it.”

Joe
looked blank. “Beat them to what?” he asked.

“To
the treasure,” Aunt Susanna said promptly, before I could stop her.

Joe
asked, “So you believe there is one?”

Aunt
Susanna opened her mouth, then looked at me in fright. In her effort to shield
Gregory’s work, she had forgotten that the forged Beaumont letter was not
common knowledge yet. Now she fumbled to cover.

“My
husband thought so,” she said simply and to our relief, Joe accepted that
explanation.

I
suggested that we were ready for coffee and dessert. Joe helped clear the
dishes while Aunt Susanna made coffee, and I daydreamed about making this a
permanent arrangement.

It
was after I set out cookies for dessert and was dreamily stirring milk into my
coffee that Joe dropped the bomb on us.

“I
was asking because I heard that someone else might come around here inquiring
about it,” he said, settling back into his chair and accepting the coffee Aunt
Susanna offered him. “I don’t suppose you’ve heard of a man named Gregory
Randall, have you?”

Aunt
Susanna nearly lost hold of her own mug and glanced at me in a panic, but Joe
wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were focused on me.

For
some strange reason, I was calm. It was as though every emotion had abandoned
me. I was being tested. I’d already resolved that Gregory Randall was not going
to be exposed - not yet, not even to Joseph Tremonti. Not until I was ready.

“Randall?”
I said, leaning forward to take a cookie that I had no interest in eating.
“Sounds familiar. Should I know him?”

I
feared that I sounded too disinterested, but Joe released my gaze and continued.

“He’s
known in some circles. He’s a historian, used to have quite a good reputation.
But that was a while ago, back when he showed some talent.”

Aunt
Susanna’s lips tightened noticeably, but she didn’t respond.

I
wondered at Joe’s tone. He sounded positively disdainful and a dreadful thought
washed over me: that gap in Gregory’s history. I hadn’t yet found out what
caused it.

Stay
the course, Maddie…

“Oh?”
I said, my curiosity pushing me beyond where I should go. “Sounds like there’s
a story there.”

He
shook his head, grinning, and Aunt Susanna said, “Why did you bring him up? Do
you expect him to cause trouble or something?”

Joe
looked up at her in surprise. “More trouble than you’ve already experienced?”
he asked, and she did a double take. “I’m sorry, that was crass. No, it’s just
I heard that he’d been asking around about the Chase letter… And the Beaumont
one.”

This
time it was I who was startled, but I recovered before Joe returned to me.

“I
wondered if he’d contacted you at all?” he asked. His eyes, now a shade of
metallic green, caught and held mine. His mouth curved into a slow smile.

In
the corner of my eye, I saw Aunt Susanna gaping at me. She expected me to
follow my usual practice, of course, and confess all. Joe’s penetrating gaze
and the Hollywood good looks usually had that effect on me.

I
looked deep into his gold-flecked eyes, leaning forward until his cologne
washed over me again.

I
lied without blinking.

“No,”
I said. “I haven’t heard from anyone like that.”

                                  
                       ***

After
that, the conversation became warm, comfortable, and lively, with even Aunt
Susanna joining in. Much, much later, I walked Joe out to his car.

It
was a brilliant night, warm and just humid enough that the air felt as though
it was a blanket embracing my shoulders. The sky was a velvet arc studded with
diamonds, and the moon was the polished silver centerpiece. Tree frogs and
crickets chorused loudly, reminding me that for all the darkness, there was
life.

We
walked out together in silence, and Joe reached out to take my hand as we
strolled. I was thrilled at his touch, and I found myself wishing that I didn’t
have to let go. His hand was so strong and his presence so stable while my life
was so shaky, filled with shadows and ambiguity. I wished to be part of his
safe and strong world; yet it wasn’t something that could be asked for. I
needed to be invited.

When
we reached the car, Joe turned to me and took my other hand, pulling me close.
I lifted my face to his.

“Thanks
for today,” he said in his husky voice. “I needed this.”

“Me,
too,” I smiled, then, “I missed you while you were away.”

His
grinned widened. “Why do you think I came back so early?”

My
heart began to pound. I was so wrapped in a tormented dream-state that I didn’t
expect what he said next.

“Maddie,”
he said, his voice as softly caressing as his touch. “Randall’s here, isn’t
he?”

It
hit me like a siren, shocking me into reality.

“What?”
I stammered.

His
smile was warm, his eyes roaming about my face without a hint of disappointment
in them.

“Gregory
Randall has been here, hasn’t he?”

When
I stared at him, flabbergasted, he nodded knowingly and even laughed. “Oh,
Maddie. You just aren’t any good at lying, you know that?”

I
very nearly pulled my hand out of his grasp, but I didn’t. Alarmed as I was,
there was no doubt that he knew and no point in denying it any more.

“How
did you know?” I asked.