The Body in the Bonfire (9 page)

“Yes, yes, of course I will. Don't worry.
Please.
I know what you must be going through, but we'll talk tomorrow. Faith just walked in; I'll let her know immediately. Just stay calm. I'm sure everything will be fine. Tomorrow, then. Okay. Good-bye.”

Tom hung up the phone, then turned to Faith, anything but calm himself. His face was agitated, and instead of reaching out to greet her, he ran both hands through his hair, tugging at the roots.

“That was my father. Mother's leaving him!”

“I don't believe it!” Faith echoed the shocked amazement in Tom's voice. Dick and Marian Fairchild heading for Splitsville? Sooner Ozzie and Harriet or the Cleavers or the Waltons or even her own parents—and that would never happen.

“You must have misunderstood what he was saying.” Dick Fairchild, semiretired from Fairchild Realty in Norwell, down on the South Shore, was a man of few words, and those words usually had to do with interest rates and radon detection.

Tom shook his head slowly. “‘Hello, son. Your mother's leaving me. Can you meet me for lunch at the Oyster House tomorrow?' That was about it.” Tom sat down heavily in a spindly Windsor chair left by prior occupants. Faith kept it in the hall corner, next to the table with the phone, lest anyone be tempted to find comfort in it. Now it
was as if Tom couldn't trust his legs to take him as far as the living room, with its soft couch.

Faith pulled him to his feet.

“Come on. Let's sit in the other room.”

“Mom and Dad. I never thought that they'd ever break up.” Tom's shaky voice was a poignant reminder that whether you're four or thirty-four, you want Mommy and Daddy together, for better or worse, and preferably in the house you grew up in. “Do you think I should call Bill and Judy?” These were Tom's brother and sister.

“Not yet.” Faith was firm on this one. “I'd be surprised if Judy didn't know.” Still very much Daddy's little girl, and his favorite. “And Bill, too. But if they don't, then your father has some reason for not telling them. And maybe the reason is that this isn't really happening. If you want to call anyone, call your father back—or your mother.”

It was Tom's turn to protest. “Mom may not know he's told me, and I don't want to add any more fuel to this fire, whatever in blazes it is.” Tom was waxing metaphorical. “And clearly Dad didn't want to talk on the phone. It will have to wait until tomorrow.” He sighed deeply. Tomorrow was a long way away.

The old Union Oyster House was Dick Fairchild's favorite restaurant and had been since college and courting days. It was where Faith had been introduced to Tom's parents, and she reflected that clearly Dick thought of it as a haven,
his turf. And he might also be in the mood for baked scrod.

“No, if anyone calls Mother, you should,” Tom said. “In fact, why don't you go down and have lunch with her while I'm seeing Dad? Take Amy.” He looked so pitiful. Faith envisioned the scene in his mind. Faith and sweet little Amy dressed in one of her granny's smocked creations, standing on the doorstep—maybe carrying a basket of baked goodies. Think of the children, Marian. If not your sons and daughter, then your grandchildren!

“Oh, sweetheart, I'm sorry. I can't. I'm teaching at Mansfield, remember, and I really can't miss the second class.” Besides, she added to herself, I have a lot of work to do. She hadn't been able to search a single room yet. “But why don't you suggest to your father that they come here for the weekend, or at least for Sunday. You know how much they love to hear you preach; then after lunch, we might be able to talk things out. They could stay Sunday night and go to the bonfire at Mansfield. It sounds like fun. The boys sing, drink hot cocoa, and there's skating on the pond.” Faith had stopped by Connie Reed's for particulars after hearing about it from Daryl. The bonfire was just the sort of thing Fairchilds loved—outdoor activity offering minimal comfort.

Tom nodded approvingly. “Better plan—although Dad won't want to miss the Super Bowl. I
don't, either. But the rest of you can go to this bonfire thing. We don't want to make too much of this. Or put Mother on the spot.” He ruminated, then said, “Poor Dad. He sounded totally bewildered. My God, Faith, they've been married almost forty years!”

Faith instantly quelled the little voice inside her head that nagged, Maybe that's the problem. She decided to dwell instead on the English clergyman Sydney Smith's words: “Marriage resembles a pair of shears, so joined that they cannot be separated; often moving in opposite directions, yet always punishing anyone who comes between them.”

 

The room was completely devoid of what Faith had come to call
Eau d'Adolescent Homme
from her brief forays into the Miller boys' rooms and memories of those of male friends during high school and college. Those rooms had smelled like unwashed garments, especially socks, forgotten food of various sorts, and, underlying it all, a powerful whiff of boy funk. There was no boy funk present in Sloane Buxton's room. No man funk, either. The air was clear, with only the faintest suggestion of leather—from an easy chair next to the desk—and the citrus of his aftershave. It was as unnerving as the boy himself.

She got to work quickly. The boys would be finished with chapel soon and arriving for her class downstairs in the kitchen.

He
had
snagged a great room. There was a window seat beneath two large windows that offered a beautiful view of the campus facing the lake, the ice sparkling in the distance. The sun streaked the snow-covered ground with blinding light, but not enough warmth to melt the drifts or the deadly-looking icicles that hung down like medieval daggers from the roof. But she wasn't here for the scenery. She turned resolutely and surveyed Buxton's room.

It wasn't large, but it had a fireplace surrounded by what appeared to be Minton tiles. The school-is-sued furniture had been augmented by the leather chair, an attractive paisley bedspread and matching curtains, several framed prints of English hunting scenes and a Daumier caricature. A small worn but authentic Oriental lay on the floor by his bed. It was really too much. Too Max Beerbohm or Osbert Sitwell. She wasn't sure what she was looking for—rope, scissors and newspapers? A copy of
The Life of John Birch
? An application to Bob Jones University? She scanned the small bookcase. His courses marched along the rows—thick copies of Janson and Brinton for Western Civilization;
Beowulf, Sir Gawain, Macbeth
—for British Lit; a physics text, several math books,
Les Fleurs du Mal
in French—maybe something there. A copy of
Mein Kampf.
She took it out and leafed through it, as she had the others. Portions of the text had been underlined. She would have to ask Daryl if Mansfield used it for any course. There was a well-read copy of
Gatsby.
She
was not surprised. What was surprising was that there weren't any yearbooks. She'd have thought Sloane would have them so that someday he could show junior what a hotshot his old man had been in prep school. Maybe he kept them at home.

In the closet, besides the school blazers—buttons intact—and gray trousers, there were several Brooks Brothers suits and a Ralph Lauren overcoat. His shoes were arranged in neat rows, each with its own wooden shoe tree. She pulled the desk chair over and checked the top shelf. Sweat-pants, sweatshirts, running shoes and not much else. No copies of
Hustler
pushed to the rear.

Sloane's chest of drawers yielded nothing, either, besides the fact that he preferred boxers and his sweaters were cashmere. A silver-backed clothes brush, hairbrush, and comb set were arranged on top. A gift from the 'rents, no doubt, but no Moroccan leather framed photo of Mummy and Daddy. No pictures of anyone. She opened the desk drawers. Paper for his printer, ink cartridges, pens, pencils. A couple of computer manuals the size of Gutenberg Bibles. No scissors, no rope. No letters. The room had a characterless feel to it, or rather, it seemed as if it
did
belong to a character, a character in some play. It was like a stage set.

She lifted the top of the large window seat. Ski boots, gloves, goggles. A hockey stick, tennis racket, skates—and an elaborate traveling bar in a leather case from Mark Cross. Scotch. She shut
the lid and sat down. The computer on his desk was silent, but a tiny orange light glowed. It was on sleep. She got up and hit the return key and the screen came to life. It was as organized as the rest of Sloane's existence. There was a folder for each subject he was taking, and she noted he'd already started keeping the log for her class. Two sentences: “The first class was devoted to the art and manufacture of pancakes, a more versatile food than I had previously imagined. My group added apple slices as the pancakes cooked, and the result was extremely satisfactory.”

What a prig.

There was a folder labeled “Games.” Maybe Sloane was into the slash-and-burn stuff—Duke Nukem, Quake. But no, only a couple of sports games, plus chess. Nothing to indicate an addiction—hours in front of the screen.

She connected to Netscape and opened his E-mail. No new messages. And not too many old ones. There were a number from Winston Freer. Apparently, Sloane had been getting some SAT prep from him. Most of the messages were to arrange meetings and assignments: “Same place, same time,” “Repeat the exercise,” that sort of thing. She was struck with the respectful, almost worshipful tone of Sloane's messages to his professor, and it was clear that Freer also thought well of his student. Winston Freer had struck Faith as a keen—rapier-sharp—judge of his fellow human beings. He'd certainly been on the
mark about Zoë Harcourt. Maybe there was something she was missing about Sloane. She continued to search his E-mail. Well, well, well. Maybe the boy wasn't such a prig after all. The majority of his correspondence was with someone named Heather at Miss Porter's. Very hot and heavy, with extremely satisfactory results apparently. It turned out he
did
have some photographs. Faith put the computer back on sleep and made a thorough search of what was left, looking under and in the bed, lifting the chair cushion, feeling in the cracks—zilch. There was a wastebasket next to his desk. Carefully, she smoothed out the pieces of paper that had been balled up and tossed into it. There were sheets with columns of numbers and some graphs. Apparently math class efforts, exam review. She scrunched them up and put them back. The last piece of paper was more interesting: a copy of the notice posted about the theft that every boy was to have received. Obviously, Sloane wasn't putting his in his scrapbook. And if he had one, Faith had failed to turn it up so far. She studied the sheet intently. She hadn't seen one yet. Zoë had indeed had some treasures, and Faith was willing to bet that it was their value on the open market and not sentimental, real or no, that was behind the woman's emotional outburst in the chapel. What was pictured was worth a king's—or rather, a czar's—ransom.

There were four items on the glossy colored
Xerox. One was an enameled snuffbox with an oval portrait of a Russian gentleman—Nicholas?—in the middle of the lid. The next was the famous pillbox of grandmother fame—small, but its ivory enamel was decorated with gold filigree and what appeared to be an emerald in the center. And there was a Fabergé, or school of Fabergé, egg. It wasn't one of the imperial eggs, yet it was very, very nice. Canary yellow, with thin gold bands studded with diamonds. The photo of its interior revealed a deep blue star-filled sky.

The descriptions were simple—color, size, not materials. Faith was sure the Harcourts didn't want the boys, particularly the guilty one or ones, to know just how valuable the objects were. The piece that caught Faith's eye was a lady's compact, a powder case, so-called. It was enameled in deep emerald green and the top was covered with a lacy web of diamonds, dripping with tiny drops of bejeweled dew. There was no sign of the spider, the arachnid that had created this artifice of nature. She skimmed the rest of the text on the sheet. It was basically what Harcourt had said in the chapel. She wondered if the deadline had been met. She'd know soon. All she had to do was look at the ninth graders. Today's chapel gathering would be a reprise of yesterday's, notched up, if the articles hadn't been returned by dinner last night. And Faith agreed with Winston Freer: It wasn't going to be that simple.

Noting again the absence of things she'd ex
pected to find in the room of a kid this age—a stereo system (there wasn't even a radio), stuff, as in souvenirs from trips, a mug or two, silly presents from girlfriends, a lava lamp, whatever—she left, the air as empty as before.

She reached the kitchen, eager for the clamor the boys would bring. Sloane Buxton's room had definitely creeped her out.

They arrived as noisily as she had predicted.

And once again, the two ninth graders looked like they'd been caught with their hands in the till. So, Zoë's heirlooms were still missing. To make sure, Faith asked jauntily, “How was chapel?”

Sloane Buxton answered politely. “We sang, ‘Turn back, O Man, Forswear Thy Foolish Ways,' Professor Freer read ‘The Darkling Thrush' by Thomas Hardy, our headmaster informed us that his wife's possessions had not been returned, and we closed with ‘Wonders Still the World Shall Witness.'”

Someone had a sense of humor, Faith thought as she suppressed her own laughter. The organist? Surely not Robert Harcourt.

“Well, that's too bad, but I'm sure it will all be straightened out. Now to the lovely,
edible
egg.” She realized she was thinking of the missing golden one in contrast. I should be taking the theft more seriously, she chided herself. But that was hard, given Zoë's histrionics and the much, much more serious matter at hand. Still, she'd
have to watch herself. Even kids as young as Amy had built-in X-ray vision, able to spot adult subterfuge at ten paces—and the students in front of her had had many more years of practice. She continued brightly: “The egg—your best friend in the kitchen. If you have eggs, you always have a meal.”

She went through the basics, showing them how to crack an egg—reminding them to discard any eggs that were cracked to start with—and how to use the shell to fish out any pieces that might have dropped into the bowl. She showed them how to separate eggs, told them the importance of keeping eggs at room temperature before cooking, and how to make a perfect fried egg, sliding it gently into the pan from a saucer.