The Lace Reader (18 page)

The trailer smelled like Ann’s shop. Essential oils of some kind. Sandalwood, maybe patchouli.

Cal frowned at the scent. As his expression changed, his scalp tightened, revealing his graying roots. Rafferty’s gaze dropped to the tiny white sink. It was stained, a deep brown color. He touched the cold porcelain, drawing his finger across the stain. It was in the wrong place for a rust stain. And too dark for blood. A close match for Cal’s hair, he realized. Angela was the one who dyed his hair. For some reason this got to Rafferty. He assumed that the baby was Cal’s. 150 Brunonia

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And it bothered him, of course it did. But this was worse, somehow. Rafferty remembered Angela’s father telling him she’d gone to beauty school for a few months after she’d dropped out of high school. Yes, it was Angela who dyed Cal’s hair all right, a shade too dark for the age of his fading skin. He wasn’t old by any means, but the hair was the wrong shade. It was like everything about Cal. Perfect to some eyes, maybe. But when you looked closely, everything was just a shade off.

“You mind if I take this?” Rafferty picked up Angela’s toothbrush. Cal flinched. He obviously did mind. But what he said was, “Suit yourself.”

Rafferty carefully placed the toothbrush in an evidence bag, sealing and labeling it. He looked around the room for more items, making a list. Under the bed he found her backpack. He’d seen it with her before. She’d had it on the island. It was the only piece of luggage she owned. It was big and bulky, and Roberta complained about it during the short time Angela had crashed with her.

“She obviously left in a hurry,” Rafferty commented, pointing to the backpack.

“I told you it was planned,” Cal said. He was clearly lying. He was good at it, Rafferty thought. Psychopaths usually are. He’d argued with Eva over that one. She had called Cal a sociopath. His religious fundamentalism seemed so out of the ordinary to her. So “beyond the fringe of polite society” was the way she had put it. Looking at it one way, she was right. But looking at it another, Eva was the one who was beyond the fringe. Rafferty had been a cop for a long time, long enough to know that two people looking at something with two different sets of eyes seldom saw the same thing. u

The Lace Reader 151

Rafferty thought of Cal’s followers, the ones he’d “saved.” They were a diverse group of misfits: the ex-marine who credited Cal with his sobriety; the one they called “John the Baptist,” a schizophrenic that Cal had taken off his meds. Ten people could tell you ten different stories about Cal. And they’d all be right—and wrong at the same time. Rafferty walked to the end of the trailer and looked back from this new perspective. Viewed one way, the trailer was the room of a penitent. Looked at another, with its velvet-curtained bed and candles, it was something else entirely. Madonna and whore. The classics. The saved and the sinner. Everything and its opposite. No wonder Angela had hung the veil in front of the Virgin’s face. She didn’t want Mother Mary to see the kind of sins that happened here. And yet, by her own admission, Angela had been “saved.” That’s what she kept saying to May when Rafferty went out to Yellow Dog Island the first time to get her back. She had to go back to Cal, she cried over and over while May paced the dock. She had made a terrible mistake coming here, she said. Cal had never beaten her, she insisted. It was the others, the women in particular, who hated her and accused her of falling back into witchcraft.

“But you were never a witch,” Rafferty had said.

“I don’t know.” Angela seemed confused. “Reverend Cal says I was.” She rolled up her sleeve, revealing a large birthmark. “I have the devil’s marks,” she said. “Here”—she started to undo her blouse—“and here.”

“Stop,” May said. “If she wants to go, let her go.”

“Praise Jesus,” Angela said.

Rafferty had expected more of a fight from May.

“I have enough trouble with the ones who
want
my help,” May said.

She turned and walked up the dock.

He didn’t know what to do. The girl was obviously delusional. 152 Brunonia

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“I am saved,” Angela said.

Saved? Rafferty scoffed. Statutory rape? Or was it child abuse?

Saved? Then, in a flash, it came to him. He understood the attraction. Rafferty with all his lapsed-Catholic guilt. And the list of amends he kept trying to make. To his ex. To his daughter. In this moment he understood the draw of redemption. He understood why people wanted to be born again. Accept Jesus and you get a free ticket to heaven. No matter what you did in the past or would do in the future. When you were saved, you were saved. No penance. No Hail Marys, no moral inventories, no ninth-step amends. The Calvinists preached fire and brimstone, but only to the unsaved: the Catholics, the Jews, the Wiccans. The insiders were protected. A few indulgences and some tithing bought you an insurance policy. Who the hell wouldn’t want to join a religion like that?

In a round piece of lace, the still point is found at the center.
All patterns emerge from it. In the laces of Ipswich, the still
point is not as easy to find. The Reader must rely on intuition.
Within the still point, past, present, and future exist simulta-
neously and time, as we know it, disappears completely.
It is from the still point that the reading must begin.

—T H E L AC E R E A D E R’ S G U I D E

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Chapter 15

Ann laughed aloud when he presented her with the toothbrush.

“You trying to tell me something, Rafferty?”

“It’s Angela’s.”

“And?”

“And I heard you tell that woman you needed something personal. So you could read her. I figured a toothbrush was pretty personal.” Rafferty grinned.

“You’re something else,” Ann said.

She pulled the curtain, took a seat across from him. On the floor under the table was a dimmer, which she pushed with her foot, bringing the lights down to a faint glow.

“Very impressive,” Rafferty said.

“Shut up,” Ann said. She took the toothbrush, held it for a few minutes. She twisted it. She felt the bristles. She closed her eyes. 154 Brunonia

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Then, suddenly, she dropped it on the table and glared at Rafferty.

“What?” he said.

She stared at him, assessing his intentions.

“Do you know why I asked that woman for something personal before I would read her?”

“I assumed it was because it had some kind of energy.”

“Everything has some kind of energy,” Ann said. “That wasn’t the point. When I asked her to give me something, what I was really asking for was permission to read her.”

“I don’t get it. Didn’t she pay you for a reading?”

“Her daughter was the one who paid me.”

“So?” Rafferty was confused.

“So I thought her daughter might have some kind of agenda.”

Rafferty looked at the toothbrush.

“Was this a trick?” Ann asked him.

“What?”

“You know it’s not her toothbrush.” Ann made a face. “It’s Cal Boynton’s.”

“I had my suspicions. I needed confirmation.”

“And they think psychics are duplicitous.” Ann excused herself and walked to the sink. She turned on the hot water and washed her hands all the way up to the elbows. Then she dried them and put on petitgrain oil for protection.

She came back and sat down again. “Haven’t you just destroyed your own evidence?”

“It’s a toothbrush, not a murder weapon. I was only looking for verification of their relationship.”

“Not to state the obvious, but I would think her appearance of late would be your verification,” Ann said.

“I needed more,” he said. Not wanting to piss her off any further than he already had, Rafferty continued: “I really do want a reading on Angela. I mean, if you can do one.”

The Lace Reader 155

“You have some other personal item for me? Used dental floss or something?”

“No,” Rafferty said. “Nothing else.”

Ann looked at him again. He was sincere.

“I’m not going to do a reading,” she said. “But I’ll help
you
do one.”

“Right,” he said.

“I’m serious,” she said. “If you want my help, you’re gonna have to work a little.”

“I don’t know,” he said. He had absolutely no talent for this kind of thing.

“A guided meditation,” she said. “I’ll lead you in it.”

“I don’t know,” he said again.

“Take it or leave it,” she said. “I’ve got a busy day today.”

“Okay,” Rafferty said. “What do I have to do?”

“You can start by breathing,” she said.

“Yeah, I seem to do that on a regular basis.”

“Slowly.”

He looked at her.

“Either you believe in this stuff or you don’t.”

Rafferty tried to slow his breathing. He felt ridiculous.

“Anyone can learn to do readings,” she said. “Eva must have told you that.”

Eva had in fact told him that, though she also told him that some people had a natural talent for reading. Like Ann. And Towner.

“Okay, okay. Help me a little here,” Rafferty said. He was starting to hyperventilate.

“Take a deep breath and hold it,” Ann said.

Rafferty’s first deep breath made him cough. He fought the urge to laugh. He took another breath and held it for a long time.

“Okay,” she said. “Now exhale.”

Rafferty repeated the breathing until he felt himself relax. For a 156 Brunonia

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minute he felt as if he were slipping off the chair. It occurred to him that he should open his eyes to check, but he didn’t.

“We’re going to do a little meditation now.” Ann’s voice seemed far away.

Rafferty nodded.

“Picture yourself in a house. It can be any house. One you’re familiar with or something you just imagine.”

Rafferty pictured the house he grew up in, a sprawling postwar ranch in need of a paint job.

“Open the door,” Ann said. “Let’s go inside.”

Rafferty did as he was told. He closed his eyes. He breathed deeply.

“We’re going to climb a flight of stairs,” Ann said. “Seven steps.”

Rafferty breathed. There were no stairs in the house he grew up in. There was no second floor. He’d already fucked this thing up.

“Slow, relaxed.”

Rafferty tried to picture another house. Nothing came.

“At the top of the stairs is a corridor with several doors.”

Rafferty was trying, he really was.

“Choose one of the doors. Open it.”

Nothing came to him. There were no stairs in this house. Well, there were stairs, and there was a door, too, but the stairs went to the basement. Not knowing what else to do, he imagined himself going down those stairs. He walked to the door. He was trying to match his breathing to Ann’s, trying to sync up.

“Walk through the door. . . . Stay for a while. . . . Look around. Take in everything and try to remember it. Don’t judge, just observe and try to remember.”

Ann was silent for a long time. When she spoke again, Rafferty wondered if he’d dozed off for a minute. He felt calm and relaxed. And completely blank.

“Okay, now slowly, slowly, descend the stairs. Hold the railing as The Lace Reader 157

you go. When you get to the bottom of the stairs, step outside into the light. Feel the warmth of the sun.”

Rafferty tried to picture himself doing the opposite. Coming up the stairs, moving outside into the light.

“When you’re ready, open your eyes.”

He opened them.

He felt embarrassed, and completely inept. He’d totally failed.

“Describe what you saw,” Ann said.

Rafferty didn’t speak.

“Go ahead,” she said. “You can’t make a mistake.”

“Well, first of all, I didn’t go up, I went down.”

“All right, maybe
you
can make a mistake.”

“It was a ranch house,” he said, trying to explain. He expected her to end the exercise right there. Or tell him to stop wasting her time. Instead she took a breath and continued.

“What did you see when you went down the stairs?”

“I didn’t see anything,” he said. “Nothing at all.”

“What did this nothing at all look like?”

“What kind of question is that?”

“Humor me,” she said.

“It was black. No, not black, but blank. Yeah. Dark and blank,”

Rafferty said.

“What did you hear?”

“What do you mean, what did I hear?”

“Were there any sounds? Or smells?”

“No. . . . No sounds. No smells.”

He could feel her eyes on him.

“I didn’t see anything. I didn’t hear anything. I kept trying to go back up the stairs. I failed Psychic 101,” Rafferty said.

“Maybe,” Ann said. “Maybe not.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I went into the room with you,” Ann said. “At least I thought I did.”

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“And what did you see?”

“Nothing. It was too dark.”

“I told you,” Rafferty said.

“I heard something, though . . . a word.”

“What word?”

“ ‘Underground.’”

“Underground as in hiding? Or underground as in dead?”

Ann didn’t answer. She had no idea.

The Lace Reader 159

August 21, 1980

At approximately 9:55 P.M., a teenaged girl entered the station. The officer on duty was Darby Cohen. Also present was Officer Margaret Kowalski. The girl, who was approximately 17, identified herself as “Towner Whitney.” She was very distraught, her appearance was disheveled, and her clothing (which appeared to be a nightshirt) was wet. She wore no shoes, and there was a deep wound on her right foot between the first and second toes. Officer Kowalski recognized her as a resident of Yellow Dog Island. When asked to state her name again, the girl revised her previous statement, saying that, “for the record,” her first name was really “Sophya.”

The girl was very agitated. There were scratches on her legs, and there was a cut on her head, although neither of the wounds appeared to be fresh. When later questioned about them, she stated that the wounds had been received “about a week ago,” when she was trying to save her “sister, Lyndley Boynton, from drowning.”

When asked the nature of her visit, the girl reported that she had come to turn herself in. She said that she had “just killed Cal Boynton.” When questioned further, as to the location and method of Mr. Boynton’s demise, she reported that Mr. Boynton was “torn apart by the dogs on Yellow Dog Island.”

The police boat was dispatched to Yellow Dog Island at approximately 10:16 P.M. At the recommendation of Officer Kowalski, the Salem paramedics were summoned to examine the girl. Sophya was bandaged and reported healthy at approximately 11:00 P.M. She refused both stitches and a tetanus shot, both of which were recommended. She was issued a change of clothes (Tyvek suit), a blanket, and some decaf-160 Brunonia Barry

feinated hot tea. Although no determining tests were given, it is the opinion of the paramedics that she was not under the influence of alcohol or any illegal substances. There was no sign of concussion, and she did not appear to be physically hurt beyond the above-mentioned wounds.

The police boat arrived at Yellow Dog Island at approximately 11:32 P.M. The responding officer was Paul Crowley, the harbormaster. Officer Crowley reported that when he arrived on the island, the ramp was down. He reported that the Boynton house was boarded up and that a lamp was on at the Whitney house, but that no one appeared to be home. All entries to the house were secured, with the exception of one open window.

Officer Kowalski stayed with Sophya. When questioned further about the events, Sophya reported that Cal Boynton had landed at Back Beach in a Boston Whaler and had proceeded to “head up the cliffs toward his house.” She reported that Mr. Boynton was “looking for his daughter.” She admitted to being confused by this, because there was no one at his house, which had been boarded up for the past two years. She said that Mr. Boynton’s daughter “died about a week ago, in a
drowning accident.
” She also said that to the best of her knowledge Mr. Boynton had already been informed about his daughter’s death. She speculated that he might have been “in denial” and perhaps that was why he had come here “all the way from California” to look for her.

The witness then informed the officer that she had been in fear for her life, when she saw Calvin Boynton, and when asked to elaborate, she went on to say that the alleged victim’s wife, Emma Boynton, had been recently hospitalized in San Diego after receiving a severe beating from her husband. This story The Lace Reader 161

was later verified. Sophya then told the officer that her “greataunt, Eva Whitney,” had flown to California the day before and that her “mother, May Whitney,” was on the island waiting for news of Emma’s condition. She then broke down in tears. She said that she had been “very frightened” by the appearance of Cal Boynton on Yellow Dog Island, and that he was “very agitated.” According to her, he said, “I’m here for my girl.” When asked to elaborate, she could not, but only described his intentions as “ominous.”

The girl reported that the dogs then “just started to appear.”

She told the officer that they “came out to see what was going on.” According to her first report, there were “hundreds of them, all over the cliffs and the beach and everything,” but when asked how many of the dogs actually attacked Mr. Boynton, she answered, “Ten or twelve, I think.”

Sophya went on to say that the dogs had “never liked Cal”

and that he “used to beat them” and had “actually killed one of them a few summers ago with a baseball bat,” although she said that has never been proven. “Tonight it all happened very quickly,” she said. “The dogs just attacked him.” When asked for more information, she said that she had “wanted the dogs to go after Cal.”

The girl reported that when the attack was over, Cal Boynton lay motionless on the ground, “dead.” When asked if she was certain that he was dead, she said she was, although she said she did not examine the body because she “did not want to get near him in any way.” When asked why she did not go to May Whitney for help, she said that she had not gone to May because it “hadn’t occurred to me.” When further questioned, she revised her story, saying it was because she knew that May Whitney “would not have helped.”

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Officer Crowley awakened May Whitney, who was “very concerned” about the girl. May Whitney told Officer Crowley that it was “improbable, if not impossible,” that Cal Boynton had been on the island that night. She told police that Cal Boynton was lost at sea somewhere off the west coast of Baja, California. After severely beating his wife, Emma, Mr. Boynton had reportedly “stolen a boat from the San Diego Yacht Club” (from which he had recently been fired), and his boat had “gone down off the coast of Rosarito Beach in Baja.” She said that both the San Diego police and the Mexican authorities were searching for the boat and that “when and if they found him,” he would not be returning to New England but would be arrested and arraigned in San Diego for the theft of the boat and for the severe beating of his wife, Emma Boynton, who had been hospitalized in San Diego and was in “critical condition.” Upon further investigation, May Whitney’s story was confirmed. San Diego police reported that Cal had been found two hours earlier off the coast of Baja. He was delirious and severely dehydrated but expected to recover. Sophya insisted that both the San Diego police and May Whitney were “liars” and once again insisted that Cal Boynton had been “ripped apart by dogs.” She became more agitated as she reiterated the story, and neither police nor May Whitney were able to calm her down.

Addendum, August 22, 1980. At 11:45 A.M., Sophya was admitted to Salem Hospital for observation. At the family’s request, she was transferred later that day to McLean Psychiatric Hospital and admitted to that facility at 4:32 P.M.
When reading the lace, the Reader must look for one of two
things: something that enhances the pattern or something that
breaks it.

—T H E L AC E R E A D E R’ S G U I D E

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Chapter 16

Rafferty grabbed the pages off the copier as they came out. A black stripe ran down the final page of the report, obscuring the signatures of the three officers.

Rafferty had read everything he could find on Angela, which wasn’t very much.

And now he’d begun to go back through the old records, pulling everything on the Whitney family and most particularly on Eva and her problems with her ex-son-in-law, Cal Boynton. Rafferty had checked every hospital and every morgue all up and down the coast. He had called Angela’s parents, who insisted they hadn’t heard from her. Then he’d checked five local shelters. He had even called HAWC, the local group that helped abused women and children. No one had seen anyone matching Angela’s description. Angela Rickey had disappeared. Again.

Rafferty went to his office and shut the door. He poured himself more coffee and sat down to read all the reports one more time, looking for something, anything, he might have missed. His mind was 164 Brunonia

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fuzzy. He hadn’t been to bed at all last night. And it looked like he wouldn’t be getting there anytime soon.

He read Towner’s report again. And anything else he could find on the family. There were two restraining orders against Cal, one forbidding him to go to Yellow Dog Island and the more recent one that kept him away from Eva. There were two older reports of beatings, one filed by Eva and the other by May and Eva the night Cal broke Emma Boynton’s jaw. There was the other beating, too, of course, the one that had blinded Emma, the one that happened in San Diego the night Cal disappeared at sea.

Eva had told him the rest of the story. About how some Mexican fishermen found Cal off the coast of Rosarito Beach. Spotting his orange life preserver bobbing out near the horizon and the line of gulls following closely, they had gone over to investigate. Cal was almost dead when they fished him from the water, Eva told Rafferty. When Cal was well enough to leave the hospital, he was taken to a San Diego jail. For stealing the boat. And for the beating that blinded Emma Boynton.

According to Eva’s story, Cal had been let go from the San Diego team, ending any hope he’d had of winning the America’s Cup. He’d gone to a waterfront bar and drunk away the afternoon. Then, as was his habit, he’d gone home and taken the whole thing out on Emma.

The severity of his normal beatings wasn’t enough to satisfy Cal, who had just seen his life’s dream dashed. He hit her harder. He smashed her face into a mirror. She wouldn’t stop staring at him, he later told the judge. He cried as he told the courtroom the story. When he saw the extent of her injuries, Cal fled. Hiding out until nightfall, he sneaked back into the club and stole the boat they had The Lace Reader 165

built for him. His boat. Somewhere south of the city, Cal had run the boat aground.

While Emma fought for survival with her mother, Eva, by her side, Cal fought for his own life. Unable to untie the life raft, Cal grabbed a vest. He was not found until forty-eight hours later. When he recovered, Cal seemed a changed man. He claimed to have seen God. Out in the ocean, without hope of survival, Cal had seen the face of Jesus. He was redeemed.

When he was finally rescued, Cal decided to devote his life to spreading the Word.

He told his story to anyone who would listen. He had seen his own death. Cal told them his body had been torn apart. He had felt the fires of hell.

Through the power of the Lord, Cal had stopped drinking without a struggle. Anyone who saw him had to admit that he was a changed man.

Cal’s work with recovering alcoholics led to a reduced sentence in his conviction for the beating of Emma Boynton. She had been relocated to New England due to the severity of her injuries, she was neither available nor reliable as a witness, and Cal’s sentence was reduced to time served plus six months’ community service and two years’ probation.

While in San Diego, Cal founded and incorporated his own church. Known as the Calvinists, his members included the severely disenfranchised and previous domestic abusers. Some of his converts were local street people, including schizophrenics and the alcoholic homeless who responded to the religious message preached by Cal and trusted him as one of their own. To this day the City of San Diego cites Cal Boynton as an example of successful rehabilitation, where “previous offenders utilize their own histories to make a difference in the lives of others.” In his campaign for reelection, the 166 Brunonia

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mayor commended the group’s success as one of his accomplishments while in office.

Cal did not acquire his robed disciples until he came back home to New England.

He had come home to reconcile with Emma, or so he claimed. When Eva took out the restraining order on him, Cal was livid. How dare she keep him from his home and family? He spent what money he could get his hands on hiring a team of attorneys to win his half of Yellow Dog Island. He wanted to build a church on what he considered was still his marital asset. But Eva and May were way ahead of him. The island had been put into trust long before, the first time Cal had raised a hand to Emma. It didn’t take a reader to know that the marriage would end badly.

“How dare you!” Cal shouted at Eva from in front of her house one snowy night in mid-December. He picked up a rock and heaved it at a second-story window but lost his balance and slipped on the icy sidewalk. He broke his leg in two places.

When asked to comment on the incident for the local papers, Eva shrugged and said, “I guess the Good Lord prefers my prayers to his.”

It was the first time Cal had been known to speak in tongues. His rant lasted several hours, until the doctors prescribed a strong sedative. Cal reportedly slept for days. When he woke up, he filed his first formal accusation against Eva. Not for the slippery sidewalk in front of her house but for witchcraft.

Rafferty went through all of Eva’s files. Cal had made several complaints against her: sorcery, witchcraft, kidnapping. That last one had been crossed out and over it were the handwritten words
“making a
girl disappear.”
It read like something you’d pay to see in a Vegas magic show. Vanishing Act. Rafferty read through the complaint The Lace Reader 167

again, looking for something he’d missed the first time. The tie was there. Eva/Angela. Angela/Eva. For a crazy minute, Rafferty thought of dragging the shoreline out by Children’s Island, looking for a second body. But Eva’s death had clearly been accidental. There had been no sign of foul play. And he’d been looking. There was nothing Rafferty would rather do than arrest Cal for the murder of Eva Whitney. But there was nothing to support it. Except for the fact that Eva was found so far away. That was the one thing everyone kept pointing to. Eva hadn’t given up swimming; she had lied to Beezer about that. But for the last few years, she had always confined her swims to the harbor. Eva was a woman who knew her limits. God, he missed her. He wondered sometimes if he didn’t miss her more than her own family did. She was like family to him. Better than, actually. She was his friend. He still couldn’t believe she was gone.

“ ‘Facts are the enemy of truth,’” Eva quoted Don Quixote.