Dreamscape (11 page)

She settled between the sheets, and he took his place on the end of the bed, willing her to drift to sleep so he could hold her. After a while when she no longer moved and looked for all the world like she was sleeping, Jason lay beside her. Lanie was actually fully awake.

Though he hadn’t yet spooned against her, he felt her body stiffen. “You’re here, aren’t you?”

He froze, not wanting to frighten her. It could only be him to whom she spoke. Thinking long and hard before answering, he leaned close to her ear and whispered, “Yes.”

He could feel her smile.

She closed her eyes and snuggled into her pillow with a sigh. “I’m glad.”

Chapter 10

“This works out great. Pete has league bowling tonight. I told him to just get a pizza at the bar.” Pulling out a chair to sit, Lexie opened the manila folder she’d brought to dinner. “Well, this is everything I could find so far.”

After wiping her hands on a towel, Lanie dropped the dried linguini into the boiling water before taking a seat beside her friend. “Anything good?”

“Well that depends what we’re looking for. I have more at home to sort through but…” She leafed through and pulled out a photocopy of an old photograph. “I’d say this is a yummy start.” She slid it across the table. “That’s him. He’s a honey, isn’t he?”

Lanie’s blue eyes grew large. She almost didn’t know what to say. “The accuracy is remarkable.” She picked it up for a closer look.

Assuming Lanie meant the quality of the photo, Lexie explained all she knew about this type of photography, She tapped the photocopy with her fingertip. “It
is
pretty good, detail wise. Fortunately for us historians, amateur photographers documented their family life as personal artistic expression. It really gives you a nice glimpse of the vernacular.”

Listening to Lexie’s detailed explanation, Lanie smiled. If Lexie knew anything, it was the details of life in the Victorian era. When Lexie seemingly had exhausted all she knew of old photographic methods, Lanie clarified, “Lex, that’s him.”

“That’s what I said.”

“No, that’s
him.
”
The man in the photo was dark-haired and smooth-shaven and would have been considered very handsome in any age. He wore a suit and stood in a casual pose next to a bust of Abraham Lincoln sitting on a white pedestal.

“Him?
Not
the dream man?” At her friend’s nod, she said, “You’re
kidding.
That’s Jason Stuart Bowen circa 1885…
he’s
the guy you’ve been dreaming about for as long as we’ve known each other?”

“I want to show you something Ben’s brother Tim found in the cellar today.” Going to the laundry room off the kitchen, she returned a moment later with a large torn canvas in a broken frame. “This was mixed in with whatever was left in the coal bin. I think it was earmarked for the furnace.” Propping it up against the refrigerator, she held up the torn corner to give a fuller view. It was a large, mantle-size portrait of two men, one of them she now knew to be Jason Bowen. “I wasn’t sure who he was until you showed me that old photograph.”

“It’s nicely done. Who do you suppose the older man is?”

Lanie leaned over the top of the broken frame to see. “This one is older, but they look so similar.” She pointed to the older man with the thick mutton chop sideburns sitting in a chair, the younger man behind him. “I’m thinking they might be father and son.” Looking across at her friend, Lanie’s brows rose in question.

Lexie nodded. “That’s likely. Those father and son paintings were popular.” She could see the similarities for herself, and both were good-looking men. “By the quality of the painting and frame, they were obviously men of means.”

“You have access to restoration experts, right?” Lexie nodded again. Lanie asked, “Know any that freelance? I’d really like this get this repaired.”

“Believe it or not, we use the art history instructor at the college. She interned on the Sistine Chapel right out of school.”

“Wow. Can you set it up for me?”

“I don’t know how much it will cost you, but sure I can do that.”

“I just want it repaired. I’ll sell stocks if I have to. The Bowen-Mason estate will come to me after a year and a day and I’ve been here a month already.”

Still floored by the surprise year-and-a-day codicil, Lexie just shook her head. “Only eleven months and a day to go and you inherit it all.”

“I have no idea what the will says or how much there is to inherit, but I can’t imagine much was left after the stock market crashed.”

Lexie nodded. “And the Depression happened forty years later. But why the year-and-a-day crap? Why not just hand over the vault with the keys?”

Lanie laughed. “I have
no
idea.” Then remembering, rose to drain the pasta. “So what did you find out about Jason?”

“Well, he was a doctor, freaky coincidence, eh? So are you.”

“Lots of people are doctors. What else?”

“He was born in 1852, right here in this house. His father, Jackson Bowen, was a doctor as well. Most likely took care of the birth himself.” Thumbing through the stapled pages, she continued, “There’s an obit for his mother somewhere in here. She died in childbirth while Jackson was involved in the Civil War. There you are a doctor, and your wife dies in childbirth and had you been there she might have lived.”

“That’s sad. Common though.” Lanie nodded. “You’d never know it, as many people as there are crowding the planet, but childbirth was at times a dicey proposition.” She couldn’t help but think what an emotional burden that must have been for Jackson to carry around the rest of his life.

“That happened a lot during the war. A lot of doctors enlisted to help preserve the Union, but their absence left their communities and families to fend for themselves. Jackson Bowen served as an army surgeon. As far as I can tell, he was involved in the Siege of Vicksburg. That was a turning point in the war. Two years after his wife died, the war ended when Lee formally surrendered at Appomattox Court House in Virginia.”

“Jason was how old when his mother died?”

“He had just turned eleven. I couldn’t find just when Jackson headed home to find his life upside down and his son motherless, but we know it was sometime between Vicksburg and the surrender. I found a ledger receipt from the old Clarkson general store. He squared up his debt on December second, 1864, but the war ended April ninth, 1865.”

Lanie finished their meal preparations and filled their plates at the stove. “What about Jason during those two years? He was just a boy.”

Lexie shook her head. “I’m not sure, but I’ll have a guess. People died all the time back then from simple illness. Even a strep throat or the flu could kick your bucket and...what am I doing? I don’t need to explain primitive medicine before antibiotics to a doctor, you know all that stuff. Occasionally we’ll find a clipping in the newspaper noting a death, but the details of the survivors are often scant. You got lucky here.”

Lanie set the plates on the far end of the table out of the way. “What did you find?”

Lexie pulled another photocopy from the folder. “It says that ‘
Agatha Bowen, formerly Agatha Pemberly, and unnamed infant girl died in childbirth on May twenty-second, 1863 while the esteemed Doctor Bowen was away tending to our heroic Union boys. Agatha is survived by her young son Jason Stuart Bowen and sisters Ardath Cobberspath and Celia Pemberly. We extend our deepest sympathies to the good doctor and pray for his safe return.’
”

“So you’re thinking Jason lived with one of his aunts?”

“That’s likely. Like I said, people died all the time. Remember, we’re talking Victorians here. They made an art of death—mourning customs, death photographs, death masks, hair art, you name it—if it had to do with death, they made a production out of it. Being such a regular feature in their lives like it was, it was common back then to absorb the surviving family members into a relative’s household.”

While they ate their dinner, Lexie relayed what she knew of Jason Bowen’s time period. America saw the greatest economic growth after the Civil War and apparently Jackson Bowen became an Industrialist. Investing in the South’s Reconstruction and in various other factories and businesses had made Jackson a wealthy doctor, and when he died, his son inherited all and continued to prosper.

Jason felt an aching pain in his soul. Listening to their conversation about his parents, his mother’s death, and the times in which they had lived made him very sad. Earlier that day when Lanie’s workers found the painting, he couldn’t believe his eyes. So that’s where their portrait had gone, to the coal bin. He looked at the portrait. Where he stood in the painting, the canvas was damaged and curling forward. His father sat just below the curl exactly how he remembered him. How he missed that man. How he missed them both. He often wondered how it was that he’d ended up alone here as a ghost and why his mother and father had not. Up to this moment he had thought it was because he loved the house that his spirit stayed behind. They loved this house as well, perhaps even more than he. The only other reason could be his business was yet unfinished.

“Ooh. You’re gonna
love
this. Jason Bowen married Cathy Ames on April thirtieth, 1886.”

“He died in 1886.”

“Yes, he did, or so they all assumed.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, look.” Lexie slid her empty plate aside and once more flipped through the folder. “They get married in April. Jason disappears sometime in July or early August. In August, she accuses him of abandonment. She has him declared dead on the twelfth of September, and she remarries later that month on the twenty-second.”

“She marries only ten days after she declares him dead? That’s rather suspicious, don’t you think?”

“Yep. Listen to this, ‘
Mrs. Cathy Bowen, wife of Doctor Jason Bowen, told officials today that her husband had not come home after making his usual calls.’
Then this part, ‘
Sheriff John Burke, a childhood friend of the good doctor, is quoted as saying, “Jason wouldn’t just disappear like that. I suspect foul play.”’
That’s telling, no? And there’s more.” Lexie read, “
Dr. Bowen’s maiden, Aunt Celia Pemberly, Dr. Bowen’s only remaining family outside of his wife Cathy, was beside herself stating, ‘Why, he’d never miss our luncheon. The lad has been my escort to the Watertown Garden Club since he was twelve years old. No, my nephew has met with some dark deed. There is simply no other explanation.’
I’m thinking it safe to assume this particular aunt looked after him after his mother died.”

“That’s sad.” Lanie frowned. “What’s the date on that article?”

Lexie turned the page over where she’d written the date. “August second.”

“On August second Cathy tells the sheriff he’s been missing for two weeks. That’s what, mid-July? Less than two weeks later she declares him dead, a week and a half after
that
she remarries?”

“So he did go missing in July. Fishy, isn’t it?”

“I’ll say. Especially since the people who knew him well said he’d never just up and leave.”

Lanie looked at the painting of the two handsome men. If the rendering were true, Jason’s eyes were a warm caramel color. Those eyes belonged to the man in her dreams. Her mind ran through the details as she knew them.
What happened to you, Jason?

That night Jason lay beside Lanie, more curious than ever, and through her dreams once more entered his old life.

Chapter 11

Pulling her blue dress from her valise, Lanie clucked her tongue. “Oh, drat, this is wrinkled,
too.
” She shook it out. As carefully as she’d packed, there were still wrinkles down the front. Setting it on the bed, she went to the wash stand, hoping to pat the dress down with damp hands, but found the ewer empty. Resigning herself to wrinkles, she began to unbutton her collar. A light knock at the door stayed her hand.

“Yes?”

“It’s Addy Fairfax, Miss O’Keefe. I’ve brought water for freshening up before dinner.”

Lanie opened the door, and the housekeeper walked in with full ewer in hand. “Thank you, Addy.” Her head tipped toward the bed where the thin cotton summer dress lay crumpled. “I’ll be a tad wrinkled unfortunately. I was only expecting a quick dinner and an early night at the inn.”

After setting the ewer on the dry sink, Addy went to the bed and lifted the blue sleeve. “I can take this to the laundry room, miss. Our laundress Tessie works today and is ironing the sheets as we speak. It should only take a minute or two to press this for you.”

“That would be wonderful, Addy.” Lanie smiled. “As it is, I feel an imposition to the Doctor and Mrs. Bowen. To appear at dinner looking for all the world like I’ve come from the ragman’s bin would add further insult, I’m afraid.”

“Nonsense, miss,” Addy cut in, not realizing her tone added more to her next words. “If the
Doctor
invited you. I assure you, you are
more
than welcome.” She gathered the dress. “I’ll be right back. Why don’t you freshen up? There’re clean towels below in the dry sink.”