Remember Me (27 page)

I know enough to return them, Amy thought resentfully. Her father was just starting to tell one of his long, pointless stories when she went into the family room.

The longest wall was covered with bookshelves. Fully half of them held videotapes, the titles facing out, in alphabetical order. Amy skimmed them and selected
The Country Girl
with Grace Kelly and
Horse Feathers,
the Marx brothers comedy.

She was about to leave when she remembered another oldie she'd always wanted to watch:
Birth of a Nation.
Was it here?

She read the
B
titles slowly and found it. As she took it from the shelf, several cassettes around it fell. Putting them back in place, she realized why they'd been sticking out. There was a cassette behind them, standing upright against the wall.

It was labeled
BOBBY—EAST HAMPTON—LAST TAPE
. Could this be the one of the Nicholses' little boy that Carrie Bell saw last year?

I'd love to see it, Amy thought. Elaine may not even realize it's here. It does belong to the Nicholses' and she might not want to lend it. I'll return it with the others and not say anything.

She dropped the cassettes in her shoulder bag and went back to the dining room.

Her father was just finishing his story.

Scott Covey was smiling politely. Elaine seemed convulsed with laughter. Amy wanted to strangle Elaine every time she heard that phony laugh. She thought, Mom would have said, “John, will you absolutely promise not to inflict that long-winded monologue on anyone again for at least a week?”

And then she would have laughed
with
Dad, not
at
him.

“N
o, I have not increased the medication,” Menley told Dr. Kaufman. “I haven't found it necessary.”

She was on the phone in the library, Hannah in her lap. Adam was on the extension in the keeping room.

“Menley, I have a feeling you regard Adam and me as the enemy,” Dr. Kaufman said.

“No, that isn't true. I did not tell you about the baby-sitter seeing me on the widow's walk for the simple reason that I thought she was mistaken. And now she has come to that conclusion too.”

“Then whom did Amy see?”

“My guess is that she saw no one. There's a metal
strip on that chimney. When the sun hits it, it gives an impression of someone moving.”

“What about the flashback to hearing the train and Bobby calling you? You told me you were afraid to pick up Hannah.”

“I didn't want her to cry anymore, but I was afraid to pick her up because I was trembling so much. I'm sorry I failed her at that moment. But even without a mother who's having an anxiety attack, babies are left to cry it out sometimes.”

Hannah tugged her hair as she spoke. Menley bent her head. “Ouch.”

“Menley!” Adam sounded startled.

“The baby is pulling my hair and I said ‘ouch,' and Dr. Kaufman, please listen to what I'm trying to convey to you. Adam is ready to drop the phone and rush in here at the least hint of anything. I have to say I think you're treating the wrong patient.”

She paused and bit her lip. “I'm going to get off now and let you two talk. Doctor, if you and Adam are able to sign me into a psychiatric facility against my will, you are going to wait until my mother is home from Ireland and can mind my baby. In the meantime, I will stay here in this lovely house and write my book. When I started having these anxiety attacks, you talked to both of us about the need for his support. Well, I don't feel that Adam has offered that to me, and I need it. The time will come, however, when I do not need it, and at that time I will neither need nor want him either.”

She replaced the receiver quietly. “Well, Hannah,” she said, “that's telling them.”

It was exactly four-forty. At 4:43, Adam came to the door. “I always said I never wanted you to get mad at me.” He hesitated. “I've got to see Fred Hendin now. I don't want to go. I'm sorry I got involved in this Covey case. But since we're being so stripped-down
honest, I'd like to remind you that you were the one who urged me to help this guy out.”

“Granted,” Menley said.

“But when I get back, I'd like to take you out for dinner. You feed her nibs while I'm gone, and we'll bring her along. We used to do that with Bobby.”

“Yes, we did.”

“One more thing. You have a call in to your mother. When she phones, don't ask her to interrupt her vacation. Dr. Kaufman believes you're doing fine and I agree. Have a baby-sitter or not. That's up to you.”

He was gone. Menley waited until she heard the sound of the keeping room door closing behind him before she said, “Hannah, sometimes you just have to stand up to people. We're going to be fine.”

*   *   *

At six-thirty, just as she came out of the shower, her mother phoned from Wexford.

“Menley, they said it was urgent that I call you. What's wrong?”

Menley made a determined effort to sound cheery. “Nothing's wrong, Mom. I just wanted to see how you were. Hannah's telling herself jokes. She's lying on my bed, giggling . . . No, I didn't have a special reason for calling . . . Jack and Phyllis okay?”

She was still on the phone when Adam came into the bedroom. She waved him over. “Mom, let me brief Adam. He'll love it.” Quickly she explained, “Phyl is now tracing my father's family. She's back five generations to 1860. She discovered Adrian McCarthy, a scholar from Trinity College. The McCarthys have gone up in her estimation. The hunt continues.”

She handed him the phone. “Say a quick hello to your mother-in-law.”

She studied Adam as he chatted with her mother,
realizing how tired he looked. This has not been much of a vacation for him, she thought.

When he hung up, she said, “We don't have to eat out. The fish market isn't closed yet. Why don't you run down and get something.”

“Actually, I would like that. Thanks, Men.”

He returned with bay scallops, freshly picked ears of small-kernel corn, beef tomatoes and French bread.

Hannah watched the sunset with them. After they settled her in her crib, they prepared dinner together. By unspoken agreement, they did not discuss the conversation with Dr. Kaufman.

Instead, Adam told her about the meetings he had had that day. “Those waitresses will be good witnesses,” he said, “and so will Tina's boyfriend. But Men, I have to tell you, Scott Covey is coming through more and more as an opportunist.”

“But surely not a murderer.”

“No, not that.”

After dinner they both read for a while. They were still sensitive from the things that had been said earlier, so they talked very little.

They went to bed at ten-thirty, both sensing that they still needed space from each other. Menley felt uncommonly tired and fell asleep almost immediately.

“Mommy, Mommy.” It was the afternoon at East Hampton two weeks before Bobby died. They were spending the weekend with Louis Miller, one of Adam's law partners. Lou was taking videos. Adam had Bobby in the pool. He'd put him on the deck. “Go to Mommy,” he'd instructed.

Bobby ran to her, his arms outstretched, his smile joyous. “Mommy, Mommy.”

She swung him up and turned to the camera. “Tell us your name,” she instructed.

“Wobert Adam Nikko, “he'd said proudly.

“And what do people call you?”

“Bobby.”

“And do you go to school?”

“Nertry schoow.”

“Nertry schoow,” she'd repeated and the sound of laughter closed the tape.

“Bobby. Bobby.”

She was crying. Adam was leaning over her. “It's all right, Men.”

She opened her eyes. “It was just a dream this time.”

As Adam put his arms around her, they heard Hannah begin to fuss. Menley pulled herself up.

“I'll go in to her,” Adam said, quickly getting out of bed.

He brought her back to their room. “Here she is, Mama.”

Menley closed her arms around the baby. A sense of peace and healing came over her as Hannah snuggled close.

“Go to sleep, honey,” Adam said quietly. “I'll put her nibs back in a couple of minutes.”

She drifted off, remembering Bobby's happy, sunny voice. “Mommy, Mommy.” By next summer Hannah would be able to call to her too.

After a while she felt Hannah being taken from her arms. A few minutes later Adam drew her to him and whispered, “Sweetheart, the one thing you mustn't do is deny you're having flashbacks.”

L
ate Saturday morning, Nat Coogan dutifully accompanied his wife into town. Their anniversary was coming up, and Debbie had seen a painting at one of the galleries that she thought would be perfect over their fireplace.

“It's a panoramic view of the ocean and shore,” she told him. “I think if I were looking at it every day, I'd feel I was living on the water.”

“If you like it, buy it, Babe.”

“No, you have to see it first.”

Nat was no judge of art, but when he saw the water-color, he thought it was a pretty amateurish job, certainly not worth the two hundred dollar price tag.

“You don't like it. I can tell,” Debbie said.

“It's okay.”

The dealer intervened. “The artist is only twenty-one years old and has a lot of promise. This painting may be worth money someday.”

I wouldn't hold my breath, Nat thought.

“We'll think about it,” Debbie said. When they were outside, she sighed. “It didn't look that good today. Oh, well.”

The art shop was on a path off Main Street. “Buy
you lunch?” Nat asked when they reached the sidewalk.

“You probably want to get out on the boat.”

“No, that's all right. We'll go to the Wayside. Tina's working today and I like her to see me hanging around. One of our few good chances to nail Covey is to get her rattled when she's testifying.”

They passed the Atkins Real Estate Agency. Debbie stopped and looked in the window. “I always check to see what waterfront estate they're showing this week,” she told Nat. “After all, we might win the lottery someday. I was so sorry when they took out that aerial photograph of Remember House. That was my favorite. I think it inspired me to get interested in the watercolor.”

“Looks as though Marge is about to put the one of Remember House back,” Nat observed.

Inside the office, Marge was opening the showcase window, and as they watched, she put the handsomely framed photograph in an empty space in the display area. Noticing them, Marge waved and came outside to speak to them. “Hello Detective Coogan,” she said. “Anything I can help you with? We've got some very attractive listings.”

“Unofficial business,” Nat told her. “My wife is enamored of that picture.” He pointed to the aerial photo of Remember House. “Unfortunately, that listing is a little out of our price range.”

“That picture has brought in more traffic,” Marge commented. “Actually this is a copy of the one you saw. Elaine made it for Adam Nichols and I'm just putting it in the window until he comes for it. She gave the original to Scott Covey.”

“Scott Covey!” Nat exclaimed. “What would he want with it?”

“Elaine says he's expressed interest in Remember House.”

“I'd have thought he couldn't wait to get away from the Cape,” Nat said. “Provided he's free to go.”

Marge was suddenly uncomfortably aware that she might be wandering into dangerous territory. She had heard that Nat Coogan was investigating Scott Covey. On the other hand, that was his job, and he and his wife were nice people and in the future could become clients. His wife was still admiring the picture of Remember House. Marge remembered that Elaine had said she had the negative and could always make copies.

“Would you want to have a print of this photograph?” she asked.

Debbie said, “I certainly would. I have just the spot for it.”

“I know Elaine would make one up for you,” Marge volunteered.

“Then that's settled,” Nat decreed.

*   *   *

At the Wayside Inn, they found that Tina had phoned in sick. “I am getting her rattled,” Nat said. “That's good.”

It was when they were finishing their lobster rolls that Debbie suddenly observed, “That isn't the same picture, Nat.”

“What do you mean?”

“There was something different about the picture of Remember House we saw this morning, and I just figured it out. The one that had been in the window earlier had a boat in it. The one Marge just showed us didn't. Isn't that odd?”

O
n Saturday morning, Adam reminded Menley to tell Amy they wouldn't be needing her that day. He had a meeting with a marine expert the harbormaster at Chatham had recommended. “I want someone to balance the people from Woods Hole who are going to raise a question about where the body washed in, but it shouldn't take long. I'll be home by twelve or one.”

Half a loaf, Menley thought. He may not have believed that I didn't have a flashback when I dreamed of Bobby, but at least he's willing to leave me alone with the baby.

“I want to work this morning,” she said. “I'll have Amy baby-sit till lunchtime.”

“Your decision, dear.”

Amy arrived just as he was leaving. She was dismayed to hear Menley ask, “Adam, where is that tape of Bobby at East Hampton? I'm ready to see it now.”

“It's in the apartment.”

“The next time you go down will you bring it up?”

“Of course. We'll watch it together.”

Should I tell them I have it? Amy wondered. They might not like the idea that I was looking at it. No, it would be better to return it to Elaine's house as fast
as she could. Mr. Nichols might remember that he'd left it at the Cape and ask Elaine for it.