Stargazey Nights (7 page)

“Sell?” Of course he had to sell. The carousel building was an eyesore. It would have to be pulled down if they wanted to gentrify this end of town. And Ned's cottage, if the outside was any indication of the inside, probably should be pulled down, too. Or he could just leave them to rot where they stood and let the town deal with it.

But if the animals still existed . . . If they were in decent shape, they could bring in a lot of money. Not that he needed it. He was doing just fine. But sell the horses? The sea horse, or the pig? Not Neptune's chariot. Or Midnight Lady? How could he sell her? He couldn't do it. None of them. He just couldn't do it.

So what the hell was he going to do? Just walk away? Maybe they were already rotted, maybe they didn't even exist. Maybe he wouldn't have to make that decision.

Beau heaved himself off the stool. “You think on it some. You'll figure it out. And if you're still here tomorrow, Millie said to invite you for Sunday lunch. One o'clock like always.”

“Thanks, thank her for me. I need to get back to Atlanta, but can I let you know?”

“Sure, just call up to the house before you come, so Marnie will know how many places to set. Bethanne knows the number.”

Beau picked up the bag of trash and went toward the door. Before he left, he turned back to the room. He didn't look at Cab but at the carousel, then around the room, a slight smile on his lips as if he were hearing, seeing something only meant for him.

Chapter 7

C
AB FINISHED OILING
THE ENGINE,
then carefully re-­covered it and tied it down, though not nearly as neatly as Beau had done. He put away his tools and went outside to nail the plywood back over the openings.

The sun blinded him at first. And it took a few seconds to realize what all the noise was. It was Saturday in Stargazey Point. ­People were out, doing whatever they did in a town that was obviously in its death throes.

Cab opened his eyes. A group of kids was playing Wiffle baseball in the widened tarmac in front of the pier. An older boy was pitching to them. It was a lesson in futility. The wind caught almost every pitch and carried it away from the batter.

“This is dumb,” the batter said, dropped his bat, and wandered away.

“Hey.” Sarah Davis, not much bigger than the kids herself, loped down the sagging steps of the community center and grabbed the bat. The remaining kids stepped out of range. Sarah's face went slack, and she glowered at the kids. ”What? If I were inclined to smack you, which I am not, do you think I'd use a plastic bat?”

She held it up, frowned at it, and hit herself on the head with it.

A dozen pair of eyes grew round.

“See?” She shrugged. “I'm going inside for a snack.” She turned on her heels, barefoot heels, Cab noticed. She barely made it to the door before the kids broke rank and ran after her, crowding through the door.

Sarah turned to where she could see Cab. “Don't even say it.”

“What?”

“That it was a stupid game. I knew that. But you can't have them breaking what windows are left in the buildings. And they aren't interested in learning anything. The high point of their day is snack, which is some god-­awful generic brand red dye # 2, 3, 4, 5, juice pack and peanut butter crackers.”

She pointed the plastic bat at him. “And don't warn me about peanut allergies. These kids are too poor to have allergies.”

Cab grinned. He knew it wasn't funny. He could tell she was frustrated. And he guessed the tiny dynamo had a short fuse. “Guess you're not having a very good day?”

“Got it in one.” She pulled the screen door open and went inside, letting it slam behind her.

What on earth had possessed her to take over a kids' program? Or maybe she really was here to take care of Ervina. The old woman was certifiable.

He finished nailing the windows shut and went back inside to get his jacket. It was ridiculous to spend any more time here. It was sad to see the old carousel cease to be, but there wasn't much he could do about it. Maybe he could find a buyer interested in restoring it—­if, and it was a pretty big if—­he could find the menagerie that went with it.

But even a restorer would want to move it to someplace where it would be appreciated, not leave it languishing in a forgotten town devoid of tourists.

But before he left it for good, he turned one last time, looking over the now-­darkened space. And he thought he must look similar to the way Beau had looked when he left. One last memory of the lights, the calliope, the circling horses and sea creatures and a small boy clinging to the pole that ran through Lady's middle and riding like there was no tomorrow.

Now there wouldn't be, not for the carousel.

He shoved the door closed, snapped the padlock, and walked away. He was sad. He'd lost an uncle and childhood memories, but he'd lost something more important than that. He just didn't know what it was.

It was time he got back to Atlanta. Have a day to relax before work on Monday. Maybe Bailey would be over her mood though she hadn't called him. Then again, the phone worked both ways, and he hadn't called her.

He still had a ­couple of things that needed to be done before he could leave Stargazey Point. He walked across the street, nodded to a ­couple of ­people as they passed. Kept one eye out for Ervina, not that he expected to see her out in the daylight. She'd wait until dark, when he was alone, and pop up like a maniacal jack-­in-­the-­box.

But when she did, he'd pin her down on where Ned had left the carousel menagerie. If he really had left them anywhere.

Cab walked away from the center of town, retracing his steps from yesterday. Jingling the ring of keys in his jacket pocket. He wasn't looking forward to this, and the sooner he got it over with, the sooner he could be done with it and leave.

Ned's house was in the middle of the block, wedged between other houses, with pretty much the same look and floor plan. A main room and kitchen and bedroom, and another little room that would be a closet in newer condominiums or an office in older ones. It had been Cab's bedroom each summer.

He walked past a rusted Chevy parked on the street, with its hood up. Two young men with Rasta hair were bent over the engine. It would be a miracle if they ever got it up and running again.

One of them straightened up. “Yo,” he said in greeting.

Cab nodded and walked on.

He slowed as he came closer to Ned's house. The house next door had pots of mums on the porch steps, deep orange and gold and yellow. An old woman used to live there, Cab couldn't remember her name. She was probably dead by now.

He stopped at his uncle's house and was surprised by his anticipation, excitement, and a sense of relief. But it was feeling from another time.

Today, he just needed to take a look inside and decide the best way in which to deal with Ned's . . . personal effects. Ignoring the burn in his stomach, probably just hunger, he told himself, he stepped onto the porch, felt the boards sag beneath his feet. The house probably wouldn't even pass inspection if he did try to sell it.

He unlocked the door, reached for the light switch, and was surprised when the light came on. Was surprised even more at the sock in the gut he felt seeing the old couch still covered with a bedspread. But it was the folded newspaper on the seat that really got to him. As if someone had been reading and had just gotten up to get a cup of coffee.

The place was dusty, and he wondered why no one had come to clean it after Ned's death. Heart attack, the death certificate said. Swift, inexorable. He never even made it to a hospital.

Cab came farther into the room, letting his hand touch the back of a chair they had found on the curb one summer, the woodstove that heated the place in winter, which Cab had never even seen lit. The floor was made of wood that had never seen a sander or a coat of polyurethane. It was covered by a big oval rag rug that someone had made by hand.

He went into the kitchen, walked across the faded and cracked roll linoleum, and had the oddest urge to take off his shoes.

Off the kitchen was his little room. The door was closed, and Cab hesitated before he looked inside. He guessed it had been converted to a storage room long ago. Ned would have stopped expecting him to visit.

But he hadn't. The room was just as it was the first day Cab had come to the house. Same twin bed, the mattress sagging between the brass bed frame. Cab remembered telling Ned that it was just like sleeping on the carousel with the brass poles all around.

Cab walked in and sat on the bed. It groaned ominously beneath his weight. But he didn't care. He was just beginning to understand what he'd really lost, and he buried his face in his hands and cried.

A
T SIX
O'CLOCK,
Sarah locked the door of the community center. She didn't know why she bothered. It would be a blessing if someone stole whatever junk they could cart away. There was no equipment, hardly any usable furniture, and the man the county had sent in to run the place had not only absconded with the grant money but taken the only working computer with him.

That's what grants got you. Red tape and charlatans. Maybe she should write an article about
that
instead of “The Demographics of the Disappearing Gullah Culture.”

Sarah considered herself a civilized woman. She had a PhD, for criminy's sake. She was a professor. She knew not to cuss south of Baltimore. But she didn't know how to inspire kids to make something out of lives that were going nowhere fast.

That was not a part of her article's premise. But it was a reality that had hit her hard the minute she drove into town. You could talk about demographics, study bar graphs, run statistics, but it didn't do squat when it came to hunger, poverty, and lack of hope. Hell, the lack of the ability to even imagine hope.

And what the hell was she supposed to do about it? Write an article or three that no one would read except the department heads, who already had too much to read and only knew the Carolinas from Charleston and the Outer Banks.

And now she was stuck here. No resources, no participants, no interest. And Ervina was relentless. The scariest part of it was that the old lady wasn't crazy. She had the gift. And she was damned and determined to pass it on to Sarah. Hell, if Sarah had an ounce of sense, she'd turn tail and do a demographics of the Harlem Renaissance from the comfort of her Upper West Side apartment—­the Upper West Side apartment that she'd sublet until next summer.

She was in no mood to go to the little hovel of an apartment she'd rented in Stargazey and spend the night feeling homesick and depressed.
God, get a life, girl.
Maybe she'd go over to the inn and hit up Cabot Reynolds III for a donation for the center.

What had she just said about taking grants? She meant government grants. She was looking for a personal donation without strings. She at least wouldn't take the money and run. She could buy some tape recorders, some books. Or hell, maybe he'd fork over enough for a secondhand computer. And then leave town and Sarah to her own devices.

She picked up the pace and was about to cross the street when she saw the empty parking spot. The fancy SUV was gone. The son of a—­was gone.

“Dammit!”

A spotted mutt that had been asleep in a nearby doorway scrambled up and disappeared around the side of the building.

“I wasn't talking to you,” she yelled after him. She marched across the street and into the Inn. Smacked the bell on the registration desk.

“Coming,” Bethanne said from the office. She came through the door the next minute. “Oh. Sarah. What's wrong?”

“Did that . . . so and so check out already?”

“Mr. Reynolds?”

“What other so and so is registered here?”

Bethanne pursed her lips. “Well, you don't have to rub it in.”

“Sorry.” Sarah's shoulders slumped. “I was hoping to hit him up for a bereavement grant. Guess I'm too late.”

“You were going to try to guilt that poor man into giving you money?”

“Not me, the center. And he isn't poor. That car of his probably cost thirty thou, and the watch, the suit? Trust me, the man's loaded. And with a name like The Third, his family is, too.”

“You've been living up there with Yankees too long to make you so jaded. He's nice.”

“Uh-­huh, blame it on the Yankees.”

“And sad. When he came back in this afternoon, I thought maybe he'd been crying.”

Sarah snorted. “All the way to the bank.”

“Sarah, that's not fair.”

“I know. I'm just in a rotten mood. But if he's so broken up, why didn't he ever visit the man? He was family.” Sarah winced. She'd visited as little as possible since she'd left for college.

“I think we both need cheering up,” Bethanne said. “Why don't I grab a bottle of wine from the bar, and we go down to Flora's for supper? Besides, he didn't check out, just had to drive up to Myrtle Beach. Maybe you can hit him up after he gets back.”

I
T WA
S LATE
afternoon by the time Cab drove away from Stargazey Point. He just needed some respite from the Point and the situation there. He'd have a nice dinner in an elegant restaurant and maybe check out the building site before driving back to Stargazey. Where first thing tomorrow morning he'd consult Jonathon Devry on—­Damn, it would be Sunday, the lawyer probably wouldn't appreciate being called on his day off. Cab should have met with him today.

He hadn't gone five miles when his phone began pinging. He glanced at it; the call log was filling up. ­People had been calling him, but he hadn't had ser­vice there. Great. He just hoped he still had a job and a fiancée.

He still had a job, but there wasn't even a message from Bailey He'd at least called that one correctly.

He put the phone on speaker and redialed Frank's number. Got the machine. “Sorry, there's no ser­vice here. If there's an emergency, call the Stargazey Inn, Stargazey Point, South Carolina. You'll have to look it up. I don't think they have a Web site.”

He listened to the other messages. By the time he finished, he was driving into the outskirts of Myrtle Beach, the site of the firm's next big project.

Cab was the main designer. He'd met the developer who was putting up the bulk of the money, but only in Atlanta. Cab had never even come to see where the development would be built. Maybe it was time he did. He gave the address to the GPS and turned left two blocks later.