The Final Victim (37 page)

    It's been years since Jeanne has laid eyes on this white china with the gold rims. It belonged to her own mother first, and then to
Eleanore
.

    She gazes down at the plate, eyes blurred with a flood of renewed disillusionment that it was Gilbert's wife, and not Jeanne, who inherited Mother's china.

    It wasn't
Eleanore's
fault, of course. Nor was it her husband's. No, it was Father who decided that the china, and everything else that had ever belonged to Mother, would be given to his son and daughter-in-law.

    Without his father's knowledge, Gilbert allowed Jeanne to take a few of their mother's possessions that had only sentimental value.
The handkerchiefs and shawl that bore Mother's meticulous stitchery.
The photograph album.
The hair ribbon.

    Gilbert never knew about the journals-or about the gun.

    How proud
Eleanore
was to have service for sixteen.

    She even threw a couple of dinner parties back when she and Gilbert were first married.

    In fact, that's how
Eleanore
met Jonathan Barrow in the first place, beginning the downward spiral that eventually ended in her death.

    But, of course, nobody knows about that. Nobody alive today, other than Jeanne, can truly appreciate the peculiar manner in which history tends to repeat itself, generation after generation, at
Oakgate
.

    Jeanne doesn't believe in coincidences, however. There are reasons for what happened to
Eleanore
, just as there were reasons for what happened to her own mother…

    And what is soon to befall yet another Remington woman who lives under the old plantation's dormered roof.

    'Jeanne?" Melanie asks, hovering at her elbow. "Aren't you hungry?"

    She is. She's famished. She picks up her fork and knife, relishing their pleasant weight in her grasp. She notices that Melanie has also provided her with a cloth napkin this evening, and a pair of salt-and-pepper shakers she remembers her mother using years ago.

    After taking a predictably disappointing bite of the turkey, Jeanne moves the plate around, checking beneath the rim.

    "What's the matter, Jeanne?" the nurse asks, hovering at her elbow. "What are you looking for?"

    "A spoon… I need it for mashed
potatoes,
and the gravy…" She doesn't want to waste a drop-especially since there's barely enough to cover the rubbery turkey in the first place.

    
"Oh, no problem.
I'll go back down and get one for you. Is there anything else you need?"

    
Yes
, Jeanne thinks glumly, staring at the dismal meal,
but not yet. Not tonight.

   
Soon, though, very soon.

    Charlotte slips out from beneath Royce's arm and crosses the parlor to the mantel, where
Grandaddy's
radio has sat mute for weeks now.

    
It'll be good to have music in this house again
, Charlotte thinks as she reaches for the dial.
Maybe I'll even leave it tuned to the Oldies station.

    She turns the knob with a click, but nothing happens. Not even a burst of static.

    Oh-the volume must have been turned all the way down. She twists the dial all the way around clockwise, but the radio remains silent.

    Ah, Nydia must have accidentally unplugged it while she was winding the clock.

    Charlotte follows the dangling cord, but finds that it's still plugged into the outlet on the wall beside the mantel.

    'That's odd," she says softly.

    
"Hmmm?"
Royce asks, stirring on the couch behind her.

    "Nothing, it's just…
Grandaddy's
radio doesn't work anymore for some reason."

    "It's old," he murmurs.
"Must be broken."

    
"First the elevator, and now this.
After all these years.
I'm going to have it fixed."
'The elevator?"

    The radio," she decides aloud. "Aimee already called the elevator guy. He's coming next week. I'll take the radio to Mr. Goldberg."

    "Who's he?
The radio guy?"
Royce looks amused.

    
"Pretty much.
He has the little repair shop down by the canal-he tinkered with
Grandaddy's
television last winter and got it running again. I have to go down to the South Shore tomorrow or Sunday, anyway, to pick up some things at the supermarket."

    "Why do you have to go running all the way down there? Let Nydia do the shopping."

    Normally she does, but she wants to pick up the ingredients for the complicated French seafood dish she cooked for Royce back when they were first married and she had vowed to become more domestic.

    He loved it, and she'd promised him she'd make it every week.

    Has she bothered with it since?

    Urn, no you haven't.
So much for Super Wife.

    Royce never really seems to mind that she rarely cooks, but it will be nice to surprise him with dinner tomorrow night.

    And she'll get a chance to get the radio fixed.

    Hearing a footfall beyond the parlor door, she looks up expectantly, expecting Aimee to return, or maybe even
Lianna
, who has yet to come down and greet her stepfather. Charlotte realizes she must be upstairs getting ready for her dinner out with Vince, but it would be nice if she spared a few minutes to see Royce before she leaves.

    But nobody emerges from the next room.

    Frowning, Charlotte calls, "
Lianna
? Is that you?"

    The only reply is a creaking floorboard.

    Irritated, Charlotte crosses to the French doors, which Aimee left ajar, and peeks into the larger parlor.

    It's deserted, but she glimpses a shadow disappearing around the corner into the hall beyond.

    "
Lianna
!" she calls.

    No reply.

    
"
Lianna
?"

    She hurries to the door, and finds the hall deserted as well.

    A moment later, Nydia appears in the doorway leading toward the back of the house. "Is something wrong, Mrs. Maitland?'

    Frowning, Charlotte asks, "Have you seen
Lianna
in the last few seconds? Or anyone?"

    "I
haven't
seen her, but I did knock on her door and tell her that her father is here waiting for her. I sent him into the parlor to wait."

    "Well, he isn't there."

    "Maybe they left."

    "She better not
have
left without letting me know," Charlotte says, and strides quickly to the window to see whether Vince's car is still here.

    Sure enough, it's parked right out front-and there's Vince on the portico, settling himself into a wooden rocker just beyond the pool of light shining from the sconce beside the door.

    'Thanks, Nydia." She peers out the door beyond the portico. A light rain is falling. "Vince?"

    Her ex-husband looks up.
"Oh, hi.
How's it going?"

    How's it going?

    What she wants to say is,
My
husband was just shot by my cousin and the whole world is buzzing about the scandal… How do you think
it's
going?

    Instead, she merely asks, "Were you in the parlor just now, waiting for
Lianna
?"

    "No."

    "Are you sure?"

    "Of course I'm sure. I decided I'd rather wait out here. Why?"

    "No reason," she says, not certain she believes him. Maybe he was eavesdropping on her and Royce. He must be nosy about all that's gone on, especially given the media's attention to the topic.

    It would certainly explain why, for once in his life, he's actually shown up on time to see
Lianna
.

    Or rather, shown up, period.

    God only knows, it would make more sense if there was something in it for him. He probably wants to ensure his bragging rights as a "Remington insider." For all she knows, he'll sell an interview to some reporter tomorrow.

    "Listen," Charlotte says, pushing aside her suspicions, "make sure you have
Lianna
back here at a reasonable hour, will you?"

    "What's reasonable?" is the maddening reply.

    'Just have her back here by eleven, okay? It's supposed to pour all night and I don't like her out late in bad weather."
Or with you
.

    He salutes.

    
"Oh, and Vince?
You should know I had to change to an unlisted phone number yesterday," she remembers to say. She hasn't even had a chance to tell anybody in the house, including
Lianna
, about that yet. Not that there's any hurry. Another day or two of silence after the constant ringing will be welcome, especially with Royce home, resting.

    "What's the new number?" Vince asks, reaching into his pocket "Do you have a pen and paper?"

    "No, I'll program it into my cell," he says, holding it up. "That way, I'll be able to call without having to look it up."

    As if he's really going to suddenly start phoning their daughter on a regular basis.
Yeah, sure.

    Frustrated, Charlotte gives Vince the number, and reminds him again to have
Lianna
back by eleven.

    Then she slowly returns to the parlor, and Royce.

    "What's going on?" he asks drowsily.

    "Nothing, I just… I think I'm hearing things. And seeing things," she adds, almost positive she had glimpsed a figure disappearing around the corner into the hall.

    "Maybe
Grandaddy
really is haunting this place," she muses, glancing again at the radio. She read somewhere once that ghosts often use electronic devices to make their presence known.

    Maybe
Grandaddy's
spirit has silenced the radio.

    Maybe he's trying to tell her something by doing that.

    Yes,
she thinks wryly as she snuggles beside her husband once again,
and maybe you've finally gone off the deep end, Charlotte Maitland.

    For the second time this month, Mimi is awakened by the piercing ring of a telephone.

    It's four thirty AM.

    She seizes the cordless receiver from the nightstand and bolts from the room with it, not wanting to wake Jed. He had a terrible time earlier, restless and moaning in agony. It was only after she gave him another round of pain meds-too soon after the last dose, but she couldn't stand to see him suffer-that he finally fell into a deep sleep.

    "Hello?" She clutches the receiver hard against her ear, praying it's not about her mother this time. She wouldn't be able to bear it.

    "Yes, is this Mrs. Johnston?"

    "Yes…"

    "This is Dr. Von Cave," a distant, European-accented voice announces. "I apologize if I've woken you… I'm afraid I have,
haven't
I? I didn't even think to consider the time difference before I dialed…"

    Stunned, Mimi stammers that it's all right.

    She never expected a return call when she at last poured out her heart to the doctor's receptionist a few days earlier. She didn't even entirely believe at the time that the woman truly took down her name and telephone number.

    "Thank you so much for calling me back," she says in a rush. "I honestly… I didn't really expect it. I thought you must get countless desperate messages from people like me…" 'To be quite honest, Mrs. Johnston, I do. But yours caught my eye when I noticed the familiar area code."

    "Familiar?"

    There's a pause. "Mrs. Johnston, you do live in Georgia in the vicinity of
Achoco
Island, don't you?"

    "Yes, I live on it," Mimi replies, wondering why that's relevant-and not really caring. All that matters is that the only woman on earth who can possibly save Jed's life is on the other end of the telephone line at last.

    But before she can beg her to help, Mimi finds herself listening in growing disbelief to the precise reason Dr. Von Cave returned her call.

    Jed, she realizes in shock, may be ensnared in a malignancy whose lethal tentacles extend far beyond his own life-and-death race against time.

    Careful not to make a sound,
Phyllida
slips down the shadowy hallway toward the stairs. The treads, she's taken care to note in the past, creak only on either side; not down the middle.

    She descends directly along the center in swift, feather-footed silence, gracefully balanced without needing to grasp the rail. All those ballet lessons she took as a girl come in handy when it comes to sneaking through a sleeping house.