Trace Their Shadows Page 2

  Sylvania stood to see him out, her tone firm. “I don’t go out at night, Axel.”

  Before the builder followed her, Brandy saw him take a furtive glance up the darkened stairway. Brandy and John sat in frigid silence, listening to the older couple’s voices recede.

  When Sylvania strode back into the room, John rose. “There’s not much time, but maybe by next weekend I can find someone who’ll make a better offer. Someone who’ll restore the house. I know a couple of architects who care about the county’s historic buildings.”

  Sylvania remained standing, her back rigid. “I greatly doubt you can. I’ve told Axel I’d sign the contract when it’s ready next Saturday. And that’ll be the end of it.”

  Brandy followed John and his great–aunt into the hall. “I’ll be in touch again, too,” she said, dropping her card on a side table. “I’ll probably have some more questions after I check out the historical museum. And I’m still interested in the woman who disappeared.”

  Outside a light wind rustled the cypress and cabbage palms. On the porch Brandy turned again to Sylvania. “Do you ever see or hear anything unusual yourself? The sightings are supposed to appear in the top floor window and then down by the boat house.”

  “I don’t use the top floor,” Sylvania said sharply. “And you heard me tell Mr. Blackthorne I don’t go outside at night. I especially don’t go near that old boat house. I don’t allow anyone else near it, either. And not just because it’s about to fall down. I worry more about cottonmouth moccasins than I do about spirits.”

  She stared down at Brandy. “I should add, young lady, that I don’t want to see any publicity about what I’ve told you today. Dredging that story up again would be unpleasant for the drowned girl’s family and for ours. Stick to the building of the house and its early history. The death of that poor girl is something everyone has tried to forget.”

  That’s just the trouble, Brandy thought. Sylvania stood for a few seconds, her angular figure silhouetted in the doorway, and then closed the door. Without looking at Brandy, John thrust his hands in his pockets and started toward the pier.

  Brandy followed across the sandy grass. “I pity the dead girl. No one cares what happened to her.”

  “For God’s sake, it was a long time ago.”

  Blackthorne’s two black Dobermans trotted beside the chain link fence, watching them. Beyond the dock the lake stretched for a mile and a half until it vanished into shadowy trees on the opposite shore.

  John stamped across the broken planks. “My objective isn’t to irritate Sylvania. Don’t expect me to bring you out here again.”

  Unfortunately, Brandy thought, she probably would need to come. “As soon as Mrs. Langdon sells the house, some reporter is going to ask about the ghost. It might as well be me.”

  Grudgingly, John offered his hand when she stepped onto the boat. “It’s already Monday. Damn!”

  Brandy moved past the polished console before the captain’s chair and slumped down on the rear seat. All the usual gear on the eighteen foot Lowe had been neatly stowed away. This guy was orderly and rational, probably why they had started out, ghost–wise, on opposite sides.

  John settled behind the wheel, turned the key, and runnning lights winked on at the bow and stern. “Whenever I can, I come out and just drift,” he said, backing the hull away from the old boat house and the smell of rotting water lilies in the next lot. “Watch the cormorants and herons and egrets. Maybe do a little fishing.”

  Brandy stared into the tannic stained water around the knotted cypress roots. Her lit degree often surfaced at odd moments. “That missing girl, pulled down to muddy death, like Hamlet’s Ophelia.” John nodded from the captain’s chair. At least he understood the reference, even if he had the curiosity of a department store mannequin. Her current boyfriend would have thought Ophelia was a yellow–flowering ground cover.

  Briefly Brandy wondered if Mack would help investigate the ghost story. She had known him since high school, an iron–pumping jock with an Atlas build and a daddy who owned a Buick agency near Leesburg. Mack got his thrills from his two hundred horse outboard, not from fishing and bird–watching. He’d rather crouch on water skis behind his Bowrider with Brandy at the wheel and a wide open throttle. Not exactly the skills he would need to stake–out a ghost. Still, she couldn’t expect any more help from Sylvania’s grand–nephew. She would have to ask Mack.

  Sighing, she tucked her bulging bag, the only untidy object on the deck, under the table. “Was your great–uncle very rich?”

  John glanced back and lifted one eyebrow. “Very. Citrus. Brookfield and his wife. Both families had miles of groves south of here. He was the big success of his generation.”

  “It’s strange about the house. Not keeping it up, I mean. I still want to see if anything funny goes on around there at night.”

  A blue heron flapped down and roosted on the sagging boat house roof. From one side came the hoarse grunt of an alligator. The animals were settling down for the night. Brandy looked back at the tall, silent house. A solitary light burned on in the crescent window. “I wonder who the missing girl was,” she said, “and what happened to her body? The ‘gator theory sounds pretty thin to me. Surely someone would find something eventually.”

  As they drew away from the fringe of cypress knees, a bone–white sliver of moon rose in the east. Brandy leaned back against the vinyl seat for the dark, two mile ride to the dock in Tavares. At least, she had made a beginning. Showed some initiative. Maybe been a bit aggressive. The first thing a real reporter would do, she said to herself, is look up the old newspaper reports.

  THREE

  At eight the next morning Brandy nodded to the advertising clerk at a cluttered desk in the Tavares Beacon’s reception area and paused before the secretary’s desk. “Did you find the clipping I wanted?”

  The fifty–year–old woman bobbed a wavering pile of lacquered hair. Customers and staff often judged her by her coiffure and one inch fingernails, a mistake. She knew more about the paper than anyone except the editor himself. “Got it right here, sugar.” She opened a drawer, laid a column of newsprint on the desk top, and tapped it with a crimson nail. “Leesburg Commercial. Ran about a year ago.”

  Brandy put the story from the larger county town in her notebook, crossed to the editorial room, and set her bag next to a laptop computer, gathering her courage. Six weeks ago she had graduated from the University of Florida, ambition at full tilt. The let–down came when she had to launch her career at a weekly that shared a building with a strip shopping center, a shoe repair shop, a recycled clothing store, and a unisex hair salon. In mostly rural Lake County, journalism jobs were scarce.

  Would her critical new boss buy the Able mansion story? Brandy’s main task was to help cover courthouse and city hall. But the fight between developer and preservationists and its background ghost story should jog Mr. Tyler’s interest, even catapult her into one of the full time reporter positions, the county news beat.

  When the article actually appeared the house would surely be sold. Then John Able shouldn’t care. Brandy stiffened her back and rapped on the editor’s door.

  Irritable Mr. Tyler, who had retired from a respectable northern newspaper, barely tolerated his job on a throw–away weekly. At least once a month he threatened to resign, but the extra income had become addictive, and he didn’t want another stressful job on a big daily.

  As soon as Brandy stepped into the room, he sat forward, clasped his forehead with one thin hand as though exasperated beyond endurance, and with the other stabbed out the butt of a cigarette. “Have you forgotten to cover the Chamber of Commerce referendum meeting? It starts in thirty minutes. I suppose you want to ask a favor.”

  He cocked his narrow head to one side. “The new city council candidate interview is at 1:00 P.M. And you haven’t forgotten the cookie fund–raiser at the library, I hope? You ought to be able to handle that one.”

  Brandy ignored his tirade. “Not to
worry, Mr. Tyler. Every story is on my calendar. I’m out of here in five minutes.” She gave him her most beguiling smile. “But you are perceptive. I do need a favor. I’ve stumbled onto a great human interest feature.” Show initiative, she thought. He ought to like that.

  He straightened up, eyes wide in mock astonishment. “Miss O’Bannon, you were hired to help out with county stories. We’re not the Leesburg Commercial. Readers pick up our rag to clip coupons and see what’s listed in the yard sales. And maybe to read about local events the Commercial skips.

  Like a partner in a conspiracy, she lowered her voice. “But it’s a ghost story, Mr. Tyler. A story about a grand old Lake Dora home, the old Able mansion. It’s about to be demolished in the interest of progress. Or maybe in the interest of profits. A ghost of almost fifty years is about to be evicted. Now isn’t that a story?”

  Behind his glum expression Brandy caught a flicker. She handed him the column. “I remembered reading this when I was home last summer. High school kids out in a boat spotted the ghost on the Able property. According to this, there have been rumors for years. The Commercial column gives a name. A witness.”

  He wagged his head. “Some columnist hard up for an idea used a bunch of impressionable youngsters.”

  “But wouldn’t it be fun to scoop the Commercial? Everybody loves a ghost story, and everybody will hate to see the old home go. People would pick up more papers. Surely that would make our advertisers happy.”

  He raised his eyebrows and drummed the desk with one finger. “I’ll make a deal,” he said at last. “I don’t want to throw cold water on your first story idea. But your other assignments have to be nailed down and copy–ready before you tackle anything else.” He shoved a manila folder of notes toward her. “And you have, let’s see…” He consulted his desk calendar. “This is Tuesday. You only have until next Monday. Sorry. Then someone’s got to take over the county news beat.” He leaned back. “Let’s see what you can do.” She had won, but she felt a tightness in her chest. He would consider her——if she didn’t fail.

  Mr. Tyler’s pale eyes locked with hers. “Do this mansion story with interviews and observations, well–documented. No mystical baloney, just facts. I want to know who, what, when, where, and how. And check with me every morning. We’ll need you on other stories, too. Our clients are mainly interested in county business.”

  “You got it.” She picked up the bulging folder. “I bet you’d love to one–up the Commercial.”

  He looked down at the papers on his desk, but she could see his tiny smile.

  Seymour Hammond was the name the Commercial columnist gave for the witness. A half hour on the phone to nearby Mount Dora located his mother. “Seymour’s home from college for the summer,” the woman said. Her voice rose and sharpened. “Why would a reporter want an interview?”

  More manipulation needed, Brandy thought. The boy’s mother mustn’t be apprehensive. “We’re considering a story about summer jobs for college students,” she said, and told herself Mr. Tyler might okay one.

  The woman’s voice warmed. “That would be great. Seymour works nights at the Burger King on Route 441. He’d love to find something, well, more genteel.” Brandy left her name.

  Mid–morning at the Chamber of Commerce meeting she heard architect Curt Greene argue for a lands acquisition and protection program. Most Lake County developers like Blackthorne would fight a voter referendum. John Able had his job cut out for him. The only citizen to speak up for preservation was a lakeside restaurant owner. His Irish pub in Tavares benefited from the view.

  A nervous city council candidate backed off the environmental issue, but Brandy raised her own morale with chocolate chip cookies at the library bake–off contest, and returned to the office to type her stories. A telecom system would transmit them to Mr. Tyler’s screen for his often caustic editing.

  At four she nosed her ‘84 Chevrolet hatchback——the major purchase of her young life——west on her missing woman mission, through heavy traffic along the narrow arm of land that separates three large lakes. Here Florida’s native live oaks and cypress had been replaced by eight miles of billboards, gas stations, strip shopping centers, and the Buick and General Motors dealership where Mack Lynch worked for his father.

  When Brandy spotted Mack’s big Sierra pickup in the rear, she pulled into a parking space. Through the plate glass window she could see his muscular form in a chest–hugging polo shirt, tipping back a coke can in the air– conditioned display room. It was a sight that excited most of the female population of Tavares. When he saw her, his square face broke into a wide grin and he waved. Now’s as good a time as any, she decided.

  As soon as she stepped though the door, he threw an arm round her shoulders. “What can I do for you, kid?”

  She knew exactly what she wanted him to do, but she wanted to spring her plan in a more seductive setting. Twisting free, she glanced at the open office door. “Your dad’s probably watching. But, yeah, there is something. How about meeting me at the Pub on the Lake tonight about six–thirty? I have a favor to ask.”

  His thick blond eyebrows contracted. “Like what?”

  Moving closer, she beamed up at him. “Like you remember the movie Ghostbusters? You can help me on a stake–out.”

  It took a minute for the words to register. Then he threw back his head and let out a yelp of laughter. “You’re kidding!” He gave her arm a nudge. “I can think of something more fun than that.”

  No need to scare him off. She patted his hand. “At six–thirty. We’ll talk then.” He was still chuckling when she trotted back down the steps.

  ***

  At the Leesburg Public Library Brandy asked for the 1945 microfiche files of the Commercial. When the missing girl vanished into Lake Dora, Brandy judged the news would be covered by the county’s largest newspaper. Perched in a carrel before a viewer, she began to check the editions after September 2, the day World War II ended.

  In a November edition, she finally found the story of the drowning, the heading prominently displayed on page 2 of the first section: Tavares Girl Dead in Tragic Accident and beside it, her photograph. The picture, undoubtedly an earlier high school yearbook pose, took Brandy by surprise. It showed a stunning face——great, dark eyes, delicate features, dark hair caught up in a pompadour and then allowed to fall in a shining sheath to her shoulders. Beneath it ran a two–column story:

  A combination welcome home and engagement party at the home of Mr. and Mrs. J. D. Able on Shirley Shores Drive, Lake Dora, turned tragic Sunday afternoon with the apparent death by drowning of a guest, Eva Stone, 23, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Richard Stone, 210 St. Abrams Street, Tavares. The weekend celebration was drawing to a close about 5

  P.M. when a maid cleaning on the top floor looked out a window and saw Miss Stone enter the lake. The witness, Lily Mae Brown, 20, of 55 Lincoln Street, Tavares, said the young woman was in street clothes. Alarmed, Miss Brown called for help. By the time the gardener, Henry Washington, could launch a row boat and summon assistance, Eva Stone had disappeared beneath the surface.

  Mr. Able, Sr. and the male guests returned from quail hunting in time to join Sheriff’s Office deputies in a search of the area and in dragging the lake. According to Mr. Able, the lake bottom takes a sudden drop several yards from shore.

  Earlier, water activities had included boating but not swimming. The other women guests had departed earlier and did not see Miss Stone leave the house.

  Both family members and guests were unable to explain Miss Stone’s actions. Her parents were not available for comment. The search for the body continues.

  The evening before the tragedy the engagement of Grace Southerland, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. C. D. Southerland of Leesburg, and Captain Brookfield Able, son of hosts Mr. and Mrs. J. D. Able of Tavares, had been announced at a gala dinner–dance on the property.

  An inquest will be held on Friday at 2:00 P.M. at the county courthouse in Tavares.

  Brandy
carried the story to a microfiche copier, then flipped quickly through the next week’s file to find the report of the inquest. The verdict, she learned, had been an apparent suicide by drowning. The girl’s parents remained uncommunicative in their grief. No suicide note was found. Since authorities couldn’t recover the body, a memorial service took place with little publicity two days after the inquest in the historic Tavares Congregational Church.

  Sitting back in her chair in front of the viewer, Brandy drew in her breath. Sylvania Langdon had said nothing about her brother Brookfield’s engagement party that weekend. Nor did this newspaper account sound like the accidental drowning Sylvania described. Yet for what reason besides suicide would Eva Stone have walked into the lake that November afternoon fully clothed? Was there a scandal that Sylvania did not want resurrected? A good reporter, she decided, would go to the original source. But where was Lily Mae Brown now, the witness to the drowning? A task for another day.

  At six Brandy parked in front of her mother’s white clapboard cottage on the outskirts of Tavares, next to a vacant lot of pines, saw palmettos, and wax myrtle. Brandy and her mother shared the house conveniently——if not very congenially——until Brandy could afford her own apartment. Until then, this isolated back street was handy to the court house and the city hall for Brandy, and to the high school for her mother, an English teacher there.

  Mrs. O’Bannon’s Ford was already in the driveway in front of the small frame garage at the rear of the lot. From the back yard Brandy heard a familiar happy bark. Inside the gate she knelt beside a ligustrum hedge, glanced at the border of petunias, and put her arms around the frantic golden retriever to whisper, “No digging today. Good. C’mon, Meg. Let’s chance it.”