“Don’t you recognize me?” The soldier loosened his bear hug, then stood back and gave me a huge grin. “Jack Poirier. From Kennebunkport.”
“Jack!” I fell back into his arms and clutched him tight. I felt stupid, but safe—like when was a little kid hanging with the big kids back in Mrs. Poirier’s living room. I finally pulled away when I realized I might cry.
“You’re in the army?” I tried to reconnect with my inner grown-up. “But you were going to be a doctor...”
Jack’s grin went lopsided. “Low lottery number. So now I’m a medic. Hey, I still get to see a lot of blood.”
I had no idea what to say. Luckily Emily and Anne took over. They suggested we move to the front lounge where there was more room. They offered him tea and toast. And flirty smiles. And hair flipping. They were flirting and flipping in a way they usually reserved for serious marriage-material guys. They didn’t know Jack wasn’t “our sort” of course. People assume everybody from Kennebunkport has money.
With his curls shorn and his face lean and tanned, Jack wasn’t the kid I used to know, but maturity looked good on him—especially the way he filled out his uniform. And his cheeks still dimpled when he smiled. No wonder the Brontës had given him my ticket. They were probably eager to give him a whole lot more.
But I had no idea what he was doing in their flat. After a few moments, I managed to put my bewilderment into words.
“Jack, how did you find your way here? Do you know Anne and Emily from somewhere?”
“He came looking for you,” Anne said. “A day or two after you visited us. Wogs gave him this address.”
“Wogs? Is she OK?” I turned to Jack. “You talked to her?”
Jack laughed. “Not me—but you know how the gossip grapevine works back home. Wogs wired home for money and of course your Aunt Livy told my Aunt Claudette. Might as well put it the Coast Star.”
“Wogs called from Missouri? Is Judy OK?”
“Word is she and Judy are in San Francisco. Sounds like they’re experimenting with the hippie thing.”
So. Wogs wired home for money so she and Judy could play hippie in Haight Ashbury. And I had gone through all that crap to keep her secret. Now I really felt like a dumb little kid.
“But what are you doing in London?” I couldn’t get over how grown-up Jack looked in the uniform. Like a guy you might be scared of if he wasn’t on your side.
He accepted more tea from Emily. “I’m looking for you, Nick. Everybody’s been worried. I guess your Dad pulled one of his three-week drunks in Las Vegas and when he sobered up he realized he didn’t have a clue where you were, so he called your uncle and your uncle called Wogs and then called me. I’m stationed near Frankfurt and had some leave coming, so I zoomed on over here.”
This brought a painful, familiar clunk to my stomach. “Dad—he’s drinking again? I thought he married somebody in AA.”
Jack shrugged. “He did. But I guess the two of them fell off the wagon together. Now they’re on separate honeymoons in rehab.” He gave me a sharp look. “So where the hell have you been? You got yourself a new honey?”
“No. An old honey,” Anne said. “Her slimy boyfriend from freshman year. He’s taken her off hobnobbing with movie stars and baronets.”
Jack gave me a look that combined disappointment and amusement. “That guy in the suit? That phony who tried to seduce everybody in your family, including your aunt?”
I flashed on that mortifying afternoon at Goose Hill when we’d walked in on Aunt Livy and Alistair and saw what I pretended I didn’t see—and then I’d kissed Jack. And he’d kissed me back. A sweet, perplexing kiss.
“That sounds like Alistair,” Emily said. “Recently he’s been trying to seduce Delia Kent, the movie star. And when that didn’t work, he pretended to jump off London Bridge. It made the papers. He’s quite the tragedian.”
“That’s not true!” After my false accusations, I felt the need to defend the man. “He really did want to die. He’d written a play, and Dame Mary Whitlock told him it was awful…” I stopped when I saw the Brontës’ faces and realized too late that a real mental illness was probably even less endearing than a feigned one.
Jack harrumphed. “Well, your family are going to be super-relieved. What time is it in Maine?” He looked at his watch. “Do you think anybody at Goose Hill will be awake at seven AM? I promised I’d call as soon as I found you.”
“Aunt Livy always gets up at six.” I didn’t particularly want to talk to Aunt Livy. She’d be full of prying questions. And I didn’t particularly want to hear about Dad’s latest bout with the bottle, especially with the Brontës right there listening.
Jack turned to Emily and Anne. “Can we use your phone? Mr. Conway said he’ll accept the charges.”
We put the trunk call through. It took a few minutes before an operator said she had Olivia Conway on the line. I made Jack talk first. I was already feeling guilty, although I didn’t quite know what for.
Jack’s demeanor changed when he spoke into the phone—his manner stiffer, more military—as if he were talking to a superior officer.
When I took the phone, I heard relief in Aunt Livy’s voice, but anger began to bleed through. “I’m so glad I can tell Con we’ve found you. We’ve been terrified out of our wits. When you never picked up the money your father sent to the American Express in Paris, we had no idea where to look for you. Polly had no business leaving you over there by yourself. Con and I are furious with her. I’m afraid she’s taken up again with that thieving Judy person…”
So Dad had tried to send me money, in spite of his fall from sobriety. That made me feel better. But I hated to hear Aunt Livy rant against Wogs. I didn’t know who stole that jewelry, but I knew it couldn’t have been Judy. Wogs had been right to follow her heart. I tried to cut the tirade short by changing the subject to Alistair and how he’d been “showing me around London.”
This had the desired effect. Aunt Livy’s voice brightened immediately. “You’re seeing that nice young man again! What delightful news. Con will be so pleased. We were both quite taken with him, you know. Tell me all about it. How is he doing?”
“Um. Great. Just great,” I decided a small fib was preferable to a litany of Alistair Milbourne’s faults at the moment. But one lie begat another, and I found myself telling about his article in Look all the lovely dinners at Claridge’s and how Alistair had “put me up” in a darling little mews cottage in Mayfair that belonged to his good friend, the actress Delia Kent. No, no—she wasn’t just a cheap starlet. She was a serious actress on the London stage. And—somehow the words kept flowing—Alistair had written a play that would be produced by Delia’s husband Sir Thomas Hume, and Dame Mary Whitlock was considering a part. I admit to emphasizing their titles, god help me.
When a placated Aunt Livy signed off, I stared at the roses on the wallpaper, ashamed to turn and look at Jack—or Anne and Emily, who were giggling behind me.
I had become Alistair—playing the Gatsby game.
“Brilliant performance,” Anne said. She actually clapped.
“Can I hire you to talk to my mom when she calls?” Emily said. “You made it sound as if you’re in some Noel Coward play. I’ll bet she ate it up.”
I nodded, still afraid to look at Jack.
He finally spoke—in a voice full of fake cheer. The easy rapport we’d had a moment ago was gone. “I can see my job’s done here. Let’s get you back to your cottage in Mayfair and your playwright friend. I can drive you if you want. I’ve got a rental car.”
“No!” Anne shouted it before I did. “No. She mustn’t go back.”
Emily jumped in. “Alistair is Gaslighting her—stealing things and hiding them—trying to make her feel crazy. He threw her out into the night, alone and defenseless.”
This wasn’t fair. After all, I was the one who’d been violent, not Alistair. And he’d only thrown me out because I’d accused him of something he hadn’t done.
I had to defend him. “He only hid my cigarettes. He doesn’t like me to smoke. I thought he’d stolen my ticket, but he hadn’t. I would have got mad, too.”
“That reminds me…” Jack pulled from a pocket the familiar two-page ticket, with the carbon paper in between looking a bit torn and crumpled. As he gave it to me, he dropped the affable grin and squeezed my hand. “Seriously, Nick—don’t listen to us if you still have feelings for this guy.”
Having the ticket in my possession felt good, and Jack’s touch felt even better. His hands were rough and dry, not damp like Alistair’s. I pulled away, realizing I was blushing.
“I have no feelings for Alistair,” I said, hating myself myself for getting swept up in Aunt Livy’s world, where there was a class difference between me and Jack. “Not that kind. But I promised Delia and Sir Thomas I’d take care of him, and I screwed up…”
“Yeah. Sir Thomas.” Jack moved from one foot to the other, no longer the confident warrior. “And Dame Whats-it. You don’t want to let them down.” He forced a laugh and glanced at his watch. “So do you want that ride? I kind of need to get going. I only have three more days of leave and I wanted to see some of England. I was hoping to get to Stratford-on-Avon today. See Shakespeare’s second-best bed and all that.”
“Stratford-on-Avon!” Emily squealed. “Let’s all go. We can show you around.”
Jack looked at the door, still ill at ease. “I’d, um, love to, but it’s a two-seater. I’ve always wanted to drive a TR3, so when I found out I could rent one…”
A TR3. The irony was almost too much to bear.
“Then Nicky should go,” Anne said. “She’s never been to Stratford—have you?” She gave me a funny look and nodded in Jack’s direction, I guess trying to signal I should do some flirting, too. She didn’t realize I’d ruined whatever might have been happening between us with the way I’d talked to Aunt Livy. Now Jack was the son of Jacques, the handyman again, and I was Miss Conway of Goose Hill.
Jack gave me bland smile. “You don’t have to. I can take you to Mayfair. I’m just your old babysitter’s kid. You don’t have to entertain me.”
“I can’t go to Mayfair. Alistair threw me out. I hit him, for god’s sake!”
That wasn’t what I meant to say. Now Jack looked even more wounded.
I decided to shut up and give him a hug. “You’re not my old babysitter’s kid. You’re my friend. And there’s nothing I’d rather do than go sightseeing with you.”
“You’re sure?” Jack’s grin came back. “Then we’d better shake a tailfeather, Miss Nicky. It’s at least a two hour drive.” He checked his watch. “You, um, might want to bring some luggage. We’re getting a late start so we might want to stay overnight.”
Overnight. Should I tell him he’d have to pay for my hotel on his meager soldier’s pay? That Miss Conway of Goose Hill didn’t have a penny to her name? Nah. If I copped out now, everybody would think I wanted to go back to Alistair. I went to the bedroom and grabbed my pack.
As they showed us out the door, Emily gave me a sly smile. Anne winked.
“Have a blast, you two.”
I was furious at them for trying to reduce my friendship with Jack to something shallow and sexual. Still, shallow and sexual would feel a whole lot better than the bizarre thing I’d had with Alistair Milbourne.