Chapter One

Jenny Rose

The young girl was thrown against the seat as he navigated the turn.

“From where are you coming?” he asked her as they settled into a straight line.

“From Ireland, sir.”

“Is that right?” He wobbled his turban. “Is this your first visit to America?”

“Yes, it is, sir.”

“How lucky for you to arrive in the rain,” he said.

She found nothing to say to this.

“And,” he continued, “to arrive on the day of the new moon.”

“Is it?” Jenny Rose peered out into the lumbering traffic. It occurred to her that he could be taking her anywhere. “That would be fortunate,” she agreed. “We Irish do know a bit about fortune.” Both good and bad, she reminded herself wryly. But she’d heard the prim tone in her voice and was instantly sorry. Music fluttered from the radio and she relaxed, just a bit, in her good raincoat, for fortune she was seeking. Many a sullen child’s nose had she wiped to afford it. It would last her a lifetime if she looked after it properly, though. You get what you pay for, Aunt Brigid would have said—and hide what a naughty girl you are, she would have thought. Jenny Rose opened the well-crumpled paper. Twillyweed. Sea Cliff. Long Island, New York. With the heel of her hand, she wiped at the fog on the window. There she was with her pale little face, the spiky, cropped black hair in every direction, the fighting lips. She felt more than saw the driver glance over his shoulder. He was frightening looking, with his unibrow extending one ear to the other.

“Who’s that?” she asked now about the music on the radio, curious because it sounded trickly and drumming, like the rain itself.

“Debussy.” His smile was sweet. Then, “Claire de Lune,” he informed her, his reflective eyes glazing over. He went away in his own mind and she was reassured, reminded that art touched all souls and belonged to no one. Finally they came to the exit and headed north over ugly terrain. There was a disappointing train station set in a section of derelict houses. At first she was taken aback, the roads and buildings were so broken down. For Rent or For Sale signs peppered the walls. Fatigue and disappointment overwhelmed her. But then the road split and the sign indicated Sea Cliff off to the right. One good thing, there were soft pink trees wherever you looked. A locust grove, she thought. She hadn’t imagined the place to be so tipsy with hills. She liked hills. They bumped up and then down a quaint road overgrown with elm and reaching willow. Willow. So they must be nearing water. Antique shops, a library, and a museum indicated they’d come to a town. Ghostly, once-lavish Victorian homes with rickety porches and arts and crafts bungalows clung to slanting properties, their tulips drowsing in the rain. A grim real-estate office and a couple of old Irish bars, upholsterers, and cabinetmakers. A curiosity shop, pottery, paintings hung, fishing nets on candles, a used-books store. They made a wrong turn and found themselves down at the foggy beach where a long-haired, disheveled old man appeared like a vision at a grimy window. Fretful, the taxi turned and chugged painstakingly up a steep hill. Jenny Rose had the wary, slow-climbing sensation of a roller-coaster drop yet to come and clung to the maroon plastic of the front seat. A low-hanging willow scraped the whole of the cab and they were blinded by a sweep of minnowlike leaves. The sun broke through the trees, a brace of gold illuminating the whiskers on the driver’s neck and the grime of the windows. You could see out across the sound then, and a little sailboat, like a toy, glided through the broken mist. A thrill of sudden perspective made Jenny Rose shiver. She was here in the States. On her own in America at last, in this village—Sea Cliff!

Claire Breslinsky

I remember I was standing in the drizzle trying to read the paper at the stop on Park Lane South in Queens. There was violence on every page: overseas, at the airport—someone had even bludgeoned a priest for a statue down in sleepy Broad Channel. The rain began to come down hard. I’d just missed the bus to the subway so I was in for a wait. I huddled deeper under my umbrella, reflecting as I did that I’d waited in this very spot facing the woods years ago back in high school, dreaming my young girl’s dreams. And then I remembered something else, long forgotten and tucked away: There was a man who used to stand over there up the hill. He’d stand half hidden by the trees and something purple wobbled up and down. In my innocence I’d had no idea what it could have been. It was with a thrill of horror it came to me. And then, with my surprise, it came to him. He’d never approached or even crossed the road. But many an icy morning I’d stand there in my Catholic-school uniform, the skirt rolled up, and accommodate him with the look of shock and surprise he’d required.

Yes, now that I came to think of it, that must have been when arbitrary behavior began for me. It was a sort of a job. I’d felt I couldn’t let him down by yawning or laughing. That it was his hurt that mattered shows you what kind a life I’ve led. I certainly never thought to tell my parents. It never occurred to me because in a way, I’d been a participant and so I was to be blamed. As an older woman, I can look back at that spot, at that girl, and have sympathy for who she was. But there are victims everywhere in this world, and the lurking monsters they protect. They sway like the fickle breezes of the past, the wicked ones—and sometimes they wait, squeezing their thighs in lewd expectation, just around the corner.

When I lived overseas, I was a damn good photographer; no doubt you’ll recognize the voyeuristic influence. I’m a divorced woman now, two kids away at college. I had a business, a bed-and-breakfast in a gracious old Queens mansion that had just been starting to take off when it burned to the ground. I lost a romantic home, but the insurance money wound up funding college for the kids—a divorce complication that let my ex-husband so utterly off the financial hook it made me see, if not red, then a simmering menopausal orange. My children still had health insurance from their father’s police department coverage, so at least they were taken care of. And I was back where I’d started. Except, luckily, now I had Enoch, the fireman who’d saved my life—my compensation for all of it the way I looked at it. But what was I doing with this life? Going to apply for a job in Manhattan where, after taxes, I’d make enough money to save nothing. How had Enoch described it? “Get me out of the house … Make a little pocket change.” Surely if Enoch thought this enough for me, then I should, too. I ought to be grateful. … And it wasn’t that anything was wrong. It was just when we made love I was simply always right there. I don’t know. I never lost myself. I’d never want him to see any signs of regret, though. He to whom I owed so much.

I stood there at the bus stop with the flimsy résumé he’d dictated. It told so little of me really. None of the good stuff, or at least none of the things of which I was most proud. Amateur sleuthing. Living in India. Thirty-eight successful hours in labor. Reconnaissance. This job to which I was applying was to be a temporary thing until I could get back on my feet, but already I could sense a dead end. To be working as a receptionist for a photographer who would have, in my old life, barely qualified as my assistant? Pocket change, indeed. The rain petered out and the sun shone through like in that catechism picture where they put God. I stood watching the reflection of the clouds race by in the puddles. If I’d had my camera with me, I would have shot the striking image. But I never had my camera with me anymore. Come to think of it, I hardly did anything I loved anymore. I stood very still, knowing this. I snapped my umbrella shut. I should have been marching around with my own book of photos. Why was I always trying to be less than I was? Because of guilt for failing at a risky business—for which I’d been warned? But that hadn’t been my fault. For my mother’s idea of how a woman should spend her time? Of course not. My mother didn’t care about things like that anymore. As a matter of fact, lately she was more of the “let’s take the day off and go to a yard sale” ilk. My ex-husband? He’d lost that right when he’d waltzed off with his actress friend, hadn’t he? Enoch? Kind as he was to have arranged this interview, the truth was he’d probably be more pleased to have me at home. He was, after all, crazy about me. I ought to remember that, I chided myself, when I start feeling discontent.

Another thing; every morning at 10:45 the dog was used to being let out. I couldn’t bear the thought of Jake standing, uncomprehending, legs crossed in distress at the back door. Just then the bus groaned across the 112th Street Bridge. The driver pulled over and cranked open the door. “No,” I told him cheerfully, “I’ve changed my mind.” I turned and walked determinedly down the hill that goes from Kew Gardens all the way to Myrtle Avenue. I reached the ugly house we’d been renting since Christmas—a hideous little narrow aluminum-sided rental, I’m afraid—in no time at all and was surprised to see the dog out in the yard. My heart lightened at the sight of Enoch’s truck on the driveway. There would be coffee and sympathy. I opened the back door and moved automatically to the pantry to get Jake a biscuit. Hearing Enoch in the dining room, I went in. He was standing with his back to me. There was someone there with him. I remember this struck me as off because whenever we had company we sat in the kitchen. For a moment I thought they were adjusting the radiator that spewed heat no matter how you wound it down. The other man bolted upright, adjusting his suspenders. We saw each other’s face at the same moment. I wouldn’t have known what was up but for his rattled expression.

I don’t think I stopped to make sure the dog was in the gate. Fortunately, Jake was so used to being locked in that he stayed where he was out of habit. All I can remember is running down the block through the puddles, all those shining, purplish abalone oil puddles sucking life from the dirty one-way road. Then suddenly Enoch behind me. I must have shrieked at his approach because the lady across the street dropped her shopping bags. His hand on my arm and me wrenching loose. The picture in my mind of him with that … I thought I might be sick. I pulled away and kept running toward the trestle where I imagined I’d be safe. Safe from what—from knowing? Enoch’s voice and what he said. And here was the best part … or in this case, excuse me, the worst part. “Claire,” he called after me frantically, “Claire, I was just,” and it was the way he said this rather than what he said—his voice, though tight with pleading, sounded, if you can believe this, justified, almost dismissive. “It meant nothing. … Nothing more,” he insisted and then, gasping, out of breath, “than emptying a hose!”

Jenny Rose

In Sea Cliff, young Jenny Rose stood with her back to the sea. Like a house in a story, she thought, looking up. It was one of those resort monstrosities for the rich that someone had plugged heaps of money into at the turn of the last century. A contrite form stooped beneath an umbrella at the front entrance. A butler, she thrilled, restraining from smoothing her hair.

He was a startling-looking fellow, short legged, with great flaring nostrils, massive shoulders, and bulging muscles. His skin bore the gray-brown shrivel of an olive branch. He looked like an aging trapeze artist. Suddenly he was jostled aside by a hefty woman tiptoeing down the steps, holding a dishcloth over her head. Blustery and at the height of her blood pressure judging from the rosy hue of her skin, the woman then squeezed her cream cake–stuffed frame into the taxi, inspected Jenny Rose’s bags, wriggled her body back out, and gave orders. The fellow who’d been flung aside had recovered and emerged now at a stately pace. He was bent forward with self-imposed subservience. He minced his way over, crouching through the rain to assist the driver with Jenny Rose’s trunk. The stout woman kept giving orders in that unmistakable New York accent.

Then the butler—in a reserved Patois lilting English—indicated the porch, wanting the trunk out of the rain. He paid the driver and the driver climbed into his cab, but not before folding his palms and bowing to Jenny Rose. She blushed. The sharp-eyed, stout woman saw that and yelled disapprovingly, “Hey! None of that paganism stuff.” She bent her cabbage knee to kick off a smatter of sopping tulip leaves from her wet shoe, then ushered them up the front steps. The driver and his lingering music drove off. Jenny Rose watched the taxi turn the curve in the batting rain, then saw it again around the second curve. She hadn’t said thank you or good-bye. A senseless feeling of loss overwhelmed her as she was led into the house.

Inside, holding a pail like a purse, was a lanky, honey-colored girl with unkempt hair. She was pretending to polish an alabaster table lamp with a limp chamois rag.

“Take the new girl to her room, Radiance,” the stout lady said, then, under her breath, muttered, “Dear diary, I forgot. I’ll need the key. Hold her here with you.” She blustered away. The butler had come in with the trolley and wheeled Jenny Rose’s rain-running trunk off to the kitchen for the time being.

Jenny Rose, left alone with the girl, took in the smell of polish and flowers, tall wooden beams and sloping eaves. It was as grand as a Dublin hotel, but there was something quiet, looming even, like a rectory.

Radiance made a face but put down her rag, pushed her soft crimped hair in a useless gesture with her wrist, and circled Jenny Rose, looking her over. Jenny Rose had never seen a girl quite like this. She had all the features of a tall black girl, but her long hair was almost blond and her eyes were light and gray and grainy as fried cat’s-eye marbles.

“Like to kick the tires?” Jenny Rose said.

“Eh?”

“Quite a house,” Jenny Rose revised her approach.

“Everyone paints it,” Radiance informed her in what sounded to Jenny Rose like a French accent, indicating the series of oils and watercolors of this very house one after the other up the grand stairway.

“Well, then,” Jenny Rose said, “there goes that idea.”

Radiance looked over her shoulder and lit a bent, yellowed roach she’d had stashed away behind her ear. She took a deep drag and squinted at Jenny Rose. “So you’re an artist?”

Jenny Rose said truthfully, “I’m not sure what I am.”

“Everyone’s an artist in Sea Cliff,” Radiance informed her in a bored voice as she blew out a rivulet of smoke. “An artist or a writer or a wannabe.”

“Really? What about you?”

“I’m the princess, can’t you tell?”

There was a noise behind them. A small, scurrying noise, like a surprised squirrel in a winter garage, and they both jumped and looked around. That was when she saw the little boy for the first time. He had a mop of fluttery hair atop a large head, giving him the appearance of intelligence, with inquisitive, timid eyes that looked away when he saw you notice his meandering eye. The eye was evident at once. Enormous ears, poor thing. So this was Wendell. Jenny Rose liked him on sight. She knelt down and offered him a peppermint from her crowded pocket. The little boy was about to take it but saw the heavy woman coming back and he hesitated, changed his mind, and stepped back and away from her, clearing his throat in anguish. The heavy lady waved him back up the front stairs with a warning look. But Wendell held something in his closed hand, some offering of welcome, Jenny Rose imagined, so she leaned in his direction without taking a step and tried to make her eyes tell the child it was all right. The boy was sensitive, Jenny Rose could see that, and she remembered her own agonies of childhood, the times they’d paraded her out and wanted her to know what to do, to say … how in the end she’d always seemed to fail. Well, never mind, she told herself, shaking her cropped, spiky, dark hair, hoping, for a moment, that this child would like her even though she knew it wasn’t about the liking. She’d have to master him if she expected to stay. Other­wise, they’d send her back. And she couldn’t go back.

“What’s that?” The stout woman marched across and grabbed hold of what the little boy had clenched in his fist. He went to cover it, but the woman snatched at it gruffly and with all the unthinking insensitivity of the ignorant went on to berate him, “What’s that ya got? Is that what they teach over there in that fancy school? I’ll show ya! Turning into a thief now, eh?” The woman ranted on, “Not in this house! What did I tell you about that, eh? Give it here!”

Jenny Rose was appalled. To humiliate the child in front of her! But the damage was done. She must assert herself with an interference of some kind if they were to respect her place over this housekeeper’s. She stood up very straight and, in a voice she acquired from she knew not where, though she suspected upon hearing it that it came from that exotic taxi driver, she extended her hand and announced, “Give that to me, please.”

They all turned to her in surprise. Before any of them could object, she’d snatched the crumpled silk scarf from the housekeeper’s hands and thrust it into her raincoat pocket. “This matter will be dealt with at the appropriate time.”

None of them knew how to take this, but while they made their faces of conspiratorial surprise, Jenny Rose slipped in a wink to the little boy and began the slow walk up the stairs.

She was almost to the top when, “Not that way, miss,” the butler at last advised. “You’ll be down the stairs, not up.”

“Oh,” she said and meekly trotted back down. This error had caused her to lose face with them, she realized. But not, she felt sure, with Wendell, who, appraising her with his one good eye, looked at her with interest and concern.

The heavy woman with the broad New York accent took the child away and returned almost immediately, sprawling one hand down over her hefty belly and pinning her lank hair back with the other. “I’m Patsy Mooney. And this here’s Radiance. Now you’ve met there’s no reason you shouldn’t call each other by your first names,” she said, insinuatingly demoting Jenny Rose to cleaning lady status. But Jenny Rose did not move, and the hefty woman urged her on with a bossy but conciliatory, “Let’s get going, Miss Rose.”

“It’s Jenny Rose Cashin,” she said clearly as she was led into a huge kitchen with an indigo Aga and a wall of shelves displaying glistening white plates. Lead-paned windows were heavy with rain-drenched ivy and a charming grandmother clock ticked loudly and cheerfully from the corner. A collection of antique white and blue porcelain milk pitchers lined the mantel. It felt like an English country kitchen of long ago. At the plank table the child returned to his seat and nibbled black bread and green salad and cherry pie. Jenny Rose’s mouth began to water. “It’s all so British,” was all she could think to say.

“Boss likes everything foreign,” Patsy Mooney told her. “Makes him feel important.” She sniffed. Then, realizing she’d said too much, she nicked her head toward the entrance hall and added in a joking way, “But you can’t always locate a nice British girl right away.” She’d meant Radiance, who was from Guadeloupe, but Jenny Rose, misunderstanding her belittling tone, took it to mean that she herself was after all just another Irish immigrant. It dredged up all the trouble she’d left behind, all the gossip and rude remarks of thoughtless villagers. Her eyes filled with tears and she dropped her head so no one should see. But the sharp-eyed Patsy Mooney softened and tactfully turned away, saying, “You gotta be tired, coming all that way. Want me to show you your room?”

“I am tired,” she admitted.

“Okay, just leave the big trunk. Mr. Piet’ll bring it along when he’s had his lunch. And I’ll bring you a tray.” She hoisted Jenny Rose’s flight bag onto her shoulder. “Watch out you don’t trip on that cat. That’s Sam—he leaves a nasty smell if he takes a liking to you—right through that door there. That’s it. And it’s a devil to get that smell off. I don’t know why they won’t have him fixed. Keeps off the rodents, Mr. Cupsand says …” But instead of heading for the back stairs as Jenny Rose had expected, they wriggled through a doorway. “When you live near the water, there’s always rats,” she informed Jenny Rose with pleasure. “Down these back stairs and you’ll see your own room at the bottom. There. Ain’t it pretty? He just had it recarpeted. When I came here, it was so slippery. Nothing but the best for the boss. And feel how soft and plushy with your feet!” To demonstrate, Patsy Mooney slipped off her battered clogs and wriggled chubby toes into the pile.

Jenny Rose’s heart sank. All the grand views from every window and she was to be stuck away in the basement? She looked around. It was all faux-finish pinkish cream, like being in a ladies’ room or a funeral parlor. How would she ever put an easel up on this carpet? Even with a drop cloth. They’d kill her if she spilled a bit of paint. And she always did.

Patsy Mooney went trilling on, “Catch the TV! Mr. Cupsand got himself a flat screen and put his big one in Mr. Piet’s. When I want to see my shows on a big screen, I’ve got to skedaddle down to Mr. Piet’s quarters and ask myself in. It’s supposed to be for all the help but you know the way it goes; you get to think it’s yours when it’s in your digs.” She touched the ugly television longingly.

I’d have preferred any small window, Jenny Rose thought but didn’t say. She sank onto the bed. Gone was any thrill of anticipation.

“’Course I got my own tiny TV, a little feller up on my dresser, but”—she made a face—“reception’s no good. … Fuzzy! And just look at the bed, they give the latest installment.” Patsy Mooney could barely keep bitterness from her voice now as she plumped the firm mattress with a deft mitt. “It’s one of them pillow tops. You got the luck.” She stood still, her bosom heaving with the strain of yearning and the steps. “Say! You’re not disappointed, are you?”

“Oh, surely not. Really! I expected nothing,” Jenny Rose fibbed.

Patsy tipped her head suspiciously. “But?”

“No ‘but.’ Honestly. I just … well … sort of would have loved to have had a window.”

“You’ll be glad not to have one when the storms rage, I’ll tell you!”

Jenny Rose smiled tiredly. “I love a storm.”

“Safe and snug you’ll be down here. No one’ll get you here.”

“Get me?”

The woman peered into the gaping suitcase then looked at her doubtfully. “That all you got? Paints and brushes and stuff?”

Jenny Rose hoisted the other bag up onto the bed and snapped it open. “See? Plenty of duds.”

Patsy Mooney’s grabby eyes lit up. “Hmm, what’s that nice old glittery thing you got there?” Jenny Rose recoiled. “My music box.” She stashed it away in the top drawer.

The woman stood there for an indignant moment then took the hint. She wet her lips. “Well. I’ll leave you then.” She shut the door.

Jenny Rose sank down onto the bed and wearily took it all in. She pulled the white wicker pail toward the bed and laid everything out beside herself, emptying her flight bag and her pockets of boarding pass, gum wrappers, and magazines. The apricot print silk she’d taken from Wendell toppled open like young cups of May leaves. And what was this? A folded paper the size of a tea bag. She kipped it open and onto the coverlet spilled two rocks of blue candy. Goodness, they glowed! They moved like gemstones. She picked them up. But these weren’t candy; they were glass. She peered closer. She was certainly no expert, but these looked like something precious. And they were matching. They looked for moment like bright blue eyes. She looked at them—and they looked at her.

Outside her door she heard a sound. Someone was there. A chill went up her spine. She cleared her throat. “Mrs. Mooney?” she called. But there was no reply. Maybe just the cat, she told herself. She looked back at the stones. They were so changing and pearly. “Moonstone,” she whispered aloud. That’s what they were. Milky blues and greens that moved as she beheld them, watery with color and light and set into almond-shaped and antique, intricate works of silver.

There was something radiant about these stones. Had Patsy Mooney been right? How on earth had Wendell got his hands on them? And what do I do now, she pondered, turn the poor kid in?

The rain outside came down with delicious force, like blue linguini, keeping him safe and hidden in the cluttered room. Who would come here now? Languidly, on hands and knees, he found his way through the blankets to Noola’s personal things. But there wasn’t much to interest him. Just artifacts. He thought of the statue and wondered blankly what had become of the eyes? He simply could not remember. But that was not his fault. There’d been so much going on … His gaze fell upon Noola’s books. She’d had so many books! He picked up the tattered Webster’s Universal Dictionary and thumbed carelessly through it. He should look something up. What? Something relevant to this place. Murder? No, not today. Ah, yes. Something enchanting. Masturbation? Why not? And here it was in black and white. So how vile could it be? Production of the venereal orgasm by friction of the genitals; self-abuse, onanism. Hm. What was that? One-ism? How true. He looked carefully at the words, fondly, almost, because there was beauty in truth, wasn’t there? And he could afford to be sentimental now. It seemed he’d passed that greenish pubescent phase. Now that he’d at last found his way to satisfaction with a mate.

He decided to look up his new best friend, torture. It was French. How fitting, he mused. “LL tortura, a twisting, torquere, to twist. 1. Extreme pain; anguish of body or mind; pang; agony; torment.” Yes, he agreed, stretching over the bedclothes, how well defined. He read on, aloud, now, savoring the sound of the words. He stopped. Where was that little cat? That was the thing. Once they knew you would hurt them, they were so hard to catch. He returned to his page.

“2. Severe pain inflicted judicially, either as a punishment for a crime, or for the purpose of extorting a confession from an accused person.” Ha! Even they said it was judicious.

“3. The act, operation or process of inflicting excruciating physical or mental pain.” He groaned with pleasure. Perhaps, he relented, tossing the heavy book aside, a little self-abasement, once or twice again … in this sentimental hollow, just for old times’ sake … ?

Claire

In Queens, I answered my cell phone. No doubt it would be Enoch. He’d chase me down now. But it wasn’t him after all; it was my sister Carmela. “Claire,” she said, “you’ve got to help me.”

“I can’t help anyone right now, I’m afraid.” I performed what I hoped was a tearful snort to emphasize the seriousness of my distress. “It’s Enoch. You won’t believe what happened.”

“Is he dead?” she said.

“No,” I said.

Because she grunted with what sounded like disappointment, I hesitated and she made use of the moment. “Claire. Please listen.”

She’d said please, which was a word she never used, and because she was not impressed by my anxiety, I let her go first. But she always went first. I call it the sense of entitlement the firstborn utilize constantly, but it’s more than that. It’s a mechanism of timing they have, the selfish ones. There is no courtesy moment ingrained in them. They just plunge on because feeling has nothing to do with it—unless it’s their own. You find my attitude cold? Wait. Let me explain.

Back when I’d first started going out with my husband, Johnny, the detective, part of the attraction I’d had for him was that he never really looked at Carmela. His way to put it was a disinterested shrug. Then he’d say, “Too many years doing vice to get caught up with a girl like that.”

This I’d found utterly charming. Imagine: a man who hardly noticed when my glamorous sister would walk in the room! Perfect. Or so I’d been fool enough to believe.

Because now, after years of being left out of pertinent information, I knew why.

When she was fifteen (and I was eleven—years before I’d even thought of dating), Carmela, with her excellent fake ID and all gussied up to look like a bombshell, latched onto a bevy of flight attendants and snuck into the local cop hangout in Kew Gardens. Who should be sitting at the bar but rookie Johnny Benedetto? From what I understand, he took her to the band shell’s parking lot in Forest Park in his convertible. Johnny always had a great car. Over her head and under the influence of three gin and tonics, Carmela surrendered her virginity. She’d been looking for someone to lose her virginity to, she’ll tell you. But she was just a girl, a foolish, miscalculating girl, and she got pregnant. That was not part of her plan. To be fair, Johnny didn’t know this, what with her going off to Ireland to have the baby. He’d chalked the episode up to a one-night stand and hadn’t even seen her again until years later, the night he’d come through the door of my parents’ house to court me. Neither of them had batted an eye. And I’d been definitely watching for signs of interest. Every guy I’d ever brought home went gaga for Carmela. And they’d recognized each other, all right. Carmela wouldn’t forget the man who’d cost her five months of her junior year at school and put her on a trip to rainy Ireland—a trip where she’d given up her daughter before she’d even seen her. As for him, well, no one would be able to forget Carmela’s bewitching face. But in our living room that night the both of them had simultaneously chosen to feign uninterest. Oh, they stayed far apart all right, sidestepping carefully away from each other the entire duration of my marriage. It wasn’t until recently he’d found out he had a child, because this secret had been kept even from me. Or, as my family likes to say, they’d carefully protected me from this knowledge.

If I’m honest with myself, me finding out about it certainly had a lot to do with our final breakup, at least from my end. That really put the bow on it.

I stood now on the corner by Holy Child Church. My marriage had fizzled, we know my relationship had fizzled, and if I moved, my cell phone fizzled.

“Claire!” Carmela spoke with harsh, attention-getting spleen. “Listen carefully. I’m outside Rome.”

I looked down at the soggy, elegant pumps I’d “borrowed” from her while she’d be gone and was still wearing and had better be careful of. I wiped their soles on the wrought-iron gate.

“And now,” she went on, “I got a message on my cell that Jenny Rose is in New York.”

“Jenny Rose? Your daughter?”

“Stop saying my ‘daughter!’ I don’t even know her!”

“Well, now’s your chance,” I muttered.

“Claire, those aunties made me swear on the Bible I’d have nothing to do with her when I let them have her.” Carmela lowered her voice. “You know they wouldn’t have taken her if I was going to waltz back into her life. I had no choice, for God’s sake! Claire. Just listen. She’s left the name of a place. I’ve written it out. Take it down before I lose you. Can’t you just go find her? She’s on Long Island somewhere. It’s some artist colony … used to be a posh resort town on the North Shore. What the hell’s the name of the place? Hold on. Here it is. Sea Cliff.”

Sea Cliff. The way Carmela said it, with that Ida Lupino English lisp of hers, it made it sound so alluring. The very name made me think of sailing boats and high winds.

“She says she’s working as an au pair. Look”—she sounded a touch frantic now and I pictured a handsome Italian coming within earshot—“she wants me to meet her out there at noon tomorrow, at a place called Once Upon a Moose. I couldn’t make out her number for all the dead spots in the call and so I can’t call her back. Can you go?”

“Jesus, Carmela, she’ll be expecting you!”

“Well, I can’t very well fly home in time, can I?” she shouted, then reasoned, “Look. She met you the time you went to Ireland for that funeral years ago. Can’t you do this one little thing for me so she doesn’t sit there looking at the door and no one comes?”

I could see the logic in this. Of course I’d met the girl. She was just a kid. Cute. But also very clearly a handful. I was actually glad Carmela showed some signs of feeling for her daughter, but I could already imagine the look of disappointment that would cross her face when she saw me instead of Carmela.

“You and Enoch could take a ride out,” she suggested, already triumphant.

So I laughed. What else could I do?

Jenny Rose

In the morning, Jenny Rose felt stronger. She’d slept well, despite the stuffy, claustrophobic space. It was new and clean enough, but whoever had designed the basement must have been a stranger to the rest of the house. She showered gingerly in the convenient pink washroom allotted to her and while she stood there dressing, her eyes fell upon the twin jewels. She’d best keep them safe. She did have a little green satin sack in the music box in which she kept a tiny pearl she’d bit into while eating clams in Ephesus. She took the music box out of the underwear drawer, opened it, and wound it. When it didn’t stick, it played the haunting “Waltz of the Flowers.” It hurt her just to hear it because the boy who’d broken her heart had given it to her. She should have gotten rid of it. But it was so old-fashioned and expensive looking … And she wasn’t ready—yet. She shut it. She placed the blue stones in the sack carefully, pulled the drawstring shut, and dropped it into her pocket. Then she made her way up to the kitchen. Ascending from her fluorescent-lit cave, she was startled by the sunshine in the windows. It was a relief.

“Good morning,” she greeted Patsy Mooney, who jumped guiltily and sprang to her feet. She’d been holding the Newsday and doing the Jumble. Nibbling delicately at a slice of cinnamon toast, she set another place for Jenny Rose. She danced around the table, light on her feet, the way some heavy people are. She had dainty hands and feet and unblemished skin, and very little, darting eyes.

“Coffee?” She held up the pot.

“If you don’t mind, I’d love a cup of tea. I could make it myself if it’s too much trouble.”

“Do I look like it’s too much trouble?” she said sharply.

“Oh! My, no. I’m sorry. Yes. I’d love a cup of tea.”

“Oh, all right. I’m sorry, too. Start fresh, all right? I’m not much for the morning.”

“Neither am I,” Jenny Rose said, relieved, although she loved mornings, but she didn’t want to start off on the wrong foot.

They sat together and waited for the pot to boil. A collection of white seashells rimmed Patsy Mooney’s workspace and her jars of wooden spoons. Jenny Rose studied her with her artist’s eye: the woman’s arms short and hairless, the skin of a beautiful woman stretched like a balloon over a sly face. Stupid, but sly. A taste for the flashy. This morning she wore a dress of cherries dancing over cotton cream. Her chubby wrist strained under a bauble of red and white poppets and her eyes strayed back to the paper. Jenny Rose realized she’d destroyed the woman’s happy solitude and decided from now on to bring a book to the table so as to restore her peace. She knew she’d been staring at her, but kept memorizing her just the way she was so she could draw her later. There was no eye like that of a first glance.

In an odd, falsely cheery voice from left field, Patsy Mooney pried suddenly, “Didn’t like things at home, huh?” It was like she’d heard it from someone else and had been saving it up. “Nowhere else to go?”

Jenny Rose didn’t see why she always had to be so cross. She extended her spine and settled her most forbidding look on the older woman.

Catching on to this new restraint, Patsy stirred her coffee counterclockwise. “Seems to me”—she spilled a little and sucked a tooth, revising her approach—“most young girls stay close to home …” She let that hang in the air.

“It’s true,” Jenny Rose said pleasantly. The woman was just being friendly. “I like to travel, though. Are you from New York, then?”

“That’s me. Born and raised in Oceanside.” She paused. “That’s the South Shore. You won’t see much of that.” She nudged her chin, indicating the rest of the house. “This here is the fancy North Shore. The gold coast, they call it. They think anyone lives on the South Shore ain’t worth the time of day.”

Jenny Rose laughed politely and inquired, “When will I see the little boy?”

“Look at that! Almost forgot what I was supposed to tell you! Dear diary, I’m thick as a post! Now. Wendell’s adopted. They told you that, right?”

“No,” she answered simply, delighted. Now she liked him even more. But she wasn’t about to tell busybody here that her reason for coming to the United States was to find her own birth mother. She smiled pleasantly.

“Right. Well, he is. But that’s neither here nor there. He goes to school every day, see. I get him off to the bus and that’ll be your job.”

“School? Isn’t he just four?”

“Almost five. You wouldn’t want him to yourself the whole day, believe me. He’s a job. You’ll find him sleeping on the floor with the cat. You can tuck him in good as you want but come morning, there he’ll be curled up like a dog on a rug at the window and the window wide open. Don’t ask me how he gets it open but he does. And not a word out of him! That’s seven twenty, now, remember. They pick him up here at the end of the drive. He’s a cinch to get up so you won’t have to be worrying about that. Opens his eyes and he’s up. It’s just getting his shoes on that’s the problem. Takes a long time. Once you get that done, he’ll be ready and waiting, smart as a pin. All dressed and teeth brushed. Not talking. And we know he can. But he won’t. Stubborn, he is, that’s all. That’s what I say. You’ll see.”

“What do you mean? He can’t talk?”

“Oh, he can, all right. Ungrateful. He just won’t.”

“Who’s been putting him to bed?”

“He goes by himself.”

At four? Jenny Rose felt a rush of outrage.

“Now, I’ll help you out at first—being there’s a time difference in your system—but after that, you gotta be up at six thirty to check on him. Here’s your tea.” She scowled and plopped a decrepit tea bag into a mug and crashed boiling water over that.

Jenny Rose made a note to buy some loose tea and a pot, if there was none. “Mrs. Mooney, what will I be expected to do today?”

“It’s Patsy Mooney, dear. Just Patsy Mooney. No ‘Mrs.’ anymore.” She raised her eyes dramatically and crossed herself. “Thank God that’s over. Mooney’s my maiden name and please God I never have to lay eyes on that man again! You’re free as a bird for the morning. At two forty, you gotta be here to meet the bus. Make sure you’re not late. The driver won’t let him off the bus if no one’s there and then there’ll be hell to pay.” She glanced to the side. “It’s just the kid’s never easy.” She shrugged. “He don’t want to get on the bus and then he don’t want to get off!”

Jenny Rose paled. Seven hours off on his own! A child that age. Of course he was confused.

“Mostly the driver yells at him loud enough and off he comes.”

“I’ll make sure to be there,” Jenny Rose promised, her eyes out the window, hungrily taking in the spectacular view. “And when will I meet Mrs. Cupsand?”

Patsy Mooney stood with her cup stopped before her mouth. “Nobody told you that part?”

“Sorry? What do you mean?”

She lowered her voice. “Nobody told you what happened or nothing?”

Jenny Rose regarded her attentively.

Patsy Mooney sat back down. “Annabel Cupsand took off with another man, hon. That’s the honest truth of it. There’s no other way to put it. Well, that’s why you’re here!” She winked. “Made off with plenty of the family loot, too, from what I heard.”

“Oh! Really? Gee, I’m sorry.” Jenny Rose stretched to reach for the honey and the green satin sack tumbled out of her side pocket. Guiltily, she slipped it back in.

Patsy Mooney narrowed her eyes. “What’s that?”

Jenny Rose reddened. Now was the moment to say something, surely. But some reservation held her back. “Just a little private thing I like to keep close.” She smiled. “My rosary,” she lied.

Patsy Mooney leaned conspiratorially closer. “Keep your private stuff on your person, like I do.” She pulled her collar aside and revealed three silver chains around her neck. A locket, a little key, and a golden heart dangled there. She gave a sly wink.

“Ah!” Jenny Rose smiled. “Faith, hope, and charity.”

“Not really.” She looked over her shoulder and moved her tongue into her cheek. “The heart’s from my father, rest his soul, the locket’s got my mother’s strand of hair, and the little red key’s just for the clock. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. So, like I was saying, good riddance to bad rubbish, when it comes to Annabel Cupsand, her and her long, showy red hair! He’s better off without her if that’s the sort she was.”

“Was?”

She stopped, seeing something far off Jenny Rose couldn’t. “It’s just sad. You know. For the little boy.”

“Yes, of course.”

“And she wasn’t such a bad person. … It’s just … she didn’t hardly have Wendell here and she goes and takes off …”

There was something about the two of them sitting together that opened some intimacy. Jenny Rose inquired carefully, “What exactly did happen with Mrs. Cupsand?”

“Annabel?” Her face softened and she relaxed. “She always had me call her Annabel. The day she left … it was snowing. I remember exactly. It wasn’t three weeks ago, and snow covered the cliff. The wind was moaning and carrying on! In the morning, the sun was shining and everywhere clean and white as a marshmallow. And cold! The town was covered and there was icicles everywhere. Cars are sliding off the road. It’s so treacherous because Sea Cliff is nothing but these steep hills, see?” She leaned in close. “It was early, before breakfast even. I come down … Mr. Cupsand was standing in the great hall. I thought that was funny, like, because he’s not one to use that way. He comes through the kitchen mostly. But there he was holding a pink letter in his hand and I thought, what’s that sound?” She leaned in close to Jenny Rose. “Well, dear diary, there’s Mr. Cupsand, howling like someone’s cutting off his foot! I come running in and it’s like he don’t even see me. He just stands there crying out loud and his sister, Paige, come running in and she couldn’t do nothing with him, neither. Then she picks up the letter out of his hand and—I’ll never forget it—she reads it and then she says to me, she says, ‘Patsy, go call Mr. Donovan. Mrs. Cupsand has left us. Tell Mr. Donovan to come here straightaway.’” Patsy gave a knowing nod, relishing her tale, “It was like she was afraid he was gonna shoot himself, see? Oh, it’s been bad days, let me tell you. Like someone died. And the little boy, well, he don’t seem to get that she’s gone. He don’t talk no more, neither. Not a word since that day! And he was a regular little chatterbox—had a way with words, he did!” She gave a mighty shiver. “So sad, what people do to people. And after all the trouble she went through to get him, too.”

“Yes, that is dreadful.”

“Well, she knew he’d be taken care of. It wasn’t like she dumped him in a garbage bin or nothing.” She made a face. “Took off with a doctor from St. Francis right over here in Roslyn. Her doctor, you know. Fertility.” She cocked a brow meaningfully. “Woman’s doctor.”

“Oh, dear.”

“I knew she liked him from the very start, the way she’d come back from seeing him all aglow. Talking what a wonderful doctor he was! I smelled something fishy right from the start.” Her fat face crumpled. “She isn’t a bad woman. Just … silly, you know? Likes pretty things.” She leaned in and gave a scornful snort. “Oliver—Mr. Cupsand—he likes them, too. Anything beautiful he likes. That and the Red Sox. He thinks art is the end-all, see? That’s what sold him on you as an au pair, if you want to know. It was my friend Darlene at the rectory told him you was an artist from her village in Skibbereen.”

“Oh, I must go and see her.”

Patsy’s face grew thoughtful. “Sometimes I think she felt like she failed him somehow, you know? Annabel? Because she was content all along just to be a housewife. Trouble was, all she ever did was spend money and fancy the place up. Shop, shop, shop. And she’d drag the kid! Americana Mall. Home Goods.” She licked the cream cheese from each finger with a smack. “’Course his sister’s supposed to be filling in and all. Mr. Cupsand’s sister, Paige. You’ll meet her soon enough.”

“Oliver and Paige.” Jenny Rose scoffed. “Nice, that is. Shame on their parents naming them British, like that, and them being Irish! But that’s typical of your self-loathing Irish, naming their kids what they think are the King’s English highfalutin’ names. Disgusting.”

Patsy Mooney eyed her carefully. “You should know. Jenny Rose isn’t what you’d call an Irish name, is it? Eh?”

“Oh. Well. You’re right there. My adoptive mother was utterly enchanted with anything at all Italian.”

“Anyways, like I was saying, Paige—the sister—just moved right in after the wife, Annabel, took off. It’s only she …” She hesitated. “You can’t say she don’t try with the kid. The truth is the kid just don’t take to her. Like he don’t warm up to her. … She don’t have no maternal instinct, if you get my meaning?”

But this was running too close to gossip. “When will I meet Mr. Cupsand, then?”

“Maybe not today. He stays in Manhattan some nights. More often than not he’s on the boat. Got a fancy sailboat right here in the port.” She shivered demonstratively. “They race them things, too, now spring’s here. Fly like the wind!” Patsy Mooney chattered on and Jenny Rose tuned out, wondering how to throw away the ghastly tea without offending her.

“You won’t get me on one of them, though. Not me. ‘Come along,’ he’ll say sometimes, ‘Come have a ride on the boat.’ But I won’t. Not me. Things go wrong in life. Well, they do. And I’m no swimmer.” She leaned her head in confidentially. “That was the last straw for the missus, if you ask me. He took her out on that boat of his and she didn’t want no part of it. She told him time and time again but he would insist …”

“Me, I’m a great swimmer,” Jenny Rose bragged.

“All that money.” Patsy Mooney shook her head, ignoring Jenny Rose’s remark. “Hundreds he spends on gas when there’s no wind! Brings trouble along with it, spending like that, you mark my words. …”

This reminded Jenny Rose of the stones in her satin sack. She wasn’t keen on hiding something. She’d report them to Mr. Cupsand straightaway. That’s what she would do, she decided, present the stones to him the moment she met him. Suddenly, at the thought of a morning all to herself, she had no jet lag at all. She walked her plate to the sink, shooting the tea down the drain. “Mind pointing me in the direction of town? I’d like to buy some things.”

“Buy?” Patsy Mooney frowned disapprovingly. “Before you get your first paycheck!”

“Just necessities. I’ll have a jog. And I must find the rectory and thank Mrs. Lassiter.”

“Darlene?” Patsy Mooney gave a guilty look. “She was here yesterday, bringing the soda bread for you. I forgot to mention it.” She made a sullen, cud-chewing face, having finished it off herself late last night. “Pretend I told you right away. She won’t know the difference.”

Jenny Rose looked her steadily in the eye. “She’s a pen pal of my adoptive mother, Mrs. Lassiter is, if you must know.”

“I know that. We play bingo together Wednesdays. Who do you think told her we needed someone here?”

“Oh. Then it’s you I should be thanking.”

“Not me. I just put the word out.” Patsy Mooney laughed then turned away. “Don’t thank me yet. Plenty of heartbreak in this house.”

“Is it right or left when you come to the end of the drive?”

“Well, it’s left. Town will be east of us. Not more than a ten-minute walk.” She stood with her hands backward on her hips. “Stores won’t be open yet, though.”

Jenny Rose washed out her cup and placed it on the drainboard. “I’ll be back well before one.” She smiled and took hold of her red jacket and was out the back door and whistling before Patsy Mooney could object.

Patsy Mooney lifted the white lace curtain and peered out the sink window at the departing figure. Hmmph. Not much to her. Washed-out little thing. Pretty smile, though. Light up the room. You had to give her that. She sat back down at the table and buttered her toast, then went back to reading the paper. Where was she now? Excitedly, she rode her pointer finger down the column to where she’d left off. Here it was, that doity business down in Broad Channel.

Claire

At Salerno’s appropriately dark and red Italian restaurant, Enoch stirred his coffee. It’s an old-fashioned, Fellini movie–look of a place in Queens, tucked away under the Montauk Line trestle. The local politicians come here, judges from the Kew Gardens courthouse, detectives with two hours to kill between hearings. In celebratory debacle, Enoch and I—who’d both long ago switched to green tea in the afternoons—drank fierce espressos today. I was miffed and tight. He was not, I thought, sufficiently contrite for the occasion. I began, “Look. I can’t believe this. My children have just let you into their hearts!”

“Claire,” he said, “your children are grown. They’re both away at school. It cannot have harmed them to have had a decent human being in the house after their father’s drinking and gambling knocked them off their hinges. I gave them nothing but encouragement and support. Be honest, all they ever saw from me was decency.”

I flinched. It was true. “How am I supposed to be engaged to you and then find out the truth about you and just let you, let you—”

Enoch smiled a sad old smile. I realized I couldn’t hate him. It was my ex-husband I hated. I couldn’t hate the both of them. It would be overkill. I slumped, exhausted, in my seat. Enoch was supposed to have been my refuge. I’d thought we were settled. I didn’t want to start all over again. I was tired of trying, tired of paying all that money up on Austin Street for highlights. This was all such a jolt. And yet, heaven knew Enoch had never asked to be gay. I slithered down still farther in my seat, abandoning all attempts at good posture.

“Claire …” He frowned, reaching across the table in his concern.

At that moment, it occurred to me that maybe I was overreacting. He was a nice man. He gave the most wonderful backrubs. And he didn’t scrimp the way some people I knew did. He kept on, kneading and plowing through the stress knots. We’d had such fun together. Really. Staying up late eating rosemary, garlic, and olive oil popcorn and watching Bette Davis movies. And he’d enjoyed it just as much as I. Oh. Yes. I see. I should have seen.

“You know,” he was saying, “I could keep Jake with me while you look for a place.”

I stared at him in disbelief. “Thank you,” I said, “but Jake is my dog and I’ll figure out—”

“Claire,” he interrupted harshly. “You can’t just take a dog Jake’s size to your mom’s house. He’s just too big. It’s not fair to her. And not fair to Lefty.”

Lefty is my parents’ dog. He is so named not because he is southpawed but because he was always to blame whenever someone left it. I know. It’s crude. We’re crude. “It’s a little inappropriate for you to be telling me what is and isn’t fair, okay?” I asserted. “And what makes you so sure I’ll go to my mom’s?”

“Where else would you go? He can come to the firehouse with me. He’ll love it. And he might be your dog, but I gave him to you,” Enoch said in a tit-for-tat tone of voice I’d never noticed. I realized what was happening. He was letting his guard down. No reason not to now. And the truth was, Jake would be fine with him.

What had happened to me? At one time I was thought to be the next Diane Arbus. True, I was the only one who had thought that, but my photography had taken me around the world and given me access to the flow of easy money. For a while I had been flush, but both these advantages, my career and the money, had withered early on the vine. What was wrong with me that caused husbands to betray me, houses to burn down around me, boyfriends to change entire sexualities on me, and people to get themselves murdered while I visited their towns?

“Have the eggs,” Enoch urged. “You always like them. C’mon. Feta cheese and spinach, with salt and pepper and tomato on the side. It will do you good. It’s early. You’ve got the whole day to work it off.”

He was right. This wasn’t about what was wrong with me. I might as well eat. I ordered the eggs. Enoch specified to the waiter exactly how I liked them. He would have an artichoke. My cell phone rang. It was my sister. I told you about her: Carmela, the bitchy one, the one in Italy. I have two sisters, actually. One’s a peach, a cop on leave of absence—she recently married an Italian landowner; the other, Carmela, is a writer—or so she claims—and is as cantankerous as a woman can be. But Carmela is beautiful and so gets away with everything. She looks like Gene Tierney but underneath that Catholic schoolgirl face lies a Machiavellian heart. I say this not in good fun; she’s sort of a sociopath. But people don’t get it because of the beauty thing. Beauty is as beauty does, they think. But it’s not true. Anyway the call came and went, and by the time I answered it, she was off on another. I know this not because her number climbed to the screen of my cell phone—I can never find my glasses quickly enough to read the numbers and answer it in time—but because she hangs up all the time if you don’t pick up quickly enough. So I know when it’s her—or isn’t her, as it were.

The eggs arrived in all their glory. I regarded Enoch’s innocent expression and decided to be frank. “Enoch, you asked me to marry you. Just when were you planning to tell me this?”

A crease appeared between his gentle eyes. “Claire. I keep telling you. It’s nothing. These are things that men do. It’s just …” He hesitated, looking for the right word, finally saying, “… release.” He pierced a slender fork hole in my egg and dappled it with A1 Sauce.

It was then I realized that there would be no end to the misunderstandings. Was I the last sexually loyal person on the planet? Suddenly I didn’t care. I stood, upsetting my eggs.

“Come on, Claire,” he exclaimed, losing patience, “sit down and attend to your brunch.”

Maybe it was that fussy stipulation that finally did it. Brunch. How right he was. It wasn’t breakfast and it wasn’t lunch. It was brunch.

“I’m counting on you to watch the dog until I can make other plans then, all right?” I relented. Even as I said it I felt I was betraying my dog, but what could I do?

He bit his lip with those white-white uppers and lowered his head in acquiescence.

I spent that afternoon and night on my parents’ lumpy sofa with their farting dog Lefty and by morning—feeling gritty, discombobulated, and in shock—I was anxious to shower and be off. I made my way over years of doggy saliva–coated toys to the kitchen. My mother, who mostly loves serial-killer stories but will settle for any horrific crime in a pinch, was enthusiastically relaying the details of a particularly gory heist out loud to my father. I caught the tail end. It was the follow-up story of that priest in Broad Channel who was whacked over the head for some holy statue. She reluctantly handed the paper over to my father when she saw me and, humming, set about making my breakfast. I had a soft-boiled egg in a blue cup painted with pagodas and fences and wise little men fishing from delicate bridges. Strips of buttered toast sprinkled with cinnamon my mother refers to as “soldiers” were presented on a cake plate from Vienna. I thought, Gee, maybe I will stay here. From the paper, the beat-up priest’s brave smile grimaced up at me. My shoulders sagged and I heaved a downhearted sigh.

“Don’t look so worried,” my dad said, pushing my foot under the table with his. “Is anyone shooting at you?” This was the prerequisite with which he, valiant survivor of World War II, would qualify any predicament.

My mother stood, her lips pursed. “I take it by your presence you’ve quarreled with Enoch.”

My father covered my hand with his own beefy mitt. “Everybody fights, Claire. A good fight clears the air.”

Look, I reasoned with myself, I’m alive and healthy and so are my kids. I’ve been through worse than this. Nobody’s dead or dying—or shooting at me. This realization did me good.

My mother hovered, hefting a pie dish of crullers above my head. “Are you going to tell me what’s up with you and Enoch or are you not?’

“Have you done something wrong?” My father eyed me carefully.

“No.”

“Then you’ll be okay.” He bit into his toast. “A clear conscience has the strength of ten men.”

My mother wasn’t so quick to let it go. “At your age, you’re better off making up. Plenty of lassies with their tongues hanging out just waiting to get a lick at a fine man like Enoch.”

“Mom,” I said, changing the subject, “Carmela told me Jenny Rose is out on Long Island.”

From the calculated look of self-satisfaction that crossed her face, I concluded it was she who’d sent Carmela’s cell-phone number to the auld sod. She’s cautious when it comes to her sister Deirdre in Ireland, though, and you have to watch what you say, Deirdre being a lesbian and an elderly one at that. Artistic, Mom safely dubs her. My mother is Catholic first and Christian second. I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the china cabinet. I was wearing Carmela’s clothes from yesterday, the grown-up-find-a-job outfit that was meant to say I was reliable and Republican. But that wasn’t me at all. I’m more of a used-to-be-pretty, dangling-earring, oriental-jacketed, befuddled-but-refuse-to-be-pigeonholed woman. So where had the real me gone? Was she ever coming back? I looked out the window.

“Take a chance.” Dad looked up from his crossword and instructed the president. “Try something new.”

I decided then. The days of running home to Mother were at last at an end. I got up to go and I told her, “Ma, save me the paper. I’ll be looking for an apartment when I get back.”

Jenny Rose

Jenny Rose was taking her jog past the marina when she caught sight of a really cute guy on a black boat with red sails furled. He had dark, silky hair like her own, only longer. Crafty eyes. Cheeky. Skinny. Weird. You could tell. He made quite a sight, cool as a rock star up on his deck on the cell phone, but his full attention was on her, watching her move. She moved faster, letting him see what a fine, healthy specimen she was and she pushed her short hair behind her ear and laughed at herself when she got far away. What a country, she thought, smiling to herself, out of breath, looking up at last to an authentic American blue sky, great dark clouds in the distance looming in like bedroom comforters. Sea Cliff’s wooden houses gripped the steep hills. She took each hill, spending an hour exploring the up-and-down terrain. Old branches heaved and toppled from the weight of all the recent rain. So many trees! The light was dappled and moving and she ran, intent, a good long while. She could hardly wait to paint it all. She was really in the country here, she realized, pleased, turning to head back. No one about. She came to a dense bit of forest, a shortcut from the look of it. The real path stuck to the outskirts, meandering off in the wrong direction, so she took the shortcut. The light was momentarily obliterated by green and dark and branches from the fury of trees. She slowed down. She could hear the birds bicker, the rude barking of some gulls, smell the pine and moss, but she was quite alone in the dark.

Suddenly all was silence. The shush of her sneakers on the pine carpet floor was the only remnant of sound. She felt the hairs on the back of her neck raise up and her heart quicken. She was being watched. Not the common watching of a strolling woodsman or an admiring pair of eyes. A hound, she thought first, feeling her body go cold. It was the calculated intention of some purposeful force. She kept her pace and never turned her head. Some deep sense of preservation kept her stalwartly moving forward; some instinct took over that knew if she hesitated, she would be the wounded gazelle and danger would strike. She’d be lost. She bent under low branches and passed into a gleam of sunshine, then almost laughed with relief. It had occurred within a minute’s space of time. And yet she knew she’d perceived something distinctly malevolent, something … foul. She looked this way and that, breathed the fresh air hard, rubbed her arms, and trotted on beneath the lowering sky.

It wasn’t difficult to find Twillyweed again. You could see it from anywhere. She made her way nervously across the cliff and found her way, glancing now and then over her shoulder, back across the vast property. There were green bent rods turning into day lilies and huge rectangles of screeching yellow forsythia. The feet of the stone wall borders were thick with rain-trodden daffodil and hyacinth, and the scent of their perfume lingered like darkening water. She felt, rather than heard, someone close by. Still jumpy, she cried out and turned.

There, on the other side of the yard, was Radiance wrapped in a heavy sweater, her voluminous hair now dragged back and knotted in place with a chopstick. Silver hoops reaching to the middle of her neck dangled from her ears and beside her was a folded turret of sheets and towels in a basket and a hardcover book opened up on her lap. She remained looking at Jenny Rose, poised and disdainful with a cigarette in one hand and a pack of matches in the other, her eyes limpid and unimpressed.

“Fuck,” Jenny Rose exclaimed with relief, “you scared the shit outta me!”

“Better not let the boss hear you using language like that, missy.” She closed the book and stuck it in the laundry like a secret. “He toss you right out.”

Jenny Rose nicked her head good-naturedly. “Ah, come on over and have one of mine.”

Radiance peered at her suspiciously, then, deciding it was cheaper to oblige, she tucked her own back in the pack and came across in a roundabout way, circling the hedge and perching herself delicately on the other side of Jenny Rose’s bench.

Jenny Rose studied her. Radiance looked a few years older than she—and so somewhat interesting. Her fingernails were painted red and perfectly maintained while her feet, naked in flip-flops, revealed a mangled, calloused wear. Her neck and legs were long and pretty and she wore a lot of silver bracelets that sang when she moved. She was, by Jenny Rose’s standards, spectacular. Also, she seemed like a tough girl, always a plus. Jenny Rose lit them up.

“That’s drop-dead gorgeous, that nail color. What’s it called?”

“Persimmon.” Radiance pulled her hand back and twiddled her nails in the air, admiring them. “I swiped it from Patsy Mooney.” She saw Jenny Rose’s look. “Phh. She didn’t need it. I found her painting things with it.”

“What’s that you were reading?”

“I’m not reading anything,” Radiance’s tone was inappropriately spiteful. “I just look at the pictures.” She sighed, looking somehow defeated, away. “And they tell me nothing.”

“Oh.” But she’d seen the gold letters peeking out upside down from the eyelet. It was the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The wind moved the branches just above them and Jenny Rose leaned back, enjoying the sky through the shimmering canopy of leaves. “What’s this, then, a beech?”

“Phh,” Radiance snorted derisively, “that’s a box elder. Don’t you know trees?” Softening a little, she added, “Just wait till the linden trees bloom. The smell is intoxicating.” A monstrous black-and-white cat strode across the garden, not bothering to give them a look.

“God, there are so many rosebushes! Like the grounds of a palace!”

“Noola and Annabel,” Radiance murmured dreamily, “they planted them.”

Jenny Rose gave her a blank look.

“Annabel is Mrs. Cupsand. Wife of Oliver.” She twisted the hem of her skirt, looked up quickly, and informed her, “And you don’t have to bother learning about her, Miss Nosy, because she’s gone. They’re both gone.” She shook her head and looked out to the sea. “Hard to believe, but they are. Annabel took off and Noola’s dead.”

“Dead?” Jenny Rose moved closer, alerted by the catch in Radiance’s voice. “Oh, I’m sorry. Was she very old?”

“Not that old. …” Radiance looked off moodily. “The thing is, she was fine the day before …” She cleared her throat. “She lived up there, Noola. In a little cottage just on the edge of that cliff. You can’t see it from here. Just from the beach. Only in winter you can see it from here. … She—” Suddenly she stopped, unable to go on.

Interested, Jenny Rose leaned forward, concerned, “You loved her, did you?”

Radiance turned her back. “You are such a busybody! Can’t a person just enjoy her privacy?”

Jenny Rose didn’t buy the routine, however, for she utilized cantankerousness herself as a cover for loneliness. Undeterred, she peered with Radiance into the distance.

But Radiance stood and turned her back, remarking dismissively, “Why am I talking to you anyway?”

“The cat can well look at the queen,” Jenny Rose shot back, hurt.

Misunderstanding, Radiance sputtered, “You make fun of me? Why? Because you think I’m a cleaning lady? I’m not just some cleaning lady. I’m a dancer, comprende?” She preened and lifted her long neck like a sassy crane.

Jenny Rose kicked her feet up and down like a child on a swing. “This is good,” she protested out loud, determined despite herself. “I can’t believe it. Here I am outdoors in the US, making friends.”

Radiance said disdainfully, “Don’t be so sure, Irish girl. Because as far as I’m concerned, you’re just another white ass. Look how white you are. You’re so white you’re almost green!” She made a face and twisted it back and forth and imitated Jenny Rose’s assertive tone the day before to Patsy Mooney: “‘I’m Miss Jenny Rose Cashin!’ Well, I’m Radiance Marie-Claire Piet.”

For a moment Jenny Rose was frightened for Radiance. There was some desperation in her voice that was not equal to this conversation. She seemed possibly unhinged.

Radiance took a last theatrical drag on her cigarette and flipped the butt to the dirt with spite. “Why would I let some little painter wannabe take up my valuable time, eh? Look. Women, I don’t like. They don’t like me and I don’t like them. Okay? You got it now?” She saw the crushed look pass on Jenny Rose’s face and justified in a rush, “You just gonna stay for a minute then pick up and leave like the rest of them anyway.” She gathered her things in her basket and got up to go.

The big cat Sam came around the ivy wall and sidled near. Jenny Rose wrapped one trembling arm around her knees and stroked the cat, then called after Radiance’s back in a hurried afterthought, “That says more about you than it does about me, you know.”

She sat there in the sudden emptiness, blinking. She would certainly not let this girl upset her. Today was a special day. Lightheartedness returned to her as she scanned the cliff path toward town. A thrill of anticipation propelled her happily forward and she stood. Today was the day. She could feel it. She would see her mother at last. All the bitterness of years gone by would be forgotten. She was grown up now, and understanding. She took the well-worn picture from her pocket and scanned it for the millionth time. It was a high school graduation picture, cracked and rubbed almost to oblivion, but it was her image. Her mother, as young as Jenny Rose was now. She could see her own reflection in the crackled plastic and she hugged herself and laughed and hurried away.

… It was always pleasant here between the dogwoods, he mused, lingering, pressed secretly against the bluestone wall, having enjoyed listening to the two silly bitches prattle on while he’d had his brunch. For they were candidates, weren’t they? Or they would be. He would have to groom them first. He’d have to be careful. Move slowly. He turned his face to the sun. A shame not everyone could enjoy it.

He took the hansome gray glove off carefully, so as not to get it dirty, and trailed his fingers across the gritty surface of the rocks, picking up the blobs of sap fallen from the maples. He liked sap. He’d cut the maples deep, in slivers, to get at it, then bring it, sticky, up to his nose.

But it was getting cold. Time to go. He picked his bag of takeout up and tucked it under his arm, then took the rock path carefully so he wouldn’t slip. Couldn’t slip. Oh, no. So much to do. And now with the old bitch gone, there was nothing more to stand in his way. …