June 15, 1957
Dear Diary,
Actors—even washed-up drunks—are so status conscious. Who’s more famous, who gets better reviews, star billing. Even at Hideaway Home, the saddest corner of the barnyard, there’s a pecking order.
I’m the alpha hen. Though I never tell anyone, everyone seems to know that my baby’s father is a star. Also, I’m the youngest. I have a future. Maybe.
Dr. and Mrs. Fogel favor the ones with money. Lorna Florian-Beck—a stylish older lady who wears diamonds and furs to breakfast—runs ahead of the pack. She sits with her friends at meals. She talks nonstop, and the others listen.
One day at lunch she paused by my table. I was alone. I always eat alone. She leaned down. She smelled of French tobacco.
She whispered in my ear. She said, or I thought she said, “I’d be careful if I was you. I’d get the hell out of here while you can. Because… you know why. I don’t have to tell you.”
Then one of her friends whisked her away, leaving me shaken.
The next morning Lorna Florian-Beck didn’t show up for breakfast, which was very unlike her.
She’d never missed a meal.
Mrs. Fogel checked her room. Suddenly people were rushing around, shouting and making phone calls. We were all ordered back to our rooms.
I’m scared of dead bodies. I’m superstitious.
I spent all day by the window, watching for them to wheel her out. They didn’t, unless it was in the middle of the night. I never saw her again.
In the afternoon, I went for a walk in the field. I saw what looked like a fresh grave.
Emma puts down the journal.
The graveyard. No wonder there are no names on the stones. The people who died there disappeared. Didn’t they have families? Emma tries to think of the name of the horror film about the hotel where the guests keep disappearing, but the hotel can prove they never checked in.
Why did they even bother with stones? Bobo the gravedigger…
That day, lunch—cold cuts, bread, oranges for me—was quiet. All the residents seemed subdued. Mrs. Florian-Beck had already changed from a rich old pain in the butt to everyone’s dead best friend.
Just before dinner, the doctor called us into the theater. He was sorry to announce that Mrs. Florian-Beck had passed. A heart attack. But as always with a sudden death there would be an inquest. A purely routine procedure.
Pretty soon we heard rumors about Mrs. Florian-Beck’s will. She’d left a third of her estate to her two Persian cats, and the rest to Dr. and Mrs. Fogel.
Two long-haired gray cats with undershot jaws moved into Hideaway Home. They were beautiful but furtive. They ran when they saw me coming.
The coroner found no evidence of wrongdoing.
No one had seen anything. Well, I had. I’d seen Mrs. Beck’s diamond ring on Mrs. Fogel’s finger one morning when she brought me crackers in bed. She must have slept with it on and forgotten. Is there anything tackier than sleeping in a dead woman’s diamond ring? The only thing worse would be killing her for her money. And burying her in the field.
THE NEXT DAY, Emma decides to take another walk in the field. This time she avoids the area where she found the little graveyard. The place where she saw the girl and the baby.
JD needs to get someone to mow the grass in back. It’s like summer wheat, golden and high, with sharp edges that scratch her legs. No matter how many layers Emma puts on, seals her cuffs and wrists with rubber bands, and tucks her hair up under her hat, she still feels ticks swarming her.
Back inside, she rips off her clothes and throws them in the laundry. She fills the tub and stays there, reading, adding more hot water when it gets cold. She’s ordered, from her bookstore in the city, a stack of British mysteries: Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Margery Allingham. One thing she likes about them is that the husband didn’t always do it. She’s careful not to get the books wet, but still the pages pucker in the steamy air.
At four she stops reading, gets dressed, and goes outside.
JD and the boys are splayed around the porch, sitting on the floor, leaning against the columns. JD sits in one of the rockers. Emma eases into the other.
JD says, “Is it okay if we hang out here?”
Emma says, “Please stay. I’m glad for the company.” She hopes she doesn’t sound pathetic. They already know she never sees anyone but them, and Ben on weekends.
It’s nice, being there with them. They’re talking about a friend of one guy’s dad and what a jerk he is. The drone of their voices, their laughter, is comforting. Nothing’s expected of her. She can sit there, staring at nothing. She’s allowed. She’s a pregnant lady. The boss. The baby kicks and snoozes, kicks and snoozes. Sweet.
JD’s drinking a beer, as are the two older guys. The rest, Emma’s glad to see, are drinking some kind of energy drink.
JD says, “It’s all going great. It’s as if the house wants to be fixed,” and one of the older guys says, “Really, it’s awesome.”
“Thank you all,” Emma says.
“You’re welcome,” JD says. “No problem.” And then they all fall silent and listen to the crickets.
After a while, JD says, “Is it okay if we get started?”
He means they’re going to talk about parts and labor, but it’s the most interesting thing Emma will do all week. Of course. Of course it’s okay.
JD takes a paper from his briefcase and reads out figures. Emma can’t listen, and neither do the kids. Emma closes her eyes, listening to JD’s calm deep voice. The insects, the birds, the breeze. Nature is buzzing. It’s peaceful.
Emma says, “Can I ask you guys a weird question?”
She senses JD getting tense.
“You guys know there’s a graveyard out back, right?”
“Every house in this county has dead bodies buried somewhere,” says one of the kids, and everybody laughs. “Usually in the cellar. People are too lazy to dig up the fields.” The boy’s skin is mottled with scaly patches, and Emma thinks of the still unidentified orange-eater, who’s never done it again.
Emma says, “Do you guys know they had their own undertaker? And the three hermits, and—”
The silence is sudden, deep, and uncomfortable. Everyone feels the temperature drop.
Finally, JD says, “People had different ideas. Different laws. Who knows what’s six feet under?” He includes the yard with a sweep of his arm. “A septic system that needs work.”
One of the younger kids says, “It’s that horror movie. The city couple comes up and zombies climb out of the swimming pool.”
Emma laughs. They all laugh. The moment is over.
THE NEXT DAY Emma goes back to the attic and begins to read from where she left off.
Either Mrs. Beck gave Mrs. Fogel the ring or she stole it. I don’t feel like playing detective. I’m not here to see justice done, but to wait for the baby.
I appreciate Mrs. Florian-Beck’s warning. But I’ve begun to think it wasn’t the first time she’d said that. At the end of her career she’d specialized in evil housekeeper roles. At least she can still spook people, she still has her acting chops. In the days since she’d said it, I’d convinced myself that she just liked scaring people. That’s all it was. The Fogels are unappealing, but I don’t think they’re killers. Mr. H. wouldn’t have sent me here.
If the Fogels kill me, it might mean real trouble for his career.
Or would it? Nobody knows I’m here.
Emma looks up from the book. Acting chops. How modern Rapunzel sounds.
Dr. Fogel’s lectures can be strange, but today’s seemed a little… unhinged. This one was called “Home Burial; or, Keep the Living Close and the Dead Closer.” Some of it was hard to understand. I focused when he began to talk about having the spirits of the dead near enough to exert their influence on their loved ones. Public cemeteries were inhuman, he said.
We held Mrs. Florian-Beck’s memorial service in the theater. They covered the painted backdrop in black, though Lorna Florian-Beck might have preferred the mural of the palace garden.
Emma shuts the notebook. She can picture it. The mural in the theater. She and Ben decided to leave it there because it was so beautiful. They couldn’t take it down.
She imagines creepy Dr. Fogel, standing in front of the mural. A framed photo of the dead actress, draped in black.
Once she would have been eager to tell Ben, but now she doesn’t want to. He’ll tell her the diary isn’t good for her. He’ll say, You’re the one who worries about scaring the baby.
She and Ben used to tell each other everything. She can’t recall when that ended. Maybe when she got pregnant. She’s become another person. But these aren’t really important secrets to keep from him. A journal in the attic. Something that may or may not have happened at the house.
On an easel, surrounded by lilies, an enlarged head shot of Mrs. Lorna Florian-Beck—young and gorgeous, covered in jewels and furs, styled and made up, starring in a Broadway musical—dominated the stage. She looked happy to be there. Happier than in life.
Residents took turns speaking about what a great actress and friend she was. They were actors playing the part of dry-out-clinic mourners. A few people talked about how great she was as the evil housekeeper.
I’d hardly spoken to her. She’d warned me to be careful. She’d scared me, and she’d meant to.
I didn’t tell anyone that I’d seen Mrs. Fogel wearing Mrs. Beck’s ring.
After the service we went out on the lawn and posed for a group photo. Dr. and Mrs. Fogel were always taking pictures of the guests and staff. We had to smile and say “Cheerful!”
I don’t know what they used the pictures for, probably advertising. Look at all the happy, recovered Broadway stars! It made me uneasy. That and the dead woman’s warning.
I’ve begun to think about leaving before the baby is born.
EMMA LOOKS OUT the attic window, braced to see the girl and the baby. There’s no one on the lawn. The emptiness is almost as scary.