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How Ella, Julia, and Alana ended up at the Nantucket wine bar along the coastline a little more than an hour after Quentin’s outburst, Julia couldn’t say. There had been a flurry of angry words, the pronouncement that Quentin “lacked empathy,” then the group decision to be quiet to allow Greta to rest, then another outburst before the ultimate exhale that Greta had confessed to wanting out. She wanted a divorce. They had to listen to her.
The three Copperfield sisters sipped wine quietly and watched the ocean lap up against the rocks. Each seemed to stir in their worries.
Julia realized that part of the reason for her sorrows was that, in a way, she’d envisioned The Copperfield House being a savior for her after Jackson’s departure and the publishing house’s failure.
But ultimately, the Copperfields had already failed twenty-five years ago. They were the walking dead. It was better to get Greta out while they still could.
And maybe Bernard would be happier alone at the house to eat his cashews and listen to Rachmaninoff. It was a different version of prison. But at least the people who resented him the most, his family, wouldn’t lurk down below.
“That night that he tried to cook us dinner...” Julia began thoughtfully. “I feel like he wanted to tell us something.”
Alana rolled her eyes. “What could he possibly say? ‘I’m sorry for ruining our family.’ It’s done. Maybe Quentin’s right. We should all move on from this. Sell the house. Go back to our lives. Asher’s probably waiting for me in Paris, wondering which bakery sells the best baguette... I always know the answer.”
“I just think he deserves to be heard,” Julia countered, ignoring the Paris comment. “We’re all here together for the first time in twenty-five years. And aren’t you curious what he might have to say?”
“No,” Alana answered, although Julia didn’t believe her.
Ella remained lost in thought.
Julia heaved a sigh, lifting her chin toward the sharp and salty winds.
“Do you remember Marcia Conrad? That young woman who—”
“Who Dad was having an affair with,” Alana finished. “How could I forget his little blonde sidekick?”
“What about her?” Ella asked softly.
“Well...” Julia groaned, trying to figure out how to explain this without giving up the news that her publishing house was going under. “The other day, I went through those old manuscripts in the downstairs study again. You know, just in case anything stood out to me for the publishing house. I started to look up where some of the writers ended up— in universities and kindergartens, stuff like that. Only Marcia Conrad’s career actually took off in a big way.”
“That’s no surprise,” Alana countered. “She was beautiful.”
“Her looks have nothing to do with her talent,” Ella returned sharply.
“Still,” Alana said. “They got her there. Trust me. I worked in that industry for too long.”
“Call it curiosity. Call it nosiness. Call it whatever you want. But in any case, I reached out to her to ask her about her time at The Copperfield House,” Julia interrupted. “And about the nature of her relationship with our father.”
Ella’s jaw dropped with surprise. “What! Julia...”
“I figured she wouldn’t even see it or that someone from her team would delete it. But instead, I got this crazy email.” Julia brought the message from the attorney onto her phone screen, which she showed to Alana and Ella.
“Wow...” Ella breathed.
“Isn’t that strange?” Julia demanded. “I mean, why would they react like this? I said in my message that I knew it didn’t matter, that I was just trying to put together the pieces of my family’s puzzle.”
“I don’t know if we should put too much stock into this,” Alana returned. “Legal teams jump on anything they think might get blown out of proportion. Besides. The girl’s smart. She knows to keep her distance from the Copperfield family. We’re poison, remember.”
Julia’s stomach twisted with confusion. Alana was probably right.
Julia sipped the rest of her glass of wine, splayed a ten on the table, and told her silent sisters that she wanted to go for a walk alone to clear her head. It was April 13th, just four days before her forty-third birthday. Had she fantasized about celebrating that birthday with her family in The Copperfield House? Had she pictured her mother baking her a cake? Truthfully, she had, but she now shoved these thoughts deep within her as her stomach tightened with sorrow.
Back to Bartlett. Back to that big house alone.
A divorced friend had tried a dating site called OkCupid for a while with not much success.
Maybe Julia could try her hand at dating for the first time in so long. She pictured herself at a dinner table somewhere, listing her interests one after another as a forty-something accountant sat, bored, across from her.
Ugh.
About five minutes after Julia had escaped the wine bar, she received a phone call from her eldest daughter, Anna.
Julia’s heart leaped. At least this was something she understood: how to be a parent to her three most important people.
“Hi, honey,” Julia answered. “This is a surprise. How are you doing?”
“Hi, Mom.” Anna’s voice sounded strained.
“Is there something wrong?” Julia continued to buck forward beneath the April sun, too disengaged from her feelings to understand Anna’s.
“Well, Henry said that he stopped by the house, and it looks like nobody’s been there in a while? Your SUV’s gone?” Anna said. “And then I asked Dad where you might be, and he said he had no idea?”
Julia’s stomach twisted strangely. She had to lie her way out of this if only to preserve herself. There was too much going on without this, too, affecting her.
“Oh, honey, your father’s been so busy with Beijing stuff that I didn’t want to worry him,” she explained.
“Yeah? Then where are you? I told Henry maybe you went into Chicago to focus on work.”
For a split second, Julia considered saying this was true. But then, what would that lie do for her? Henry would probably try to track her down in the city where he lived, and then she’d be caught.
“I had to head out to Nantucket for the week,” Julia explained. “My mother was ill.”
The silence on the other end of the line was heavy.
“Your mother?” Anna breathed. “You’ve hardly ever mentioned your mother. And when we asked about our extended family, you just...”
“I know, honey,” Julia replied, her voice laced with exhaustion. “It’s all a really long story. I’ll tell you one of these days, okay? But I really have to go. Just know that I’m safe. Your dad’s safe. We’re all good. Keep working hard on your internship. I love you.”
“I love you, too.” Anna’s voice was distrusting and strange.
But before Julia could doubt herself, she hung up the phone. She couldn’t worry about her children or her husband or that whole other life just then. She burned with anxiety and stress. She had to walk it off.
**
SOME OF THE MOST PROMINENT mansions on Nantucket Island were located on Polpis Road. Years ago, Julia had read an estimate that the entire road and its immense estates were worth upward of four hundred million dollars. This made the eighteen million her father had stolen seem laughable.
As Julia paced down the road, a dog walker approached with five different breeds latched to five different leashes. The dogs were beautiful and gleaming, as though they’d just come directly from the salon. It was a sure bet that they each belonged to a millionaire that lived on Polpis Road, one that was simply too tired to walk them.
Toward the middle of the street, a large, ornate sign read: PUCK.
Julia’s heart seized with recognition. She’d been to that beautiful red-brick mansion before, played its grand piano, and fell in love with its gleaming staircase railing, which she and Ella had ridden down before Quentin had yelled at them.
The house belonged to Gregory Puck, one of her father’s ex-best friends and the man she’d stumbled into at the grocery store when she’d first arrived. The man who’d belittled her and, for the first time, brought up the memory of Marcia Conrad.
What was it he’d said?
“Gosh, she seemed like such a prop for him, didn’t she? While he stole my money right out from under me, she was always right there, performing for us. Distracting us from what he was up to.”
Julia’s jaw dropped.
This, together with the email she’d received from Marcia’s attorneys, clicked in her mind.
She rushed for the fence that outlined the Puck property, burning with anger. With her finger on the outdoor bell, she heard a loud blare within the mansion. And a moment later, a young man answered it with a simple, “Puck residence.”
“Hi. My name is Julia Copperfield. I need to speak with Gregory Puck.”
“What is this regarding?”
“Tell him it’s urgent,” Julia said.
“Mr. Puck is not avail—”
“Hello? Who is that?” Gregory’s wife, Bethany, appeared across the vibrant green grass on the lawn that rolled around the mansion. She was stunning in her wide-brim hat and an old-fashioned forest-green dress.
“Hi! Mrs. Puck. It’s me, Julia Copperfield.”
Bethany’s smile flickered in and out as she approached. Confusion filled her eyes. “Julia. Of course. How has your time been on the island?”
She spoke through the fence, reluctant to let Julia in. Maybe she thought she was after the Puck funds, just like her father.
“It’s been interesting,” Julia replied, sounding cheerful and kind. “I was just on a walk down Polpis Road and remembered you lived right here. Such a beautiful house. We just don’t have places as grand as this back in Chicago.”
That’s it. All you had to do was compliment rich people to make them melt like butter in your hand.
“That’s very kind of you to say, Julia. I’m sure your place in Chicago is gorgeous, as well. We’ve always loved Chicago. Gregory goes for the sports. I love the shopping on Michigan Avenue. And the hot dogs!” Bethany giggled playfully.
“Oh, yes. Chicago Dogs are incredible,” Julia affirmed.
They exchanged light banter for a few moments, with Julia playing the part of an all-around nice neighbor, not one who was trying to manipulate the conversation in her favor at all.
When the conversation stalled, Julia snapped her fingers and said, “It’s so good I ran into you. I’ve been thinking about what Mr. Puck said at the store.”
“Oh, honey. Don’t worry about him. He was angry all those years ago, but he’s gotten over it. Really. I think he was just taken aback that night at the grocery store. On top of it, he was having a nasty flare-up of back pain.”
“Terrible to hear that,” Julia offered. “But he has every right to be angry. The question I have is about the young woman he said was always with my father. He couldn’t remember her name at first.”
“Marcia. Marcia Conrad.” Bethany’s face became stony. “I remember her well. The men treated her like a trophy, almost passing her back and forth among them.”
Julia shook her head disdainfully as though to say, Men! Can’t live with them; can’t live without them.
She then added, “I can’t help but think that Marcia might have had something to do with the funds that were stolen from your husband and his friends.”
Bethany arched her brow.
“Do you think something like that could have happened? That maybe Marcia and my father were working together in some way to manipulate your husband?”
Bethany’s lips formed a round O. “You know, if that were true, it would answer a lot of questions for me. I couldn’t help but wonder why Marcia Conrad bothered to hang around with older men when she could’ve had anyone she pleased.”
Julia’s heart jolted against her ribcage. “And if my memory serves me correctly, she left right around the time he was first accused.”
“Running away from the mess,” Bethany whispered.
Bethany and Julia held the silence for a moment. Overhead, a beautiful long-winged bird streamed toward the clouds above.
“I just can’t help but think that she knows something. She’s been allowed to have such a promising career while my father’s spent the past twenty-five years in prison. Is that strang?”
Bethany turned her eyes to the ground. Together, they stirred in the sorrow and shame that came from learning about a wasted life. Bernard Copperfield had committed crimes, and he’d paid for them, year after year, counting the days. But that didn’t mean that Bernard Copperfield wasn’t one of the worthiest thinkers of his generation, a man who could have continued to make great and powerful works of literature. All things could be true at once.
“Thank you for your help,” Julia said simply. “I have to go.”
With that, she turned on her heel and fled down Polpis Road, as though if she remained in the midst of all those mansions for a moment longer, she would suffocate.