The Ghosts of Lovely Women Read online

  “Good. Ready for some dinner?” He’d been rooting around in my kitchen, and something smelled absolutely wonderful.

  “So ready I can’t believe it. What time is it, anyway?”

  “Almost seven. I made some fajitas for us.”

  “Yum. You know, I was thinking about Jessica again.”

  “Yes?”

  “These little “clues” she left — for me, and possibly Kathy, and also, it seems, for your sister — they seem more like a game than like reality.”

  “Meaning what?” He came out with some drinking glasses and set them on my table.

  “Meaning, I don’t know that she ever expected us, or wanted us, to figure them out. Maybe they had a totally different function. Maybe it just amused Jessica to make a reference that we would never get. To know those little clues were out there, but that they were safe from anyone’s interpretation. And yet, if she simply gave them a key, they would know everything…”

  “Seems like a lot of work to go through.”

  “Yes. But in her little note, she mentions “the miracle.” That’s another reference to A Doll’s House.”

  “Oh?” He paused on his journey back to the kitchen. “How so?”

  “All through the climax of the play, Nora keeps saying that a miracle will happen, that it will happen any moment now. She’s committed a crime — forgery — which she did out of love. She needed money to help save her husband’s life, and women weren’t allowed to borrow money without a man’s consent. Now she’s caught in a net, and she believes that when her crime is exposed, her husband will take the blame. That’s the miracle. But in Jessica’s case — well, it’s just her re-imagining the story again. Saying she doesn’t need a man to get her out of trouble.”

  “And does he?”

  “What?”

  “In the story. Does her husband take the blame?”

  “No. He blames her for everything. He calls her a hypocrite, a liar, a criminal. He fears that he will be thought her accomplice. He utterly betrays her idealism.”

  “Wow. What a bastard.”

  “Jessica thought so, too. But I’m worried about this, Derek. She said, ‘I make the miracle happen.’ So does that mean she’s going to take responsibility for something she’s done? Or is she going to force a man to take responsibility for something he’s done?”

  “Her poem makes me think that it’s choice B.”

  “Me, too, I think.”

  Derek brought in dinner — which was delicious — and I ate and talked with him in a distracted way, still thinking about Jessica and her inscrutable actions.

  Derek cleared the table and did my dishes. I packed my briefcase for the following day, and he appeared next to me with a quick kiss. “I should go,” he said.

  I started. “Why?”

  “Well, you seem like your mind’s on something else right now. And just because you’re my girlfriend doesn’t mean I’m going to assume that I can stay here.”

  “I’d like you to stay.” I put my arms around him. “I was hoping you’d stay.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. This morning — we were kind of rushed. I was hoping that tonight we could… take more time. Not that this morning wasn’t nice. It was very passionate.”

  “Indeed,” Derek said against my cheek.

  That did it. With something like a growl I grasped his arm and pulled him to my bedroom. He laughed and let himself be pulled, and we landed together on my bed. Outside the storm had become a true tempest, and lightning briefly illuminated our faces. On Derek’s, the text I read most clearly was devotion. I wondered what he read on mine; whatever it was, it seemed to encourage him, because he bent his dark head until he was an inch from my lips and said, “This is the beginning, Teddy.”

  *

  I dreamed of Jessica; she was in the Underworld, but she wasn’t clamoring to reach the blood, as the others were who craved re-animation. She was animated already, and just like her old self. She laughed when she saw me peeking into the dark hole that led to Hades’ kingdom. “Miss Thurber, I was just thinking about you,” she said. “Didn’t you read my book? Didn’t you look at my website? I’m getting revenge for Nora Helmer!” I realized then that it wasn’t Jessica at all, but an illusion — a tragic Echo who could only repeat things that Jessica had said in life.

  I tried to reach her anyway. “Jessica, listen to me! You’re in danger. You’re in danger, and you shouldn’t be playing games. You’re just a girl, Jessica. You’re just a girl.” I was trying to warn her; hot tears burned my eyes and fell down my cheeks.

  “You should come to New York!” said Jessica’s image. “You would love New York, Miss Thurber!”

  “Jessica, what does it all mean? These puzzles of yours.”

  “I’ll even buy you lunch. I’m an independently wealthy young lady these days. A wealthy young lady these days!” Then a noise, a horrible gasping noise, sent all of the souls running away, especially the girls, and even Jessica looked frightened…

  I woke up, perspiring. The storm was over; it was still dark, but I could tell it was morning, and a fragrant breeze came in the window I had left open just a bit. P.G. snored in his basket at the foot of the bed, and Derek slept quietly beside me, his feet still intertwined with mine. I gently disentangled myself and ran a finger down his cheek before I got up, donned a T-shirt, padded into my living room and sat in a chair. I had the oddest feeling that I had just spoken with Jessica — that she had only just left my apartment — that the room still vibrated with the energy of her presence.

  But I realized it was just a dream — I had dreamed about her, and about Will’s story from The Odyssey. I was thinking of what she had said to me on her phone message — about how she had said she’d buy me lunch. She had said, “I’m an independently wealthy young lady these days.”

  I sat up straighter. Jessica had been raised in a wealthy family, but she had stressed that she was recently an independently wealthy person. And the money from her website had gone to women’s shelters — Mitch Menteith had said so. So what did Jessica mean? Where had she gotten the money to make her wealthy independent of her family?

  I thought of Kathy Olchen’s note: “2000 dollars so far.” Was that the money that Jessica had made? Was this the “cash” that Kathy had asked Danny and Mitch Menteith about? Had Jessica gotten it from some man who feared exposure? The man who “wouldn’t step down?”

  “Oh, no,” I said. It seemed as clear as day. Jessica had been blackmailing someone.

  Twenty-Three

  “But I’m telling you this: if I get shoved down a second time, you’re going to keep me company.”

  —Krogstad, A Doll’s House, Act I

  Half an hour later on Wednesday morning it didn’t seem quite so clear, and I felt nervous about even mentioning my conclusion to Derek. He had hinted, the night before, that I was getting a bit too caught up in Jessica’s murder, and perhaps I was. But the more I thought about her, the less I seemed able to stop thinking about her, especially because there were so many tiny threads connecting me to her life, her death. Still, I didn’t intend to pursue ridiculous notions. There were ways of finding out a bit more before I went off half-cocked, spewing theories to Derek or running to Detective McCall.

  I still sat in one of my living room chairs, gazing out the window at the rain-washed world and trying to sort my thoughts.

  Derek appeared in a pair of boxers, looking rumpled and adorable.

  “Hi,” I said. “Happy May 5th.”

  “Cinco de Mayo.” His voice was still morning-ish, but he was making an effort to be sociable.

  “There’s coffee on the stove,” I told him. “But you don’t have to be up yet. I don’t think it’s even six o’clock.”

  “You left,” he said simply.

  “I had a dream, and it woke me up.”

  He had gone into the kitchen and was pouring coffee, but his eyes were on me. “Did you dream about me?”

  “I wish I had
. I can’t believe I didn’t, considering the lovely experience I had just before I went to sleep.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You’re spilling coffee!”

  “Sorry.” He grabbed a paper towel and started mopping up the little puddle on the floor. “You’re distracting.”

  I sighed and stretched. “I shouldn’t even be in a good mood. I had a bad dream, and Kathy’s wake is tonight.”

  “Right.” He sobered and sipped his coffee, making his way to the dining room table.

  “By the way, I have to banish you from my house today. I have to catch up with my reading for my grad class. I’ve been grading papers and falling behind, and now I need about six straight hours to read.”

  “Okay. I’ll do all my department paperwork. What about tonight?”

  “That is negotiable,” I said.

  We smiled at each other in a comfortable silence. I was relieved to realize that I didn’t need to make desperate conversation with Derek, and he seemed to be appreciating that, too. Finally I stood up and stretched. “I need to get ready. I’d like to get there a little early today — do you mind, Green Week partner?”

  “Fine. I’ll throw some eggs in a pan while you’re in the shower.”

  “You keep feeding me, I’ll get used to it,” I warned.

  “Then I’ll keep feeding you,” he said.

  *

  I walked down the second floor hallway, feeling generally contented, when a screeching girl grabbed her friend’s arm and yelled, “You texted me? I texted you!” The amazing coincidence had them both in a frenzy. I couldn’t imagine why anyone wanted to talk to anyone else on a cell phone, home phone, or even computer at 7:20 A.M.

  “Quiet down, girls,” I said. They disregarded me. At this time in the morning, teachers are mere ghosts in the halls; many students don’t acknowledge authority until the first bell rings — it’s one of those unspoken rules they have among themselves.

  I sighed and went to Room 202—my room. Rosalyn’s locker was just down the hall, and she stood there in the plaid uniform she’d shortened against regulations, rapidly punching buttons on her phone. “Rosalyn? Can I talk to you for a minute?” I asked.

  She looked at me, bright and pretty as always but with a bit of exhaustion around the eyes, and said, “Sure, Ms. Thurber.” She hit one last button, then tucked her phone into her purse and picked up her book bag. I unlocked my door and she followed me inside; the room smelled musty. Rosalyn helped me open some windows, and I turned on the ceiling fans (St. James was not an air conditioned building).

  “That’s better.” I sat on top of the radiator and Rosalyn sat on it, too. We were on equal footing this way — I wasn’t facing her from behind the desk of authority. “I wanted to ask you something else about the last day you saw Jessica.”

  Rosalyn’s eyes widened. “Are you trying to figure this out on your own, too?”

  My stomach gave a nervous jolt. “Who else is trying?”

  “Danny. He’s being kind of weird to everyone. He thinks that he can, like, hunt down the perpetrator like the guy in the book. He said it’s a psychological puzzle.”

  “But it could be a perfect stranger who killed her. It probably is.”

  Rosalyn paled. “It’s so hard to believe.”

  I touched her hand. “I know. And I’m sorry to keep bothering you about this. It’s just that questions keep popping into my mind, and then I wonder if their answers might help the police. Assuming someone has the answers.”

  “What kind of questions?”

  “Well, for one — did Jessica say anything to you about someone in authority? Someone she resented for some reason? Someone — oh, I know I’m not saying this very well — but someone she felt should NOT be in that position of authority?”

  Rosalyn studied my face for a moment. “It’s weird that you ask that, because she — I don’t know — she seemed like she had this feeling of power.”

  “Power over someone?”

  “I don’t know. She was saying stuff like about how she had a unique chance to make a difference. That she had waited far too long. I figured it was just like, paraphrasing from all those books she was reading. I didn’t really get into that stuff — all that self-help sort of stuff.”

  “Did she say what she wanted to make a difference about?”

  “Not really. I mean, at the time it didn’t seem like anything important.” Her eyes moistened. “I feel bad, you know? Like maybe I should have listened harder.”

  “Do you feel that she was trying to give you any… clues? When you think back to your conversations over the last few days with her — her e-mails, her My Space chatter, her phone calls… anything weird or out of the ordinary?”

  She shook her head, then paused. “There was one thing, but that was just a weird thing between us.”

  “Oh?”

  “We used to get together sometimes and cook dinner. We both liked cooking. I had this old cookbook of my mom’s called Creative Cookery and we would make all sorts of dishes from it and then use our families as guinea pigs. We pretended that we had our own show on the Food Network. My sister Rachel would videotape us.”

  “How neat.”

  “Yeah. Anyway, that last day, we were in her back yard and she said she had to go out later, and that she’d meet up with me and Danny at The Riviera for some iced coffees. She said she was going to put someone in his place.”

  “Those were her words?”

  “Well, something like that. Put him in his place, teach him a lesson, something. I figured she was being metaphorical. Like maybe she was going to tell off a store manager or something. I had no idea. She was talking about giving back. I guess like giving back to the community?”

  “What about giving it back? Didn’t you say she had said something about cash? Having lots of cash?”

  She looked at me blankly. “No.”

  “No, wait — that was Danny. And Mitch, you know him. They said Jessica had been burdened by something — perhaps by money that someone had given her. Might that be what she was “giving back?”

  Rosalyn nodded. “That makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. She was being so weird that day, but I remember her putting something in her purse before she left. I thought it was a packet of letters; you know, like bills she was mailing for her mom or something.”

  “Ah.” I pictured Jessica stowing cash in her purse. I thought of Kathy’s note: “2000 dollars so far.” Had she brought that much money with her? To whom was she “giving it back?” And if she were returning it, then certainly it hadn’t come to her as the result of blackmail?

  “There’s something else, Ms. Thurber. Before she left she told me she changed her My Space password. She asked if I could guess what it was. I said no, and she said, “Cookery.”

  “Ah.”

  “So I laughed, and we just moved on to other stuff, but later I realized that it was weird.”

  “That she changed her password?”

  “No — that she told me. I mean, why would I need to know? Besides, Jessica was ultra private about stuff like that. She didn’t give out her locker combinations or things the way some kids do.”

  “Huh. Jessica seemed to be leaving little mysteries with everyone, without really providing a chance to solve them. She seems like she was content to keep her secrets.”

  I thought of Nora Helmer in A Doll’s House, saying My secret — my pride and joy…

  In any case, if Jessica had left some sort of clue on My Space, the police would surely find it. They must have examined all of her accounts, all of her e-mail, her entire presence online. I sighed.

  “Thanks, Rosalyn. I don’t know that we can help with anything, but it’s good to think about it. You know what I say about writing papers? Getting inspiration?”

  “Nothing will come until we start writing,” she parroted obediently.

  “Right. The same is probably true with solving mysteries, don’t you think? We have to start the work, and then the ideas
come.”

  “I guess so.”

  The class had started to file in. Danny approached Rosalyn and me where we sat. “What’s going on?” he said.

  “I was hoping for clues. Something that would help the police.”

  “Me, too,” he said. “I’ve been thinking it over…”

  I wanted to pursue that, but then Steve Jansen and Juan Perez, the boys who had helped me off the floor the week before, marched in. “Hey, Miz T, did you know that it’s going to be hot today? I mean really hot!” said Juan, looking pleased.

  “I didn’t know.”

  “There’s like some major heat wave coming up from the Gulf. We’re gonna go to the Dunes this weekend if it keeps up,” Steve added.

  This was not good news. Hot weather and I have never been friends.

  Since I had missed Period 1 the day before, my students had been forced to process double the reading on their own. They launched into complaints about the length of the assignments. “Four chapters! Do you know how many pages that was!”

  “I’ll bet you do,” I said, setting down my briefcase.

  “Eighty-six! It was eighty-six pages of long Russian sentences,” said Walter Hirsch, who seemed downright insulted.

  “I know, it’s tough.” I had re-read it myself. “But we only have four weeks to read this, and it’s long!”

  “Why do we have to read it at all?” Rosalyn asked.

  I sighed. “Kids, this is a college preparatory school. Do you know why they call it that?”

  Chris Angelini sighed. “Because it prepares us for college.”

  “Right. You know what you do a lot of in college?”

  “Reading?” Their little faces looked desolate at the thought.

  “Yes! And the more we do, and the more we practice looking for the most important stuff, the better, the faster you’ll be able to move through that college reading.”

  “College is scary,” said Jennifer Barnes.

  “College will be a revelation. It will be the most important time of your life,” I assured them. “You’ll grow in a million ways.”