The Shadow Box(9)

I’ll do it for myself, and I’ll do it for Ellen. I say her name as I walk, and I talk to my father. “Dad, help me. Help us, me and Ellen. Get me to the cabin.” I swear I feel my father lifting me up, carrying me through the woods, and suddenly my refuge is in sight.





4





CONOR


“She still hasn’t shown up,” Jackie said to Conor. “It’s her own opening, and she’s not here.”

He looked at his watch; it was five thirty.

“Half an hour late,” he said.

“That’s not like her, not at all,” Jackie said.

Nate Browning, Claire’s first husband, began walking toward them. A Yale professor, he had been in the local paper lately for doing whale research in Alaska. Three women were right behind him, all dressed expensively in an art world way.

“I am not up for this,” Jackie said under her breath. “The Catamount Bluff social circle.”

“What?” Conor asked.

“Claire’s neighbors. Leonora Lockwood, Sloane Hawke, and Abigail Coffin.”

Conor recognized Leonora, a grande dame married to Wade Lockwood, a generous donor to charities that benefited the police. She was regal, in her late seventies, dressed in a bold green-and-yellow-print caftan with gold bangles on tan arms, long white hair pulled up in a French twist, and wrinkles she wore proudly. It was well known in law enforcement circles that she and Wade were political donors and honorary parents to Griffin.

“Where’s Claire?” Leonora asked, glancing around.

“I’m not sure,” Jackie said, exchanging a quick look with Conor.

“She should be here, greeting her public!” Leonora said. “And Griffin’s, too, for that matter. They want to meet our state’s next first lady.”

“I’m sure she’ll walk in any minute,” Nate said. He was about five foot nine, rumpled, with a comfortable and expanding belly. Needing a haircut and a beard trim, he was the opposite of fastidious Griffin.

“What do you think of her new work?” Leonora asked Nate, and the group began to discuss it.

Conor watched Griffin, across the room and deep in conversation with Eli Dean, the owner of West Wind Marina. Many people in town kept their boats there. When Conor saw Griffin put his head in his hands, he walked over.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, standing between Griffin and Eli.

“Claire told me this morning she was going to row to Gull Island, to clear her head before the show,” Griffin said.

“But I just told him she wasn’t at the boatyard at all,” Eli said. “I was working on dock two most of the day, and that pretty little rowing dory of hers never moved.”

“When did you talk to her last?” Conor asked Griffin.

“This morning,” Griffin said. “After breakfast.”

“Hey, listen,” Eli said. “It’s hot in the sun, out of the wind, today; she probably just didn’t feel like taking the boat out in the heat.”

“Seventy-five degrees,” Griffin said. “Seems pretty perfect to me.” He took a deep breath. “Look, I’m worried.”

“What can I do?” Conor asked.

“I’m going home to see if she’s there,” Griffin said.

That ripple Conor had felt when he’d first walked into the gallery got stronger.

“I’ll follow you,” Conor said. And he and Griffin Chase hurried to their cars.





5





JEANNE


Late that afternoon, the easternmost part of Long Island Sound was unusually calm and gleamed amber in the declining sunlight. Jeanne and Bart Dunham were sailing northwest from Block Island on Arcturus, their Tartan 36, barely speaking because Bart had had too much to drink at the Oar and Jeanne had thought they should wait till morning before heading back home to Essex, Connecticut.

Jeanne stood at the helm steering while Bart stretched out in the cockpit. The sails were up, but the boat was motoring. There wasn’t a bit of wind. She had brought them through Watch Hill Passage—shoal waters, hair raising at the best of times—past Fishers Island, then Race Rock, then the mouth of the Thames River.

There wasn’t a lot of boat traffic—it was early in the season, but she and Bart were retired, and they wanted to get a start on summer. They were considering the idea of selling their house, sailing to Fort Lauderdale, and living aboard Arcturus. These short trips were test runs. She gave Bart a disgusted look. He had failed the test.

She had seen the cross-Sound ferries pass each other, coming and going between New London and Orient Point. She took care in the shipping lanes, where tugs and barges plied Long Island Sound. The tide was with them after the long day on the water, and she couldn’t wait to get home, throw Bart into bed, and take a shower.

“How you doin’, hon?” Bart asked.

“Fine,” she said, the word clipped.

“No problems in this weather!” he said. “Don’t know what you were so bent out of shape about. Put ’er on autopilot, and come over here, sweetheart.” He held out his arms. “Is this the life or what?”

She ignored him, peering west, focusing on the glowing water ahead.

“Okay, then,” he said. “You don’t love me anymore.”