The Beach Club

8 Heat Wave

August 14 (not sent)

Dear S.B.T.,

I have notified the authorities about your harassment by mail. Your letters-all of which I’ve saved-insinuate that you’ve been stalking me, spying on me, spying on the hotel. The police will uncover your identity and your pursuit of me and of the hotel will be put to an end. Leave me alone!

Bill Elliott

August 15 (sent)

Dear S.B.T.,

Do you read poetry?

Bill Elliott

In the middle of August, a heat wave hit Nantucket like none Lacey Gardner could remember, and she had been on the island for close to a century of summers. In general, Nantucket was a place to escape the heat because of the sea breeze. It could be in the nineties in Boston and New York, and Nantucket would be a comfortable seventy-seven. Lacey had only noticed the heat once before-in 1975, on the day islanders called Hot Saturday, when the thermometer hit one hundred degrees. Lacey and Maximilian had stayed inside, running the fans at full blast, playing cards in the guest bedroom of their house on Cliff Road, because that room stayed dark most of the day. They drank three pitchers of lemonade and at four o’clock started with Mount Gay and tonics, heavy on the ice. Lacey felt as though she were on vacation-staying in the one room of the house she never used, sliding aces and queens across the quilted company bedspread. When it grew dark, she and Maximilian slipped into their bathing suits and walked to Steps Beach for an evening swim. They felt like teenagers, sneaking around in the night, although even in 1975, they were senior citizens, and had to grip the railing tightly as they descended the stairs to the sand.

When they arrived at the beach, it was as crowded as midday. A patchwork of towels and blankets covered the beach, citronella candles flickered, and in the moonlight, Lacey saw men with sideburns holding hands with topless girls. A radio played the Beatles’ “The Long and Winding Road.” Some of the kids brought picnics-summer sausages, cheese, chicken salad, and cold beer. Max and Lacey ate and drank and splashed around in the water as though they were forty years younger. Lacey watched Maximilian smoke marijuana for the first time with a man named Cedar. She studied all the young people as their lean bodies floated through the hot night, and she wished again for children. She decided to say something to Max walking home. It was almost midnight, Hot Saturday turning into Sultry Sunday. She said, “Maximilian do you ever wish we’d had children?”

Max didn’t answer. Maybe it was the marijuana getting to his brain, or maybe it was his same old stubbornness on the topic. His determination never to admit he might have been wrong.

This August was the worst heat of all. In the sun it was broiling, in the shade it was difficult to breathe. The flag out in front of the Beach Club drooped like an old nylon stocking. The first hot night, Lacey tossed in bed, kicked off the sheets, flipped her pillow. Finally she struggled for the lamp and made her way over to the air-conditioner and turned it up as high as it would go. That sufficed for the night, but when morning came and Lacey ventured into the hallway, she nearly gagged. The air was thick, syrupy, a steaming Turkish bath. She opened all of her windows and switched on her two ancient fans. She kept her bedroom door closed and cranked the air-conditioning, thinking that if worse came to worst, she could lie in bed and read her mystery novel all day, refusing to step out.

Mack appeared as usual. Instead of coffee, he brought her an icy Coca-Cola.

“Bless you, Mack Petersen,” she said. It was eight-thirty, and already Mack’s sandy hair was wet around his ears and he had the smell of a man who’d worked all day.

“It’s eighty-two degrees right now,” he said. “Radio said it would top ninety by ten o’clock.”

Lacey took a sip of her cola. It was so cold and crisp, it stung the back of her throat and her eyes watered. She coughed.

“Be careful in this heat,” Mack said. “I want you to promise me you won’t exert yourself.”

“Because this kind of weather kills old ladies, is that what you mean?” Lacey said. “Well, it won’t kill me. I’ve lived through worse than this. But just to be safe, I’m going back to the bedroom where it’s cool. Knock at the end of the day to see if I’m okay, would you, dear? But just knock. I have half a mind to sit in there naked.”

Mack laughed. “You got it, Lacey.”

He left with a wave, and Lacey took another swallow of cola and let out a healthy belch.

“What am I going to do when you’re gone?” she said out loud. “Who will take care of me?” She sounded more plaintive than she meant to, but it was a fair question. What would she do when the handsome messenger that Maximilian sent, left her? She guessed either another boy would come, or her time with substitutes would finally be over, and she would join Maximilian in whatever came next. Dying wasn’t quite as scary when she thought of it this way-as the place where Maximilian was waiting.

It was so hot that Mack and Maribel slept nude under one thin sheet. Maribel made cool things for dinner-chilled cucumber soup, Caesar salad, melon balls. She recited cool words: silver, glass, mint, shade, green, blue, drink, flute, ice, a bed of ice, a world of ice. She pulled F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Ice Palace” off the shelf at the library, and then “The Snows of Kilimanjaro,” Ann Beattie’s Chilly Scenes of Winter, David Guterson’s Snow Falling on Cedars, and even Richard Russo’s The Risk Pool. She stacked the books on her desk, looking at them every so often to repeat their cool titles in her head.

Maribel and Mack fought almost every night. Because of the heat, and the crazy things it did to the hotel staff and guests, Mack shut down. He came home, took off his clothes, ate what Maribel put in front of him, and sat in a sweaty heap in front of the TV until bedtime. If he and Maribel talked at all, they snapped at one another.

Mack never mentioned getting married anymore. They didn’t talk about a wedding, they made no plans. Now Maribel feared she might end up one of these women who were engaged for fifteen years. One night, she asked Mack about it.

“Are we going to get married on the island this fall? Because if we are, we need to make plans.”

“I don’t know,” he said, his eyes glued to the baseball scores. “I can’t think.”

“You can’t think?” she said. “I’m asking you about our wedding and you can’t think?”

“It’s hot, Maribel,” he said. “All day at work I have people complaining. The beach is hot, the sand is hot, the water is too warm. We had a beach boy get sunstroke today and off he goes to the hospital. I check on Lacey every two hours because I’m afraid she’s going to wilt. I caught Jem with his ass in the ice machine. He was sitting in the ice machine. I don’t have time to think about a wedding.”

“Fine,” Maribel said. “Maybe we won’t get married then.”

“Don’t play games with me, Maribel,” Mack said. “Because right now nothing is funny. Including that comment.”

Maribel felt tears rising and she went into the bedroom where at least the fan was on. She lay across the bed and swept every strand of hair from her neck, tucked them into a bun. She moved so that the air from the fan hit her bare neck. She had never been able to enjoy happiness because she always wondered, When will it end? When will something bad happen? She wanted to call her mother, but the phone was in the other room. Besides, what would she tell Tina? That right now she hated Mack? That right now the thought of a whole life with him was dreary and depressing? That maybe, just maybe, she wanted to get married so badly that she made certain compromises. Compromises like the fact that she agreed to marry Mack when only weeks before he confessed he loved another woman. Maribel tried to forget about that, she decided to believe that when Andrea Krane left the island, Mack’s feelings for her vanished as well. And since Mack planned on leaving his job at the hotel there was no danger of him seeing Andrea again. But did he still have feelings for her? Maribel was so thrilled, first with the proposal and then with the ring, that she hadn’t allowed this question into her thoughts. But now, Maribel realized that of course Mack loved Andrea. You didn’t stop loving someone in a matter of weeks. Mack had probably proposed to Andrea first, and when she said no, he came to Maribel. She was his second choice. No wonder Mack couldn’t think about the wedding. He didn’t want to marry her at all. That scene a few weeks ago with him all sincerity and sweet promises had been a lie.

Maribel marched out to the living room. Moths threw themselves against the screen door with reckless abandon.

“Do you still love Andrea?” Maribel asked.

“What?” Mack said. He wore only his boxer shorts. Twelve years ago he had left Iowa, but he still looked like a farmer: tan neck and arms, pasty white torso. “What did you just ask me?”

“Do you still love Andrea Krane? I want to know.”

“You’re ridiculous,” Mack said. “I just spent a small fortune putting a diamond on your finger and you have the nerve to ask me that. What’s gotten into you?”

“You’re not answering my question,” Maribel said.

“Your question is obnoxious,” Mack said. “I asked you to marry me and you said yes. I gave you a ring. Now, why would I do that if I still loved Andrea?”

Maribel winced at the word “Still” because it admitted one fact: he had loved her. “That sounds like an answer to my question, but it’s not. You’re not telling me you don’t love her.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Mack was yelling now, standing up. Sweat dripped down his face. The temperature in the room rose; the room was boiling over. Maribel took a deep breath, trying to remember the stack of books on her desk, the chilly titles. What were they? All she could think of was The Risk Pool. A pool of risk, that’s where she was right now, swimming in it. The moths batted themselves against the screen. If it weren’t so abusively hot Maribel would have shut the door, to block out the horrible sound.

“Do you want to marry Andrea?” Maribel asked.

Mack’s blue eyes were on fire. “I don’t want to marry anybody,” he said.

There was a split second of silence, enough time for only a single thought. Oh, God.

Mack said, “But you.”

Except by then it was too late because in that speck of silence, Mack had told the truth. A silence so short, so small, an infinitesimal silence, exposed him. I don’t want to marry anybody.

He came toward Maribel, cooling off, ticking like a car engine, and he put his arms around her gently so as not to smother her. “I don’t want to marry anybody but you.”

He could say whatever he wanted now, she supposed, because he’d told her the truth. For one glimmering instant, the truth was free, and Maribel recognized it. She had known it all along: Mack didn’t want to marry anybody.

She bent her chin to her chest, and Mack kissed her forehead.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

She pulled away. “I’m just hot,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

She retreated into the bedroom, threw herself on the bed face down and cried. She didn’t have the genius for love-if that was what love required-genius, like one had for painting, or the piano. Genius for love didn’t run in her family. And so Maribel had relied on persistence, she gritted her teeth and dug in her heels and butted her head against the brick wall until it surrendered. Her tears cooled on her cheeks. Sore head, she thought, sore heart.

Cecily was in the office with her father when he discovered his big mistake. It was too hot for her to be out on the beach; walking on the sand would have blistered the soles of her feet. The heat freed her from chatting and schmoozing, thank God, but her father insisted she join him in the office so she could better understand how he ran the hotel. Because he wouldn’t live forever, he said, and she might be in charge sooner than she thought.

Bill swiveled in his chair. “I can’t believe it,” he said. He shuffled some papers, ran his fingertips over one page, then another. He wiped his forehead with a handkerchief. “It must be this heat,” he said. “In twenty years, I have never done this. Never!”

“Done what?” Cecily said. The mercury routinely rose to ninety-seven degrees in Rio. Soon, Cecily would be sweating next to Gabriel in bed. She only needed five hundred more dollars before she could escape. Her father had called UVA trying to reverse her deferral, but ha!-it was too late. Now her parents wanted her to come to Aspen, where they would ski with her, and teach her about the hotel. It was as if they were blind, deaf, stupid. “What’d you do?” she asked.

“I can’t believe it,” Bill repeated. He flipped through his book of Robert Frost poems. He did it again and again until Cecily realized he was having some kind of panic attack.

She sat up straight in her chair; in this heat, even that took effort. “Dad, what’d you do?”

“I double-booked a room,” he said. “I have a confirmation letter here for a family of four, the Reeses, for room fourteen, August twenty-four through August twenty-seven. And I have a confirmation letter for a Mrs. Jane Hassiter for that same room for the same dates.”

Cecily fell back in her chair. “Move somebody.”

He opened the reservation book and Cecily peered at it. The whole month was highlighted in fluorescent green.

“We’re full,” he said.

That was how Mrs. Jane Hassiter ended up staying in Cecily’s house during the heat wave. First, though, Cecily and her father called every guest house and B and B in the phone book. No vacancy. There wasn’t room on the island for even one more person, a lonely widow. That’s how Cecily’s mother described Mrs. Hassiter, a lonely widow. Cecily’s father prayed for a cancellation, but none came. Her mother tried to calm him.

“Mrs. Hassiter can stay in our house,” she said. “We have the extra room, don’t forget.”

“The extra room” was on the first floor in the front of the house, with a window looking over the parking lot at the beach. It even had its own bathroom. But in Cecily’s eighteen years, no one had ever stayed in that room. It was meant to be the bedroom for Cecily’s dead brother, W.T., but he’d never slept in it. W.T. didn’t make it home from the hospital; he was born dead. Cecily’s parents preserved the room, though, for the ghost baby, their dead son.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Bill said.

Cecily rolled her eyes. Her parents were outrageously predictable.

“You double-booked the room, Bill,” Therese said. “Mrs. Hassiter is on her way. There isn’t any space on the island. We don’t have a choice. We made a mistake, we have to pay up.”

“It’ll be fine, Dad,” Cecily said. Both her parents looked at her as if she’d spoken Portuguese. Those were the nicest words she’d said since the Fourth of July.

Bill exhaled; his shoulders loosened. “I hope you’re right,” he said.

Cecily was standing at the front desk talking to Love when Jane Hassiter walked in. Hotel guests were a mixed bag, but they had one thing in common-they all looked rich. Their watches gave them away, their Italian shoes, their haircuts. Rarely did someone step into the lobby looking like Jane Hassiter.

It was terrible to say-horrendous, awful-but Mrs. Hassiter immediately reminded Cecily of the woman who cleaned her dormitory at Middlesex. Mrs. Hassiter walked into the lobby in the same way that woman skulked around the students’ rooms-as though she didn’t belong in a place so fancy and nice. And then, as Mrs. Hassiter got closer, Cecily zeroed in on her tight, steel gray pin curls, her watery blue eyes, and she filled with warm dread. Mrs. Hassiter was the woman who cleaned at Middlesex; she was the housekeeper, the custodian, right here in the lobby of the hotel. Jane-yes, her name was Jane. Cecily had said, “Good morning, Jane,” when she swept the halls with her wide broom, and “Thank you, Jane,” when she cleaned the bathroom and emptied the trash. The girls on Cecily’s hall bought Jane a Christmas present every year-a silk flower wreath, a subscription to Reader’s Digest.

Cecily shivered despite the heat. The last week of school, Jane unlocked the door to Cecily’s room with her giant ring of keys, and walked in on Cecily and Gabriel making love. Cecily was sitting in Gabriel’s lap, facing him, her legs wrapped around his back as he lifted her up and down on his beautiful penis. They were supposed to be at breakfast, but they had skipped so that they could make love yet again. Cecily heard the jangle of Jane’s keys, and before she could move, Jane stepped in, ogled them. Cecily pulled Gabriel’s face into her chest as though he were a child that needed protecting and she shrieked, “Get out! Get out of here, Jane!”

Jane, what could Jane have thought? She looked hurt, Cecily remembered. She said, softly, “I’m sorry. So sorry.” And closed the door.

Cecily climbed off Gabriel and cried. She cried because Gabriel was leaving for Brazil and one of their last times making love had been ruined. She cried because now there was danger of being expelled, right before graduation. And she cried because she had yelled at Jane, frightened her, hurt her. Nobody yelled at Jane. No one except Cecily.

Jane didn’t report them. Of course not, Gabriel said, who was she anyway? An old woman cleaning up after a bunch of teenagers. Cecily made herself forget about the incident; she concentrated instead on the vodka parties, graduation, making a scrapbook for Gabriel. Cecily cast her eyes down when she passed Jane in the hall.

It was the world’s worst coincidence that Jane, the cleaning woman, whom Cecily hoped never to see again, was the only guest in the history of the hotel ever to stay in Cecily’s house. Cecily had half a mind to hide in the back office. But this was the behavior of the old Cecily. The new Cecily, the one headed for South America, faced adversity when it walked in the door.

Jane wore a plaid blouse, a pair of men’s denim overalls cuffed at the ankles, and shiny AirMax running shoes. Jane walked with her head down, every once in a while allowing herself to glimpse a quilt or a painting, when she gave a tiny gasp. She looked so painfully out of place that Cecily wanted to apologize a hundred times.

Vance came in the door behind Jane carrying two brown paper bags, like the kind they used at Stop & Shop. He set them down at the front desk, practically at Cecily’s feet. Those are her bags, Cecily thought. This is her luggage. She wanted to weep. They occasionally saw people like Jane Hassiter over the years, but Cecily was too young then to care or understand: Men and women who saved up their whole lives to splurge like this, just once.

“I’m Jane Hassiter,” she said to Love. “I have a reservation.” It was Jane’s voice. I’m sorry. So sorry.

“Indeed, Mrs. Hassiter,” Love said. “You requested a side deck room, but I’m pleased to inform you we’ve upgraded your room, free of charge. You’re going to be staying in the proprietor’s suite.”

“The proprietor’s suite?” Jane said. She looked at her shoes. “That’s wonderful.”

“Vance will show you to your room,” Love said.

“I’ll do it,” Cecily piped up.

“Okay,” Love said. “Mrs. Hassiter, Cecily here, the owner’s daughter, will show you to your room.”

Jane raised her head and looked at Cecily. Cecily’s cheeks burned. Jane smiled shyly. “It’s nice to meet you, Cecily.”

She was pretending. Cecily felt both relief and disappointment. In the last five minutes, Cecily’s guilt swelled like a blister that needed to be popped with sharp words of accusation. You little slut! You ungrateful, spoiled child!

When Cecily found her voice, it was very small. “Welcome to Nantucket.”

“Thank you,” Jane said. “This place, it’s yours? You lucky girl.”

Cecily would gladly have signed the deed over to Jane that instant. I don’t want this place. I don’t want it at all. “It belongs to my parents,” she said. She picked up the paper bags and allowed herself a peek at the contents. One bag held clothes and one held a second paper bag, twisted at the neck. Cecily made her way slowly through the lobby so Jane could enjoy it. The lobby was air-conditioned, but waves of heat rose from the asphalt out in the parking lot. It was a griddle. She let Jane through the lobby doors. “We’re going to the big house over there.”

“Forgive my asking,” Jane said, “but what did I do to deserve this? The proprietor’s suite, my God!”

“It’s just the way things worked out,” Cecily said. Her father was posted at the upstairs window, watching them swim through the waves of heat to the house. Earlier that day, he’d read Jane’s confirmation letter out loud. “‘We look forward to having you stay with us.’ Ha! Little did we know what we meant by that.”

Cecily didn’t enter the extra room very often. There was just a double bed, an empty dresser, a regular bathroom. When Cecily swung the door open, she saw her mother had fixed it up for Jane-a quilt on the bed, two of those idiotic miniature bicycles on the dresser, fresh flowers, and a box of chocolates from Sweet Inspirations, which were probably all melted together by now. A fluffy white robe hung in the empty closet.

Cecily closed the door in case her father should come wandering down. Now that they were alone, Cecily wanted to say something. She was about to burst.

“This is just lovely,” Jane said. “So lovely. I can’t believe my good fortune.”

“Jane,” Cecily said. “Mrs. Hassiter, Jane-”

Then there was a knock at the door and Therese stepped in.

“Hello, Mrs. Hassiter, welcome.”

Jane shook hands with Therese. “Thank you. This room is so fine.”

“I’m glad you like it,” Therese said.

“It’s my dead brother’s room,” Cecily said. Both her mother and Jane stared. Cecily wanted to kill herself. Why had she said that?

“Cecily,” Therese said.

“Your dead brother?” Jane said. “I’m sorry to hear it.”

Therese cleared her throat. “Go find your father,” she said. “Go right now while I talk to Mrs. Hassiter.”

Cecily stomped up the stairs to where her father was standing by the bay window watching Beach Club members pull up in their Range Rovers and unload beach bags, buckets and shovels, picnic lunches.

“I think we should let Mrs. Hassiter stay for free,” Cecily said. “She’s not even in the real hotel. Her room isn’t on the beach.”

“Has she complained?” Bill asked.

“No, she’s happy. But you can’t charge her. It wouldn’t be fair.” Cecily lowered her voice. “Besides, I don’t think she has much money.”

“We have fifty percent in a deposit,” he said. “I’d be happy to leave it at that.”

“No,” Cecily said. “You should return it all.”

“That’s what you’d do if you were running the hotel?” Bill asked.

The obvious trap. Cecily sniffed. “I’m just saying what I think you should do, as a decent person.”

“Decent person, huh?” her father said. He focused back out the window. “I can’t believe this heat. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen.”

“Dad?” Cecily said.

“Okay, we won’t charge her,” he said. “We’ll just pretend like she’s an old friend.”

Cecily tried to get a minute alone with Jane-to apologize, and offer this up-her stay at the Beach Club free of charge. But Jane didn’t emerge from her room, and Cecily was too timid to knock. Cecily spent an hour on the beach talking with Major Crawley, the Hayeses, and Mrs. Papale, who was turning herself into a human crouton. Cecily eyed the front door of her house for Jane, but Jane didn’t materialize. Perhaps she hadn’t brought a bathing suit. Cecily cursed guilt, the worst of all emotions, worse than hate and heartbreak put together. Cecily not only felt guilty about yelling at Jane and having sex with Gabriel when she should have been in the dining hall, but now she felt guilty about telling Jane she was staying in a dead boy’s room. It wasn’t even true, technically.

At eleven o’clock that night, Cecily’s usual hour to call Gabriel, she resisted picking up the phone. She had been lying on her bed for two hours, listening for any activity that might be going on in Jane’s room. She heard the water (a shower), the water (teeth brushing) and two toilet flushes. Every fifteen minutes, Cecily checked down the hall to see if Jane’s light was still on. If the light was on at midnight, Cecily was going down there. It would be impossible to sleep with this guilt hanging around her neck like a medieval shackle. Cecily replayed the awful moment in her room at Middlesex again and again in her mind, wishing she could somehow change the ending, change it so that it was not Jane who caught her screwing during breakfast, change it so that at the very least Cecily hadn’t screamed Get out of here! and hadn’t used Jane’s name, Get out of here, Jane!

And then, at last, Cecily heard Jane’s door open, she heard footsteps in the hallway. Cecily leaped from bed and opened her bedroom door. Jane stood in front of her in a high-collared nightgown.

“I think your brother is trying to contact me,” Jane said.

“Excuse me?” Cecily said.

“He’s trying to contact me. He’s making noise.”

Cecily followed Jane down the hall and into the extra room. Sure enough, there was a light tapping on the window.

“Turn off the light,” Cecily said. She went to the window and peered out into the darkness to see if the wind was knocking a branch against the pane. But there was no wind; the American flag sagged in the spotlight, impotent. No one was outside, and yet Cecily heard the tapping, so light, so faint, it was all she could do to keep from imagining a baby’s fist, the size of an egg, tapping the glass, demanding to be let in. “I need to get out of this place,” she said.

“This room is haunted,” Jane said.

Cecily sat on the edge of Jane’s bed. “It could be. No one has ever slept in here before.”

“Why me?”

“My father overbooked,” Cecily admitted. She forgot about the ghostly tapping and became excited that at last she had gotten a chance to apologize to Jane. “Listen, I know you recognize me. Cecily Elliott, room two-seventeen, Darwin House. You saw me and my boyfriend…and I yelled when I shouldn’t have. I feel terrible about it, but I love him so much. It’s the kind of love that hurts whenever I breathe, practically, because he’s living in South America, and I’ve been saving my money to go see him.”

“I do know you,” Jane said. “You’re a hard person to forget. And your boyfriend, so handsome!”

“Yes,” Cecily said. Longing for Gabriel rose in her throat, like a song she couldn’t sing. “Anyway, I wanted you to know I was sorry. Also, I spoke with my father and he’s not going to charge you for the room.”

“Oh, please, dear,” Jane said. “I want him to charge me.”

“What?”

The tapping started again, and Cecily wondered if this were all just a very bizarre dream, caused by the unrelenting heat, a mirage.

“I want him to charge me,” Jane said. “I have to get rid of my money.” She opened the top drawer of the dresser and pulled out the paper bag that was twisted closed. She turned the bag upside down on the bed.

Money fell out of the bag, money the way it appeared in the movies, in neat stacks the size of bricks. Cecily gasped: hundreds and fifties and twenties.

“Where did you get that money?” Cecily asked. She almost asked Jane, Did you steal it? Jane, the cleaning woman, was filthy rich.

“It was my husband’s money. He owned apartment buildings in Lawrence, and this is twenty years of rent right here. It was supposed to go to my son but he refused to take it. My son thought Jerry was prejudiced because he wouldn’t rent to blacks or Puerto Ricans.”

“Was he prejudiced?” Cecily asked.

“Yes,” Jane said, sadly. “Someone with dark skin, like your boyfriend, wouldn’t have been able to rent from Jerry.”

“That’s really shitty,” Cecily said. “I told off a woman this summer because she didn’t want black people on our beach.”

Jane wrung her wrinkly hands. “I can’t excuse what Jerry did. But I don’t want the money to go to waste.”

“Why did you come here?” Cecily asked. “Why did you pick our hotel?”

“I found this,” Jane said. She opened the second drawer where she had put her clothes. She pulled out a Nantucket Beach Club and Hotel brochure with the picture of the pavilion and the five blue Adirondack chairs, and handed it to Cecily. “I found it when I was doing the final clean at school.”

“You found it in my room?” Cecily said.

“Must have been,” Jane said. “I was pretty sure I’d recognize someone around here, but I didn’t know it’d be you.” Jane patted Cecily’s hand. “I’m glad it was.”

“Me too,” Cecily said.

“How much money do you need to see your young man?” Jane asked.

“Five hundred dollars,” Cecily said.

Jane counted out ten fifties and pressed them into Cecily’s palm. “There you go,” she said, “a little graduation present from old Jane.”

Again, the tapping. Cecily closed her eyes and listened. Maybe it wasn’t W.T. at all. Maybe it was Gabriel knocking, beckoning to her from far away.

“I can’t take this,” Cecily said. “I really want to but I can’t.”

Jane frowned. “You feel like my son, then? Won’t take the money because it’s tainted?”

“Sort of, yeah.” Cecily thought of Mrs. John Higgens, and let the bills flutter to the bed.

Jane walked back to the dresser and pulled out her wallet. “I have four hundred and eighty-six dollars here from my last paycheck from Middlesex,” she said. “Will you take this?”

Jane’s paycheck, that she earned by cleaning up after Cecily and her classmates? It seemed strange to take that money, too, but at least it wouldn’t be unethical. Cecily could fly to New York first thing in the morning, and she’d be on her way to Rio before her parents even realized she was gone. It was thrilling, and positively terrifying. Terrifying! She couldn’t do it. But then Cecily thought of Gabriel, the way he cupped her face when he kissed her, the way his smile spread slowly across his face like a sunrise.

“Thank you, Jane,” Cecily said.

“Where are you headed again?” Jane asked.

“Rio de Janeiro,” Cecily said.

And with those words, she was free.

Therese knew the second her baby boy died inside of her, and she knew as soon as her feet hit the ground in the morning that Cecily was gone. The house sounded hollow beneath her feet; it sounded like a house without children. She didn’t let herself panic until she checked Cecily’s bedroom, however, because in this heat, her instincts could be wrong. Therese tiptoed down the stairs so as not to wake their guest, Mrs. Hassiter. Knocking lightly on Cecily’s door, Therese said, “Honey, are you in there?”

No answer, but that didn’t mean anything. Cecily was probably still asleep; she didn’t have to be on the beach until ten.

Therese was halfway up the stairs when she caught her reflection in the mirror. Fooling yourself, her reflection said. She marched back down to Cecily’s room and opened the door.

Cecily’s bed was made, the room neat and clean. It was a teenager’s dream room: queen-size bed, TV, stereo, built-in bookshelves that held Cecily’s schoolbooks and her field hockey trophies. There was a spartan desk-built to Cecily’s specifications-an old hotel door sitting on two filing cabinets. A framed black-and-white photograph of the Beach Club circa 1928 hung over Cecily’s bed. On the nightstand was a hotel envelope, the kind guests left tips in for the chambermaids. On the front, in Cecily’s youthful hand, it said, “Mom and Dad.”

Therese sat on Cecily’s bed, picked up the envelope, and held it in her lap. Her hands trembled.

Therese knew all about running away. She’d practically done the same thing on her eighteenth birthday when she took the Long Island Railroad from Bilbo to Grand Central Station, her father’s World War II army bag slung over her shoulder. She was only sixty miles from home, but it might as well have been another continent-her orderly, cookie-cutter neighborhood left behind for Manhattan. She would never admit it to Bill, but she understood why Cecily wanted more. Cecily was her mother’s daughter. Forty years ago, Therese had gone searching for beauty, and found love. Cecily searched now for love-maybe she would be lucky enough to find beauty. Maybe: if she didn’t get killed or end up in jail or contract some appalling disease.

Therese opened the envelope.

Dear Mom and Dad,

I’m sure you two are pissed like never before, and I’m sorry. You are great parents and I understand why you didn’t want me to go. But I had to chase this feeling because it’s the best feeling I’ve ever had. You two love each other, think of life without that and you’ll understand why I left. I’ll call to let you know I’m okay, but don’t come after me because it will be an impossible search. I love you both and I’m sure you think leaving is easy for me, but trust me, it isn’t.

Love, Cecily

Therese scanned Cecily’s bookshelves for her yearbook, and when she brought it down, the book fell right open to Gabriel’s picture. Gabriel da Silva: He was filed under S. Therese studied his picture with a dissonant, high-pitched whine in her ears, like something caught in a vacuum cleaner. Gabriel was astonishingly handsome. Toasty brown skin, black hair, a diamond stud in his left ear. Perfect straight white teeth in the kind of smile that singed the page. He’d signed the yearbook next to his picture-something in another language, Portuguese?-and then: “I love every inch of you. Gabriel da Silva.” Therese stared at the words. I love every inch of you. The words of a lover, forcing Therese to imagine the secret, soft inches of Cecily that Gabriel loved. But then, after that intimacy, he signed his full name. Therese held the book open and put the words and the picture together. I love every inch of you. Gabriel da Silva.

Therese didn’t tell Bill where she was going-he was in the kitchen eating his cereal. She left the house with a wave, and said, “I have to run a quick errand. Back soon.” Mrs. Hassiter hadn’t stirred and Therese was relived; she didn’t feel like explaining anything yet.

Outside, the air was thick as chowder. Therese cranked the air-conditioner in her car and opened all the windows on the way to the airport. She couldn’t remember the last time she had left the property on a summer morning; always, her first concerns were the rooms, the chambermaids, and guests with problems more pressing than her own. But now Therese appreciated the morning, even though it was hot, and the lawns were turning brown and the hydrangeas had dried up into crisp little heads. It was nice to be off property. A lone jogger dripping with sweat plodded down North Beach Road. It was Maribel. Therese wanted to stop and ask, “Have you seen Cecily?”-but she flipped down the eye shade and accelerated.

At the airport, Therese searched for Cecily in the ladies’ room, the gift shop, the restaurant. Not there. Then Therese surveyed the local carriers. When she asked at Colgan-Any young redheads on a plane to New York this morning?-the perky attendant bit as though Therese was holding out an apple. “You must be her mother, you two are, like, identical twins! I mean, gosh, you have the same hair. I guess people tell you that all the time.”

“So she made her plane then?” Therese said. “Good. What time did it leave?”

The girl checked the board behind her. “She was on the first plane. The six-oh-five. It was early, I remember that!”

“And that was to New York?”

The girl bobbed her head. “La Guardia. I think she had a transfer to JFK, though.”

“Thanks for your help,” Therese said.

“Where was she headed, anyway?” the girl asked. “In the end, her final destination?”

Her final destination? Therese swallowed. “Brazil,” she said.

Therese ordered breakfast in the restaurant. As she ate her eggs, she considered taking a poll of other mothers. Do I get on a plane and go after her, or do I let her go? Therese thought back to all the guests she had advised with their personal problems, guests like Leo Hearn. No, Leo, she thought, there is no instruction manual for parents. I made it all up. She bit off the corner of her toast and saw Cecily at a year and a half, toddling by herself through the sand, falling over onto her hands. Cecily at thirteen, the night of her first kiss, climbing into bed with Therese to tell her all about it. They were so close, identical twins, motherdaughter. And yet in only a couple of hours, so much distance between them. Where was Cecily? In another country, sleeping with the dark prince.

Out the window, a small propeller plane got ready for take-off. The props spun, there was a lurch, and then the plane rolled forward, picked up speed, until just barely lifting its nose and soaring, soaring. There were a million metaphors for childhood, and here was one of them right outside the window. What could Therese do but hope that somewhere, Cecily was soaring?

“Are you kidding me?” Bill shouted. They were upstairs in the living room, and as far as Therese could tell, Mrs. Hassiter hadn’t stirred. Bill waved the letter in the air. His face was bright red and his hair glittered from silver to white; he was aging in front of her eyes.

“Your heart,” Therese said. “Bill, please. I can’t lose you, too.”

“Why do you look so calm?” he said. Suspicion flickered across his face. “You knew, didn’t you? She’s your daughter, Therese. She’s always been your daughter. She confided in you and you let her go.”

“Not true,” Therese said. But she did feel preternaturally calm, as though someone had drugged her. I love every inch of you. Therese never kept secrets from Bill, but she didn’t show him the yearbook. “I had no idea! I just went to the airport to see if I could catch her.”

Bill checked his watch. “We’re going back right now. There’s no way she’s made it out of New York yet. International flights leave at night. We have all day to turn JFK upside down.”

“You’re thinking of west-east flights,” Therese said. “Those leave in the evening. North-south flights leave in the morning.” She had no idea if this were true; she didn’t even know where the thought had come from.

“We’ll go anyway,” he said. “We’re irresponsible parents if we don’t. I’m sure she wants us to come after her.”

“Bill, come here and sit down.” Therese led him to the couch and he sat down despondently, his hands in his lap. Then, with a sudden burst of energy, he bounced up again.

“There isn’t time to sit down,” he said.

“We’re not going to New York,” Therese said.

“Cecily is expecting us,” Bill said. “She’s probably lingering at her gate, waiting for us to march down the concourse. This isn’t the kind of thing you hope to get away with at the age of eighteen.”

“There’s only one person she wants to see,” Therese said sadly. “And it’s not you, and it’s not me.”

“I can’t even think about that boy,” Bill said. “If I think about that boy, I’m going to lose my mind.”

“She’s living her life, Bill.”

“You’re in cahoots with her,” he said.

“No, it’s just…” How to explain this feeling? Therese was worried, but seeing the picture of Gabriel da Silva excited her, too. And she hadn’t expected to feel excited. Her daughter was alive and living. When Therese left home, wonderful things happened. She ended up here. “I thought Cecily leaving would kill me. But I feel okay. It’s like anticipating her leaving was ten times worse than her actual leaving. She’s gone, Bill. We’re through worrying about how to keep her here. We’re liberated, in a way.”

“You’re nuts,” he said. “Cecily hasn’t gone to overnight camp, my dear. She hasn’t left for college, or another relatively safe place where we can get a hold of her. She has flown to Brazil to sleep with a boy we’ve never even met.”

“I guess what I’m saying is that I know she’s coming back,” Therese said. “Unlike W.T., Cecily is coming back.”

Bill collapsed on the sofa. “Oh, God,” he said.

Therese heard soft footsteps on the stairs and Mrs. Hassiter popped into the living room. She looked at Therese expectantly.

“Breakfast is in the hotel lobby, Mrs. Hassiter,” Therese said. “It’s our compliments. Just go on over and help yourself.”

“I already had breakfast,” Mrs. Hassiter said. “I want to talk to you about something else.”

So she’d overheard them. “We’re having a bit of a family situation,” Therese said. “Things might be rather hectic. I apologize.”

“I understand,” Mrs. Hassiter said. She looked at her hands. “I understand because I have a child of my own.”

Therese got a funny twitching in her stomach. “Did you see my daughter this morning, Mrs. Hassiter? Did you see her last night?”

Mrs. Hassiter’s pale blue eyes sought Therese’s, then Bill’s, helplessly. Oh, dear God, Therese thought. She has some part in this. But before Mrs. Hassiter could answer, Bill pointed his finger; his voice was tight and sharp.

“Do you know where our daughter is?” he asked. “Do you?”

Mrs. Hassiter nodded slowly. “I wasn’t thinking as a parent last night. But these kids seem so grown-up. Much older than my own son at that age.”

“What did you do?” Bill asked. Therese dug her fingernails into the buttery leather of the couch. “What did you do to Cecily?”

Mrs. Hassiter took a deep breath. “I gave her the money to go.”

Therese felt all her previous calm fly from her, like her soul leaving her body. Gave Cecily the money! They let the woman into their home and she interfered with the delicate balance they had worked so hard to achieve. She tipped the scales in favor of Cecily and off Cecily went-with a stranger’s money in her pocket-to Brazil.

Bill spoke first. “The nerve of you,” he said. “You had no place doing that.”

“I know,” Mrs. Hassiter said. “I realized that this morning. I should have just let things be. But I was possessed by pride.”

“By pride, Mrs. Hassiter?” Bill said. “What is that supposed to mean?”

Mrs. Hassiter looked at both of them, then her eyes took in the rest of the room: the leather couch, the Turkish rug. “I’m a janitor at your daughter’s private school,” she said. “At Middlesex. I clean the rooms. I’ve been doing it for twenty-one years.”

“You know Cecily from Middlesex?” Therese asked.

“We didn’t know each other well,” Mrs. Hassiter said. “And I didn’t know you folks owned this hotel. But when I saw your daughter here, I couldn’t help myself. Those kids never thought much of me. They were always polite, but they thought of me as the cleaning woman. And they were all so young and beautiful and well-to-do. I wanted to prove I was good for something other than changing your daughter’s linen and cleaning the toilets. So I gave her four hundred and eighty-six dollars. It was money I earned.”

“Well, I hope you’re happy!” Bill shouted. “Because here we sit without our daughter. We’ve been stripped of all our options, Mrs. Hassiter, thanks to you.”

“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Hassiter said.

“That doesn’t fix a goddamned thing!” Bill said.

“Bill,” Therese said. She squeezed this hand; she had never seen him this angry before. Therese looked at Mrs. Hassiter-her shoulders slumping, her feet bright and unlikely in a pair of fancy sneakers. The thought that a woman this age felt she had to prove something to Cecily broke Therese’s heart. She tried not to let herself soften toward Mrs. Hassiter, but she couldn’t help it. The woman gave Cecily the money; in the end, she only expedited the inevitable. “There’s nothing wrong with being a cleaning woman,” Therese said. “I’m one myself. It’s a job I respect.”

Mrs. Hassiter looked at her hands again, as though she were ashamed of them. “It’s not the same. You own this beautiful place.”

“It is the same,” Therese said. “In fact, you can do me a favor.”

“What is it?” Mrs. Hassiter asked.

“I need you to supervise my chambermaids this morning while I take my husband out. Then you’ll see how much our jobs are alike. And just so you know, I would only trust my job to a professional.”

Mrs. Hassiter pushed up her sleeves. “I’d be glad to,” she said. “I’ll go right now.”

Therese said nothing to Bill until they were both in the car and Mrs. Hassiter had safely reached the lobby. Therese turned the key in the ignition, set the air-conditioning, and adjusted the vents so that they blew directly onto herself and Bill. “I know you’re mad at me,” she said, backing out of the parking lot. “But I won’t let myself blame that poor woman.”

“I don’t blame the woman,” Bill said. “I blame myself for double-booking the room. There’s a reason why we don’t let strangers sleep in our home, Therese. They don’t belong.”

“Don’t be angry with Mrs. Hassiter.”

“She tells a sob story and that’s all you need to hear. She’s a saint now and a martyr.”

“I feel for people, Bill,” she said.

“If you’re going to feel for people,” Bill said, “how about starting with Cecily and me?”

“I have always put you first,” Therese said. “Every day for thirty years I’ve put you first, and you know that.” She turned onto Main Street, which was bustling with activity, and she was grateful for the distraction. “I can’t remember the last time you and I were on Main Street on a summer day,” she said. She pointed out the Bartlett Farm truck, its sectioned bed bursting with red and yellow tomatoes, zucchini and squash, string beans, lettuce, and a colorful array of flowers, which bloomed despite the heat. “Look over there. Bountiful summer.”

“My summer hasn’t been bountiful,” Bill said. “First I lose Mack, then my only child.”

Therese gripped the wheel with both hands as they rumbled over the cobblestones. “She’s coming back.”

“Where are we going?” Bill asked. “I see you’re not driving to the airport.”

“No,” she said. “I’m not.”

They reached the Somerset Road Cemetery and Therese wound her way through the sandy paths until they came to W.T.’s grave. Bill gave a little groan and smacked his head back against the seat. “You’re trying to torture me.”

“No,” she said. “I just want to remind you what real loss feels like.”

They stood together on the patch of dry grass in front of the headstone. Therese read the inscription aloud. “W.T. Elliott, beloved son, April seventh, 1970.’” Then, as if she had given them permission, they both started to cry. Bill pulled out his handkerchief and held it to his nose as his body wracked with sobs. Therese cried into the crook of Bill’s arm. At one point, she gained a moment of clarity, enough to wonder what they must look like: two middle-aged people standing in the hottest Nantucket sun on record, crying for someone who died such a long time ago, someone they had never even known.

After a while, Therese let Bill go. She plucked her blouse away from her sweat-soaked body and flapped her arms as if she were a bird, as if she could fly. Then she took a tentative step toward the car. Sweat rolled down her back, and the edges of her mind were blurry with the tears, the grief, and from standing still for too long in the heat. Blurry from wondering-would Cecily be back? Or would they be left to cry in graveyards. Nobody’s parents.

“You know what I want more than anything else?” Therese said.

“What?” Bill said.

“Rain,” she said.

It was so hot in Love’s Hooper Farm Road house that she had to try the early pregnancy test three times. At dawn, she peed into a plastic cup, and then got ready to dunk the test strip to see if it changed color. The first strip stuck to her sweaty fingers like flypaper, and when she tried to unstick it, it ripped in half.

“Good thing they give you more than one chance,” Love said. She’d been talking to herself since she woke up that morning. She treated her second test strip more delicately. It was supposed to turn pink (positive) or blue (negative) when she dipped it in the urine. But the second strip turned green as soon as she picked it up. Green! She dipped it gingerly into the urine, hoping the green would magically change, a frog turning into a prince. But no-it stayed a disappointing, sickly green.

Love hopped on her Cannondale and rode back to the Stop & Shop-the only place carrying early pregnancy tests that was open at six thirty in the morning-and she plucked another test off the shelf. Unfortunately, the sole cashier was the same young man Love went to an hour before, when she bought her first test.

“That’s right,” she said. “I need another one.”

The cashier might have looked at her with understanding, or he might have made a gagging face, as if to say, Too much information, ma’am; Love couldn’t meet his eyes to find out. I could be pregnant! she almost said. But, of course, he would realize that. Love managed to keep her mouth shut until she paid another eighteen dollars and hurried from the store.

Before she dipped the third strip, Love washed her hands and dried them thoroughly. Then she pinched the strip between her fingernails and dunked it like a doughnut. She laid it on the little resting pad provided. Now she had to wait-five minutes, the instructions said.

She had to wait.

Love walked out into the hallway, through the kitchen, to the small living room that faced the road. She sat on the dingy sofa and stared at the blank wall in front of her. Her roommates, Randy and Alison, were still asleep.

“I’ve never actually sat in this room before,” Love whispered. “Probably a good thing.” The room was perfect for waiting because of the innocuous rentedness of it-an ugly sofa with two rock-hard cushions, a braided rug, a TV with nonfunctional, rabbit-ear antenna. It was as sterile as a doctor’s waiting room-nothing to excite or agitate, perfect for thinking.

Love had missed her last period. At first she thought she was just late, normal for her because she exercised so much. After a week, late became a miss. But Love wouldn’t let herself get excited until she knew for sure. Her other symptoms could easily have been caused by the heat. She went to the bathroom more frequently-but she also drank water all day to keep from dehydrating. She felt dizzy and tired, but who wouldn’t after skating in ninety-five-degree heat, 100 percent humidity? She vomited once-but that was after eating sushi, and in this heat the fish was probably spoiled. Love couldn’t tell if she was pregnant, or just hot, like everyone else.

She checked her watch. Four minutes, twenty-six seconds. She made herself stand up.

“Good-bye living room,” she said.

Then something caught her eye. On the wall behind the sofa was a picture the size of a baseball card. Love stepped closer to take a look, then recoiled. It was a photograph of an Indian swami, a brown-skinned man wearing a white turban, his hands in front of him in prayer, a mean-looking snake around his neck. Underneath the picture it said, “Pray with Swami Jeff.”

Swami Jeff? Maybe Alison or Randy tacked the card to the wall as some sort of joke. The man’s dark eyes penetrated Love and she shivered. He frightened her. She took the picture off the wall and held it in her hands. She wanted to throw it away. But instead Love raised the picture in front of her face and kissed Swami Jeff right on the lips. You want me to pray with you, I will. I want a baby, Swami Jeff. Please, I want a baby! She put the picture of Swami Jeff facedown in a kitchen drawer with the can opener and measuring spoons, and then bravely she walked into her room.

The strip was pink. P for pink, P for positive.

Love snatched up the resting pad. The strip was bright pink, lively pink, the pink of a healthy internal organ. There was no doubt about it. Love was P for pregnant.

She wanted to scream and shout and dance. She wanted to wake up Randy and Alison and tell them the good news. And what, what could be better news than this: another person coming into the world! A goal accomplished. A dream come true. She was pregnant!

Then, for just a second, Love experienced sheer terror. What made her think she was remotely qualified to be a mother? Or ready? So she was forty years old, so what? A person would have to be fifty or sixty to have the knowledge to raise another human being. It was an irrevocable thing she had just done. There was no going back.

She sat on her bed, and thought of Vance, who often slept with her there. Last night he’d declined because of the heat. What was she going to do about Vance? Love went back into the kitchen. She opened the drawer where she’d put the picture of Swami Jeff. Her knees buckled and she sucked in her breath. Through the holes of the cheese grater, Love saw Swami Jeff’s intense black eyes; the picture was face up in the drawer. She nudged the cheese grater aside. Swami Jeff stared at her. Love shut the drawer. She was positive she’d put the picture in facedown. (Positive, she thought, I’m positive.) Love opened the drawer again and picked up the picture. She took Swami Jeff into the bedroom.

Okay, Swami, what am I going to do about Vance? Shall I tell him or not? She stared at Swami Jeff’s face and tried to ignore the snake curled around his neck, baring fangs. She closed her eyes and pressed the picture to her forehead.

What was she expecting to see? A vision, maybe-a scene from the future, like a film clip-Love walking down Durant Street in Aspen pushing a stroller. Was Vance in the picture? That was what she wanted to know. But there was no scene, no vision at all. Love held the picture of Swami Jeff in front of her and neatly ripped the card down the middle, slicing him between the eyes.

Vance met Love in the parking lot of the Beach Club as she was locking up her bike.

“How was your night last night?” he asked. “I was thinking of you.”

“Uneventful,” Love said. “An absolute bore. A hot bore.”

“I have some news,” Vance said. “Big news.”

“Big news?” Love asked. She hoped he wasn’t about to propose coming to Colorado again. She hoped he wasn’t about to propose anything. She shut her eyes, but saw nothing. “What is it?”

“Cecily’s gone,” Vance said. “She got on a plane and flew to Brazil without telling a soul. Bill said he and Therese woke up yesterday-and boom, Cecily was gone. She left them a note. The guy is really bumming.”

“Poor Bill,” Love said.

Vance shrugged. “I think it’s only natural,” he said. “You have kids and then at some point they leave the nest. What can you do?”

Instinctively, Love touched her abdomen. “You might feel differently if you had your own child,” she said.

“My kids are going to be out of the house by eighteen,” Vance said. He took out a navy bandanna and wiped his head. “But, listen, I don’t want to talk about having kids right now.”

I don’t want to talk about having kids right now.

Love made a decision: She would tell Vance about the baby if she went home and found the picture of Swami Jeff restored to a whole.

“Me either,” she said.

On her way to the front desk, Love peeked into Bill’s office. He sat at his desk with his eyes closed, his hands folded in front of him. The volume of Robert Frost was nowhere to be seen. We are at the two ends of parenthood, she thought. I have just started to hold on, and Bill is letting go. She wondered what that kind of pain must feel like. She couldn’t imagine.

When Mack heard Cecily was gone, his hand itched to call How-Baby and turn down his brand-new job. Bill was bereft, a man lost at sea, his heart floating on a refugee raft somewhere between Nantucket and Rio de Janeiro. Bill, his almost-father. Mack admired Cecily’s courage for leaving. He’d run away once, twelve years before, but then Mack had run from emptiness. Cecily ran from a home where people loved her. When his turn came, Mack wondered, would he be brave enough to go?

Jem called Maribel at the library.

“If you don’t want to go to Southeast Asia, how about Brazil?”

The funny thing was, Maribel had just scoured the shelves for novels about Brazil, and finally found one by Jorge Amado called Gabriela, Cinnamon and Cloves. She hid in the stacks and read several passages, thinking, This doesn’t sound bad. This doesn’t sound bad at all.

“It’s hotter in Brazil than it is here!” Lacey exclaimed, when Mack told her of Cecily’s escape. “What was the dear girl thinking?”

Secretly, Lacey was elated. She was all for chasing a dream; she was all for chasing love.

Bill put his volume of Robert Frost back on the shelf in his bedroom; it had done him no good. His daughter was gone, Mack was leaving, Bill’s health was slipping away, and what did his wife want more than anything else? Rain. In the end, Bill decided, it was very Frost-like of Therese. To stare in the face of all this emotional anguish and want nothing more than a simple rain.