Free Dark Homecoming by William Patterson Page B

and I should say goodbye before they go.”
    â€œNo live-ins?”
    â€œJust Mrs. Hoffman and the chef, Variola. Everybody else goes home. We have a couple of shifts here at Huntington House, seven to three and three to eight. By eight-thirty the entire place is dark and quiet—unless there’s a party. David tells me in those circumstances, everybody gets overtime.”
    â€œAll right, baby, you go downstairs and be social. Don’t forget—you’re the mistress of the house now.” She blew her a kiss. “Keep in touch, okay? Once I’m off the ship, you can call me anytime.”
    â€œI will. And congratulations on the new job. Really.”
    â€œLove you, Liz.”
    â€œLove you, too.”
    They signed off.
    Liz stood and took a deep breath.
    She really should go downstairs. Make small talk with the staff. Learn something about them. Like their names, to start. She only knew Rita and Variola by their first names. She had no idea what Mrs. Hoffman’s first name was, or Mrs. Martinez’s for that matter. Any others’ names, if she’d been told them, she had now completely forgotten.
    I’m terrible , Liz thought to herself. I should go down there right now and project confidence and cordiality and everything will get better.
    But she didn’t want to. All she wanted to do was crawl into her bed—that big, canopied haven—and go to sleep.
    Liz became aware of the ticking of the clock on her mantel. It was a soft, reassuring sound, background noise throughout the day. She glanced over at the clock and saw that it was nearly seven-thirty. The sun was beginning to set, filling the room with crimson light.
    But there was a sound competing with the ticking clock, Liz realized. How long had that sound been there? A knocking sort of sound, a banging of some kind. Soft and muffled. Sometimes it seemed to fade away, but when Liz listened closely, it was still there. Tap, tap, tap . . . She drew closer to the mantel. No, it wasn’t coming from the clock. It seemed to come from another part of the room . . .
    Liz tried to follow the sound, but suddenly she lost it. She listened, but all she heard once again was the ticking of the clock. She dismissed the sound as the rattle of a pipe.
    Looking back over at her desk, Liz spotted her dinner plates. Was she going to place the tray with its dirty dishes outside her door, in the hallway, as if she were staying in some hotel?
    No , she told herself. Take them downstairs yourself. Be friendly. Make them like you.
    As much as they seemed to have liked her.
    They did like Dominique, Liz believed.
    Mrs. Hoffman sure seemed to. She lost no opportunity in bringing up the name of the late Mrs. Huntington. How witty Dominique was. How charming. How eloquent. How talented. How beautiful.
    The young men of the house, like that impertinent Jamison, had been obsessed with Dominique. What was it that David had said? Some of the boys who worked here became almost obsessed with my late wife. They tried to get her to pay attention to them. They imagined all sorts of things about her . . .
    â€œThey had thought she was the most beautiful creature to ever walk the earth,” Liz said out loud, looking at her pale reflection in the mirror.
    That was why Jamison tried to frighten me on my first day here. I was daring to replace his beloved Dominique!
    All Liz’s insecurities came bubbling back to the surface.
    She’d have to face everyone eventually. She knew that. But not tonight. Her fears and anxieties were just too raw at the moment. No way was she going downstairs to try to win them over tonight. Maybe tomorrow. But not tonight. Liz placed her tray outside her door in the hall, then turned off her light and went to sleep.

12
    W hat Sergeant Joe Foley thought of as he looked over at the scene in front of him was the candied apples his granddad used to buy him at the county fair. An apple on a stick would be dipped into