Home of the Gray Dog - Segment 24

Chapter 116

Miles away from the mansion, something momentous was about to happen. The prosperous area in the city where Walker lived during his childhood had turned into a rundown and dangerous neighborhood.

         On that cold autumn morning, Reverend McCready walked to the wooden box at the back of his church. As usual, the Reverend found an assortment of miscellaneous detritus from the buildings scheduled soon for demolition. Recently, those moving away to safer sections of the city used the lost-and-found container as a place to save painful memories of better days gone by.

         What do we have today? he asked himself, lifting the lid off the box. Inside, resting on top of many smaller objects, he found four thick photograph albums. After taking them out and placing them on the table beside the box, he pulled out item after item until the box was empty.

         When he opened the first album, a smile broke out on his tired face. In one photo, he recognized the older man watching a widely smiling boy, who was leaning over the railing of a ferryboat. The Reverend scanned a few more pages filled with photographs that were curling from age at their edges. He wondered who found these four albums and how they had made their way to his church.

         “Hey, Rev,” called a gruff voice from outside. “We need you, so get your bones out here now!”

         Reverend McCready left the items on the table and quickly walked outside. He abruptly came face to face with a group of angry women. “Calm down, ladies,” he said, trying to be heard above their loud yells. “What’s wrong?”

         One woman, a sturdily built Amazon, pushed her way to the front of the crowd. It was Annie’s voice the Reverend had heard rudely demanding he come outside. “You’ve got to do something about those people.”

         “What people?” Reverend McCready descended the short flight of stairs from the church to stand in front of the woman. “You have to be more specific about who you mean, Annie.”

         The question, spoken softly, calmed Annie down from boiling to barely simmering. Her gruff voice lowered a few notches when she answered, “These bums who are tearing our neighborhood apart, that’s who.” All around her, the women nodded their heads in agreement.

         Reverend McCready sighed. “What have they done now?” The running battle between the residents of the disintegrating area of the city and the company trying to gentrify it for more affluent people had been going on for months. With many of the occupants of the original buildings gone, only those unable to move for one reason or another remained.

         “There’s a bulldozer and a machine with a wrecking ball heading for that large house over on DeMarco Street.” Dorothea, another woman near the front of the group, yelled this out before Annie could answer. “You know the one, Rev, the one where those rich people lived before they died. Remember their son moved away ‘cause it was too big for one young man?”

         “I think so, Dorothea.” The Reverend thought for a second before adding, “He never did come back, did he?” Again, all the women answered in unison, this time shaking their heads.

         Annie, not to be upstaged by anyone, jumped in at this point. “No, he just walked away the day after his father’s funeral. That was three months after his mother died from cancer. He just locked the door behind him and left the area years ago. Workmen did come in to take out furniture, paintings, and other stuff a few days later. Nobody’s returned to the empty house ever since. I think someone should tell him what’s going on here, but I don’t know where he went.”

         The Reverend didn’t let on that he knew where the man currently was and had followed his philanthropic life style over the last few decades. “Well, Annie, there isn’t much I can do, is there?” This set off another round of yells from the angry women, but he just ignored them and slowly went back into the church.

         Once inside, he made a call to the City Planners and verified the man, now in his early 50’s, still owned the house on DeMarco Street. His next step was to place a restraining order against the construction company to stop the destruction of the building.

         Finally, he boxed up the four albums and the few other items he realized came from the old house. All the while the Reverend carried the carefully wrapped and addressed package on the subway to the post office, he wondered how these memories from the past would affect the person receiving them. Inside the package was a letter he had written to the man living so far away. It told of the disintegration of his old neighborhood and hopes that this man, now a multibillionaire, could help in their fight against the construction company. He also told of the company illegally trying to destroy his old home, and what he had done to prevent it.

Chapter 117

“Walker, there’s a package addressed to you here at the front desk, and it’s making a strange sound.” This phone call from a nervous-sounding Edith interrupted the mansion owner’s meeting with Felix. The two men were reviewing the blueprints for the addition to the nearby hospital. Walker’s friends were trying their best to keep his mind occupied while Samantha was away in San Francisco. She had already been gone a week, and most of them were running out of ideas. Felix was the one to finally come up a few days earlier with something he knew would interest Walker.

         “I’d better go get it before Edith has a heart attack!” With a grin, Walker stood with one last look at the blueprints spread out on his dining room table. The original hospital on his large property, built only three years earlier for the elderly guests at his mansion, now also served the nearby town’s population. The U-shaped building needed a third section to accommodate the new pediatric section for the children from Hannah’s Home.

         Leaving the architect still working on changes to the blueprints, Walker went quickly down the three flights of stairs from his apartment to the bottom floor. He then crossed the large entrance room to where his mother was impatiently waiting for him. On the floor by the front desk, there was a large wooden box. Even from a couple feet away, Walker could hear the strange sound Edith had mentioned.

         Motioning her safely away from the desk, Walker took out his pocketknife, knelt, and cut through the cords surrounding the box on all sides. When he raised the wooden top, the sound intensified, but was now recognizable.

         “Don’t worry, the clicking sound is harmless,” said Walker, lifting the item carefully out of the box. “This is a perpetual motion ball thing. My mother used to have one of them when I was a kid, and the moving of this box to the floor must have set it off.” By mother, Edith knew he meant his adoptive mother and not her, his birth mother. Still, his calling the other woman his mother gave her a moment of pain, quickly pushed away.

         Still kneeling, Walker placed the small metal rack with five silver balls dangling from it on the floor beside him, and then reached back into the packed box. His bent legs gave out from under him when he recognized the contents of the box, surprising Edith when he let out a loud shout of pure delight. She watched in amazement as he sat down on the floor, holding the top item from the box tightly to his chest, long legs outstretched.

         “Do you know what this is?” she heard him ask, surprised for the moment by the unexpected joy in his voice. Not waiting for her answer, he continued, “This is my mother’s photograph album she started when they first adopted me. I recognize the album’s cover.”

         Walker placed the precious album on the floor beside the perpetual motion ball item before reaching back into the wooden box. Edith sat down on the floor next to him, watching as he removed an additional three thick photograph albums and placed them with the first one. The last item at the very bottom of the box was a large plain manila envelope addressed simply to Mr. William Walker, care of Maison du Renard Rouge.

         “Aren’t you going to open that?” Edith’s curiosity prompted her to ask Walker, but he ignored her as if he was alone. She watched him silently, almost reverently, reach for the oldest album in the pile, and slowly turn page after page of photographs. Looking over his shoulder, his mother could not hide her delight at seeing pictures of Walker. They began when he was only a tiny newborn infant and continued through his preteen years.

         The mysterious envelope forgotten for the moment, Walker and Edith slowly went through that album. He had finally noticed his mother and made room for her on the floor beside him. For the next hour, the sight of two adults sitting on the floor amused people passing through the entrance room. The usually prim and proper Edith, the woman who some knew was the original reason for Walker’s mansion, surprised many when they saw her sitting there with legs tucked up underneath her body.

         Oblivious to anyone else, Walker shared his childhood memories with Edith, who listened to his every word, trying to show no regret at not being there for him during those years. “Mom took this on a trip to San Francisco when I was, oh, about six,” pointing to a photograph curling slightly at the edge from age. It showed a widely smiling boy leaning over the railing of a ferryboat but looking back at the person taking his picture. A tall man stood next to the child, looking with pride down at his young child. “That’s my dad,” Walker said, a look of sadness crossing his face then disappearing as quickly. “You’d of liked him, my mother, too.”

         Edith gently touched his shoulder, thinking of her own cold uncaring parents. Adopted when only a few days old and finding his birth mother many years later, Walker had what she never did while growing up, people who loved him.

         His sudden laugh brought her thoughts back to the present. “My father took this picture of my mother on that same ferry boat trip.” Edith looked at the photograph that looked slightly tilted and felt her own smile growing. In front of her was a picture of a young windblown brunette. She was trying to hold down her full skirt, without much success, while the ocean breeze showed off her pretty legs to everyone around her.

         When he eventually closed that album, Walker decided to look through the remaining three in the privacy of his own apartment. The laughs and chuckles of his elderly guests heading past them for the dining room finally made him realize how odd he and Edith must look.

         Before standing and helping his mother to her feet, he took out the envelope and placed the four albums back into the wooden box. Once on his feet, he looked at the manila envelope without immediately opening it. What’s waiting for me inside? he thought, Where have these missing albums been all these years, and who knew to send them here?

         Putting the unopened envelope back with the albums, Walker picked up the box and headed for the stairs, these silent questions unanswered for now.

* * *

         A week would pass before the Reverend got his answer in the form of a telephone call. He heard a baritone voice say, “Reverend, you can tell your people rescue is on its way since I have a phalanx of lawyers heading for the city. I’ve given them orders to get the paperwork started to buy that construction company to put a stop to what’s going on.”

         The Reverend couldn’t think of a thing to say at this generous offer, and he listened in shock when the man continued, “Give us a few months to get the buildings already there up to code, and I don’t want to hear of anyone forced out of their homes during that time, okay?”

         After the conversation ended, the Reverend hung up the phone and thought back over the happenings of the last week. The discovery of items in a lost-and-found box would now improve the lives of all living in the neighborhood, thanks to the generosity of one man.

         Miracles do happen! he thought happily, heading out of the church to tell his neighbors of the upcoming changes soon to happen.

Chapter 118

Two days before Samantha’s expected return from San Francisco, the various children at Hannah’s Home showed signs of extreme cabin fever. The many thunderstorms during the previous week kept them inside, and many of the adults took turns trying to keep them entertained.

         Late that afternoon, Abe and Sylvia Goldman wandered over from the mansion to help and immediately found themselves surrounded by half a dozen of the noisy children. Itzam, recently released from the hospital and still recuperating from her fall, chattered away in excited broken English. A laughing Joshua would quickly translate her occasional Q'eqchi word whenever he saw a confused look on Abe’s face.

         “She’s doing fine, isn’t she, Mr. Goldman?” Joshua asked.

         The elderly man, not sure if Joshua meant Itzam’s return to health or her increasing grasp of the English language, could only nod his head in agreement. He felt someone tugging at his sleeve and looked down at young Paul. This particular boy was a favorite of his, perhaps because Paul rarely spoke when listening intently to Abe’s stories.

         “So, Paul, what type of story do you want today?” Abe walked over to a sofa in the main room and waited for his wife to join him. Sylvia patted the empty space beside her for Paul. The other children found chairs or simply sat on the floor at the feet of the elderly couple.

         Before Paul had a chance to say even one hesitant word, the always inquisitive 10-year-old Eddie jumped into the conversation. “Mrs. Goldman, I have a question.”

         “Yes, child, what is it?” She smiled at the little boy who was on the floor and leaning against the giant Irish Wolfhound, Valentine.

         “Some of us are curious why you always wear paper clips on a chain around your neck. Is there a reason or story behind them?” Eddie shyly asked this and didn’t understand why Sylvia’s smile disappeared. Watching as Abe took Sylvia's hands in his large ones, Eddie wished he hadn’t brought up the subject.

         However, Sylvia gained her composure and slowly pulled her hands away from those of her husband. “Eddie, I wear the paper clips in remembrance of my family.”

         “Remembrance? Why? What happened to them?” These questions came not from Eddie but from his close friend, 12-year-old Brennan.

         Sylvia looked down at the gold chain from which five paper clips dangled. First was a dark blue one. Next to this was a pink clip followed by two light blue ones and finally a plain silver clip. “The Holocaust happened to them. You’ve heard about that time in history, haven’t you?” She saw heads nodding on the older children and blank looks from the younger ones. Sylvia decided to try not to go into too much graphic detail about the horror of those days.

         She started speaking, so softly the children had to lean forward to hear her clearly. “The officers came to our home in the middle of the night and dragged Papa out of bed. In my dreams, I still can hear Mama screaming in terror!” She paused once again then said in a whisper, “They took him away along with all the grown men in town, and we never heard from them again. The first clip is for him.”

         Abe put his arm around his wife’s shoulders to comfort her when she said, “The following morning, those remaining in our small town were all herded into a railroad car. There must have been about 80 to 90 women and children packed into that small area.”

         She stopped for a moment, old memories of those times with her family rushing back. “The pink paper clip is for Mama while the blue ones are for my two younger brothers. They died in a German concentration camp.”

         However, Brennan had yet another question. “There is one more clip, the plain silver one. Who is that one for?”

         Another minute passed, and those listening were starting to think Sylvia wouldn’t answer when she finally said, a sob evident in her voice. “That was for the baby Mama was pregnant with when she walked into the gas chamber with my brothers. We didn’t know if it was going to be a boy or a girl.”

         Joshua then asked the question the others might have been too shy to ask. “Mrs. Goldman, how did you survive when the rest of the family didn’t?” Abe frowned at the boy, but Sylvia stopped him before he could scold Joshua for being impertinent.

         “I was only 18 when we arrived at the camp, and the guards soon discovered I played the violin.” She looked over at Joshua, but he knew she wasn’t seeing him. Her thoughts were back in time somewhere. “When our railroad car packed with those of us who had survived that long cold ride got to the camp, the guards forced us to run inside the wooden compound. We had to stand silently for what seemed like hours. Every now and then, they would point to some of us to follow them, and we never saw these people again.”

         A tear trickled down her wrinkled face unnoticed. “Mama and my brothers, Liron and Tomir, were in the first group led to a large building next to one that had streamers of smoke coming out of its large chimneys. I later found out this other place was a crematorium, and the one they walked into was one of many gas chambers.”

         By now the children surrounding Abe and Sylvia were completely silent. Only the muffled sound of the thunder and rain was heard. Abe picked up her story, letting his wife gain her composure. “The guards chose Sylvia to play the violin in the camp’s Jewish orchestra, thus music saved her life.” He pushed back the long sleeve of her dress and did the same to his shirt. This revealed numbers tattooed on both their arms, permanent reminders of those terrifying days.

         “We were both in the same camp, but never met until after the Americans came to liberate us in 1945. I worked in one of the smaller buildings picking through the pitiful bits and pieces of jewelry. The removal of these and all their clothes left the prisoners naked when shoved into the gas chamber. Finally, their dead bodies ended in the crematorium.”

         By now Sylvia had brought herself back to the present and was able to continue her story. “You asked about the paper clips, Eddie.” Her hand went to her chest where the chain containing the five paper clips ended. “The Norwegians started wearing these clips on their lapels as a symbol of resistance against Nazi occupation during the World War II. I’m just carrying on that tradition even though the memories of my family are never far from me. Does that answer your question?”

         “Yes, Mrs. Goldman, thank you.” Eddie patted Valentine one last time on the head and stood. Walking over to the elderly couple seated on the sofa, he reached out to gently touch the pink paper clip. “I think your Mama would be happy for you now.”

Chapter 119

That evening when Jack was enjoying a quiet dinner, Anthony practically bounced into the dining room, a large grin on his handsome face. He called out from the doorway, “We identified all the bodies!” Jack, used to his friend’s excitable nature, quickly motioned him over to their table.

         “You’ll never believe what we found out,” Anthony said, his grin never wavering despite the stern look on Jack’s face. He glanced at Jack. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb the other people eating, but Dr. Brown and I had to really dig to find out who all the women were.” He winced when realizing what he’d said. “Oops, no pun about digging intended.”

         Jack motioned a waiter over to give Anthony time to calm down. After the waiter left to get Anthony’s dinner, Jack leaned forward, ready to hear what the younger man had to report. “Well, we know the first woman was Nancy Edgeworth and the fourth one was Rebecca Atherton, but how did you find out the names of the other two?”

         Anthony pulled out a paper from his jacket’s pocket. “We were able to check old newspaper clippings in Westbrook’s library.” He handed the paper to Jack. “I microfilmed this about a missing woman who simply disappeared one day. She was Marian Keys, the wife of a wealthy businessman, Reginald Keys. The news made front page for days until the fruitless search for her body ended two weeks later. According to one article, one of the men leading the search was Jason Edgeworth, a close friend of Mr. Keys.”

         Jack looked at the picture of Marian Keys. Even though it was grainy like most newspaper pictures of that era were, he could tell she had been a beautiful woman. Her dark hair worn piled high on her head showed off a slender neck. Noticing the velvet choker studded with diamonds jewelry, Jack said softly, “We found in the chamber of the third woman.” He didn’t look at the other two men, but continued almost to himself, “He started raping the women with this one. I hope she didn’t suffer for long.”

         Anthony remembered the sight of a skeleton loosely tied and stretched out on the metal bed in Marian Key’s death chamber. During Dr. Brown’s autopsy of the woman’s remains, he had discovered shallow cuts on some of the bones, evidence of Edgeworth’s sadistic pleasure in inflicting pain on the still living woman. She suffered and for a long time, Anthony sadly thought to himself.

         Jack brought Anthony back to the present with his questions. “Could you identify the woman in the second chamber? The poor woman burned alive in that brass coffin?” He waited for Anthony to answer, but the pleased smile on his new friend’s face surprised him.

         Anthony pushed the memory of Marian Key’s terrible fate from his mind to answer Jack. “She was harder to identify, but the ragged clothing we found started us off. Samuel Hobson told us what it probably was.”

         “The banker?” Jack asked, puzzled by this piece of information.

         “Yes, he remembered his grandfather had maids who wore dresses of that material. Evidently, the servants at the turn of the century were all required to wear uniforms.”

         Jack jumped in before Anthony could continue. “So, this was a maid of Hobson’s grandfather?”

         “Not exactly, no. Burned remnants of plain, dark green wool remained on the woman’s body. The Hobson family clothed their servants in blue. The upper class wore clothes of lighter material such as silk and cotton, while only servants still wore heavier wool outfits year round.”

         Jack thought about this for a few minutes. “So, the heavier fragments identified the woman as a servant, maybe a maid?”

         “Actually a governess.” Anthony decided to wait to finish his story when he saw the waiter coming across the room with his dinner. The other two men waited silently as he attacked the delicious meal. With the autumn weather slowly turning cooler with winter creeping closer every day, Chef Geoffrey was adding hearty stews and soups to the menu, and today’s was a thick, creamy corn chowder with corn muffins smothered with butter served with it. In this way, he used up the last ears of corn from the garden next to the mansion.

         It took Anthony quite some time to finish his meal since he slowly savored every bite. After eating his own limited cooking while in San Francisco, he found himself spoiled by the meals he received from Chef Geoffrey’s kitchen. Finally, he put down his soup spoon, wiped his mouth with a linen napkin, and looked over at his friends.

         “You’ll never guess who she turned out to be.” After giving this tantalizing hint, he paused.

Chapter 120

Deciding he’d drawn out the suspense long enough, Anthony asked, “Jack, do you remember the jewelry we found near her body?”

         “Sure, a ring and some type of bracelet.” Jack waited after saying this, wondering how these items identified the body.

         “Well, the ring was very ordinary, but the bracelet had an inscription inside it.” Anthony paused once again for effect, but quickly went on after seeing Jack’s annoyed frown. “It read, ‘To Essie with all my love, Jason’”

         “Jason? Jason Edgeworth?”

         “Yes.” Anthony leaned forward in excitement. “We tracked the bracelet down to the jewelry store in town. It had been in business for over 100 years, and the new owner last year hired high school kids to copy all the old receipts into his computer. These entries had item bought, the purchaser, who received the item, and any inscription engraved. It took only a few minutes to find the receipt for the bracelet.”

         “So who is Essie?’ Jack was still impatiently waiting for Anthony to get to the crux of his story.

         Anthony went on. “It seems Essie was Esmeralda Ferguson, governess to the Atherton family. Edgeworth must have met her while courting the daughter, Rebecca. Another daughter, only a few months old, suddenly appeared when the family came back from an extended visit to Europe. Everyone thought the baby was Mrs. Atherton’s child, but she wasn’t.”

         Jack quickly asked the next questions. “How do you know, and who was the child?”

         Anthony pulled out a journal from a briefcase he’d placed under his chair when first joining the others. “This explains everything now. I’d read it before, but couldn’t put all the pieces together. Here, read this portion.” He handed the journal to Jack with it opened to a page near the end.

         In a hoarse tone of voice, barely recognizable as his own, Jack read, “The whore actually thought I’d marry her, a slut of a servant. She tried to blackmail me into marriage after finding out she was carrying my bastard. The threats I’d kill her worked, though, since her employers secretly adopted her child. However, after they came back from Europe, Essie kept after me to marry her instead of the rich bitch, Rebecca.”

         Jack’s voice lowered when he read the next few sentences. “She thought she’d won when I told her I would marry her. She followed me like the dumb female she was down into the cavern. I’d promised her a surprise to get her down there, and she got that surprise when I placed my knife against her throat. After a few minutes of Essie crying and pleading for her life, I could feel myself starting to get hard. When I forced her to climb into the brass coffin I’d had built by a local smithy, I still heard her begging me to let her out. This was even after I lowered and bolted down the cover over her. My excitement grew and grew while I placed faggots of wood underneath the coffin and lit the fire.”

         Jack finished the entry, almost against his will. “Essie actually thought I’d marry her. Why would I when there was Rebecca to be all mine soon? The screams of the stupid whore got louder and louder, and I started to regret not enjoying her one last time. Only after the screams stopped did I undo my breeches and let my seed come out in a hot flow of sexual satisfaction. I promised myself I would enjoy Rebecca’s soft body before bringing her down here. Soon, very soon.”

         He closed the journal. “That’s the end except for a few more obscene sentences of what he planned on doing to his next woman.” He silently gave the journal back to Anthony. Seeing Anthony wanted to say something else, he hesitated before asking, “What else is there? Get it over with quick. I don’t think we can take much more of this man’s insanity.”

Continued in next segment.

Home of the Gray Dog - Segment 25  (18+) Chapters 121 through 125. #1347914 by J. A. Buxton