More than once I’ve overheard the Kydd on the phone telling his Southern relatives that the goings-on in our Yankee law office never cease to amaze him. The look on his face at the moment tells me we’ve outdone ourselves this time. “Yeah,” I say. “We’re swell.”
“Of course we are,” Harry adds. “We’re adults.”
“Sure.” The Kydd wipes the grin from his face and lowers his voice to a deep bass. “So am I.”
“No, you’re not,” Harry fires back. “Adulthood begins at forty, not a minute sooner.”
“I’d love to stay and debate,” I tell them, getting to my feet. “But it seems I have an appointment. Where does she live, Harry?”
He grimaces and looks up at the ceiling again.
I’m tired of this case already. “Harry, you told the woman I’d come to her house. That means you have to tell me where she lives.”
He keeps his eyes on the ceiling, as if the information I’m asking for will appear there sooner or later. “On Easy Street,” he says. The Kydd hoots again.
“That’s cute, Harry. I’m sure she does. But where’s her house?”
Finally, he tears his gaze from the ceiling and leans forward. “I’m not kidding,” he says, squeezing his eyes shut as if he’s in pain. “She lives on Easy Street.”
The Kydd stands and opens the pine table’s single drawer. He pulls out a street map of Chatham, unfolds it on the tabletop, and runs a finger down the alphabetical list of streets.
I stare at Harry while I put my jacket back on. He opens his eyes and nods up at me, apparently trying to convince me he’s serious.
“Harry, I was born and raised in this town. There’s no such street.”
“Oh yes, there is,” the Kydd announces, pounding a pen on the map.
I bend over and follow his gold Parker to a spot in Chatham-port, past the country club. It’s one of the most exclusive areas in our affluent town. And there it is. Barely long enough to display its short name on the map. Easy Street. I’ll be damned.
“What’s the address, Harry?”
He doesn’t answer. When I look up, he’s inspecting the ceiling again.
This is getting old. “The number?” I prompt. “On the house?”
“It’s number one,” he says.
Well, of course it is.
CHAPTER 4
Fox Hill Road is aptly named. A handful of estates enjoys expansive grounds here, and the fox population thrives on the smaller creatures who share the lush landscape—squirrels and rabbits, mostly, along with the occasional household pet. I hit the brakes to slow my old Thunderbird when a healthy-looking vixen with a thick red coat trots into the road ahead. I hit them harder and come to a complete stop when two kits emerge behind her, their noses to the ground, oblivious to my car’s approach.
The mother fox stands still in the middle of the road, like a traffic cop, and stares up at me while her young ones cross in front of her. She seems entirely untroubled by my presence. Once the kits reach the safety of the bushes, she saunters after them, in no hurry whatsoever. She pauses before taking cover, looks back at me, and seems to nod. A thank-you, maybe. In this part of town, even the foxes are well bred.
A mile farther down Fox Hill Road, the rolling green hills of Eastward Edge Country Club come into view. The club’s oceanside golf course is touted as one of the most prestigious—and scenic—in the world. In the summertime, well-heeled golfers enjoy exclusive use of these hills, their compact carts rolling along narrow paths like busy ants. But in the winter, when the club is dormant and its members have fled to kinder climates, all that changes.
After winter snowstorms, the locals claim these slopes. They come by the truckload with sleds, toboggans, and cross-country skis, their thermoses filled with coffee, hot chocolate, and brandy. When my son was younger, we’d spend entire days here each winter, surrounded by friends and neighbors, hurtling down white hills toward the icy blue of the winter ocean, then climbing back up to do it all over again. Inevitably, Luke’s lips would be near-purple, his fingers and toes on the verge of frostbite, before I could convince him to call it a day. Luke and his friends still make a beeline for Eastward Edge after every winter storm, but in recent years they’ve traded their toboggans and skis for snowboards. And that makes me a spectator.
Just beyond the golf course, Strong Island Road forks off to the left, leading to one of Chatham’s busy town landings, where fishermen of all stripes unload their catches. I bear right instead and stay on Fox Hill as it narrows and snakes along the water’s edge. I’ve never been on this portion of the road before. It’s no more than a sandy spit, and just when it seems that land is about to disappear completely, Easy Street opens up on my left. I hesitate for a moment, my stomach still questioning the wisdom of this meeting, and then I turn in.
It’s clear at once that precious few of us can aspire to live on Easy Street. The road hosts only a trinity of homes. Number three appears first, on my left, a stately colonial on manicured grounds. It’s sealed up for the season, sheets of plywood nailed over its windows and doors to protect them from Cape Cod’s fierce winter winds.
I pass number two next, on the right, a pristine, newly shingled saltbox surrounded by dozens of hydrangea bushes, their few remaining blossoms a faded blue. It too stands abandoned, its cobblestone driveway empty, its shutters closed, waiting for the warmth of summer to lure its absentee owners back to Chatham’s charms.
Number one is on the left at the end, on the water. It’s a gem. A classic Cape with a gambrel roof, a waterside deck, and a floating dock, it’s obviously an antique that’s been painstakingly restored. I park the Thunderbird in the oyster-shell driveway and head for the side of the house, intending to knock on the kitchen door as Cape Codders always do. The front door opens first, though, just as I reach the steps to the deck, and a woman’s voice stops me in my tracks.
“This way,” she calls at my back. “Right this way. I am some kind of happy to see you, darlin’.”
It’s a Lauren Bacall voice: deep, throaty. But that’s not what makes me freeze. She sounds like the Kydd. Louisa Rawlings is Southern.
She’s cut the distance between us in half by the time I turn around. Long, certain strides carry her toward me, across a brick walkway, her full red lips glistening. She’s in tight black slacks and heels, her long-sleeved white silk blouse tucked in at her belted waist. Louisa Rawlings is six feet tall if she’s an inch. No, taller; she’s even taller than Harry.
And she’s stunning. Statuesque.
“You must be Mrs. Nickerson,” she says, extending her hand. Her French manicure is perfect. So is her makeup. And her shoulder-length, auburn hair.
I’m not quite sure how to respond. My mother was Mrs. Nickerson. “Marty,” I tell her as we shake hands. “Please. Call me Marty.”
“Marty it is,” she says, latching on to my arm as if we’re old sorority sisters reunited at last. “Let me tell you right now how grateful I am for your help, Marty. Harry Madigan says you’re the very best.”
I feel myself tense when Harry’s name rolls so easily off Louisa Rawlings’s tongue, but she doesn’t seem to notice. She leads me back across her brick walkway and through the front door. As we enter the foyer, I remember she’s only lived on Cape Cod a month. She doesn’t know, yet, that we don’t use our front doors. We come and go through kitchen doors, always.
I follow her down a short hallway and through the living room. It’s sparsely furnished in beiges and ivories, each piece looking as if it were created specifically for the spot it occupies. Huge wood beams and uncomplicated moldings throughout the room have been restored, not replaced. The same is true of the dark wooden mantel above the fireplace, as well as the two ovens built into the hearth beside it. And the soft pine floor, though refurbished, is the original. I can tell by the width of the boards, by the way they dip and slant, and by the square heads of the nails that secure them.