by C.W. Bigelow
The notification by registered mail was a shock to me. My grandfather died almost two years before at the age of ninety-six, and I had totally swept that memory clean. Because of the length of time, an inheritance was reason for the first surprise. The other was that we hardly knew each other, the last visit being almost two decades before. The last communication was a poem I wrote to him on his ninetieth birthday. He told my father at the time that he thought it was good and he liked how I equated his first day of spring birthday with rebirth and his long life. The very day the letter arrived I had been passed over for a promotion at a job I’d been floundering in for ten years. Having the vacation available I decided to head east to look at the inherited house.
Unkempt bushes reached out wildly in front of the house, camouflaging the windows in the small cape cod as I pulled in with a full-size mattress that I purchased at the Salvation Army store in town fastened loosely on top of the car.
Dragging it into the house, I recalled my grandfather drop kicking me through the screen door when I was twelve. Second guessing him was not advised. That was the second of three visits. My curiosity was lit again. Why leave this to me?
The sharp creaking of a large oak outside the bedroom window woke me – it was like old bones squeaking in a strong wind off the Cape. It was still dark. There were hushed voices in the living room, and I turned over to escape the noise in hopes of falling back asleep, before realizing where I was and there was no one else with me. Who were the voices, or was I dreaming, or were these conversations being held by trespassers who had been inhabiting the house since my grandfather’s death?
I opened my eyes to a gray daylight. It had been a dream. A variety of voices argued with alarmed tones was all I remembered.
The resounding wind swept low, smoky clouds across the trees lining the property. A chill hung in the house like a wet towel. The musty scent of mold permeated the air. The cold continued shaking me as I fumbled with a coffee pot in the small kitchen. A fine layer of dust lay on the dishes in the glass faced cupboards. All valuables had been claimed by relatives or sold off, leaving just an old couch and a laminated kitchen table with two chairs.
The walls in the living room were blotched with bleached oval shapes – ghosts of pictures that had hung on the walls for decades.
I found a stack of firewood in the carless garage and got a fire going in the living room fireplace. The heavy smoke from the wood floated in the room before I got the chimney flue to suck it up. A few cups of coffee by the fire warmed me enough to enable me to explore. I climbed pull-down stairs in the ceiling to see if there was anything left in the attic. Balancing on the rickety stairs, head at floor level, I yanked a cord illuminating a single light bulb which revealed a stack of boxes in a far corner. After hauling them down the slim staircase I dug out old books and piles of letters and diaries written by relatives from previous generations. They contained the thoughts and emotions of people to whom I owed my looks and character. My few visits with William in Cape Cod left me with impressions of soberness and anger. Callous and stubborn with his emotions, it was as if he was afraid to reveal any part of himself. Comments were pointedly thrown about, but his arrogant, attacking manner seemed more of a defense mechanism; closed to discussion as if he couldn’t bear to have his opinions questioned. The last time I saw him, I was seventeen and the generation gap was so wide and defined, disgust for each other was what we shared. So, why did he leave the house to me? It made no sense.
I found bibles and diaries dating back to the early seventeenth century when the Jamieson’s had arrived in the country from England and discovered John was the first who landed in America in 1636. Why were these left behind? What if I’d just sold the place without visiting? A trove of history would have been lost.
There was snow in the dusk air by the time I quit reading and decided to find someplace to eat. The wind had slackened, and I was locked in the past when my ancestors were educators, pastors, and soldiers in the Revolutionary and Civil Wars; one cousin was a famous poet and my great aunt had been an artist of some acclaim. Bare trees reached into the gloaming sky like skeletal hands as I searched my phone for nearby restaurants. Just a mile away was The Bully Lyon. Pulling up to the fieldstone building, the sign declared it had been established in 1750. The roofed front porch sagged like the mouth of a stroke victim. The rotting porch moaned under my steps and the entrance door was difficult to open.
Void of patrons, I wandered through a handful of square tables in a small room bordered on three walls by a thin spindled railing deck that held more tables. The bar was separated from the dining area by another white wood spindled partition. A single candle glowed in a red glass lantern on each table. The only other light was a jaundiced aura from small bulbs under each of six oil portraits spaced along two walls. I wandered across the dining area to the first one, a thin, royally adorned, yet sullen blonde woman. Her eyes peered out in a vacant gaze as if she’d lost total interest in posing for the painting. Lips pursed under long cheeks. I wondered why anyone would have chosen her for a subject.
“Can I help you?” It was a deep voice and I turned to see a woman of fair heft plodding towards me. A red apron spread over her like an inverted V. Her straw like red hair was pulled into a lazy ponytail atop her head. “Maybe a drink?”
“That’s a good idea. Vodka on the rocks.”
Her smile spread wide freckle sprinkled meaty cheeks.
“You wouldn’t happen to know who the artist was?” I asked – pointing toward the blonde.
“I’ve got it filed somewhere. That’s my great, great, great grandmother.” She chuckled and her green eyes sparkled in the dull lighting. “Her husband next to her, followed by their son, then his wife and family. The first and second generations of The Bully Lyon. Story goes that the artist used to eat here regularly and paid his bills with these paintings. It was the artist’s idea to dress them up as royalty, which I find ironic cause though they were the owners, they were the cooks, clean up and wait staff, so royalty was a bit farfetched.”
“Is this place yours?” I sat on a high-backed bar stool as she handed me my drink.
“Will be eventually. My mom is still living. Dad died last year. That’s how it always is.”
“How what is?”
“Man dies before the wife, then the wife runs it for a while before she ends up dying and leaving it to the survivors. Guess the men can’t manage us too long.”
“You an only child?”
“Yep. Not married either, so this might end both my business and my family. Besides us reds are a healthy line. Been carrying on since the second generation of Lyons. The daughter of the grim one on the wall.”
“So, you are a Lyon?”
“Linda Bagley. Lyon is my mother’s side.”
“Lived here always?”
“Every day of my life,” she chuckled, her barrel chest bouncing freely. “Right above on the second floor. If there’s a husband needed, we go out and bring him home.”
“Will need someone to help you continue the family.”
She shrugged as she dried a cocktail glass. “Suppose so.”
Drunk after dinner at the bar I decided a mile home was an easy jaunt and left the car in the parking lot at The Bully Lyon. Linda had offered to drive me but watching her catching sips behind the bar as she served the sparse crowd that had joined me, I decided the walk would do me good and be safer.
Slipping and sliding through town I happened upon a small graveyard encircled with a stone wall. Within sight from the sidewalk was a striking marble tombstone that turned out to be my grandparent’s. Topped with a few inches of snow that glittered in the glow of a streetlight, I nodded and said, “Thanks grandad.”
Awakened by banging temples, I heard voices drifting from the living room.
“But you paid for her to go to Europe.”
“Wasn’t me. It was your half-sister.”
“You didn’t argue. And you refused my request.”
“And why would I argue with your half-sister.”
“That is not the issue here and you know it.”
“And what is the issue here? Did you pull us here for what purpose? I’m confused. Is anyone else confused? Isn’t this all water under the bridge anyway.”
“Closure. My destiny wasn’t fulfilled.”
“And that is my fault?”
“Well, as you just admitted, you let her go off to Europe.”
“Aren’t you listening? Your half-sister paid for her, in fact, accompanied her much of the time, and she wasn’t going to need to support a family with her art.”
“Because she isn’t a man?”
“You are convinced you could have supported a family with a writing career?”
“Jack said as much, albeit many years later.”
“And isn’t that the point. I was a lawyer who liked to dabble in writing…”
“And satisfied doing that. I wasn’t satisfied in my vocation.”
“And sending you to Europe would have made you a writer? And made you more satisfied? I can’t recall you ever being happy. Ever satisfied.”
“Exactly.”
I climbed out of bed and walked to the bedroom door which squeaked as I opened it. I flipped the light onto an empty living room and walked tenuously to the kitchen to gulp a full glass of water. There was an electricity in the air, but no sounds and I struggled to recall my dream. Emotionally charged narratives, raised voices. Pausing in the living room, listening carefully, finally convinced there was no more conversation, I went back to bed.
The next morning was spent reading the collection of my grandfather’s poet cousin. Each of the books were autographed and inscribed to my grandfather, with copies of correspondence between the two of them stuck inside the pages of each book. One letter from Jack the poet stated, “Your nostalgic, and extremely evocative description of the far and lost Morristown School days of 1900-1902, of the grounds around the building, the grass circle and the little popular tree…which you hadn’t thought of for 66 years – your very feeling description of all this, and the way it haunts you, prove you, yourself to be a poet, at heart if not by profession.”
Visions of my grandfather trekking to the beach wearing a floppy white tennis hat pulled down to his narrow nose. I recalled the green under-brim adding a deeper shade to his narrow face. Always in faded madras swimming trunks and a white terry cloth beach shirt, open just enough to reveal the long rough scar where his right breast had been removed. After that cancer was removed, he lived another twenty years. I distinctly recalled his standing atop the dune peering at the surf rolling onto the sand. There was a sad searching in his eyes.
I discovered my great aunt, the artist, was sent a monthly stipend of a hundred dollars while she traveled and painted in Europe. Calculating the difference of worth – it was over three thousand dollars a month in current dollars. Now that was a nice allowance.
I headed to The Bully Lyon for lunch.
Still dim and gloomy but a boisterous crescendo filled the room because each table was occupied with elderly couples. The vibrant hum of their voices warmed the room and I escaped to the seclusion of the bar.
“You look worse than you did when you left last night,” Linda laughed.
“Huh?” I lifted my head off the bar.
“I didn’t realize you were here until I heard snoring.”
“Long night without much sleep.” I gazed around hazily. I’d been asleep for a couple of hours. The tables were vacated.
“Think you need a bloody and you can tell me about yourself. We talked about me enough last night.”
Taking a deep draw, I wiped my mouth with a napkin and said, “I’m staying at my grandparent’s house. My grandmother died two years ago, and Grandad died last year. I’ve been offered it and am checking it out.”
“Free?” I nodded as I gulped again, the energy of the alcohol buzzing through my veins.
“What’s the question?”
I suppose she was correct; I hadn’t given it any serious thought of moving there when I left Chicago, but something kept clawing at me. A feeling I couldn’t identify but couldn’t shrug. And the question of why still lingered.
“Obviously, you have doubts since you’ve been staring into space since I asked.”
“You’d take it, it seems.”
“You’re thinking of turning it down?’ she asked throwing her head back in mock shock.
“No. There is the question to sell it or live in it. But my real confusion is the reason I was the one who got it. My grandfather and I weren’t close.”
She poured herself a drink. “How about renting it?”
I shrugged as she poured me another drink. “Difficult being an absent landlord. It’s also a feeling of guilt, especially since I’ve been reading all kinds of family history since I arrived. He obviously chose me for a reason, though I don’t know what that reason was.”
“You’ll have to show me the house.”
“You brought him here for a different viewpoint. We are getting nowhere. You said so yourself.”
“And what do you suppose his reaction to us will be? Have you taken that into consideration?”
“I’m sure he’s heard us by now.”
It was a female. “My god! He’s got The Bully Lyon girl in bed with him.”
The female voice chuckled. “Some things never change.”
Another female voice. “Not Mark?”
“Yes, I can’t believe you didn’t know. Started with Bud, the painter.”
“Ah, I loved Bud’s portraits. Who got the paintings of my grandparents. I’ve been trying to visualize them by staring at the dark oval shapes where they used to hang.”
“Madeline. She always loved them as a child, so I thought she should have them.”
“She’s a bit large, don’t you think?”
“The Lyon’s were buxom women. Redheads each and everyone except the original blonde who started the Bully.”
“So, the youngster is carrying on the tradition. He is the third generation from Mark.”
“Christ! She’ll hear you!” I grumbled as I sat up to four relatives in the small bedroom.
“No need to worry, Ben. Only you can hear us.”
It was my great aunt, Annie the artist, who I had met once in Boston when I was ten. “Not a dream?”
“Maybe a nightmare. But no, not a dream,” Annie chuckled.
Linda let out a lewd chuckle and turned away from the voices. Her red hair lay plastered across the pillow.
Annie turned to William. “Ben looks a lot like your wife, Patti, don’t you think.”
“Lucky for him,” he sighed as he walked into the living room.
Once out of the bedroom, I watched as they took their seats on ghost furniture, or the furniture that existed when I had last visited decades before. William bit the inside of his cheek, jaw flexing as he gazed gloomily at his sister.
Primed for this visitation by the previous night’s discussion didn’t make it easier. Being coaxed from a warm bed on a chilly, dank night by four ghosts, relatives or not, was not as unnerving as it should have been. Curiosity overwhelmed any fear. A lazy fire in the fireplace and a dim glow from a lamp were the only sources of light, both creating waves of flickering shadows on each wall. The night air outside was still.
Alfred, my great grandfather, was in a wood rocker. The ladies were on the old sofa that had been left behind. William paced a bit in front of the fire, before plopping down on an ottoman, resting his chin on his raised knees. I was left standing, glancing apprehensively from relative to relative who hovered as holographs.
Elbows on knees, Alfred leaned forward and began in a soothing, restrained tone. “My boy, we asked you here to function as our jury. We have been arguing this matter since William joined us two years ago. The reason you were chosen was the lack of a relationship you had with your grandfather. We need a totally objective view.”
“But you gave me the house,” I reminded them all as I looked at William. William nodded with a sigh.
Alfred smiled, his muttonchops spreading like wings across his cheeks. The lamplight reflected off his balding crown. “I suppose so. But it was the only way we could get you here. We can only appear in property owned during life. At any rate we would like you to solve this issue so we can move on to other matters.”
“Other matters?”
“Death is too vast an area to teach. One can only learn from experience.”
“So Jury,” Annie began.
“Our father is charged with murder.”
“Murder? By whom? And who did he murder?”
Faith jumped in for the first time. “The murder of William’s muse, so to speak.”
“And I am here…” Annie began.
“Because he supposedly nurtured yours Annie,” I responded. “At least that’s what I’ve gathered over the last couple of nights. But Faith, what exactly is the reason for your appearance?”
A self-conscience grin opened, allowing her bright teeth to vividly contrast with her dark complexion. “I happened to be with Annie when she was subpoenaed. I am also half-sister to both and know them very well – a character witness with some skin in the game as it were. And I have been accused of being Annie’s enabler.”
“So?” I asked peering at my grandfather.
He took a deep breath. “It is my heartfelt belief I could have, should have been a fine writer with some more support from these relatives.”
“The kind of support Annie received from Faith?”
“Exactly.”
“And what proof do you have?” Alfred asked calmly.
“Proof?” William cried indignantly. “Proof that you didn’t support me. Isn’t it obvious? When I came to you after graduation and requested a trip to Europe, you turned me down. Annie was already in Europe. Proof!” His long legs stretched out like ropes.
Alfred snickered, displaying confidence. “Son I told you, I couldn’t afford it at that particular time. Annie didn’t go to college. You did.” He turned to me and explained, “I’d been laid up with pneumonia for a month and not being able to practice caused a large thinning of finances at that moment. Timing was wrong to begin with. You began selling stocks at that point.”
“And his muse was buried,” Annie added. “At least that is the argument.”
“And what exactly was your muse? Or should I say who was your muse?”
“William?” Alfred asked.
He remained silent. The angst on his face was the same as it was on my few visits.
“I read through all Jack’s books and your correspondence.”
William lit up. “And did you read the letter where he said I had the heart of a poet?”
“I did and he added, ‘if not by profession.’ I never found any of your poems in all those papers.” I pointed to the piles of boxes.
He looked sadly at the boxes.
“Do you think there would have been poems if you had gone to Europe?”
Still silence, as he anxiously rubbed his large hands together.
“Alfred, I enjoyed the story you wrote about going to Washington and dealing with Stanton and Seward during the Civil War.”
“Did you? Thanks.”
“And Annie, I delved into your diaries and read all the newspaper clippings about your paintings in Paris and in New York. And the awards.”
She smiled and nodded, recognizing the direction I was headed.
“And Faith, I really enjoyed the book you self-published about your mother and Alfred.”
I looked at William. “Did you ever write any poetry?”
Continued silence.
“I read one of Jack’s articles about creating poetry from the most mundane things. Walking along the street. Anywhere and anything can be the spark to create a poem. And love poems. He had many love poems about his wife. They lived in New York, didn’t they?
“Don’t you think poetry, if it is in you, can be motivated by almost anything? I never knew you to ever smile, Granddad. Was your unhappiness caused by your inability to create poetry and you spent your whole life blaming others because you didn’t want to face that fact?”
“It seems you wasted your life wishing you were like your cousin,” Albert sighed.
I looked around the room as together they slowly dissipated into thin air right before the fire extinguished. And suddenly I was alone in an empty room with a worn-out sofa, haunted by the empty expression on my grandfather’s face. He’d wasted his life by remaining stuck where he wasn’t happy, but he’d done nothing to change it. He didn’t have the financial resources, true, but in reality, he lacked the ability.
“You’re one hell of deep sleeper,” Linda said. I opened my eyes as she was dressing. “I’ve got to get back to the Bully, but you’re welcome to come by for breakfast.”
I nodded. “Thanks.”
As I walked her to the door, I felt that energy in the room again. I hadn’t felt energetic about anything for years. Unhappy and drowned by my job, I realized there might have been more than one reason William left me the house. I smiled widely as I watched the next Bully Lyon lady drive out the driveway.
THE END
About the Author
After receiving his B.A. in English from Colorado State University, C.W. Bigelow lived in nine U.S. northern states, before moving to the Charlotte NC area. His fiction and poetry have most recently appeared in The Blue Mountain Review, Midway Journal, The Write Launch, Drunk Monkeys, Ponder Review, The Saturday Evening Post, Hole in the Head Review, Flash Fiction Magazine, Glassworks, Blue Lake Review, Remington Review, Last Leaves, Hare’s Paw, Red Weather, New Note Poetry, Backchannels, Thimble Literary Magazine and has poems forthcoming in Frost Meadow Review and Koru Magazine, and a short story forthcoming in Aether Avenue Press.