The Bungalow (34 page)

I set the journal down in my lap and marveled at the letter that had taken some fifty years to reach my hands.
He still loves me. God, he still loves me. Just as I love him, as I did in 1959, and as I do today.
And the bungalow—he said it was just as we had left it.
Yet why didn’t he mention the painting?
I turned to the next page and continued reading:

I closed the journal tightly, too disturbed, too tormented by the unfolding story to read further. Kitty had lied to me at the hospital. She had intercepted his letters.
Why did she do it? If I’d gotten Westry’s letters, might things be different?

I turned to the hotel room when I heard Jennifer at the door. “It’s a beautiful morning, Grandma,” she said. “You should get out for a walk.”

I stood up and nestled the journal in my suitcase, before pulling out Genevieve Thorpe’s letter.

“I think we should call her now,” I said, more sure of myself than I’d been in years.

Jennifer sat beside me on the bed as I punched the numbers into the phone and then listened to the ringing. One, then two, then three.

A woman’s voice answered, speaking a French phrase I didn’t understand. “Hello,” I said, “this is Anne Call—Anne Godfrey. I’m trying to reach a Ms. Genevieve Thorpe.”

The woman’s voice switched from perfect French to perfect English. “Why yes, hello, Anne, this is Genevieve speaking.”

“I’m here,” I said, a little more hesitantly than I’d expected. “I’m here in Bora-Bora.”

“My goodness,” she said. “What a wonderful surprise! I’d mailed the letter unsure if I’d ever hear from you, much less see you in person. Would it be possible to schedule a meeting before you go?”

“Yes,” I said. “It’s why I came.”

“Is today too soon?”

“No,” I said, “it’s perfect. We’re staying at the Outrigger Suites. Would you like to meet us for a drink?”

“I’d love to,” she said. “I’ve been waiting many years for this visit.”

“I suppose I have too,” I said. “See you this evening.”

I hung up the phone, hoping I hadn’t made a mistake.

“Just two tonight?” the hostess asked as Jennifer and I walked into the restaurant.

“No,” I said. “We’re expecting another guest.” Just then, a woman at the bar stood up and waved from across the room. She was striking, petite, with rosy cheeks and light brown curly hair fastened in a gold clip.

“Hello,” she said, walking toward Jennifer and me. She couldn’t have been much older than my sons, maybe in her sixties. “You must be Anne.”

“Yes,” I said, trying to place the familiar feeling I sensed when I shook her hand. “And this is my granddaughter, Jennifer.”

“Hello to you both,” she greeted us warmly. “I’m Genevieve.”

“It’s so nice to meet you,” I said. “Shall we sit down?” She carried a large canvas bag with navy stripes. I wondered what was inside.

“That would be lovely,” she replied.

The hostess directed us to a table by the window. When the waiter appeared, I ordered a bottle of white wine.

Genevieve smiled. “I can hardly believe you’re here,” she said, shaking her head. “You seemed like such a mythical figure. I mean, your name was in the registry of nurses during the war, but you still seemed like such a figment.”

A hush fell on the table as the waitress filled our glasses with wine. I took a sip and it warmed me as it traveled down my throat. “So I take it you know of the bungalow about a half mile from here,” she said, turning to Jennifer. “Just a little hut. You’d miss it if you blinked.”

I nodded. “I know the place.”

“It’s funny,” she said, taking a sip of wine and leaning back in her chair thoughtfully. “The locals won’t go near the place. They say it’s cursed. I avoided it all my life, especially as a girl. On a picnic with our parents down on that very beach, my brother and I stumbled upon it, but neither of us would dare step inside.” She shrugged. “But at some point I suppose my curiosity got the better of me. About twenty-five years ago, I climbed through one of the windows, took a look around. Wouldn’t you know it, a week later I found out my husband was having an affair and my mother was dying of breast cancer.”

“I’m so sorry,” Jennifer said, topping off each of our glasses with more wine.

“So you believe in its curse, then?” I asked.

Genevieve swirled the wine in her glass for a moment. “I don’t know,” she said. “Part of me does, and yet part of me feels there is so much good that resides there too. I felt it when I was there.” She scrunched her nose. “Does that even make sense?

“It does,” I said. “It’s how I’ve come to feel about the bungalow myself. I spent a great deal of time there alone.”

She reached into her bag and pulled out a small white envelope.

“Here,” she said, smiling. “I found this on the floor in a corner of the bungalow. I believe it belongs to you.”

I took a deep breath before lifting the flap of the envelope. My fingers felt around inside and met something hard and cold. The sparkle of the blue jewels refracted the setting sun. My pin. The one Kitty had given me. I gasped, reading the inscription on the back, an inscription lost in time. Thick tears welled up in my eyes and the room blurred.

“Surely there were a dozen Annes on the island at one time or another,” I said, puzzled. “How did you know this belonged to me?”

“I did my research,” she replied, smiling.

“And in your research,” I said, pausing, “did you happen to come across a Westry?” I looked at Jennifer. “Westry Green?”

Genevieve nodded. “Yes, I found a book of his, in fact—in the drawer of the desk in the bungalow.”

“A book?”

“Yeah,” she continued. “Just an old novel from the nineteen thirties. His name was written on the inside cover.”

I grinned, remembering Westry’s hope to keep our ties to the bungalow hidden.

“It took me a great deal of time,” Genevieve continued, “but I found him. We spoke many years ago, before I’d taken on the project I wrote about. I’ve tried reaching out to him since, with no luck.” She sighed. “The phone number’s been changed, and no one seems to know what became of him.”

I looked at my lap, folding the ivory napkin there in half, and then in half again.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t mean to imply that he—”

“What did he say?” Jennifer asked, swooping in to lighten the moment. “When you spoke?”

Genevieve smiled and gazed up at the ceiling as if to recall the exact details. “It was out of the pages of a novel,” she replied. “He said that he once loved you a great deal, and that he still did.”

“Why didn’t he just call or write?” I said, shaking my head.

Genevieve shrugged. “I suppose he had his reasons. He was eccentric, Mr. Green. I suppose all artists are, though.”

I frowned in confusion. “
Artists
?”

“Why yes,” Genevieve replied. “Of course, I haven’t seen any of his work, but I know that he has, or rather had, quite an impressive collection to his name. Paintings, sculpture. He studied art in Europe after the war, and settled down somewhere in the Midwest, where he taught art at the university level.”

“Genevieve,” I said, “you said he
had
an impressive collection. What do you mean?”

“He donated it all to various galleries,” she said. “I recall him saying that art was meant to be shared, to be seen, not cloistered.”

I smiled. “That sounds like the Westry I knew.”

Jennifer cleared her throat. “Genevieve, you mentioned that Westry did sculpture,” she said, looking at me for approval. “Do you know the medium? Clay?
Bronze
?”

I knew where her mind was going. The island had a way of drawing connections that weren’t real.

“I’m not sure,” Genevieve said, shrugging. “He was very brief about his work. And I could be wrong entirely. It was so long ago. My memory has faded some.”

Jennifer and I watched as she pulled a yellow notebook out of her bag and set it on the table.

“Do you mind if I ask you some questions?” she asked cautiously.

“Of course not,” I said, using my right hand to steady the clinking water glass in my left.

“As I said in my letter, a young woman was murdered on this island long ago,” she began. “I’m trying to put the story to rest, to find justice.”

Jennifer and I exchanged a knowing look.

“I understand that you were a nurse here and that you were off duty the night of the tragedy.” She leaned in closer. “Anne, did you see or hear anything of significance? There’s been such a shroud of secrecy around the circumstances of the murder. It’s like the island swallowed her up without a single clue. You may be my last hope for justice.”

“Yes,” I said, “I do know something.”

Genevieve opened her notebook. “You do?”

I clasped my hands in my lap, thinking of Westry’s convictions about keeping the secret. Even after years of analysis, turning the story over and over again in my brain, I’d never understood his intentions, or whom he’d been protecting. Perhaps bringing the secret to light would give me the answers I’d longed for.

“Atea,” I said. “Atea was her name.”

Genevieve’s eyes widened. “Yes,” she said.

Jennifer squeezed my hand under the table.

“She was a beautiful woman,” I continued. “I knew her only briefly, but she exuded the goodness of the island.”

Genevieve nodded and set her pen down. “Many of the islanders never came to terms with her death,” she said. “Even today. The ones who are old enough to remember still speak of it as a great evil that occurred on their shores. It’s why I’ve made it my mission to find justice, for her, for all of them.”

“I can help you,” I said. “But I’ll need to take you somewhere. I know of a clue that may bring you the justice you’re seeking.”

The sunset, orange with violet hues, caught my eye outside the window. “It’s too late tonight,” I said. “But can you meet us near the shore in front of the hotel tomorrow morning?”

“Yes,” Genevieve said, smiling gratefully. “I can be there as early as you like.”

“How about nine thirty?”

“Perfect,” she said. “I can hardly wait.”