“Our Mary White? Former lover of John Hobbes?”
“Yup. The same.”
Evie’s heartbeat quickened. “How long ago was the offer made?”
“Three months.”
“Mary White is alive?” Evie said, wide-eyed.
“Yes she is. Living in one of those shacks out at Coney and still holding on to that house up on the hill.”
“Now why would she do that, I wonder?”
“Maybe we should find out.”
Mary White Blodgett lived on Surf Avenue in a wind-and-salt-battered bungalow with a view of the Thunderbolt roller coaster. Mrs. White’s daughter, Eleanor, met Will and Evie at the door wearing a housedress, her hair set with bobby pins.
“Mrs. Ambrosio?” Will asked.
“Who wants to know?”
“How do you do? I’m William Fitzgerald. From the museum. We spoke on the phone.”
Some spark of recognition showed in the woman’s eyes. “Oh, yeah. So we did. My mother’s an old lady, and she’s real sick. So don’t go agitatin’ her.”
“Of course,” Will said, removing his hat.
Mrs. Ambrosio led them through a sitting room littered with empty Whitman’s Sampler boxes and a collection of Radithor bottles that hadn’t yet made it to the rubbish bin. The place smelled of old beer and salt. “It’s the cleaning girl’s day off,” she said, and it was hard to know if it was a gallows joke or an excuse—or perhaps both. “Wait here in the kitchen a minute.”
Evie kept her hands to herself. She didn’t want to stand in the place, much less sit. On the messy kitchen table, a bottle marked MORPHINE stood dangerously close to one labeled RAT POISON. A dirty syringe lay on a wad of bloodstained cotton.
Mrs. Ambrosio disappeared behind a curtain, but her voice could still be heard, loud and shrill. “Ma! Those people are here to see you about Mr. Hobbes.”
Mrs. Ambrosio reappeared suddenly, moving the bottles hurriedly into a cabinet and shutting the door. “We get rats sometimes,” she explained. “Like I said, she’s real sick. You can have fifteen minutes. Then it’s time for her nap.”
Behind the curtain, Mary White’s bedroom was tomblike. The roller shades had been pulled down, and the bright beach sunshine bled around the edges. The old woman sat propped in bed against a pillow. She wore a sleep cap and a dirty peach silk boudoir jacket. Under the fragile skin of her arms, her gray-blue veins stood up like a knotty mountain ridge drawn along the folds of an old map.
“You want to know about my John,” she said in a voice weak with labored breathing.
“Yes, Mrs. Blodgett. Thank you.” Uncle Will sat in the only chair, forcing Evie to sit on the edge of the bed. The old woman smelled of Mentholatum and something sickly sweet, like flowers dying; it made Evie want to bolt from the house and run toward the hard light of the beach.
“Did you know my John?” Mary White smiled, showing teeth gone brownish-gray.
“No. I’m afraid not,” Uncle Will said.
“Such a lovely man. He brought me a carnation every week. Sometimes white, sometimes red. Or a pink one for special days.”
Evie shivered. From what they knew, John Hobbes had been anything but a lovely man. He’d killed many people and taken body parts from them. He’d terrorized and probably murdered Ida Knowles. And if they were correct, his spirit had come back to finish a macabre ritual and bring forth terrible destruction.
“Yes. Well. Can you tell us about John’s beliefs?” Uncle Will asked. “About the cult of the Brethren and—”
“It wasn’t a cult!” the old woman coughed out. Evie helped her sip water from a grimy glass. “They tried to make it sound diabolical. But it wasn’t. It was beautiful. We were seekers manifesting the spiritual realm on this plane. Jefferson, Washington, Franklin—enlightened men, the founders of our great nation—they knew the secrets of the ancients. Secrets even the Masons in their hallowed halls didn’t know. We meant to free people’s minds, rid them of their shackles. The world we know would die, and in its place a new world would be born. That was our mission—rebirth. John knew that.”
“What about the boarder who went missing? The servant girl?” Will persisted.
“Lies,” Mary spat. “The boarder left without paying his rent. The servant was insolent. She left to see her sister and didn’t bother to say good-bye.”
“And Ida Knowles?”
“Ida?” Mary’s hand fluttered about her mouth and her eyes searched. “Who are you? What do you want?” she said in a raised voice. “I did not say I would receive you!”