Osprey Island

ballpoint letters traced over so many times they were nearly engraved, it read: THE DIARY OF LORNA MARIE VAUGHN SQUIRE.

“Duane”—Eden looked the sheriff in the eye—“why’re you showing this to me?”

The sheriff set down his cup. “Like I said, Eden, or tried to . . . There’s mention of you all over in there—says right on the first page you’re the one suggested she write down her thoughts in the first place. Back when it starts at first she writes the date in—late ’seventynine is it?—then it just kind of drops off. It’s right there on the first page . . .”

Eden opened the cover. Nov. 23, 1979. Right when Lorna was pregnant with Squee. Eden flipped the page. The initial entries were dated, then devolved into July . . . ? Until they disappeared altogether. The notebook was maybe three quarters full, and most of it seemed to be letters of a sort. Dear Diary had given way to Dear Squee, and then later in the notebook the pages began with just My Sweet Baby Boy. “Duane,” Eden said again, “what are you here for? What are you asking me?”

The sheriff looked as though he’d have liked to climb into his coffee cup and hide. “Roderick was my friend,” he said. “I’ve known you nearly all my life, Eden. Eaten dinner at your table. You know I’ve got nothing but respect for you, Eden—you know that.”

Whether it was true, and whether Eden believed him, were questions for another time. She nodded.

“There’s stuff in there that Lorna wrote that concerns a lot of people on this island. It says some things that’re not easy to believe, and even if you do believe them it’s nothing easy to swallow. There’s lots about you in there, Eden, and I won’t pretend to understand all what it says, but I have a real good feeling that it’s not things you’re wanting too many folks knowing about . . .”

Eden screwed up her face in sudden and nearly comical surprise: “Are you blackmailing me, Duane?”

Duane Harty’s eyes popped. “Christ lord, no!” he cried. “I just don’t know what in god’s name to do with the damn thing!” His face was pleading. “Police procedure’d be to register that diary and then send it along with any other personal belongings we salvaged, hand it over to her next of kin, and if that’s Lance or that’s Art and Penny I don’t even care who, because I for one don’t want to be around when any of them lay their eyes on what it says in that book. I am at a loss here, Eden. I don’t know what in god’s name to do. I am asking for your help here, is what I’m asking.”

Eden nodded.

“There’s part of me thinks I should just burn the damn thing,” the sheriff continued. “Let it be one more thing lost in the fire. But I read it, Eden. I read it all. And there’s things in there—I mean, I don’t fully understand all she’s saying, but I’ve got half a mind to go down to the Lodge and haul Bud Chizek into jail and toss away the goddamn key! That book there”—he pointed to it accusingly—“that book makes me feel like I’m going to lose my mind. What it says, I can’t even keep the half of it straight. I don’t even want to know half of what’s in there. But the other part—most of it, really—it’s all those letters, like, addressed to Squee . . . That boy’s going to grow up without his mother. She left him something there, and there’s a part of me feels like if I did one good thing in my life—forget police protocol—if I did one good thing I’d make sure that boy gets that book. Not now, but someday. You know—someday that boy might need to understand that there was someone on this earth once that loved him more than anything there ever was.” Sheriff Harty was fighting back tears. “I don’t know what to do with the rest of all of what’s in there. Part of me should be taking you in for friggin’ questioning, Eden,” he cried. “I don’t know what in hell you were running out here—I don’t want to know—I don’t want to know any of this . . .”

“I suppose,” Eden began, “I suppose the way one ought to handle something like this’d be to arrange some sort of way to get the book put away until Squee’s of an age to see such a thing—”

“But then you’re talking lawyers,” the sheriff interrupted. “You’re talking more people seeing this thing. You’re talking about the possibility of what’s in there getting spread here to Menhadenport—”

“What do you want me to say, Duane? You want me to take this thing and hide it away in my closet until the boy’s eighteen?”

Sheriff Harty froze, his mouth set in a grim purse. “No,” he said. “I want you to go get a safe-deposit box or some such down at the bank and keep it there until the boy’s eighteen.” And he just kept looking at Eden then, right at her, letting her know that he didn’t get any more serious than that. Eden looked down at the notebook, then back to Sheriff Harty. She drew in a long breath and let it out slowly. She said, “OK.”

COUNTY SANITATION HAD already brought a dumpster to the Lodge, set down—at Bud’s direction, no doubt—so that it blocked the view from Sand Beach Road to the laundry shack’s blackened husk. It was a terrible-looking thing: monolithic charred and melted washers and dryers rising above the rubble, like a miniature city, incinerated. Fire Chief McIntire was there, inspecting the wreckage, collecting data for the reports he would have to file. There were a few construction guys from the island milling around, hired for the demolition. Bud had dressed himself in a pair of old, stained Bermuda shorts and a striped polo shirt splotched with bleach, as if he planned to help with the demolition work, though it was hard to imagine Bud doing anything but bark orders from the sidelines and go inside to make “important” phone calls just when large items needed lifting. Bud was waving Roddy over. “Good morning, good morning.”

Bud started rattling off instructions when Roddy was still a good distance away. “There’s nothing we can do right here till the insurance boys make it out to have a look. They promised me they’d hustle through—we’ll start tearing it down the minute they’re done.” Roddy stopped about ten feet from Bud and listened to him orate. The construction crew guys listened too, though it seemed they’d already heard the speech. “For now, this morning, we’re waiting for the new equipment—they promised before noon—and we’ll need to get the maintenance shop cleared out. We’ll use this as an opportunity to get rid of whatever crap’s in there we don’t need—toss it all in the dumpster, but check with me first, you hear? Then I’ve got dimensions for the exhaust holes we’re gonna . . .” Bud dropped off. “Ach,” he said. “Screw it, save that for later. Let’s get the damn thing cleared out first. Load it into the pickups. We’ll store everything in the meantime off the staff quarters . . .” He turned and pointed. “That storage shed, there.” And thus a tedious and labor-intensive process began.

AT THE EAST END of the first floor in the Lodge there was a door without a room number. An index card was thumbtacked over the peephole. On it, in ballpoint pen that had faded to nearly nothing, someone had written “MAID.” Hunting down a key to the door was Suzy’s first order of business, and she walked up the hill to her folks’ house to see if Nancy had any ideas. Her mother was up and dressed and wanted to come down to the Lodge and find the key for Suzy. Making herself useful was an effective form of martyrdom for Nancy. Suzy was too tired to fight. They walked down the hill in silence, watching the men haul tools and equipment. Suzy slowed her pace to her mother’s. Nancy’s face looked thinner; she seemed perpetually near tears.

The insurance guys had shown up, and they circled the periphery of the burn site, one speaking into a handheld tape recorder, the other making marks on a company clipboard with a company pen. Bud could be heard nearly from the road, directing traffic down inside the maintenance shop.