“Thank you,” she said, and he poured.
“Grandfather died when I was in high school. I went off the rails not long after that, and my life entered a downward spiral. Anyway, in the spring of ninety-five I was at the beach house. The necklace was usually kept in a safe in the Manhattan apartment, but my parents had been to some big fancy charity affair in Raleigh, and Mom had worn it. The necklace, by the way, originated in India, and the diamond itself was famous enough to have a name: the Rajipani Diamond. It had been the property of some minor princeling who’d fallen on hard times and had to sell all his wife’s jewelry. My parents stopped off in Nags Head for a couple of days after the Raleigh event, and for some reason they left the necklace in the house when they returned to New York.
“I had a party once they were gone. I had a lot of parties in those days. I had a lot of friends, many of whose names I couldn’t have told you the next day. People realized I had a lot of money and not much sense, and they moved into the house for weeks at a time, or asked me for loans they had no intention of ever repaying. I provided the booze and the drugs. They flattered me and made me think I was popular.”
Rachel sipped her drink and stared into space. “What a fool.”
Aunt Ellen reached across the table and touched her hand. Rachel gave her a big smile. “Of all the things in life I’m grateful for, the fact that I’ve learned what friendship truly is, is perhaps the most important. Jeff Applewhite was one of those so-called friends that spring. He came, he partied, he left. He was not a boyfriend of mine or even anyone special; he hung with the crowd who hung around me. I learned later he was from Iowa, had arrived in Nags Head the previous summer, and got a job with a construction firm. The night of April thirtieth, the usual crowd of hangers-on were at my house. Someone lit a bonfire on the beach, it got out of control, and the neighbors complained. I remember that. They were always complaining. I never paid any attention—my parents’ lawyers would smooth it all over when it got too serious to ignore. At some point in the night, I thought it would be amusing to wear the necklace. I put it on and pranced around the house in it. So funny.” She shook her head.
“Was Tina Sanchez at the party?” I asked.
“She might have been, Lucy. I don’t remember her being there, but I honestly don’t know. The point is, people wandered in and out all the time. They drank my booze, ate my food, borrowed my things and never returned them. I woke up the following morning on the floor of my bedroom, which wasn’t an uncommon occurrence. I didn’t realize I didn’t have the necklace on anymore. I didn’t know it was missing until my parents came back a few days later and wanted it. I couldn’t find it. They called the police.”
“It was never seen again,” Aunt Ellen said.
“Not by me, at any rate. The police talked to everyone they could locate who’d been in my house that night. People told them I’d been wearing it early in the evening, but no one had seen me take it off. A necklace of that value, with stones of that quality, isn’t something you sell on the street corner. The police were confident it would turn up. It never did.”
“And Jeff Applewhite?” I asked.
“He went to work the morning following the theft, and on the day after, but by the time the time the police got involved and went to his workplace, he was gone. They said he simply hadn’t shown up the morning of May third and hadn’t been heard from since. He hadn’t even come in to collect wages owed. He was working for a company called Reynolds Renovations, which isn’t around anymore.”
“Roy Reynolds died a few years later,” Uncle Amos said, “and his children didn’t want the business.”
“I remember them,” Aunt Ellen said. “Didn’t they do the family room extension we put on the old house? They were sorely missed when they closed, because their work was excellent and their prices good. I think they did some work on the interior of the library years ago, modernizing it and such. Sorry, Rachel. Please go on.”
Rachel sipped her drink. “Most of Jeff’s stuff was still in his apartment, but no one was able to say if anything was missing or when they’d seen him last. The police searched for him. They never found him. They eventually located his truck, or at least the truck registered to him, parked near the bus station in Elizabeth City. They concluded that Jeff stole the necklace and left town with it. What happened then”—she held out her hands—“no one knows.”
“And you?” I asked. “What did you do?”
She smiled at me. “My parents yelled and screamed and called me irresponsible. I yelled and screamed and blamed it all on them. But I was smart enough—and still not totally lost—to realize what I’d done. Juliette, who’d known my beloved grandfather and out of loyalty to him patiently stayed with me over my difficult years, helped me realize I’d lost his most important possession because of nothing but sheer stupidity. He would have been devastated. And so dreadfully disappointed in me. I’d like to say I immediately devoted myself to doing good works, but that took a while. I can say I never threw another wild party again. I never again saw most of the people who’d been there that night. I stopped taking drugs completely, although …”—she lifted her glass of wine—“I do like a drink now and again.”
“And fish,” Uncle Amos said, “I hope you like fish, because dinner’s ready.”
Josie sprang to her
