The Only One Left by Riley Sager

FOURTEEN

I put the pages in the lockbox under my bed, pretending I’m not hiding them, when that’s exactly what I’m doing. Secreting them away beneath Lenora’s rolling, rattling pill bottles because I don’t want anyone else to find them. But it’s not Lenora I’m worried about as I lock the box and slide it back under the bed. My concern is that having Lenora Hope’s partial confession in my possession will somehow make me look equally bad.

Guilt by association.

I’m dropping the lockbox key into the nightstand drawer when I hear a series of noises from above and outside.

A crack, a scrape, a clatter on the terrace.

I rush to the window, struggling to see what it was. It’s dark outside, and the lights inside the bedroom merely reflect my worried, tired face onto the window’s glass.

Thinking whatever I just heard could be related to the noises coming from Lenora’s room last night, I decide to investigate. I whisk out of my room and take the service stairs to the kitchen. From there, I move through the dining room on my way to the terrace. As soon as I step outside, something crunches beneath my feet.

A slate shingle recently fallen from the roof.

That’s at least one mystery noise explained.

A dozen more shingles litter the terrace, many broken into a hundred pieces, a few still miraculously intact. I step over and around them on my way to the terrace railing. A frigid breeze comes off the ocean in steady, brine-scented puffs. I close my eyes and lean into it, enjoying the chill. It feels good after spending so much time inside the stuffy confines of Hope’s End. Lenora doesn’t know what she’s missing.

The terrace runs the length of the entire mansion, ending on both sides with four short steps. The ones on the left descend to a flagstone patio surrounding an empty swimming pool. On the right, the steps lead to a swath of lawn. On the other side of it sits a one-story stone cottage so quaint and tidy it could have been plucked from a storybook. Warm light glows from a window beside the arched door.

Light from another window flicks on above and behind me, in the mansion itself. It casts a slanted rectangle of brightness across the terrace. In that patch of light, a curl of metal glints among the shards of broken tile.

I pick it up and hold it to the light. At first, I think it could be a paper clip bent into an oblong ring. But it’s much thicker than a paper clip. Sturdier, too. It takes some force to bend it further. Both ends are curved toward each other, one more so than the other, making me deduce it was a hook of some kind that either broke or fell off. Maybe it’s what caused the shingles to drop from the roof.

I turn back to the lit window to scan the roof one story above it. Craning my neck, I try to see where it is in relation to my room. Two doors down, it looks like. On the other side of Lenora’s room.

Mrs. Baker.

I take a few backward steps, angling for a better glimpse inside the room. I can make out frilly curtains, a hint of purple floral wallpaper, a shadow stretching across the ceiling.

Something else then catches my eye.

To the right of the lit window, in Lenora’s room.

There, framed in the darkened window, is a gray blur.

I gasp, watching as the blur passes the window and disappears. I can’t make out what it is. The room is dark and the movement too brief. All I know is that I’m certain someone is walking around Lenora’s bedroom.

I keep moving backward, eyes fixed on the window, hoping for another glimpse of whoever it is. I’m so focused on Lenora’s room that I stop paying attention to the slate shingles on the terrace. I trip on one and stumble backward into the railing, which hits the small of my back and throws me off-balance.

The twist of metal flies from my fingers as I reel wildly.

Arms flailing.

Heart jittering.

My shoulders and head lean beyond the railing, out over the waves crashing far below. For a second, the chasm at my back feels like it’s reaching up, as if trying to yank me over the edge and into its depths.

I manage to lunge to the side, flipping over until my stomach is pressed against the railing and I’m staring straight down the cliffside. Fifty feet below is the Atlantic, its waves collapsing onto the shore at the base of the cliff. A narrow strip of rock-studded sand sits between the cliff and the water, glowing white in the moonlight. I’d find it lovely if not for the fact that one wrong move would have sent me crashing into it.

On my right, I hear the swish of footsteps across the dew-dusted lawn. Carter’s voice cuts through the night. “Mary?”

I turn to see him already halfway across the lawn and coming closer. He halts when he realizes it’s me.

“Sorry.” He pauses, befuddled, like he’s literally just seen a ghost. “Are you okay?”

“I think so,” I huff, still breathless from my near miss.

Carter resumes his approach, reaching the end of the lawn and hopping up the steps onto the terrace. “For a second there, I thought you were going to topple over the railing.”

“So did I.”

I step away from the railing on rubbery legs. It’s the same feeling I had when I was first hit with the tilt on the second floor of Hope’s End. Which makes sense, seeing how the terrace is likely also slanted toward the sea. The thought makes me take another wobbling backward step.

Carter rushes to my side to prop me up. “Let’s sit you down for a few minutes.”

“I’m fine,” I say. “Really.”

“You don’t look fine.”

Instead of leading me back into the mansion, Carter guides me down the steps and across the lawn to the stone cottage. Its open door spills golden light across the grass.

“Do you live here?” I say.

“I do indeed. It’s not much, but it’s home.”

“Why don’t you stay in the main house?”

“Because I’m the groundskeeper and this is the groundskeeper’s cottage,” Carter says. “Besides, it’s nicer than that crooked old mansion. Cozy.”

When he ushers me inside, I see what he means. The cottage, while not large, has an undeniable charm. A single room divided into two areas—kitchen and bedroom, with a small closed-off bathroom in the corner—there’s a rustic feel to the place. Exposed beams run across the ceiling, and diamond-pane windows face the ocean. Throw pillows on the couch and neatly made bed add splashes of color, while Audubon prints of native seabirds brighten the walls.

Carter sits me down at a woodblock dining table big enough for only two people. My chair faces a boxy black-and-white TV on the kitchen counter, which broadcasts Game One of the World Series. Orioles versus the Phillies. Carter lowers the volume before opening a nearby cupboard.

“I have it on for background noise,” he says. “I’ll care about the World Series when the Red Sox are in it. Which will be never.”

From the cupboard, he produces two rocks glasses, into which he pours an inch of whiskey. One glass is placed on the table in front of me. He holds the other as he leans against the counter.

“Drink up,” he says. “It’ll calm your nerves.”

“I don’t think Mrs. Baker would approve.”

“Mrs. Baker probably has three glasses of Chardonnay under her belt and is now working on number four.”

“Oh.” I stare into my glass, surprised. I never would have pegged Mrs. Baker as someone with a drinking problem. She seems so . . . serious. It makes me wonder if she was that way before arriving at Hope’s End or if the place slowly drove her to drink. “I didn’t know.”

“Of course you didn’t. You just got here. But give it enough time and you’ll know all our secrets.”

I allow myself a tiny sip of whiskey. Carter is right. Its amber warmth instantly calms me. “Anything else I should know about Mrs. Baker?”

Carter leaves the counter and approaches the table, turning the remaining chair around so he can straddle it, his arms folded across the backrest. Inside and in the light, I notice things about him that I missed earlier. Like the small cleft in his chin barely visible beneath his beard. Or the way he smells freshly showered. The scents of soap and shampoo rise off his skin.

“Such as?” he says.

“Her first name, for starters.”

“Beats me. I have no clue. What’s your guess?”

“Morticia,” I say. “Or Cruella.”

Carter, caught mid-sip, snort laughs. “Maybe Archie knows, since he’s been here as long as she has.”

“Do you think they’re a couple?” I say.

“I doubt it. From what I can tell, they barely speak to each other.”

“Then why do you think they’ve stayed here this long? Archie told me he’s been here almost sixty years, and Mrs. Baker left but eventually came back. I assume both of them could have gotten jobs anywhere.”

“I think the situation is more complicated than that,” Carter says. “They knew Lenora before the murders. And the truth is, she’d be helpless without them. I think they know that, which might explain why they’ve been here so long.”

“And how long have you been here?”

“Ah, now you’re interested in my secrets,” Carter says with a smile that could be considered flirtatious but is more likely out of politeness. No one has flirted with me for a very long time. Kenny certainly didn’t. He skipped the flirting and got straight to the point. Sadly, it worked.

“You said I’ll find out eventually,” I say, trying a little weak flirting myself. I blame the attempt on the whiskey. “You might as well tell me now.”

“My secret is that I’m not a groundskeeper. At least I wasn’t until I took this job.”

“What were you?”

“A bartender.” Carter raises his glass, takes a sip. “That feels like a lifetime ago, even though it’s only been a year. One of my regulars was the former groundskeeper here. When he retired, he suggested I be his replacement. Even put in a good word for me.”

“That seems like quite a leap, from bartender to groundskeeper.”

“Oh, it was. My guess is he thought I was trustworthy, which is necessary for a place like Hope’s End. Mrs. Baker agreed, and now here I am.”

A muffled roar drifts from the TV. On the tiny screen, someone from the Phillies circles the bases after hitting a home run. Carter reaches for the television and switches it off.

“And you really do like it here?” I say.

Carter spreads his arms wide. “I’ve got my own place, and it comes with a view of the ocean. Not many people can say that. Sure, the job’s a bit much for just me, but then again, Hope’s End doesn’t get too many visitors, so there’s no need to impress anyone. What’s not to like?”

“Um, the fact that three people were murdered here. And that there are still bloodstains in the carpet.”

“I see you’ve taken the murder tour.”

“Jessie showed me around last night,” I say with a nod.

“Please don’t tell me you’re now thinking of running away like Mary did.”

“How well do you know her?”

“Enough to think you were her,” Carter says.

I look down at my uniform, which had once been worn by Mary. The fact that I can fit into it means we’re about the same size and height. No wonder Carter mistook me for her in the dark.

“It must have been strange thinking she’d suddenly come back.”

“Not as strange as the way she left,” Carter says. “No notice or warning. One day, Mary was simply gone. It was a surprise. I’d assumed she was happy here.”

“Jessie also said she was surprised.”

“She and Mary were pretty close. I, on the other hand, mostly keep to myself. Don’t get me wrong. Mary and I were friends. The truth is, I didn’t see much of her. I live here. She stayed in the mansion, spending most of her time with Lenora. So we didn’t exactly hang out. Most of the time, we’d chat on the terrace in the evenings. Every time I spotted her uniform, I’d come out and say hi.”

“Do you think Lenora had something to do with why she left?” I say. “That Mary was, I don’t know, frightened of her somehow?”

“It sounds like you think Lenora’s guilty,” Carter says.

I stare into my drink, contemplating my reflection wobbling atop the amber liquid. Fitting, for I feel wobbly myself. My opinion of Lenora has shifted so much in the past two days that I no longer know how I feel.

“It sounds like you think she isn’t. So who do you think did it? Winston Hope or the painter?”

“Neither,” Carter says. “I think it was Ricardo Mayhew.”

I look up from the whiskey, confused. “Who?”

“The groundskeeper at the time. He and his wife were living in this cottage when the murders occurred. She wasn’t here. She worked as a kitchen maid and was given the night off with the rest of the servants. She went into town and saw a movie. Ricardo, though, stayed behind.”

“Did the police know this?”

“They did,” Carter says. “Back in 1929 it was widely suspected that not every member of the household staff left for the night.”

“How do you know this?”

“From my predecessor. I poured the drinks, and he told me stories about this place. Another reason I took the job. After hearing so much about Hope’s End, I wanted to experience it for myself.”

“So this groundskeeper—”

“Ricardo,” Carter interjects.

I nod. “Right. Ricardo. He stayed behind and did . . . what?”

“No one knows.”

“The police didn’t question him after the murders?”

“They couldn’t. Ricardo Mayhew was gone. After that night, he was never seen again.”

Carter eyes me over his glass, waiting for my reaction. I respond appropriately, my jaw dropping in surprise.

“And his wife—”

“Berniece.”

The name jars my memory. Lenora mentioned her in passing. Berniece was the kitchen maid who wished her a half-hearted happy birthday.

“She never saw him again, either?”

“Nope.”

“And she had no idea where he went or what happened to him?”

“None,” Carter says. “She’s still around, though. Most folks say she never left town because she’s waiting for her husband to return. It’s more likely the poor woman has nowhere else to go.”

“So you think Ricardo Mayhew murdered the rest of the Hope family and then ran?”

“That’s my guess. Short of Lenora killing them, it’s the only thing that makes sense.”

“But why would the groundskeeper want to kill Winston Hope and his family?”

“I don’t know,” Carter says. “Why would Lenora?”

A fair point. One I’m still trying to understand myself. But Carter didn’t just spend the entire day helping her type. He didn’t read about the bloody nightgown. Or Lenora tossing a knife into the ocean. Or leaving the terrace to get rope that, I assume, was later tightened around her sister’s neck.

And even though I want to tell him all those things, I don’t. It seems wrong to mention anything until I learn the whole story. Only then will I spill any details. I think that’s what Lenora ultimately wants—for me to be the voice she doesn’t have. Even if what I’m saying is her long-delayed confession.

“If you’re right—and that’s a very big if—it still doesn’t make sense. Why wouldn’t Lenora say anything? If Ricardo killed her parents and her sister, why wouldn’t she tell that to the police?”

Or to me, for that matter. So far, she hasn’t once typed the name Ricardo Mayhew. If she thought he did it, why wasn’t that the first thing she wrote? Instead, she began when, to use her phrasing, it was all but over.

“Maybe she didn’t know,” Carter suggests.

But Lenora did know her parents were dead. She told me so. They were dead and her nightgown was bloody and she threw the knife over the terrace railing despite knowing it was evidence of two brutal crimes. Why would she do that if she wasn’t the one who had used it?

I finish my drink, my thoughts rattling like the ice in my now-empty glass. In that tumbling mental chaos, a new theory takes shape. One I can’t share with Carter.

Not just yet.

“I need to go,” I say, standing suddenly. “Thanks for the drink.”

Carter watches in confusion as I give a quick wave goodbye, leave the cottage, and cross the damp lawn. On the terrace, I watch for shingles underfoot and steer clear of the railing. Only when I’m under Lenora’s window do I risk an upward glance. Although her room is still dark and nothing appears at the window, I can’t stop thinking of Lenora lying within, wide awake and mentally repeating a single line from the rhyme I’ve known since grade school.

“It wasn’t me,” Lenora said

Maybe that part of the rhyme is true.

But I suspect there’s more to the story than Lenora is letting on—then or now.

Inside the house, I quickly climb the service stairs. On the second floor, I begin to sway, the mansion’s tilt made worse by the whiskey. Instead of just one drink, it feels like I’ve had four, which explains why I brazenly lurch into Lenora’s room.

I switch on the bedside lamp, startling her awake.

Or maybe Lenora’s only pretending to be startled. I can’t shake the sense that she was already awake—and that she knew I’d be coming. Before she saw it was me storming into the room, her left hand made no move to press the call button. Then there’s the intrigued look in her eyes. While the rest of her face retains a shocked, questioning scrunch, they glisten with satisfaction.

“I want you to tell me about Ricardo Mayhew,” I say.

I spent ten minutes weeping in the ballroom before running through the house, looking for Archie. He’d know what to say to make me feel better. He always did. But Archie had made himself scarce recently. My only glimpse of him today was as I passed through the kitchen before dinner, and even then I didn’t dare say anything to him. My sister and I were forbidden from socializing with the staff and vice versa, but that had done nothing to stop me and Archie from becoming best friends.

Unable to locate Archie, I found myself outside on the terrace. Even though it was technically spring, winter’s grip remained tight, making the night air bracingly cold. I didn’t mind, though. I was just happy to be anywhere but inside that awful, awful house.

I climbed atop the railing. Another thing I was told not to do but did anyway, mostly because the railing was so low. If my father hadn’t wanted me to climb on it, then he should have made it higher. Sitting there, balanced precariously, I stared down at the water below. Moonlight sparkled on the ocean swells and the whitecaps glowed in the night. It was so beautiful that, just for a moment, I considered leaping off the railing to join them.

It seemed a better alternative than life at Hope’s End. I was young and bursting with yearning. For love. For adventure. For life. Yet none of that awaited me here, in a place where my mother medicated herself into a stupor, my father openly cheated with the maids, and my sister pretended nothing was wrong. Was this how I was going to spend the rest of my life?

If that was the case, I’d rather end it now. And what a fitting end it would be, making the day of my birth also the day of my death.

Before I could entertain the notion further, a voice spoke up from behind me.

“Careful. If you fell to your death, this place would have nothing worth looking at.”

I whirled around, almost losing my balance in the process. I teetered on the railing a moment, suddenly terrified I was about to fall. A second earlier, I’d been thinking of ending it all. Now I wanted nothing more than to live--if only to chastise my unknown companion for spying on me.

After righting myself, I hopped off the railing. At the same time, the source of the voice crept from the shadows along the side of the mansion. I knew who he was because I’d heard Berniece mention him in the kitchen and eavesdropped on the maids talking about how handsome he was.

And indeed he was handsome. Wearing just work pants and a cotton undershirt, he had a primal look to him. Strong and slightly brutish. Rather than slick his hair back with pomade like most men did at the time, he let it grow wild and unruly. He swiped a lock of hair from his eyes and stared at me in a way that can only be described as wolfish. A smile played across his lips, as if he knew every wicked thought I’d had earlier that day.

“You weren’t really going to jump, were you?” he said.

I looked his way, even though I’d been trying not to. I didn’t want to stare, for I knew it would make him think I considered him worthy of staring at, which he very much was. But his remark forced me to face him head-on. While completely true, it also smacked of impropriety.

“I don’t need to explain myself. Especially to someone like you.”

“You’re right,” he said. “You don’t. But I am curious why someone with your life would even risk death by climbing up on that railing.”

I turned back to the ocean, refusing to look at him a moment longer. “You know nothing about my life.”

“I’m all ears.” He joined me at the railing, focusing his attention solely on me, as if he couldn’t wait to hear what I had to say. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“Everything.”

He let out a low whistle. “That sounds quite serious.”

“Do my problems amuse you?” I asked.

“Not at all, Miss Hope. But surely not everything is terrible.”

“This house is,” I said. “It’s downright awful.”

He turned around and gazed up at the glittering mansion behind us. “It looks quite nice to me.”

“It’s not, I can assure you,” I replied. “Honestly, I would kill to leave this place.”

He moved closer until we were mere inches apart. So close I felt the heat coming off his skin, which in turn gave me delicious chills.

“We haven’t been properly introduced,” he said, holding out a hand. “I’m Ricky.”