The Mansion of Mystery, CONCLUSION

When I recover I decide to press on. I ask Chloe if she knows what happened to Elizabeth.

I almost faint when Chloe responds, "You can ask Elizabeth."

"She's here???" I gasp, looking around.

"She lives nearby. She came home with me and is one of mom's...YOUR...closest friends." Chloe walks out of her bedroom doorway.

Remembering all the movies and tv shows I have ever seen I worry about the time/space continuum and call after her, "Chloe! Is your mother here?"

Chloe comes back in and says, "No, she's at work. Miss Elizabeth watches me until she and Victor come home."

Chloe exits once more and I, again, sit stunned on her bed. My thoughts are whirling and while I am trying to sort them out Chloe comes back in. Behind her is her friend, Elizabeth Wilton-Turner Hewitt.

She is about my height, and only slightly older than the pictures I have seen of her. Her hair is down and is a vibrant chestnut color, spilling gently onto her lean shoulders. She is now clothed in the same style as Chloe and no longer wears glasses.

She looks as confused and as stunned as I feel, and isn't sure whether I am a friend or foe.

"Hello, Catherine."

"H-hi" I stammer. I am looking into the eyes of a woman who should either be really old or dead at this point in my life. Instead, she is my age. My mind is whirling.

"Elizabeth...I don't know what to say. I...Chloe..." My mind shuts down. I am no longer able to form sentences or complete a thought.

"Miss Elizabeth?" Chloe interjects, "I was telling mom...Miss Catherine... about my visits with you. She wants to know what happened in your house when you were there and why you left."

"Oh. Well, I suppose it's time. It's been a secret for far too long...at least...it has felt like a long time."

She sighs heavily and looks out the window. Her eyes turn wistful and she begins to speak, not making eye contact. Her words are almost beyond comprehension. My thoughts are almost too loud for me to hear her. How can I be talking to her? And yet...she is really the only one who knows what went on here in 1927. I am torn between wanting to know everything and wanting to run away before I break time or ruin something or perhaps, even before I find out something I really do not want to know. I sit and listen anyway because under my apprehension and fear I need to know the truth.

"Chloe, darling, would you mind running outside to play so I can talk to Catherine?" Elizabeth glances at the girl who nods and, doll in hand, runs downstairs.

Elizabeth sighs. "Victor and I were married and moved into this house in 1927. I loved him so much. I just knew that our love would last forever. He was so wonderful to me. We joined right into the town, made friends, had parties at our house...the future seemed so bright. Then everything changed."

She looked down at her hands folded in her lap and asked, "Do you know how quickly life can change? How fleeting happiness truly is?" She took a breath and continued.

"Before I found out about Victor, Chloe had been making appearances. At first I thought she was a dream or a figment of my imagination. Then I thought perhaps she was a ghost. She never frightened me or brought any ill feelings with her. She is and was bright and honest and just sweet. She came to talk to me often and we became good friends she and I."

She smiled and looked at me, perhaps to see if I thought she was crazy, and then continued. "Chloe always came when I was alone. I always thought that was a wonder. Like she knew I was alone, she came to keep me company. She was so sweet. I was happier with her than I was with Victor sometimes. Then, of course, after Chloe and I had become friends..." her voice trailed off and her eyes filled with tears.

"Elizabeth?" I moved next to her and put my hand on her shoulder. My mind had time to shout "She's REAL! I can touch her!" I shook my head to clear the thoughts away and said "Elizabeth, it's ok. Whatever it is I won't tell, I won't laugh...it'll stay between you and me, all right? My life has been so full of this house and you. I would really like to know what happened."

She sniffed, "Oh Cath. You find this out later, but I guess there is no harm in telling you now. I caught Victor and my mother in his den. Kissing!"

I was so shocked I said, "Oh no!"

Elizabeth nodded. "Yes. I was so upset I wanted to leave. I yelled at both of them. I told them I was going to pack and leave and I never wanted to see either of them again. Mother became so upset she started drinking. I heard her and Victor yelling at one another through my window. I packed only my clothes, I left everything else. I went back downstairs and told Victor and my mother that I would make sure everyone knew just why I was leaving and what they had been up to. Victor begged me not to. He said it would ruin his reputation. His businesses would suffer. He said it would be scandalous. Mother just cried and yelled. She kept on drinking, and begged me not to say anything. I told both of them that perhaps they shouldn't have been doing something they were so ashamed of and I retreated to get my clothes.

Mother panicked and ran outside through the den doors and Victor followed her trying to calm her down. I knew then that if it was she that he was running after there really was no hope for him and me. In my bedroom I picked up my bags and was ready to leave, but I had nowhere to go. No other family to lean on. I couldn't stay in town and face the friends I had made with Victor. I was so upset. I had no idea what to do.

Then Chloe was there. She could hear my mother yelling and Victor pleading with her, and she saw me weeping and saw my bags. It was Chloe I was happy with. It was Chloe I didn't want to be apart from. We just thought that if she could visit me and talk to me....then maybe there was a way that I could get to her time and stay there. I'm not really certain what happened or how it happened. Chloe and I held hands and I just walked back with her and my house turned into her house and then there I was in her time.

She introduced me to her mother and father and we explained that I had just caught my husband cheating on me and they let me stay here. They began to pay me for watching Chloe while they worked and then after a time I was able to pay for my own place to live in town. Now, once again, I am a member of town, I have friends, I still have Chloe and I'm happy. Well, happier. My heart still hurts when I think..."

Her voice trailed off again and I said, "Yes, I imagine it does. I'm so sorry." I paused. "And then you were just gone? Do you know what happened to Victor or your mother?" I heard myself ask. I wanted to kick myself as soon as I asked, but the overwrought mystery solver in me was still looking for answers.

Elizabeth shook her head. "I haven't been back to the house until...well, I haven't been back to the house. I haven't had any contact with anyone until just now. I had no idea Chloe could still do whatever it is that she does. Why? What happened?"

I did not want to tell her. I felt like an idiot. Then I realized that perhaps I should. Maybe she had to hear the truth as much as I had needed to myself. I held her hand.

"Your mother drowned in the fountain in the back of the mansion. And Victor packed up his stuff and left. No one knows what happened to him." I hoped she could bear the truth.

"My mother..." She looked upset and stunned at the same time. "When?"

"I believe it was the night you disappeared." I watched her eyes. I so wanted her to be okay.

She sniffled, "She was drinking so much, just one after the other after I'd found them together...do you suppose that when she ran out of the house she fell into the fountain?" She looked more wondering than upset about her mother's death.

"I don't know. I don't think anyone ever decided if it was an accident or..." I stopped myself, "or not."

Her eyebrows raised and her damp dark eyes widened, 'Or not?" She nodded, 'Or not. I suppose anything is possible then isn't it? Oh my. And Victor just left town?"

I nodded, still concerned, "Yes. And no one knows what happened to him after that."

She stood and nodded. "Well. I suppose that's that."

I stayed on Chloe's bed and went through everything in my head. With the scandal of their affair looming overhead, Victor and Evelyn argued and somehow she died. Whether she fell and drowned in the fountain or whether Victor decided he would fare better if Evelyn were no longer around and he pushed her in and drowned her Elizabeth lost her whole family that night. She went home with Chloe where she discovered me, my husband and Chloe's big brother Victor.

Chloe walked in and sat down with me and said, "My mom said that she was always so interested in Victor and Elizabeth's story that she named us after them. Victor is Victor Hewitt Nichols, and I am Chloe Elizabeth Nichols."

I nodded. It sounded like something I would do. However, knowing that somehow Elizabeth became a friend to our family, for her sake I felt awful that I had named my son after the husband who broke her heart.

I stood up. "Chloe, honey I should go before...well, before I come home and find me here."

She seemed to understand that that would be best. She nodded.

"Thank you so much for coming to visit me and for letting me come visit you. I really appreciate that and I am so grateful that I found out more about what was going on at my house."

I walked toward the bedroom door. "Chloe," I turned to look at her. "You're a good girl." I smiled. "I guess I'll see you in a few years."

She smiled too. She said, "Goodbye Miss Catherine."

I walked back out into the hallway where the light and the future faded. The house was once again mine, in my time. My mystery was settled and I relaxed and between assignments for my magazine I worked on fixing up the mansion. By the time I met my future husband the inside of the house was completely redone and the landscaping had just been completed. It was on our first date, actually, that we had walked through the gardens and I had turned on the fountain for the first time.

I never saw Chloe again. Well, at least not until she was born and my husband Michael and I took her home to the mansion to meet her big brother Jonathan. This time around, Elizabeth never moved out. She took a different room than the one she had had when she lived here with Victor, but she stayed and was welcomed into the family with open arms. For Elizabeth and I this family was just what we needed, and we lived happily ever after.