Page 32 of The Guests on South Battery
He studied the road in front of him, and I had the feeling that he was avoiding looking at me for a reason—and not just to avoid the tourist standing in the middle of Broad Street taking a photo of St. Michael’s.
“Is this about using our house for the movie? Because we arenotgoing to agree to that, right?”
As if even parking spaces in Charleston weren’t immune to Jack’s charms, one opened up on Meeting Street just as we approached the Fireproof Building. He easily slid the minivan into the spot before turning to me with a smile. “We’re here.”
“Jack...”
But he’d already leaped out of his seat and was opening the passenger door for me. He glanced at his watch. “We’re a little late—hurry up. I hate to keep Yvonne waiting.”
Grabbing my hand, he led me up the familiar staircase and into the building, then up to the familiar reading room, where Jack and I had spent many hours researching various Charleston historic factoids.
Yvonne was sitting at one of the long wooden tables with several books set out in front of her, little scraps of paper marking spots inside each one. She looked up and smiled before standing, the rhinestones in her cat’s-eye glasses sparkling.
She stood on tiptoes to kiss Jack on each cheek, then turned to me. “You look lovely as always, Melanie. Are you keeping Jack in line?”
“Of course,” I said at the same time Jack answered, “Not even close.”
She winked and then kissed my cheek. “Same ol’ Jack,” she said with a wistful note in her voice, and I thought, not for the first time, that if she were thirty years younger and he were still single, she would have set her cap for him.
“I like your new glasses,” Jack said, eyeing Yvonne. “They frame your face beautifully.”
Her cheeks flushed a flattering pink. “Careful, Jack. Flattery will get you everywhere.”
“And don’t I know it?” he said, squeezing her shoulders and making her flush even more.
Clearing her throat, she turned our attention to the books on the table. “They’ve moved so many of the archives to the new College of Charleston Library, but happily most of what you were looking for I found here. You might still want to go look there and at the archives at the Charleston Museum for more on the Pinckney family. It’s a very old Charleston family—two signers of the Constitution and a governor. My mother was a Pinckney, you know. Different branch from Button and her brother, Sumter, but our family trees touch somewhere. Their mother, Rosalind, was a cousin—many times removed, of course—but we would spend summers together at our family plantation on Edisto. We were of an age, you see.”
Jack and I sat down in the hard wooden chairs. “It looks like you’ve been busy,” Jack said. “I know I can always rely on you to find the information I need.”
“Glad to hear it,” she said. “One would think that by this time I’d have been mentioned in the dedication of one of your books.” She stared pointedly at Jack.
I stared at my husband. “I can’t believe that you’ve never done that despite all the help Yvonne has given us. Really, Jack.”
“Actually,” he said, and I noticed a tic in his jaw, “I was planning on dedicating the book I was working on when I met Mellie to Yvonne. And then the book wasn’t published.”
“Don’t you worry about that, Jack. Despite being a dyed-in-the-wool Episcopalian, I do believe in karma. Mark my words, Marc Longo will get what’s coming to him eventually. Hopefully we’ll all be lucky enough to witness it in full living color.” She grinned, her perfect dentures gleaming.
She turned to the books spread out in front of us. “So, let’s take alook at what I found. I was not fortunate enough to find the original blueprints for the Pinckney house on South Battery. However, I think I found something even better.” She spun an old leather-bound volume around to face us. “The blueprints for the house that stood there before it was built.”
Yvonne folded her arms primly in front of her as we examined the old sketch of a modest dwelling that had once occupied the lot where Jayne Smith’s house now stood on South Battery. “As you can see, the property was once fronted with swamp that led out to the Ashley River. Starting in 1909, city leaders had the swamp filled in and the level of the land raised and created Murray Boulevard.”
I kept silent, wondering what any of this had to do with anything.
“Let me guess,” Jack said. “The man who built it was a sea captain.”
Yvonne gave him an appreciative look. “You’ve been cheating on me and doing your own research.”
“Guilty as charged. I thought I’d do some poking around just in case I might find something that could lead to my next book, and I came across the deed to the original plot of land, owned by Captain Stephen Andrews.”
Yvonne looked at him expectantly.
“Gentleman Pirate,” he added.
“Although it was never proven; nor was he hanged at what is now White Point Gardens with Blackbeard and Stede Bonnett, as he easily could have been. Despite guards watching his house, he managed to escape to Barbados, where he lived out his long life. And had many children with younger and younger wives, into his nineties.” She set her mouth in grim disapproval.
I was getting impatient listening to the boring history of someone who’d died a long time ago and didn’t even own the house I thought we were investigating. “And the point of all this would be...”
Both Yvonne and Jack sent me a blank look, similar to the ones Sophie gave me when I was suggesting a cheaper, more sensible alternative involving replacing anything old in my house.
