Page 67 of The Shape of Night

“Oh, sorry.ProfessorSherbrooke. I’m Ava Collette. Thank you for seeing me.”

“So you’re writing a book about Brodie’s Watch,” he says as I step into the foyer.

“Yes, and I have a ton of questions about the house.”

“Do you want to buy it?” he cuts in.

“I don’t think I can afford it.”

“If you know anyone who can, I’d like to get rid of the place.” He pauses and adds, “But not at a loss.”

I follow him down a black-tiled hallway to the living room, where floor-to-ceiling windows overlook the salt marsh. A telescope stands at the ready, and a pair of Leica binoculars sits on the coffee table. Through the window I spot a bald eagle soaring past, followed by three crows in hot pursuit.

“Fearless buggers, those crows,” he says. “They’ll chase away anything that invades their airspace. I’ve been studying that particular corvid family for ten generations, and they seem to get more clever every year.”

“Are you a professor of ornithology?”

“No, I’m just a lifelong birdwatcher.” He waves at the sofa, a haughty command for me to sit down. Like everything else in the room, the sofa is coldly minimalist, upholstered in stark gray leather that looks more forbidding than inviting. I sit facing a glass coffee table which is uncluttered by even a single magazine. The entire focus of the room is the window and the view of the salt marsh beyond.

He offers no coffee or tea but just drops down in an armchair and crosses his stork-like legs. “I taught economics, Bowdoin College,” he says. “Retired three years ago, and ironically enough find myself busier than ever. Traveling, writing articles.”

“About economics?”

“Corvids. Crows and ravens. My hobby’s turned into something of a second career for me.” He tilts his head, a movement that’s unsettlingly birdlike. “You said you had questions about the house?”

“About its history, and the people who’ve lived in it over the years.”

“I’ve done a bit of research on the subject, but I’m by no means an expert,” he says with a modest shrug. “I can tell you the house was built in 1861 by Captain Jeremiah T. Brodie. He was lost at sea over a decade later. Subsequent ownership passed through several families until it came to me thirty-some years ago.”

“I understand you inherited the house from your aunt Aurora.”

“Yes. Tell me again how these questions are relevant to this book you’re writing?”

“My book is calledThe Captain’s Table.It’s about traditional foods of New England, and the meals that might have been served in the homes of seafaring families. My editor thinks Brodie’s Watch, and Captain Brodie himself, could serve as the focal point for the project. It would give the book an authentic sense of place and atmosphere.”

Satisfied by my explanation, he settles more deeply into his chair. “Very well. Is there anything specific that you’d like to know?”

“Tell me about your aunt. About her experiences living there.”

He sighs, as if this is one subject he’d rather avoid. “Aunt Aurora lived there for most of her life. In fact, she died in that house, which may be one of the reasons I can’t seem to get rid of it. Nothing kills a house’s resale value like a death. People and their stupid superstitions.”

“You’ve been trying to sell it all these years?”

“I was her only heir, so I got stuck with that white elephant. After she died, I put it on the market for a few years, but the offers were insulting. Everyone seemed to find something wrong with the place. Too old, too cold, bad karma. If only I could’ve torn down the heap. With that ocean view, it would make a spectacular building site.”

“Why didn’t you just tear it down?”

“It was a condition of her will. The house had to remain standing or the trust fund would go to…” He pauses and looks away.

So there’s a trust fund.Of course there had to be family money. How else could a mere university professor afford this multimillion-dollar property in Cape Elizabeth? Aurora Sherbrooke had left her nephew a fortune as well as a burden when she’d bequeathed him Brodie’s Watch.

“She had enough money to live anywhere,” he says. “Paris, London, New York. But no, she chose to spend most of her life in that house. Every summer, starting when I was seventeen, I’d dutifully drive up to visit her, if only to remind her that she had a blood relative, but she never seemed to welcome my visits. It was almost as if I were invading her privacy. An intruder, disrupting her life.”

Their lives. Hers and the captain’s.

“And I never liked that house.”

“Why not?” I ask.

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