Page 34 of The Ghostwriter

“Tell me about the vandalism happening at the school.”

I’d made extensive notes from my conversations with both Mark and Margot, noting places where their theories overlapped and where they differed. Each of them seemed to believe a different sibling had been the target. Neither of them mentioned Danny as a threat. Certainly not a killer. My father is the only person claiming that.

“Vandalism? Where did you hear about that?” my father asks now, looking surprised.

We’re holed up in his office again, and I’ve decided to keep the existence of the diary and films to myself for now.

Over the last several days, I’d watched and rewatched several clips of Poppy’s movies documenting this vandalism, but she’d made no mention of them in her diary. Why film them if they weren’t important? Then I’d gone back to the library and scoured the newspapers for the month of May, looking for any reference to them.

“There were several mentions about it in the paper,” I tell him now. “The police were looking into it. One student was quoted as saying they thought Mr. Stewart was the target. Did they ever figure out who was doing it?”

My father looks annoyed. “Why are we talking about vandalism that happened fifty years ago? We have a book to write. It’s not related.”

I decide to humor him. “Probably not, but I’d like to learn more about it for context. After all, you didn’t live in a vacuum. Life was happening all around you, and I’d like to capture it.” My father gives a reluctant nod, so I continue. “What kind of vandalism was it? The papers were light on the details. Just something in the gym and then later an equipment shed?”

I think again of those clips—the man on the ladder, the burned-out shed, a broken lock dangling on its hook, the interior blackened by flames. Was Poppy just wanting to document something that surely would have been a big topic of conversation among the kids? Or was there more?

“It was just those two incidents,” my father says. “Obviously, people thought I was the one who was doing it, but they blamed me for everything.” Then he leans forward. “Danny didn’t like Mr. Stewart either, but no one ever talks about that.”

“So you think Danny was the one who vandalized the school?” Not once did Poppy capture Danny sneaking out at night. But there are several clips of my father, creeping across the yard, Poppy filming him from an interior window as he disappears into the field behind their house. And there are two such clips, on either side of the vandalism ones. I think again of the story of the cat. How my father had layered over his memory with something different. Could this be the same?

“All I can say,” my father tells me, “is that after Poppy and Danny died, the vandalism stopped.”

“Or maybe the person who’d been doing it didn’t want to be out alone at night anymore,” I suggest. “I can imagine everyone must have been on edge in the days and weeks afterward.”

He shakes his head. “It was Danny. He’d been growing secretive. His temper would flip like a switch. One night, he attacked me out of nowhere. We were in our room after dinner. I can still remember what we were listening to on the hi-fi—Joni Mitchell.” He leans back in his chair and crosses his legs, settling in for a story. “Our mother had been in the kitchen doing the dishes, our father was in the living room with the paper and his nightly gin and tonic. And I was trying to pick up my side of the room. My mother had threatened to ground me if I didn’t clean up. So I was bending over to grab some dirty clothes and Danny suddenly comes flying at me, tackling me into the hallway. Thank god I went through the doorway and not into the wall.”

He shakes his head, like he still can’t believe it. Slowing his words down, recounting it carefully. “Our father had to pull him off me.” He shudders. “It was terrifying. I didn’t feel safe around him anymore, so I ended up sleeping in Poppy’s room after that.” His expression softens. “Pretty much up until the day she died.”

I keep my eyes trained on my notes, but my posture has stiffened. Because I recognize this scene. Poppy filmed it and referenced it in her diary: May 30: Vince/Danny fight. Did he learn the truth??? Everything feels different now. May #4, Clip #9.

And the story my father just told me isn’t how it happened.