The Moonlit Mind (Novella): A Tale of Suspense Read Free Page B

ones—tells Crispin, “Kid, your mom she’s like the magical princess in some fairy-tale cartoon movie, how she can charm kings and princes, even make animals and trees and flowers swoon and sing for her. But I never did see a cartoon princess as smokin’ hot as she is.”
    At that time Crispin is seven years old. He understands the princes, animals, trees, and flowers part. Years will pass before he knows what “smokin’ hot” means.
    Their mother is drawn to many men, not because their beauty matches hers but because of what they are able to do for her. She says that she has expensive tastes and that her “little bastards” are her ticket to the good life.
    Each of their fathers is a man of great prominence for whom the existence of a little bastard would not only be an embarrassment but also a wrecking ball that might smash apart his marriage and lead to an expensive divorce.
    In return for specifying on each birth certificate that the father is unknown, Clarette receives a one-time cash payment of considerable size and a smaller monthly stipend. The children livewell, though not nearly as well as their mother, because she spends far more freely on herself than on them.
    One night, she enjoys too much lemon vodka and cocaine. She insists that eight-year-old Crispin cuddle with her in an armchair.
    He would rather be anywhere else but in her too-clingy arms and within range of her exotic breath. When she is in this condition, her embrace seems spidery, and for all her expressions of affection, he expects that something terrible will happen to him.
    She tells him then that he ought to be grateful that she is so smart, so cunning, and so tough. Other women who make their living by giving birth to little bastards are likely sooner or later to have a well-planned accident or to become a victim of a supposedly random act of violence. Rich men do not like to be played for fools.
    “But I’m too quick and bright and clever for them, Crispie. No one will take your mommy from you. I’ll always be here. Always and always.”
    Time passes and change comes.…
    The change is named Giles Gregorio. He makes the other rich men in Clarette’s life seem like paupers. His wealth is inherited and so immense as to be almost immeasurable.
    Giles has palatial residences all over the world. In this city, he lives atop Shadow Hill, directly across the street from the fabled Pendleton. His mansion—called Theron Hall—is not as large as the Pendleton, but large enough: fifty-two rooms, eighteen baths, and a maze of hallways.
    When Giles intends to be in town, twenty servants precede him by a week, readying the great house. Among them are one of his personal chefs, his junior butler, and his junior valet.
    Two weeks after Clarette meets the multibillionaire, cuddling again with her oldest son, once more under the spell of lemon vodka, she speaks of a glorious future. “I’ve changed my business model, Crispie. No more little bastards. No more, no more. Mommy’s going to be richer than she ever dreamed of being.”
    Just a week later, three weeks after Giles met Clarette, they are married in a private ceremony so exclusive that even her three children are not in attendance. In fact, watching arrivals from a high window, Crispin thinks that fewer than twenty people come to Theron Hall on the day and that more servants than guests must be witness to the wedding.
    Crispin is nine then, Harley seven, Mirabell six.
    He and his younger siblings are confined to a second-floor drawing room for the duration of the celebration, where they are showered with fabulous new toys, fed all their favorite foods, and watched over by Nanny Sayo, who is Japanese. Petite and pretty, with a soft, musical voice, Nanny Sayo is quick to laugh, but any test of her authority is met with the displeasure of a stern disciplinarian.
    Following the wedding, all the many servants at Theron Hall are respectful of the children and even treat them with affection. But it