The Unfinished Portrait
As a bachelor, New York Yankee pitcher Jed Ames was content to spend a good portion of his life in hotels, airplanes and ballparks. Once married to a beautiful magazine editor from Boston, however, he felt it was time to put down roots. As a wedding present for his bride, he purchased Belmont Hall, an old Dutchess County mansion located on the Hudson River, only a short distance from Franklin Roosevelt's Hyde Park mansion. It was a gift that brought tears of joy and gratitude to his wife's eyes.
The newlyweds moved into Belmont Hall in the middle of October, at the end of the baseball season. Shortly thereafter, Rosemary began the arduous task of renovating the hundred-and-sixty-year-old house. Although her husband did not offer to help with the painting and decorating, he did encourage her to spend freely.
"With what the Yankees pay me, you can hire enough people to redo every room in the place."
The first step Rosemary took was to hire a local interior designer, and the two of them went over plans for modernizing the 1950s kitchen.
"I want all the bells and whistles," she insisted, "a garbage disposal, built-in microwave, double oven, beverage refrigerator and warming drawer."
In the following weeks, the quiet serenity of Belmont Hall was shattered by the clamor of hammering, drilling, sawing and sanding.
"You'd better get used to the noise," Rosemary warned Jed. "The kitchen is only the beginning."
"I guess we can put up with it for a couple of months."
"The renovations will take longer than that."
"Yes, but we leave for Tampa the second week of February. Spring training starts on the eighteenth."
"I can't leave in the middle of remodeling the kitchen."
"You've hired a competent contractor. Let the man do his job."
"But I still have thousands of things to do myself. I'll need to select the flooring, window treatments, paint colors, backsplash tiles and lighting fixtures. I also want to buy new dishes, pots and pans, glassware and cutlery. You did tell me I could redo everything in the house."
"I was talking about hiring a decorator. I didn't realize you wanted to do it yourself, nor did I have any idea you'd want to stay here when I go down to Tampa."
"You won't be in Florida forever. You'll be coming back home at the end of March."
Despite Jed's wanting his wife with him during spring training, Rosemary convinced him that the temporary separation might be for the best. They could both concentrate on their jobs. She would redecorate their home, and he would devote the time to getting into shape for the upcoming season.
* * *
Once her husband left for Tampa, Rosemary devoted the majority of her time to transforming Belmont Hall into the home of her dreams. Day after day, she sat at the dining room table amidst color charts, furniture catalogs and fabric swatches. As soon as renovations in the kitchen were progressing smoothly, the contractor brought in a second crew to begin work on the mansion's five bathrooms.
With the makeover going according to schedule, Rosemary decided to sort through the items left in the attic by the previous owner.
"There's probably nothing but old clothes up there," the realtor had said. "Maybe some discarded toys—the usual junk people don't want to bring with them when they move."
The attic was one vast open space that extended the entire length and width of the house. As Rosemary expected, it was dark, dusty and cold. Still, she was not to be deterred. She put on a jacket, carried a flashlight and climbed the stairs. For someone with a love of antiques, searching the attic was a labor of love since everywhere there were trunks, cardboard boxes and old furniture.
"It looks like an indoor flea market up there," she told Jed over the phone one evening. "You wouldn't believe the exquisite antiques I found. I wonder why the previous owners left them behind."
"Maybe they were moving to a smaller place."
"Then they should have sold them. They could have made a small fortune on eBay."
"Did you find anything you could use in your decorating?"
"Yes, quite a few things including a Duncan Phyfe drop-leaf table, a Chippendale desk, a Sheraton hand-carved mirror and a pair of Hepplewhite chairs."
The names his wife rattled off, although icons in the antique world, meant nothing to Jed.
"There was also a really interesting portrait that I want to hang in the living room after it's been redecorated and the new furniture brought in."
However, Rosemary did not wait for the room to be finished; she hung the painting over the fireplace mantel the following day. She found the portrait of the man in late nineteenth-century attire fascinating and yet disturbing at the same time. Although the painting's subject was extremely handsome, there was something haunting about his eyes. She was so mesmerized by the portrait that she would often sit on the sofa for long periods of time, staring up at it, asking herself questions to which she had no answers: Who is he? Did he ever live in this house? Was he a branch on the Belmont family tree?
For the former editor, intent on remaking her Hudson River home, the winter passed quickly. For Jed, however, his time off the playing field consisted of a succession of lonely evenings and nights when he longed to have his bride beside him.
Finally, on March 30, the Yankees returned to the Big Apple. Not long after arriving in New York, Jed got into his Jaguar and immediately headed home.
"Wait until you see how much has been done in the kitchen," Rosemary exclaimed after greeting him at the door.
As far as the amorous young pitcher was concerned, however, the kitchen could wait.
* * *
"That's the painting you fell in love with?" Jed asked with disbelief when he saw the portrait above the fireplace mantel.
"Yes, isn't it fascinating?"
"I don't know much about art, but it looks off-balance to me. See how the chair is located in the center of the canvas, while the man, who should be the focus of the picture, is standing off to the side. It seems as though something is missing."
"I don't agree. It looks quite natural to me, as though the artist captured the man off-guard, not in some fake pose."
Her husband shook his head. He would have preferred a seascape or a still-life to this off-centered portrait of a strange man with a piercing stare. However, he reminded himself, the house was Rosemary's domain. For all the time he would spend under this roof, she might just as well have hung up a velvet Elvis or a painting of dogs playing poker.
Jed's stay at Belmont Hall was brief. On April 10, after playing four games at home, the Yankees took to the road, heading for Baltimore to play the Orioles, Cleveland to battle the Indians, Chicago to take on the White Sox and finally Detroit to challenge the Tigers before returning to New York to host their next twelve games at Yankee Stadium.
Again, Rosemary found an excuse not to accompany her husband.
"I can't possibly leave now. The living room and dining room floors are going to be refinished on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the kitchen appliances are going to be delivered. Thursday, the carpet is being installed in the master suite. Friday, the electrician is coming to install the outside lights. Saturday ...."
"Okay," Jed said, throwing his hands up in the air in a gesture of surrender. "I'll go without you—again. But I can't wait until this house is done."
* * *
Not long after her husband left for Baltimore, Rosemary returned to the attic and resumed her search for objets d'art. In doing so, she found a chair identical to the one in the painting above the fireplace.
"The portrait must have been painted in this house, and that man must have lived in Belmont Hall," she reasoned. "I wonder ...."
The following day, Rosemary visited the county historical society in Poughkeepsie, which had records of most of the people who lived in the estates along the Hudson dating back to the 1700s.
"Do you have any idea who he might be?" she asked, showing one of the volunteers a picture of the portrait on her phone.
"It looks like Quentin Belmont," the elderly woman replied. "He was the last of his family to own Belmont Hall. He never married, you see, so the family line ended with him. After his death, the house went to one of his followers."
"Followers?"
"Yes," the volunteer said with a grin. "Quentin was a bit odd. He belonged to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn."
"What's that?"
"It was a magical and fraternal order founded in England in 1888. As one of the order, Quentin dedicated his life to seeking knowledge of the occult. It was all quite scandalous. Most people around here wanted nothing to do with him and accused him of dabbling in the black arts."
There was little else the woman could add since, in his later years, Quentin rarely left Belmont Hall. But Rosemary, her curiosity piqued, wanted to learn more about the man in the portrait. Perhaps it was Quentin's connection to the mysterious world of the occult that fascinated her so, or maybe it was the fact that such a handsome man never married. Regardless of its cause, her interest soon bordered on obsession. During her waking hours, she could not take her mind off of him; and in her sleep, she dreamed about him.
Meanwhile, Jed concluded his road trip and returned to New York. When he went home to Belmont Hall, he found his young wife changed. Where once she had been vivacious and affectionate, she was now quiet, withdrawn and unresponsive to his romantic advances.
"I'm sorry," Rosemary apologized. "I guess I'm just exhausted from all the work I've done remodeling the house."
"That settles it," Jed replied. "In two weeks, we leave for California to play the Angels and the A's. Then we go to Seattle to play the Mariners before heading back east. You can use some rest and relaxation on the West Coast."
"I'm not leaving Belmont Hall," Rosemary emphatically declared. "This is my home."
It was at that moment Jed realized the short-lived honeymoon was over.
* * *
In the following months, Jed channeled all his energy into his career. At the All-Star break, he had a record of 10-0 and an earned run average of .196. There was already talk that he was a likely candidate for the Cy Young Award.
When he was home at Belmont, he found his wife cold and distant.
"What's happened to us?" he asked her. "Lately, when we're alone together, you behave as though I was a stranger."
"I know what this is all about," Rosemary snapped at him. "You want me to follow you from ballpark to ballpark, sitting in the stands and cheering every strike you throw."
"I don't want a cheerleader; I want a wife. I love you, and I want to be with you. What's wrong with that?"
"Would you give up baseball and stay here at Belmont Hall with me?"
"You know I can't do that. I'm at the peak of my career right now. If I'm lucky, I'll have another ten years before I'll have to quit playing. Then we can settle down here if you'd like. By that time, I'll have made enough money for us to live quite comfortably anywhere we choose."
"We have enough money now. You won't quit baseball because you like the glory and the adoration of the fans. You'd rather pitch for the Yankees than be home with me."
"What's important is that we're together, whether it's here, in the Bronx or in a hotel in Kansas City or Boston."
"This is my home. I won't leave Belmont Hall," she stubbornly insisted.
* * *
In addition to being a highly paid, well-known athlete, Jed Ames was an extremely handsome and personable young man. As such, there was no shortage of young ladies seeking his company. Successful athletes, like rock stars, attracted groupies. With his marriage tottering on the brink of divorce, the pitcher turned to a succession of attractive young women to ease his loneliness. It started with a blond secretary in Chicago and spread to a redheaded high school teacher in Oakland and a brunette flight attendant in Toronto. Soon Jed, like the fabled sailor, had a girl in every port, including New York City.
Rosemary never questioned her husband about the sudden cessation of phone calls while he was on the road or remaining in the city when the Yankees were playing at home. The brutal truth was that she did not care where he went or whom he was with. Her only concern—to the exclusion of all else—was completing the renovations to the Dutchess County mansion.
"Another month and it should all be over with," she congratulated herself. "The contractor has finished work on all the rooms on the first two floors. All that's left is the third floor."
As she stared up at the portrait hanging above the fireplace mantel, she imagined that Quentin Belmont smiled down at her, pleased with the report of her progress.
* * *
A family man at heart, Jed was not happy with his transient relationships. What he wanted was Rosemary, the only woman he'd ever truly loved. Yet while his personal life was not all that he desired, his career was phenomenal. His name was already being linked to Yankee greats such as Whitey Ford, Ron Guidry and Roger Clemens.
The glory days would not last forever, though. Baseball was a sport for young men. What would he do when the time came for him to retire? And what would happen—God forbid—if he suffered an injury that would cut his career short? Of course, he could become a coach or manager, take a job in the front office or even go into broadcasting. Many jobs revolved around the world of major league sports, but none were as fulfilling or exciting as donning a uniform and taking the field.
With the season drawing to an end and the Yankees headed toward the playoffs, Jed began to think about his life with Rosemary. Once postseason play was concluded, he would return to Belmont Hall. Surely, by then, the redecorating would be completed, and he and his wife would have four months in which to reconcile. He sincerely hoped that once she was no longer being kept busy with supervising the contractors, she would grow bored and lonely in that big, old house.
* * *
The Yankees returned to New York in triumph after their World Series victory against the Atlanta Braves. None of the players was happier to see the season come to an end than the team's star pitcher, Jed Ames.
Not long after his plane touched down at JFK, Jed's Jaguar was in a northbound lane of the Taconic State Parkway. He then headed west to Poughkeepsie where he got onto Route 9, also known as Albany Post Road. The drive seemed interminably long, but eventually, Jed approached "Millionaire's Row," a collection of stately old homes along the Hudson, including FDR's Georgian colonial family home, Springwood; Frederick Vanderbilt's neoclassic style mansion designed by the renowned architectural firm of McKim, Mead and White; and the former Belmont family estate, Belmont Hall.
Relief flooded over Jed when he drove up the long circular driveway and saw no construction vehicles parked in front of the house. He entered his home and called his wife's name. There was no response. As he walked from room to room looking for Rosemary, he noticed the fine job she did renovating the place. It was obvious that a lot of love, hard work and attention to detail had gone into the job.
"Rosemary? Where are you, darling?" he shouted as he ran up the stairs to search the rooms on the second floor; she wasn't there either.
Maybe she went shopping.
Jed tried to reach her on her cell phone, but the call went directly to voicemail. Was she deliberately not answering? A sudden thought chilled his heart. What if Rosemary found out about the other women and left him? No, he decided. She loved the house far too much. If the marriage was over, she would expect him to pack his bags and return to the city.
He was about to go downstairs and begin phoning his wife's friends, when he saw the door to the third-floor staircase was ajar.
Could she be up there rummaging through the boxes in the attic? he wondered.
"Rosemary?" he called again as he mounted the narrow attic stairs.
Jed opened the door at the top of the staircase and felt a cold chill envelope his body. While the light from several small windows along the front of the house seemed intent on creating shadows rather than illuminating the large room, there was enough light for him to see that the boxes, furniture and eBay treasures had all been removed.
Rosemary, not content to limit her renovations to the first two floors, decided to turn the third floor into an immense library. Jed found this extremely odd since neither he nor his wife was particularly interested in reading.
Maybe, he thought hopefully, boredom is starting to get to her.
He walked over to the nearest bookshelf and casually scanned the titles of several old volumes, expecting either romances or mystery novels.
"What the hell?"
The books all dealt with matters of the occult—but why? Rosemary had no interest in such things. She was not the type to believe in horoscopes, tarot cards or psychics, nor had she ever been a fan of horror films or ghost stories.
Jed returned to the first floor. He called his wife's name several more times, but there was still no reply. He walked into the living room, sat on the couch and reached for the old-fashioned, land-line phone on the end table. He would call her mother first and see if she had heard from Rosemary. He pressed the buttons, and as he waited for the sound of the ring, his eyes strayed to the portrait above the fireplace mantel.
The horrified pitcher dropped the receiver onto the floor.
"Hello?"
He vaguely heard his mother-in-law's voice on the other end of the line.
"Hello?"
He walked to the fireplace, reached up, touched the canvas and felt the paint. It was dry.
The man in the portrait looked different from the way Jed remembered him. His first impression of Quentin Belmont had been that of a wealthy, arrogant man, yet one who lived under the curse of sorrow, defeat, loneliness and possibly madness. Now, however, the piercing green eyes seemed to radiate with happiness and hope, two emotions that vanished from Jed's own heart the moment he looked up at the portrait.
The painting of the master and mistress of Belmont Hall that had been started more than a hundred years earlier had finally been completed. Sitting in the chair in front of Quentin Belmont, dressed in a gown from the late 1800s, was an exquisitely beautiful and blissfully happy Rosemary Ames.
Salem insisted I place his portrait above our fireplace mantel. Does that surprise anyone?
