"Let There Be Love…"
A Ghost and Mrs Muir Story
By TunnelsOfTheSouth
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The Ghost and Mrs Muir and all its wonderful canon characters are the eternal property of R.A. Dick and NBC Television Studios.
I have enjoyed myself hugely with this work.
I make no monies from this one or any of my fanfics, only the joy and delight of creation.
"You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams…"
Dr. Seuss
Chapter One
You Called Me Carolyn
"Well, I'm sure I have you to thank for the pearls…" Carolyn looked up over her shoulder from the necklace of beautiful, matched pearls she held in her hands.
Daniel gazed down at her, loving her even more at that moment. If such a thing was possible.
She looked so beautiful in the moonlight. Deep inside his chest, the heart he no longer possessed felt as if it was breaking. His silent wish that the wedding they'd witnessed this evening had been theirs must remain only that, an unfulfilled desire.
Keeping his hands behind his back, he leaned as close as possible, absorbing the beauty of her smile. "If I were alive, Madam, they'd be emeralds —diamonds — and palaces…"
Carolyn's expression grew wistful. "Captain, if you were alive, Gull Cottage would be a palace…" She nodded quickly.
They stared at each other for some time, both lost in dreams of things that could never be… not while one of them remained alive…
"I must go in…" Carolyn finally sighed, looking away first, her eyes beginning to brim with tears. "I know Mom will want to talk all about the wedding. I'm glad they were able to renew their vows. I've never seen my parents looking so happy. It was a beautiful ceremony."
"Yes, it was…" Daniel agreed with a sigh. "Beautiful, breath-taking and poignant…"
"It was all those things, but it still wasn't ours…" Carolyn's breathing fractured. "I wish it had been…"
"I know…" Daniel watched her struggle with her emotions.
It was all he could do not to reach for her. He ached to hold and comfort her. He hated to see any woman cry. And to see his beloved on the verge of tears…it almost unmanned him. All he had to offer as comfort were words and even they seemed to have deserted him in this singular moment.
"Tonight, you called me Carolyn…" she whispered brokenly, holding her pearls against her chest. "I liked that…"
"Go…" Daniel commanded softly, pointing toward the closed front door of the house with his chin. "I will remain out here and look at the stars. Or I might take a walk. It is a fine evening..."
"Then, I'll say goodnight, Captain…" Carolyn drew a shuddering breath as she half-reached a hand toward him before letting it drop. She hurried past him, opening and then closing the door behind her with the hollow sound of finality.
"Goodnight, Carolyn…" Daniel looked after her, shaking his head as he dematerialised.
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Carolyn was surprised to find her parents waiting for her in the living room. She thought they'd already retired to their room. Her heart sank, knowing they didn't want to discuss the wedding ceremony.
Both their expressions were serious. A tray holding the coffee pot and cups along with a plate of Martha's excellent cherry cake sat on the table in front of them.
"We need to talk," her mother said. "We haven't had much of a chance, until now."
"I see. What do you wish to talk about?" Carolyn asked warily, shaking her head in refusal at her mother's offer of coffee, as she went to sit in the armchair beside the fireplace.
"You, of course," her father replied brusquely. "After all, you are the reason we flew all the way out here. To see you safely married to that man Harriet told us was absolutely divine and so suitable for you. She couldn't have been more wrong."
"You must understand. I tried to tell you that Cousin Harriet exaggerated the situation between me and Captain Gregg," Carolyn attempted to explain. "I… it's complicated."
"And you must understand that you can't stay buried in the wilds of Maine forever, dear," her mother gently remonstrated with her. "We all know it's entirely unrealistic. Your children are growing up a little wild, especially Jonathan. They both need a man in their lives. And you need a husband."
"There's still Captain Gregg…" Carolyn offered valiantly.
"The less said about that man, the better," her father chipped in severely. "I don't know what Harriet ever saw in him. He's not the man his ancestor obviously was. Not by a long mile." He stabbed one finger toward Daniel's portrait.
Carolyn couldn't disagree so she wisely kept silent. She looked surreptitiously into the shadows of the living room, but they remained stubbornly silent.
"We came all the way out here because we love you. When we thought you might elope with the Captain, as you did with Robert…" Carolyn's mother pressed the back of her hand to her lips.
"There, there. Don't upset yourself," her husband said bracingly, patting her free hand. "Our girl is more sensible than that, now she has her children to think of."
"I had no intention of eloping with Captain Gregg, or anyone," Carolyn told them. "But it would be my business if I did."
"Yes, well, let's leave that thorny matter aside for now," her father continued in a more hopeful tone. "I remember you saying the lease on this place was for two years. Then it must be up next month. How about this for a plan? We could fly back and collect you all, the very day your lease ends. We want to take you back home with us, where you belong."
"Oh, Brad, that's a wonderful idea!" Carolyn's mother enthused as if they hadn't already discussed it between themselves.
She turned to Carolyn. "Oh, think of it. We could hold a dinner party to welcome you home, dear. We could invite around some of your old friends. They've all been telling us how much they miss seeing you. I know Owen Mitford was especially heartbroken when you left town."
"I am thinking about it…" Carolyn shook her head.
Her mother's hopeful expression squeezed her heart with guilt. But the old, familiar sensation of being trapped by her family's expectations for her quickly resurfaced. She detested Owen Mitford and had no intention of ever marrying him.
Besides, how could she possibly leave Gull Cottage? Everything she loved and treasured was within its walls. Her entire future was here, but how could she explain any of it to her parents?
"To make you happy, I will give it some thought…" She made a mental note to phone Claymore as soon as she'd finished writing her latest article. He would be thrilled to hear she intended to renew her lease for an extended period.
She smiled. Twenty years had a nice, permanent ring to it. At least one Gregg would be very happy with her decision.
Her eyes strayed to Daniel's portrait hanging above her. "It's been a wonderful day…" She faked a yawn as she rose from her chair. "I'm sure you're both tired. Let's leave this until the morning when we've all had time to think. Good night…"
She hugged them, ignoring their protests that there may be no time for them to talk in the morning. She knew they loved her dearly and only wanted the best for her. But what she wanted most in the world, they couldn't provide. Not at any price.
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Daniel sighed as he stood on the headland. He'd been there all night, waiting and watching for the sun to rise from the restless ocean before him. He closed his eyes, desperately trying to remember the welcome touch of the summer warmth he could no longer feel.
In the last hundred or so years he'd forgotten how a lot of things felt. Many things that had once been so important for him to remember and understand that he didn't think he would ever forget them.
Sunshine and rain, hot and cold, the fundamental basics of human life. The taste of sea salt on his tongue or the sweet lushness of tropical fruit.
"Ah, but then…" His eyes snapped open as renewed awareness shot through him.
He tried to recall how the softness of a woman's skin felt moving against his own. The simple act of holding her hand or kissing her lips whenever the fancy took him, not caring who might be watching. The capacity to love beyond all sanity or caution and to be so loved in return…
"Therein lies the rub…"
He turned from the view, to be confronted by Gull Cottage bathed in the early morning sunshine. It looked perfect, his sanctuary, his home, his anchor in this sometimes frustratingly modern world.
In that moment he couldn't bring himself to go inside the house, not even to the refuge of his own Wheelhouse. He suddenly had the strange, almost overwhelming sense that he no longer possessed a place among the family who'd been living beneath his roof for the last two years.
He was a ghost. How could he have a purpose or use for the living?
Claymore, masquerading as the flesh and blood Captain Daniel Gregg, had a somewhat dubious place. Even if he was no longer engaged to Carolyn, he was still the family's landlord and a useful friend when needed.
Daniel didn't doubt Carolyn's parents were already returning to the idea of finding future suitors for their precious, but stubbornly defiant, daughter. That whole thorny matter was far from settled. And Daniel was powerless to prevent any of it from happening.
What if they finally succeed in convincing Carolyn to return to Philadelphia with them?
"Blast!" he shouted at the skeins of seabirds beginning to fly overhead. "I've been evicted from being able to haunt my own house!" He shook his fists at them as they squawked and wheeled away from his anger.
Part of the previous night's conversation with Carolyn kept replaying in his mind. 'Captain, if you were alive… if you were alive… were alive… alive…'
"Blast…" he said again, without heat, his hands dropping to hang uselessly at his sides.
What wouldn't he give in that moment to actually be alive once more? His old adversary, Mr Turner, the devil's henchman, had offered him all sorts of blandishments and sensual enticements in the hope of finally securing Daniel's soul for his boss.
His mouth set grimly. If the confounded demon had known enough to offer the ultimate enticement, that of returning Daniel to the physical plane so he could truly be with Carolyn, it would have been almost impossible to deny. The idea held irrefutable appeal and dangerous consequences.
"If Turner ever got wind of my present disquiet then I would be truly lost because I doubt I would be able to resist such a blandishment…" Clasping his hands in the small of his back he walked the headland, moving ever closer to Gull Cottage.
He was in time to see Carolyn's parents leaving the house, following their luggage toward a cab parked outside the front gate. He drew close enough to hear them say they were catching an early flight back to Philadelphia because they'd decided to go on a second honeymoon.
He watched as they took Carolyn aside for a last-minute conversation which did not go well, judging by the looks of discontent on all their faces. They were interrupted by the children clamouring for goodbye hugs.
Daniel moved closer into the concealment of the rose trellis at the end of the front porch to watch Carolyn and the children say their last goodbyes. The whole time he felt like an intruder watching the tableau of family life going on without him.
Once again he felt dissatisfied with his current lot, but this weekend had brought the reality of all he and Carolyn could not have together. No matter how much they both might wish it to be otherwise…
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"Goodbye…" Carolyn stood at the gate, waving until the cab carrying her parents to the airport drove out of sight.
She felt a deep sense of guilty relief. Nothing had been resolved, but she'd been given some space in which to reorganise her life before her parents tried to intervene again.
Over breakfast, in front of the children, they had talked of mundane things such as the weather and the time of the flight they'd decided to book last night. To their annoyance, Carolyn had refused, once again, to discuss her future before Candy and Jonathan had come running into the kitchen, demanding their attention.
Carolyn had been made very aware by their looks that they hadn't given up the idea that she would marry again and soon. But not to Claymore. Thankfully that engagement had been firmly and irrevocably broken.
She'd been given the blessing of two weeks' grace. The length of her parents' Caribbean cruise. Then they would be in touch for her answer which they both hoped would be in the affirmative.
Martha had bustled about between the table and the stove, observing but not commenting. But her shared looks of understanding with Carolyn said a great deal. Carolyn had been grateful to know she was on her side, as always.
She turned from watching the cab drive away to look over her shoulder. She sensed Daniel's presence in the garden rather than saw him. He had been gone all night and she'd worried about him.
She sighed as she watched her children playing with their dog. Nothing had been resolved between herself and Daniel. Her overworked imagination kept returning again and again to an impossible wish.
Part of the previous night's conversation with him kept replaying in her mind. 'Captain, if you were alive…'
She shook her head. Wishing for the impossible had given her nothing but an incipient headache. She raised one hand to her temple, massaging at the dull pain. "A cup of strong, black coffee would be very welcome right now."
She left the gate and walked up the front path. "Candy and Jonathan," she called. "Let's go inside. I know you two have homework to finish before school tomorrow."
"Aw, Mom…" Jonathan wheedled, picking up his discarded baseball bat and mitt. "We were just gonna play a game." He glanced around the garden. "As soon as Scruffy remembers where he left the ball."
"Well, all right, then," their mother conceded, walking toward the open front door. "One game, then it's inside with you two and up to your room to get the work done."
"Okay, Mom…" Candy nodded, taking the bat her brother held out.
"Thanks, Mom!" Jonathan grinned. "Let's go find the ball, Scruffy!" He raced his pet across the lawn and into the nearest bushes.
Carolyn paused on the doorstep, surveying the rose trellis at the far end of the porch, but it was empty. If Daniel had been there, he was gone now.
"Good morning, Captain…" she said, wistfully, before crossing the threshold and heading toward the kitchen to share that welcome cup of coffee with Martha.
Another literary deadline loomed and she was seriously behind now because of the disruption caused by her parents' impromptu wedding ceremony. All she had to submit was a rough draft of an article she'd put aside some months ago.
In desperation, she'd pulled it from the top drawer in her desk last night when she couldn't sleep. She needed to finish it today, but once again, she was stumped for a suitable ending.
As always, when she was truly stuck for a line or the outline of a scene, she would sound it out with her housekeeper and good friend, whose sharp wit and excellent mind were far better than any editor's.
As she entered the kitchen she glanced back over her shoulder through the open front door. "Is it fate that I've chosen to try and complete a story about the hopelessness of impossible love?"
She shook her head, hoping for an answer from the dappled shadows behind her. But they remained silent and empty…
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