The Gate House   ::   Demille Nelson

Susan was, and probably still is, a beautiful woman with long red hair, arresting green eyes, pouty lips, and the perfect body of a lifelong equestrian.

I picked up a photo that showed Susan on my first sailboat, the original Paumanok , a thirty-six-foot Morgan, which I loved, but which I’d scuttled in Oyster Bay Harbor rather than let the government seize it for back taxes. This photo was taken, I think, in the summer of 1990 somewhere on the Long Island Sound. The photograph showed a bright summer day, and Susan was standing on the aft deck, stark naked, with one hand covering her burning bush, and the other covering one breast. Her face shows an expression of mock surprise and embarrassment.

The occasion was one of Susan’s acted-out sexual fantasies, and I think I was supposed to have climbed aboard from a kayak, and I’d discovered her alone and naked and made her my sex slave.

The woman had not only a great body, but also a great imagination and a wonderful libido to go with it. As for the sexual playacting, its purpose, of course, was to keep the marital fires burning, and it worked well for almost two decades because all our infidelities were with each other. At least that was the understanding, until a new actor, don Frank Bellarosa, moved in next door.

I picked up a bottle of old cognac that I’d found in the sideboard and topped off my coffee cup.

The reason I’ve returned to America has to do with the former residents of this gatehouse, George and Ethel Allard, who had been old Stanhope family retainers. George, a good man, had died a decade ago, and his wife, Ethel, who is not so nice, is in hospice care and about to join her husband, unless George has already had a word with St. Peter, the ultimate gatekeeper. “Wasn’t I promised eternal rest and peace? Can’t she go someplace else? She always liked hot weather.” In any case, I am the attorney for Ethel’s estate and so I needed to take care of that and attend her funeral.

The other reason I’ve returned is that this gatehouse is my legal U.S. address, but unfortunately, this house is about to pass into the hands of Amir Nasim, an Iranian gentleman who now owns the main house, Stanhope Hall, and much of the original acreage, including this gatehouse. As of now, however, Ethel Allard has what is called a life estate in the gatehouse, meaning she has a rent-free tenancy until she dies. This rent-free house was given to her by Susan’s grandfather, Augustus Stanhope (because Ethel was screwing Augustus way back when), and Ethel has been kind enough to allow me to store my things here and share her digs whenever I’m in New York. Ethel hates me, but that’s another story. In any case, Ethel’s tenancy in this house and on this planet is about to end, and thus I had returned from London not only to say goodbye to Ethel, but also to find a new home for my possessions, and find another legal U.S. address, which seems to be a requirement for citizenship and creditors.

This is the first time I’d been to New York since last September, coming in from London as soon as the airplanes were flying again. I’d stayed for three days at the Yale Club, where I’d maintained my membership for my infrequent New York business trips, and I was shocked at how quiet, empty, and somber the great city had become.

I’d made no phone calls and saw no one. I would have seen my daughter, Carolyn, but she had fled her apartment in Brooklyn right after 9/11 to stay with her mother in Hilton Head, South Carolina. My son, Edward, lives in Los Angeles. So for three days, I walked the quiet streets of the city, watching the smoke rising from what came to be known as Ground Zero.

Heartsick and drained, I got on a plane and returned to London, feeling that I’d done the right thing, the way people do who come home for a death in the family.

Over the next few months, I learned that I knew eleven people who’d died in the Twin Towers; mostly former neighbors and business associates, but also a close friend who left a wife and three young children.

And now, nine months after 9/11, I was back again. Things seemed to have returned to normal, but not really.

I sipped my coffee and cognac and looked around at the piles of paper. There was a lot to go through, and I hoped that Ethel would hold on a while longer, and that Mr. Nasim wasn’t planning on getting his encumbered gatehouse into his possession the minute Ethel’s life tenancy expired. I needed to speak to Mr. Nasim about that; speaking to Ethel about hanging on until I tidied up my papers might seem insensitive and selfish.

Because the night was cool, and because I didn’t have a paper shredder, I had a fire going in the dining room fireplace. Now and then, I’d feed the fire with some letter or photo that I wouldn’t want my children to see if I suddenly croaked.

In that category were these photos of their mother whose nakedness revealed a lot more about her head than about her body. Susan was, and I’m sure still is, a bit nutty. But to be honest, I didn’t mind that at all, and that wasn’t the source of our marital problems. Our problem, obviously, was Susan’s affair with the Mafia don next door. And then to complicate things further, she shot and killed him. Three shots. One in the groin. Ouch .

I gathered the photos and turned in my chair toward the fireplace. We all have trouble parting with things like this, but I can tell you, as a lawyer and as a man, no good can come of saving anything you wouldn’t want your family or your enemies to see. Or your next significant other, for that matter.

I stared into the fire and watched the flames dancing against the soot-blackened brick, but I held on to the photos.

So, she shot her lover, Frank “the Bishop” Bellarosa, capo di tutti capi , boss of all bosses, and got away with it – legally, at least – due to some circumstances that the Justice Department found mitigating and extenuating.

Fact is, the Justice Department took a dive on the case because they’d made the mistake of allowing Mrs. Sutter unobstructed access to don Bellarosa, who was under house arrest in his villa down the road, and who was also singing his black heart out to them, and thus needed to be kept happy with another man’s wife.

I’m still a little pissed off at the whole thing, as you might guess, but basically I’m over it.

Meanwhile, I needed to decide if this trip was a death vigil, or perhaps something more permanent. I had kept up with my CLE – continuing legal education – and I was still a member of the New York State Bar, so I hadn’t burned all my bridges, and theoretically I was employable here.