The Golden Gate: A Novel

During the Golden Gate Bridge opening in May 1937, Isabella Stafford roller skates across the bridge with her cousins Cassie and Nicole. They meet their grandmother, Mrs. Bainbridge. The girls discuss a recent prank where Isabella wore a wig to impersonate her deceased sister, Iris, scaring the family housekeeper. Isabella reveals that her mother underwent a brain operation. She claims to communicate with both Iris and some unnamed evil presence, and her cousins worry that if she keeps saying things like this, she, too, might be forced to undergo a brain operation. 

The scene shifts to March 15, 1944, when Mrs. Bainbridge sits in a legal deposition room being questioned by DA Doogan about Wilkinson’s murder case. She resists providing simple yes-or-no answers, insisting that the complex family history requires proper context. She proposes to write her own complete account of the family’s background.

This chapter consists of Mrs. Bainbridge’s written testimonial addressed to Doogan. She begins by sharing a 1930 newspaper clipping about Iris’s death. She confirms that seven-year-old Iris died after falling down a laundry chute at the Claremont Hotel, leaving six-year-old Isabella traumatized and mute for months.