
<#FROWN:P01\>
"I'm sorry to be late," she said, hurrying to her customary chair beside Lady Louisa. "I was going over the accounts, and I fear I lost all track of -" She broke off, her eyes widening in delight as she spied Mr. Stallings. "Richard!"
"Matty!" He leapt to his feet, his earnest face lit with pleasure as he held out his hand to her. "By all that is holy, I never thought to find you here!"
"I have been at Kirkswood for five years now, since Papa's death,"she replied, her brown eyes shining as she gazed up at the young curate who had once been her father's assistant. The two of them had been quite close, but despite her father's hopes their feelings for each other had never developed into anything deeper than friendship. "And you?"
"Still working as an assistant," he confessed with an affable shrug. "I was at the rectory near Compton for almost two years, but the bishop recently assigned me to Mr. Thorntyn's parish. At the time I confess to being slightly put out, but now that I know you are here ..." His boyish grin and sparkling eyes completed the sentence for him.
"I had no idea you had a connection with Miss Stone." Mr. Thorntyn's remark sounded suspiciously like an accusation. "Odd you never mentioned it."
"I didn't know she was here, Mr. Thorntyn," Richard answered easily, assisting Matty to her chair. "But she and I are old friends. I had the privilege of working with her good father when I was fresh out of the seminary. He was a very good rector, and one of the kindest men I have ever known."
"Your father was a vicar, Miss Stone?" Mr. Thorntyn turned his jet-black eyes on hers. "One would have never guessed."
Matty favored him with a honeyed smile. "Why, thank you, Mr. Thorntyn," she said, as if he'd just paid her a high compliment. "It is very kind of you to say so."
The vicar clearly did not know how to take such sauce, but fortunately Joss did, and adroitly he steered the conversation in another direction. He successfully kept the peace for the remainder of the hour, until it was time for their visitors to take their leave. "It was most gracious of you to have us here, my lord, most gracious," Mr. Thorntyn said, bowing to Joss. "May I hope to see you in church this Sabbath?"
"You may," Joss said, knowing it would be expected of him while he was in residence.
"And you, sir?" He sliced a cool look at Raj.
"I shouldn't think of being anywhere else, Raj assured him solemnly.
"Hmph." Mr. Thorntyn settled his flat back hat on his head. "Come along, Stallings, we've much to do this day."
"In one moment, sir." Richard turned to Matty. "I have been informed by our housekeeper that Lady Kirkwood's companion is responsible for a great deal of the charitable work hereabouts. That must be you?"
"I do make a point of calling on the tenants, yes," Matty admitted, feeling a stab of guilt at the realization that she'd been neglecting that particular duty over the past week.
"Well perhaps you will let me accompany you on your rounds," he suggested thoughtfully. "It will give me the opportunity to meet with my new parishioners and acquaint myself with their needs."
The suggestion brought a delighted smile to Matty's lips. "What an excellent idea, Richard! I've often tried interesting Mr. Thorntyn in helping me, but he never ... that is," she corrected hastily, "I would appreciate the help, thank you."
"When do you next go out?" Richard prudently ignored the first part of her statement.
"I should go out as soon as possible," she replied, her brows meeting in thought. "Tomorrow, perhaps, or -"
"I beg your pardon, Miss Stone," Joss interrupted, his voice cool. "Is tomorrow not the day you were going to take me about?"
Matty gave him a confused look, knowing full well that such plans had never been made. She was about to ask for clarification when the ice in his green eyes stopped her. "Of course, your lordship, in the excitement over seeing Richard again the matter slipped my mind. Naturally, I shall place myself at your disposal." She turned back to Richard.
"I will send you a note," she promised, holding her hand out to him. "It will be wonderful working with you again."
He took her hand and raised it to his lips. "I will look forward to it," he said, pressing a fleeting kiss on the back of her hand. "Until then, Matty, I shall bid you adieu."
The moment the door closed behind them Louisa collapsed against her chair. "Well, thank heavens that is over with for the next few months!" she said, taking a restorative sip of tea. "I know it is unkind of me to say so, but I really can not abide that man."
"He does have a rather ... trying personality," Raj agreed with a wry grin. "The assistant seemed to be an all right fellow, though. Are you well acquainted with him, Miss Stone?" His blue eyes flashed in Matty's direction.
"Very well acquainted," she replied, taking a sip of her own tea. "As I mentioned, he was my father's assistant for several months, and we were quite close."
"And now he is here," Lady Louisa drawled, her eyes lit with a speculative light. "Hmmm, I find that most interesting."
Matty didn't deign to comment on what her employer might mean by that. Instead, she occupied her thoughts puzzling over the marquess's odd behavior. One would almost think he disapproved of her going about with Richard, she brooded, the cup of her tea in her hand quite forgotten. But that made no earthly sense. Unless he felt she was making a play for him, she thought, her lips tightening with indignation. Doubtlessly Lord Kirkswood considered her a dried-up spinster desperate to toss her bonnet at any man who looked at her twice.
As soon as this notion appeared she dismissed it as untrue and unkind. Whatever his other faults, the marquess struck her as being a fair man. Perhaps he genuinely thought they had a previous engagement; they'd once talked about visiting some of the tenants. It wasn't unreasonable to assume he'd mixed the matter up in his mind. Her papa was always doing things like that, and Lord Frederick had never been able to keep a single detail straight in the four or so years she had known him. Yes, she decided with a satisfied sigh, that must be it.
While Matty was congratulating herself on the brilliant way she had solved the puzzle, Joss was silently cursing himself for his behavior. What the devil made him interfere in Miss Stone's meeting with her old friend? he wondered, his jaw clenching with annoyance. It wasn't any concern of his what the minx did on her own time. He only knew he hadn't cared for the thought of her rambling around the countryside with that grinning clergyman dogging her every step. She was his sister-in-law's companion, and that, indirectly, made her his responsibility.
Perhaps that accounted for it, he decided, staring at the fire in the grate with unseeing eyes. He was only concerned for her welfare. Lord knew the chit didn't seem to give her own reputation any thought. He'd slip a discreet word in her ear about the inadvisability of a single lady racketing about with an eligible man, he decided with a flash of self-righteousness. She would probably rail at the very suggestion, but he didn't let that concern him. Over the past few days he had grown accustomed to dealing with shrews, and he was pleasantly surprised to find he had a talent for it.
The next morning Matty was up early to raid the kitchen for supplies. Since the marquess's return, the account with the grocer had been settled to everyone's liking, and the larder fairly overflowed with bounty. Matty was filling the second food box when she suddenly sensed she was no longer alone. She whirled around to find the marquess standing just in the doorway, casually dressed in a riding jacket of green velvet, his muscular legs encased in a pair of deerskin breeches.
"Good morning, sir," she greeted him with a wary smile. "I hadn't expected to find you up and abroad at such an early hour. It is scarce nine o'clock."
"I am accustomed to rising early," Joss said, thinking she made a pretty picture despite her prim gray gown and the awful mob cap perched on her curls. "In India I was often hard at work by seven. It was the only way to avoid the appalling heat."
"Well, in that case I am surprised to see you turning into such a slacker," she teased, recalling he'd said something about owning a fleet of ships. "You'll be sleeping until noon next, and demanding the servants bring you your breakfast in bed."
"You wound me, Miss Stone," he said, pushing himself away from the doorframe and advancing slowly toward her. "I've been up since eight and have already taken my morning ride. If anyone is the slugabed around here, it's most assuredly not me."
She could see the justice in that and gave a merry laugh. "Hoisted by my own petard," she said, placing a tin of biscuits in the box and covering it with a napkin. "Well, that should teach me to be so annoyingly self-righteous."
"Somehow I think it will take more than that to shake that self-confidence of yours," Joss said with a slow smile. "But enough of this. What are your plans for this morning?"
"I thought we would start with the tenants most in need of assistance. Several of our families have suffered rather cruelly this past year, and it may be necessary to extend their leases even if they haven't paid their rents." She shot him an anxious look as if gauging his response.
To her relief he merely shrugged. "Whatever you think best," he said, moving forward to take the boxes from the counter. "I'll have these placed in the carriage and then we'll be on our way."
"Carriage?" Matty seemed startled.
"Certainly a carriage." He gave her a puzzled look. "How do you usually make your visits?"
"On foot," she admitted, "or on horseback if I have a great deal to carry."
Given the conditions of the stables this came as no great shock to Joss, for the horses did not look capable of regular work. But he stiffened to think of a woman as slender as Miss Stone tromping about his vast estate weighed down with packages for the poor. "Well, we have a carriage now, and it will please me if you use it when you are on estate business," he informed her stiffly. "Or, if you prefer, a horse can be made available for your use. Would you like that?"
"My own horse?" Matty's eyes grew wide with delight. "Oh, my lord, I should like it above all things!"
Her enthusiasm pleased Joss, and he resolved to send for a new horse at once. Some gentle, placid beast, he decided as they made their way out to the stables. He wondered if Lady Louisa would also like a mount, and decided he'd ask her the moment they returned from their visits.
The early morning sun was low in the gray-blue sky, but the air was sweet nonetheless with the smell of blossoming flowers and budding trees. Easily handling the carriage he'd rented until his own could be delivered, Joss allowed himself to enjoy the splendor of an English spring. He'd forgotten how very beautiful it could be - or perhaps he hadn't allowed himself to remember. The thought brought another jab of pain.
Their first call was upon a family who had moved into an estate cottage less than six months ago. The farmer was wary, if capable, and after quizzing him on the matter of planting Joss told the startled young man not to worry about his rent.
<#FROWN:P02\>
Chapter 11
WILLIAM insisted that Sarah go to his doctor in Harley Street, the moment they returned to London. And he confirmed what she had guessed weeks before. By then she was five weeks pregnant, and he told her that the child would be born in late August or early September. And he urged her to be cautious for the first few months because of the miscarriage she'd had. But he found her in excellent health, and congratulated William on his heir, when he came to fetch her. William was clearly very pleased with himself, and with her, and they told his mother when they went to Whitfield that weekend.
"My dear children, that is marvelous!" she raved, acting as though they had accomplished something no one else had since Mary with Jesus. "I might remind you that it took you thirty days what it took your father and me thirty years to accomplish. You are to be congratulated on your speed, and your good fortune! What clever children you are!" She toasted them and they laughed. But she was enormously pleased for them, and she told Sarah again that having William had been the happiest moment in her life, and had remained thus in all the years since then. But as the doctor had done, she urged her not to be foolish and overdo, lest it hurt the baby or herself.
"Really, I'm fine." She felt surprisingly well, and the doctor had said they could make love, "reasonably," he had suggested they not hang off the chandelier or try to set any Olympic records, which Sarah had passed on to William. But he was desperately afraid that making love at all would hurt her or the baby. "I promise you, it won't do anything. He said so."
"How does he know?"
"He's a doctor," she reassured him.
"Maybe he's no good. Maybe we should see someone else."
"William, he was your mother's doctor before you were born."
"Precisely. He's too old. We'll see someone younger."
He actually went so far as to find a specialist for her, and just to humor him, she saw him, and he told her all the same things as kindly old Lord Allthorpe, who Sarah much preferred. And by then she was two months pregnant, and had had no problems.
"What I want to know is when we are going back to France," she said after they'd been in London for a month. She was dying to get started on their new home.
"Are you serious?" William looked horrified. "You want to go now? Don't you want to wait until after the baby?
"Of course not. Why wait all these months when we could be working on it now? I'm not sick, for heaven's sake, darling, I'm pregnant."
"I know. But what if something happens?" He looked frantic and wished she weren't so determined. But even old Lord Allthorpe agreed that there was no real reason for her to stay at home, and as long as she didn't wear herself out completely, or carry anything to heavy, he thought the project in France would be fine.
"Keeping busy will be the best thing for her," he assured them, and then suggested they wait till March, so she would be fully three months pregnant before they left. It was the only compromise Sarah was willing to make. She would wait until March to go back to France, but not a moment longer. She was dying to get to work on the ch<*_>a-circ<*/>teau.
William tried to drag out his projects at Whitfield as best he could, and his mother kept urging him to tell Sarah to take it easy.
"Mother, I try, but she doesn't listen," he finally said in a moment of exasperation.
"She's just a child herself. She doesn't realize one has to be careful. She wouldn't want to lose this baby." But Sarah had already learned that lesson the hard way long before. And she was more careful than William thought, taking naps, and getting off her feet, and resting when she was tired. She had no intention of losing this baby. Nor did she intend to sit around. And she pressed him until finally he was ready to go back to France, and couldn't stall her any longer. By then it was mid-March, and she was threatening to leave without him.
They went to Paris on the royal yacht, when Lord Mountbatten was on his way to see the Duke of Windsor, and he agreed to take the young couple over as a favor. "Dickie," as William and his contemporaries called him, was a very handsome man, and Sarah amused him during the entire crossing, telling him about the ch<*_>a_circ<*/>teau and the work they were going to do there.
"William, old man, sounds like you have your work cut out for you." But he thought it would be good for them too. It was obvious that they were very much in love, and very excited about their project.
William had had the concierge at the Ritz hire a car for them, and they had managed to find a small hotel two and a half hours outside Paris, not far from their crumbling ch<*_>a-circ<*/>teau. They rented the top floor of the hotel, and planned to live there until they had made the ch<*_>a-circ<*/>teau habitable again, which they both knew could be a long time.
"It might be years, you know," William grumbled as they saw it again. And he spent the next two weeks lining up workmen. Eventually, he had hired a sizeable crew, and they began by prying off the boards and shutters to see what lay within. There were surprises everywhere as they worked, and some of them were happy ones, and some of them were not. The main living room was a splendid room, and eventually they found three salons, with beautiful boiseries, and fading gilt on some of the moldings; there were marble fireplaces and beautiful floors. But in some places the wood had been destroyed by mold and years of dampness, and animals who had ventured in through the boards and gnawed at the lovely moldings here and there.
There was a huge, handsome dining room, a series of smaller salons, still on the main floor, an extraordinary wood-panelled library, and a baronial hall worthy of any English castle, and a kitchen so antiquated it reminded Sarah of some of the museums she'd visited with her parents the year before. There were tools there that surely no one had used for two hundred years, and she collected them carefully with the intent to save them. And they carefully stored the two carriages they had found in the barn.
William ventured cautiously upstairs after their initial investigations on the main floor of the ch<_*>a-circ<*/>teau. But he absolutely refused to let Sarah join him, for fear the floors might cave in, but he found them all surprisingly solid, and eventually he let Sarah come up to see what he'd found. There were at least a dozen large sunny rooms, again with lovely boiseries, and beautifully shaped windows, and there was a handsome sitting room with a marble fireplace, which looked out over the main entrance and what had once been the park and the gardens of the ch<*_>a-circ<*/>teau. But suddenly Sarah realized as she walked from room to room, that there were no bathrooms. Of course, she laughed to herself, there wouldn't have been. They took baths in tubs in their dressing rooms, and they had chamber pots instead of toilets.
There was a lot of work to do, but it was clearly well worth doing. And even William looked excited now. He made drawings for the men, and drew up work schedules and spent every day from dawn to dusk giving directions, while Sarah worked beside him, sanding down old wood, refinishing floors, cleaning boiseries, repairing gilt, and polishing brass and bronze until it shone, and eventually she spent most of every day painting. And while they worked on the main house, William had assigned a crew of young boys to repair the caretaker's cottage so that eventually they could move there from the hotel, and be right on the site of their enormous project.
The caretaker's cottage was small. It had a tiny living room, a smaller bedroom beside it, and a large cozy kitchen, and upstairs there were two slightly larger sunny bedrooms. But it was certainly adequate for them, and possibly even a serving girl downstairs, if eventually Sarah felt like she needed one. They had a bedroom for themselves, and even one for their baby when it arrived.
She could feel the baby moving inside her now, and each time she felt it, she smiled, convinced that it would be a boy and look just like William. She told him that from time to time, and he insisted that he didn't care if it was a girl, they wanted more anyway. "And it's not as though we're supplying an heir to the throne," he teased her, but there was still his title, and the matter of inheriting Whitfield and its lands.
But they both had more than Whitfield, or even their ch<*_>a-circ<*/>teau, on their minds these days. In March, Hitler had raised his ugly head, and had "absorbed" Czechoslovakia, claiming that in effect, it no longer existed as a separate entity anymore. He had, in effect, swallowed ten million persons who were not Germans. And he had no sooner devoured them, than he turned his sights on Poland, and began threatening them about issues that had been a problem for some time, in Danzig, and elsewhere.
A week after all that, the Spanish Civil War came to an end, having taken well over a million lives, as the well-being of Spain lay in ruins.
But April was worse. Imitating his German friend, Mussolini took over Albania, and the British and French governments began to growl, and offered Greece and Romania their help if they felt it was needed. They had offered the same thing weeks before to Poland, promising this time to stand by if Hitler came any closer.
By May, Mussolini and Hitler had signed an alliance, each promising to follow the other into war, and similar discussions between France, England, and Russia stopped and started, and went nowhere. It was a dismal spring for world politics, and the Whitfields were deeply concerned, yet at the same time they were moving ahead with their enormous work at the Ch<_*>a-circ<*/>teau de la Meuze, and Sarah was deeply engrossed in her baby. She was six months pregnant by then, and although he didn't say so to her, William thought she was enormous. But they were both tall, and it was reasonable to think that their child might be large. He would feel it moving inside her at night as they lay in bed, and once in a while when he moved close to her, he'd feel the baby kick him.
"Doesn't that hurt?" He was fascinated by it, by the life he felt inside her, her growing shape, and the baby that would soon come from the love they had shared. The miracle of it all still overwhelmed him. He still made love to her from time to time, but he was more and more afraid to hurt her, and she seemed less interested now. She was hard at work on the ch<_*>a-circ<*/>teau, and by the time they fell into bed at night they were both exhausted. And in the morning the workmen arrived at six o'clock and began hammering and banging.
They were able to move into the caretaker's house in late June, and give up their rooms at the hotel, which pleased them. They were living on their own turf now and the grounds had begun to look civilized. He had brought a fleet of gardeners from Paris to cut and chop and plant, and turn a jungle back into a garden. The park took more time, but by August there was hope for that, too, and by then it was amazing, the progress they had made with the whole house.
<#FROWN:P03\>
This whole mad weekend trip was typical of Zach Nevsky, Nick De Salvo thought in admiration. Just yesterday, on Friday morning, Zach's entire company of actors had been stuck up to their eyeballs in a thick miasma of dullness, a vast glue-like bog that was rising fast over their heads. Every last one of the performers, even he, the star, was numb with a supreme lack of interest in the playwright's vision. That word, vision, made him queasy behind his eyes. Vision, ech!
Was vision-sickness some sort of violently contagious virus that only attacked actors who had been struggling in a rehearsal hall for weeks on end? Maybe it was unshakable, unacknowledged insecurity that made them all secretly wonder why the hell they were involved in this silly business of worrying about the vision of some writer, instead of working at a normal job as their parents had suggested, demanded, implored that they do for as long as they all could remember?
He'd been sitting there, word-perfect as always, but mentally flat on his ass with his sudden lack of curiosity about the subtext of the play. Did he give a flying fuck if Hamlet and his mom had a yen to dance the dirty turkey? Did he care if his uncle had done the nasty on his daddy? Did he give a shit if he'd hurt the feelings of that weird nymph, Ophelia, or if she'd always been around the bend? Talk about a whiner! And what sensible guy could worry that if he died, he might - perchance, as the fellow said, per-chance, no less - dream? Weren't bad dreams just about the least of Hamlet's worries, perchance?
Why had he, Nick De Salvo, a dues-paying, seriously major, hot young star, an outstanding member of Young Hollywood, turned down a giant-budget buddy flick at Universal to come back to New York and play Hamlet Off Broadway? So what if all the greatest actors in history had felt they had to have a whack at the greatest play in history? Why hadn't he left it alone, he didn't need to prove to himself that he was as good as Olivier, he knew he wasn't, not yet. Give him time. The guys at Universal weren't exactly hustling him to play Shakespeare, and his agent had all but popped a hernia at the news.
Yeah, yesterday there wasn't an actor in the room who hadn't reminded him of a gloomy, resentful schoolkid kept in unfairly during recess. And then Zach had walked in and strolled around the table without a word, looking at their glum faces in paternal amusement, given each of them a jelly doughnut out of a paper bag, unleashed that big, unguarded laugh of his and told them all to take seventy-two. Not five, not ten, not even the afternoon off, but just to get the hell out of the rehearsal hall and not dare to come back until Tuesday, when they would have had a three-day weekend to recover from too much great language.
"You're all too good to be bad," he'd told them, "you've all got what it takes or I wouldn't let you in the door, but you're forcing it. You can fake an orgasm - yeah, even you guys - but you can't force Shakespeare, so out! Have some laughs before I lay eyes on you again, or I won't let you come play tragedy with me!"
The room had cleared in ten seconds and he had decided to go skiing with Zach. Nothing New York had to offer could be more fun, Nick reflected as he drove along a highway that had been recently cleared of snow after an early, pre-Christmas blizzard. Zach and he had been best friends since grammar school, even though he sometimes got fed up with the guy when he was nudging, kvetching, manipulating, shaking, moving and harping on that vision thing. "I'm not a sieve, Nick, " Zach would say, "I'm there to serve the playwright and I can't do it unless I connect to the vision personally. Directing is about allowing creative people to discover the stuff they've got through me."
Well, Zach was right, as usual. The only time he had been spectacularly wrong was back in seventh grade when he'd tried to be an actor himself. Probably because Zach was the tallest guy in the class, he'd been given a part in the spring play. A real lox, act he could not, no way, but he'd memorized everyone's lines by the first rehearsal and started prompting them when they forgot, and then making suggestions and finally shaping the play to his thirteen-year-old vision, leaving poor Miss Levy, their homeroom teacher and official director of the play, wondering what had hit her.
Being in that play with Zach was the reason he was a successful actor now, Nick realized. Even way back then, Zach had encouraged him, even deep into the first year of puberty the guy had time to have vision and to articulate it. What the fuck, admit it, he'd missed hearing people carry on about the vision thing out on the Coast. Like all the rest of Young Hollywood he'd wake up every morning and wonder if his success was due to dumb luck and timing plus the face he couldn't be proud of because he'd been given it, not worked for it, or whether he could maybe, possibly, really act. Actors lived with fear. The whole town ran on fear. Somehow Zach took the fear away and replaced it with courage. A stint with Zach forced him to dig down the way the camera never did, made him touch the core of the talent he had, allowed him use it to its fullest. His commodity. The ability to act was his commodity, the only one he had to offer besides his face, and every once in a while he needed to work with a director who deeply valued that commodity, who recognized it and didn't inhibit his individual creative impulses. Yeah, he had to admit it, he had the vision thing too. Once you'd been exposed to Zach, you couldn't ignore it. He hadn't been back East for a year - he was overdue for a dose of Zach. Invigoration, thy name is Nevsky. When had the guy learned to ski?
What about the girls? How had Pandora Harper, who was playing Ophelia, and who was hopelessly and, as far as he could see, unsuccessfully, drooling for Zach, managed to horn in on this ski trip? He didn't remember inviting her, but she seemed to be with him, sort of. She wasn't his type, he didn't lust to melt her glacial, well-bred blond beauty, although Pandora, to be fair, could act up a storm or Zach wouldn't have cast her. She'd come from an impeccable background, been Deb of the Year or something equally improbable, yet she had a frightening ambition to succeed as an actress and a lot of the equipment. But, good actress or not, he sure as hell wasn't interested in a girl who was manifestly salivating over Zach in a subtle way only another man could see.
What he didn't get was Gigi Orsini. Was she Zach's date or wasn't she? It hadn't been made plain. Zach's sister's roommate? What kind of relationship was that? It didn't explain how come she made the fourth member of their little winter sports group, especially since she'd never been skiing before. He had to get to the bottom of this because if Gigi was not Zach's date, he personally would be deeply interested in teaching her how to, most efficiently and quickly, take off her ski boots, her ski pants, and her ski underwear, all of which she'd told him she'd borrowed for the weekend. She had zing, tang, zest, zip, all that scrumptious springtime stuff. Nothing dumbly traditional there. Gigi'd be all pinky-pointy and spirited, not well-bred and boring. Yes, indeed. Yum!
What she'd like to know, Pandora Harper thought, was how this Gigi somebody, who couldn't even ski, had attached herself to Nick De Salvo, just about the most happening young leading man in Hollywood. Had Zach, in his divinely dictatorial way, simply dragged her along as a blind date for Nick? Improbable as it sounded, in this day and age, people still got fixed up, as they quaintly put it, and there was every chance that his sister had nagged him to do something about her roommate. Tacky.
Gigi-whoever was a perky little thing, you had to admit, if you liked perky, and she very much did not. You couldn't trust the perky ones, they were sneaky and fast, disappearing behind almost any closed door or into any dark closet to rip off a quickie and no one the wiser. They had a kind of animal cunning, or, as Hamlet said, "methinks it is like a weasel."
Darling, gorgeous Zach, hard as it was to credit, was old-fashioned enough to care deeply for his sister. He was sentimental in a world in which men hadn't been sentimental for a hundred years. And an idealist in a world that glorified everything but ideals. If he weren't the most unassailably sexy man she'd ever laid eyes on, she'd steer very clear of him. Useless idealism and outdated sentimentality weren't her thing, any more than perky. Nobody got famous on them. Or rich, for that matter.
Not that money mattered to her, she had more money than anyone would ever need in a dozen lifetimes, thanks to Great-Grammy's trust, and a good thing too, when you considered that another actress would have to be willing to go hungry working Off Broadway. No, money didn't matter. Fame, oh, yes, fame, nothing less - that was what she was after, and that was what she intended to have. On her way to fame, how divine to find Zach Nevsky, bull-necked, rugged, boiling with energy, and by reputation possessed of the most reliable hard-on in the entire theatrical world of Greater Manhattan. Every fine young actress must screw her quota of directors, and a few extra if possible. Tradition demanded it, and she'd been brought up to obey tradition, particularly when it agreed with her inclinations.
She'd called Zach as soon as she'd heard that he'd lured Nick De Salvo to town. The Prince of Young Hollywood daring to tackle the Bard was bound to draw a flock of reviewers from every element of the media. They would come to bury Nick - a violently handsome boy, but not her type - and end up raving about her Ophelia. Zach had been directing new work by young playwrights for almost a year. It was a clever shift of pace for him to put Nick into the ultimate classic, and to cast against physical type, a Danish prince played by a smoldering Latin who looked as if he belonged to a biker gang. Maybe it would work, but it didn't matter to her how long the play ran; opening night was the only night that mattered. She'd been letting Zach direct her as he saw Ophelia - that unutterably dreary vision thing of his - but on opening night she'd play her as she should be played - Ophelia was clearly a raving nymphomaniac, not just borderline, but seriously batshit. She'd get her hands on Nick's cock and caress it in all sorts of deliciously wicked ways during the "get thee to a nunnery" number. There wouldn't be anything anybody could do to stop her; Nick was professional enough to carry on, and she'd make the sensation and get the attention she was expecting. What could Zach do about it at that point, after the critics saw her doing everything but giving Hamlet head while he nattered away at her? Words, words, words indeed! She'd show them. A doublet and hose were perfect for easy access.
Just thinking about it made her ready for Zach. There had been some nonsense mentioned about her sharing a room with Gigi - she'd manage to get around that barrier somehow or her Great-Grammy would be ashamed of her.
<#FROWN:P04\>
3
He knows my secret, Beverly Burgess thought as she looked out at the snowy night. He knows my secret, and he'll use it to destroy me.
She was standing in the highest tower of the mansion known as the Castle, and she sometimes thought ruefully of the parallels between her situation and the fairy-tale story of the princess with a curse on her, forbidden to be seen, or to see anyone, locked away as if lamenting the loss of a lover and living out her days spinning ropes of gold out of strands of her hair.
Except that Beverly's hair wasn't gold any more, or even blond, as it had been. It was brunette now, worn in a stylish Liz Taylor shag instead of the French twist that had been Beverly's trademark for so many years. And she wasn't really a princess, there was no lost lover, and the high tower was in fact her office. The Castle was the main building of Star's, the resort she had owned for the past two and a half years.
Her hair wasn't the only thing that had changed; she had a new name as well. Many years ago, to hide her identity, she had changed her name from Rachel Dwyer to Beverly Highland, naming herself after two streets in Hollywood. And then, three and a half years ago, Beverly Highland had 'died.' Now she was Beverly Burgess; she had borrowed her mother's maiden name, but kept Beverly.
The hair and name changes had been made to protect her identity once more, but while the first disguise had fooled people for many years, she suddenly had reason to fear that she might not have been successful this time.
He knows who I am, she thought again as she turned away from the window and looked at the book that lay on her desk. It was called Butterfly Exposed, and the man she was afraid of was its author, the tabloid journalist Otis Quinn, who had claimed during a recent television interview that Beverly Highland was still alive.
How could he possibly know? She had been so careful! The staged death - the car going over the cliff and plunging into the ocean - the funeral and burial at Forest Lawn. Beverly had left no traces of that former life, when she had lived for the destruction of one man in revenge for what he had done to her.
Beverly had come out of hiding three years ago, after a brief sojourn on a Pacific island with a young lover named Jamie, where she had spent a few months living totally for herself, indulging in every pleasure from food to sex. But when Beverly had grown tired of that existence she had decided to see the world. Carefully constructing a new identity and a new look for herself, she had traveled to exotic places, and she had felt the old hunger return - the desire to create a place where people could find happiness among beauty and luxury. That was what Butterfly, the establishment she had created above an exclusive men's clothing store on Rodeo Drive, had been - a place where women could seek sexual fulfillment in complete safety and anonymity, and in elegant surroundings. When Beverly had discovered that she yearned to do that again, to offer pleasure to people, she had searched for just the right place, and she had found it at Star's Haven, high up the slopes of Mount San Jacinto.
The heart of Star's Haven was a huge gray stone estate house, built like a castle, with turrets and towers and battlements, and even a drawbridge - a romantic setting plucked right out of medieval England. Built by the silent-movie queen Marion Star, it was a replica of the set used in one of her movies, Robin Hood. It had stood boarded up for many years after her death, but had come onto the marked a few years ago. Now the forty-two-room mansion was called the Castle, and here Beverly had her executive offices. The resort's main restaurants, ballroom, cocktail lounges, boutiques, and private clinic were also located here, as well as luxury suites for the guests, including four tower apartments that were accessible only by private key-operated elevators. Everything had been going well; the resort was a big success, Beverly had kept her old identity a secret, her past completely unknown. And then this Otis Quinn had decided to exploit the story of Danny Mackay and Beverly Highland and conduct his so-called investigation.
She stared at the book. Although the word butterfly was in the title, Beverly regarded it as if it were a deadly spider. The pages were filled mostly with speculation. Quinn hadn't really been able to prove anything; he hadn't found any hard evidence linking Beverly to the brothel on Rodeo Drive. He claimed to have interviewed women who had patronized the rooms above Fanelli's, having sexual liaisons with the men who worked at the place - 'companions' they had been called - who had performed a variety of sexual acts for money. But Quinn hadn't named any of the women he had supposedly interviewed, claiming that they all insisted that their identities be kept a secret, and so Beverly believed he had made the stories up. Nonetheless, the book was sensational enough to keep it on the best-seller lists for months. Everywhere Beverly turned, it seemed, the black and white cover with its pink butterfly was there to mock her. And bring back memories from years ago...
Young Rachel Dwyer, ten years old, finding a photograph of her mother with two babies in her arms. "Who was the other baby, Mama?" she had asked, and Naomi Dwyer had said, "Your twin sister. She died shortly after you were born."
And then Rachel, fourteen years old, all alone while a fierce New Mexico storm battered the old trailer the Dwyers lived in. Her father coming home drunk, attacking her, inflicting a pain on her body that she hadn't thought possible, and shouting, "We got rid of the wrong one!"
Later that night, Rachel getting ready to run away, asking her mother what her father had meant by "the wrong one," and her mother explaining: "Honey, when I was in the hospital to have you and your sister, we were broke. We didn't have a dime. There was a depression on, and there we were with twin babies and no money to pay the hospital bills. So when a man came to the hospital and said he new of a nice couple who would pay us a thousand dollars for one of our babies..."
Beverly closed her eyes against the memory. She turned away and looked out the window again at the dark December night. She could make out the lights in the valley below, the sparkling spread of Palm Springs - fabled playground of the super rich, home to three former U.S. presidents, where it was said there were more golf courses than anywhere else in the world and more plastic surgeons per capita than any other city. A place where streets were named Bob Hope Drive and Frank Sinatra Drive; a desert oasis affectionately known as the Backyard of Beverly Hills.
And Beverly Burgess - once Beverly Highland, once Rachel Dwyer - was eight thousand feet above above<&|>sic it all.
Beside the window, which was narrow and deeply recessed like the window of a medieval castle, photographs hung on the wall. There was one small one, in a silver frame, black and white but yellowing with age. It had been taken in 1938 and it showed a young woman in a hospital bed with a baby cradled in each arm. One of those babies was Beverly. The other was the twin sister her parents had sold, who had been given the name Christine Singleton, and whom Beverly, after many years of searching, had ultimately not been able to find.
She couldn't help herself; she was drawn back to the hateful book on her desk.
Beverly had been shocked when she had first seen Butterfly Exposed in a bookstore. She had thought it a coincidence that the book should be named for the operation she had established above Fanelli's. And then she had thumbed through it and, in shock, purchased it. One night's reading had brought back all the old nightmares: Danny Mackay befriending a frightened fourteen-year-old runaway, gaining her trust, telling her he loved her, and then installing her in a cheap whorehouse in San Antonio. And Rachel, terrified and homesick, unable to service Hazel's customers, wishing that Danny would take her away from it all, and Danny coming back and sweet-talking her into performing sex with strange men. "Just lay back, darlin'," he had said, "and imagine it's me who's doin' it to you."
And then, when she was sixteen and she thought they were going to get married, Danny taking her to a back-alley abortionist and forcing her to kill her baby. She had begged and pleaded with him, and afterward he had kicked her out of his car, telling her she was ugly, and that he had never loved her, and that she was to remember his name, because he was a man who was going places. Danny Mackay, he had said. Remember that name.
And remembered it she had, almost to the exclusion of all else. The rest of Beverly's life had been a quest for the perfect revenge against Danny Mackay, and when it had finally come, three and a half years ago, she had thought that their secret, twisted story had come to an end at last.
But now there was this journalist, making up lies and outrageous speculations about the relationship between the wealthy socialite Beverly Highland and the Reverend Danny Mackay, who had controlled a multy-billion-dollar TV ministry and who had been one step away from the Oval Office. Everyone in the country, Beverly knew, was either reading Butterfly Exposed or talking about it. And she had heard that a TV miniseries was in the making.
But something even worse than that had happened.
Otis Quinn had declared during a TV interview that he believed Beverly Highland, who was supposed to have died in a car accident the night she had destroyed Danny Mackay, the woman who was in fact responsible for Mackay's death by suicide in the L.A. County Jail, was still alive. And he claimed to have found her.
And now, Otis Quinn was coming to Star's.
Beverly was brought out of her thoughts by a discreet knock at the door. She looked at her watch. It would be Simon Jung, her general manager, making his daily report.
"Come in," she said.
Simon Jung, Swiss born and educated, was a smoothly handsome man in his late fifties, impeccably trim and tailored, whom Beverly had met in Rio de Janeiro at the swank Amanha Restaurant. Simon had an impressive background of over thirty years of hotel management experience, having worked in only the finest establishments around the world. There was nothing he didn't know, it seemed to Beverly, about human nature and pleasing guests, and he was the one person in all the world she felt she could trust.
But even Simon didn't know about her past, that she was the Beverly Highland whom Otis Quinn had written about in Butterfly Exposed.
"Good evening, Beverly," he said as he closed the door quietly behind himself.
As always, the sight of Simon in the Armani or Pierre Cardin suit that had been made just for him caused an unwanted reaction deep inside her. Beverly had sworn off men long ago - except for her brief interval with young Jamie. In her travels, when she had stayed at such exclusive places as the Mount Kenya Safari Club in East Africa, Raffles in Singapore, the H<*_>o-circ<*/>tel du Cap on the Riviera, and she had met such handsome and impeccable men as Simon, she had been immune. They didn't move her.
But somehow, during her two and a half years of working with Simon in a strictly professional relationship, making Star's a place for the best people to come to, Beverly had found her defenses starting to crumble.
<#FROWN:P05\>Tragedy and great sorrow, I thought, make us grow older very quickly.
Gavin, Edwina and Granddaddy Longchamp arrived late in the evening. Uncle Philip had them put up in one of the guest houses we used when the hotel became overbooked. One look at Granddaddy Longchamp's face was enough to tell me how much the tragedy had crushed and overwhelmed him. In one fell swoop, he had lost his son and the young woman he had always considered his daughter. He looked years older, the lines in his face sharply deeper, his eyes darker and his skin paler. He moved slowly and spoke very little. Edwina and I hugged and cried, and then Gavin and I had a chance to be alone.
"Where's Fern?" Gavin asked.
"No one seems to know," I said.
"She should have been the first one here to help you with Jefferson," Gavin said angrily.
"Maybe it's better she's not. She's never been much help to anyone but herself," I said. "Maybe she's feeling bad that she and Daddy had such a terrible argument the last time she saw him."
"Not Fern," Gavin concluded. We stared at each other. We had just naturally wandered away from everyone and found ourselves in the den. Mommy and Daddy often used it as a second office. There was a large cherrywood desk and chair, walls of bookcases, a big grandfather's clock and a ruby leather settee. Gavin gazed at the family pictures on the desk and shelves and at the framed letters of commendation Mommy had received for her performances at Sarah Bernhardt.
"She was so proud of those," I said. He nodded. "I can't believe it," he said without turning to me. "I keep thinking I'm going to wake up soon."
"Me too."
"She was more than a sister-in-law to me. She was a sister," he said. "And I always wanted to be like Jimmy."
"You will be, Gavin. He was very proud of you and never stopped bragging about you and how well you do in school."
"Why did this happen? Why?" he demanded. Tears flooded my eyes and my lips began to tremble. "Oh, I'm sorry," he said, quickly coming to me. "I should be thinking of what you're going through and not be so concerned about myself." He embraced me and I pressed my face against his chest.
"What are you two doing in here?" Aunt Bet demanded. She was standing in the doorway, her eyes wide with surprise. I lifted my head slowly from Gavin and wiped my eyes.
"Nothing," I said.
"You shouldn't be alone here with everyone gathered in the living room," she said, gazing from Gavin to me and then to Gavin. "It's not ... proper," she added. "And besides, Jefferson's not behaving. You had better speak to him, Christie," she said.
"What's he doing?"
"He won't sit still."
"He's only nine years old, Aunt Bet, and he's just lost his mother and father. We can't very well expect him to be as perfect as Richard," I retorted. Her face flamed red.
"Well, I ... I'm just trying to-"
"I'll see to him," I said quickly and took Gavin's hand. "I'm sorry," I said after we had rushed past her. "I shouldn't have been so short with her, but she's been taking over everything and bossing everyone around. I just don't have the patience."
"I understand," Gavin said. "I'll help with Jefferson. Let's find him," he offered. Gavin was wonderful with him, taking him up to his room and occupying him with his games and toys.
Aunt Fern didn't arrive until the morning of the funeral. She appeared with one of her boyfriends from college, a tall, dark-haired young man. She introduced him only as Buzz. I couldn't believe she had decided to bring a boyfriend to the funeral. She behaved as if it were just another family affair. The whole time she was at the house before we left for church, she an Buzz remained aloof from the other mourners. A number of times I caught them giggling in a corner. They both chain-smoked. I reminded her that Mommy hated people smoking in the house.
"Look. Buzz and I are not going to be here that long, princess, so don't lay all the heavy rules on me, okay? The fruit doesn't fall far from the tree," she told Buzz, who smiled and nodded at me.
"Well, where are you going?" I asked.
"Back to school for a while. I don't know. I'm beginning to grow bored with the schedules and the homework," she said. Buzz laughed.
"Daddy wanted you to graduate from college," I said.
"My brother wanted to live my life for me," she said dryly. "Don't remind me. Well, he's gone now and I can't keep worrying about what other people want me to do. I've got to do what I want to do."
"But what will you do?" I asked.
"Don't worry about it," she whined. "I won't be coming around here that often, especially since Philip and his brood have taken over the place," she said.
They haven't taken over the place," I insisted.
"Oh, no? What do you call it: a temporary situation?" she laughed.
"Yes," I said.
"Face reality, princess. You're too young to be on your own. Philip and Betty will become your guardians. Well, I don't intend for them to be mine. Cheer up," she added. "In a few years, you can leave, too."
"I won't leave my brother, ever."
"Famous last words, right, Buzz?" He nodded and smiled as if she had her fingers on his strings and he was only her puppet.
"I won't," I insisted. Aunt Fern could be so infuriating. Now that Daddy was gone, there wouldn't be anyone to watch over her and rescue her from the pools of trouble she usually fell into, I thought. She doesn't know it now, but she's going to miss him more than she ever dreamed. I left them as soon as I was told Aunt Trisha had arrived.
Aunt Trisha had begun her Broadway show and despite her great sorrow, had to perform. I didn't blame her; I knew the show must go on. Mommy always talked about the sacrifices people made when they became professional entertainers. But Aunt Trisha and I had time to cry together and console each other. Jefferson was happy to see her too, and rushed into her arms. She remained at our side from that moment until the end, when she had to leave to get back to New York.
The limousine led the line of traffic to the church. The thick gray sky was appropriate. I could just hear Daddy saying, "Oh, no, the weather's going to make her even sadder still." The hearse had been parked on the side by the time we arrived. The church was overflowing with mourners. Bronson had Grandmother Laura sitting up front. She wore an elegant black dress and a black hat and veil. I saw she had put on pounds of makeup and had especially overdone the thickness of her lipstick. She seemed in a daze, confused, but still smiled at everyone and nodded as we filed in to take our places. Jefferson clung tightly to my hand and sat so close to me that he was practically on my lap.
As soon as the minister came out, the organ master stopped playing. The minister led the mourners in prayer and read from the Bible. Then he spoke lovingly and admiringly of Mommy and Daddy, calling them the two brightest lights in our community, always burning warmly and giving the rest of us reason to be hopeful and happy. He was sure they were doing the same for all the souls in Heaven.
Jefferson listened wide-eyed, but neither of us could shift our eyes off the two coffins for long. It still seemed unreal and impossible to believe that Mommy and Daddy were lying in them. When I turned to leave after the church service, I saw that most people had been crying, some quite hard.
The funeral procession went directly to the cemetery. At the site of their graves, Gavin held my hand and Aunt Trisha held Jefferson. We stood like statues, the cold breeze lifting my hair and making my tears feel like drops of ice on my cheeks. Just before the coffins were to be lowered, I stepped forward to kiss each one.
"Good-bye, Daddy," I whispered. "Thank you for loving me more than my real father could ever dream of loving me. In my heart you will always be my real father." I paused and had to swallow hard before I could continue.
"Good-bye, Mommy. You're gone, but you will never be far away from me."
I gazed up at Uncle Philip who had come up beside me. He was staring down at Mommy's coffin and the tears were streaming freely down his face and dripping off his chin. He touched the coffin softly and closed his eyes and then stepped back with me. The coffins were lowered.
I heard the sobbing. I wanted to comfort Jefferson, but I couldn't stop my own tears. Gavin embraced me. Granddaddy Longchamp had his head bowed and Edwina stood beside him, her arm around his waist. Fern wasn't laughing anymore, but she wasn't crying either. She looked tired and uncomfortable and her boyfriend looked confused, probably wondering what he was doing here. Bronson had managed to get Grandmother Laura back into her wheelchair and down to the grave-site. I could see he was explaining things to her and she was shaking her head, the realization of what had happened maybe just settling in.
"Come, everyone," Aunt Bet said, ushering Richard and Melanie ahead of her. "Let's go home."
"Home?" I thought. How can it ever be home without Mommy and Daddy there? It's just a shell of itself, a memory, a house full of shadows and old echoes, a place where we hang our clothes and lay down our heads, a place where we will eat a thousand meals more quietly than we had ever eaten them, for gone would be Daddy's laughter after he had just teased Mommy, gone was her singing and her warm smile, gone was her kiss and soft embrace to help keep the goblins and ghosts of our bad dreams from lingering behind.
The sky grew darker, the world was angry, and rightly so, I thought. We stumbled away from the gravesites, past the other deceased family, past the large monument for Grandmother Cutler. I was certain Mommy wouldn't have to face her again, for she could never be in Heaven.
"Remember, children," Aunt Bet said when we got back into the limousine. "Wipe your feet before you go into the house."
I looked up at her sharply and wondered if the nightmares had really only just begun.
Compromising
WITH UNCLE PHILIP SO DISTRAUGHT, AUNT BET HAD taken over the management of the reception at our house after the funeral. Just about everyone at the hotel was eager to do anything Aunt Bet wanted. Mr. Nussbaum and Leon cooked and baked what she thought was appropriate. They worked in the house under her supervision. She asked Buster Morris and other grounds people to bring over tables and benches and set them up on the front lawn. We knew there would be mobs of people coming to pay their last respects and console the family. Neither Jefferson nor I were in any mood to greet people, even people who sincerely wanted to show their love and sympathy; but I knew it was something we had to do, and anyway, Aunt Bet made sure to assign us our roles and position in the house.
"You and Jefferson will sit there, dear," she said, pointing to the sofa in the living room. "Melanie and Richard will sit beside you, of course, and I'll bring people to meet you."
"I don't want to meet people," Jefferson said, a little plaintively.
<#FROWN:P06\>
"Call it off," Sylvia the woman says in a harsh whisper. "Please!"
"Sylvia?" Harry says. There is nothing he can do. He only looks on as the woman opens the door slowly and steps back into the hall. But before she can get the door closed again, the dog bolts after her. She screams and runs toward the stairs with the dog snapping at her spiked heels. He knows that he will not see either of them again.
He closes the door after them and turns the lock. Then Harry goes to the kitchen to get himself a beer.
At the Supermarket
"I don't see the difference."
Sylvia puts her hands on her hips and looks at him sideways. Harry hates it when she does that.
"The difference is," she says, "that I always buy Hellman's."
He takes the jar of mayonnaise out of the shopping cart and weighs it in his hand. "As far as I can see," he says, "the difference is that the store brand costs half a buck less than this one."
Sylvia speaks very slowly, spelling out the words in a harsh whisper. "I ... always ... buy ... Hellman's." She's really angry.
Harry is, too. She isn't making sense. "But if the store brand is cheaper ...."
She sighs. Harry knew she was going to do that. She always sighs when they have an argument. He hates that, too. "Do you know why you're upset?" she asks him.
"I'm not upset."
"Do you know why you're upset? You don't want to be here."
"I'm not upset. I'm just talking about mayonnaise."
She sighs again. "It's got nothing to do with mayonnaise. It's about football, and you know it."
Harry can see the clock above the checkout lanes in front. It's a couple of minutes into the first quarter. She promised they'd be back in time for the kickoff. If he were at home right now, he'd be sitting in front of the TV with a beer in his hand and a bag of cheese balls on his lap.
With a series of dramatic gestures, Sylvia puts the Hellman's back on the shelf, picks up a jar of the store brand, and pops it into the cart. Then she glares at him. That will teach him a lesson he'll never forget.
"We forgot my cheese balls," he says.
Sylvia doesn't reply.
He tries again. "We went past the snack aisle and forgot the cheese balls."
She sighs for a third time. "So go get them," she says.
"I'll catch up with you in a minute," he says, hurrying away down the aisle. He knows Sylvia is glad to be rid of him.
The place is really crowded. Harry weaves his way in and around the shopping carts. Everybody shops on Sunday afternoon, it seems. Almost all the shoppers are women, of course. The guys are at home, watching the game.
Now, while he's wandering through the store looking for the snack aisle - and it's around here someplace, because they went past it just a minute ago - he knows that Sylvia is pushing her shopping cart through the crowd and mumbling to herself. She always mumbles to herself when they've had a bit of a disagreement. Right now, she's mumbling about how she can never ask him to do the least little thing to help out, how he never lifts a finger to keep their place clean, how he won't even empty an ashtray, how he can't give up a few minutes of his precious football game just to make sure they've got some food in the house, for Christ's sake. He's heard it a million times before.
He still can't find the snacks. Harry hasn't been in this supermarket for a long time, but he remembers that the potato chips, the pretzels, the cheese balls and all that stuff always used to be right next to the beer. The problem is, he can't find the beer either.
As it turns out, the snacks are now with the picnic stuff, paper plates and cups, plastic forks, and Styrofoam coolers, right next to the magazine rack. Harry picks up two bags of cheese balls - one for what's left of today's game, another for the game tomorrow night - then spends a few minutes at the magazine stand, thumbing through the current issue of Sports Illustrated. But he's just wasting time and he knows it. He's got to catch up to Sylvia and help her finish the shopping if he wants to get home before halftime.
Clutching his cheese balls, Harry heads for the dairy case at the far end of the store where he knows Sylvia has to stop eventually for eggs and milk. On his way, he looks down each aisle, but he doesn't see her. She might be there picking up coffee or Jell-O or Spaghetti O's, but he can't spot her in the crowd of shoppers and carts. He tries to remember what she was wearing. That white dress with the flowers all over it? The green blouse and jeans?
She isn't at the dairy case, but he waits there for awhile, comparing prices, looking at the more exotic cheeses. Suddenly he's hungry for a grilled Velveeta sandwich. If he were home right now .... But of course he's not at home. He's in the supermarket. Harry's getting angry all over again. Where the hell is she anyway? The thing that drives him crazy about her, the reason he never wants to help with the grocery shopping, is that she just takes her own sweet time about it. The thing of it is, she makes a list before she goes, and if she just picked up the stuff she needed, she'd be done in half an hour. But no, she's got to go up and down every aisle, look at every can and package, squeeze every tomato, and she picks up all kinds of crazy stuff - artichoke hearts, yogurt, salsa sauce, pita bread, stuff that isn't on the list and that nobody would ever eat anyway. So right now, while he's waiting to get out of there, she could be anywhere in the store - in the deli department, in bulk foods, looking at the greeting cards, you name it.
Harry is going to have to find her and get her moving if he wants to see any of that game. This time, though, he decides to conduct his search more systematically. Harry, still carrying his bags of cheese balls, makes his way up and down every aisle. It isn't easy. Now the store seems to be even more crowded than before. The whole town must be here - little old ladies, college kids, retired guys in lime-green golf trousers, young professionals who are overdressed for the occasion, all pushing shopping carts full of goodies. The fact that Harry doesn't have a cart of his own is a real advantage - he's got a lot more mobility than his fellow shoppers. But it's still tough going. There's an incredible traffic jam in the coffee aisle, and in condiments two women are arguing over the last jar of Vlasic Dills.
Even so, Harry manages to cover every inch of the supermarket - from canned meats to packaged dinners, from produce to the bakery section. Then he backtracks up and down the aisles again, this time more slowly. He looks at every woman who even vaguely resembles Sylvia. But he doesn't find her. The only way Harry can figure it is that, just by dumb luck, no matter where he's been looking, Sylvia has just happened to be somewhere else. He knows she's around here someplace, but, for the life of him, he can't figure out where. Sylvia is lost.
Well, actually, Harry is the one who's lost. This is Sylvia's turf, not his, and she knows exactly what she's doing and where she's going. Now, standing in the frozen goods section near the ice cream and looking around helplessly, Harry feels a bit like a little kid who's lost track of his mom. Should he go find the manager and have Sylvia paged over the store's speaker system? No, that would be too embarrassing. He'd never live it down. To tell the truth, the whole situation is kind of funny, and just the thought of hearing Sylvia's name booming over the PA system and interrupting the Muzak makes him laugh out loud.
An elderly woman who's picking through the Sealtest in search of her favorite flavor gives him a dirty look. Embarrassed, Harry turns away and scurries off to the next aisle. Now that he thinks about it, the situation really isn't funny after all. He's still missing the football game, and now he wants to get out of that supermarket more than ever. He just wants to be home in front of the tube with his feet propped up on the coffee table, munching his cheese balls while Sylvia fixes Tuna Helper for dinner.
He goes through the store once again, this time very slowly, department by department. Harry even goes through aisles where Sylvia would have no reason to be - hardware, baby food, pet supplies. He covers every inch of the place, but he doesn't find her. This is getting out of hand. Harry stops in frozen foods again for a free sample of pepperoni pizza and tries to think things through. It's possible, of course, that for some reason she left the store, and she simply isn't there anymore. Maybe she forgot that he came along with her. After all, she usually does the shopping on her own. Maybe her mind was on other things, and she just finished getting the stuff on the list, went through the checkout line, then headed home without giving him another thought. Sylvia isn't usually absentminded, but, well, it could have happened that way.
Harry has another piece of pizza then goes back to the water cooler in produce to get a drink. Sylvia's probably at home by now. The minute she walked into the house and saw that he wasn't there in front of the TV, she remembered. She must really feel like a jerk now, leaving him behind like that. Of course, she can't come back for him right away. She has to unload the car and put the groceries in the refrigerator first. If she doesn't, the ice cream and the TV dinners will defrost. So he'll just have to wait it out at the supermarket until she can come for him. He has no choice.
Well, it isn't the worst thing that's ever happened to him, but he doesn't like the idea that Sylvia just forgot about him that way. By this evening, he'll probably laugh about it, but right now it makes him a little angry. He'd never do that to her, you can be sure of that.
He decides he'd better pay for his cheese balls, then wait for Sylvia out in front, so he starts making his way toward the checkout lines. The crowd hasn't thinned out any. There are people with shopping carts everywhere. Harry is passing through condiments when it occurs to him that maybe she didn't forget about him after all. Maybe she left him behind on purpose.
She was angry about the mayonnaise. Maybe she was so angry that she just stormed out of the supermarket, got into the car, and took off without him. Right now she's at home or just driving around town, still steaming mad. Probably when she cools down, she'll come back for him. But God knows how long that will take.
Maybe she won't come back at all. Maybe she's left him for good. Harry can picture their little red Toyota zipping along the interstate with Sylvia at the wheel. She's free now, free of him and his damned cheese balls and his store brand mayonnaise. She doesn't know where she's going and she doesn't care. She's on her own. And Harry? He can stay there in the supermarket forever, living on free samples or eating cheese balls until he explodes.
<#FROWN:P07\>
CHAPTER FOUR
A charged silence filled the living room after the door closed behind Katy. Luke was aware of a curious sense of satisfaction. It wasn't easy winning battles with guardian angles. Virtue always had an unfair advantage.
He almost smiled as he listened intently to the sound of Katy's footsteps retreating into the distance. He had her now. She was all his for the next six months. It was a heady thought, even though he was not at all certain just what he would do with her.
"You upset her," Justine said after a moment.
"Did I?"
"Yes. She's normally very calm. Quite unflappable. She's also extraordinarily cheerful most of the time." Justine frowned thoughtfully as she picked up her cup of tea. "I've often wondered how she does it. It doesn't seem quite natural somehow. Nevertheless, she's rather a delight to have around, actually."
"Is that why you've kept her? Because she amuses you?"
Justine did not take offense. "On the contrary, I believe it is she who finds us Gilchrists amusing. When she's not exasperated with us, that is. She needed a job. I gave her one. It's been a mutually beneficial arrangement. I don't know what I would have done without her, especially these past two years."
"I know she's Richard Quinnell's granddaughter." Luke moved back to the window.
"Yes. She's Richard's granddaughter. The resemblance is unmistakable. She got that brilliant red hair and those deep blue eyes from him. Her mother looked just like her at that age."
Luke frowned. "Justine ..."
"I'll never forget that day at the church when we all finally realized your father was not going to show up. Most brides would have collapsed in humiliation. Deborah Quinnell was so very brave about it all. She and her father insisted that everyone attend the reception. Richard said that as long as he'd paid for the food, someone was going to damn well eat it."
"Justine, let's get something straight. If this new association of ours is going to have a chance of working, there will have to be some ground rules. Number one is that we don't talk about the past. You and I are on opposite sides in that old war, and unless you want to refight it, I suggest you don't mention it."
Justine's mouth thinned. "I'm sure you're right. A very logical decision. But you can't blame me for wanting you to understand that there were two sides in the feud between your father and the rest of us. We were the ones who had to face the Quinnells that day at the church."
"And you were the one who called off the merger between Quinnell and Gilchrist right after the wedding. You had made a deal, and you backed out of it."
Justine's expression was suddenly stark. "I had to call it off. Without the marriage there was no real link except that of business between the two families. Who knew what would happen when Richard's daughter married someone else, as she eventually did? I couldn't risk having everything I'd worked for eventually falling into the hands of outsiders. Surely you can understand that."
"Yeah, I understand," Luke said. Because he did. If he had been in Justine's shoes, he would have called off the merger, too. It was a sobering thought. He did not like the idea of empathizing with Justine in any way. His loyalties lay elsewhere.
"Your father ruined everything when he ran off with your mother," Justine snapped, her voice growing stronger as she sensed a small victory.
Luke smiled wryly. "Given that I wouldn't be here if he hadn't fallen in love with her, I'm sure you can understand that I have a slightly different view of the situation. Look, Justine, there are always two sides to a story. But in my case there's no question about which side I'm on. Don't waste your time trying to influence me with propaganda for the other side."
Justine almost smiled. "Katy has frequently pointed out to me that we Gilchrists tend to see things in overly simplistic terms - black and white. She claims we have a problem with the gray areas of life."
"I don't have a problem with them."
Justine nodded."Because you don't even see them. I know. I've been that way most of my life." She paused. "Katy sees them, you know."
"People who deal in shades of gray get bogged down in sentiment and indecisiveness."
"Oh, my," Justine murmured. "It's going to be interesting watching you and Katy interact."
Luke shrugged. "Katy and I will get along just fine so long as she remembers I'm the boss. In the meantime, you and I don't talk about the past. Agreed?"
"Agreed." Justine put down her teacup. "I'm too grateful to have you here at last to risk arguing with you. I must say, however, that I find it ironic that it's Richard Quinnell's granddaughter who has achieved the impossible by getting you here."
Luke narrowed his eyes. "You think I'm here because of Katy?"
"Aren't you?"
Damned if he was going to admit anything to the old witch. The truth was, he was not altogether sure why he had come to Dragon Bay. "I'm here because the Pacific Rim restaurant is a ripe plum. As a businessman, I can't bring myself to pass up such easy pickings." It was partially true. He certainly intended to take the restaurant when this was over.
"Katy Wade is a ripe plum, too," Justine said quietly. "I think you should know that she's been living an almost cloistered existence for the past several years."
Luke smiled grimly. "That figures. It goes with the wings and halo."
"It's because of her brother," Justine said coolly. "The fact that she comes with a teenager as part of the package has put off most males. Her social life has been far too limited for a young woman of her age."
Luke studied the fog. "My social life has been a little limited lately, too. Just what the hell are you trying to say, Justine?"
"Her brother will graduate from high school in another month. Then he'll be off to college, and Katy will be on her own for the first time in her life. She has a right to make up for some of what she's missed out on during the past few years, and I believe she intends to do so."
Luke hesitated. "She said something about business plans she wants to pursue."
"Yes. She yearns to open her own small business. A rather na<*_>i-trema<*/>ve dream, I admit. I am, however, encouraging her to sample some of the other aspects of the freedom she has hungered for in recent years."
Luke arched one brow. "You think she should rush out and have a few passionate affairs?"
Justine inclined her head. "Don't be crude. Perhaps one or two interesting relationships, yes. I would like her to experience some genuine passion in her life. She is, after all, an attractive young woman. I fear, however, that because she has had to postpone so much for so long, she is rather more vulnerable than other, more experienced young women are at her age. I do not want her hurt."
Luke looked at Justine. "Are you warning me off, by any chance?"
"Yes, I suppose I am." Justine's gaze was unreadable. "There was a man a year ago. Nate Atwood. He was dating Katy when he met Eden. He dropped Katy to marry my granddaughter."
"Atwood is the name of the man Eden divorced six months ago?"
"Yes." Justine pursed her lips in fierce disapproval. "I fear he used Katy to get close to the family. His real goal was Eden. He wanted to marry a Gilchrist, you see. Thought he could worm his way into a position of control at Gilchrist, Inc. He is no longer a problem, but I do not want to see Katy hurt again."
"I'll keep that in mind. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go upstairs and start letting everyone know who's running Gilchrist, Inc. these days."
Justine sat forward with sudden urgency. "Luke."
"Yes?"
"I am not entirely certain why you have come here. But I want you to know I am grateful."
"Maybe you'd better wait and see how it all works out before you decide whether or not to be grateful."
Justine eyed him closely. "I think it is you who isn't certain how it's going to work out. By the way, you will be needing a place to live. Have you given the matter any thought?"
"If you're about to offer me a room here in the mansion, forget it. I'll find myself something."
"There are several cottages along the cliffs not far from here. Katy and her brother live in one. I'm sure you can rent one if you like."
Luke considered the suggestion, aware that he was being pulled more deeply into some invisible web. On the other hand, he needed a place to live until he had sorted out Gilchrist, Inc. And he wanted to be near Katy. "All right."
He walked out of the room, ignoring the tight-lipped housekeeper. He let himself out of Justine's private suite. In the hall he took the stairs to the second floor and strode down the south wing corridor to a door that stood open.
The woman at the desk looked up quickly from a book she was reading when he appeared in the doorway. The nameplate in front of her read Liz Bartlett.
"May I help you?" She peered at him through a pair of oversized glasses.
"I'm looking for Katy Wade," Luke said.
Liz's eyes widened behind her glasses as she put down her book. "Yes, sir. You must be Mr. Gilchrist. I'll let her know you're here. She's with Mr. Stanfield." She reached for the intercom.
"Never mind," Luke said. "I'll announce myself."
"But Mr. Gilchrist -"
"It's all right. She works for me now."
He went to the inner door and opened it without knocking. Katy was standing next to a man a the window. The two were huddled in an obviously intense conversation.
The pair sprang apart with guilty haste as the door opened. Katy spun around and glowered at Luke. The man narrowed his eyes briefly and then smiled and stuck out his hand.
"Luke Gilchrist? Welcome to Gilchrist, Inc. I'm Fraser Stanfield, your operations manager."
Luke shook hands briefly. He found himself wondering if this man was one of those who were waiting in line for Katy to be free of her responsibilities to her brother. "Stanfield, you're just the man I want to talk to this afternoon. I'm going to set up an office here in the mansion."
"Justine's old office is available next door," Katy volunteered.
Luke nodded, still watching Stanfield. "Be there at two with a summary status report on the restaurants and on Gilchrist Gourmet."
Fraser's smile faded slightly. "Yes, sir."
"I'll be going into headquarters on a regular basis. Several times a week to start. Set up an office there for me, too, will you?"
"Sure. No problem."
"Fine." Luke turned to Katy. "I'm going back to Oregon tomorrow to pick up a few things. I'll drive back to Seattle in the afternoon and spend the night there. I'll want to meet with everyone at the restaurants and at Gilchrist Gourmet during the afternoon, evening, and the following morning. Have Liz make arrangements for me at a downtown hotel for tomorrow night, will you?"
Katy nodded quickly. She looked relieved. "Certainly."
Luke turned to leave and then paused. "By the way, I'll need someone to look after my dog while I'm gone. I thought I might leave him with you."
Katy's eyes flickered with alarm. "Your dog? With me? I don't think your dog likes me."
"I'm sure the two of you will get along just fine." Luke nodded to Fraser and walked out of the office.
The next morning Katy sat across from her brother at the kitchen table and watched as Matt guzzled freshly squeezed orange juice and downed vast quantities of the homemade muesli cereal Katy had prepared.
<#FROWN:P08\>
Chapter One
Sunrise was her favorite time of day. Rachel Hathaway stepped onto the apartment's covered porch, noting that the weathered boards could use a fresh coat of paint. The early-morning sky was a pale blue, with a golden flush just beginning to tint the far horizon. The humid air was warm, but without the heat that the August sun would soon be spreading. From the vantage point of the second floor, she gazed through the treetops, trying to catch sight of the Gulf of Mexico just two blocks straight ahead. Inhaling deeply, she caught the familiar salty scent of the sea.
The railroad tracks, overgrown now, were still visible. Years ago, the San Antonio Railroad had had daily runs along there. Beyond were the huge ranches and a smattering of stately southern homes. On the other side of the tracks - Rachel's side - were the older, seedier houses always in need of repair.
Moving to the far left, she leaned forward at the waist as far as she dared. Rachel could just barely make out Main Street stretching westward, the business district that nearly all of Schyler's residents visited at some time each day. Typical of most small Texas towns, the shops and public buildings were all clustered along that thoroughfare, a hodgepodge like so many colorful child's clocks arranged by an unskilled hand.
The morning breeze rearranged her long hair, and Rachel brushed it back from her face, her memory supplying what her eyes couldn't quite make out along Main Street. On the near corner was Herb's Gas Station, then the red brick library with the twin lion statues flanking the double doors, and the post office with the flag flying in front. Next to that was Edna's Diner with its long counter and red vinyl booths, probably not open yet, but it would be by seven. Then there was Hannah's Beauty Shop, the general store, the newspaper office, and across Main, the rest of the stores, most of which were owned by the powerful Quincy family - the Quincys who'd forced her to leave town ten years ago.
Turning, she saw that the old glider was still against the wall sporting new yellow corduroy cushions. With a sigh, Rachel settled onto the swing and pressed her bare feet to the floor to start the gentle swaying. She couldn't help thinking she wouldn't mind having a nickel for every time she'd sat here just like this. Sometimes dreaming, often-times crying. Rarely happy.
Around front she heard a car rumble down the road. Schyler was waking slowly, as it usually did in town. On the large cattle ranches, the hands had been up before the sun, she was certain. Just as she was certain nothing much had changed in Schyler during her absence.
Rachel drew her legs onto the swing, crossing her arms atop her bent knees. She'd slipped on terry-cloth shorts and a loose shirt when she'd crawled out of the tangled sheets of her childhood bed. She hadn't slept much, but then she'd known she wouldn't. She hated being here, hated Schyler, Texas, hated the reason that had brought her back to the town she'd vowed to never visit again.
But she'd had no choice. Her mother needed her today more than she ever had. Today they would bury Orrin Hathaway, her youngest brother.
She'd shed her tears two days ago when her mother had phoned her in California. Tears for the sweet retarded boy who'd died of pneumonia at age twenty-five. Orrin had never developed mentally beyond eight or nine; perhaps this was merciful, for he alone of all the Hathaways had never realized the scorn that Schyler had for his family. For Orrin, she'd broken her self-imposed exile and come back. And for her mother.
Rachel lay her cheek on her arms and closed her eyes, fighting a surge of emotion that threatened to have her weeping again. What was she going to do about her mother?
For all of Rachel's growing-up years, Gloria Hathaway had been a pillar of strength. Abandoned by her husband, the father Rachel scarcely remembered, Gloria had gone to work in the tavern, the town's only 'beer garden and eatery,' as the sign above the door boasted. Waitressing was hard work, but Gloria had managed in order to keep her children together, for along with the job had come the rental of the apartment above the tavern at an affordable rate.
And Gloria was still here in this dingy apartment, Rachel thought with dismay. Still waitressing, even though Bart Mitchell, the bartender who'd hired her, had died a few years ago and shocked everyone by leaving Gloria the saloon and building, such as they were. And Gloria was still smoking even though she had emphysema so severe that she had to sit on the top step after climbing the stairs to her apartment. Still stubbornly refusing to leave Schyler, where scarcely one of the Hathaways could remember having a truly happy day.
Why? Rachel asked herself as she gazed into the sky now bright with the rising sun. Why wouldn't her mother move with her to California now that Orrin was gone and her other son, Curt, was in the Navy? There'd never been anything much for her here in this nasty, unforgiving town, and there never would be.
"No one's going to drive me out of my home," Gloria had told her yesterday, when Rachel had flown in from Bakersfield. Then she'd lighted another cigarette, inhaled deeply and gone into a coughing fit that had turned her face a mottled reddish color. Before Rachel could say another word, Gloria had gone into her small bedroom to lie down, effectively calling a halt to the conversation.
Rachel ran both hands through her hair and let out a ragged sigh. Worried about her mother, she had steeled herself and walked down Main Street toward Doc Tremayne's tiny office located in a two-story building on Barlow Road. Doc, a round-faced man with a bent back and kind eyes, had delivered her twenty-seven years ago, and she'd never known him to hedge. He'd told her the truth she's feared, that her mother was very ill.
Stunned, Rachel had walked back to Gloria's apartment above the tavern, hardly aware of the surreptitious glances from behind the windows of the stores and buildings she'd passed. Strangers and prodigal daughters were treated the same in Schyler - with suspicion. Rachel Hathaway's return had been duly noted the moment she'd stepped foot over the county line.
She could deal with Schyler's rejection, Rachel thought, rising to go stand by the railing again. She had for years. But she wasn't sure how to deal with the knowledge that her mother would soon be gone.
Gloria had always understood Rachel's reasons for leaving, for not returning all these years. They'd kept in touch by phone and mail, both unhappy that they couldn't be together but accepting the way things were. Rachel had harbored the hope that one day things would work out and she'd be able to convince Gloria and Orrin and even Curt to join her in California, to forget Schyler and begin life over. She'd known it would take time, but she hadn't once considered the possibility that at forty-six, time would be running out for Gloria.
"There you are," Gloria Hathaway said from the doorway.
Turning, Rachel smiled at her mother. "I was watching the sunrise. It was lovely."
The inevitable cigarette in her hand, Gloria took a drag and moved to the banister, her gaze taking in the morning sky. "I remember. You used to come out here a lot when you were little."
She's aged, Rachel thought sadly. The blond hair that had been long and thick like her own was thinner now, with strands of white lightening the once-rich color. About two inches shorter than Rachel's five-seven, Gloria still held herself erect, though her shoulders slumped wearily when she thought no one was watching. Her figure, always lush enough to invite admiring glances and more offers to share her bed than Gloria could count, was still good. But her skin had a sallow cast, and the green eyes that Rachel had inherited had lost their sparkle.
Swallowing around a lump, Rachel rose and slipped an arm around her mother's waist, pulling her close for a moment. In the distance, a train whistle could be heard, and somewhere below them, a dog barked in protest. "Remember the time I hid behind that old glider because I was so mad at you?"
Gloria released a stream of smoke, then smiled. "I'd refused to let you have a puppy for your fifth birthday, and I thought you'd run away. I grabbed the boys - they were just babies, really - and I searched all over for you. I was nearly frantic."
"And Edna found me."
"That's right. She'd closed the diner to help me look for you." Gloria's husky voice held a wistful note.
"Did she ever scold me for scaring you! Then she bought me a stuffed dog the next day and told me it would last longer than a real one and was much easier to care for."
Nodding at the memory, Gloria stubbed out her cigarette in a coffee can in the corner. "Doc Tremayne told me you were allergic, that I shouldn't allow a pet in the house. You never liked cats, but you wanted a dog so badly. How do you explain allergies to a five-year-old? But you grew to love that stuffed dog. You named him Rufus, remember?"
"Sure. I found him on the closet shelf last night." Rachel shifted her gaze toward the sea, deciding not to tell her mother that she'd lain awake for hours, clutching the scruffy animal and staring at the ceiling. She'd avoided walks down memory lane for years, but back here again, she was caught in its uneasy grip.
Gloria tightened the belt of her robe, then leaned her elbows on the ledge. "It's hard being back here for you, I know. I'm grateful you came."
"I'm sorry I didn't come sooner," Rachel answered, her voice thick with regret. "Orrin had had so many asthma attacks in the past. I never dreamed he'd ... he'd ..."
Gloria reached for her daughter's hand. "I know. The pneumonia struck so fast that even Doc was surprised. At least Orrin didn't suffer long."
Rachel squeezed her mother's fingers, nodding. "I suppose we ought to get dressed."
Gloria straightened. "I'll make some coffee while you shower. It's going to be a long, difficult day."
"We'll get through it, Mom. We always have." Squaring her shoulders and reaching for the cool reserve that had seen her through many difficult days, Rachel walked inside.
"Are you sure I can't go with you, Daddy?"
Justin Wheeler adjusted the rubber band on the end of his eight-year-old daughter's long, dark braid and smiled down into her round, freckled face. He'd walked her over to the sitter's house located four doors from their own small bungalow, and they'd been locking horns over the day's agenda every step of the way. "We've been over this, Katie. Funerals are no place for young girls."
"But Orrin was my friend, too," Katie Wheeler said, giving her voice that persuasive note that usually worked on her father.
"Yes, he was. And I want you to remember him as someone very special. But I also want you to stay with Mrs. Porter while Grandpa and I go to his funeral." Justin touched her chin and waited until she raised her blue eyes, startled as always at how much they resembled her mother's. "Will you do that for me?"
Katie's good nature never let her argue losing battles too long. She grinned up at him, revealing a gap where two teeth were still missing. Then she jammed her baseball cap sideways onto her head. "Okay, Daddy."
Feeling a rush of love for her, Justin gave her a quick hug and flipped her hat around until the bill faced the back.
<#FROWN:P09\>
CHAPTER
1
Montego Bay, Jamaica
June 1803
IT WAS SAID she had three lovers.
Rumor numbered those three as: the pallid thin-chested Oliver Susson, an attorney and one of the richest men in Montego Bay, unmarried, nearing middle age; Charles Grammond, a planter who owned a large sugar plantation next to Camille Hall, the plantation where she lived, a man with a long-faced, strong-willed wife and four disappointing children; and a Lord David Lochridge, the youngest son of the Duke of Gilford, sent to Jamaica because he'd fought three duels within three years, killed two men, and tried unsuccessfully, because of his phenomenal luck at cards, to spend his grandmother's entire fortune that had been left to him at the tender age of eighteen. Lochridge was now Ryder's age - twenty-five - tall and slender, with a vicious tongue and an angel's face.
Ryder heard about these men in surprising detail - but nearly nothing about the notorious woman whose favors they all seemed to share equally - on his very first afternoon in Montego Bay in a popular local coffeehouse, the Gold Doubloon, a low sprawling building whose neighbor was, surprisingly enough to Ryder, St. James's Church. The crafty innkeeper had gained the patronage of the rich men of the island through the simple expedient of using his beautiful daughter, nieces, and cousins to serve the customers with remarkable amiability. Whether or not any of these lovely young girls carried any of the innkeeper's blood was not questioned.
Ryder had been made welcome and given a cup of local grog that was dark and thick and curled warmly in his belly. He relaxed, glad to be once again on solid ground, and looked about at the assembled men. He silently questioned again the necessity of his leaving his home in England and traveling to this godforsaken backwater all because the manager of their sugar plantation, Samuel Grayson, had written in near hysteria to Douglas, his elder brother and Earl of Northcliffe, describing in quite fabulous detail all the supernatural and surely quite evil happenings going on at Kimberly Hall. It was all nonsense, of course, but Ryder had quickly volunteered to come because the man was obviously scared out of his wits and Douglas was newly married and to a young lady not of his choice. Obviously he needed time to accustom himself to his new and unexpected lot. So it was Ryder who'd spent seven weeks on the high seas before arriving here in Montego Bay, in the middle of the summer in heat so brutal it was a chore to breathe. At the very least, what was happening was a mystery, and Ryder loved mysteries. He heard one of the men say something about this girl with three lovers. Had the men no other topic of conversation? Then one of her lovers had come in, the attorney, Oliver Susson, and there had been a hushed silence for several moments before one of the older gentlemen said in a carrying voice, "Ah, there's dear Oliver, who doesn't mind sharing his meal with his other brothers."
"Ah, no, Alfred, 'tis only his dessert he shares with his brothers."
"Aye, a toothsome tart," said a fat gentleman with a leering smile. "I wonder about the taste of her. What do you think, Morgan?"
Ryder found himself sitting forward in the cane-backed chair. He had believed he would be bored on Jamaica with backwater colonial contentiousness.
He found himself, instead, grinning. Who the devil was this woman who juggled three men in and out of her bedchamber with such skill?
"I doubt it's cherries he tastes," said the man named Morgan, tilting back his chair, "but I tell you, young Lord David licks his lips."
"Ask Oliver. He can give us his legal opinion of the tart in question."
Oliver Susson was a very good attorney. He blessed the day he arrived in Montego Bay some twelve years before, for he now controlled three sugar plantations since all three owners were living in England. Not one of the owners seemed to mind that he was a competitor's attorney. He sighed now. He had heard every provocative comment and he never showed any emotion save a tolerant smile.
He said with an easygoing bonhomie, "My dear sirs, the lady in question is the queen of desserts. Your jealousy leads your tongues to serious impertinence." With that, he ordered a brandy from a quite striking young woman with wild red hair and a gown that offered up breasts as creamy as the thick goat milk served with the coffee. He then opened an English newspaper, shook the pages, and held it in front of his face.
What the hell was the woman's name? Who was she?
Ryder found that he really didn't want to leave the coffeehouse. Outside, the grueling sun was beating down, piles of filth and offal on all the walkways, thick dust that kicked up even when a man took a single step. But he was tired, he needed to get to Kimberly Hall, and he needed to soothe Grayson's doubtless frazzled nerves. Grayson was probably even now at the dock wondering where the hell he was. Well, he would discover all about this so-called tart soon enough.
He paid his shot, bid his new acquaintances good-bye, and strode out into the nearly overpowering heat of the late afternoon. It nearly staggered him and he found himself wondering how the devil one could even want to make love in this inferno. He was immediately surrounded by ragged black children, each wanting to do something for him, from wiping his boots with a dirty cloth to sweeping the path in front of him with naught more than twigs tied together. They were all shouting <quote>"Massa! Massa!" He tossed several shillings into the air and strolled back to the dock. There were free blacks in the West Indies, he knew, but if they were free, they couldn't be more ragged than their slave brothers.
On the small dock, the smell of rotting fish nearly made him gag. The wooden planks creaked beneath his boots, and there was a frenzy of activity as slaves unloaded a ship that had just docked. Both a black man and a white man stood nearby, each with a whip in his hand, issuing continuous orders. He saw Samuel Grayson, the Sherbrooke manager and attorney, pacing back and forth, mopping his forehead with a handkerchief. The man looked older than Ryder knew him to be. When he looked up and saw Ryder, Ryder thought he would faint with relief.
Ryder smiled pleasantly and stretched out his hand. "Samuel Grayson?"
"Yes, my lord. I had thought you hadn't come until I chanced to see the captain. He told me you were the most enjoyable passenger he's ever had."
Ryder smiled at that. The fact of the matter was, he hadn't slept with the captain's wife, a young lady making her first voyage with her much older husband. She'd tried to seduce him in the companionway during a storm. Captain Oxenburg had evidently found out about it. "Oh yes, I'm here, right enough. I'm not a lord, that's my older brother, the Earl of Northcliffe. I'm merely an honorable, which sounds quite ridiculous really, particularly in this blistering sun, particularly in the West Indies. I believe a simple mister in these parts is quite sufficient. Good God, this sun is brutal and the air is so heavy I feel as though I'm carrying an invisible horse on my shoulders."
"Thank God you are here. I've waited and wondered, I don't mind telling you, my lor - Master Ryder, that we've trouble here, big trouble, and I haven't known what to do, but now you're here and, oh dear, as for the heat, you'll accustom yourself hopefully and then -"
Mr. Grayson's voice broke off abruptly and he sucked in his breath. Ryder followed his line of vision and in turn saw a vision of his own. It was a woman ... really, just a woman, but even from this distance, he knew who she was, oh yes, he was certain this was the woman who dangled three men so skillfully. When she bade them dance, they doubtless danced. He wondered what else she bade them do. Then he shook his head, too weary from the seven weeks on board the comfortingly huge barkentine, The Silver Tide, that he simply didn't care if she were a snake charmer form India or the whore of the island, which, he supposed, she was. The intense heat was sapping his strength. He'd never experienced anything like it before in his life. He hoped Grayson was right and he'd adjust; that, or he'd just lie about in the shade doing nothing.
He turned back to Grayson. The man was still staring at her, slavering like a dog over a bone that wouldn't ever be his because other bigger dogs had staked claim.
"Mr. Grayson," Ryder said, and finally the man turned back to him. "I would like to go to Kimberly Hall now. You can tell me of the troubles on our way."
"Yes, my lor - Master Ryder. Right away. It's just that she's, well, that's Sophia Stanton-Greville, you know." He mopped his forehead.
"Ah," said Ryder, his voice a nice blend of irony and contempt. "Onward, Grayson. Pull your tongue back into your mouth, if you please. I see flies hovering."
Samuel Grayson managed it, not without some difficulty, for the woman in question was being helped down from her mare by a white man, and she'd just shown a glimpse of silk-covered ankle. To render men slavering idiots with an ankle made Ryder shake his head. He'd seen so many female ankles in his day, so many female legs and female thighs, and everything else female, that he by far preferred an umbrella to protect him form the relentless sun than seeing anything the woman had to offer.
"And don't call me master. Ryder will do just fine."
Grayson nodded, his eyes still on the Vision. "I don't understand," he said more to himself than to Ryder as he walked to two horses, docilely standing, heads lowered, held by two black boys. "You see her, you see how exquisitely beautiful she is, and yet you are not interested."
"She is a woman, Grayson, nothing more, nothing less. Let's go now."
When Grayson produced a hat for Ryder, he thought he'd weep for joy. He couldn't imagine riding far in this heat. "Is it always this unmercifully hot?"
"It's summer. It's always intolerable in the summer here," said Grayson. "We only ride, Ryder. As you'll see, the roads here are well nigh impassable for a carriage. Yes, all gentlemen ride. Many ladies as well."
Grayson sat his gray cob quite comfortably, Ryder saw, as he mounted his own black gelding, a huge brute with a mean eye.
"It's nearly an hour's ride to the plantation. But the road west curves very close to the water and there will be a breeze. Also the great house is set upon a rise, and thus catches any breezes and winds that might be up, and in the shade it is always bearable, even in the summer."
"Good," Ryder said and clamped the wide-brimmed leather hat down on his head. "You can tell me what's been happening that disturbs you so much."
And Grayson talked and talked. He spoke of strange blue and yellow smoke that threaded skyward like a snake and fires that glowed white and an odd green, and moans and groans and smells that came from hell itself, sulfurous odors that announced the arrival of the devil himself, waiting to attack, it was just a matter of time. And just the week before there'd been a fire set to a shed near to the great house. His son, Emile, and all the house slaves had managed to douse the flames before there'd been much damage. Then just three days before a tree had fallen and very nearly landed on the veranda roof. The tree had been very sturdy.
"I don't suppose there were saw marks on the tree?"
"No," said Mr. Grayson firmly. "My son looked closely. It was the work of the supernatural. Even he was forced to cease going against what I said."
<#FROWN:P10\>
Chapter One
Off the Carolina coast, 1673
The English Wench, prized by her pirate crew for her speed and agility, had had no trouble overtaking the heavier merchant vessel. Being attacked by pirates was one of the hazards faced by those who sailed along the coast of the Carolinas in the year of the Lord 1673.
While the merchant vessel had attempted to position itself to use its cannons, the English Wench had drawn alongside. Using grappling hooks, the pirates had bound the two vessels together. Even before all the lines were secured, members of the band had leapt from their vessel to the deck of the merchant ship.
Kathleen had watched the battle through a spyglass from the bridge of the English Wench. Captain Thorton's ruthless pirates had won, but not easily. The captain of the merchant vessel and his officers had fought valiantly. Even the crew had put up more of a fight than was usual. These men did not commonly feel a sufficient loyalty to the owners of the vessel on which they sailed to risk their lives in battle. Then there had been the brown-haired man who now stood tall and proud, despite his wounds, among the other prisoners. She judged his age to be near thirty. It was not easy to decide his place. He had moved with the air of one used to being in a position of authority. But he wore no wig. Had he, it would have been a certain sign of rank. However, it was his own natural hair that hung thick and full past his shoulders. Very nice hair, too, she mused, a rich brown like the shell of a hickory nut.
His clothing was well tailored and most definitely the attire of a gentleman. But to her shock she had found her mind going beyond the depth of her gaze. It was difficult to determine the true figure of a man beneath his clothing, but his movements had been strong and lithe, and Kathleen had found herself envisioning strong shoulders and firm legs. Not at all the kind of thoughts for a modest woman to be having, but then she had not lived in polite or refined company for many years. A sudden concern that some of the pirates' lusty nature had rubbed off onto her caused a cold chill. Never!
Her mind returned to the business at hand. The battle was over and the captain of the captured vessel was ordering the healthy prisoners to help the wounded members of his crew. Meanwhile, standing slightly apart form the others, the brown-haired swordsman was tying a make-shift bandage around his arm. A slicing blow from a saber had cut through his clothing to the flesh below. The bleeding had slowed, however, indicating that the wound was not deep. For a moment she wondered if he was one of the owners of the vessel. But noticing that the captain made no move to consult with him, she concluded that he was merely a passenger.
Suddenly realizing how long she had allowed this particular man to occupy her attention, she frowned. "You're wasting precious time," she berated herself aloud. Putting the spyglass aside, she left the bridge. As she crossed the long plank now connecting the two ships, she tried not to think of the blood on the deck or the bodies of the dead and dying.
"I've lost a few of me men today," Captain Lawrence Thorton said, addressing the crew of the ship he had just captured. "If any of you lads are wanting to join me merry band, you're welcome. Just step forward. The rest of you will be set adrift with what remaining officers you have. If you're lucky, the sharks'll eat you 'afore the Indians get you." He laughed at his joke while Kathleen fought back a wave of nausea as she nearly tripped over a severed arm.
As distasteful as such expeditions were, she'd convinced Captain Thorton to allow her to board the captured ships. She'd led him to believe her motives were purely those of mercy toward the wounded. Since he hadn't a single merciful bone in his body, he found this amusing and did not stop her. In truth, while she did try to help the injured, especially those of the captured vessel, her real purpose was to find small weapons she could conceal in a pocket in her petticoat. She was determined that one day she would escape from Captain Thorton. And that day will be very soon, she promised herself as she knelt beside a corpse and guardedly took a dagger and its sheath from the corpse's belt.
Hearing a splash, she glanced toward the rail to find that Captain Thorton's men were already tossing the bodies of those who had died, both friend and foe alike, overboard to the waiting sharks. No formal ceremonies for these cutthroats. Cries for mercy suddenly filled the air as a badly wounded member of the merchant crew was flung over-board along with the dead. <quote>"He'd never of made it, mate," one of the two pirates explained with a gleeful grin when the captain of the merchant vessel protested.
Kathleen's stomach knotted as she heard the body hit the water. After eleven years of sailing with Captain Thorton, she should have grown used to his and his crew's callous disrespect for human life, but she hadn't.
About half of the remaining merchant crew accepted Captain Thorton's invitation to join him. This didn't surprise her. Joining the pirates provided them an opportunity to gain wealth they would never otherwise have. It also afforded them a much better chance of survival than being set adrift in an overcrowded lifeboat.
Hearing a groan, Kathleen turned to see one of Captain Thorton's men lying dazed on the deck not far from where she knelt. She knew that if he did not regain his senses by the time the 'burial' crew found him, he, too, might be tossed to the sharks. Captain Thorton's crew operated on the principalprinciple of survival of the fittest, always keeping in mind that the fewer left to share the booty, the larger their portion of the prize.
A part of her was tempted to leave the man to his fate. He had certainly shown her no kindness. None of Captain Thorton's crew had. They leered at her and made crude remarks, and she knew that should Captain Thorton ever decide to relinquish his guardianship over her, each would be willing to use her foully. Still, she couldn't bring herself to let the man die. Rising, she crossed over to him and helped him to his feet.
He had a large bump on his head, but other than that, he was not injured. "If you want to live, stay on your feet," she instructed him firmly. She saw the glimmer of understanding in his eyes. Reaching out, he steadied himself against the mast.
Moving away from him, she continued around the deck. The blood again caused her stomach to churn. "You can be sick later," she reprimanded herself in a harsh whisper.
The time had come for the officers and those remaining with them to board their lifeboat. Despite the fact that their chances of survival were very slim, with all her heart she wished she could go with them. The passenger who had captured her attention during the battle was in the group. Without even thinking, she moved closer until she found herself beside him. He was taller than she had first thought. Her slender five-foot-six-inch frame did not quite reach his chin. And he was even more muscular than she had judged from a distance. His shoulders were broad and his abdomen was firm and flat. While his manner was that of one ready to accept his fate, she noted that the muscles of his legs were flexed like those of an animal prepared to defend itself. Her gaze traveled to his hands. The palms were callused. He dressed like a gentleman, but clearly he was no man of leisure.
As if he suddenly felt her studying him, he turned and looked down at her.
His features were strong but blended well into a face that could be considered ruggedly handsome. His eyes were a deep brown, a shade darker than his hair. When they first settled on Kathleen, they showed surprise, then they became even darker with disapproval.
A pirate's whore, John thought to himself, as the shock of seeing a woman in the middle of this carnage wore off. He looked down at the fresh blood smeared across the back of one of her hands. He'd once heard that a bloodthirsty woman could be a thousand times more dangerous than a bloodthirsty man. Best to stand clear of this one, he decided, shifting his gaze back to his captors.
Kathleen's gray eyes flashed with proud defiance as she read the disdain in his features. Her head held high, she stepped away from the arrogant prisoner as Mr. Louker, Captain Thorton's first mate, approached and ordered the group to begin their descent into the waiting lifeboat. Oh, how she wished she could go with them.
Suddenly Joseph Yates was at the brown-eyed prisoner's side. "He stays to pay for the death of me brother." Grabbing the man by his wounded arm, Joseph yanked him out of the line. His knife was already drawn to slit the prisoner's throat. As if her own death was being set in motion, a chill shook Kathleen. Without thinking, she raced across the deck and grabbed Joseph's arm before he could do his filthy deed.
"Your brother died in a fair fight," she insisted, her fingers digging into Joseph's arm as he tried to shake her free. Even as she fought for the prisoner, she did not understand why it was so important to her that he live. She told herself her concern was only because he was an innocent human being who did not deserve to die at the hands of these cutthroats. "I was watching from the bridge of the English Wench."
"How me brother died is of no importance. He's dead and I'll have me revenge." Joseph's eyes glistened with hatred as he gave a strong jerk that sent Kathleen sprawling onto the deck.
The woman's attempt to save his life startled John. But he had no time to wonder at her behavior. The pirate's struggle with her had drawn Joseph's attention away from his quarry. John was not one to allow an opportunity to go to waste. He captured the wrist of Joseph's knife-wielding hand in a viselike grip and twisted it hard. As Kathleen scrambled back to her feet, the bloody knife dropped to the deck.
"You're a dead man," Joseph spat at the prisoner, who now held him captive.
"You cannot kill him without the captain's permission," Kathleen warned Joseph harshly. It was the direst threat she could muster. "Or you'll pay with your life."
Joseph greeted her warning with a self-righteous scowl. "He killed me brother. I've got a right -"
"You should listen to Kathleen," a male voice cautioned from behind her.
Glancing over her shoulder Kathleen saw Captain Thorton approaching them. He looked older than his forty-five years. The ocean winds and his own innate cruelty had etched harsh lines into his features. His attire was that of a fancy English gentleman. There were polished buckles adorning his boots, a lace cravat at his throat and a heavy, full wig upon his head. He was only an inch taller than she but the cocked hat he wore, graced as it was with a plume, made him seem taller. His green silk waistcoat strained against his stomach, but she knew he was made more of muscle than fat. His dress and the manner in which he carried himself caused her to think of a strutting peacock, a very vicious, very deadly one.
"She knows better than any member of my crew what disobeying my orders can mean."
<#FROWN:P11\>
Prologue
Westmorland, England, 1807
Walter FitzHugh looked up from the papers strewn across his desk. His eyes seemed dull, his face haggard, yet he was able to smile when he saw her standing in the hall outside his study. "So, pet, are you ready to leave for Beckworth House?"
Heather shook her head, feeling more lost and confused than she'd ever felt in her ten years.
The baron held out his arms to her. "Come here, child."
She ran to him and hurtled herself onto his lap, into the safety of his arms. Her hands clasped behind his neck as she buried her face against his chest.
"It won't be so terrible at your aunt Caroline's, Heather. My sister might be a trifle vain and arrogant, but she was a FitzHugh before she married the viscount. Once a FitzHugh, always a FitzHugh, I say. She'll make you a good home."
"But I don't want to leave GlenRoyal, Papa," Heather whispered. "Why do we have to leave?"
It was her brother, George, who answered her question. "Because the Duke of Hawksbury cheated at hazard." The fourteen-year-old's voice was filled with bitterness. "Isn't that right, Father?"
Heather turned her head toward the doorway and watched as George crossed the room, coming to stand beside her and their father. "But why does that mean we have to leave our home?"
"You're too young to understand, Heather," the baron replied. "One day we'll be able to come back. I don't know how, but one day ..." His voice faded, the beaten expression returning to haunt his features.
"Let's make a FitzHugh oath." George stuck out his hand, palm down, toward his father and sister. Youthful idealism gleamed in his green eyes. "I swear that I shall do whatever I must to reclaim GlenRoyal for the FitzHugh family."
Heather slid from her father's lap. She stood as straight and tall as she could, not too young to understand the solemnity of taking a FitzHugh oath. She thrust her pudgy arm forward and laid her hand over her brother's. She spoke forcefully, fervently, repeating George's words. "I swear that I shall do whatever I must to reclaim GlenRoyal for the FitzHugh family."
In unison, the siblings looked toward their father, waiting expectantly.
"Children, I ..." His gaze shifted back and forth between them. Finally, he rose from his chair. "I swear that I shall do whatever I must - " His voice broke, and he turned away from them.
Heather felt tears burning her throat at the sound of despair in her beloved father's voice. She wanted to make him laugh. She wanted to make him smile. She wanted the father she'd always known back again.
The baron moved to the window. He ran the fingers of one hand through his graying hair as he gazed outside into the bright summer sunlight. "George, take Heather outside. I won't be long."
Her brother's hand folded around hers. "Come on." His fingers squeezed hers gently. "Father wants to be alone." He led her to the door. "And don't you ever forget what we swore to do."
Insulted by his authoritarian tone, Heather lifted her chin. As if she would ever forget the importance of what they'd just promised! "A FitzHugh never breaks a FitzHugh oath," she retorted, forcing herself to sound brave and sure.
Three horses were waiting for them in the drive, their reins held by the only remaining footman at GlenRoyal.
Heather broke away from George and hurried toward her pretty chestnut mare. She stroked the horse's sleek neck as the lump returned to her throat. At least no one had taken Cathy from her. She'd been afraid when so many things had started disappearing from GlenRoyal, so many things that had meant safety and security to her. But she couldn't have stood it if someone had taken her mare. A passion for horses - for all animals, really - was something Heather shared with the baron. When she was seven, her father had given her the yearling filly, and Heather had helped to train her.
"May I give you a lift up, Miss Heather?" asked Cosgrove, the footman.
She knew that if she looked at him she would burst out crying. She didn't want to say anymore good-byes. So she shook her head. "I can do it, Cosgrove." Thus said, she led Cathy to the mounting block, hiked up her skirts, and tossed a leg over the saddle. She immediately imagined her aunt Caroline's frown of disapproval at such an unladylike act, but she didn't care. She wasn't living with Aunt Caroline yet.
A moment later, Walter FitzHugh appeared at the top of the steps. He kept his eyes straight ahead as he descended the stairs and walked to his horse.
"Good luck, my lord," the footman said as he handed the reins to the baron.
"Thank you, Cosgrove. Same to you." He swung up onto the saddle, then spun his horse away from the house and cantered down the drive, his children following close behind him.
"You know as well as I do that the duke didn't cheat at hazard," Caroline scolded. "You must make George stop saying so, or you're going to cause us no end of grief. Hawksbury is a powerful man. And that son of his is well thought of among the ton. They would never do anything so scandalous as cheat at cards, and well you know it. You'll find yourself called out if rumors begin because of George."
Her brother's response was to lift his glass of port and swallow several gulps.
"'Tis your own fault, Walter. You never could stay away from the clubs and gaming hells. I'm surprised you didn't lose everything before now. Whatever would have happened to you and the children if it weren't for me? Thank heaven I had the good sense to marry a man like Frederick. He shall never leave me destitute. His daughter will never be living off someone else's charity, as your children are."
"Go away, Caroline," Walter grumbled as he refilled his glass.
"You're getting drunk."
"Go away."
His sister shot him a disgusted glance. "All right, Walter, I'll go. But you'd better spend some time deciding what you're going to do now. You haven't a home. You haven't any income left. You surely don't expect to go on living here indefinitely, being waited on hand and foot. I have my own life to lead. I have responsibilities in Society. I can't have people gossiping behind my back about my wastrel brother."
"By George!" he shouted. "Go away and leave me in peace!"
Her face pinched with anger, Caroline twirled away from him and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
"Damn woman," Walter muttered before lifting the glass to his lips. "Never could stand her. Never could."
Now, his Victoria ... there was a woman to love and be loved. If only she'd lived. He'd never failed at anything when Tory was alive. Since her death, life had lost its meaning for him. If it weren't for his children ...
Heather was a lot like her mother. She had the same raven hair, curly and unruly, and the same violet eyes, big and round and expressive. Sometimes it almost hurt to look at his daughter for the sense of loss it brought him. But Heather was stronger than Tory had been. Heather was a fighter. She'd find her place in life all right, no matter what a mess her father had made of things. No, he wouldn't have to worry about Heather.
And George. George had all the best qualities of a FitzHugh and few of the weaknesses. George was well on his way to being a man. He was strong and intelligent. He wouldn't repeat his father's mistakes. He would make the FitzHugh name stand for something again. George wasn't the failure Walter had become.
He refilled his glass and let the port slide down his throat, feeling it warming all the cold parts of his body. Heaven help him, he was tired of feeling cold. He'd been cold ever since that night at Watier's.
His senses might be dulled by the alcohol, but he still remembered every detail of that night at the club at No. 81, Piccadilly, as he'd faced the Duke of Hawksbury and his son across the hazard table. Walter had already lost a phenomenal sum of money that night. In fact, he'd known he was all but ruined. He'd had only one chance to win it back. Only one. He'd demanded that the duke accept GlenRoyal as his wager. He'd been so certain the dice would be good to him on the next roll. He'd been so sure he would nick it, that the chance would equal the main and he would win all the stakes.
But he hadn't nicked it. He'd thrown crabs. With one roll of the dice, he'd lost GlenRoyal.
God only knew why he'd allowed his son to think the duke had cheated by using dispatchers. When George had claimed the dice must have been loaded, Walter had remained silent. Perhaps it was because the truth about himself was too difficult to face. For the thrill of the game, he'd thrown away his son's future, his daughter's security. For the thrill of the game, he'd lost his family's heritage.
Caroline was right about him. He was a wastrel. He was an embarrassment to his children and his sister and his friends. Perhaps it was merciful that Tory hadn't lived to see him come to this.
"Ah, Tory, I need you with me, love. I need you."
Heather sat up suddenly, startled awake by a loud noise. Her heart hammered in her chest as she stared into the darkness of the strange room. She was frightened. Terribly frightened. She longed for her own bedchamber at GlenRoyal and her familiar bed. She didn't care that GlenRoyal wasn't as large or impressive or finely furnished as Beckworth House. She wanted her own home.
Then she heard the voices. Excited voices. Voices shouting. She heard footsteps running up and down the stairs. She heard pounding on the doors. Her anxiety increased. Frightening forms took shape in the corners of the room, shapes that seemed to move and whisper and threaten.
"Papa," she whispered, "come find me."
A thin light appeared beneath her door. She slipped out of bed and hurried toward it, blood pounding in her ears. She yanked the door open, letting a flood of golden lamplight spill into the bedchamber, dispelling the ghosts and goblins that fear had created.
She stepped into the hallway, moving toward the commotion on the floor below. Her hand was on the banister, and she was ready to descend the stairs when George appeared.
His face was white, his green eyes eerily bright.
"Stay there, Heather," he said.
"Why?"
"It's Papa. Papa's dead."
Chapter 1
London, England, 1816
To the many pairs of feminine eyes watching him covertly - and otherwise - throughout the room, Tanner Huntington Gilbert Montgomery, tenth Duke of Hawksbury, was a magnificent sight. Tall, lean, and broad of shoulder, he was dressed fashionably, yet there was something almost indolent about his appearance, as if he were mocking the gentlemen who'd spent hours at their toilet perfecting their starched cravats. His tight black trousers revealed long legs and muscular thighs. A long-tailed black coat fit him snugly at the waist. There was an aura of raw strength about him, a barely restrained power that was both frightening and fascinating.
But it was the chiseled contours of his face that drew the most attention. Ruggedly handsome, he had a wide forehead and an aquiline nose. His mouth was thin with what appeared to be a permanent cynical twist at the corners. Golden-brown hair brushed the back of his white collar, and cool blue eyes stared out at the drawing room with undisguised boredom.
Tanner sipped champagne and glanced over the rim of his glass. The Rathdrum rout was in full swing.
<#FROWN:P12\>
Chapter One
The last time Lanie Robinson ran away from home she had been eight years old. She had lost her shoe, fallen into a mud puddle and been chased by a dog. By the time darkness came she was more than happy to creep back home to supper with no one ever having been aware that she was gone.
Now, almost twenty-seven years later, Lanie Robinson's Great Escape II was turning out to be almost as inauspicious as her last one. The only difference between then and now was that this time home was almost twelve-hundred miles away. Her plane from Iowa had been late and she had missed her connection in Philadelphia. By the time she had finally arrived in Miami, the airport transportation had already departed, and she had had to find her own way to the port. Her luggage was lost. She was lost.
She paused to catch her breath, letting her heavy carry-on bag, oversized purse and bulky all-weather coat sink to the ground as she struggled to capture, even for a moment, that sense of heady triumph she was sure should be hers. After all, she had done it. Lanie Robinson - who had never traveled more than a hundred miles from home in her life - had scrawled a note, packed a bag and walked out on her home, job and family without a backward glance. She had made it this far; she wasn't about to turn back now.
She only wished she didn't have quite so far to go.
Christopher Vandermere scrawled his signature on the last document just as the chauffeur-driven limousine pulled into the harbor area. He pushed up the tortoiseshell reading glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose, scowling into the telephone. "Look, Madison, you can tell him for me -"
"If you don't mind, sir, I'd rather not." The crisp contralto tones of his secretary bore not the faintest hint of reproach - nor, in fact, any emotion at all. It was a pattern of speech that Elizabeth Madison, administrative assistant extraordinaire, had elevated to an art form. "If we might move on ..."
Chris groaned out loud, letting the glasses drop painfully to the bridge of his nose again. "Move on?" He moved the telephone away from his face just long enough to tug the glasses off impatiently and toss them across the seat. Then he started to work on his tie. "I've got a stack of papers here tall enough to keep even you busy for the next month, two tapes of dictation are on the way to the office by special messenger as we speak, and if there's anyone in the continental United States I haven't talked to today it's only because I've faxed them. Please, don't you think I can go out and play now?"
He had been trying for five years to break through Madison's imperturbable facade and elicit a laugh, a chuckle, or even a small smile; mentally he marked down another failure as she replied, perfectly deadpan and without missing a beat, "In just one minute, sir. There are only a few more items we need to cover."
Chris was looking out the window, across the water, watching the harbor traffic with a quickening of his pulse and a deepening of anticipation that was so intense it was almost sexual. Only a few more minutes now and his escape would be complete. Meantime ...
Chris got the tie off and tossed it the way of the glasses. His sigh was resigned as he shrugged out of his jacket and began working on the vest. "All right, go ahead."
The man at the Great Escapes Tours booth had pointed Lanie in the direction of Pier Twenty-one and radioed the captain that she was on her way. He had neglected to mention that numbering the slips seemed to be irregular and optional. The last readable number had been Fifteen, and it felt to Lanie as though she had walked a mile since then. She had to be getting close.
She blotted her forehead with the cuff of her silk-blend blouse - which that morning had seemed so classy and stylish but was now as limp as her brand-new, guaranteed-not-to-frizz hairstyle - and shouldered her bags again with a muffled groan. She was wearing a skirt above her knees for the first time since puberty, and that made her self-conscious enough. But the pink wool was travel-creased and scratchy and completely inappropriate for Miami, even if it was January.
Two weeks sailing on a private yacht, maximum capacity six passengers, exploring small islands at which the bigger ships could never dock, scuba diving on coral reefs untouched by the tourist crowd, gourmet meals every night, being pampered from dawn to dusk ... it was a dream to come true. It didn't matter that Lanie did not know how to scuba dive, that she had never been sailing before in her life or that her idea of being pampered was Chinese takeout on Friday nights. It didn't even matter that this trip had taken every penny of her savings and most of her cash-advance limit on her credit card. This was her chance - quite possible her last chance - to do something exciting, something unexpected, something purely because she wanted to do it. Nothing was going to stop her now ... except, perhaps, missing the boat.
And then she saw Pier Twenty-one, and her spirits soared. The ship - boat, she corrected herself - was even more luxurious than the brochure had promised. Gleaming white and polished teak, it dwarfed its neighbors, both in size and beauty. The black letters across the side proclaimed its name to be Serendipity and Lanie broke into a rueful grin.
Not much about her life or even this trip had been serendipitous so far - but Lanie felt sure her luck was about to change.
Very little of Chris Vandermere's attention was on Elizabeth Madison's voice as he discarded his vest and pushed a button that lowered the tinted glass window. Almost immediately the climate-controlled interior of the limo was tainted by the smell of fish and salt and fuel, thick and humid and warm. Real air, real life. Chris inhaled deeply, unbuttoning the top three buttons of his shirt.
They passed Pier Eighteen, where the Sunchaser, a four-hundred-fifty-passenger cruiser, was docked; Pier Twenty, where the Nordic Queen, fifteen-hundred passengers, seventy-thousand tons, would be returning after a seven-day cruise to the Bahamas tomorrow at six a.m.; Pier Thirty, where the Rendezvous, the newest and some said the most luxurious cruise ship afloat was just now departing amid a rain of confetti and streamers for a two-week cruise of the Caribbean.0
Chris did not have to glance out the window to identify the ships or even the piers they were passing. He knew them by smell, by feel, by the shadow they cast and the sound of their engines. The <tf>Sunchaser, the Nordic Queen and the Rendezvous were his, along with two other cruise ships docked in Miami and another three in Los Angeles. But they were business, and business was something he was in the process of shedding as systematically as he was his clothes. His mind was on the Serendipity.
"The board meeting has been confirmed for the fifteenth," Madison was saying. "That will give you two days after your return -"
"If I return."
That caused Madison to pause, and Chris experienced a small surge of satisfaction for having unsettled her, however temporarily. She recovered in less than a beat, however, and said, "If I may say, sir, that would be ill-advised at present ..."
"I'm cutting this trip short as it is. What's the big deal if I miss one board meeting? There's nothing on the agenda that's not routine and Anthony has my proxy."
Again, a slight pause. Madison did not get along with Anthony and never had, which was one of the reasons Chris had put his brother in charge of west coast operations three years ago. The other reason, of course, was to simply give Anthony something to do.
"To be sure, sir, your brother is a fine young man, but with the situation being what it is I think your presence at the meeting would do a great deal to reassure the board members."
Chris scowled again. The last thing he wanted to think about now was the 'situation' as it was. "The one thing that's guaranteed to worry the board members is my presence at a routine meeting," he pointed out, and not entirely facetiously. "Then they'll know something is wrong."
"Perhaps you're right, sir. Nonetheless -"
"Nonetheless," he interrupted firmly, "if I do decide to extend my trip you are not to send the coast guard looking for me. Is that clear?"
"Perfectly, sir." But Chris thought he detected a note of reluctance in her voice. "However, since you are occasionally out of radio contact -"
"I mean it, Madison."
"Yes, sir."
Score one for executive privilege, Chris thought grimly. But duty compelled him to say, "Is there anything else?" It didn't surprise him that there was.
The gangplank was one of those temporary, rolling structures that seemed to be attached to the boat more through good intentions than mechanical expertise, and Lanie clutched the handrail with both hands, lurching from side to side with each step. Her clattering approach must have been heard through the innermost reaches of the ship, for in only a moment the door to the cockpit opened and a man in yachting whites stepped on deck.
"Afternoon," he said, smiling.
He was middle-aged, fit and friendly-looking. "Hi," Lanie said, breathing hard. "Are you the captain?"
The smile widened into a grin as he touched the brim of his cap. "No, ma'am, afraid not. I guess you could call me the first mate, though. I'm Andrew, and Joel, here ..." he nodded toward a younger man, also in white, who came around the side of the cockpit "... he'd be the crew. What can we do for you?"
"I'm Elaine Robinson. The captain is expecting me." She tried to shift around her carry-on bag and coat to get to her purse, where her boarding card was stored in one of the numerous compartments or pockets. "I'm sorry I'm late. I hope I haven't held you up too long."
There was only the slightest hesitance, and out of the corner of her eye Lanie saw the two men exchange a look. Then Andrew said, still in that warm, friendly voice, "No, you haven't held us up a bit. Mr. Vandermere isn't even here yet. Here, let me help you with that." He came forward to take her bag. "Joel, do you want to show the lady to the main cabin?"
Joel hurried forward with a quick "Welcome aboard, ma'am. Mind your step there."
He took her arm to help her on board, relieved her of the cumbersome coat and shouldered the bag Andrew passed to him. Now this is more like it, Lanie thought as he escorted her toward the main causeway.
Lanie had never been on anything bigger than a rowboat and she was fascinated by everything she saw. Unfortunately Joel moved too quickly for her to have much more than an impression of warm wood and polished brass, framed seascapes on the walls and rich carpeting underfoot.
"This is the main salon," Joel said when they went below deck. "Dinner is served here at eight, and you can find just about anything you want in the way of entertainment here. The galley is just beyond that hatch there, and the crew quarters and guest cabin are forward. Here you go."
He opened the door to another room and Lanie, feeling exactly like the wide-eyed tourist she was, dragged her attention to this new wonder with difficulty.
And it was a wonder. It was more of a suite than a cabin - a presidential suite at that. It was decorated in royal blue and gold with accents of rich wine, and every detail spoke of elegance and taste.
<#FROWN:P13\>He had a rare serenity, and almost never complained of his aches and pains from the spreading cancer. He believed that everything was God's will, and had no fear of dying. They talked for a while, about the weather, chopping wood, how the caba<*_>n-tilde<*/>uelas calculations in January could predict the weather for an entire year. Then the old man listened as psalms were read to him in Spanish. He closed his eyes and smiled and folded his hands on his chest. He seemed to go to sleep. There was a pause of absolute quiet in the room. The younger man leaned forward to see if the chest was still moving. Then he realized that his longtime friend was held to life by only a flimsy thread. He opened the Bible again and at random read more psalms in Spanish. Though he had long feared the moment, when it arrived he was very calm. He liked the sound of his voice, the snoozing cats, the old arthritic hands clasped in peaceful resignation. The Spanish had a rhythm like poetry. There were longer pauses in his aged friend's breathing....
"That's how it happened," he said. "I read him into the promised land. I never knew exactly when he died. At one point he opened his eyes and looked at me, and there was a twinkle in them. He smiled and said what he always said, when, daily, after every visit, I put drops in his aching eyes: "Ay, que tino de borracho." I guess those were his last words. Even after I realized he was dead, I kept reading the psalms in Spanish. He had loved them very much. I had been reading to him for three years, almost daily. Finally, I stopped and just sat there, listening to the void. Both cats were purring. His body must have felt warm to them for a long time after because of the electric blanket."
"Did you cry?"
"No, nothing. I was relieved. It was very peaceful. His eyes were shut, but his mouth was wide open. I remembered how he used to collect wood together, and he would swing a two-bladed ax all afternoon, at eighty-five years, without growing tired. He almost never took a sip of water. He remembered when there weren't any fences and you could drive a flock of sheep hundreds of miles west to Navajoland without encountering private property, barbwire, or other impediments. I had long enjoyed that space - vicariously - through knowing him."
They buried his old man in a small camposanto up against the foothills. About a foot of fresh snow lay on the ground and powdered the branches of pi<*_>n-tilde<*/>on trees at the edge of the cemetery. It was a cold day, clear and sharp as a blade, very sunny and without a breath of wind. After the service the ushers took off their carnations and placed them on the coffin as it was lowered on the green nylon straps. About ten of them stayed afterwards to fill in the grave. Shovels were brought from a couple of pickups and passed around. People took turns with the palas, heaping dirt onto the coffin. A couple of old boys in their seventies wore dusty suits and bolo ties and polished cowboy boots and weathered Stetsons. The old man's best friend, a plump elderly sheepherder recovering from a terrible bout with kidney stones, worked up a furious sweat moving the dirt atop his longtime companion. In past years the writer had often driven his aged amigo over to his man's camp west of the gorge during the hija-dero. After the lambs were born, and the castrations had taken place, the trasquiladors came down from Colorado and sheared the entire flock in three days. As they shoveled on the dirt, he recalled how the old man had spent much of his youth in the early part of this century tending sheep on the surrounding mesas. During his teen years he had been a trasquilador, beginning on the ranches in southern Arizona in January, and moving north with spring, finally arriving to shear Montana sheep in June. He had loved the borregas, and was deeply attached to his few friends who still ran flocks in the valley. Of course, the herders were dying out. In ten more years they would all be gone.
After the grave was filled in, the men wandered away, returned to their pickups, drove off on the hard-packed snow. One of the old man's grandchildren, down from Denver, tried to arrange a funeral wreath just so on the mound of earth and stones. And juncos disported in the whitened pi<*_>n-tilde<*/>on branches nearby, kicking down sprinkles and dusty puffs of snow.
Thirteen
When the weather cleared they went fishing. She was in a chipper mood, forging ahead on the path, sashaying back to him, giving little shoulder punches, sticking her tongue in his ear, whispering naughty propositions. It was about two miles from the rim of the gorge down to the river. Large pinecones littered the trail; juniper trees were heavy with blue berries. They stopped at his favorite giant ponderosa and got a whiff of the bark. It smelled strong, like vanilla.
The air was warm and languid after the rains. She rubbed against him. He fondled her in all the appropriate places. She laughed and danced away. "Let's build it up to a fever pitch, then go crazy."
She galloped ahead, flicking her fingers at feathery Apache plume and bright yellow chamisa blossoms. Lizards, ignited by her shadow, scampered out of the way. Iridescent purple darning needles drifted to and fro.
He called her off the trail, and together they climbed about twenty feet up onto a ledge used by raptors for an eyrie. He explained, "Every spring for the last ten years great horned owls have nested here."
The rock was littered with tiny bones, owl shit, castings, little skulls, pack-rat droppings. In a crevice they found an egg that had never hatched back in April. Puffy fledge feathers were caught on jagged rocks and in the branches of yellow flowering brickellbush. Above their heads on the sheer rock wall were several hundred mud nests made by cliff swallows, now empty, of course, and silent.
They rested a moment, overlooking the gorge. "You have all these magic places," she said, growing moody and contemplative, opaque. "I envy you."
He pointed: "There's a buzzard." Then he told her that the birds singing in pi<*_>n-tilde<*/>on trees below were Townsend's solitaires.
She hooked her hand through his arm and laid her head against his shoulder. "Do you love me?" she asked.
"Yes ... I love you," he answered.
She squeezed him a little, gently.
Down by the water, poison ivy had turned a bright crimson. Wild milkweed leaves were brilliant yellow. In places, Virginia creeper, flamboyantly red, was smothering the branches of ancient cedars. Watercress half filled the pool of an arsenic spring that emptied into the noisy river.
On a small beach where he liked to set up the rods, at least a dozen ebony-black tarantula hawks with bright orange wings were crawling around in a clump of sawgrass. Several of the wasps, caught in a mysterious torpor, lay at the base of the stems or on the sand, dying.
The more energetic wasps poked and prodded their logy comrades. They nudged and dragged and seemed almost to be performing artificial respiration. They were indifferent to the nearby humans.
"What's the matter?" she asked.
"I don't know. Some kind of poison? Perhaps it's a normal ritual of dying at the end of a season."
"Death again: Christ almighty!"
"They're beautiful."
"To a ghoul. C'mon, let's jam."
She grabbed one hand and yanked him upright. He groaned, "Oh my aching knees."
She whacked his arm. "Stop bitching," she said, and laughed. "I hate it when you complain."
"I'm old," he protested.
"In your brain, numskull. I think your body is wonderful!"
For almost twenty years he had fished the river, and he knew it well. He only used a few simple flies, tied by a friend, and moved quickly among the boulders heading upstream. Casting only to trout in back eddies or to holding spots behind rocks in midstream, he passed up most of the water, which was either too deep or too fast for his style. He used a tail fly and one dropper, fished almost on the surface, sometimes with a natural drift, or else skittered across the water. He danced easily across the massive basalt boulders, which were often more than ten feet high and shiny slick from the pummelings of roiling springtime runoff. She was more uncertain of her balance, and fell behind. "Hey," she cried, "you're supposed to be sick and dizzy! Wait up!"
But on the river he was in a familiar element, and the rhythm and momentum were important to his joy. Shadows needed to be on the water for fish to strike, which meant he had only two hours before dark. So he concentrated wholly on the task at hand, reading water, casting quickly several times, then shifting his angle or moving to another pool, hopping effortlessly across the boulders.
"What happens if you fall?" she asked, catching up, breathless and a trifle shaken.
"I never think of that," he said. "I'm not afraid of anything down here."
The water was tinged a faintly green hue. It moved fast, splashing against numerous boulders, roaring loudly so they had to shout to hear each other. But once into it he became all concentration and quit talking. He always checked out pockets on the near shore first, flicking his small badger flies across the back eddies and any quiet and shallow water behind a rock, or into crevices where foam had gathered. Then he climbed onto the higher outposts of stone and cast across-stream with a precision she found remarkable. He could land a fly exactly at the base of rocks on the opposite shore, and more often than not a fish struck instantly as the current grabbed his line. He missed the first two hits, but hooked a brown trout on the third. It went into the air once and then swooped downriver in fast, splashing water. He doubled back downstream past the girl and worked the fish quickly into a quieter pool, then guided it to his net. She came over as he removed the hook, then held the foot-long trout beneath the surface, moving it forward and back, running water through the gills. When he let go, the fish slipped sideways, caught by the current, and was sucked into turbulent darkness.
She said, "You're good at this, aren't you?"
"If the conditions are right for my style, yes, I'm good at it. If conditions are bad, I'm a total flop. I hate to add weight for nymphing."
In the next forty-five minutes he landed and released over a dozen fish; the largest was about fifteen inches. She left him alone to enjoy his evening. His rhythm was fast and precise and fanatical. In almost the same motion that he released a fish he would straighten up and be casting again. He almost never stopped advancing. Every cast was directly aimed at a specific quarry, and almost always the cast triggered a strike. He failed to set the hook at least half the time, not from being slow, but because he was overeager - too fast. He laughed each time he failed, and moved on to the next position.
She had a hard time scrambling over enormous boulders, keeping up. The river banged, hissed, and splashed. Often as not he was silhouetted against angry spindrift, arm pumping, working that skinny line into a perfect cast. He felt absolutely comfortable, happy, on top of the world. And he had no idea if the girl was still behind him.
Shortly before dark the river went dead. He cast for another five minutes, just to be certain, then leaned against an enormous basalt slab and sighed deeply.
<#FROWN:P14\>Thinking about what had happened - not that being held gently in a warm , loving embrace was all that much - she smiled slightly. Putting the memory away, she asked, "Now, what is the problem?"
"You were going along the Brighton road."
Ah. Not the journey home.
"Helen, you know -"
"We visited the orphanage," she interrupted.
His mouth open, he stared. Then, more quietly, "The orphanage?"
"Sec wished to see one of my projects in detail."
"Couldn't you have taken Miss Alcester along for propriety?"
"I suppose we could. Neither of us thought of it. John, it isn't as if I were seventeen and he a rogue." She watched him for a few more moments. "Is that your only objection?"
"You know it is not." He took the few steps to the windows and back, a frown creasing his brow. "You know I don't trust the man." His scowl softened, and his eyes begged her to understand. "I fear for your future if it becomes entangled with his."
"John, I am four and thirty years old."
"Helen, you are my sister," he said, mimicking her tone, his manner joking but his eyes serious.
She chuckled. "Will you allow that I do very well organizing and running my charities? All of them? That I don't become flustered when faced with a complicated situation? That I understand how to use money and how my fortune is invested and that I watch any changes made in those investments?"
"Helen ..."
"I am not a child, John. I will not hand my capital to a fortune hunter and allow my projects to die. And, leaving aside the money, I often think I am better fitted to understand other people and deal with my emotions than you are with yours."
A wary look crossed John's face. "Well, if you say it was an open carriage...."
"Running away, John? It's all right to berate me about mistakes you think I make, but I may not tell you that your hermitlike existence is wrong? You interfere in my life, but I may not object to yours?"
"Oh, well, if you think I should get out and about more."
"John, why are you so unwilling to spend time among your peers?"
A grimace of distaste crossed John's face. "You truly don't wish to know. Besides, it is but a mishmash of little things. The women's shrill affected laughter; unmarried women's inane and flirtatious ways; deep doings at the club - too often by those who can least afford it." He shrugged. "Things I don't like and have ceased, therefore, to have to do with them." She continued to stare at him. "Helen, I come to London spring and fall to see my tailor and bootmaker. I check, then, with our solicitor so he need not come down here as he does, if needed, the rest of the year. I attend a few parties and see a few friends." He shrugged. "What more do you want of me?"
"Find a wife," said Helen promptly. "You've turned thirty. You don't live the sporting life as do so many of your contemporaries and you've no desire to travel. You love your estate and spend a deal of time caring for it. Surely you wish a son to whom you may leave it." She watched his growing unease. "Get you a wife, brother mine."
John stared out into the garden. "It has crossed my mind."
"Any w-w-woman in particular?" asked Helen, her tone verging on the bright social voice she adopted when embarrassed. When wishing to turn John's thoughts from her future, it hadn't occurred to her she'd do more than irritate him. Now she wondered where the conversation might be headed. He didn't respond, just stared. "John?" she asked, worried now. He turned, seemingly undecided. "Can I help? Have I been b-b-blind? Is it that you've fallen in love with someone who is t-t-tied to another?"
"Nothing like that. I just can't quite make up my mind whether ..." He hesitated, opened his mouth to speak, but closed it. Finally, he said, "Helen, when I decide to wed, you'll be among the very first to know." He walked to the door. Exiting, he closed it softly behind him. Helen was still staring at it when he stuck his head back in. "Sneaky Helen. Just like when we were in the nursery. Will you someday explain to me how it is that when it is you who are at fault, we somehow manage to end up discussing my faults?"
He ducked back out before she could do more than open her eyes wide. Helen turned back to her work, chuckling softly. He was right, of course, although it had taken him a very long time to see it. She'd always used the ploy, and quite successfully, too. Helen raised her pen, her eyes focused on the picture hanging behind her desk. It had occurred to her he was less likely to be tricked by such maneuvers in future. She'd have to think up something else! Helen bent to her writing, only to look up with an impish grin a moment or two later. The next time John complained about Secundus, she'd send him to complain to Secundus. That would fix him.
The day of the party dawned with that odd summer haze which told the weather-wise it would grow bright and warm. Lucy, realizing it at an early hour, also realized she'd forgotten to give Ruth the parasol which went with the dress. She rang for her maid. With the connivance of various servants, Lucy was soon mounted on her favorite hack and jogging along the lanes to the Alcesters'. She arrived just as Robert exited the front door.
"Lucy!" A flustered look crossed Rob's face. "Miss Chalmers, I mean."
She smiled down at him. "You meant no such thing, did you, Robert?" It was the first time he'd used her name to her face and she reveled in it, although using that as an excuse to say his was pure self-indulgence. "Now help me down, please. I must take this to Ruth and return home immediately."
He automatically reached for her waist, set her on her feet, but couldn't bring himself to let her go. "Lucy ..."
"I know. I know, Robert." They stared at each other for a long moment.
Peter appeared in the impetuous manner of his youth and slammed to a halt. He came down the steps to the drive in a more gentlemanly fashion and bowed. "Miss Chalmers? Are your going with us to the party?"
Lucy forced her gaze from her love's, irritated by the interruption to a rare moment when Robert allowed himself to admit his affection for her. She took a second look. "Peter. Why, how smart you are. A regular tulip."
The boy blushed, a red tide rolling up his neck and into his ears. "No such thing!"
"Quite right," Lucy said with the seriousness the situation demanded. "A tulip would demand more in the way of dash when it came to waistcoats, would he not?" Peter still scowled. "But I shouldn't tease you. You look very well, Peter."
Robert took mercy on his brother's embarrassment. "You came to see Ruth, Miss Chalmers? Shall I send up to her?"
"She's in her room? I'll join her there." Lucy wasn't ten minutes with Ruth - just long enough to give a bit of advice about her hair - before tripping down the stairs into the hall. There, instead of Robert whom she'd hoped to see again, she came face-to-face with Paulo. She grasped the newel and blinked.
"Good day." Paulo bowed deeply. "You have been visiting Miss Alcester?"
"Yes." Lucy looked around, wishing someone would come.
Paulo's teeth flashed in an understanding smile. "The family is occupied elsewhere, so I must introduce myself. I am, Miss Chalmers, Paulo da Silva. May I escort you to your steed?"
"You know me?"
"Young Peter said you were here." Paulo crooked his arm, and Lucy placed trembling fingers on it. "Is it true you and Mr. Robert wish to wed, but are forbidden to do so?" he asked politely.
Lucy stiffened. How dare he ask such personal questions? She hadn't a notion how to answer.
He said, "I've embarrassed you, have I not? You must forgive me. I have yet to learn just what one may speak of openly and when one must creep around corners on tippytoes merely touching on the subject."
Paulo helped Lucy up into her saddle. She hooked her knee firmly and settled her skirts. Then she really looked at Paulo. She saw a kind face and dark, warm eyes. She couldn't help but smile back when he smiled at her. Impulsively, she held her hand down to him, and he grasped it. "It is a very private and personal matter, sir, but I'll answer you because I believe you wish us well. Robert and I would like to marry, but at the moment there are difficulties. We'll come about in the end. I'm sure of it."
"Your father wishes you to marry well?"
She sighed. "I'm sure it is the way of all fathers. Good day."
Paulo watched her go before searching out Secundus. "She is a nice little thing," he said. Sec looked blank. "Robert's Miss Chalmers. She would very well for him, I think."
"You do, do you?"
"I think her father is not aware of all the ramifications" - Paulo rolled the word off his tongue with a touch of justified pride - "of marrying into the honored family of the elder Alcester. He forbids the match."
"He does, does he?" Sec looked up from the letter he'd been doing his best to decipher. "Robert isn't good enough for his little girl?"
"It is not, I believe, that Robert isn't good enough for a precious daughter. It's more that he is not wealthy enough."
"Paulo, you're a cynical soul." Sec's eyes narrowed, and the cynicism sounded in his voice. "Surely Chalmers wouldn't blight love's young joy for the want of a few pounds in the three percents?"
"But it seems that he would, oh honored second son."
"Then," sighed Secundus, "I suppose I'd best go about setting up the trusts for my relatives. If I read this rightly" - he waved the letter - "I must go to London anyway. You've been asking about the London office. Now you may see for yourself why I'll find it a dead bore."
"Often and often we've discovered that what you find a bore I find quite interesting," soothed Paulo. "Perhaps this is another such case."
Secundus studied Paulo's face. It was perfectly bland, the eyes steady and giving nothing away, but Secundus's suspicions were roused. "Hmmm." Paulo's teeth flashed in a grin. "Hmmhumm. I see." Paulo tipped his head, questioningly. "Well, perhaps I see ... Poor Gubby," Sec added, his eyes twinkling. "He arrives today and we must tell him we leave for London one day very soon. The man will be quite bewildered by such antics."
"You may tell him you require him to be responsible for your family while we are gone."
"Perhaps I will just to see his look of horror. What fun." Secundus handed Paulo the letter. "See what you make of those hen scratches. I can't read the half of it." They reached a conclusion concerning the business just as the forecourt filled with such racket it drew them into the hall.
Sir Augustus Falconer had arrived. He drove a curricle, with a tiger on the step. Following, was a closed carriage from which an upper servant descended, his nose quite out of joint at the lack of pretension in the house to which they'd come. Then came a more serviceable carriage for the baggage. Behind that was a long dray pulled by six sturdy beasts and filled to capacity with boxes and bundles of all shapes and sizes. Secundus took one look and doubled over laughing. He controlled himself, took another look, and, weakened by more laughter, turned to lean against the door frame.
<#FROWN:P15\>
Noel turned to Lydia. "Since we didn't have any warning, I'm going to need time to get things ready for you in the office." She headed out of the room.
Kate looked at Lydia. "What's this about not knowing I was coming? Didn't Rebecca call you?
"No," Lydia said.
Kate shook her head. "I don't believe this. I was told Rebecca had set everything up."
"That's some company you work for," Lydia observed. "Are you going to last? I don't want to get involved with this book again if you're not going to be around to see it through."
"I've been there twelve years," Kate said. "I'm not going to leave now."
Lydia smiled. "Okay, it's a deal. It's not my style to leave something unfinished. Gracia - see if Kate would like anything. I'll be back in a minute."
As soon as Lydia was out of earshot, Gracia turned to Kate. "Oh, Se<*_>n-tilde<*/>orita Weston, I am so glad you have come! The Se<*_>n-tilde<*/>ora has been working on the book for such a long time and it has made her so unhappy."
Kate smiled. "I can see how it could be discouraging," she said.
"Gary - Se<*_>n-tilde<*/>or Steiner," Gracia continued, "has known the Se<*_>n-tilde<*/>ora a great many years. He writes the Se<*_>n-tilde<*/>ora's show and is very talented. He wants to help her. I wrote down his telephone number." She pulled a slip of paper from her pocket.
"Thank you," Kate said, "this is helpful."
The next moment, Noel and Lydia reentered the room, and Gracia left.
While Kate waited patiently, Noel and Lydia began to go over Lydia's appointments for the coming weeks. Then there was a loud buzzer-like noise in the kitchen. Lydia looked in that direction and frowned, waiting.
A moment later, Gracia came out and grimaced. "It is Mr. Mortimer Pallsner. He is here," she said.
"He says it is an emergency, Se<*_>n-tilde<*/>ora."
"Mort?" Noel exclaimed. "Why is he here?"
Lydia turned to Noel. "Noel," she said, "you are to take Kate upstairs and you are not - under any circumstances - to come back down until he leaves. Do you understand me?"
Noel nodded.
"Kate," Lydia said, turning to her. "You are to go upstairs with Noel - and under no circumstances are you to allow her to come downstairs until he's gone. Do you understand?"
"Not in the least," Kate said, "but I'll do it."
"Oh, baby," Noel said, smiling, walking over and picking up Kate's briefcase for her, "but you do learn fast."
"Who's Mort?" Kate asked, as they went upstairs.
"The executive producer of Cassandra's World," Noel replied, leading Kate to a large room that was surprisingly cozy, with a double bed, desk, couch, and by the window, a little tea table for two.
Since she was alone with Noel, Kate took the opportunity to grill her about Lydia for the book. Did she have a special diet?
No, Lydia had a basic food plan. Junk food, soda pop, caffeine, white sugar didn't exist in Lydia's world. You could wave a candy bar in her face and she wouldn't see it.
How much did Lydia sleep?
On her own, at least eight hours. When she was working, sometimes as little as four.
Did Lydia color her hair?
A few highlights.
Did Lydia work out?
Did she!
Noel led Kate down the hall to a tremendous exercise room with every exercise machine Kate had ever seen.
"She works out at least an hour every day," Noel said, "most often two." She stopped suddenly, cocking her head.
For a moment, Kate couldn't hear anything. And then, from the front hall, she heard Lydia say, "Mort, the door is this way." Then she heard a loud smack.
"Lydia hit him!" Noel whispered with glee.
"Thanks again for stopping by, Mort," Kate heard Lydia say, and the front door slammed so hard Kate could feel the floor shake.
Mark Fiducia had been astonished when Sarah ran into his office to say that Lydia Southland was on the phone, demanding to talk to someone other than Rebecca about Kate.
"Is this Mark Faith and Trust?" she had said.
"Excuse me?" Mark said.
"Isn't that what Fiducia means, in Italian?" she said.
He laughed. "Yes, yes, it does."
"Okay," she said then, "enough chitchat. Tell me about Kate Weston."
"She's the best, Ms. Southland," Mark was quick to say. "I'd choose her over any editor in town. She also knows how the house has messed up with your manuscript - that's why she's there."
Lydia laughed. "I like you, Mr. Faith and Trust," she said. "Thank you."
Now Kate had been gone only a day and Mark was already bored. There was no one to overhear on the phone saying, "You may speak to me that way, but you are never, ever to speak to any secretary of this company in that tone of voice again. They work hard for next to nothing, so pick on someone your own size!" Then there would be a burst of laughter from Kate and, "Exactly! I don't want her job, you don't want her job, so don't convince her that she doesn't want it. Somebody has to answer the phone!" A breath, then, "Now, about your latest brilliant book ..."
Oh, Kate, Mark thought, we need you. With Kate away, there was no one to come into his office, close the door and collapse on the floor, declaring that her love life would kill her for sure. Mark loved it because then he could see that Kate was less than the perfect person he otherwise thought she was. Take Harris Pondfield, her current boyfriend, and her struggle about whether or not to marry him. The complaints Kate made about him were almost identical to the ones she'd made about all her previous boyfriends. She always dated stuffed shirts, and yet she never saw the correlation. It seemed incredible to Mark.
Of course, Mark was hardly in a position to judge the way Kate conducted her love life. His wife had left him the past year - for a wealthy Wall Street broker. Afterward, Mark had been a total mess.
He'd gotten through it only because of Kate. She listened to his bitter, rage-filled rantings. She called him at home to make sure he ate. She gave him encouragement to believe in himself again. "Now you're free to be who you are," she said. "You don't have to dress to please anyone but yourself anymore."
He had always made himself look the way his wife had wanted him to. So, with Kate's support, he stopped the torture of shaving twice a day and let his beard grow. He put his contact lenses away and was fitted for the kind of horn-rimmed glasses he'd always preferred. And he left the suits his wife had liked in the closet and went shopping for tweed jackets.
Depression about their personal lives was part of what had drawn Mark and Kate so close - and the fact that they were two talented editors working at a company that seemed to be falling down around their ears. Mark could stand it as long as Kate was there. He didn't know how long he could last without her.
"Excuse me ... Mark?"
He looked up to see Sarah standing in the doorway. He checked his watch. "You should get going," he said. "It's late."
"I'm going in a few minutes," Sarah said, "but I just talked to Kate and I thought you'd like to know that everything's going well with Lydia Southland now."
"Great," he said.
"So well, in fact," Sarah said, "she's becoming a part of Lydia's entourage. They're on their way to the studio as we speak."
At the studio, Lydia explained to Kate, they would be reshooting the final scenes of the Calamity Jane episode, the cliff-hanger to end the season.
The car stopped in front of a large trailer and a good-looking man in his early forties came out to meet them.
"There's Gary," Noel said.
Lydia smiled. "Hi," she said when he opened the door for her.
"Hi, Lyddie." He kissed her on the cheek as she got out then looked a bit startled when Kate emerged behind Noel.
"My new editor," Lydia said, "Kate Weston, this is Gary Steiner, our head writer."
Ah, ha. The man Gracia had urged Kate to see about Lydia's book.
"Kate, it's wonderful to meet you," he said, shaking her hand. He had warm brown eyes and wavy brown hair.
"Nice to meet you too," she said. Under her breath, she added, "Gracia said you might be interested in helping on the book."
"Somebody had better," he whispered back. "It's awful."
Lydia swung into work at once, and Kate was amazed at the pace she set. By the middle of the evening, after listening to Gary and Lydia go over line changes, meeting the producers and the rest of the crew, and watching the filming of several scenes, Kate was starting to fade - until they called a dinner break.
She helped herself to portions of everything on the buffet table. Then she noticed Lydia's plate, which had a little tossed salad on it. She looked up and found Lydia smiling at her.
"I don't like to eat after six-thirty," the actress said. "I'm never sure if I'll be up late enough to burn it off."
Oh. Another reason Lydia looked the way she did. Kate made a note of it.
"So how do you like the world of an actress?" Lydia asked Kate around midnight, yawning, pulling off her cowboy boots in the back of the car.
"I wonder how you do it," Kate said.
"I am paid very well to do it."
"But none of this is in your autobiography," Kate said. "You say next to nothing about what your work is like."
"The only thing any other editor has cared about," Noel said, "is juicy gossip: Who were the men in Lydia's life? Who's on drugs? Who stole from whom? You know, the usual."
Kate looked at Lydia. "Is that true?"
Lydia nodded.
"Do you want to write about your work?"
"Of course," Lydia said, exasperated, "but I've had those nincompoops to deal with and we never got anywhere."
"Oh, Lydia," Noel said, "you got somewhere - you managed to trash everybody in town." Noel turned to Kate. "And she thinks she's going to walk on two legs after the book comes out."
"How will you be able to work with people after all the things you have written about them," Kate asked.
Lydia sighed. "This fall will be my last season - and then I retire. Good-bye public life ... and good riddance."
Kate looked at Noel.
"Bummer, isn't it?" Noel said. "But as you overheard at the house earlier, Mort Pallsner didn't like the news either."
Ah, Kate thought, that explained the mystery of the slammed door.
"I don't know what to think," Kate said to Mark on the telephone from her hotel room the next morning. "I've known Lydia less than eighteen hours and I've never been so confused in my life. She says she wants to write the book, she never wanted to write the book, she loves acting, she hates acting, she's leaving the show - I don't know what to make of it!"
Mark was laughing, and Kate knew exactly how he looked; hair a little messy, tie loose. She smiled at the image. She missed him.
"Rebecca's moving forward and selling the book as if a manuscript has already been delivered," Mark said.
She would. So if Kate failed to bring the book back it would be disaster for B,F&C - and for Kate.
The other line on her phone was ringing. She said a quick good-bye to Mark and answered it, just as someone knocked on her door.
"Hi, honey," Harris Pondfield said.
Kate could visualize how Harris would look this morning too; gray banker's suit, pale blue shirt, blue and gray tie. As he talked to her on his speaker phone, he would be taking off his jacket and hanging it up.
<#FROWN:P16\>
Destiny
He's far too young for her. He's silly. But he's sexy. And if he keeps insisting on being Mr. Right, she might have to take him seriously.
You're feeling old as you deliver your talk to the college physics class. Old and jaded. You look out over the rows of eager young faces, thinking of how much you remind yourself of all the other women you know in their midthirties. You pretend to be more cheerful than you actually are. You talk about aerobics more than you do it and dress a lot younger than you ought to. You're someone these students would never understand.
The talk you're giving is part of a career seminar - really, a sales pitch for cheap labor for the company you work for. Afterward, one of the boys in the class approaches you - David. He says hello with a self-assured grin. His perfect adolescent body towers over yours. You watch the arteries pulse in his neck. Eloquent, he says of your speech. As he talks, he blushes. He is impressed with your wit and your intelligence. Would you like to go out for pizza?
You have to get back to work, approve some press releases, answer your phone messages. "Sure," you say. "I'd love to." David seems so genuine, so unblemished, and you like the idea of just sitting and talking for a while with someone who isn't suspicious of you. You want to believe all men started out this way.
AT THE PIZZA PARLOR, you watch David eat, cramming piece after piece into his mouth as fast as he can. It is awesome to you that a person can be so immersed in eating. You have the feeling that he is not only hungry but driven, as though he would eat anything.
You sip on your soda as he continues his attack. He orders another shake. Occasionally, his eyes move up from the plate, in deference to your presence. "You bored?" he says.
"No," you say.
He shrugs his shoulders, smiling as he finishes the last piece, wipes his mouth with several small paper napkins. Folding his hands in front of him, he looks at you with new interest, as though you have just arrived. He looks at you like you are food.
It's then that you invite him over for dinner. This seems innocent enough. You just want to watch him eat again, marvel at the passion of it.
It's innocent until after dinner, when you find yourself on his lap and he's kissing you like you're the next course, which is suddenly just what you want to be.
So you invite him to sleep over. Your relationship with guilt is of the all-or-nothing variety, so if you're going to feel guilty anyway, as you know you are, then you might as well get something out of it.
In the morning you ask him how old he is. Eighteen, he says. Eighteen, to your thirty-six. You were hoping for twenty-one. Not that this would make much of a difference, except that now you're wondering if you could actually go to jail.
In an effort to encourage him to see this as a one-night stand, you make some comment about those lucky college girls he goes to school with. You sound more awkward than you'd hoped, so you keep talking. You tell him about your marriage - how it lasted just a few scant months, how you no longer trust romance. You've been divorced longer than you were even married.
"Listen," he interrupts, "I know what you're getting at. But I'm not that kind of a guy. I mean, I fall in love with someone and that's it. No more college girls for me."
You understand that he is confused, that it is sex he's in love with, not you. But the more you think about this, the more confused you become. You want to see him again - just one more time, you tell yourself - and you begin to feel the overwhelming need to confess.
You choose the receptionist at work - Lisa, another eighteen-year-old. She, too, is sweet and pure, and she owes you - you're keeping her from getting fired.
You whisper the story of your escapade to her in a corner of the coffee room, watch her tiny features assume a grave and grown-up expression.
"Maybe this will be good for you, Cynthia," she says. "Maybe this will mellow you out."
She's missed your point entirely, how you've so shamelessly acted out a fantasy that can't possibly continue. You begin to wonder if she isn't really as incompetent as everyone else seems to think, but you can't think of any appropriate response, so you thank her and smile in an awkward sort of way, feeling very much like an adolescent yourself.
BEFORE YOU KNOW IT, you've got David's dirty socks and underwear in your laundry hamper. He apologizes, but keeps forgetting to take them with him. The Pop-Tarts he eats for breakfast are out on your kitchen counter.
You're always buying the wine for dinner because David's not old enough to buy it himself. He's not used to drinking it yet either, so when he does, his face flushes and he says things like, "True love never dies."
This embarrasses you and you tell him to stop, that he's just deluding himself. Of course, he doesn't believe you.
"DO YOU LOVE ME?" David's been asking you. Love? Well, maybe you do. Or could. You do, after all, have a lot in common. You both read, and so what if he's reading Ulysses while you're on Jackie Collins.
He is smarter than you. You can't even remember all the names of his scholarships and awards. So it flatters you that he wants you anyway, that he wants you all the time.
Once, before dinner, he said you were the first truly passionate woman he'd ever known, and then he looked at you in a way that made you feel like hot pie filling oozing out the seams of the crust. The hell with dinner, you thought. What could food possibly mean in the face of such passion? So you led him into the bedroom, both of you groping in the dark.
It intrigues you that someone can be so interested, make you feel so much younger than you are. It is the way you always wished you could have felt when you were really as young as you feel now.
You realize that you're becoming exactly what you used to complain about most in men. They had one-track minds, their interest stopped where your neck began. You don't care about David's brilliant mind, at least not in comparison to the rest of him. You feel as though you're using him to satisfy something insatiable. You wonder if you'll start thinking about him the same way you think about your job. You're overpaid, so it keeps you there, in a place you'd rather not be.
ONE AFTERNOON David says he wants to have a serious talk. Great, you say, they're your favorite kind. He looks at you with an expression of longing that makes you want to roll your eyes and laugh. You don't know exactly what he's going to say, but already you're trivializing it, you realize, the same way men have so often trivialized you and your serious talks.
He's making you dinner, at your apartment, before the talk. He says it's going to be gourmet.
It's spaghetti, with some kind of clear garlic sauce and broccoli, pineapple, and raisins on top. For dessert, there's lime Jell-O with Chinese pea pods and artichoke hearts. "I've always wanted to try something different with Jell-O," he says, scooping a large lump of it onto your plate. He watches you as you eat it.
You can't believe how many bowls and pans he's gone through, the dirty spoons sticking to the counters, the stovetop freckled with grease. The kitchen never looks this way when you cook. You're a wiper, a cleaner-as-you-go, an everything-in-its-place kind of person.
David says he wants to talk about the future. He tells you he's not like any of those men you're always complaining about. He doesn't need to be in control or to argue with you. He can talk about his feelings. Ask him anything, he says, anything at all about his feelings and he'll tell you.
But you already know what his feelings are. It's yours that nobody's talking about. Right now you have only one feeling - fear - which you're going to keep to yourself and hope that it goes away.
He's not one of those men who expects to be taken care of, he continues. When he moves in with you, he'll cook and he'll clean and you'll have a lot less work on your hands than you do right now.
Fear is not strong enough for what you're feeling now. You tell him he's not moving in, that he's too young to know what he really wants.
Don't underestimate him, he says; he's probably the only man you've ever known who really appreciates you.
Maybe he's right, you think, but you don't say that. His momentum seems large enough on its own.
He says he's going back to his dorm room. When you kiss him good-bye, his neck smells like soap. His skin is smooth, unblemished. He kisses your eyes. You're aware of the webbing of lines around them, and that he must see it, too, and you're wondering if he is trying to kiss it away, to somehow wish you younger.
You turn off the lights and get into bed, but the streetlight leaks in. You can see a pair of David's socks balled up on the floor and there's one of his physics demonstrations on your bookshelf - a spoon and a fork clamped together, suspended on a matchstick on the rim of a glass. It looks impossible, as though there is some kind of magic involved. But it's just physics, he's said, a demonstration of the center of gravity. He's explained to you why the sky is blue, why gravity makes you shrink. The room seems filled with him, even though he's gone. You're afraid of closing your eyes, afraid of losing him if you do.
AT HOME THAT EVENING, David asks if you'd like to meet his parents.
Of course not. You wouldn't dream of it. In your opinion this kind of thing is best kept hidden.
Well, his parents are already on their way, somewhere in the air between Iowa and Oakland. Do you want to deprive him of seeing his parents?
No, of course not. See them all you want to, you say. You'll stay home for a few weeks. There's a lot on TV you've been missing.
"Just dinner," he says. "Just one dinner."
You're not hungry, you say, and probably won't be for a while. At least for two weeks, maybe forever.
"Coffee, then," he says.
"No."
"A drink?"
HIS PARENTS, Rick and Adelle, are pleasant midwestern people. Rick is wearing jeans with Birkenstocks and a short-sleeved shirt with parrots on it. Adelle looks crisp in white wash-and-wear. Her auburn hair is parted in the middle, blunt cut at chin length. You keep staring at the hair, inspecting it for gray, hoping she is older than you.
No one is saying much. "Highball?" Rick says, unmistakably to you. "Oh, come on, have one. It's on me."
"Maybe a little later," you tell him, conscious of trying to smile sweetly, like someone much younger might smile.
You're not sure how much later it is that the room is swimming before your eyes. David's father has been talking to you about the sixties, when there was so much peace and love and freedom, that 'anything goes' kind of feeling. You suppose he's trying to tell you that he accepts you, that it's all right with him that you've deflowered his son.
Adelle is starting to look rumpled. There's a tuft of hair falling the wrong way across her part.
<#FROWN:P17\>
The Stranger's Surprise
None of them would ever forget the outcome of this unusual man's Christmas Eve visit.
By Ilse Stanley
"All set, Mr. Harris," said the garage attendant, closing the door of the car. "Merry Christmas!"
"Merry Christmas to you, George," said Mike Harris, and handed him a generous tip for the occasion.
Then he set out for his home on Long Island. He felt pretty good. The office party hadn't been too boring and now there was nothing to worry about but the possibility that he might have forgotten one or two presents for his family. On the back seat was a heap of packages. Now let me see, he thought, the coat for Mildred was to have been delivered. One - two - yup. I think I got everything. And for the children - Well, he knew he had bought more than he had intended to buy. But then, Christmas wouldn't be Christmas if one bought only the things that one set out to buy.
Mike Harris drove along the East Side Franklin Roosevelt Drive toward the Triborough Bridge. Lucky, he thought, just beat the traffic by half an hour. On the bridge, he stayed in the right lane. It was not only the least used but led to his exit on Long Island. He paid his toll, turned on the radio and listened to the news. The commentator warned repeatedly about speeding on the highways, recalled the enormous casualties of previous years, pleaded with drivers to slow their pace.
I certainly will, thought Mike. I'm in no hurry. Amused, he watched other drivers cutting in and out. Silly, he thought. How much time can they save? If they're racing to the airport they should have left earlier to make a plane. There was no one in front of him, the right lane being almost devoid of traffic.
Suddenly Mike stared at the road ahead, startled. There were no cars before him for a couple of hundred yards, but a man loomed up in his view, walking along the road as though he were taking a stroll in a quiet country lane. Mike sounded his horn frantically, but the man was either drunk or deaf, because he did not react. He continued his leisurely pace.
Mike slammed on his brakes, but could not prevent his left fender from striking the man slightly. The shove caused him to stumble, but he did not fall. Traffic began to pile up behind and horns blared.
Mike got out of his car.
"What the devil do you think you're doing?" he demanded. "Do you want to get run over? If you have to get plastered, why don't you pick a quiet street, like Eighth Avenue?"
The man looked almost indignant. "I am not drunk, sir," he said quietly, as though nothing had happened. "I am sober."
Mike felt like calling down all the imprecations listed in the Unabridged. Grab hold of yourself, he thought. Don't forget the Christmas spirit.
"Look, my good man," he managed to say, "don't you know it's suicide to walk along a bridge like this? Aside from the fact that it's against the law. The first cop driving by would arrest you."
"That would be quite all right, sir," said the man.
The cars stacked up behind them were blowing their horns frantically.
"Never mind," Mike said; "just get in the car. We'll have that out later. But it's a hell of a way to hitch a ride."
The man got in, an almost-satisfied smile on his face.
Mike grew a bit suspicious. "What was your purpose in doing that?" he asked. "Are you trying to stage a holdup? I don't have much money on me, you know. Besides, you shouldn't do that on Christmas; it's against all ethics."
"I'm not attempting a holdup, sir," said the man.
"Well, what's the idea of walking along a busy highway?"
"I want to get some attention," said the man. "Are you very angry at me, sir?"
Mike had enough. He was looking for the first exit. "I'd better get you to the nearest hospital," he said. "You might be hurt, after all. Perhaps it would be best if you had a checkup."
"Oh, no," said the man. "I am quite all right, I assure you. You did not strike me very hard, and it certainly was worth it."
"Worth it!" ejaculated Mike. "What's wrong with you? I have a lot of patience because it's Christmas, but this sounds crazy. Are you crazy?" he asked. "Escape from Bellevue, perhaps? Do you have amnesia? Or do you know who you are?"
The man smiled. "I know who I am, sir. Oh, I have not introduced myself. My name is Higgins - A. H. Higgins."
"Glad to meet you," said Mike dryly. "My name is Michael Harris. On second thought, I'm not so sure I'm glad to meet you. The setting is rather unusual. Tell me, how did you get there, anyway?"
"I took a cab," said the man, "from the other side of the bridge. I asked the driver to let me out in the middle. He thought it was a bit odd, but I told him that I was waiting for a friend to pick me up in his car. So he let me out and I started to walk."
"But why?" asked Michael. "Did you want to commit suicide?"
"Oh, no, sir," said A. H. Higgins. "I told you, I just wanted to get some attention."
"You could have easily got more than you bargained for," said Mike. "I happen to be a careful driver; I was only doing about 25 or 30. If somebody came flying along at 60 you would have been a goner. Do you realize that?"
"Even that would have paid, sir, as long as I felt it. I mean, just so I would have remained alive long enough to realize that people were standing around and showing me some attention."
"That's a rotten way to die. In order to get attention!" said Mike. "Why are you so set on getting attention?"
"I never have it," he said simply.
"What do you mean?" asked Michael.
"I never gave it any thought until my doctor mentioned it."
"Your doctor? Then you are ill!"
"No, not exactly. Oh, I had sometimes felt tired and listless. Everyone feels that way now and then. Well, the doctor told me my heart was kind of weak."
"Too much work and too little relaxation, I suppose?"
"Almost exactly his words. Only he said 'too little diversion.' I should take some vitamin pills and get a little attention."
"Did it help?"
"Well, my heart doesn't bother me. I take the vitamin pills, but nobody's shown me any attention. So I thought this Christmas I'd give myself the present of making someone really mad at me."
"Make someone mad at you? Why?"
"Because if someone is mad at you, he's bound to give you some attention," said Mr. Higgins. "Of course, it didn't quite work out," he added a bit sadly, "because you aren't really mad at me, are you, sir?"
"No, I'm not. But that hasn't anything to do with you. I'm just content with the work I've done and the fact that I'm going home."
"That's one of the points I was making," said Mr. Higgins. "When you get home you'll receive a lot of attention, won't you?"
Mike laughed. "Yes. Mostly because of the packages behind me in the car."
"It's worth it," said Mr. Higgins. "I wish I had some packages to pack."
"Don't you have any money to buy some?"
"Oh, yes," said Mr. Higgins. "I have enough money - I've a good bank account. I just don't have anyone for whom I could buy presents. And since no one has any particular reason for liking me, I thought I might at least get some attention by having someone mad at me."
They were by now well on their way out on Long Island.
"Look," said Mike, "I'm probably taking you out of your way. Where do you live?"
"I live in New York; in Manhattan, sir. But it does not matter. I can always take a train back."
"Why?" asked Mike. "Is it worth the ride you're taking with me?"
"Oh, yes," said Mr. Higgins. "Not just the ride, but I can't remember when anyone spoke so many words to me in such a short time. I mean, gave me so much attention. You have asked at least six questions which showed your interest in me. No one else has ever shown sufficient interest in me to ask six questions."
"That's ridiculous," said Mike. "It's beyond me."
"I can understand that," nodded Mr. Higgins. "Nevertheless, it is the truth."
"You have a fixed idea there," said Mike. "Let's analyze this question. You say nobody gives you any attention. Aren't you married?"
"No," said Mr. Higgins.
Mike glanced at him. A. H. Higgins was a rather good-looking man, about 50 years old, hair beginning to turn gray at the temples. He was dressed in good taste, businesslike, and immaculately clean.
"Why aren't you married?" asked Mike. "I realize, of course, that it's none of my concern, but since you like attention, I thought I might as well ask. I can't say that you haven't made me curious."
"Your curiosity makes me very happy," said Mr. Higgins gratefully. "It is difficult to explain why I did not marry. I have thought about ifit often. When I was young, I was too busy. I come from a small family. I studied; worked in the evening in order to be able to go on studying. I never knew my father; he died when I was very young and I helped my mother along. Then I got a good job and felt it was the wrong time to get married; I had to concentrate on getting ahead."
"What do you do?" asked Mike.
"I am a bank manager," said Mr. Higgins modestly.
"A bank manager?" Mike was stunned. "And you don't get any attention?"
"No. I give attention, but I never receive it. People are only interested in a bank manager when they want a check cashed or something like that."
"Why don't you go out sometimes? Have a good time? You make good money, don't you?"
"Oh, yes, sir, I have a very good income. But I've never known how to spend it."
"Well, there are ways, you know," said Michael, laughing.
"Oh, yes, I know. But you see, I am shy. It was difficult for me to get acquainted with women. I did not know anybody."
"But you business associates?"
"Well," said Mr. Higgins thoughtfully. "I guess I am not a very gregarious or entertaining fellow. People like to invite bachelors when they can make themselves useful at parties; when they can tell funny stories, or entertain the ladies, or mix good drinks. I was never very good at either category. I was invited to parties once or twice, but I sat around in a corner feeling awkward, knowing I was boring company. Why would people invite a man who bores their guests?"
Mike shook his head. This was a completely new world to him. He had never been alone. One of six children, he was accustomed to company, parties, had flirted with his sisters' friends, competed with his brothers once or twice for the favors of their girl friends and had always busied himself in his parents' home giving and receiving joy and - as Mr. Higgins called it - attention. He often felt he was receiving too much of it; had too little privacy, too little quiet, too little relaxation. But he was too intelligent to complain about love. It was incomprehensible to him that a human being could exist who was so lonesome, so completely isolated that he had to walk along a busy highway in order to gain some attention.
"You see, sir, I am boring you," said Higgins.
"No," Michael said, "you're not boring me; I was just thinking.
<#FROWN:P18\>
A recipe for love.
After her divorce from Stan, Tess sewed little black bows all over her sneakers. She wore them everywhere - to work, to her son Nick's seventh-grade basketball games, to parent meetings at four-year-old Robbie's daycare center.
"Why black?" Gary asked.
She grinned. "I'm in mourning. More or less."
Less, Gary decided, and proposed to her the next night.
"Absolutely not," she said. "I'm going to become a nun."
He kissed her. "Be serious, Tess. I want to spend the rest of my life with youryou."
She laughed and patted his cheek. "I had twelve years of serious with Stan. That's enoughtenough."
"The boys need a man around the house. Have you thought about that?" He took her hand.
"I'm doing just fine on my own," she said with conviction.
But Gary couldn't leave it alone. He felt like he was 16 and in love for the first time. All he thought about was Tess, with her big smile and slanting green eyes. She made him feel happy just being alive.
He started meeting her at Nick's basketball games. Gary sat beside Tess, himhis arm looped over her shoulder. Robbie curled up at her feet and drew pictures on old envelopes. Sometimes, Stan was at the games, too, sitting by himself. Gary saw how Tess's face got red when she looked at him. He squeezed her hand and she moved closer to him.
"Marry me," he whispered, holding her.
She traced his jawline with her finger, smiling. "We'll see."
"Just say yes and get it over with. I'm serious, Tess."
"I know. You're always serious."
The next morning, Gary dropped by her place on his way to work. Nick answered the door.
"Mom, your boyfriend's here," the boy called, then turned and walked back to the kitchen. Gary noticed Nick's long toes; they must come from Stan, he thought. Tess had short, stubby toes, which he wanted to tickle whenever he saw them.
Tess appeared at the kitchen doorway. "Gary, hi. Would you help Robbie change his shirt? He soaked it plaingplaying in the sink."
He loved the way she never missed a beat. "Sure," he answered.
He found Robbie under his bed, playing with blocks. Gary squatted down. "Come on out and let me change your shirt, sport."
"No!" Robbie squirmed. "I'm gonna stay here all day. Mommy's not gonna make the pie."
"I'm sure she'll make it when she gets a chance."
"No, she won't." His voice was hurt. "She said she wouldn't, and she never changes her mind."
Gary reached under the bed for the boy's arm. "Come on out and I'll make sure you get your pie. I promise."
Robbie slid out, and Gary touched the front of the boy's shirt. "You're pretty wet, sport." It struck him then that he loved Robbie almost as much as Tess. It wasn't just Tess he wanted to marry, it was the whole family. He gave Robbie a sudden hug, wet shirt and all.
It wasn't until Gary had changed Robbie and brushed his hair that he thought to ask what kind of pie.
The boy looked up at him, his eyes sparkling just like Tess's. "Popcorn pie."
Gary frowned. "Never heard of it."
"You have to," Robbie sang, running out the door. "You promised!"
Gary followed him into the kitchen. Tess was standing at the stove. He went up behind her and ran his hands down her arms. "How about making some popcorn pie?"
She turned her head sharply; her face was bright red. "Who told you about popcorn pie?"
"Robbie. He said he wanted one. I'll make it if you give me the recipe."
She shook her head. "Sorry. No can do."
He was startled to hear her giggle as she turned back to the stove. A knob of anger formed in his chest. "Come on, Tess, tell me. I promised Robbie."
"It's a family joke," she said.
The way she said 'family' made him angry. She was excluding him. He made his voice cold. "I hope someday you'll trust me."
She shook her head, swallowing laughter. "Don't be mad, Gary." She pulled him toward her. "Kiss me."
For a minute, he didn't want to, but her warm lips made him forget everything. When she pulled away, he forced himself to look at his watch. "I have to run."
Robbie confronted him at the door. "She's not gonna make it, is she?"
"Not today, sport." He put his hand on the small head. "Tell you what. I'll talk to her again tomorrow night."
It came to Gary that night while he was watching TV. He would make a popcorn pie for Robbie. He could already see the boy's eyes shine as he presented the pie. It was a crazy thing to do - he didn't even have a recipe. But he wanted to show Robbie he was part of the family, too, that he could share the family fun.
He stayed up late, experimenting, rolling out the crust, popping the corn and then caramelizing it so it would stick together, baking it until the crust was golden brown. When it cooled, he packed it into a box.
He was tired at work the next day. But just the idea of showing the pie to Tess kept him smiling all morning. He felt juiced up, full of his surprise.
Tess called at noon.
"Marry me," he said, his opening line whenever they spoke these days.
"No, Gary. Listen." Her voice cracked. "You can't come over tonight. Something's come up. I can't explain."
"Tess, you owe me an explanation!" he protested.
"I know, I'm sorry, Gary, really. Don't be mad."
But he was mad, furious. Once again, Tess was pushing him away. It was time to put his foot down, make her decide once and for all if she wanted him in her life. But how could he get through to her?
Suddenly, he knew what he would do. He would take the popcorn pie over to her apartment. It was for Robbie, after all; she wouldn't keep him from giving it to the boy. He'd camp out at her doorstep until she let him in. She'd have to talk to him then.
At Tess's door, he lifted the pie out of the box, took a deep breath, and rang the bell.
Nick opened the door.
Gary forced himself to keep smiling. He felt foolish, standing there holding a pie in his hands. "Hi. Where's Robbie?" he asked.
Nick scowled. "In his room. You can't come in." His voice dropped and his scowl deepened. "Dad was here."
"Stan?" Gary stepped past Nick into the narrow hall that led to the kitchen. "What was he doing here? Where's your mother?" But he didn't wait for the answer, just rushed through the kitchen, dropping the pie onto the counter as he ran by.
In the living room, Tess was hunched on the couch, arms around her knees. He couldn't see her face, but he could hear her cyringcrying.
"Tess?" he said gently.
She raised her head. "Gary." She swallowed. "What are you doing here? I told you not to come."
"What was Stan doing here?" He planted his feet firmly on the carpet. "That's why you told me not to come, isn't it? You knew he was coming."
She looked away from him. "It has nothing to do with you."
"It has everytingeverything to do with me." The words were like little iron pellets he had to spit from his mouth. "I have to know where I stand with you, Tess. Do you still love him?"
She sighed. "I don't know. He wants us to get back together. He says it's best for the boys. I said I'd think about it."
Gary sat down beside her, took her hand.
"Is that what you want?" he asked.
"Like Stan said, there are other considerations." Tears rolled out of her eyes.
He realized that he was probably going to lose her. For weeks, he'd been asking her to marry him, but she'd never given him any reason to think she'd say yes. StangelyStrangely, he didn't feel sad. All he wanted at that moment was to see her smile again. Suddenly, unexpectedly, her happiness had become more important than his own.
"Look," he said, "if it'll help, I'll leave. I'll give you all the space you need."
She took a deep breath. "Thanks, Gary." She smiled weakly. "Would you midmind holding me a minute?"
He put his arms around her, and something loosendloosened in his chest. Love, he realized, wasn't something you had to nail down. Love was light and spacious; there was room for patience in it, room for laughter, room for letting go.
Just then, Robbie's voice sounded from the kitchen, high and urgent. "Mommy! Come look!"
Tess stood up and Gary followed her into the kitchen, where they found Robbie perched on a stool, pointing at the pie. Tess stood with her hand to her mouth.
"What is it?" asked Robbie.
"It's a popcorn pie," Gary said. "I made it for you."
"That's not popcorn pie!" He slid off the stool, pouting. "You said you'd get Mommy to make it," he said, stomping out of the kitchen.
Tess spun to face Gary. "You actually made a pie out of popcorn?"
He was surprised to see her grinning widely, her eyes dancing. He shrugged. "So I'm not the world's greatest cook," he said sheepishly.
"Popcorn pie's not food. It's a code name for getting pregnant." She erupted in a burst of laughter. "My family's always called it that," she finally managed to say. "All that bouncing around the baby does inside - it feels like you're popping corn."
He had trouble finding his voice. "You mean Robbie wanted you to get pregnant?"
"He's at that age. Four year olds always want a baby brother or sister."
"Why didn't you tell me? I feel like an idiot," he said.
"No, it's great! It's the first really funny thing you've done!" She kissed his cheek. "I think I've been waiting all along for you to do something a little bit crazy like this."
He stared at her. Then a slow smile spread across his face. "I hope it's edible."
Tess laughed again. "Let's find out."
He shook his head. "notNot until I buy the champagne."
"Champagne and popcorn pie," she said, struggling to keep a serious face. "I thinthink it's time to take the bows off the sneakers."
He pulled her into his arms and kissed her then. Over her head, he saw the pie sitting on the counter. A fat knob of popcorn poked through the brown crust. It made Gary think of Tess's toes. He looked down at her bare feet and his fingers tingled.
Graduation
"The graduation service will be at ten," said Mrs. Angus. "That will be followed by a reception for the special guests of the graduates. Reverend Angus and I will be attending because of his part in the reception. You will be the guest of Pastor Barker."
Anna knew all that, but she smiled and nodded her head. Then an awful thought struck her.
"Does that mean I won't be sitting with you?" she queried.
"Oh, we can sit together for the service. At the reception we may need to sit at a separate table. I don't know the seating arrangements, but by then you will be with the Barker family, so you won't be deserted."
Near panic seized Anna. The Barker family. She had only thought of Mr. Austin Barker. She was sure she could feel reasonably comfortable with him. But his family? How many Barkers were there? Would she be among a whole group of strangers?
"Only his father and mother were able to come," went on Mrs. Angus. "He has three married sisters and a married brother. Austin is the youngest family member. Two of the girls are missionaries and the brother is a seminary professor."
If the words had been meant to encourage Anna, they had quite the opposite effect.
<#FROWN:P19\>
Infidelity. It's as old as marriage, and there are as many reasons for it as there are men - or women - to commit it. thereThere are no easy explanations for it. One expert will tell you it will destroy a relationship, and another will say it can save one. But there are two indisputable truths that I have learned from experience about infidelity: One is that if you want to understand your marriage, you must understand the reasons for its betrayal. The other is that each tale of infidelity is as unique as the person who has been hurt or healed.
My tale begins with a honey-smooth voice on the other end of the telephone line:
"Is Daniel in?" she would ask.
"No," I would answer.
"Well, when do you expect him?"
"Probably later on tonight."
A pause. "Would you tell him to call Shelia? He knows the number." Click.
I cringe now in embarrassment when I remember that typically 'Shelia' conversation. Her boldness and my naivete seem equally unbelievable. I wonder how I could have ignored the signs that my husband was having an affair, but I chose not to see - or in my case hear - the obvious. My husband is a well-known artist and teacher, and that voice was one of a dozen that regularly phoned him. So I ignored the significance of this particular voice - and the desperation that later began to characterize it.
How, I ask myself now, could I have been so foolishly trusting? But in the same breath I must admit the truth: I could not yet face the reality of the life I shared with my husband.
LIVING LIES
Each marriage has its own ebb and flow, but there are rhythms they have in common. I think what they sometimes call the seven-year itch is one of those common rhythms. Seven years mark the end of a certain era in marriage. You have been together for nearly a decade and have settled comfortably into each other's ways. But that seventh year - or a year or two before or after - can be one of false security. It was for me.
I was well satisfied with my life at that seven-year point. My husband and I had three sons. We were secure financially. I worked as a substitute teacher when I could, but mostly I stayed home with my children. Daniel and I were a 'happily married couple' and we did 'happily married couple' things: We danced together at appropriate times at the parties of similarly 'happily married' couples; we shopped together; we made joint visits to our sons' school. With our home in the suburbs and cherry-red Volvo station wagon, I felt I had an ideal life, the kind you used to see in 1950's sitcoms.
But within our marriage there was an emptiness that neither of us could face; there were the unspoken lies told by both of us - to ourselves and to each other.
My lie was that I completely defined myself and my happiness through other people. I was Daniel's wife, Sean, Winston and Danny, Jr.'s mother, Mr. and Mrs. Payne's daughter. When I married Daniel, I tucked away those parts of me that didn't fit into what I thought our marriage should be.
I am a musician. The Good Hope Baptist Church's substitute organist. I have played the piano since I was 6. I play by ear and by note, and people have always told me I am gifted.
I stopped playing when I married Daniel. Somehow there seemd to be room for only one artist in the family - the life of a musician didn't seem to fit with the kind of life we planned to live. Daniel loved me for my good sense, my practicality - not my artistic spirit. So I tucked away that musical part of me and it came out only when I played hymns on Sunday morning or when I hummed lullabies to my sons at night. We didn't even own a piano.
There were other parts of me that I let go too. I love jazz clubs, but Daniel hates them, so we never went. I love the mountains, but Daniel loves the ocean, so we spent vacations in the Caribbean. Daniel never demanded that I give up anything, but it seemed easier that way. We couldn't afford a piano; the Caribbean was cheaper; we couldn't find a baby-sitter. I was his 'wife' and it ended there.
Daniel lied, too. He was my 'husband,' and he defined his life as narrowly as I defined mine. We closed each other up in a closet of 'love' that nearly smothered us both. There was no spontaneity in our love - no authenticity.
So when I found out about Daniel's affair with Shelia, things changed forever between us. Maybe they couldn't have gotten any worse.
BETRAYAL
The telephone call that changed us came at two in the morning. I found out later it was from one of Shelia's sisters. I was dead asleep, but I vague heard him say "I've got to ..." He stopped, glanced at me and then stared at the wall. "I've got to go out for a while," he said quickly before I could awaken myself enough to ask another question. Curious, but too tired to care, I went back to an uneasy sleep.
I was awakened by the alarm at seven and saw Daniel sitting in a chair across from our bed, his head in his hands.
"There's something I have to tell you," he said. I sat up. The tone of his voice frightened me.
"You know Shelia, the woman who calls here sometimes ...?" he began. I could sense something was up.
"What about her?" I asked, suddenly alarmed.
"The call was from Shelia's sister. Shelia ... Shelia tried to kill herself last night. I just got back from the hospital."
I didn't get it at first. "Why did she call you?" I asked, innocently stupid.
"Lynda, we've ... I've been having an affair with her," he said softly, as if he were talking to a child. "I broke it off last night, I ..."
I stared at him blankly, and then suddenly it all came together - the voice, the working late, the excuses, the call last night. I felt sick.
"You son of a bitch!" I snarled with a ferocity that surprised even me. "You filthy son of a bitch!" I began hitting him with my fists and crying hard at the same time. I punched him as hard as I could - on his back, in his face, on his shoulders.
"How could you do this to me?" I was crying now so hard that my voice was coming in short, hard gasps. Daniel said nothing. One of my smacks had knocked his glasses to the floor, and they lay there reflecting the morning light that was streaming in through the window. He took my blows without flinching.
"How long have you been seeing her? How long have you been lying to me? No more lies, Daniel! No more lies!"
"Two years," he said softly.
I glared at him in disgust and disbelief. Without saying anything more, I pulled on my clothes as quickly as I could. I needed to get out, to get away from him.
I ran to my car and backed out of the driveway fast, without paying attention to signs or traffic, and I headed toward the highway. I needed to go someplace where I could think, where I could breathe; I felt as if I were choking.
I felt violated and foolish. A fool for not seeing sooner what was going on right in front of me. A fool for being happy when my husband was sleeping with another woman. But then another thought occurred to me. Maybe he really loved her. Was he going to leave me? My marriage was everything - my identity, my security, my life. What would I do if he left me for Shelia? I hadn't worked since the birth of my first child. How would I make a living?
My mind was a blank. I felt empty and stupid and used. I drove aimlessly, listening to tapes, crying, wasting time. When it was dark, I headed home.
When my key turned in the lock, I could hear my children running to the door.
"Mommy, where have you been all day?" my youngest son demanded to know. Guilt swept me as I kissed his forehead.
"Shopping," I said.
"Where are your bags?" my oldest son, always the detective, asked. I didn't say anything. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Daniel enter the room. I didn't look at him.
"I left some dinner for you in there on the stove," he said, trying to sound casual.
"Daddy made a coconut cake. He wouldn't let us have any 'til you took the first piece. Please cut it," my middle son eagerly said, dancing around me.
"Okay, tomorrow," I said to my sons. "You all go up and get ready for bed; it's way past your bedtime." I waited until the boys were out of earshot. "Asshole," I hissed under my breath to Daniel as I swept past him into the kitchen. I noisily scraped the plate he'd set aside for me into the garbage disposal, and then I went in to kiss my sons good night. After I'd tucked them into bed, I went into our bedroom and locked the door behind me. It was hours before my bedtime but I was tired. And the questions about Daniel and Shelia gnawed at the edge of my mind. As I crawled into bed, I noticed a sealed envelope resting on a glass on the night table. I tore it open and read it quickly: I love you and only you. Shelia means nothing to me. She tried that stupid stunt because I told her that I wouldn't leave you. Please forgive me. I know I can't live without you. I tore Daniel's note into a dozen pieces, but I breathed a sigh of relief: If anyone left our marriage, it would be me.
A QUIET RAGE
The next day when Daniel went to teach and the children were at school, I threw his clothes on the floor in the spare bedroom. That move marked the beginning of my quiet rage, and in the weeks that followed we spoke to each other only when the children were around.
Angered by my unwillingness to forgive, Daniel withdrew into his work and spent more time in his studio. All I cared about were my kids - and my music, which like some sweet savior had begun to creep back into my life.
I started playing the piano again because I realized that I'd have to make a living if I decided to leave him, and music was the only thing I knew. Ic ouldI could substitute-teach for a while, but music was my God-given talent and I would make it pay. So I returned to it, a betrayed lover come home.
I called the university that I had graduated from 15 years before and found that I could rent a practice room, so three or four times a week I'd drive the distance to play. I would play for hours. I played my rage and pain, and I played for my lost marriage.
Two years of lies. I could forgive a one-night stand, a moment of passion brought to climax in a cheap hotel room or the backseat of somebody's car - but two yearyears took planning, 24 months of betrayal with each whispered phone call and stolen touch. So Daniel and I went our separate ways in a quiet, angry truce.
WHISPERED FUN AND DANGER
One Monday afternoon while I was practicing at the university, there was a rhythmic rap on the window. WheWhen I looked up, my heart skipped a beat. It was Jerome Thompson. I'd known him when we'd both been students. He was a musician now; I'd seen his name in the clubs around town.
<#FROWN:P20\>
CHARLES DICKENS knew his stuff, you know. Listen to this<\_>" "Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, result <\_>happineshappiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery."
Right on. You adjust the numbers of inflation and what you've got right there is the history of Wall Street. At least, so much of the history of Wall Street as includes me: seven years. We had the good times and we lived high on that extra jolly sixpence, and now we live day by day the long decline of shortfall. Result misery.
Where did they all go, the sixpences of yesteryear? Oh, pshaw, we know where they went. You in Gstaad, him in Aruby, her in Paris and me in the men's room with a sanitary straw in my nose. We know where it went, all right.
My name's Kimball, by the way; here's my card. Bruce Kimball, with Rendall/LeBeau. Account exec. May I say I'm still making money for my clients? There's a lot of good stuff undervalued out there, my friend. You can still make money on the Street. Of course you can. I admit it's harder now; it's much harder when I have only thruppence and it's sixpence I need to keep my nose filled, build up that confidence, face the world with that winner's smile. Man, I'm only hitting on one nostril, you know? I'm hurtin'.
Nearly three years a widow; time to remarry. I need a true heart to share my penthouse apartment (unfurnished terrace, fortunately) with its grand view of the city, my cottage (14 rooms) in Amagansett, the income of my portfolio of stocks.
An income - ah, me - which is less than it once was. One or two iffy margin falls, a few dividends undistributed; bad news can mount up, somehow. Or dismount and move right in. Income could become a worry.
But first, romance. Where is there a husband for my middle years? I am Stephanie Morewell, 42, the end product of good breeding, good nutrition, a fine workout program and amazingly skilled cosmetic surgeons. Since my parents died as my graduation present from Bryn Mawr, I've more or less taken care of myself, though of course, at times, one does need a man around the house. To insert light bulbs and such-like. The point is, except for a slight flabbiness in my stock portfolio, I am a fine catch for just the right fellow.
I don't blame my broker, please let me make that clear. Bruce Kimball is his name and he's unfailingly optimistic and cheerful. A bit of blade, I suspect. (One can't say gay blade anymore, not without the risk of being misunderstood.) In any event, Bruce did very well for me when everybody's stock was going up, and now that there's a - oh, what are the pornographic euphemisms of finance? A <\_>shakehoutshakeout, a mid-term correction, a market adjustment, all that - now that times are tougher, Bruce has lost me less than most and has even found a victory or two amid the wreckage. No, I can't fault Bruce for a general worsening of the climate of money.
In fact, Bruce ... hmmm. He flirts with me at times, but only in a professional way, as his employers would expect him to flirt with a moneyed woman. He's handsome enough, if a bit thin. (Thinner this year than last, in fact.) <\_>stillStill, those wiry fellows ....
Three or four years younger than I? Would Bruce Kimball be the answer to my prayers? I do already know him and I'd rather not spend too much time on the project.
Stephanie Kimball. Like a schoolgirl, I write the name on the note pad beside the telephone on the Louis XIV writing table next to my view of the East River. The rest of that page is filled with hastily jotted numbers: income, outgo, estimated expenses, overdue bills. Stephanie Kimball. I gaze upon my view and whisper the name. It's a blustery, changeable, threatening day. Stephanie Kimball. I like the sound.
"There is a tide in the affairs of men, which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune." Agatha Christie said that. Oh, but she was quoting, wasn't she? Shakespeare! Got it.
There was certainly a flood tide in my affair with Stephanie Morwell. Five years ago, she was merely one more rich wife among my clients, if one who took more of an interest than most in the day-to-day handling of the portfolio. In fact, I never did meet her husband before his death. Three years ago, that was; some ash blondes really come into their own in black, have you noticed?
I respected Mrs. Morwell's widowhood for a month or two, then began a little harmless flirtation. I mean, why not? She was a widow, after all. With a few of my other female clients, an occasional expression of male interest had eventually led to extremely pleasant afternoon financial seminars in midtown hotels. And now, Mrs. Morwell; to peel the layers of black from that lithe and supple body ....
Well, <\_>Forfor three years, all that was merely a pale fantasy. Not even a consummation devoutly to be wished - now, who said that? No <\_>wattermatter - it was more of a daydream while the computer's down.
From black to autommal colors to a more normal range. A good-looking woman, friendly, rich, but never at the forefront of my mind unless she was actually in my presence, across the desk. And now it has all changed.
Mrs. Morwell was in my office once more, hearing mostly badly news, I'm afraid, and in an effort to distract her from the grimness of the occasion, I made some light remark, "There are better things we could do than sit here with all these depressing numbers." Something like that; and she said, in a kind of swollen voice, I'd never heard before, "There certainly are."
I looked at her, surprised, and she was arching her back, stretching like a cat. I said, "Mrs. Morwell, you're giving me ideas."
She smiled. "Which ideas are those?" she asked, and 40 minutes later we were in her bed in her apartment on Sutton Place.
Aaah. Extended widowhood had certainly sharpened her palate. What an afternoon. Between times, she put together a cold snack of salmon and champagne while I roved naked through the sunny golden rooms, delicately furnished with antiques. What a view she had, out over the East River. To live such a life ....
Well. Not until this little glitch in the economy corrects itself.
"Champagne?"
I turned and her body was as beautiful as the bubbly. Smiling, she handed me a glass and said, "I've never had such a wonderful afternoon in my entire life."
We drank to that.
We were married, my golden stockbroker, and I, seven weeks after I first took him to bed. Not quite a whirlwind romance, but close. Of course, I had to meet his parents, just the once, a chore we all handled reasonably well.
We honeymooned in Caneel Bay and had such a lovely time we stayed an extra week. Bruce was so attentive, so charming, so - how shall I put it? - ever ready. And he got along amazingly well with the natives; they were eating out of his hand. In no time at all, he was joking on a first-name basis with half a dozen fellows I would have thougth of as nothing more than dangerous layabouts, but Bruce could find a way to put almost anyone at ease. (Once or twice, one of these fellows even came to chat with Bruce at the cottage. I know he lent one of them money - it was changing hands as I glanced out the louvered window - and I'm sure he never even anticipated repayment.)
I found myself, in those first weeks, growing actually fond of Bruce. What an unexpected bonus! And my warm feeling toward this new husband only increased when, on our return to New York, he insisted on continuing with his job at Rendall/LeBeau. "I won't sponge on you," he said, so firm and manly that I dropped to my knees that instant. Such a contrast with previous marital experience!
Still, romance isn't everything. One must live as well; or, that is, some must live. And so, in the second week after our return, I taxied downtown for a discussion with Oliver Swerdluff, my new insurance agent. (New since Robert's demise, I mean.) "<\_>CongratualtionsCongratulations on your new marriage, Mrs. Kimball," he said, this red-faced, portly man who was so transparently delighted with himself for having remembered my new name.
"Thank you, Mr. Swerdluff." I took my seat across the desk from him. "The new situation, of course," I pointed out, "will require some changes in my insurance package."
"Certainly, certainly."
"Bruce is now co-owner of the apartment in the city and the house on Long Island."
He looked impressed. "Very generous of you, Mrs., uh, Kimball."
"Yes, isn't it? Bruce is so important to me now, I can't imagine how I got along all those years without him. Oh, but that brings up a depressing subject. I suppose I must really insure Bruce's life, mustn't I?"
"The more important your husband is to you," he said, with his salesman's instant comprehension, "the more you must consider every eventuality."
"But he's priceless to me," I said. "How could I choose any amount of insurance? How could I put a dollar value on Bruce?"
"Let me help you with that decision," Mr. Swerdluff said, leaning that moist red face toward me over the desk.
We settled on an even million. Double indemnity.
"Strike while the widow is hot." Unattributed, I guess.
It did all seem to go very smoothly. At first, I was merely enjoying Stephanie for her own sake, expecting no more than our frequent encounters, and then somehow the idea arose that we might get married. I couldn't see a thing wrong with the proposition. Stephanie was terrific in bed, she was rich, she was beautiful and she obviously loved me. Surely, I could find some fondness in myself for a package like that.
And what she could also do, though I had to be very careful she never found out about it, was take up that shortfall, those pennies between me and the white medicine that makes me such a winning fellow. A generous woman, certainly generous enough for that modest need. And I understood from the beginning that if I were to keep her love and respect and my access to her piggy bank, I must never be too greedy. Independent, self-sufficient, self-respecting, only dipping into her funds for those odd six-pences which would bring me, in Mr Dickens' phrase, "result happiness."
The appearance of independence was one reason why I kept on at Rendall/LeBeau, but I had other reasons as well. In the first place, I didn't want one of those second-rate account churners to take over the Morwell - now Kimball - account and bleed it to death with percentages of unnecessary sales. In the scond place, I needed time away from Stephanie, private time that was reasonably accounted for and during which I could go on medicating myself. I would never be able to maintain my proper dosages at home without my bride sooner or later stumbling across the truth. And beyond all that, I've always enjoyed the work, playing with other people's money as if it were merely counters in a game, because that's all it is when it's other people's money.
Four lovely months we had of that life, with Stephanie never suspecting a thing. With neither of us, in fact, ever suspecting a thing. And if I weren't such a workaholic, particularly when topped with my little white friend, I wonder what eventually might have happened. No, I don't wonder; I know what would have happened.
But here's what happened instead. I couldn't keep my hands off Stephanie's financial records. I wasn't prying, it wasn't suspicion, it wasn't for my own advantage, it was merely a continuation of the work ethic on another front.
<#FROWN:P21\>
It's Come to This
NO HORSES. That's how it always starts. I am coming down the meadow, the first snow of September whipping around my boots, and there are no horses to greet me. The first thing I did after Caleb died was get rid of the horses.
"I don't care how much," I told the auctioneer at the Missoula Livestock Company. He looked at me slant-eyed from under his Stetson. "Just don't let the canneries take them." Then I walked away.
What I did not tell him was I couldn't stand the sight of those horses on our meadow, so heedless, grown fat and untended. They reminded me of days when Montana seemed open as the sky.
Now that the horses are gone I am more desolate than ever. If you add one loss to another, what you have is double zip. I am wet to the waist, water sloshing ankle-deep inside my irrigating boots. My toes are numb, my chapped hands are burning from the cold, and down by the gate my dogs are barking at a strange man in a red log truck.
That's how I meet Frank. He is hauling logs down from the Champion timberlands above my place, across the right-of-way I sold to the company after my husband's death. The taxes were piling up. I sold the right-of-way because I would not sell my land. Kids will grow up and leave you, but land is something a woman can hold onto.
I don't like those log trucks rumbling by my house, scattering chickens, tempting my dogs to chase behind their wheels, kicking clouds of dust so thick the grass looks brown and dead. There's nothing I like about logging. It breaks my heart to walk among newly cut limbs, to be enveloped in the sharp odor of sap running like blood. After twenty years on this place, I still cringe at the snap and crash of five-hundred-year-old pines and the far-off screaming of saws.
Anyway, Frank pulls his gyppo logging rig to a stop just past my house in order to open the blue metal gate that separates our outbuildings from the pasture, and while he is at it, he adjusts the chains holding his load. My three mutts take after him as if they are real watchdogs and he stands at the door of the battered red cab holding his hands to his face and pretending to be scared.
"I would surely appreciate it if you'd call off them dogs," says Frank, as if those puppies weren't wagging their tails and jumping up to be patted.
He can see I am shivering and soaked. And I am mad. If I had a gun, I might shoot him.
"You ought to be ashamed ... a man like you."
"Frank Bowman," he says, grinning and holding out his large thick hand. "From Bowman Corners." Bowman Corners is just down the road.
"What happened to you?" he grins. "Take a shower in your boots?"
How can you stay mad at that man? A man who looks at you and makes you look at yourself. I should have known better. I should have waited for my boys to come home from football practice and help me lift the heavy wet boards in our diversion dam. But my old wooden flume was running full and I was determined to do what had to be done before dark, to be a true country woman like the pioneers I read about as a daydreaming child in Chicago, so long ago it seems another person's life.
"I had to shut off the water," I say. "Before it freezes." Frank nods, as if this explanation explains everything.
Months later I would tell him about Caleb. How he took care of the wooden flume, which was built almost one hundred years ago by his Swedish ancestors. The snaking plank trough crawls up and around a steep slope of igneous rock. It has been patched and rebuilt by generations of hard-handed, blue-eyed Petersons until it reached its present state of tenuous mortality. We open the floodgate in June when Bear Creek is high with snowmelt, and the flume runs full all summer, irrigating our hay meadow of timothy and wild mountain grasses. Each fall, before the first hard freeze, we close the diversion gates and the creek flows in its natural bed down to the Big Blackfoot River.
That's why I'd been standing in the icy creek, hefting six-foot two-by-twelves into the slotted brace that forms the dam. The bottom board was waterlogged and coated with green slime. It slipped in my bare hands and I sat down with a splash, the plank in my lap and the creek surging around me.
"Goddamn it to fucking hell!" I yelled. I was astonished to find tears streaming down my face, for I have always prided myself on my ability to bear hardship. Here is a lesson I've learned. There is no glory in pure backbreaking labor.
Frank would agree. He is wide like his log truck and thick-skinned as a yellow pine, and believes neighbors should be friendly. At five o'clock sharp each workday, on his last run, he would stop at my blue gate and yell, "Call off your beasts," and I would stop whatever I was doing and go down for our friendly chat.
"How can you stand it?" I'd say, referring to the cutting of trees.
"It's a pinprick on the skin of the earth," replies Frank. "God doesn't know the difference."
"Well, I'm not God," I say. "Not on my place. Never."
So Frank would switch to safer topics such as new people moving in like knapweed, or where to find morels, or how the junior high basketball team was doing. One day in October, when red-tails screamed and hoarfrost tipped the meadow grass, the world gone crystal and glowing, he asked could I use some firewood.
"A person can always use firewood," I snapped.
The next day, when I came home from teaching, there was a pickup load by the woodshed - larch and fir, cut to stove size and split.
"Taking care of the widow." Frank grinned when I tried to thank him. I laughed, but that is exactly what he was up to. In this part of the country, a man still takes pains.
When I first came to Montana I was slim as a fashion model and my hair was black and curly. I had met my husband, Caleb, at the University of Chicago, where a city girl and a raw ranch boy could be equally enthralled by Gothic halls, the great libraries, and gray old Nobel laureates who gathered in the Faculty Club, where no student dared enter.
But after our first two sons were born, after the disillusionments of Vietnam and the cloistered grind of academic life, we decided to break away from Chicago and a life of mind preeminent, and we came to live on the quarter section of land Caleb had inherited from his Swedish grandmother. We would make a new start by raising purebred quarter horses.
For Caleb it was coming home. He had grown up in Sunset, forty miles northeast of Missoula, on his family's homestead ranch. For me it was romance. Caleb had carried the romance of the West for me in the way he walked on high-heeled cowboy boots, and the world he told stories about. It was a world I had imagined from books and movies, a paradise of the shining mountains, clean rivers, and running horses.
I loved the idea of horses. In grade school, I sketched black stallions, white mares, rainbow-spotted appaloosas. My bedroom was hung with horses running, horses jumping, horses rolling in clover. At thirteen I hung around the stables in Lincoln Park and flirted with the stable boys, hoping to charm them into riding lessons my mother could not afford. Sometimes it worked, and I would bounce down the bridle path, free as a princess, never thinking of the payoff that would come at dusk. Pimply-faced boys. Groping and French kisses behind the dark barn that reeked of manure.
For Caleb horses meant honorable outdoor work and a way to make money, work being the prime factor. Horses were history to be reclaimed, identity. It was my turn to bring in the monthly check, so I began teaching at the Sunset school as a stopgap measure to keep our family solvent until the horse-business dream paid off. I am still filling that gap.
We rebuilt the log barn and the corrals, and cross-fenced our one-hundred acres of cleared meadowland. I loved my upland meadow from the first day. As I walked through tall grasses heavy with seed, they moved to the wind, and the undulations were not like water. Now, when I look down from our cliffs, I see the meadow as a handmade thing - a rolling swatch of green hemmed with a stitchery of rocks and trees. The old Swedes who were Caleb's ancestors cleared that meadow with axes and cross-cut saws, and I still trip over sawed-off stumps of virgin larch, sawed level to the ground, too large to pull out with a team of horses - decaying, but not yet dirt.
We knew land was a way to save your life. Leave the city and city ambitions, and get back to basics. Roots and dirt and horse pucky (Caleb's word for horseshit). Bob Dylan and the rest were all singing about the land, and every stoned, long-haired mother's child was heading for country.
My poor mother, with her Hungarian dreams and Hebrew up-bringing, would turn in her grave to know I'm still teaching in a three-room school with no library or gymnasium, Caleb ten years dead, our youngest boy packed off to the state university, the ranch not even paying its taxes, and me, her only child, keeping company with a two-hundred-and-thirty-pound logger who lives in a trailer.
"Marry a doctor," she used to say, "or better, a concert pianist," and she was not joking. She invented middle-class stories for me from our walk-up flat on the South Side of Chicago: I would live in a white house in the suburbs like she had always wanted; my neighbors would be rich and cultured; the air itself, fragrant with lilacs in May and heady with burning oak leaves in October, could lift us out of the city's grime right into her American dream. My mother would smile with secret intentions. "You will send your children to Harvard."
Frank's been married twice. "Twice-burned" is how he names it, and there are Bowman kids scattered up and down the Blackfoot Valley. Some of them are his. I met his first wife, Fay Dell, before I ever met Frank. That was eighteen years ago. It was Easter vacation, and I had taken two hundred dollars out of our meager savings to buy a horse for our brand-new herd. I remember the day clear as any picture. I remember mud and Blackfoot clay.
Fay Dell is standing in a pasture above Monture Creek. She wears faded brown Carhartt coveralls, as they do up here in the winters, and her irrigating boots are crusted with yellow mud. March runoff has every patch of bare ground spitting streams, trickles, and puddles of brackish water. Two dozen horses circle around her. Their ears are laid back and they eye me, ready for flight. She calls them by name, her voice low, sugary as the carrots she holds in her rough hands.
"Take your pick," she says.
I stroke the velvet muzzle of a two-year-old sorrel, a purebred quarter horse with a white blaze on her forehead.
"Sweet Baby," she says. "You got an eye for the good ones."
"How much?"
"Sorry. That baby is promised."
I walk over to a long-legged bay. There's a smile on Fay Dell's lips, but her eyes give another message.
"Marigold," she says, rubbing the mare's swollen belly. "She's in foal. Can't sell my brood mare."
<#FROWN:P22\>
I WAS A PROM DATE RENEGADE
FICTION BY REBECCA LANNING
"Guess what?" I moaned.
Miranda and I were standing by our lockers just before first period when I told her the depressing news. "Douglass Bartholomew called me up last night and asked me to the prom."
"Oh really," she said with a half smile. "That's nice."
"Who are you kidding?" I snapped as I slammed my locker door. "He caught me off guard. I didn't know what to say."
Miranda shrugged. "So why didn't you turn him down?"
I looked up the hall, hoping I wouldn't see Douglass. He's not hard to spot. He's real tall with a long neck and this orangy hair. I know some girls think he's kinda cute, but he reminded me of ... well, a giraffe. "I guess I was desperate," I confessed.
See, the prom was coming up in less than two weeks, and everyone had a date but me. I was thinking of begging my cousin Julian to take me, but I couldn't handle the humiliation of showing up with a blood relative. I stared down at my feet, at my new red cowboy boots. I'd bought them on a whim, hoping they'd attract the attention of some bold, dare-devil kind of guy. Instead, I roped in Douglass.
"You know," Miranda said. She was playing with her earring, not looking at me. "I'm glad Douglass got to you before -" She bit her lip. "Never mind," she said quickly. But her eyes told me she knew something big.
"What?!" I clutched her arm. "Was someone else going to ask me to the prom?"
Miranda stepped back a little. "Come on, Cammie," she said. "It's a done deal. Don't start stirring things up."
"Tell me!" I pleaded.
"Forget it," Miranda said shaking her head. "Douglass is a nice guy, so let's just drop it, okay?"
I felt like pinching Miranda, or at least tickling her, until her mouth fell open and the truth came pouring out. But I could tell by the way she held her jaw that she'd never back down. She was like a stern mother that way, always thinking she knew what was best for me.
But she didn't really have any idea what it was like to be me. Miranda was a star; I was space dust. I mean, when she made cheerleader our sophomore year, I got elected treasurer of the Latin Club. When she was voted Best Looking Girl of the junior class, I was named Library Assistant of the Year. And this year, when Miranda was nominated for prom queen, I was appointed head of the prom decorations committee.
"Listen," Miranda said before heading off to calculus. "You'll have a great time at the prom with Douglass. He's so smart and funny. Maybe we can even double date."
"I doubt it," I said. The mere thought made me wince. After all, Miranda's date was Rex Riley, the president of the student body, the biggest catch of our senior class. He'd probably wear a tux and dance like Patrick Swayze. Douglass would probably wear some boring blue suit and weird shoes with tassles.
Suddenly, I felt like disappearing for a few weeks, maybe head down to Florida. Take up wind surfing. Come back after the prom with blond highlights and a great tan. I could change my name to CoCo. I mean, it was the spring of my senior year. The air around me was supposed to crackle with excitement. I should be gathering tons of memories to look back on in my old age. Instead, my life was just one big ordinary bore.
In English class this morning, Douglass stared at me for the entire 48 minutes. Then, at lunch, while I was in the art room working on the decorations, he appeared in the doorway. I think, he'd grown an inch since second period. As he brushed back his scraggly orange bangs, he flashed me a big grin. "How's it going!" he asked.
"Fine," I said distractedly. I kept working, cutting stars out of cardboard, covering them with tin foil. The theme for the prom was 'Starry, Starry Night."
Naturally, Douglass didn't get the hint. He wandered into the room and settled down next to me at the long, wooden table. "I like your boots," he offered.
"Gee, thanks," I said and smiled. At least I tried to smile.
Douglass scooted his chair even closer to mine. He had on this wrinkly white oxford shirt and baggy old khakis. He smelled like furniture polish. "Tell me something," he said. "Do you like pork chops?"
"What?" I said.
"Do you like -"
"I heard you. Why do you want to know?" I knew I was being mean, but I just couldn't help myself.
Douglass puffed up his chest like a bird. "I thought I might cook pork chops at my house before the prom. We can have a nice candlelit dinner. I can get some great chops from Sloan's, real thick and tasty."
Douglass worked in the meat department of Sloan's Supermarket. Whenever I ran in there, on an errand for Mom, he'd always follow me around in his white uniform, trying to help me find the bread crumbs or waxed beans or whatever was on my list. Now I tried to picture myself at his house eating pork chops by candlelight. I guess he thought it would be romantic. I could imagine his parents lurking in the next room, barging in every few minutes to snap a photo of Douglass and me trying to chew and smile at the same time. The whole idea gave me the creeps, but what could I say? "Sure, Douglass," I sighed. "I like pork chops just fine."
That afternoon after school, I borrowed Mom's station wagon and Miranda and I went to Longview Mall. While she was looking for some earrings to match her prom gown, I went hunting for some kind of self-help book. Tips for Surviving a Prom Date Disaster. How to Act Nice When You Feel Like Killing Someone.
I was about to walk into the bookstore, when I spotted Bo Grady, the star of the soccer team, heading my way. My knees got all wobby. We'd gone out once in the fall of our junior year. Shortly after that, Bo started dating Samantha Rawlings, and he'd been dating her ever since. But his good-night kiss still ranked right up there on the list of my life's highlights. I think he had electric lips.
"Hey, Cammie. What's up?" Bo said as he approached me. He had on these real faded 501s with holes in the knees and a gray T-shirt that said Class of '92. He was carrying a big shopping bag from Athletic Attitudes. My heart flip-flopped.
"Not much," I said trying to act nonchalant. "Just waiting on Miranda. She's having a total cow about earrings for the prom." I rolled my eyes.
Bo rolled up the end of his shopping bag. "So, I don't suppose you have a date, do you?"
"We- Well, ..." I stuttered. My throat turned dry as a bone.
Right at that moment, Bo stepped a little closer toward me. He smelled good, like a lime.
"Listen," he whispered. "Samantha and I broke up." He sort of checked me out from head to toe. I fell into a deep freeze. "Have you heard anything about it?"
"Well, no, actually, I hadn't heard. I'm real sorry."
Bo shrugged and bit his lip. "I realize this is kind of late notice," he said. "But if you don't already have a date for the prom, would you like to go with me?"
My mind started racing. This was like a dream come true and a nightmare all in one. I mean, why did he and Samantha break up so close to the prom? And what about Douglass? I couldn't back out on him now. Or could I? This was my chance at having the kind of prom night I really wanted. The kind that you remember all your life. I looked up at Bo. Our eyes locked. Suddenly, I didn't care about doing the right thing. Bo Grady was cool. He was popular. He did not remind me of a giraffe. That's when the words, "I'd love to go to the prom with you, Bo," popped out of my mouth.
Bo smiled and threw me a playful punch. "That's great, Cammie," he said. "Maybe we can have dinner first at Le Chateau."
For a second, I couldn't speak. I mean, I'd never been to Le Chateau. But how was I going to work this out? I felt like an outlaw or something. I wanted to hop on a train and make a fast getaway. "That sounds wonderful, Bo" I squeaked. And suddenly, I saw my whole life flash before my eyes.
"Was that Bo Grady you were talking to?" Miranda asked as we headed out to the parking lot. I was walking real fast, and Miranda was eyeing me suspiciously. "Did he tell you Samantha dumped him again - this time for some college guy?"
"Sort of," I said and got behind the wheel of Mom's station wagon. Before Miranda could even fasten her seat belt, I was backing out. "Bo just asked me to the prom." I said it, but still couldn't believe it.
Miranda gave me this look, and suddenly I remembered her hinting around that someone else was interested in being my prom date. "Was he the guy?" I asked as I sped past Fallon Park. "The guy you'd heard might ask me?"
Miranda stared out the window, at the azaleas blooming everywhere. "It was just some rumor," she muttered. "I figured he was on the rebound from Samantha. I didn't mention it because I didn't want you to get hurt. Bo can be kind of thoughtless sometimes."
I whipped the car on to Lassiter Road.
"Don't you think that's something I could've decided for myself?!" I was furious. Miranda: my mom away from Mom.
"I'm sorry," she offered. "I should've told you what I'd heard." Then she pulled her rhinestone earrings out of the bag and held them up to the sunlight. Shiny little dots flashed all over the car. "I guess Bo was bummed when you told him you were going to the prom with Douglass, huh?"
"I'm not going with Douglass," I said matter-of-factly.
Miranda stuffed her earrings back in the bag. "What?!"
"I'm going to the prom with Bo." I don't know why, but I was driving real fast. The engine kept backfiring.
"You're making a big mistake, Cammie," she said. "You're making a HUGE mistake." Miranda kept shaking her head so much I thought maybe it would fall off. "Bo and Samantha are bound to get back together. They always do. What are you going to tell Douglass? You're going to break his heart. You're going to ruin him for life!"
"Get off it, Miranda," I snapped. "He'll get over it. And so will you."
"But Douglass is really looking forward to the prom. This afternoon in chemistry, he was telling me about his pork chop recipe. He really, really likes you."
"You know what? I am really, really sick of your junk," I said. Miranda glared at me. "It's easy for you to sit here and preach to me about keeping my word. But would you go to the prom with Douglass Bartholomew? Would you?"
Miranda sat up straight and clasped her hands together. "If he asked me, yes, I'd go with him."
"But that's just it!" I practically screamed. "Douglass would never ask you to the prom or any place else. You're like some ... some totally up there girl. You can be all friendly with him. But that's because you know he'd never even think about asking you out. You're not on his level, and he knows it. And you know it. And you don't have any right to judge me for going out with somebody I really feel like going out with!"
<#FROWN:P23\>THE DAY BEFORE DAVID HOWELL was to leave for college, the weather turned to autumn.
Martin had reluctantly folded down the back seat of the Volvo station wagon to allow as much space as possible to pack everything his son needed for school. "Your mother and I had planned to drive you tomorrow, but now there isn't enough room for both of us. Are you sure you need all this stuff?"
"Mom made out the list." David held up a sheet of notepaper. Dinah recognized her careful list from five months back, but she knew she hadn't suggested that David take his skis. She thought about how she wouldn't be able to see David's room, to get a picture of where he would be living, or even to tell him goodbye.
Martin was wrestling with the skis, trying to fit them in while David reached into the car to adjust them himself. Dinah decided to leave the two of them alone. "I'm going inside unless you need me."
Martin emerged from the station wagon and stood running his eyes over the items that were yet to be packed.
"What's with this damned stereo?" he asked her. "His room would have to be the size of an auditorium to do the thing justice. It must be some macho thing. Like we were with cars."
"Well, at least no one can get pregnant in the back seat of it," Dinah said, turning and making for the house.
Dinah went inside and called for dinner reservations at their favorite restaurant. She had decided as she watched the car slowly fill up with David's belongings that it was important to attempt a modest celebration to mark the beginning of his college career. But when she announced that she had made reservations for seven o'clock, David's face registered irritation.
"I was going to see Christie tonight, Mom. It's my last night at home."
"I'd love to have Christie come, sweetie. We'd like to see a little of you, too, on your last night," she said lightly. "You and Christie will have the rest of the evening." She looked directly at him with an expression of huge good humor that brooked no disagreement.
The Candlelight Inn was the first civilized restaurant to which they had ever taken David and Toby. At the time, Dinah was heavily pregnant with Sarah. On the drive over, Martin and Dinah had instructed the two little boys about not misbehaving.
"Absolutely no diving under the table if you drop your napkin," Martin said. "Or for any other reason," he added.
They had been seated at a table in front of the fireplace; Toby and David were stiff in their blazers and amazingly subdued as they drank sodas and listened to their parents discuss the menu over their drinks. David had opened his own menu and studied it solemnly; and when their waiter had come to take their order, David had looked up at the man and inquired, "How is the lamb tonight?" Without a blink the waiter had replied, "It's very good, sir."
Dinah and Martin's eyes had met in amazement in one of those moments when one acknowledges the utter separateness of one's children from oneself. And because of the waiter's absolute lack of hesitation, The Candlelight Inn had been Dinah's favorite restaurant ever since.
This evening, though, Dinah realized that eating dinner in a public place often affected people as if they were performing on stage. Tonight it was all to the good. Sarah launched into a long tale illustrating the unfairness of her field hockey coach; and Christie sympathized. If there had not been waiters coming and going, however, and diners at other tables who glanced their way occasionally, the five of them would have sat silent in an atmosphere permeated with the tension of David's imminent departure.
Sarah leaned around Christie to speak to David. "Do you remember when we tried to convince Mom that the next time we buy a car it should be something besides a Volvo?" She glanced around the rest of the table, signaling amusement, but David shook his head.
"Oh, David. Don't you remember? Mom was saying how safe they were, that we didn't need to be able to go any faster. That the point of having a car at all is just to be able to get from one place to another." Sarah made her tone didactic.
David smiled. "Oh, yeah, now I do."
Sarah laughed and nodded, and Dinah smiled, too, knowing where the conversation was headed. "Mom pulled up at a stoplight and looked over at this car next to us and she said, 'Now, I can see that a small car like that might be handy for just doing errands around town.' And David and I looked over at it, and it was this incredible white Porsche!"
Dinah shrugged and joined the general laughter. She was glad to have Sarah and David reminiscing. She could hear the fondness in her children's voices. But it was also as if the sharp, first chill of fall had crept into her own spirit, because she came up hard against the reality that she no longer had any power to protect her children from anything at all.
She couldn't, in fact, be sure they traveled only in safe cars - a phobia with her since Toby's death six years ago. She could no longer be sure they wore their seat-belts, put on life jackets when they went sailing. She couldn't keep them from harm. And all her efforts at having done so - "Be home before dark! Don't talk on the phone during a thunderstorm! Plastic bags from the cleaner's are not toys!" - would be relegated to the nostalgia of their youth. She and Martin had become anecdotes in their own children's lives.
MARTIN SLEPT SOUNDLY, AS usual, but Dinah heard David come in about two o'clock and move around the house. She would have liked to go downstairs, but she knew she should give him the solitary run of the nighttime rooms. When she did wake up early in the morning, she was surprised to see that Martin wasn't asleep beside her. His side of the bed was empty. In the kitchen she discovered she was the last one to come downstairs, even though it was only 6:30. Martin had made coffee, and Sarah was having orange juice at the table. Dinah had planned on preparing a grand meal to see David off, but everyone had eaten. Martin and David were huddled over an enormous schefflera in a terra-cotta pot that Christie had given David for his dorm room.
"There's no way in the world we can fit that thing into the car, David. We'll bring it on Parents' Weekend."
"I know I can fit it in. Scheffleras are probably the best plants to clean toxic substances out of the air. They work almost like a scrubber."
"Well, you'll have to hold your breath until October, then."
"Dad, don't worry about it. I'll get it in," David said stonily, and went out to survey the possibilities.
Dinah moved around the kitchen helplessly, collecting cereal bowls, putting things back in cabinets. Martin finished his coffee and poured another cup. He was already dressed, while Dinah had only slipped in her pink flannel robe. "I'd like to get going as soon as we can," Martin said. "If it takes us about three and a half hours, we'll probably be earlier than most, and it won't be so hard to unload."
Time was flying past her, this moment before David would be gone.
Martin was uneasy this morning, too, with a kind of regret and tension that he hadn't expected to feel. He wanted to get this over with.
David came back into the kitchen. "I can fit it in, Dad. There's no problem."
"Okay, then. Ready to hit the road?"
"Yeah," he said, "I'm all set."
Martin rinsed his coffee cup and headed out the door, and David and Sarah followed him. Dinah looked around at the empty room, and her eyes filled with tears. She wiped them away quickly with her sleeve before she trailed after the rest of her family.
Martin was sitting in the driver's seat with the door open, unsuccessfully trying to slide the seat back against the immovable mass of David's possessions. David was leaning against the car while Sarah stood by holding the plant.
When Dinah met her son's eyes she saw that he, too, was near tears. She simply moved toward him, and he embraced her fiercely, wrapping his arms around her shoulders and putting his face down against the top of her head.
"Oh, sweetie," she said, overcoming the break in her voice, "oh, sweetie! I hope everything is just perfect. I hope you have a wonderful time and ... I hope ... well, I'm so excited for you! Harvard's lucky to get you."
David held on to her tightly. "I love you, Mom," he said, almost brusquely, and then turned and climbed into the passenger seat of the car and Sarah gave him the schefflera to balance in his lap. Dinah bent down into the car and kissed him on the cheek. "I love you, too, sweetie. We'll miss you." She backed away a bit so David could close the door. Martin put the gear in neutral while he twisted to shift several items, and then the car began to move slowly toward the end of the drive.
"Have a safe trip," Dinah called. David waved his hand up over the roof. Then the car turned onto Slade Road.
DINAH DECIDED TO ACCOMPANY Martin when he took Duchess for her afternoon walk. For the first few weeks after David's departure she had been reluctant to leave the house in case her son might phone. In fact, he had called only once, and nothing he had said had appeased the longing that his busy voice evoked. His classes were fine. He liked his roommate, and his room was fine. She hung up the phone, assuring herself that she was delighted he was content, but she had been momentarily shattered with yearning.
As Dinah and Martin cut across the front yard, Duchess kept circling back on her leash, tangling herself around their legs, wagging her tail in excitement and delight at having Dinah with them. "This will be a good thing," Dinah said. "I never get any exercise."
"Walking with Duchess isn't very invigorating," Martin said.
"Maybe we can train her to heel," Dinah mused, but they both looked doubtfully at the shambling dog whose muzzle was almost completely gray. They made their way along the path fairly briskly, Martin leading the way and Duchess crashing through the brush behind them.
When they reached a natural summit, Dinah was out of breath. She sank down to sit on the ground, bracing herself against the trunk of an enormous spruce, and looked out on the valley. "This seems pretty invigorating to me," she said to Martin, who hadn't sat down, and she looked up at him. "Can we stop for a little while? I need to catch my breath."
Martin lowered himself to the ground beside her, and the powerful scent of evergreens enveloped them.
"You've been thinking about Toby, haven't you?" Martin asked her.
She looked at him in surprise. "No, not really." She didn't want to talk about Toby's death. She thought that with David's recent departure they were both susceptible to opportunistic sorrow, as if the flu had been going around and their white counts were low.
"You know," he said, "I still keep wondering if there wasn't some way I could have avoided that wreck. I've gone over it and over it. I was so distracted ..."
"If you could have avoided it?" Dinah's voice rose a little in consternation. "Don't even think about that, Martin. Of course you couldn't have avoided it. That's not fair to yourself - for you to try to ... oh ... take on the responsibility."
<#FROWN:P24\>"It cracks me up. She really gets upset at tractors on the road. I just pass them, but my mom follows them for miles. It's so funny."
"You have your license already?" Christy asked.
"No, just my permit. But I drive all the time anyway. Everyone does."
"What about the insurance? What if you got in an accident?"
"I don't know."
"You're kidding!" Christy looked at bright-eyed Paula. "Insurance is a big deal here. Nobody can drive without insurance, and it's super expensive. My Uncle Bob said he'd pay my insurance for the first year if I passed my driver's test the first time I tried."
David turned around and announced, "And she needs insurance! She already had an accident!"
"You did? What happened?" Paula quizzed her.
Christy gave her brother a dirty look before explaining the parking lot incident in a matter-of-fact way, hoping it would come across as no big deal.
Paula giggled. "That must've been embarrassing! Did anyone see you do it?"
"No, just my dad."
"So, did you get your license yet?"
"I haven't taken the test yet. My birthday's not until ..." Christy's eyes grew big and bright. "I can't believe it! I almost forgot all about my birthday!"
"Hey," Paula added, "it's tomorrow, isn't it? With all the Hawaii stuff, I almost forgot too. I'm so sure! You're going to spend your sixteenth birthday in Hawaii. Is that like a dream, or what?"
"You may end up spending your sixteenth birthday in this car, if that motor home doesn't move it!" Mom sputtered.
Christy and Paula turned and made giggly faces at each other, laughing at Mom's anxiety attack. A few minutes later they spotted the reason for the clogged freeway - a stalled truck had closed off the center lane, and traffic had been routed around on both sides.
Once they made it past the holdup, the freeway cleared, but the tension kept building until they reached Marti's. Then the fireworks really began. Christy and Paula watched as the two women acted like teenage sisters, squabbling over why Mom was fifteen minutes late, which car they should take, and why they couldn't have been more organized.
The group ended up in Mom's car, with David in the backseat, his seatbelt tightly holding both him and the duffle bag, and Marti in the front seat with a suitcase under her feet.
"This is precisely why I requested you each fit your things into one suitcase apiece," Marti scolded. "This day is certainly starting out wrong; I've never left so late for a flight in my life!"
"We hit a lot of traffic, and there was a stalled truck," Mom explained, still gripping the steering wheel tightly as she maneuvered back onto the freeway.
"We might be able to bypass some of the traffic," Marti suggested, "if we get on the 405. See the sign there? Stay in this lane."
Mom followed the directions while Marti continued to make plans. "Okay, now, if we do miss our flight, which I certainly hope we don't, then we'll find out when the next flight leaves and switch to that."
As it turned out, they didn't need Marti's alternative. They made it to the airport, checked their luggage, received their seat assignments and ended up with half an hour before they could even board the plane. Mom gave in to David's pleas for a pack of gum, and the two of them scurried off to the nearest shop, leaving a somewhat subdued Marti sitting in the waiting area with the girls.
"We should've gone with them," Paula suggested after Mom and David were out of view. "I don't have any gum, and my ears always bother me on airplanes."
"Paula," Christy pointed out, "you've only been on one airplane in your whole life and that was a few days ago coming out here."
"I know. And I chewed gum the whole time. Marti, would it be okay if we went to get some gum?"
"I suppose. If you hurry. I'll stay here with the carryons. Don't forget, we board in less than half an hour."
"Would you like us to bring you anything?" Paula asked sweetly.
"No thanks, dear. Just hurry!"
Paula and Christy briskly nudged their way through a throng of people lined up at the check-in desk. Christy suggested they make a quick stop at the bathroom too, since Marti had said the flight would take five hours.
"First some gum," Paula directed. "And I saw a magazine I wanted to get while we were running past all those shops on the way in."
Suddenly Paula stopped. "I don't believe it!" she squealed under her breath, or as under her breath as Paula was capable of squealing. Then plunging her hand deep into her huge shoulder bag, she rummaged around until she pulled out a pair of glasses, which she quickly slipped on.
"When did you start to wear glasses?" Christy asked.
That's him! Over there; see him? That's the guy from that TV show -what's that show? You know, there's these two guys and -"
Grabbing Christy by the arm Paula yanked her around the bathroom area and into another section of the terminal. "Come on! He's going this way! Did you see him? What's his name, Christy? I can't remember his name!"
"Paula!" Christy yanked her arm back and yelled at her friend, "Paula!"
Paula turned, looking dazed but still heading toward the movie star. "What? What! Come on!"
Christy hustled to keep up with her. "I don't see who you're even talking about! Come on, Paula! What are you doing?"
"I'm going to get my first movie star's autograph! Come on!"
They blitzed past a large tour group and ended up in a section of the airport that had two wings to choose from.
"This one." Paula grabbed Christy by the arm again. "I saw him go this way."
"Paula! Do you even know who we're chasing?"
"I can't think of his name. He's on that show, you know ..." Paula stopped short. "Where did he go? I don't see him!"
"Paula, I mean it! We have to go back right now! I didn't see anybody who looked famous. This is stupid!" Christy brimmed with anger and exasperation but kept her words brief. "We have to go back right now!"
She abruptly turned and marched away from Paula.
"Okay, okay, I'm coming." Paula caught up. "I know I saw him, though. What's his name? This is going to drive me crazy! He's really cute and popular and he's on that show ..."
"Most movie stars are cute and popular and on shows!" Christy picked up her pace, scolding Paula over her shoulder. "I can't believe you! We could've gotten lost or missed our plane over this phantom movie star!"
"Wait, Christy," Paula urged, slipping her glasses back into the bag and grabbing Christy's arm again, which Christy jerked away. "I want to go in here and get some gum."
"We don't have time!"
"Yes, we do. Your aunt was just pressuring everybody. We have like an hour until the plane takes off."
"Half an hour," Christy corrected.
"Half an hour till we board; then it takes another half hour until the plane even takes off. We have plenty of time."
Paula entered the small souvenir shop and took her time browsing through the magazines before selecting one. She picked up a pack of gum and held it up for Christy to see. "You like this kind?"
"I don't care. Anything. Let's go!"
Paula slipped her purchases into her bag, and the two girls stepped back into the main terminal area and looked around. Neither of them moved. Nothing looked familiar.
"We go this way," Paula said, regaining her self-assurance.
"Are you sure? I thought our gate was over there."
A cloud of uncertainty came over Paula, casting a puzzled shadow on her expression and giving away her feelings of terror.
The noise and constant hubbub from the throngs of people rushing past them made Christy feel dizzy.
"Let's ask somebody," Paula said breathlessly, scanning the bustling crowd, apparently looking for a stranger who appeared approachable and trustworthy.
"We can't just start talking to some stranger!"
"Then what are we going to do?" Paula dug her fingernails into Christy's arm, sounding as panicked as she looked. "What are we going to do? We're lost!"
"Let go!" Christy said. "Where's one of those TV monitors that shows all the flights and their times?"
"Over there!" Paula spotted one on the wall behind them. "What flight are we on? What airline? Do you know? I don't even know what airline we're on!"
"It was United, wasn't it?" Christy asked, as they scrambled closer to the monitor for a better view.
"There!" Paula said pointing. "Honolulu! There's a flight in half an hour to Honolulu. That's us, isn't it? Honolulu is in Hawaii, isn't it? Of course it is. Isn't it?" Her voice rose and became squeakier.
"Yes! Yes! Yes!" Christy's irritation overtook her fear. "But what's the one listed above it? How do you say that - Ka-hu-lu-i?" Christy asked. "I think that's the airport we're going to because that one leaves at the time we were supposed to, and it has a Hawaiian name."
"How do you know it's a Hawaiian name? Honolulu - now that's a Hawaiian name. Kahului could be some place in Bora Bora, or worse, it could be a flight to the Antarctic! We can't go jumping on the first flight we find that has a Hawaiian-sounding name! I think we should go to Gate 87 where the flight to Honolulu is. Everyone knows Honolulu is in Hawaii."
Just then the Kahului line began to blink, and instead of a time being listed, the words "now boarding" flashed across the screen.
"Now boarding, Paula! I know that's our flight! I know it! And they're leaving right now. Come on! Gate 57. Where's Gate 57?"
The girls took off sprinting down the nearest wing of the terminal, then realized it was the wrong one and ran the other way, following signs and bumping into people. Both of them were crying. Panting and blinking wildly, they suddenly recognized the wing they'd started from.
"This is it! I'm sure of it," Christy said, and the girls dashed to the waiting area which previously had been crowded with people. It was empty now, except for Christy's mother, who had her back to them. She stood next to the ticket counter, talking to the flight attendant and using sharp hand motions.
"Mom!" Christy yelled from twenty yards back, not caring who heard her. "Mom!"
"Mrs. Miller!" Paula screeched.
Mom spun around, and instead of welcoming them with a relieved embrace, she planted both fists on her hips. Her face, stern as stone, told Christy everything she didn't want to know.
"We missed the plane, girls," Mom stated. "We missed the plane! Where have you been?"
Christy scrambled to gain her composure and respond as maturely as possible. Before she could say a word, Paula let her emotions rip. With wild sobs, she clung to Mom's arm and went on hysterically about trying to get away from some strange man and getting lost and being afraid the man was going to kidnap them and a whole bunch of other unintelligible garble.
Mom instantly changed her approach and tried to calm Paula down before she drew a crowd. Christy kept all her terrified feelings from being lost to herself and wiped away her tears.
"Excuse me," the flight attendant interjected, leaning over the counter and looking much sweeter and more concerned than she had when Mom had been talking with her a few minutes ago. "Are you girls okay?"
Christy nodded.
Paula could have landed a role in a melodrama with her reaction. She curled in her lower lip, opened her eyes wide and let more inky, mascara-stained tears zigzag down her baby face.
Then softly, to Christy's mom, the uniformed woman said, "We did experience an abduction of an eight-year-old girl at the airport last Thursday. Perhaps I should call security."
<#FROWN:P25\>
EDGE OF ROCK
Fiction by May Mansoor Munn
This was the last breath of summer, its heat suffocating, weighing her down. Laila is on her knees in her front yard, scraping at earth, when she sees the boy once more loop around in the street on his bicycle. Not more than eleven, she thinks, a small figure of a boy in an odd-looking hat. He reminds her of her son, Omar, when he was that age: a grapevine, resting on air, its tendrils reaching toward the sun.
Her dog, Charlemagne - a gift from her Texas son-in-law - tugs at the chain secured to the porch railing as the boy, welded to his bicycle, weaves past moving cars in the street. Just then, brakes screech and a car comes to a sudden stop in front of Mrs. Rhodes's house. A man leans out the car window, shakes his fist at the boy who has barely escaped with his life - who now races toward the sidewalk, hits the curb, and lands, splayed, near Laila's drive-way. His hat, taking off on its own, lands in Mrs. Rhodes's rose bushes.
"Damn!" he says, loud enough for Laila to hear.
He gets up grumpily, crosses over to the roses and retrieves his hat.
"Guys like him," the boy says scowling, "should be put away."
Laila glances covertly at the house with the rusted car where, she knows, the boy lives. She says, "Your folks might worry ... riding your bike in the street like that. Taking risks."
"Ma expects me to be a sissy, like some girl. But Dad don't worry none." He taps the crown of his hat. "He got me the hat two years back - just before he skipped town." He flashes a grin. "It's been around, that hat. Fell in a creek near Livingston a year ago. And once, it blew out my Ma's car window ..." A small pause. "Dad's a Louisiana man. Last time he wrote, Ma tore up his letter ..." A sly look touches the corners of his eyes. "But I got them pieces when she weren't looking. Made out his address in New Orleans."
Laila marvels at his straw hat, with pheasant feathers forming its headband. Frayed and drooping, it rests lightly on the crown of his head.
He points to the patch of brown earth in the midst of green, and the clumps of wilted grasses at her knees.
"It's against the law, Ma says!"
Momentary fear stings her throat. "To dig in my front yard? To make a garden?"
She understood harassment in a land under occupation. Her land. But not here, in America, from this scarecrow of a boy.
She looks into the restless gray eyes of the boy, their color reminding her of a Wadallah winter sky.
"To build in your front yard. It's the law, Ma says."
"It'll be a fall garden," she explains. "The backyard is too shady for growing vegetables."
But here in the front yard, away from the shade of the mimosa tree, she has chosen a few meters to receive full benefit of sun. Barely a stone to dig, and no edge of rock to scrape or cut into flesh: only rich, loamy earth to weed and till.
Crouching, the boy begins to stroke the amber-splashed fur of Charlemagne. He asks, looking up, "Does he have a name?"
"My son-in-law, the history teacher, named him Charlemagne."
"Funny name for a dog." A reflective pause. "Think I'll call him Charlie, for short." The boy's gray eyes glint in the sun. "My name's Billy. What's yours?"
"Laila El-Fihmi." She says it slowly, carefully, the way her Detroit teacher pronounced it in English class.
Billy scratches the back of his head. "Never heard that name before ..."
"It's an Old Country name." Laila smiles. "Mrs. Rhodes next door calls me Miz El - for short. You can, too."
Billy stands up, looks back at the dog. "Ma don't allow no dogs at our house." A matter-of-fact statement brooking no sympathy.
Tenderness, like a breeze, filters through Laila's defenses. "Come by tomorrow at one and have dinner with us," she says. "You'll get to meet my daughter, Salwa, and her family. You can play with ... Charlie."
Billy shrugs. "Don't promise nothing."
He gives the dog a quick pat, leaps on his bike, and like a young horse-man, gallops across the lawn and back into the street. He turns and waves his hat at her - a small, city-boy, playing at cowboy.
Work in the garden for now must wait. Coring and stuffing the squash for tomorrow's dinner will have to come first. A few weeks before, when Salwa finally persuaded her mother to leave Detroit for Houston, Salwa and her family started to come to dinner every Sunday - the children spilling over Laila's small house, filling its corners with a vortex of motion and noise. Ramzi, five, his brown eyes questioning the hidden meanings of the adult world, often came to her for comfort. Katy, two years older and more self-sufficient, and Jesse, eight, played their noisier games outside, with Charlemagne.
Laila brings out the mound of squash, corer and pan, sets them all on the patio table, and settles down in the porch swing.
As her hands begin to deftly hollow out each squash, she considers the shape and color of the houses on her street. Except for Mrs. Rhodes's brick house, all the houses in her neighborhood are made of wood, with wooden doors and no bars to secure windows.
Their Wadallah house is built of stone, with iron bars across windows and heavy steel doors. Her grandfather built the house to last the centuries.
But here, in this rented house, a thief could easily break glass, or pry open windows and crawl in - unhampered by steel or stone. For the first few days of her arrival here from Detroit, the thought had kept her awake - until Bob gave her the dog, to allay her fears. A dog named Charlemagne.
"He's a half-Sheltie," Bob said and expected her to understand.
In Wadallah she learned her English from a children's book with colored pictures and a dog named Spot - not Charlemagne. And in Detroit, she took 'intensive' English classes after work, but could not quite master American slang.
Her husband, Bakri, remained behind in Wadallah - refusing to abandon the house, the vineyard, and the olive tree to strangers.
"Your brother in Detroit is right," Bakri had said. "Go now, for the children's sake. You can always return when our world is safe again."
A promise and a hope.
Laila's brother, who owned an import store in Detroit, even sent them tickets. But her daughter, Salwa, seventeen, and her son, Omar, fourteen, left Wadallah reluctantly.
Laila worked long hours in her brother's store, and practiced her spoken English every chance she got.
"Is your husband well, Mrs. Brown?" she asked a regular customer once.
"Well enough to nag the daylights out of me," Mrs. Brown replied. "Between you and me, I think he's got bats in his belfry ..."
"And how are the bats in your poor husband's belfry?" Laila asked the next day. Mrs. Brown shook her head, and hurried out with her jar of marmalade, her black olives - perhaps too worried about her husband's condition to answer.
Independence - Laila's children gloried in the word. She raised them to explore their talents, to test their strength. But in the end, each chose a separate path. Her daughter, Salwa, fit into American life like old-fashioned bread around pebbles in a taboon oven. In college she met Bob, with Texas roots, and brought him home to meet her mother. When Laila inadvertently called him "Boob," his laughter exploded in her face. Later, in private, Salwa gave her mother a lesson in accents and American slang.
Her son, Omar, missed his father, worried about political events in their country. Two years ago, at age seventeen, he decided to return to Wadallah to live.
As a small boy, Omar had rebelled against authority and the wisdom Laila offered - probing and testing for himself. Once at six, defying warnings, he climbed their olive tree to the highest branch, and promptly fell, breaking his leg. Her scoldings only served to spur him on toward a second and even third try.
If Laila had her way, he would study medicine. He had the brains for it. My son, the physician, she would say to anyone who asked.
As Mrs. Rhodes hobbles across the yard toward Laila, Charlemagne strains at his leash, the beginning of a growl forming in his throat.
"I've lived in this neighborhood for thirty years," Mrs. Rhodes says, leaning against the porch railing. "But, my dear, this place is fast going to the dogs."
"I usually keep the dog in my backyard," Laila says apologetically. "But today, I thought the change ..."
Mrs. Rhodes's laughter crackles across the yard. "I'm not talking about real dogs. Just houses, and people." She sniffs, drawing up the muscles of her sagging face. "Like that family with six kids down the street. And the dump where Billy lives."
Laila's hands pause momentarily in their task. "How old is Billy anyway?"
"Not a day under fourteen!" Mrs. Rhodes plunges her cane into the grass at her feet. "But he's small for his age. And not too bright. His third year in the sixth grade, you know." She waves her hand in the air above her head. "And that sloppy hat he wears. I bet a dog's ear he sleeps in it."
She focuses pale green eyes on Laila's face. "By the way, what's your son up to these days?"
What can Laila say? Mrs. Rhodes would understand little, if anything. Since even she, his own mother, failed to understand.
In his last letter, Omar wrote, "I've joined the Resistance. I've pledged to fight this unjust military occupation till the end ..."
Concerned, she wrote back that same day, to dissuade him, to ask: "But how will you earn a living? What does your father think?"
She was still waiting for answers.
Laila meets Mrs. Rhodes's glance, allows herself a careful smile. "Omar has been accepted in medical school." She speaks clearly without flinching, waits for words to find their mark.
Mrs. Rhodes curls her lower lip. "When he becomes a real doctor, maybe he can find a cure for my arthritis ..." With a flourish of her cane, Mrs. Rhodes turns and heads back to her own yard.
Midway into their Sunday dinner, Billy walks in, his hat pushed back, his face pink with scrubbing. Hesitantly, he slides into the empty seat between Bob and Ramzi.
Laila serves him the stuffed squash with the sterling silver spoon her children gave her for her fortieth birthday. Billy runs his finger over the raised indentations on the handle. "Never seen real silver before," he says, wide-eyed.
"The rest of my 'silverware' is stainless steel," Laila admits.
Later, over coffee, Salwa looks uncertainly into her mother's eyes. She and Bob are contemplating a possible trip to Mexico - without the children. A chance for the honeymoon they've never had.
Laila feels a surge of compassion for the small girl Salwa once was. At eight, seated cross-legged on the floor, she had tried to fit together pieces of a broken doll. An hour passed before she brought its shattered skull - bisque oozing with glue - and set the pieces before her mother. "Help me this time, please," she said. "I won't ask again. I promise."
Until the next time. And only if absolutely necessary.
Of course, she'd be glad to stay with the children for a week. What were grandmothers for?
Monday morning, when Billy stops by Laila's house on his way to school, she says, "I won't be here next week, Billy. I need someone to take care of Charlie. And to water my new garden."
He stands in the doorway, his hat light and airy on his head. "How much?"
"Five days. Five dollars."
"In advance?"
Laila nods. "If you like ..."
He flicks his fingers at the inner rim of his hat.
<#FROWN:P26\>It didn't feel right sitting at a table with just men, as though you were at a meeting.
From the booth Tommy had a clear view of the band and dance floor. He had seen the band before. They were nothing great, although he thought the woman singing lead was good-looking and had a decent high voice. She had tight pants on and a pink blouse pulled low on her shoulders. When she sang the chorus she threw her head back so that you saw the swelling in the big vein in her neck. She never talked between songs. One of the men did the talking. He was a fat black-haired man with curly side-burns and played the guitar. The other two were a skinny drummer with long arms like a monkey and a bass player who closed his eyes when he played.
In front of the band there were fifteen or twenty couples dancing in the open space between the booths. They were moving about in circles, most of them in a shuffling two-step, although a few of the older couples knew how to fox-trot and there were others who could manage the jitterbug when there was a fast song. After each song the fat guitar player made a joke or two and the people on the dance floor turned to look at him. Then all at once the band would pick up again, apparently from some private signal, and the woman would begin to sing, and once more the people would start to move about the floor. Between sets, while the band took a break, the jukebox was turned on and everybody returned to his place and drank.
It was during the break after the second set that Tommy noticed that Bobbie and her friend Jan had come in. They were standing near the bar in that crowd of people. Bobbie's hair had been cut in a new way, in a kind of bob, and she was wearing a short dress. Tommy hadn't seen her since he'd come back to town. He wondered if they'd say anything to one another before the night was over. Maybe they'd at least say hello. Later he might even ask her to dance.
Then he saw that the guitar player was standing beside her. He had a drink in his hand and he was talking to her, waving his glass while he talked; then he must have said something clever because both Bobbie and Jan opened their mouths and laughed. From across the room Tommy couldn't hear any of it, but he saw the women laugh and afterward he watched Bobbie pat the guitar player on the cheek. Then the man was saying something more, something that was funny too, apparently, and he set his glass on the bar and he took Bobbie's hand up and kissed it, bending over her hand as if he were a Frenchman. Tommy watched while Bobbie spread her dress to the man, and made him a little curtsy.
"Hey, Tommy," Leo Hagemann said, "don't look now. But isn't that your wife over there?"
"I see her," Tommy said.
"She's looking pretty good."
"We're getting a divorce."
"That's too bad," said Milt Saunder. "I hate to hear that."
Leo Hagemann said, "I didn't hardly recognize her. She looks different. Tommy, she's looking pretty good."
Tommy looked across the table. Leo was leaning forward with his arms on the table; he had both hands around his glass, turning it in his fingers. He was staring out at the dance floor.
Tommy turned back to watch Bobbie once more. The guitar player was gone now and she was talking to someone else, someone with a red shirt. He was tall man with wavy brown hair. He was lighting her cigarette and she was holding under his hand to steady the match.
"Listen," Leo said. "Hey? What would you think if I asked Bobbie to dance?"
He didn't say anything.
"I mean, if it doesn't bother you."
"I don't know," Tommy said.
"What do you think?"
"I haven't seen her in a year," he said. "We don't even talk anymore."
"I guess that's the green light then," Leo said. He stood up. "Here goes nothing."
Tommy watched him walk across the floor. Leo looked heavier than he had a year ago. The tail of his shirt was sticking out, and he was wearing boots, shiny and black. Tommy watched while he walked over and stood beside Bobbie, patting her on the shoulder. Soon the music started up and Leo took Bobbie's hand and led her out onto the floor. Leo knew how to dance; he and Bobbie were spinning around, making dips and turns in time to the music, and people were making room for them on the dance floor. When the song ended Leo bent her over backward, as people did in the movies, and raised her again and gave her a hug. They stood laughing at one another and as the music started they began to dance again. Tommy watched for a moment longer; then he turned to look at Milt Saunders to see what Milt made of any of this.
When he noticed that he was being watched, Milt Saunders sank his head between his shoulders so that it appeared momentarily as if he had no neck. He reminded Tommy of a bird. Then Milt straightened up and raised his glass and drank from it.
Tommy watched him swallow. He had never before paid much attention to the movement of a man's Adam's apple.
By 10:30 the Legion was crowded and noisy. The band continued to play and everyone had to talk above the music if they hoped to be heard. Under the lights the thick smoke hung in the air like fog.
After a while, when Leo Hagemann went on dancing, Tommy stood up and moved to the other side of the booth. It felt uncomfortable, he and Milt Saunders sitting on the same side with nobody sitting opposite them. They sat across from one another, without talking, watching the dancers.
Later the barmaid came by and Tommy ordered another drink for himself and one for Milt. The barmaid was a young girl in blue jeans and a tight plaid shirt that had snaps instead of buttons. She was working very hard to keep up with the crowd; the hair around her face and at the back of her neck was dark with sweat and her cheeks were bright pink. When she returned with their drinks, she set them on the table on clean napkins and Tommy gave her a twenty dollar bill. She made change and he left a dollar tip on the tray.
"Well, thank you," the girl said.
"You're welcome," Tommy said. "Any time."
She gave him a quick look; then she smiled a little and went on.
"Who's that?" he said.
"She's new," Milt Saunders said. "She's from out of town."
"Who is she?"
"She married that Simmons boy."
"Arnold Simmons? I thought Arnold Simmons was still in high school."
"He was," Milt Saunders said. "But not no more. He graduated."
Tommy watched the young girl move across the floor, moving back and forth between the booths and the bar, carrying her tray of drinks. He wondered if she were even twenty-one yet.
Then someone was pushing in beside him. He turned and it was a woman in her mid-thirties, a little too heavy but with a pretty face, and with long black hair and blue eyes and very white even false teeth. "Hey, stranger," she said.
"Hey," Tommy said. "Marla Kroeger."
"I thought that was you sitting over here," she said. "So I said I'll go over and say hello."
"How are you?" Tommy said.
Marla Kroeger was a bus driver for the Holt County School District. For a year she had come into the bus barn where Tommy had worked as a mechanic; she had been unhappy and he had listened to her while she had talked. She would talk and he would lie on his back under one of the buses and listen to her, and now and then he would look out at her feet and ankles and at her knees if she had a dress on. After they had gotten to know one another, the topic she had talked most about was her husband Darrel.
Darrel was one of the Kroeger boys, a wheat farmer out north of town. He was a huge man, with thick hands and thick wrists and heavy legs that stretched his pants legs tight when he sat down. He was older than Marla by seven years, but he had begun to date her, to take her out in his Oldsmobile, when she was only a sophomore in high school. That was thrilling to her, she had told Tommy, to have a twenty-three-year-old man ask her out and to take her places and buy her dinner and afterward to go driving in the country with him while the stars shone overhead and the radio played the top forty from Denver. It was thrilling, she had said, but by the start of the summer after her junior year she was two months pregnant. So she had to quit school.
"I didn't care about it at the time," she said, "one way or the other. I never liked school anyway. I think I was just waiting for something to happen."
"And then it did," Tommy said.
"Oh, yes," Marla said. "Doesn't it always?"
That summer she had married Darrel Kroeger and they had moved into a double wide trailer northwest of town. Seven months later she had had a little boy. Then three years after that she had delivered another child, a little girl this time. That was enough; she had had her tubes tied after that.
So she'd had her hands full, taking care of the children, managing the house and the yard and the gardening, and doing everything else there was to do, being the wife of a farmer. But gradually the children had grown up and had become more independent, and then Marla was only twenty-six by the time they were both attending school.
"It was so quiet out in the country," she said. "At first I liked it, after the kids were gone. And Darrel, he was always gone somewhere. Darrel, he was always outside, crawling under his machinery or drilling wheat. Or driving off to some auction with his brother."
After a year and then the beginning of another year of this, it had begun to get on her nerves. She had felt raw, in some way. She needed a little excitement. She needed something for herself. "I got tired of standing in front of the picture window, looking out at the wind blow dirt across the yard."
So she had taken what was available. There was an advertisement in the Holt Mercury for a substitute bus driver, and she had applied for the job and was hired; and the next year there was an opening for a full-time driver and they had hired her for that position too. "It wasn't much," she said. "It wasn't legal secretary. But it did get me out of the house."
And that's where she was five years later when she had begun to come into the bus barn to talk to Tommy. She was out of the house, driving the county kids to and from school every day.
But she didn't think she loved Darrel Kroeger any more.
Oh, he worked hard and he wasn't a drunkard. It wasn't that. And he didn't hurt her, not physically, although more and more she wished he would leave her alone in bed. She wasn't interested in that with him anymore. It was getting so she felt suffocated by him. And she wished he would bathe more often. She liked things clean. What good did it do to wash the sheets and hang them out on the line so they would smell fresh of the outdoors, if Darrel wouldn't bathe when he came in at night?<#Frown:P27\>Cigarettes, mouthwash, leather. "Sure," she said, squinting against the glare of a passing car, trying to look casual, thankful and pretty at the same time. "Wherever you're going, long as it's this way."
"Load on up then. I'm on the night shift down the road a piece. Take you as far as I can." The driver twisted a knob on the dash and lit up the inside of the car so she could see his face. "I'm Panks Gaylord," he said, words cracking as he cleared his throat. "And I'm as safe as I can be."
"My name's Rebecca. Thanks a lot." She pulled the passenger seat forward and laid her guitar and the satchel in back. The Monte Carlo was perfectly clean - no trash or dirt anywhere. Even the floormats were spotless. The soft smell of leather came from a pair of creamy sheepskin seat covers that looked brand new. The ash tray was open - it held two fresh butts - and the radio was playing low, a cut by Waylon Jennings. She took off the oversized suede jacket and tucked her turquoise T-shirt deep into her waistband, feeling the play of Panks Gaylord's eyes. His glance, crude as it was, actually reassured her. Dropping the jacket behind the seat, she drew her long blond hair over one shoulder and lowered herself into the car. The silver-spoke wheels were gliding over gravel before she even closed the door.
She had to wait until he offered her a cigarette to get a good look at him. He was in his early twenties, cleanshaven, with a narrow jaw and pinched, deep-set eyes that looked a little surly in the glow of the dash. He seemed familiar, probably because she had seen countless men like him. Aunt Percy would say he was downright common with the criminal English face of his ancestors, and she'd be right. His ears were large, his neck long, his brownish hair thin and dull, showing thickness only in the sideburns. But Rebecca felt comfortable enough. The best thing about men like Panks Gaylord was that she'd been around them all her life and could pretty much read them like a children's book. She estimated that the difference between Gaylord and Espy Tosh was about one tiny inch, and she'd been going out with Espy for two years and handling him just fine. Besides, she knew that country boys loved to think they were bad and tough, and she'd been playing that game for a long time too. She just hoped she'd be able to talk Panks into driving a few miles extra.
"So where you going with that guitar?" he asked, gripping a Marlboro in the corner of his mouth.
"Outta town."
"You from around here? I thought so. Thought maybe I'd seen you before." He flexed his tanned forearms and smiled. He was still young enough to have good teeth. "You got a last name you care to give?"
"O'Connell," she said, dropping her voice so she'd sound a little shy.He hissed between his teeth, trying to whistle. "Rebecca O'Connell. I play ball against Espy Tosh and I seen you up at The Mill House. My friend Eddie and me sit at the bar near the dart board. You sing good." He turned to her and winked. "I knew I remembered that pretty hair."
She smiled and held out her cigarette for a light. He'd forgotten to do that.
"You leaving town?"
"For a while."
"What's Espy got to say about that? Ain't he got enough money or whatever to keep you around?" Panks lifted his chin and slapped at the steering wheel. She could hear the crackle of rivalry in his laughter as she drew one of her legs underneath her, careful not to dirty the sheepskin. Her chances were improving every minute.
"We're not married or nothing," she said. "Just see each other when we need to."
"Well, if I had a girl could sing as good as you and look fine too, I'd need to see her every day." He drew on his cigarette, both eyes winking. "And every night."
She laughed out loud and reached for the knob of the radio. A fancy, polished song by Barbara Mandrell. One she hated.
"Sorry to say I'm only going as far as Truevine. Got my job to tend to till morning." He spoke carefully, like he was trying to coax a child into sitting still. She almost laughed again but didn't want to interrupt his routine. It was too much fun to watch. "After work I could drive you clear to North Carolina if you wanted."
"Panks," she said, dropping a hand onto his arm where his rolled-up sleeve met skin. "Why don't you take me as far as you're going. Then we'll see what happens."
He took the curves fast, especially the blind ones, showing her how well his car handled and how much pickup the Chevy engine had on hills. She complimented him on his driving and asked him all sorts of questions about his years at the high school, his weekends at the lake or the speedway, anything to keep him relaxed and occupied. She didn't ask him about his girlfriends because she knew it was best not to rush a man, especially if he was older and thought he was in charge. The flirting was easy. It was part of a bargain she'd always understood.
"Hey," Panks said, interrupting himself. "You got me talking your pretty little ear off and I ain't heard word one about you." He twisted his shoulders toward her, his eyes round with playful shock. "Not hiding anything, are you?"
"No," she lied, looking out the window into a black tangle of cornfields. "Don't need to. I'm eighteen and on my own. Like everybody else."
"Shit, yeah. I hear that. I moved in with my brother when I quit school. Been making my own way - my own good trouble too - for nearly eight years." He slapped the open part of the seat between them and pressed the accelerator. The Monte Carlo shot up the hill like it was riding a current of warm air.
"You're lucky," she said.
"I'd say so. Fast car. Good-looking girl. Early enough for work so I can buy you a Coke at the Truevine Store. Maybe put a little J.D. in it, for the road and all."
Rebecca shifted and tilted her face into the palm of her hand. Her hay-colored hair swirled in the crosscurrents of his open window. "Sounds good," she said, reaching toward his shirt pocket for another Marlboro. "I'm all for some fun. What time's work?"
"Need to clock in by eleven, but I'm the watchman so who gives a damn. Jamison owes me a half hour anyway. I cover his big ass all the time."
"I reckon you're a nice guy," she said.
"Tell me about it," he said, smiling even harder.
The parking lot at Truevine Store was empty except for a beige Datsun pickup with a FOR SALE sign taped inside its window. The warm, puddled asphalt glittered with beer tabs and broken glass. Two cold drink machines - one for Coke, one for Dr. Pepper - stood against a wall advertising boat rentals and live bait. The interior of the store was filled with a sickly light cast by the plastic moon face of a Red Man clock.
"You ever seen the paint factory?" Panks asked, getting out of the car and yanking his dark blue work pants out of his crotch. "I'd give you a tour but it's against the rules. Something to see though, if you ever get the chance. Something to smell, too."
"That's all right." She spoke slowly and gently. "I'll take a big old Coke instead."
"Damn. That's my girl. You reach in that glove compartment there and we'll have us a little party."
Rebecca got the pint of Jack Daniels and held it in front of her eyes while Panks hunted through his pocket change for quarters. She watched him waver through the clear amber liquid, then disappear as he got lost behind the bottle's black label. She was more tired that she'd realized. Putting on faces for Panks Gaylord was sapping her strength. Below the fatigue, however, she sensed a fearsome edginess. She wondered if a drink or two would keep Panks driving.
He walked back toward the car like he was crossing a dance floor. "Can you believe that redneck George Philpott wants three thousand dollars for that tiny Japanese thing." He squatted by is open door and waved toward the Datsun. "This world's crazy." He looked at her more closely than before, letting his small eyes rove. Rebecca felt the skin on her neck go tight. He looked even skinnier when he was out of the car, but she had to admit he had nice arms. "You want to stand out here or what?" he asked. "I got some cups in the trunk. Nobody'll bother us if we're quiet."
"I'm gonna drink my drink in here by the radio," she said, pushing her hair away from her face. "Why don't you climb in and keep me company?"
She watched the eagerness run through his hands like a tingle. He stepped back and poured some Coke out of both bottles, then handed them to her so she could add the whiskey. "Fill 'er up. Let's see if I can't get a good story out of you."
He talked about himself until his Coke was half gone. She kept a cigarette lit, one they could share, and listened to him tell about playing second base in high school and for the American Legion team. He claimed to be a real baseball fan and thought the game proved that country boys could keep up with the city high schools and summer leagues. "I halfway dreamed of going pro or semi-pro myself, but soft-handed infielders is a dime a dozen with the niggers and spics around. And I'll tell you the truth. I don't have the world's quickest bat." He sneered and reached over to pat her thigh. "That Espy of yours thinks he's hot shit though. Switch hitter and all. But I'll tell you something, little girl. If he's so great why's he still suiting up for Standard Oil after all these years? I mean I hear he's selling dog food for Dan Hawkins down at the mill. Now Wade Tosh was a great pitcher, real pro-type material. Him getting killed in Nam was a real loss. But little brother Espy ain't squat. You probably love the son-of-a-bitch and all, but that don't matter. Not when Panks Gaylord tells the truth."
"I don't love Espy," she said.
He raised the glistening mouth of his Coke to his eye, then emptied it in two swallows. "Nothing to love."
"I just don't love him. That's all."
"I'll drink to that. You're smarter than I thought." He checked his big black-banded watch. "I got twenty minutes free and clear."
She could tell he was the kind who would take on an ugly swagger if he got too drunk. Her own hands felt as warm and fuzzy as mittens as she looked through the windshield at the low-slung silhouette of the Blue Ridge Paint Factory across the road There was a bit of moon in the sky now so she could just make out the shapes of some railroad cars lined up on a weedy siding. She set her half-empty bottle outside the car and turned the keys in the ignition. It would't hurt to hear the radio.
Panks poured way too much whiskey in their second drinks. Coke and liquor fizzed up over his knuckles and he laughed, lifting his feet to keep them dry. The night was still; the air began to smell sticky and old. They both kept their doors open, Tammy Wynette blending with the slow song of the crickets.
"You must think Espy's right special, you've stayed with him so long."
<#FROWN:P28\>
Separating
My mom is standing in the rain talking to the guy whose pickup she just rear-ended. It's getting dark. We've pulled off the road and the two of them are under a tree next to his truck. He's younger than Mom, wearing jeans, a T-shirt, and cowboy boots. When they laugh, Mom looks like she does with her dates, these guys that shake my hand and call me Sport. It's Michael, I tell them, but they don't listen to a fourteen-year-old. He gets a notebook and pen from his truck, and they write things down and exchange pieces of paper while I wait in the car. I wait a lot lately, for school to end, or Mom to get home, or Dad to pick me up. They separated four months ago. Mostly I'm waiting for them to work things out.
Mom gets in the car and slams her door, which doesn't close quite like it did twenty minutes ago. She looks at her skirt. "I'm soaked," she says, as though it's a surprise, and she pushes her hair off her face. "He's nice. Lee, that's his name. He says we don't have to tell our insurance." This is big news. Mom's been to traffic school twice.
"What's the catch?" I say, but she's not listening. She's watching the truck.
"He's coming over later to give me the names of some body shops. I told him to come for dinner," she says, and she looks at me and shrugs.
It took Mom awhile to start dating. Dad used to ask me every week, first thing, Is she seeing anybody? And every week I'd shake my head, and Dad would seem half disappointed, half relieved. Until three weeks ago when she went out with Jim, a new teacher at the school where she's a speech therapist, and since then she's been a regular little social butterfly. Dad took it like bad news he'd been expecting.
Dad, on the other hand, has done his fair share. Her name's Darilyn, and she's had pizza with us a few times. She drinks white wine with an ice cube, and never takes her sunglasses off. I stare at her nose when we talk; looking at her body feels weird, knowing what she and Dad are up to, and if I look at her eyes all I see is myself in the reflection of her glasses. I know that nose pretty well. The first time I met her, she and Dad acted like seeing each other was a big coincidence; Dad was shy and excited around her, then on the way home he asked me in a confidential, buddy-buddy tone to please not mention her to Mom. I don't want to hurt her any more than I have, he said. Is she why you moved out, I said, but he wouldn't answer.
Dad called us every day the first few weeks he was gone; sometimes Mom would talk to him, sometimes not. She acted as though he were just on a trip, and got mad if I asked when he was coming home. Then we saw him at the market. He'd seen Mom's car on Lake Street, he said, and he'd followed us. He walked with us through the aisles, saying he was sorry things were like this, asking how we were, was there anything he could do. Would you be quiet, Mom said, we're in the market, as she squeezed our cart past Mrs. Markey, the school counselor, who gave Mom a look. You've flipped, Mom whispered to Dad. If you think I'm just going to sit around until your little crisis is over, you're crazier than I thought. She put some bananas in our cart, weighed a bag of oranges, while Dad and I looked on. Jean, he said, I'm forty-six years old and I felt ten years older than that with you. I felt like things were closing in on me in that house, and he waved his arm as though he meant the market, the town. Us. Mom was tying a knot in the bag of oranges, pulling hard at the corners. What did you expect, that's what I'd like to know, she said, from people like us with a son? You didn't turn out to be the person I thought you were, Dad said, looking away from her. You mean she's not Darilyn, I wanted to say, but I kept quiet. Mom started pushing the cart fast, almost running from him. This is a goddamn market, she said, louder than she meant to. People stared, a cashier stopped ringing things up and looked our way. Mom turned down the cereal aisle, barely missing a box boy putting jars of peanut butter on a shelf, where she abandoned our cart and headed for the exit. Come on, Michael, she said, let's get out of here. Dad tried to take her arm, but she shook him off. Go to hell, Grady, she said, and when he stared at her with his hangdog look, she said, Look, what did you expect? You weren't exactly trying to win some popularity contest, were you? Her words seemed to ring out in the store. I looked at the linoleum floor and kicked at a piece of lettuce as we walked out, wishing we were invisible.
Little things have changed since then. We eat out a lot; Mom says it's a lot of trouble to cook for two. She has the radio on, all the time, news, sports, easy listening, she doesn't care what, as long as it's noise. And the house. Every day Mom puts a few more of Dad's things in the den: books, albums, his tools from the garage, quilts passed down from his mom, his clothes. I hear her late at night, sorting things, moving things, and if I come out of my room she stops, wide-eyed, as though I've caught her at something furtive, then she goes back to what she was doing without saying anything. It sounds like there are rats in our house.
Mom and I drive to Monty's, where Dad's picking me up tonight. Mom doesn't like him coming to the house - she says it makes it hard to keep her distance - so we meet at different places around town, where we try to act like nothing's wrong. Mom likes to get us there early enough to sit down and have something to drink while we wait for Dad. It's always awkward; I think she's trying to be nice to me.
Monty's has dim lights, dark-red vinyl booths, and paper placemats with maps that have gold stars to show where the other Monty's are. Mom and I sit in a corner booth and she orders our usual: a glass of wine for her, a Coke with lime for me. The lime is her idea; she says it's festive.
"Well, we made it to another Friday night," she says. "Cheers," and she clinks my glass. "This must be hard for you. When I was fourteen everything was so set. No ifs, you know?"
"It's all right," I say.
"I wasn't apologizing, Michael." She hands me my napkin, the heavy cloth kind, the same dark red as the booths.
"I didn't say you were."
She straightens her silverware, then looks around like she's trying to find someone she knows. "I didn't think I'd end up like this. A single mom, a place like this on a Friday night."
"The baseball team had their awards banquet here last year," I say. That's the trick with Mom: keep the conversation light, don't let her start considering things.
Mom smooths her placemat where her glass has made it wet. "I think we're doing better. I feel like I'm coming out of this. Maybe it isn't the worst thing that could have happened, you know?"
"You're doing great," I say, my voice high and fake, and I wish again that they wouldn't talk to me about their marriage, or their divorce, whatever it is they have. "I wish it were a year from now," I say.
Mom nods. "I'm not too crazy about the near future either." She sighs. "Who knows? Maybe this is just wife talk, mumbo-jumbo talk. Maybe I just gave you a great big earful of wife talk is all, do you think?" She rubs my cheek and smiles. I started shaving a few weeks ago, just before school started. "You're so big," she says. "We never expected that."
We stare at the table. I squeeze some lime into my Coke, drop the rind into it, and stir it around. I'm getting used to the taste of lime. I try to think about predictable things like geometry, soccer, that great smell of some girls' hair. Then I see Mom look up and sigh, a noise like our house makes in the night, settling, and I know that Dad's here. Mom smooths her hair.
Dad leans down and kisses Mom's cheek, something he used to do every night when he came home from work, but there's an apology in it tonight, and it feels like a small conversation's taken place between them.
"I didn't see you," he says.
Mom nods. "It's dark. I knew there was a reason we never ate here." She won't go to our old places.
Dad's hair is wet from the rain. He seems nervous and excited, and it occurs to me that maybe he has Darilyn stashed in the car. "Your front bumper looks funny," he says, as he stares at the table and moves the salt closer to the pepper.
"I know. I'll pay for it," Mom says.
"I wasn't worried about the money," he says. "You always think I'm going to say something bad."
"Since when do you know what I think?" she says. Dad looks at the ceiling, which sparkles. Mom picks up the check, puts some money on the table, and stands. She smooths her skirt, which is still damp, and Dad and I follow her out.
Dad drives to the pizza place where we go every week. I sit at our same table, the one in the back under the neon Miller sign, while Dad gets a pitcher of beer and a Coke.
"Drink your Coke," he says when he sits down.
"I'm not thirsty."
"Trust me," he says. "Just drink it." He watches me while I down it, then he takes my empty glass, looks around the room, and fills it with beer. This is the second time he's given me beer. The first time was on our second night out when I cried. I don't know why I did that, except that it all hit me at once: Mom's weirdness, Dad's scatteredness, how screwed up everything was. Dad said stupid things about the passage of time, which he knew as well as I did was bull, so he finally just shut up and gave me a beer.
"We're celebrating," Dad says as he puts my glass down in front of me. He clinks it with his mug. "To reunions."
I watch him drink. He puts his mug down and leans forward, anxious, waiting. "Well, what do you think?" he says. "About your mom and me."
I put my glass down a little too loudly, and the waiter glances at us. "You mean like you're getting back together?"
"The very thing," Dad says. "As of tonight." He lowers his voice. "I made a mistake. But it's over now."
"When did you tell Mom?"
"We're telling her tonight. You and me. There's a bottle of Emerald Dry in the trunk. I figured after dinner we'd go home and celebrate. The three of us." I can feel him staring at me, and when I don't say anything he roughs up my hair. "Hey, who died? We're talking good news here."
"What happened to Darilyn?"
He shrugs, looks away. "She went back," he says.
"Back?"
"To her husband, all right?" He glares at me.
"Okay."
<#FROWN:P29\>
"He is my life."
"If he is alive," said Wil Usdi, "and if anyone knows anything about him, Gun Rod will know."
"Gun Rod?"
"He's an old man. He's a white man who was once married to a Cherokee woman. They had children, but they lost them all years ago to a sickness. More recently Gun Rod lost his wife, too, so he is all alone in the world. I've seen him not long ago, and he seems to know all about what has happened to the People, to many of them. His knowledge amazed me."
"Where can I find Gun Rod?" Oconeechee asked.
He was with your father at the fight at Horseshoe Bend," said Little Will. "Do you know that place?"
"Yes," she said. "My father took me there once to show me where it happened."
"Gun Rod lives near there. It's a long trip for you to make."
"I'll make it."
"He's an old man with long white hair and a long white beard. He lives alone in a small cabin near the battlefield. The Cherokees knew him as Gun Rod, but his white man name is Titus Hooker. Can you remember that? Titus Hooker."
"Titus Hooker," repeated Oconeechee, pronouncing the English sounds with some difficulty. "Titus Hooker. Gun Rod."
"If you are really determined to go there to continue this search of yours," said Wil Usdi, "I'll draw you a map to show you the way to Gun Rod's house from the battleground."
The following morning Wil Usdi left. His ultimate destination was Washington City. At almost the same time, Oconeechee left. She left well supplied for a long journey, but she left with a much lighter heart than she had had on her previous excursions. This time she had a destination. She would not be wandering aimlessly. She had a man's name, and she had a map. In her mind she could see this Gun Rod, this white man with the hairy white head, and he seemed to her to be the very image of the white man's God, and the longer she walked, the more her trek took on in her mind the characteristics of a sacred pilgrimage. This god-like white man, this Gun Rod who had so much knowledge in his hoary head, he would give her the answers to her questions.
The first day of her trip she did not even stop to eat, so anxious was she to get to Gun Rod there by Horseshoe Bend in the land that the whites called Alabama. But the second day, in spite of her eagerness, she deliberately slowed her pace. She was weary from her haste the previous day, and she knew that she must eat to maintain her strength. She also realized that the farther she traveled away from the mountain fastness of Ut'sala and the others, the more dangerous her situation became. She could not allow herself to be captured or harmed, perhaps killed, when she was finally getting close to her goal. And she knew that she was getting close. Wil Usdi had sent her to Gun Rod, and Gun Rod would have the answers. She began to travel more cautiously. When it was possible, she moved at night and found daylight hideaways in which to sleep. She kept away from main-traveled roads, and when she saw people, she quickly hid herself and kept still and quiet until they were gone. She had heard it said that the whites were no longer trying to catch Cherokees to send them west, but Ut'sala and his people still hid in the mountains, and she would be at least as skeptical as they. She would not take any unnecessary chances. She would not trust rumor. She would not be caught being careless or neglectful or overconfident.
Oconeechee was confident, though. Not only had Wil Usdi given her hope by telling her of Gun Rod, but she had also gone to see the old man known as the Breath who lived there among the fugitives and was said to be a conjuror. She had told him about her search for Waguli. The old man had taken from a little bag two beads, one black and one red. Oconeechee did not have to be told the significance of the colors. She knew that the red one stood for success, and the black was ominous and indicated disaster. She had stopped breathing without realizing it, and she could feel her heart pounding in her breast as the old man took up the beads. He held them, the black one in his left hand, the red one in his right, between his thumbs and index fingers. He stared hard at the beads, and mumbled something to them, low, too low for Oconeechee to understand what he was saying. Time seemed to stop. Then suddenly, frightfully, the black bead seemed to take on life. It began to crawl along the leathery old finger of the Breath, and Oconeechee's heart skipped a beat. Then the red bead moved, and the black one moved back to its original position. The red bead seemed to quiver for an instant, then it shot along all the way to the first joint of old Breath's finger. The stored-up wind came out of Oconeechee's lungs. She would have success, the old man had told her. She would find Waguli.
She was sleeping in an open field late one evening. She had found the country through which she was moving to be heavily populated with whites, and she was afraid to travel by day. The field was covered with tall grass, and she had moved a distance away from the road to lie down in the cover of the grass. When the sun was down, she would crawl out and resume her travel. The sky had been clear all day, and she expected a bright, starry night. It would be all right for traveling. She was awakened from her sleep by the noise of a barking dog. She sat up to listen. The dog seemed to be coming closer, and she could hear the voices of white men, could hear them trampling through the grass. She raised herself up as much as she dared and strained to see through the dimming light of evening. There were three white men with guns following a dog, and they were coming straight towards her. They had not seen her, could not know of her presence there. The direction of their movement was just bad luck. Panic-stricken, she wondered what to do. If she sat still, they would surely come upon her. Even if the men walked by without noticing her there, the dog surely would not. If she jumped up and ran, they would be bound to chase her. She might outrun the men, but she could not outrun the dog.
Then off to her left, back in the direction from which she had come, sounded the loud, clear call of a mountain whippoorwill, followed by a rustling of dry grass and a flapping of wings. The dog barked and ran after the sound, and the men yelled and ran after the dog. Oconeechee watched until they had run almost out of her sight, then got up and began to move quickly in the opposite direction.
"Waguli," she said out loud.
She recognized the battlefield when she found it. She could remember it from the time years before when Junaluska had brought her there. Not much had changed. She saw the spot her father had pointed out to her with pride, pride which would later turn to regret, the spot where he had saved the life of Old Hickory, Tseg'sgin. Thoughts of her father brought tears to her eyes, but she brushed them away and brought out the map Wil Usdi had drawn for her. The house of Gun Rod would be just over the hill off to her right. She was almost there, and a good thing, too, for she had run out of food and had been traveling for a day without anything to eat. She was weak and weary from hunger and from physical exertion.
"Gun Rod is just there," she said.
She was pleased with the accuracy of Wil Usdi's map and with how easily she could read it. She started to walk directly across the open battlefield toward the hill which was hiding her goal from her eyes. Her legs seemed to move of their own will. She seemed to be plunging forward. She saw nothing but the hill. She moved across the field in long, jerking strides. Reaching the hillside shortened her steps, but still she moved forward, still straight ahead. As the climb grew steeper, she leaned more and more forward until at last her hands touched the ground that seemed to be rising before her. Then she was crawling. And then she was on top of the hill.
She stood up straight and drew in lungs full of air, her breast heaving in labored motion. Her head felt light, and her vision was beginning to blur, but down below she could see a cabin with blue-gray smoke rising lazily from its stone chimney. It was Gun Rod's cabin. It could be no other. Oconeechee started walking again. She walked faster. She was almost running when she reached the steep downhill grade, and she fell forward tumbling. She scrambled to her feet once, only to pitch forward, rolling again. At the bottom of the hill, she stood up on unsteady legs and walked to the front of the cabin. The old man must have heard her approach, for he opened the front door and stepped out onto the small porch. He was short, though not so short as Wil Usdi, and he was powerfully built. His blue-gray eyes, red nose, and bit of loose flesh below each eye were all that showed of a face through the mass of white hair and beard. He looked down off the raised porch at Oconeechee, dirty and battered there before him, and she thought she could read in those clear old eyes both curiosity and compassion.
"Gun Rod," she said, and then the world began to spin around her, and the last bit of strength left her tired legs. Her knees buckled beneath her, and she sank to the ground unconscious.
22
She went into Alabama
to a place they call Big Bend,
where her father had saved Old Hickory,
and that's where she found a friend.
Bitterly she wailed in sorrow,
"Why am I crying still,
and who has taken from me
my noble Whippoorwill?"
Old Titus Hooker practically jumped off the porch when he saw the girl faint. He ran the few steps from the porch to where she lay, and he knelt heavily beside her with a loud groan. Carefully he rolled her over onto her back and straightened her arms and legs. He listened to her breathing for a moment, and then, satisfied that it was regular enough, he shoved his thick arms underneath her body and lifted her to carry her into the house. Inside, he lowered her gently onto his bed. Then he located a clean rag which he soaked in water that stood in a basin on a small table. He wrung the excess water out of the rag and went back to her side to bathe her face and lower legs. He touched a hand to her cheek and to her forehead.
"No fever," he said. "I expect she's just wore out."
He was speaking English, talking to himself out loud, as he spread a blanket over the unconscious girl. Then he stepped back to look at her. He wondered who this strange young woman could be and what had brought her to his lonely cabin. He was sure that he had not seen her before, but, he thought, she called me by my Indian name. Looks like she's come a long, hard ways to find me.
