All for a Sister (22 page)

“And you are too old for this bickering,” Daddy said. “Now stop it once and for all.”

His words took hold of not only the squabbling siblings but apparently the film as well. It sputtered a bit and the screen went dark—the result of a crudely pasted edit—only to spring to life again with a new image. This time, the entire frame consisted of Graciela’s prized hibiscus and the image of yet another woman standing in front of it. Celeste could see she was beautiful, now that so many years stretched between that awkward afternoon and this evening. She ran her fingers delicately along the bright-red petals and brought her nose close to smell their fragrance. Looking mischievous, she plucked one free—this eliciting an irritated gasp from Mother at the viewing of the act—and ran it along her painted lips.

Nobody spoke.

Celeste vaguely remembered watching the film soon after Daddy processed it, but had been unable to appreciate anything other than her own, now rather silly, performance. This, in contrast, was art—a full-color, living depiction of beauty. Somehow, that shrill, painted woman conveyed a loveliness equal to the bloom, but there was something else, too. Something Celeste didn’t quite understand, but which had moved Calvin to the very edge of his seat, his cigarette dangling from his lips, forgotten.

“This one,” Daddy finally said, his voice thick. “And no other.”

Daddy raged around the house, his voice echoing from the high ceilings and shiny tile and empty walls.

“My blue cravat—with the orange! I must have it!”

It was past nine o’clock in the morning, and Celeste, home
from school on the spring holiday, sat in the middle of the staircase, listening to the chaotic morning. Mother appeared, still in her dressing gown, her hair wrapped in a soft pink scarf. She dangled a scrap of blue silk over the banister.

“Here it is.” Her voice left no doubt to how little she cared about her husband’s dilemma.

Daddy emerged from his study and bounded up the stairs, his freshly shined shoe barely missing Celeste’s smallest finger as she scooted out of his path.

“Not this one. I need the navy blue, with the bright-orange dots.
Color!
I need to convey color.”

“Well, I’ll see what I can do,” Mother said, then yelled Graciela’s name at the top of her lungs.

Graciela emerged from the kitchen, full of apologies. “
Lo siento mucho.
You asked me to steam press this for you yesterday, and I forgot to bring it up to your room.”

“Thank you, Graciela.” He spoke with affection and gratitude as he took the tie from her. Rather than going back upstairs, where Mother had watched the finding of the lost treasure with unmasked ennui before returning to their bed, he went to the front hall and used the mirror there to create a fashionable knot, fastening his collar bar beneath it.

“Fetch my vest and jacket, won’t you please, Celi? The brown tweed laid out on the bed.”

“Yes, Daddy.” She jumped up from her place on the stairway and took the steps quickly.

In her parents’ room, the shades were drawn against the sun, her mother’s form barely discernible in the bed.

Celeste moved gingerly through the semidarkness. “Aren’t you feeling well, Mother?”

The reply came in the form of faint affirmation.

“Wouldn’t you like to come downstairs and see Daddy off? It’s such a big day for him, and I think he might even be a little nervous. It’s not like him to fuss so about a silly tie.”

“I can’t.” She shifted from being curled up on her side to her back, with some obvious discomfort in the transition. “Ask Graciela to bring up a pot of tea, once your father is safely out the door.”

“Yes, Mother.” She found her father’s jacket and vest on the large, upholstered trunk sitting at the foot of the bed. Before draping them over her arm, she held them close to inhale the scent of his shaving soap.

“You love him very much, don’t you?”

“Daddy? Of course I do.”

Mother’s outstretched hand beckoned, and Celeste took it, settling on the edge of the bed, fearful of hurting her.

“And me?”

“Of course,” she repeated. What a strange conversation to have on such an exciting day. Mother’s hand was soft and plump and of so perfect a temperature—neither hot nor cold—that Celeste could hardly tell where her touch ended and her mother’s began.

“I haven’t always been a very good . . . person.”

Celeste leaned over and kissed her dry cheek. “Don’t be silly.”

“We left so much behind in Chicago. We left everything. . . .”

She often fell into these maudlin reminiscences about Chicago, as if they didn’t have everything they needed right here. A home, each other, and now a chance for Daddy to fulfill his dream. She supposed Mother was talking about the baby, the little girl who died before Celeste was even born. The one where Calvin got so mixed up, calling Celeste that baby’s ghost. She didn’t want to talk to her mother right now, not about anything so sad, so she gave her hand a squeeze and promised to send Graciela up with
tea. “In fact,” she said, “I’ll bring it up myself if you like. And read to you. Would you like that?” She loved to read aloud to anyone who would listen. It gave her a chance to practice her accents.

“No. I have a better idea. You should go with your father.”

“Me? Why would I—?”

“You’re two of a kind, with all your silliness and dreams.”

“But this is an important meeting, with very important men.” Hadn’t she been listening to a word her father said all these years?

“All the more reason to bring a sweet little girl in tow. They’ll be less likely to be unkind if you are there.”

“Why would they be—?”

“Do you think this is the first meeting your father has ever had with very important men? Go.”

“What if he won’t allow me to go?”

“Remind him that you are his daughter. In fact, you’re his muse, and then tell him your mother insists.”

Thrilled at the prospect and armed with her mother’s blessing, Celeste ran quickly into her own bedroom and chose a wine-colored velvet ribbon from her top drawer. Earlier in the day Graciela had given her an intricate braid that began at her crown, which she looped and secured at her nape with the ribbon. She quickly changed from her play clothes into one of her nicest school dresses and grabbed her shoes, thinking she could hook the buttons while Daddy finished dressing.

Her stockinged feet made no sound on the stairs, and she moved slowly with one hand on the banister lest she slip. She rounded the corner into the entryway, announcing that Mother had the most wonderful idea, and came upon her father and Graciela stepping away from each other. Graciela’s hands flew to her mouth and tears glistened in her eyes.

“Perdón.”
She spoke the word behind her silver-and-turquoise
rings as she hustled past without giving Celeste so much as a glance. Her father, too, seemed reluctant to look at her, and busied himself smoothing his already-smooth hair.

“Is everything all right?” she asked. “Were you angry with Graciela about forgetting your tie? Because everything turned out fine. She found it, didn’t she? Nice and steamed.”

“What are you—?” He looked confused and then at peace. “No, no. Nothing like that. Everything’s fine.”

“She seemed upset.”

“It’s fine.”

He took the vest and slipped his arms through, but Celeste could tell immediately that he’d misaligned the buttons. She giggled at his gaffe and offered to complete the task for him. He acquiesced and held his arms limp at his sides while she deftly unbuttoned and rebuttoned the vest, happy to be needed.

“There.” She stepped back to give him room to pull on his suit jacket and fuss with the lapels. “You look very handsome.”

He did, even with the fine lines at the corners of his eyes and the touch of gray in his sideburns. Not like other girls’ fathers, those she saw at school functions and in their neighborhood. They were paunchy or bald with sagging faces and puffy eyes. Guilt tugged as she thought—as she often did—that her father was so much more handsome than her mother was beautiful. He was so trim, so
disciplined
in his appearance, while Mother had been to the dressmaker’s last week because she’d grown too fat for most of what she had. She’d developed a soft roll beneath her chin and was beginning to move with a kind of breathless lumbering—when she moved at all.

“Mother said I should go with you.”

He stopped in his preening long enough to give her a measured look. “She did?”

“Can I, please, Daddy? I’ll sit quiet as a mouse, I promise.”

“What possible reason could you have for going?”

“I could help you carry your things.” She didn’t want to share her mother’s remarks.

“I can carry them myself.”

“The papers and the film?”

He chuckled, and then his eyes sparked with an idea. He tucked his thumb under her chin and raised her face, looking at it from one angle and the next. “Of course.”

She rose to her toes. “Do you mean it?”

“When they see you in the flesh, and then what I’ve done for you on film . . .”

He didn’t finish the sentence, but she fully understood. “Does that make us in cahoots?”

“I suppose it does.” He stooped to pick up the small leather satchel waiting by the door. “But this won’t have to be a secret.”

THE WRITTEN CONFESSION OF MARGUERITE DUFRANE, PAGES 67–79

YOU MIGHT BE SURPRISED
to know that it was my idea to go to California. Arthur would have everybody believe otherwise, going on and on about how bringing color to film meant the fulfillment of a chemical engineer’s dream. Poppycock. I concur that his interest was piqued when he went to that first symposium the week you were born, and I also know by now that his desire to move to that godforsaken coastal village had little to do with making movies. Had I been privy to such future revelations, I might not have urged my husband in that direction. For example, I might not have made it a point, each and every winter, to complain about the bitter coldness or the exhaustion of bundling children up to play outside for an hour. I might not have peppered every dinner conversation about my growing dissatisfaction with our church, and our friends, and the haunted draftiness of our rambling family home.

Somehow I knew, from the day you were born, that I would have to secret you away to keep you to myself. I thought at first we would be hiding from your mother. But even after that fear was allayed, I knew it would be far too easy to simply keep you. You see, I learned when Mary died that we cannot decide what
will and will not be our earthly treasures. Only God can keep those accounts. And so, in those first few years, when I had my beautiful baby girl, and a handsome son and husband, and a stately family home with all the privilege that such allows, and a church with my name on a brass plate, and a few friends still willing to adhere to the ever-more-archaic calling hours . . . well, how selfish it would be to think I would pass from this life into the next with all those blessings intact.

Above all, I wanted to keep you, my Celeste, because you had come at such a price. And the price grew and grew and grew.

It is good to remember that I pen this at our attorney’s behest, to shine the light on my guilt, my manipulations, my orchestration of the imprisonment of that poor girl, and I wonder if he will let it stand, given the chink it reveals in his own breastplate of righteousness. But it is so important to me, my dear, dear Celeste, that you not see me as some monstrous puppeteer, controlling erstwhile honorable men. Judge Stephens was more than willing to trade her freedom for his reputation, and Christopher Parker, Esquire, for all his nobility, allowed greed to temporarily stay his integrity. But unlike Job, who sat in the ash heap among three advisers who would urge him to look to his own sin, I employed three duplicitous men to absolve me of my own. I’ve already given full account of one and shall now tell you of the second. The third—Christopher Parker himself—I’m loath to unveil, knowing your affection for him.

Two years before our departure to California, I received a letter from Judge Stephens. Not from him exactly, I suppose, but from his wife, informing me that he had died peacefully in his sleep the week before, and that she had found this letter—enclosed in an envelope with his signature across the seal—and a note informing any who found it to mail it to me immediately upon his death.