"I don't think Rachel's gonna let you in to see him," Jerry called after her.
"Screw Rachel!" she shot back, allowing the door to swing shut behind her.
Jerry reflected briefly on the shrieking harpy who had driven him from the emergency room. "Better you than me, kid," he muttered.
R
achel refused to admit Holly that day, the next day, and the day after, but on the third day following Malcolm's injury, Old Quincy answered the door when Holly knocked and was busily greeting her and ushering her in before Rachel could interpose herself between them.
"Come in, child, come in!" Quincy said, taking her by the arm and pushing Rachel out of the way with his bony shoulder. "I'm glad you've come. Malcolm has been very depressed. Seeing you should cheer him up some."
"Thank you, Mr. Harker," Holly said, shooting Rachel an angry glance. "I've been coming by every day, but Rachel didn't seem to think that Mal was strong enough for visitors."
"Really!" Quincy said, feigning surprise, though he had known about it all along. "Is that so! Well, be that as it may, he's certainly strong enough now. You just go right on up. His room is the third one on the left."
"Grandfather, I hardly think it's proper to—"
"Oh, be quiet, Rachel!" he said. "I hardly think that a boy in bed with three bruised ribs and a neck brace is going to be either in the mood or the condition to misbehave!" He grunted with irritation. "Now, just go on up and have a nice visit," he said to Holly, smiling.
As Holly began to mount the stairs, Rachel came to the foot and placing her arms akimbo, called up, "You keep that bedroom door open, young lady, do you hear me?" Holly ignored her and proceeded on up to Malcolm's room.
She knocked first and, receiving no response, pushed the door open and walked in softly. Malcolm was lying on his bed in a terrible state, bruised and battered, pallid and haggard,
and some small element of Holly's anger and hurt dissolved into pity. She had entered the room with every intention of taking him to task for his actions, but he looked so forlorn that she felt her resolve weakening. She knelt down beside the bed and touched his thin, sweaty hand. "Malcolm? Are you awake?"
Malcolm opened his eyes and seemed to take a few moments to focus them. "H . . . Holly!" he said weakly.
"Hi," she said, trying to sound cold.
"I, uh . . . I got hurt," he said needlessly, not knowing what else to say to her.
"I know," she said, her words clipped and precise. "Jerry told me what happened."
"Everything?" he gulped.
"Yes, everything, from start to finish." Her eyes were unsympathetic and accusatory.
"That stupid son of a bitch," he muttered, and then he sighed. "Holly, I'm sorry, I really am. I guess I just wasn't thinking straight when I let Jerry talk me into going to . . . well, into . . ."
"Uh-huh," she said, nodding. "So it's all Jerry's fault, right?"
He lowered his eyes. "Of course not. It's all my fault, really, I guess."
"I guess so," she agreed mercilessly. "You know, Malcolm, if you don't want an exclusive relationship here, I can relate to that. We can both see other people."
"Holly, I don't want to see anybody else, honestly I don't! I was just trying to . . . well, make things better between us, that's all."
"I see," she said, pretending understanding. "Sleeping with other women is designed to improve our relationship. That's a very interesting concept, Mal."
He sighed loudly and then groaned as a stabbing pain radiated outward from one of his bruised ribs. "Oh, shit, Holly. I'm really sorry. I don't know what else I can say."
Holly Larsen tried not to forgive him—and lost the struggle. She laughed softly. "Malcolm, you look so unbelievably pathetic!"
He grinned at her weakly. "Feel sorry for me?"
"Not in the least," she said, smiling, "but I'm considering giving you another chance." She paused. "What about the rest of it? The fight, I mean. What happened?"
"I can't remember a thing about it," he said morosely, not a damn thing. All I know is what Jerry told me, and I . . . well, what he said happened . . . I don't know, Holly, I just can't understand . . ."
"It's simple," she said, rising from her knees and sitting down on the side of the bed. "Jerry is usually half-drunk, so he didn't know what he saw. Malcolm, don't give yourself anything silly to worry about. Just rest up and get better."
He sat up slowly and painfully in bed, trying his best to smile at her. "I'm not as bad off as I look, actually. My ribs are killing me, but my neck's okay. This brace is coming off tomorrow. And the swelling on my face has gone down a lot."
Her eyebrows raised in surprise as she surveyed his still-swollen eye and cheek. "God, you must have been a mess if you're better now!" She laughed, and he laughed slightly also until the discomfort in his side stopped him. "Have you been out of bed at all?"
"Of course I have. I'm not crippled, you know. Just wound up fighting somebody four times my size, that's all." He grabbed her hand and kissed it. "I'm so happy to see you, Holly!"
Then you should have come to me instead of to that slut
, she thought. What she
said
was, "You know, that sister of yours turned me away at the door three days in a row."
"Rachel!" he said, growing angry. "I swear to God, someday I'm going to . . ."
"Someday you're going to be all better and then this whole silly week will be just an embarrassing memory. In fact," she said, a hint of anger creeping back into her voice, "I'm looking forward to giving you a hard time about this someday."
He smiled and yawned, saying, "Sounds good to me." He yawned again sleepily. "I'm sorry, Holly. The doctor gave me a painkiller and it makes me drowsy." He lay back down.
"That's okay," she said softly. "Just go to sleep. You really look like you need it."
"Haven't been eating right, I guess," he muttered, his eyes closing against his will. "But I'm okay. I can stay up and talk for a while . . ."
"I wouldn't bet on it," she said, smiling. "Just sleep.
Sleep and rest. I can wait until you're better to yell at you some more." He seemed to drift off almost immediately, and Holly left the room, closing the door softly behind her.
As she descended the stairs, she heard Rachel saying coldly, "Miss Larsen, I wish to speak with you for a few moments, if you please."
Holly sighed, realizing that she had to attempt to establish some sort of amicable relationship with this woman, and not wishing in the slightest to do so. "Sure, Rachel," she said as cheerfully as possible. Rachel turned from the bottom of the stairway and walked into the sitting room. Holly followed her, willing herself to project an image of unruffled calm and poise, no matter what was to come.
"I don't believe that you have met my husband, Daniel," Rachel said in her hostile, rapid-fire voice. "Miss Larsen, Mr. Rowland. Miss Larsen is the young woman with whom Malcolm has been associating of late." Rachel's disapproval and dislike seemed to drip from her words.
"Hello, Daniel," Holly said amicably, extending her hand and walking forward toward him. "It's nice to meet you."
"Miss Larsen," he said, nodding, not moving to take her hand.
Okay, if that's the way you two want it
, she thought angrily. "What can I do for you?" she asked Rachel.
"For one thing, you can stop attempting to see my brother," the older woman replied.
Holly emitted a curt laugh, stunned at the presumption. "Is that so!"
"Yes," Rachel said matter-of-factly. "Quite frankly, I don't think it would be in either of your best interests to pursue this friendship of yours."
"Really! Well, quite frankly, I don't think my relationship with Mal is any of your goddamned business!" Holly began to flush, angry not only at the other woman's words, but also at the way in which she managed to make the word "friendship" sound obscene.
"Young lady," Daniel said coldly, "I'll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head when addressing my wife!"
"Then tell your wife to mind her own business!" Holly said as she turned to walk out.
"Are you aware of the fact," Rachel called after her, "that
our father, Malcolm's and mine, was hanged for murder twenty years ago?"
This stopped Holly in her tracks. "What are you talking about?"
Rachel laughed humorlessly. "Ah, I thought that might interest you. Yes, Abraham Harker, our father, was convicted of murder in Kansas and executed for the crime."
"So?" she asked angrily. "So what?"
"Isn't it obvious?" Rachel said. "Certain forms of insanity are hereditary, and can be triggered by improper associations and experiences. Our family is an old one, and we must guard ourselves very carefully lest we become involved with persons of unsavory characteristics. In Malcolm's case, his recent behavior, it seems to me, is a result of his relationship with you and his friendship with that Barry person."
"Jerry," Holly corrected her. "And I'm not going to bother arguing with you about something this stupid." She turned again to leave.
"It is quite serious, Miss Larsen," Rachel said firmly, again stopping her before she left the sitting room. "For us, only religious devotion can serve to repress the bad strain, the bad blood, as it were. You, I take it, are not particularly religious?"
"My religious beliefs are my own concern!" she snapped.
"So," Rachel nodded, as if Holly's response had confirmed her suspicions. "I'm afraid, Miss Larsen, that if you and Malcolm continue to see each other, it will have a terrible effect upon him. And if, God forbid, you two should marry, I shudder to think what your offspring would be like." She said all of this in a largely expressionless monotone.
"Okay, listen up, lady, and listen good!" Holly said heatedly. "Point one: the only kind of insanity which can be hereditary is a type of schizophrenia which comes from a chemical imbalance, so any notion of insanity running in a family is superstitious nonsense. Point two: I don't care one bit what Mal's father was like or what he did. It doesn't mean anything to me at all. Point three: I draw a very clear line between being religious, like lots of nice, kind, friendly people are, and being an overbearing, narrow-minded, pompous, parochial, ignorant ass, which is what you are. And," she shouted over Rachel's and Daniel's voices as they began to speak angrily, "point four: I love Malcolm, and I think he
loves me, and if you don't like it, you can just go . . . go . . . well, I don't know what," she huffed, "but you can just go do it!"
"Rachel. Daniel. Leave me with the child," old Quincy said as he shuffled into the room, his sudden appearance silencing all of them for a moment.
"Now just a moment, Grandfather," Rachel began.
"Don't argue with me," Quincy said sternly. "Just go about your business and leave me with the child." Rachel and her husband stormed out of the room, casting Holly one last angry look. Quincy turned to her and smiled. "Don't let them bother you, my dear. Neither my granddaughter nor her husband have ever developed the, ah, social graces, shall we say."
She smiled at the old man and blushed slightly, embarrassed at her own flare of temper. "I'm sorry if we disturbed you, Mr. Harker," she said. "I really am. I just came by to see if Mal was okay, and they started . . . well, why go into it. I'm just sorry; that's all."
"Think nothing of it. It's not important." Quincy paused and looked up and down appraisingly with that innocent presumptiveness acceptable only in the very old and the very young. "I'm gratified to see that my taste in ladies has been handed down to my grandson. I know Rachel thinks that Malcolm isn't safe in the same room with you, but I have to say that if I were seventy years younger"—and his rheumy old eyes twinkled—"you wouldn't be safe in the same room with me!"
She blushed but could not keep herself from laughing. "Mr. Harker! Please!"
"I'm well into my nineties, my dear," he said, smiling. "That gives me the right to say anything I want." He chuckled. "How else do you think I keep Rachel at bay?"
Holly shook her head. "I don't know why she doesn't like me. I've never done anything to her, and I . . . well, I'm very, very fond of Malcolm."
"I think that Rachel takes after her mother, Cynthia," he said, shuffling over to the large cut-glass decanter on the table and pouring her unbidden a glass of sherry. She did not really want it, but she was reluctant to offend the old man by refusing his hospitality, so she accepted it as he handed it to her. Then he said, "Cynthia, my son Abraham's wife, was as stiff as a starched shirt and just about as stimulating. I never did understand why he married her."