Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances (99 page)

“Oh, wonderful, Clara.”

It was a buttery pound cake, and the coffee was hot and strong. They sat and chatted, and then Clara went off, in her shabby little heap, an old Chevy, and the house was silent again. She wandered through it: she had to come to some kind of decision, but she couldn’t put her mind to it.
What shall I do with myself now?
she asked, staring out at the rain, and then the phone rang.

“It’s Norma. How are you, Margo?”

“So so. How nice of you to call.”

“You read the will.”

“Yes, I read the will.”

“I’m sorry the weather’s so bad.”

“So am I, it’s getting me down. You’ll come to dinner tonight?”

“Thanks much, I can’t.”

“Oh, I
am
sorry.”

“John nixed it. You and he have to have a long talk.”

“We do?”

“Yes, and he’s right, Margo. After all, you know the terms of the will now. You’ll have to come to some kind of decision.”

“But what does that have to do with — ”

“It’s a family matter,” Norma said, gently but firmly. “Once things are settled, it’ll be different.”

“But — ”

“I hear my master’s voice. Mr. Bach is looking for something. It’s undoubtedly right under his nose, but he’ll never find it. Men are really so helpless, aren’t they? Keep your chin up. See you soon.”

“Good-bye, Norma.”

A few minutes out of a long, tiresome day.

And now what?
she thought, her teeth on edge. But the phone rang again. She got it before it had a chance to ring twice. “Is this Margo?” a voice asked.

“Yes, who’s this?”

“Douglas Michaels. Hello, honey.”

“Douglas … oh, I’m so glad you called.”

“I was apprised of the fact that you were in these parts,” he drawled. “I guess you feel pretty rotten.”

“Yes, very. The weather doesn’t help, either.”

“Isn’t it a bugger.”

“Just awful. I don’t know what to
do
with myself.”

“I wish I could say the same. I have a dozen things to take care of, but tomorrow’s another day. How about driving out this way in the morning, when the weather will be better.”

“The weather will be better?” she repeated, looking out the window.

“Yes, sunny and coolish. You remember where Peking Hill is, don’t you?”

She said promptly, “About fifteen miles from here, just north of the turning at Corinth Road.”

“Just beyond is my spread. Fourteen acres of good farmland. Come around eight, nine, ten, or eleven. I’ll be waiting.”

“All right, Doug. Unless this rain keeps up.”

“Trust me. Tomorrow will be bright and shining. Do you still have those freckles?”

“A few on my nose.”

“See you tomorrow. I’ll give you lunch.”

• • •

John arrived at just before six. He greeted her and asked to be excused while he got under the shower. She had changed into a long dress, a caftan, really. Pompey entered and looked at her approvingly.

“Will wonders never cease,” he said, and wandered kitchenward. She had already made the salad and now sat smoking, restless, looking out onto the drenched trees and bushes, disoriented and jittery.
I
could use some guidance
, she told herself.
What am I supposed to do?

A fancy school in Switzerland never prepared me for this
, she thought, and paced the floor, lighting another cigarette, and then abruptly sat down again. As if seeking some help from her dear departed aunt, she looked up at the ceiling. ‘You must have had
some
plan,” she said, aloud, and then heard John coming down the stairs.

He walked in and said now he felt more like a human being, and went to the liquor cart, making martinis without asking her. He busied himself, standing there with his back to her, a tall, dark-haired young man, and she suddenly realized something.
What about John? What about John, now the house had been left to her …

Why, this was John’s home, had been his home from boyhood on. What was he going to do now?

She pondered the question, while he stirred rhythmically.
If
she accepted the gift of the house, what would he do? And if she declined it, and the house went to the Historical Society, what would he do?

It seemed John had a decision to make too, and she remembered what he had said as he put her bags down in her room.

“It’s changed all our lives … you must realize nothing will ever be the same again …”

He poured the drinks, walked over to her and handed her the frosted glass, then sat down in an easy chair. “Cheers,” he said.

“Cheers to you. How was your day, John?”

“So so. And yours?”

“Rather wearing. This rain. Otherwise I’d have taken the car and driven some place.”

“It will be better tomorrow.”

“Who says?”

“The weather report. Rain ending tonight. So take heart.” He crossed his legs and lit a cigarette. “Margo, I want to warn you,” he said. “There will be people coming in and out of this place. You’re in a peculiar position, you’ve inherited a property. This is a well-known house, a relic of another age, with a fantastic history. It belongs to you now. I’ll try in every way possible to protect you from the merely curious, the sensation-seeking. Historians with good credentials will, naturally, have every right to view the premises. But I don’t want you badgered. And you don’t have to see anyone you don’t want to. So just take each day as it comes, and if you’re in doubt, let me know. Just — ”

He hesitated, frowned, and then shrugged. “How’s your drink?”

“Fine, thanks. Is this what it means to … to have something left to you?”

“Yes,” he said. “Having something valuable left to you is a responsibility.”

“You mean a white elephant,” she said listlessly.

“That sounds, you know, rather unkind.”

“I trust you to see beyond the harshness of the words.”

“I do see beyond them.”

“I just don’t understand what it all means. And I feel, suddenly, without wisdom, without comprehension. I just feel that somebody should help me, I don’t know who. I have this feeling of vertigo, as if I were standing on a high ledge, clinging to the safety of a solid foundation, and that the foundation is beginning to crumble. I feel frightened.”

She clasped her hands. “I can’t see her face,” she said. “I try to see it, remember it, but I can’t, John. It’s all too much for me; I can’t cope.”

“So don’t try to,” he said. “Your teeth are chattering. Are you cold? Shall I make a fire?”

“No, don’t bother, it’s almost dinner time.”

But he insisted. And it helped. The logs, apple-wood, blazed merrily as John poked at them. They stopped talking. This was the boy who had kissed her in the daisy field. Doug had kissed her too. The way children kissed, before they knew what kisses could be like. “I love you,” he had said. Doug had told her the same thing. The rings they had made her, tiny colored beads strung on thin wire. “That’s pretty, Margo,” Aunt Vicky had said. And the bracelet, made out of corn silk. From John or Doug? She couldn’t remember.

He’s marvelous-looking
, she thought grudgingly.

And again thought of a Renaissance portrait. Caravaggio. Dark head bent to the fire. Hair thick and dark and strong.

“Isn’t that better?” he asked, throwing down the fire tongs.

“It’s lovely, thank you.”

“Drink up,” he said, refilling her glass. “Well, hello, Pomp. Are you ready for us?”

“Dinner is served,” Pompey said with mock solemnity. “Bring your drinks in with you.”

• • •

She was in her room at a little before ten. She listened to the faint thud of John’s footsteps above her. Doug was right: he did dig his heels in. But she welcomed the sound in the quiet house. She left her door open, and apparently so had John, because when she went out again, to walk back and forth in the corridor — restless and not at all sleepy — she heard the distant tap tap of a typewriter. He must be preparing some brief or other.

How proud Aunt Vicky must have been.

My godson, the lawyer …

She went back to her room and wrote a letter to her illustrious parents, now in Russia. “I’ve inherited Aunt Victoria’s house. It’s a Homeric joke, is it not? Tonight, talking to John, I called it a white elephant. How can I possibly — ”

She tore the letter up. Made ready for bed, got in after she turned off the several lamps, lay listening to the wind and the rain. Above her the footsteps paced again. Listening, she followed their peregrinations. John was walking back and forth, back and forth. Why? Couldn’t he sleep either?

I don’t believe it will be a nice day tomorrow
, she thought, and tensed as a thunderclap shattered the night. The sheets felt damp, and she bunched her pillow beneath her head.

And it finally came home to her in full force. The fact of the matter was that this house was
hers.
Aunt Victoria was dead, but she had left something behind, a great pile of stone and brick, and it now belonged to her, Margo.
It’s too much to handle
, she told herself, and recalled all the houses, castles, mansions, stately homes she had seen in Europe. There they were, standing fast, while those who had slept in their beds and eaten at their tables and held court on their thrones had long gone. Mere mortals exist but briefly, whereas brick and mortar have longer endurances, and into whose magnificent rooms the curious stream, tourists looking for a thrill on holiday. “This is the bed in which King Louis XIV slept,” the guides said. “Napoleon was made Emperor as he knelt on this slab of stone.” “On this balcony King Victor Emmanuel …”

A mechanism in her brain turned off, like the flick of a radio dial, and thoughts stopped. Outside the rain continued, bending the great old trees, and it was midnight, dawn six hours away.

• • •

The telephone?

She looked over at the bedside clock. It was three in the morning. Just the same, the telephone was ringing. She sprang out of bed and, opening her door, went out to the hall. It was dark, and she had to grope her way. Then she felt the damp-cold instrument, picked up the receiver.

“Hello,” she said, in the thick dark.

There was no answer.

She said again, “Hello. Hello?”

But there was no answer.

Someone had made a mistake. Or had she been dreaming?

She went back to her room again, climbed into bed. She must have been dreaming. A hand under her cheek and the covers pulled over her.

She must have been dreaming.

And then, like a pistol shot, the phone again.

She raised her head, listening. This time she wasn’t dreaming. This time she was wide awake. And alert, wary. What ghastly news now? She hopped out of bed and raced outside to the phone.

“Yes, hello,” she said, waiting.

There was no answer.

But there was something else. There was a sound, a very soft sound, but it was there. It was the sound of someone breathing.

Chilled, she listened, then said, “Who is this?”

There was no response. Only the quiet, eerie breathing.

“Who is it, who is it?” she cried.

There was only the breathing.

She held the receiver to her ear, listened attentively, and then quietly hung up. When she went back to her room there were goose-pimples on her skin, and she sat on the edge of the bed. Remembering. It had rung last night too. She had been too fagged out to register it more than subliminally, but yes, the telephone had rung late last night too.

She knew, of course. That it would come again. And it did. Five or ten minutes later. She sat and heard it out. Ring, ring, ring … and then she started counting. Eleven, twelve, thirteen …

And then it stopped.

It was half an hour before she got into bed again. By then the sky had imperceptibly lightened, and she was so groggy that the phone could have rung again but she wouldn’t have known it. She fell into a deep, soporific sleep, accepting what had happened. The telephone late at night, two nights in a row. Once could have been a mistake. But twice?

Turning in her sleep she thought she heard it again, but this time it was probably, after all, a dream.

The next morning was one of exquisite brilliance. Every blade of grass was diamond bright, birds sang and trilled, the sky was like a Wyeth painting. Margo couldn’t help marveling at the beauty of the day, and in the kitchen she told Pompey about the telephone calls.

“Neither you nor John heard anything?”

“This is a big house,” he reminded her.

“Who would do that?” she asked. “I certainly didn’t expect, in this neck of the woods, one of those crank phone calls … you know the kind.”

But she saw at once that he didn’t, and explained. “Some pervert calls you at odd hours and either says nasty things or just breathes hard into the phone.”

He was shocked and stern. “You don’t mean it!”

“Well, that’s why young women living alone have unlisted numbers. It’s true in every large city in the world.”

He muttered as he served her breakfast. “Like to show him a thing or two,” he said angrily. “Just let me get a hold of him.” Then he sat down, wonderingly.

“But up here, Miss Margo? I just can’t credit it.”

“I feel the same way,” she said. “But it happened. Let’s have another cup of coffee, Pompey, and then I’m going to drive out to Doug’s place.”

“That’s the best idea I can think of,” he said approvingly. “You’ll be surprised what he’s done with that farm.”

And so she left a little before ten, drove through hilly country, recognizing this landmark and that one, then came to the mailbox in the road, with the flag up and the name MICHAELS in red lettering. There was a crossbar fencing, beyond which, through the trees, one glimpsed a hospitable-looking farmhouse in that lovely shade of barn-red, matching the barn itself. There was a silo, silvery in the sun, wheat waving in a field. She heard the chug of a tractor.

“Hi,” a voice said, as she drove through the open gate, and he came out of the house, banging a screen door.

She waved out the car window. “Doug?”