Authors: Belva Plain
“I don’t see why, if you feel that way.”
A pile of boxes in glossy wrappings lay on the sofa next to Amanda. “Naturally, you won’t open the presents yet,” she said, “but I think I’d better tell you what they are so you can let me know if anything needs to be exchanged. The books are for Dan, and also a box of chocolate-covered orange peel; that was pure sentiment because I remember how when we were still with our parents he stole a boxful from the pantry and ate them all.
I hope he still likes them. For Susannah, there’s a rag doll with painted eyes, no buttons to swallow, and a baby doll with a whole wardrobe for Tina. Little girls, I remember, really prefer dolls they can wash and dress instead of the beautiful ones that you’re not supposed to rumple up. And for you, Sally, there’s a hand-knit sweater, black and white, because I remembered your coal-black hair. One of my girls made it. I’ve gotten her set up with a couple of others in a little children’s-wear shop. She has real talent, and I see quite a future for her.”
“You were too generous.”
Sally was feeling confusion in the face of this generosity on the part of a woman who was apparently determined to ruin them all. And deciding to be completely frank, she said, “I have to tell you that I don’t understand. I thought we were enemies, that you were very angry at Dan. And now you bring presents.”
“As far as the business is concerned, I am angry. In fact, I’m furious. But that has nothing to do with Dan, my brother.”
“I’m sorry, but I’m still confused. You’ve made a distinction between Dan at work and Dan at home. Yet surely there’s a wide overlap.”
“There is, but I can’t let it stop me from getting my rights.”
“Nobody wants to deprive you of them, Amanda,” Sally said stiffly.
“Then you can’t know what’s been happening. All this stalling over some foreign deal, while I
have to wait. I don’t believe a word they say anymore. I’ve given them to the first of the year, and that’s only ten days away, so—”
“I know all that, Amanda. There’s no use telling me about it anyway. I have nothing to do with Grey’s Foods.”
The woman was a nervous wreck. One foot was tapping the floor and one hand, in time with the foot, was tapping the arm of the sofa.
“Dan will be home tomorrow afternoon late. Perhaps,” Sally said, trying to placate her, “when you meet face-to-face, you will be able to make peace. It’s rather hard over the telephone.”
Amanda was silent, and Sally continued, “I wish you would all come to terms. Dan’s really sad about these arguments, and I know poor Oliver must be distraught, even though he keeps it all in.”
Amanda was staring into space as if she had not heard. With a sudden shiver, she hugged herself.
“Are you cold? There’s a shawl on the chair, I’ll get it,” Sally said, rising.
“No, it’s not that kind of cold. It’s inside me. I guess I shouldn’t have come back here. I’ve never had a happy minute in Scythia since I lost my parents.”
People don’t usually walk into a house and reveal themselves this way in the first thirty minutes, Sally thought. And she answered with sympathy, “No wonder you have no happy memories. You were a young girl who had just lost her parents! It must have been even harder for you than for a little
boy like Dan. And to become the only female in a male household.”
“It wasn’t all male. There was my aunt Lucille. Do you know anything about her?”
“Only the portrait in the dining room at Hawthorne.”
“She committed suicide, you know.” Sally felt her mouth drop open. “I never heard that!”
“Well, you wouldn’t have. It is popularly supposed that she missed the bridge on a foggy winter afternoon and drove the car into the river. Or else that she had a heart attack. Take your choice. But I know better.”
“Are you saying that you are the only person who knows the truth?”
“Maybe not the
only
one, although I’m sure Dan doesn’t suspect, or he would have told you.”
This woman was probably ill. The very mildest adjective one might use was “eccentric.” Since she seemed to be expecting a comment, Sally made a brief one.
“It must have been terrible for you all.”
“I wasn’t there. It happened the day after I left for boarding school. I wanted to go home for the funeral because I loved her, but they didn’t think I should. The school thought it was too long a trip, since I had only just arrived, and my relatives—my mother had cousins in California, second or third cousins who took an interest in me—agreed. Aunt Lucille was a sweet, quiet woman, very gentle with me, and especially with Clive. He was a kind
of misfit, I remember,” she said reflectively. “Poor Clive.”
This last remark offended Sally in spite of the fact that she had always thought much the same of Clive. Now she defended him, saying decidedly, “He isn’t one now. He’s happily married and doing well, even though he’s been very ill. But he’s recovering nicely.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I understand that he doesn’t want to sell the forest to that group.”
“I don’t know.” Sally did know, but she was annoyed at these attempts to draw her out. “I told you, I don’t get involved in the affairs of Grey’s Foods.” And then, having given this blunt reply, she softened it by plucking something out of her memory. “Dan boasts about your college commencement honors. He said you did wonderfully all the way through.”
“Oh yes, but I can’t say I had a wonderful time doing it. I was never popular. I was really not very attractive.”
“I find that hard to believe. You’re a lot more than merely attractive now.”
Sally was extremely uncomfortable. In truth, these intimate, gloomy revelations repelled her, and she moved to change the subject.
“Would you like to see the house? I’ll give you the tour if you want.”
“The house and the children, of course.”
Amanda was appreciating Sally’s row of photographs on the wall above Dan’s desk in the upstairs
office, when Susannah in her pink bathrobe came tottering into the room.
Nanny, following on her heels, cried out, “Would you believe it? She’s getting too fast for me. Hold on, miss, your hair’s still wet. Let me dry it.” For Susannah was laughing, wrestling away from Nanny and the towel.
“There. Now go to your mommy.”
Sally picked her up. “This is Amanda. Can you wave to her, like this?”
Five fingers wiggled toward Amanda, who wiggled back.
“May I hold her, or will she be terrified of me?”
“She’ll go to you. Most babies this age are terrified of strangers, but for some reason, this one seldom is. Try her.”
Amanda held out her arms, and Susannah allowed herself to be transferred.
“The beauty!” Amanda cried. “Look at you! You’re adorable. She’s adorable, Sally. How old is she?”
Sally said proudly, “One, and she seems to have no fears.”
Amanda nodded. “She’ll meet life easily, I predict. Look at that smile. Now, where is Tina?”
Nanny answered. “Playing. She’s a bit cranky today,” and she directed a tactful look toward Sally. “I’m trying to get her downstairs for supper.”
“Perhaps we’d better let her alone, then,” suggested Sally.
“Let’s see her,” Amanda said. “Who cares whether she’s cranky? We all get like that. God knows, I do.”
Sally thought it more prudent to explain that something a bit more than “cranky” was meant.
“We’ve been having a little problem with her lately. Nothing serious,” she quickly amended, “but every now and then she has a stubborn spell when she simply refuses to talk. Nothing serious,” she repeated, “just annoying.”
“I won’t be annoyed,” Amanda said.
While crossing the hall, they heard the music-box tinkle of “The Blue Danube” waltz.
Tina was standing beside the carousel. At the sight of her mother with a stranger, she ran straight out of the room.
“Tina, come back and say hello,” said Sally, knowing very well that no attention would be paid. She turned to Amanda and apologized. “Yes, it’s one of her cranky days. We’ll let her go down with Nanny. She’ll be in a better humor after her supper,” she explained, without being at all sure of any better humor.
The carousel was still playing. “Damn thing,” she said, turning it off. “It’s a present from Hawthorne. I get so sick of hearing that tune.”
Amanda had covered her face with her hands. She was just standing there, trembling.
“What is it?” cried Sally.
“That awful thing. That awful thing was mine, a present to me.”
“I don’t understand.”
Amanda was staring at the carousel as if she had been stricken and paralyzed.
Sally cried, “What is it? What’s wrong?”
Amanda shook her head. “Nothing, nothing important. I’m sorry … I was just thinking. I’m sorry.”
“But you’re ill! It has to be something. You’re frightening the life out of me!”
“No, no, forget it. I don’t want to come to your house and make trouble.” This was most strange behavior, and Sally wished Dan were there to cope with his sister.
Nevertheless, taking Amanda’s arm, she said kindly, “If I can help you, it will have been no trouble at all. But if you leave me with a mystery after scaring me so, I’ll have to say it was a lot of trouble. Please, I need to know.”
“I—I was just stunned for a minute, that’s all. It’s dreadful for me to come to your house and do this to you. I’m awfully sorry.”
Amanda was looking at Sally with the expression people wear when they are making an estimate or considering a decision to purchase something. The brilliant eyes, Dan’s eyes, met Sally’s and stayed.
“I have never, never in all my life told this to anyone. And I’m wondering whether I should even tell you.”
“As you please. But whatever it is that can do to you what it did just now should be told to somebody before it goes off like a bomb and blows you apart.”
“I know. You’re a very kind woman, Sally. I remember telling you that once after I had seen your photographs.”
“Thank you. I try to be kind.”
Two large, slow tears slid down Amanda’s cheeks. “Many, many times I’ve thought I must tell, but when the moment comes, I’m never able to.”
“Are you able now?”
Of course Sally was curious; anybody would be. Yet in another way, she did not want to hear more. Her own worries weighed heavily enough.
Amanda drew a long sigh. “Yes,” she answered. “I’m able.” Then she gave a wry little laugh. “You’d better make yourself comfortable because it’s not a short story.
“It was the sight of the carousel,” she began. “It was given to me when I was twelve, a bribe, the price of silence, although I didn’t need it. I would have kept silence anyway. And I have.
“And there were so many people, friends and those distant relatives who came to the memorial service for my parents, so well meaning, so comforting. ‘You will be in the best home a girl could have,’ they said, ‘living at Hawthorne in such a family.’ I was told that over and over. Even the servants at Hawthorne used to say so.
“Nobody understood why I cried so much all the year I was there, why I was so rebellious and full of anger. But I was scared, so scared. I used to sit alone in my room, or sometimes under a tree
with a book that I wasn’t able to read because the words all ran together.”
The words were all running together now, in a slow, monotonous stream. Amanda’s eyes were half shut, her fingers playing with the clasp of her purse. And Sally was mesmerized by the sight of her pain, as when seeing on television a flood of refugees, the walking wounded, and although you cannot bear the sight of them, you are unable to look away.
“People tried for a plausible explanation of my behavior: the horrible deaths of my father and mother, and I only twelve, at the sensitive start of adolescence. Aunt Lucille could not have been more gentle with me. Every day she spent hours trying to distract me with walks, lessons, little trips, dresses and new books. She didn’t know about the nights, nights when she was downstairs playing the piano or at the weekly meeting of her women’s club …”
Finish, finish, Sally said inaudibly. For God’s sake hurry and say what you have to say.
But the voice resumed its own dreamy pace. “I was in my bed. He came the first time just to sit on the edge of it and talk. He held my hand, and I was grateful for the warmth of his touch. ‘You’re lonesome,’ he said, ‘I will come again.’ And he came again. The next time he held his hand over my mouth to keep me from screaming.… At twelve a girl thinks she knows everything about life and sex, doesn’t she? But she knows nothing.
There’s nothing written that can tell you what it is like to have—to have that happen.”
Sally was abruptly aware of her own body, of her heartbeat and rigid spine; leaning forward, as if to hear more clearly, she wrapped her long sweater in tight concealment of that body, as if to protect it. Her frightened eyes fastened themselves on the other woman, whose own drifting gaze went far beyond and away from this place.
“I cannot forget the smallest detail of that room. There was a branch that tapped at one of the windows all that winter. The curtains were white dotted Swiss. The tiebacks were held by painted metal pansies. The clock on the dresser clicked at the half hour and the hour. I used to lie awake to listen for it, listen for footsteps coming lightly down the hall, and then for the turn of the knob. There was no lock on the door.
“One night he brought me the silver carousel. I had admired it and played with it, so he gave it to me. Yes, it was a bribe. There were threats, too. ‘If you tell, Amanda, nobody will believe you. And God will punish you, anyway, for what you have done.’ That’s how it was.”
A terrible anger surged into Sally’s throat, and she thought she was tasting blood. If Clive had done this to Amanda, why not, then, Tina?
“Clive,” she said. “Clive.”
Amanda raised her head. “What? Clive? Ah, poor, sad Clive. Of course not. Don’t you know that I’ve been talking about Oliver?”
For an instant, Sally’s mind went blank and, uncomprehending, she stared back at Amanda.
“He was right,” Amanda said bitterly. “He told me no one would believe it, and I see you don’t. You’re thinking,” Amanda said, “that I am hallucinating or that I’ve had what’s called a ‘recovered memory,’ persuaded by some incompetent or dishonest therapist that this really happened to me. There are people who truly have recovered their buried memories, just as there are frauds and hysterics, but I’m none of them. I have lived consciously with this every day of my life since it happened, and I swear to you that it is all true.”