ask.”
“Well, for starters, how did you ever do so well without committing a crime?”
Michael laughed off the flattery. “When you see this house in a couple of months,” he said, “you’ll understand.” But he wasn’t fool enough to think his modest fortune had impressed this man. What were a couple of million in blue chip securities compared to the Mayfair legacy? No, this was a little talk about the geography of New Orleans-that he had come from the other side of Magazine Street, and that he still had the Irish Channel in his voice. But Michael had been too long out west to worry about something like that.
They walked together over the newly clipped grass. The new boxwood-small and trim-was now in place throughout the garden. It was possible to see the flower beds as they had been laid out a century before-to see the little Greek statues placed at the four corners of the yard.
Indeed, the entire classical plan was reemerging. The long octagonal shape of the lawn was the same as the long octagonal shape of the pool. The perfectly square flagstones were set in a diamond pattern against the limestone balustrades which broke the patio into distinct rectangles and marked off paths which met at right angles, framing both garden and house. Old trellises had been righted so that they once again defined the gateways. And as the black paint went up on the cast-iron lace railings, it brought to life their ornate and repetitive design of curlicues and rosettes.
Yes, patterns-everywhere he looked he discerned patterns-struggling against the sprawling crepe myrtle and the glossy-leafed camellias, and the antique rose as it fought its way up the trellis, and against the sweet little four o’clocks which fought for light in the brightest patches of unhindered sun.
Beatrice, very dramatic in a great pink hat and large square silver-rimmed glasses, met with Rowan at two o’clock to discuss the wedding. Rowan had set the date for Saturday a week. “Less than a fortnight!” Beatrice declared with alarm. No, everything had to be done right. Didn’t Rowan understand what the marriage would mean to the family? People would want to come from Atlanta and New York.
It couldn’t be done before the last of October. And surely Rowan would want the renovations of the house to be complete. It meant so much to everyone to see the house.
All right, said Rowan, she guessed she and Michael could wait that long, especially if it meant they could spend their wedding night in the house, and the reception could be held here.
Definitely, said Michael; that would give him almost eight solid weeks to get things in shape. Certainly the main floor could be finished and the front bedroom upstairs.
“It would be a double celebration, then, wouldn’t it?” said Bea. “Your wedding, and the reopening of the house. Darlings, you will make everyone so very happy.”
And yes, every Mayfair in creation must be invited. Now Beatrice went to her list of caterers. The house could hold a thousand if tents were arranged over the pool and over the lawn. No, not to worry. And the children could swim, couldn’t they?
Yes, it would be like old times, it would be like the days of Mary Beth. Would Rowan like to have some old photographs of the last parties given before Stella died?
“We’ll gather all the photographs for the reception,” said Rowan. “It can be a reunion. We’ll put out the photographs for everyone to enjoy.”
“It’s going to be marvelous.”
Suddenly Beatrice reached out and took Michael’s hand.
“May I ask you a question, darling? Now that you’re one of the family? Why in the world do you wear these horrible gloves?”
“I see things when I touch people,” he said before he could stop himself.
Her large gray eyes brightened. “Oh, that’s most intriguing. Did you know Julien had that power? That’s what they always told me. And Mary Beth too. Oh, darling, please let me.” She began to roll the leather back, her long pink almond-shaped fingernails lightly scraping his skin as she did it. “Please? May I? You don’t mind?” She ripped the glove off and held it up with a triumphant yet innocent smile.
He did nothing. He remained passive, his hand open, fingers slightly curled. He watched as she laid her hand on his, and then squeezed his hand firmly. In a flash the random images crowded into his head. The miscellany came and went so fast he caught none of it-merely the atmosphere, the wholesomeness, the equivalent of sunshine and fresh air, and the very distinct register of
“What did you see?” she asked.
He saw her lips stop moving before the words came clear.
“Nothing,” he said as he drew back. “It’s considered to be the absolute confirmation of goodness, and good fortune. Nothing. No misery, no sadness, no illness, nothing at all.” And in a way, that had been perfectly true.
“Oh, you are a darling,” she said, blank-faced and sincere, and then swooped in to kiss him. “Where did you ever find such a person?” she asked Rowan. And without waiting for an answer, she said, “I like you both! And that’s better than loving you, for that’s expected, you know. But liking you, what a curious surprise. You really are the most adorable couple, you with your blue eyes, Michael, and Rowan with that scrumptious butterscotch voice! I could kiss you on your eyes every time you smile at me-and don’t do it now, how dare you? – and I could kiss her on her throat every time she utters a word! A single solitary word!”
“May I kiss you on the cheek, Beatrice?” he asked tenderly.
“Cousin Beatrice to you, you gorgeous hunk of man,” she said with a little theatrical pat of her heaving bosom. “Do it!” She shut her eyes tight, and then opened them with another dramatic and radiant smile.
Rowan was merely smiling at them both in a vague, bemused fashion. And now it was time for Beatrice to take her downtown to Ryan’s office. Interminable legal matters. How horrible. Off they went.
He realized the black leather glove had fallen to the grass. He picked it up, and put it on.
But who had been speaking? Who had been digesting and relaying that information? Maybe he was simply getting better at it, learning to ask the questions, as Aaron had tried to teach him to do.
Truth was, he hadn’t paid much attention to that aspect of the lessons. He mainly wanted to shut the power off. Whatever the case, there had, for the first time since the debacle of the jars, been a clear and distinct message. In fact, it was infinitely more concise and authoritative than the majority of the awful signals he’d received that day. It had been as clear as Lasher’s prophecy in its own way.
He looked up slowly. Surely there was someone on the side porch, in the deep shade, watching him. But he saw nothing. Only the painters at work on the cast iron. The porch looked splendid now that the old screen had been stripped away and the makeshift wooden railings removed. It was a bridge between the long double parlor and the beautiful lawn.
And here we will be married, he thought dreamily. And as if to answer the great crepe myrtles caught the breeze, dancing, their light pink blossoms moving gracefully against the blue sky.
When he got back to the hotel that afternoon, there was an envelope waiting for him from Aaron. He tore it open even before he reached the suite. Once the door was soundly shut on the world, he pulled out the thick glossy color photograph and held it to the light.
A lovely dark-haired woman gazed out at him from the divine gloom spun by Rembrandt-alive, smiling the very same smile he had only just seen on Rowan’s lips. The Mayfair emerald gleamed in this masterly twilight. So painfully real the illusion, that he had the feeling the cardboard on which it was printed might melt and leave the face floating, gossamer as a ghost, in the air.
But was this his Deborah, the woman he had seen in the visions?
Taking off the gloves and handling it yielded nothing, only the maddeningly meaningless images of intermediaries and incidental persons he had come by now to expect. And as he sat on the couch holding the photograph, he knew it would have been the same had he touched the old oil painting itself.
“What do you want of me?” he whispered.
Out of innocence and out of time, the dark-haired girl smiled back at him. A stranger. Caught forever in her brief and desperate girlhood. Fledgling witch and nothing more.
But somebody had told him something this afternoon when Beatrice’s hand had touched his! Somebody had used the power for some purpose. Or was it simply his own inner voice?
He put aside his gloves, as he was accustomed to do now when alone here, and picked up his pen and his notebook, and began to write.
