He said he was working for the Mayfair family.”
“No, just watch him. Maybe Ryan did hire him. Maybe Ryan forgot to tell you and me. Just watch him, watch him and anybody like him, and don’t let anyone in without talking to me.”
“Yes, sir.”
Michael went back inside, shutting the big door behind him. For a moment he stood against it, looking down the narrow hallway, at the old familiar sight of the high keyhole door to the dining room, and the bit of colored mural beyond.
“What’s going to happen, Julien? How is it going to work itself out?”
Tomorrow the family would convene in the dining room to discuss this very question. If the man had not surfaced, what should they do? What was their obligation to others? How should it be handled?
“We will deal with the specifics,” Ryan had said, “with what we know, as corporate lawyers are bound to do. This man abducted and abused Rowan. That is all the various law enforcement agencies need to be told.”
Michael smiled. He started the slow climb up the long flight of stairs. Don’t count them, don’t think about it, don’t think about a twinge in your chest, or a swimming feeling in your head.
It was going to be fun working with “law enforcement agencies,” trying to keep all this secret. Ah, Lord, would the papers have a field day. He suspected the simplest angle would be some cheap statement as to the man’s being a “Satanist,” a member of a violent and dangerous “cult.”
And then he thought of that shining spirit, “the man” whom he had once seen behind the crib at Christmas, and staring at him in the garden below. He thought of that radiant countenance.
What’s it like, Lasher, to be lost in the flesh and to have the whole world looking for you? Like being a needle in a haystack, instead of such a powerful ghost? In this day and age, they find needles in haystacks. And you are a bit more like the family emerald, lost in a box of jewels. Not so hard to see you, snatch you, snare you, keep you, the way no one could have ever done when you were Julien’s daemon or fiend.
He stopped at the door of the bedroom. All was as he had left it. Hamilton reading. The nurse with her chart. The candles giving off the sweet good odor of expensive wax, and the shadow of the Virgin’s statue dancing behind them, the shiver of the shadow thrown across Rowan’s face and giving it a false life.
He was about to resume his old position when he spied a movement in the bedroom at the end of the hall. Must be the other nurse, he thought, but he didn’t like it, and he went down the hall to check.
For one moment, he couldn’t make out what he was seeing-a tall gray-haired woman in a flannel gown. Sunken cheeks, bright eyes, a high forehead. Her white hair was loose over her shoulders. Her gown hung to her bare feet. The twinge in his chest became a pain.
“It’s Cecilia,” she said mercifully, patiently. “I know. Some of us Mayfairs were born looking like ghosts. I’ll come in and sit with her if you like. I’ve just slept a good eight hours. Why don’t you he down here for a little while?”
He shook his head. He felt so foolish and so badly shaken. And he hoped to God he hadn’t hurt her feelings!
He went back in to take up the vigil as before. Rowan, my Rowan.
“What’s that spot on her gown?” he asked the nurse.
“Oh, must be a little water,” said the nurse, pressing a dry washcloth to Rowan’s breast. “I was wiping her face and moistening her lips. Do you want me to massage her now, just move her arms, keep them flexible?”
“Yes, do it. Do anything and everything. Do it whenever you get bored. If she shows the slightest…”
“Of course.”
He sat down and closed his eyes. He was drifting. Julien said something to him, but he was just remembering, the long story, the image of Marie Claudette with her six fingers. Six fingers on the left hand. Rowan had had beautiful and perfect hands. Hands of a surgeon.
What if she had done what Carlotta Mayfair wanted? What her mother had wanted? What if she had never come home?
He awoke with a start. The nurse was lifting Rowan’s right leg, carefully, gently, smoothing the lotion over the skin. Look how thin, how worn. “This will keep her from getting drop foot. We have to do it regularly. You want to remind the others. I’ll write it on the chart. But you remember.”
“I will,” he said.
“She must have been a beautiful woman,” said the nurse, shaking her head.
“She
Thirty-two
HE WANTED TO do it again. Emaleth didn’t want to stop dancing. The building was empty; no one else came this evening. And she wasn’t dancing, except in her sleep. She opened her eyes. There he was. The music was playing, she’d been hearing it in her dreams, and now he was so insistent. Do it. He wanted to take off her long pants again and be inside her. She didn’t mind it, but she had to be going to New Orleans. She really did. Look, it was dark again, positively late-night dark. The stars would be hanging low over the field outside, over the swampland, over the smooth highway with its silver wires, and its dreamy white lights. Got to start walking.
“Come on, honey.”
“I told you, we can’t make a baby,” she said. “It just won’t work.”
“That’s just fine, darlin’. I don’t mind at all about not making a baby. Come on, now, you’re my sweet little thing. What if I turned off the music? And here, I got you some milk? Some fresh milk. Said you wanted some more milk, remember? Look, I got you ice cream too.”
“Hmmmm, that’s good,” she said. “Turn down the dial on the music.”
Only then could she move. The music was little and tiny and thumping on her brain, kind of like a fish splashing in a tiny pool, trying to get bigger. It was grating, but it didn’t engulf her.
She tore open the plastic top of the big bottle and began to drink and drink. Ah, good milk. Not Mother’s milk, but it was milk. Not fresh and warm. But it was good. If only there had been more milk in Mother. She was so hungry for Mother. So hungry to lie in Mother’s arms and drink. This feeling became worse instead of better When she thought of Mother she wanted to cry.
But she had taken every drop she could get from Mother, and it had been enough. She had grown tall, and only left Mother when she knew she had to.
Pray the brown people had found Mother and taken Mother to a proper grave. Pray they had sung and dropped the red ocher and the flowers. Mother would never wake again. Mother would never speak. There wouldn’t be any more milk ever in Mother. Mother had made every drop that she would ever make.
Was Mother dead? She ought to go to Michael, tell Michael what Mother said. A feeling of love and tenderness came over her when she thought of Michael, and Mother’s love for him. Then go on to Donnelaith. What if Father was waiting there for her now?
On and on she drank. He was laughing. He had turned up the music again. Boom, boom, boom. She let the bottle drop, and wiped her lips. She should be walking. “Got to leave you.”
“Not yet, darlin’.” He sat down beside her, took the milk bottle and laid it carefully out of the way. “Want some ice cream? People who like milk always like ice cream.”
“I never had any before,” she said.
“Honey, you’ll love ice cream.” He opened the package. He began to feed her with a small white spoon. Oh, this tasted even more like Mother’s breast, sweeter and delicious. It made a shiver pass through her. She took the carton and began to eat. She was humming with the music. Suddenly the music and the taste were all she knew. She tried to shake herself back into the moment. The little building in the woods; he and she alone on the floor. All the dancers gone. His wanting to do it with her. And the spot of blood after, when she had reached down. “It just died like that.”
“What was that, darlin’?”
“The baby. I can’t make them with men, only with Father.”
“Ho, ho, honey! Keep that secret to yourself.”
