Silent Partner

With candy and flowers and a bottle of wine. He said he was the brother of the woman who’d given me away- he apologized for that, said I shouldn’t hate her, though he understood if I did. That she was an inadequate person but he’d always looked after me. Both as an uncle and an emissary of my father.”

She looked over at the empty bed. “Then he told me who my father was.”

I said, “How’d it feel learning you were Leland Belding’s heir?”

“Not as strange as you’d think. Of course I’d heard of him, knew he was a genius and rich, and it was strange finding out we were related. But he was dead, gone, no chance for any connection. I was more concerned with living ties.”

She hadn’t answered the question. I let it pass. “How did Uncle Billy chance to find you?”

“Paul had traced my roots and found him. He said he’d wanted to meet me for years, had been unsure of what to say or do and stayed away out of fear of doing the wrong thing. Now that the cat was out of the bag, he wanted me to hear everything from the source.

“I told him I knew about Sherry and we talked a little about her- I could tell he wasn’t fond of her, but he didn’t push it and I didn’t challenge him. I wanted to know about my other sister, about my roots. We sat there and drank wine and he told me everything- how the three of us were the love children of Mr. Belding and an actress whom he’d loved very much but couldn’t marry for social reasons. Her name was Linda. She died of childbirth complications. He showed me a picture. She was very beautiful.”

“An actress,” I said. When she didn’t react, I said, “You look like her.”

“That’s quite a compliment,” she said. “We were also miracle children- premature, tiny at birth, and not expected to live. Linda became sick, with septicemia, but she never stopped thinking about us, praying for us. She named us just minutes before she died. Jana, Joan, and Jewel Rae- that’s me. And though we all made it, Joan had multiple deformities. Despite being rich and powerful, Mr. Belding was in no position to raise her- or any of us. He was painfully shy- actually phobic about people, especially children. From what Uncle Billy described, a bit agoraphobic as well. So Uncle Billy had us adopted by his sister. He’d thought she’d turn out to be a better mother than she did. All these years both he and Mr. Belding felt tremendously guilty about letting us go.

“I told him Paul was going to arrange a meeting with Sherry and he said he knew. Then I asked if he could arrange one with Joan.”

“So he and Paul were working together.”

“They were cooperating. He was evasive about Joan, but I kept pressing him and finally he told me she was somewhere in Connecticut. I said I wanted to see her. He said there was no point- she was severely disabled, had no conscious mind to speak of. I said not only did I want to see her, I wanted to be with her, to take care of her. He said that was impossible- she required full-time care and that I should concentrate on my education. I said she was a part of me. I’d never be able to concentrate on anything else again unless I could have her with me. He thought about that, asked if I could take some time off from school, and I said sure. We drove straight to a private airport, hopped on a corporate jet to New York, then took a limousine to Connecticut. I know he thought the way she looked would change my mind. But it only made me more resolute. I lay down in bed next to her, hugged her, kissed her. Felt her vibrations. When he saw that, he agreed to move her out here. The corporation bought Resthaven and set up a private wing for her. I got to interview attendants, hand-picked Elmo. She became part of my life. I came to really love her. Loved the other patients, too- I’ve always felt at home with the defective. If I had it all to do over again, I would have spent my life working with them.”

At home. The only real home she’d known had been shared with two retarded people. A textbook insight, but she wasn’t getting it.

I said, “And you changed her name.”

“Yes. A new name symbolizes a new life. Both Jana and I had been given S names; I thought Joan should have one too. To fit in.”

She got up, sat by her sister’s side, and touched the sunken cheeks.

“She goes on forever,” she said. “She’s been a constant in my life. A real comfort.”

“Unlike your other partner.”

That cold look again. “Yes, unlike her.” Then a smile. “Well, Alex, I’m pooped. We’ve covered a lot of ground.”

“There are a few other things, if you don’t mind?”

Pause. For the first time since I’d known her, she looked drawn. “No, of course not. What else would you like to know?”

There was plenty, but I was looking at her smile: stuck to her without being part of her- like a clown’s makeup. Too wide, too bright. A prodrome- early warning of something. I ordered my thoughts, said, “The story you told me about being orphaned- the accident in Majorca. Where did that come from?”

“A fantasy,” she said. “Wishful thinking, I guess.”

“Wishing for what?”

“Romance.”

“But the way you tell it, the true story of your parents is pretty romantic. Why embellish?”

She lost color. “I… I don’t know what to tell you, Alex. When you asked me about the house, that story came out- just poured out of me. Does it matter after all these years?”

“You really have no idea where it came from?”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s identical to the way Leland Belding’s parents died.”

She turned ghostly. “No, that couldn’t…” Then, again, the glazed smile. “How strange. Yes, I can see why that would intrigue you.”

She thought, tugged her ear. “Maybe Jung was right. The collective unconscious- genetic material transmitting images as well as physical traits. Memories. Perhaps when you asked me, my unconscious kicked in. I was remembering him. Eulogizing him.”

“Maybe,” I said, “but something else comes to mind.”

“What’s that?”

“It was something Paul told you under hypnosis, then suggested you forget. Something that surfaced anyway.”

“No. I… there were no suggestions for amnesia.”

“Would you remember if there were?”

She stood, clenched her hands, held them stiff at her sides.

“No, Alex. He wouldn’t have done that.” Pause. “And what if he did? It would only have been to protect me.”

“I’m sure you’re right,” I said. “Pardon the armchair analysis. Occupational hazard.”

She looked down at me. I took her hand and she relaxed.

“After all,” I said, “he did tell you about the drowning- which was pretty emotionally loaded stuff.”

“The drowning,” she said. “Yes. He did tell me that. I remember it clearly.”

“And you told me. And Helen.” Twisting and turning the truth like wood in a lathe.

“Yes, of course I did. You were the people I felt close to. I wanted both of you to know.”

She pulled away, sat down on the opposite end of the bed. Bewildered.

I said, “It must have been a terrible experience, being forced under water, someone trying to kill you. Especially at that age. The primal age.”

She turned her back to me. I listened to the arrhythmic hiss and squeak of Shirlee’s breathing.

“Alex?”

“Yes?”

“Do you think lies are… a combination of elements?” Her voice was empty, dead, like that of a torture victim. “Fiction combined with repressed truth? That when we lie, what we’re really doing is taking truth and changing its temporal context- bringing it forward from the past to the present?”

I said, “It’s an interesting theory.” Then, “If you feel up to it, I’d like to hear about how you and Sherry finally met.”

“A couple of days after Uncle Billy visited me, Paul came by and told me she was ready.”