Kit put a hand to his throat. His voice had grown hoarse and whiskery. “I’m just like him,” he croaked. “You said so yourself.” It was as if he had only just noticed that his fingers were webbed or his pupils square.
Holly did not say anything. She looked sad and sorry but not very sympathetic. He had spent years ignoring his own sister, and he was not surprised at the distance that remained between them.
“I’m going away for a few days,” he told her. “I’m not sure where. Anywhere but here.”
Holly sighed and looked at him impatiently. “Have a heart, Kit,” she said. “Don’t tell me about your plans to go off soul-searching. I’ve already found my soul, and I’m dying to take it away from here.”
“So what’s stopping you?” Kit said. He placed the heavy paper sack in his sister’s lap.
“What’s this?” she asked cautiously. When he didn’t answer, she opened the bag and dumped its contents onto the coffee table.
“The money should see you through to our birthday,” Kit said. “And the gold ought to make a nice nest egg. Open the small bag.” He watched with real pleasure as she poured their mother’s rings into her small palm.
Holly cried for a while after that. She put the rings on her fingers, put her face into her jeweled hands, and cried. Kit smiled at her now and then, when she wasn’t looking, and eventually got up and ran his hand over her smooth hair.
He was pleased at her reaction, although he realized that he could not possibly understand the enormity of her relief. He had not suffered as Holly had, though he was beginning to think that his father’s influence would give him much to regret. Nor had he ever looked at money the way Holly had. She had known for years that to live in a mansion means nothing if you can’t afford to leave it. But Kit had credit cards, bank accounts, plenty of everything. His father had always paid his debts when he came up short and had attended to the nuts and bolts of everyday life so that Kit himself had never had to pay a bill, stick to a budget, make ends meet. High finance Kit understood. But he’d never known what a gallon of milk cost … or cared. Nor had he ever learned to take care of himself. There was always someone else to do that, to wash his clothes, cook his meals, clean up after him. Holly had never made her own living, or held even a summer job for that matter, and the money that was allowing her to leave was not money she herself had earned, but she knew how to take care of herself in other ways, was far more self-reliant than her brother, and he both envied and respected her for it.
“I’m afraid you won’t have time to pack much,” Kit said. “I should have given you a couple of days notice before I”—he nodded at the trove on the coffee table. “I’m obviously not thinking too clearly.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Holly said, wiping her face with her sleeves. “You’re thinking very clearly. Besides, I don’t need much time to pack. An hour, tops. There’s not a lot I want to take with me. And I don’t need to make any plans. I’ve spent years imagining what I’d do when I had money of my own. All I have to do is throw some things in a suitcase.”
“I’ll help you,” Kit offered.
He followed her around the apartment for a while, bumping into her and getting underfoot, until she finally handed him the phone book and asked him to call a travel agent. “Find out about flights to San Francisco for tomorrow morning,” she said, “and book me a room for tonight somewhere near the airport. Somewhere nice.”
While he made the calls, Holly finished packing, tucked her riches into a fat leather bag, and carried her things down to Kit’s car.
She was gone for such an oddly long time that Kit was on the point of going after her, afraid suddenly that their father might have found them out, when she returned. She was a bit breathless and looked as if she might have been crying.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“Fine. I’m a little overwhelmed, I guess. It’s finally beginning to sink in.” She took a quick look in the fridge and, after a moment, reluctantly poured a quart of milk down the kitchen sink. “I hope you won’t mind giving me a ride to the hotel.”
“Of course not,” he said, glad that they would be leaving together.
“Oh, here,” she said, fetching a postcard from her desk, writing out a name and a telephone number, handing it to him. “I’ll write to you at Yale in the fall to let you know where I am, but I don’t think I’d better try to reach you here. If you need me before then, call the Corrigans. Emily Corrigan’s my best friend. She’s been my roommate at Bryn Mawr for the past two years. When I go back to school in the fall, I’m sure it will be somewhere else, but I’ll still be in touch with Emily. She’ll know where I am.”
Kit was ashamed to realize that he had not known about an Emily, that he had never bothered to ask Holly about the man she’d been with the night before, who had unintentionally played such a pivotal role in their lives. But he believed that there would be time to learn about Holly’s life, and he looked forward to meeting her again on neutral ground where the only shadows would be their own.
On their way to the hotel, Kit and Holly Barrows said their good-byes
