The Sound of Thunder

by Taylor Caldwell

  Edward’s brothers and sister were a gigantic drain on his resources. And were they grateful for all his work, all his guidance? They were not. On holidays, at home, here in the resplendent mansion he had built for them, for their enjoyment and pride, they were sullen, irritable, secretive, and uncommunicative. His questions about their progress were met with monosyllables, and when he pressed them, their eyes would become congested and they would leave him without further words. “If they’d had to work for their education, it might have been better for them,” he had once said explosively to William, now the head of his purchasing department.

  “Aye, and that it would,” William had replied, with a side-wise glance at his employer, an unreadable glance. Edward had paused; he was disturbed by what he believed to be an elliptical intonation in William’s voice.

  “There is not one thing they are doing that I wouldn’t have given half my life to have had the opportunity to do,” Edward had said with deep resentment. “Music, painting, the stage, writing. I felt them all, inside me. But there wasn’t time for my own development. I had to work!”

  He could not understand, then, why the almost always merry William had suddenly looked grave, and why his foxy hazel eyes had sparkled so mysteriously on his friend. But William, at last, had only shaken his head and had murmured something about “it’s a pity.”

  “I had no genius. They have. They clamored to develop their genius, and so I worked and sacrificed myself. And all they can do is to glower at me when they’re home. Contempt for me, and I paying their damned bills!”

  The grounds about the mansion had not yet been developed, though many mighty trees were scattered over the eighteen acres. This spring a score of gardeners would place flower beds and gravel walks, plant fruit trees, create arbors. The house stood in the midst of heaps of snow-covered earth; it had been built of grayish-white stone, in the English manner, all chimneys, severe porticoes, small latticed windows, stone steps, and white doors. There were twelve bedrooms, each with its big marble bath, and three with private sitting rooms. The servants’ quarters, five rooms, were on the third floor. On the first floor there was what the architect had called “an informal morning room,” a grand library full of leather furniture and mahogany tables, a dining room of impressive proportions, a drawing room of even more impressive proportions, two large kitchens and pantries, and a reception room. There was also a small music room for David.

  Each was furnished well, with imported objets d’art, Oriental rugs, French chandeliers fitted with electricity, paneled walls of the finest mahogany, or walls covered with gold or rose silk damask. Nothing had been spared. Edward winced sometimes, thinking of his debts.

  “There is a saying, an English saying,” George Enreich had said contentedly, “to the effect, my boy wonder, that one should not bite off more than he can chew. It has been my experience that one should bite off more than he can chew, and chew it.”

  “I’ve certainly got a mouthful,” Edward had replied apprehensively. “I just hope those damned stocks you recommended to me will pay off. Otherwise, I’ll go bankrupt.”

  “They will pay off,” said George. “Be patient. Rome was not, I have heard, built in a day.”

  “Tell the banks that,” Edward had retorted. There were times when he felt that he was walking on a very thin crust over a flood that might break through at any time. Sometimes he thought that he had come too far too fast. His personal life was ascetic. He spent little or nothing on himself. He had but four suits and six pairs of shoes, and only one overcoat, three years old. The income from the shops, though almost unbelievable, was not sufficient to pay all the expenses. Often his nights were sleepless. He was living beyond his immediate income, and this violated all his inborn instincts. It was fine to take chances; he had taken many chances, audaciously in his life, but they had been chances backed up by solid probabilities and his own sense of immediate control. Now he was dissipated over numerous enterprises in the stock market. He spent much time going over reports and scowling at the sluggish stocks he had bought. Up a point, down a point. He could not control the stock market, and what he could not control he distrusted.

  Munitions, for God’s sake! Who wanted munitions in this peaceful world? Sometimes he hated George Enreich for this stupidity. And George, of course, collected his twenty-five per cent of the profits with serene regularity. Nothing disturbed George, who was a multimillionaire. Edward owed him, on personal notes, over seventy thousand dollars. For this infernal house, which no one appreciated but himself and which no one loved but himself. In believing this, Edward was wrong. His family gloated over the house, but they would not give him the satisfaction of betraying their pride and their arrogant elation.

  Edward did not reply to Sylvia’s remark, tonight, on the subject of her Little Theater being the “sole center of culture in Waterford.” His silence was contemptuous. But he was thinking. This Mrs. McNulty, the famous actress—it would not hurt for her to see Lady in Waiting. Perhaps she would be able to inspire Sylvia to take the woodenness out of the play. Like David’s music, Sylvia’s stage direction, choice of amateur talent, and timing, were flawless. It was a silly play, a tragi-comedy, but the exasperating thing about it was that it was never quite tragic and never quite funny. Once Edward had seen the leading lady, a charming girl of nineteen, in tears, and he had asked her the trouble. She had burst out, sobbing, “Oh, Miss Enger insists on restraint where there shouldn’t be any. The second act—why, Mr. Enger, an actress should let herself go! I’ve tried it and almost got thrown out. Miss Enger said it was cheap.”

  Edward said to his sister, “Padraig’s invited her. She might be able to give you some tips—”

  “She’s too emphatic,” Sylvia protested, “even if famous.” Her pride smarted. “Too exaggerated, though I suppose that sort of thing goes in New York.” She looked at the gold watch pinned to her very chic, very severe, black silk dress, which she herself had designed, and had made. The dress gave her an austere and modish appearance, very smart though unfashionable by Waterford standards. “Heavens! It’s almost eight, half an hour to curtain time. I must go, if the sleigh can get through the drifts.” She smiled, and her smile was like sudden moonlight on her face as she glanced at Padraig. “It’ll be warm under the rugs, though.”

  Padraig hesitated. “I promised to call for Mrs. McNulty and possibly her friend.”

  “I intend to go with you,” said Edward. “I want to hear what she thinks of the play. It’s one of her earlier ones, isn’t it? So we’ll get out the new Pierce-Arrow which seats seven, with the chauffeur. Ring for him, Sylvia. We’ll pick up the ladies.”

  This was not pleasing to Sylvia, who had pictured herself being alone with Padraig under the fur rugs as she had never been alone with him before. Her white face tensed, and seeing this, Edward smiled to himself. He, too, had his hopes. He could conceive of nothing more gratifying than a marriage between Sylvia and Padraig, for Padraig was not only a gentleman but his advertising manager, with an impressive salary, and worth every penny of it, too. Padraig was also his, Edward’s, friend. In this house Padraig appeared less melancholy. Sometimes he breached his withdrawn silences enough to enter into a conversation that was both wise and entertaining, spoken in a very pleasant brogue that, in its lilt, was expressive and musical. He was a man who could be trusted, and if he spoke in a friendly manner, it was with sincerity. Edward knew of no one of his acquaintance like this, not even William or George Enreich. Padraig never “spoke in riddles,” as they did, nor was he frequently oblique or mystifying.

  Full of cold resentment, Sylvia, in her fine large bedroom which she had insisted upon furnishing, studied herself in the long, silver-framed pier mirror. She had designed a most unusual black velvet hat, small where the pervading mode was large and wide, and it was almost bonnet-shaped in order to accommodate her classic coronet of braids. It hugged her head in jet severity, relieved only by a pearl-and-rhinestone pin in the exact center of her marble forehe
ad, on which the sharp widow’s peak was very startling. The combination of the pin and the peak gave a Tudor effect to her carved and patrician face, with its tilted dark eyes and white planes. Her coat, of black velvet with great erm ne cuffs and collar, had also been designed and made by herself.

  Why had Edward decided to come tonight, instead of sitting in his library surrounded by books? He spoiled everything, as usual. He was spiteful and malicious. Angrily, as she pulled her gloves over her slender hands, Sylvia paced the room, which was all crystal and silver and ivory, and not ponderous and magnificently gilded and inlaid and dully colored as were most of the other rooms in the house. Her cool nature was reflected in her choice of smooth pale woods, light gray carpets, and ivory damask walls, a combination much disapproved of by Maria, who preferred grandeur and pomp. Sylvia, pacing, could see her reflection in the many narrow glasses of her dressing table and dresser and pier mirror. She stopped suddenly and stared at herself again. She never “painted” her face, not only because it was coarse and suspect to do so, but because beyond her clothing she gave little heed to her appearance. Now her full attention was on her extreme pallor, which, though luminous, suddenly seemed unpleasant to her. She rubbed her wide thin mouth with a handkerchief and bit her lips. There was no rush of warm blood to them. She thought. She remembered a red silk handkerchief she sometimes used with a black suit, and darted for it in a drawer. She wet a corner and rubbed it briskly over her mouth. A little delicate color was immediately imparted to it, and she smiled, showing her perfect teeth. It looked very natural, and she threw up her head in its customary proud arching.

  She ran down the broad white staircase with a sense of excitement, her feet hardly touching the dark red carpet that covered the steps. The baronial hall below was warm, and a fire burned in the black marble fireplace. (Though the house was well and centrally heated, Edward, remembering the cold days and nights of his attic, insisted on fires everywhere.) Large black walnut and mahogany chairs, upholstered in crimson and deep blue velvet, stood near the fire. An immense crystal chandelier, imported from France, swung down from the second story, ablaze with electric candles. Old Pierre, once a teacher at the Waterford School for Girls, was now Edward’s butler, receiving twice the customary wages, and he stood in the hall expectantly. Sylvia did not like the tiny and aged Frenchman, who was nearly eighty. It had been stupid of Edward to take him in when the school decided that he was too frail and old to continue teaching, and too deaf. Charity was all right, Sylvia supposed, but it ought to begin at home.

  “Where are the gentlemen?” she asked Pierre peremptorily. He was anxiously watching her lips. He bowed gracefully, in spite of his age. “They will be here almost at once, Mademoiselle,” he said in his soft voice.

  She hated to have her mouth gazed at so intently. Then she was ashamed. She knew her own temperamental rigidity in which she took pride as a rule; it ought not to extend, however, to those afflicted in any sense or crippled in body. I just can’t help it, though, she would think. I demand perfection. She began to pace restlessly up and down the deep-colored Oriental rug which covered the floor, shifting her hands with impatience in her ermine muff. Surely Padraig, after all these years, knew that she loved him! And surely she was not wrong in believing that he was less remote and quiet when he visited this house. Her heart felt hot and choking in her unfashionably small breast, and the palms of her hands sweated with love and longing. She wanted to put them on his face, and hold it, while she pressed her lips vehemently to his mouth. She wanted him to forget—what was he remembering? He had never told, but it was evident that some agony in him kept him so still, so withdrawn, his eyes shrinking, sometimes, under his bushy black eyebrows, so that they almost disappeared. His very mystery intrigued her, while it repulsed and angered her; it was like a door shut in the face of the world and, more importantly, in her face.

  Pierre was watching her discreetly near the cloakroom. In her restlessness she paced even faster, her frail silk skirts rustling against the slim ankles in their black silk stockings. She kept glancing, in her impatience, at the large and opulent and excellent paintings on the walnut walls. Everything was opulent in this house, huge and dim and muted in an Old World splendor, except for her own room. But she did not really dislike the furnishings; there was something solid and rooted in them, something which gave her a sense of safety, though she affected, in Edward’s hearing, to depreciate his taste. Oh, when she and Padraig were married, they would have one of the suites upstairs and they would be so happy! The tautness in her would dissolve away; she would do as she wished. She would go with him on his travels to all those shops, and while he also visited the many stores in the many cities which carried C. C. Chauncey’s fine wines and delicacies (all with their distinctive gold, blue, and scarlet label) she would visit the fashionable places to see the new styles, she would attend concerts, she would buy. Then there would be the evenings alone, in expensive hotels and in this house, she and Padraig together, and it would be enough for her, more than all the world enough, just to sit beside him and smile at him as he read.

  She wanted to give him all she had, her austerely virginal soul and body, the sweetness he could arouse in her, the yearning tenderness that often seemed to ignite her cool heart to a conflagration. She had loved him from the moment she had seen him, six years ago; she had not, then at eighteen, ever dreamed of being married one day. She had dreamed, since, of being married to Padraig, and he was never out of her mind, even when she slept.

  Edward and Padraig entered the hall, Edward smoking one of George Enreich’s cigars, Padraig attentive as he listened to his employer’s new ideas. They both seemed startled at seeing Sylvia. Can’t he dress, even for one evening? thought Sylvia, scornfully, as she looked at her brother. He was so big and uncouth and bulky, to her, in his worn clothing, his stiff collar, his undistinguished tie. Beside him, Padraig was a British gentleman, moving with grace and ease. Edward’s dark hair, which needed barbering, his big shoulders, his heavy legs and arms, his looming height, his broad features and granite-colored eyes, and even the way he walked, setting his feet down hard, antagonized his sister more than ordinarily. The famous Mrs. McNulty would have nothing but disdain for him, and Sylvia was mortified.

  “Oh, there you are,” said Edward, without apology for his delay. “Well, Pierre, is the automobile waiting?” The old man assisted Edward first with his shabby overcoat, and a look of paternal adoration stood on the delicate and wizened face. Edward, seeing it, patted his butler and mentor’s shoulder affectionately. Padraig waited, and there was a gentle spark in his eyes as he watched.

  The snow had stopped; the air rang with clarity; the alabaster drifts glimmered and sparkled under a fresh moon. “I don’t suppose the theater will be half full, after that storm,” said Edward, smoking busily. (He did not like tobacco, but George had given him some of his special cigars for Christmas and he supposed he should smoke them. He was considering adding them as a speciality of C. C. Chauncey’s.)

  “Why not?” demanded Sylvia, but her voice was not as acid as usual, for she was sitting between the two men and her arm leaned on Padraig’s. The contact made her feel exquisitely happy and content. “We’ve had worse, and people came. Besides, I shouldn’t wonder if the whole town knows that Mrs. McNulty is here—”

  “Were they the newspapers you were calling tonight?” asked Edward, in a disagreeably amused voice. “I thought I caught a few words through the door of the library. It’s too late for the newspapers, until tomorrow.”

  Sylvia’s face was hot; her eyelids felt touched with flame. Padraig said with unusual quickness, “Mrs. McNulty, as an actress, would be grateful for any publicity. After all, we have news services. Besides, she said she would have to telegraph, and the hotel would pick up the information. I wonder if her friend is coming, too.”

  “Her friend?” Sylvia swallowed over the burning lump of rage in her throat.

  “Yes. You may have forgotten that I mentioned her,”
said Padraig. But Sylvia had spoken only in her desperation to change the subject. “I don’t think I told you her name, though. It’s Madame DelaFontaine, of New York. At least Mrs. McNulty explained that’s her professional name.”

  Sylvia forgot her rage in this new wonder. “Madame DelaFontaine! Why, I read she designs all Mrs. McNulty’s clothes! Everything! She’s the most famous designer in the whole country, and people who can afford to go to Paris for their gowns and coats and hats go to her!” The limousine was passing a street lamp, and Sylvia’s face was lustrous with joy and excitement. Padraig smiled down at her with kind understanding, and then he sighed.

  “A dressmaker,” said Edward, in an uninflected voice.

  “A modiste, a coutourière!” cried Sylvia. “You’ve been taking French lessons for years, Ed, and I supposed you’d had a little French culture rubbed off on you or had acquired it through osmosis. I see I was mistaken.” She turned her head to Padraig. “‘Her professional name?’ Isn’t she French?”

  Padraig hesitated. If Mary Garrity wanted to reveal her real identity, that was her affair. “I’m not sure,” he said quietly. “She’s a very interesting woman, though.”

  Sylvia jealously mulled over his last words. Had they been admiring? But then Madame DelaFontaine must be old, very old. She’d been famous for years. When the limousine, which had lumbered majestically through the snow, drew up before the dimly lit entrance to the Whitney House, Sylvia leaned forward avidly. Padraig and Edward left the limousine and went into the lobby. In a few moments they emerged with two ladies, one tall and swathed in sables, with a glittering scarf over her head, and one very small and vivacious. Sylvia recognized Mrs. McNulty and dismissed her after a brief glance. Handsome but florid, and entirely too big, bigger than she appeared on the stage. The small woman—and how stylish she seemed even in that brown suit she was wearing and that short sealskin jacket!—had a little impudent face which Sylvia happily designated as monkeyish. Sylvia was not a girl to like people on sight, or even to like people, but suddenly, without warning, she liked Mary Garrity, and smiled at the flash of striking and animated eyes as Mary said something amusing to Edward. So engrossed with Mary was Sylvia that she missed Maggie’s intimate hand on Padraig’s arm, and the smile he gave her as he bent his head a trifle.