“Now?”
“Just for a moment, sir.” My urgency seemed to penetrate his haze of anticipation. “I’m sure the young lady can amuse herself, just for a moment or two.”
She draped herself against the doorway, one hand raised to stroke the wood. “Don’t be too long.” A caricature, an unintentional mockery of every screen seductress—no, every television seductress—she backed into the library. Mr. Theo followed me down the hallway.
“It’s incredible what girls will do. God I’m grateful to be alive at this time, to be living in—I’ve never laid eyes on her before, but she seems to know me. Honestly, I got out of the elevator and she latched herself on to me.”
I swung the kitchen door open.
“She knows my name. And what is it that’s so important?”
Miss Sarah looked up, iron in her hand, laughter in her eyes. She was, just as she’d hoped, a complete surprise.
“Oh,” Mr. Theo said. “Sarah?” He took a couple of steps toward her. “Oh my God, Sarah. What are you doing here? Why aren’t you in Geneva or wherever it was?”
She had expected a welcome. She had expected to be a welcome surprise.
“What are you doing? Ironing?”
“It’s fun,” she said, sulky.
“Well you can’t stay here. You’ve got to go.”
She put the iron back on its holder, reached across to pull the plug out of the socket, pulled the nightgown off the ironing board—slow and recriminating gestures.
“No, not right now. I didn’t mean—Wait. Wait a minute, let me think. Look, Sarah, just stay out here. OK? Stay in the kitchen and don’t come out.” He was thinking fast, thought made visible. “If anybody asks you, you’re the maid or something. I can’t explain, but this is a real problem. You shouldn’t be here,” he told her.
Miss Sarah folded her arms under her breasts. “Don’t worry, I’ll go to a hotel. You don’t have to worry about me.”
“I’m sorry,” Mr. Theo said. She didn’t accept the apology. She held her chin high and her nose above it. “I didn’t mean it, you don’t have to leave. Look, I’ll explain later. Don’t pay any attention to me. Gregor”—he was back in command of the situation—“we’ll have dinner right away, the sooner the better, then we’ll be out of here.”
“We?” Miss Sarah metamorphosed into a shrew. “What we? You and who, we? Not Prune, I bet; for Prune you wouldn’t keep me in the kitchen. As the maid. Nothing to say for yourself, Theo?”
“It’s none of your business, honey,” he said.
When I set dinner plates down before the romantic couple, she had moved her place setting until she was sitting not across from but next to him. She wasn’t having to work very hard to recapture his entire attention. I served them Scandinavian style, off a single platter, roast, rice, carrots. They paid no attention to me, as if I were not there, or as if I were invisible, like the castle servants in Beauty and the Beast. Only in this version, I thought, as she murmured “Teddy-Weddy” at him, the genders were reversed. Or, I thought, it was Beast and the Beast, honors equal. I was the only player true to the original.
The doorbell rang as I was spooning cream sauce over the slices of roast.
The doorbell didn’t ring once, then wait for a response. It rang steadily, like an alarm. I set the platter down on the table.
When I opened the street door, I was all pomp and presence at the unmannerly summons, and a dark force went by me, tall, and the shoulders with which he shoved me aside were broad.
“Sir?” I inquired, in a corrective and I hoped warning voice. “What—?”
He was already inside, at the living room door and spinning around to look in the library. He paid no attention to me, gave no more than a dark, angry glance as he ran back toward me, then swung around to thunder up the stairs.
Probably not a thief, I deduced. I didn’t follow him. His footsteps pounded along the upstairs hall. There was the sound of doors, opening, closing. I waited.
He stopped halfway down the staircase to glare at me. “Where are they? I saw them come in. You’ll keep out of it if you know what’s good for you.”
I could almost see the gears of his mind turning, and then, as they meshed, he was on the run again. He shoved my restraining hand aside and went back down the hall. I was on his heels. I didn’t know who he was, or what, but I was making a guess. I didn’t think there was cause for fear. I could match him; a young man like that wouldn’t have learned how to fight in the kind of places where I’d picked up my skills.
We entered the dining room as one. Carlie was feeding Mr. Theo a bite of roast, or perhaps it was a carrot; my memory isn’t exact on the point. The young man stopped dead in his tracks and I ran up against his broad back.
Mr. Theo’s mouth stayed open. The fork froze in the air. Mr. Theo put his hands against the table to push himself back and up. “What the—?”
“Oh shit,” Carlie said. Her fork clattered onto the plate.
“You,” the young man said to Mr. Theo, “are a son of a bitch. You,” he said to Carlie, in the same growling voice, “get your coat.”
I stood back, to watch.
Mr. Theo rose aggressively from his seat. His nostrils flared. “Just one minute here.”
The young man moved toward Carlie. “You heard me.” She stayed where she was, seated. He turned his attention to Mr. Theo. He came to stand in front of him, looming over him. He shoved Mr. Theo backward, toward the buffet. “You think you can get away with—” Anger choked his voice. “Well you can’t, Teddy Mondleigh, not this time. You aren’t going to.”
At the sound of his own name, Mr. Theo relaxed. “Hey.” He pushed the hand away. “Cut it out, will you? Do I know you?”
“You know me.” The hand shoved again. Mr. Theo batted it away. “And I know you.”
“I said, stop it.” The nostrils flared again. Mr. Theo called in his reserves. “Gregor?”
I moved toward the fray, to take the young man into an armlock, I thought. Carlie leaped up and hung onto my arm. She opened her mouth over my wrist.
I restrained myself from slugging her, although if she did bite me I wasn’t sure I could answer for my reaction.
But she screamed instead, shrill as a siren.
“Help! Help! Police! Someone!”
She hung off my arm, impeding me.
“Somebody, help!”
The young man ignored us. “Bradley Wycliffe. I was three years behind you at Yale.” He had Mr. Theo by the shoulders now and was shaking him. I grabbed Carlie around the waist with my free arm. The young man shook Mr. Theo—“You’ve already met my sixteen-year-old sister”—shook him hard, to match each syllable.
That news stopped me in my tracks. Mr. Theo’s face, even as it flopped back and forth, registered shock.
“My sixteen-year-old sister, Mondleigh.” The young man spat the words.
Carlie let go of my arm. “Oh shit,” she said.
Mr. Theo regained his composure. He punched at the young man’s chest and threw his full weight against him. Mr. Wycliffe stumbled, off balance, and sprawled backward onto the table. Glasses tumbled. Silver scattered. “And keep your hands off me, Wycliffe.”
Mr. Wycliffe shoved his hands onto the table, to regain his feet. A glass cracked under the pressure. We all fell silent. He lifted his left hand slowly, and by the time he got it up to eye level, blood had begun to flow.
Carlie screamed in earnest.
Blood flowed down his wrist, soaking the buttoned cuff of his white shirt, soaking into the knitted cuff of his Aran Isles sweater.
Carlie screamed again. I let go of her and reached for a napkin, to staunch the flow. Mr. Theo stood panting.
Mr. Wycliffe held his hand out so I could wrap the napkin around it.
The kitchen door flew open and Miss Sarah ran in. “What’s happening?”
“Get out of here, Sarah,” Mr. Theo panted.
She looked at me. “Should I call the police?” Then she caught sight
of the young man. Who was staring at her.
I’d never before seen it happen. They were like two animals that suddenly discover they are sharing space each had thought was his own, a dog and a cat at the moment of realization of each other’s presence. “What have you done to him, Theo?” Miss Sarah asked, but her eyes never left the young man’s face.
“Who are you?” he asked her, holding the bandage in place with his right hand.
“Just get out of here, both of you,” Mr. Theo said.
“I’m the maid.”
Carlie was sniffling, weeping, so I picked up another napkin for her, to mop her eyes with and blow her nose into. “Would you like me to call the police, sir?” I inquired.
“No, that won’t be necessary. Have you cooled down, Wycliffe?”
There was no answer.
“Sarah, I told you to go back to the kitchen.”
She moved toward the door but stayed in the room.
Mr. Wycliffe turned away from her. “Get your coat, Carlie, you little”—he looked back at Miss Sarah—“fool.”
His sister pushed her face up at him. “You’ve ruined everything. I hate you.”
“All right, we’ll leave the coat.”
“The young lady’s coat is in the hallway,” I said. I was waiting to escort them out.
“But your hand,” Miss Sarah said.
“It’s just a cut. Not serious,” he told her. “Sarah. No, don’t,” he said, as she reached a hand to take the napkin away, survey the damage. “What’s someone like you doing here? Don’t try to lie, I’ve been upstairs. It makes me sick,” he told her.
“What do you mean it makes you sick?”
Mr. Theo interrupted. “You did say sixteen? Did you say sixteen?”
Slowly, the young man turned to face his adversary. “Sixteen. As in statutory rape.”
“Oh my God.” Mr. Theo sank into his chair.
“This one at least looks the age of consent. Barely.”
Sarah had understood. “How can you say that? You don’t know anything about me.”
“What is it then, are you his?” He indicated me by a nod of the head. He couldn’t seem to take his eyes away from her face. “Convenient and cozy.”
“How about leaving, Wycliffe? Believe it or not, I’m grateful to you, but you’ve overstayed your welcome. For the record, she picked me up. Waiting for me, lying in wait, outside the office. For the record.”
Mr. Wycliffe paid no attention to him. “And you look as good as gold,” he said to Miss Sarah.
“Which is more than can be said for your sister,” Mr. Theo said.
Those words seemed to sink in. “Carlie, is he telling the truth? Did you do that?”
Carlie was all rebellion. “Of course it’s true. What do you think? I’d been waiting half an hour for you. You couldn’t be bothered to be on time, what do you expect? I’m sick of boys, and he was in your alumni register. I saw his name. So I did. So what?”
“Oh my God,” Mr. Theo groaned.
“But why him?” Mr. Wycliffe asked.
“It’s not as if he’s married or anything.”
The young man kept his temper, barely. “You’re going home tomorrow, first plane out.”
“Not unless you promise not to tell.”
Mr. Theo stood up. “Just get out of my house, will you both?”
“With pleasure,” Mr. Wycliffe answered. “Come on, Carlie. I’ll never set foot in this”—he looked at Miss Sarah for the last time—“whoremaster’s haven again.”
I followed them to the door. He had his right hand at the back of his sister’s neck, not gently. He took her coat without thanks. I closed the door behind them.
Miss Sarah was gathering up pieces of glass, mooning over them. Mr. Theo remained seated, except that now his face was buried in his hands. I spread out a clean napkin, to cover the bloodstains.
“Will they come out?” Miss Sarah wondered.
“I know how to remove blood. I had a sister,” I told her, I don’t know why.
“Sixteen,” Mr. Theo mumbled, through his fingers.
“Do you know what he thought?” Miss Sarah asked.
She didn’t need to tell me who he was. “The gentleman made that fairly clear.”
Her outrage needed expression. “He thought I was living here. As in, living with, as in sex. With Theo.” She thought. “Or you.”
“You have to excuse him. The girl was his sister. He was upset.”
Mr. Theo lowered his hands. He spoke to both of us. “I honestly had no idea.”
Miss Sarah turned on him. “Look what you’ve done. With your…womanizing.”
“How was I supposed to know?” Mr. Theo asked her. He was happier now that he could justify himself.
“Who is he, Theo?”
“I don’t know. I can’t remember. Brad Wycliffe, he rowed crew, that’s all I remember. From Chicago. Or Iowa. Somewhere out there, it’s Wycliffe Industries—grain, beef, I read somewhere they’re expanding into fertilizers. He was only a freshman, Sarah. Don’t pester me now.”
“If I’d been him, I’d have slugged you. You know, he came to rescue her. I bet you wouldn’t do that for me.”
Mr. Theo wasn’t interested in hypothetical situations. “I could have gone to prison. Doesn’t that mean anything to you? I’d better get married. I’d better do something about myself.”
“If you’ll set the table again, Miss Sarah? For two.”
She turned on me. “I told you not to call me miss.” She turned on Mr. Theo. “He thinks I’m your mistress, Theo, or playmate, or whatever. Are you listening to me?”
“Or Gregor’s,” Mr. Theo said, starting to grin. “Or both of ours.”
She was not amused. “How could you do this to me?”
“I’m sorry, really. I sure didn’t mean to. I had no idea, and I am sorry. I’m a pretty sorry specimen, all around.”
I gathered up the dirty plates. “I’ll serve dinner again.”
“Don’t bother, I don’t have much appetite left. That was a sixteen-year-old girl, Gregor.” He spoke man to man. “My God—and I had no idea, absolutely no idea. Do you know how much a lawsuit could cost me? A man with my assets?” He shuddered at the thought. “I’m going to give up sex, give up women. Get married.”
Miss Sarah stood puffed up with anger. “Lucky Prune.”
“If you’ll permit me, sir, you’ll feel better about things after you’ve eaten. You’ll feel better in the morning.”
“No, I mean it,” Mr. Theo said. “I’d better. Before I do something serious to myself.”
16
Puttiesque Forces Attack
This time there were two of them on the steps, under a fall of April sunshine. Miss Sarah wore jeans and one of those loose sweaters that manages to suggest how succulent is the flesh it conceals. The young man wore slacks and a crew-neck sweater. I wondered how he earned his living, to be so casual in the middle of a Tuesday morning.
Miss Sarah stood up, ostensibly to greet me and offer to take one of the grocery bags I carried. “I’ve explained everything, Gregor. He knows I’m your sister.”
The young man stood.
I wished I could sit down, somewhere solitary, to ingest this piece of information.
He held out a forthright hand and smiled. “Brad Wycliffe.”
I shifted the bag, shook his hand.
“I apologize for what I said last night. And thought. Apology accepted?”
“Accepted,” I said. Miss Sarah, taking the bag from me, looked urgently into my face.
“Although I still think she shouldn’t be living here, in Teddy Mondleigh’s house.”
“Mr. Mondleigh would never,” I assured him.
Miss Sarah stood between us, hugging the grocery bag, beaming from one of us to the other. Brad Wycliffe had three or four inches on me, a lean man, and young. He had an open face, wholesome, the bones squaring it off, a firm mouth, a firm handshake. If she had been my sister, he was just the kind o
f young man I’d have liked her to have taken up with. Four-square, reliable.
“Gregor would poison his soup or something if he tried anything, and he knows it,” Miss Sarah said.
“And I also admire the way you’ve taken care of Sarah, since your parents died,” Mr. Wycliffe added.
I didn’t dare say anything.
“See? I have told him all about us. Even about how I’m studying dance.”
“Even about dance? Well, I’m glad that’s cleared up.”
She smiled happily at me.
“Would you care to come inside?” I asked the young man.
He shook his head, emphatically. “Into Mondleigh’s house? Not a chance. I’ll pick you up at noon tomorrow, Sarah?”
“Yes.” Her cheeks were pink.
“Until tomorrow then,” he said. “Gregor,” and he shook my hand again.
“See you,” she called after him, watching his long stride, watching until he had turned the corner and moved out of sight.
That scene played out, she let me into the house. As I followed her into the kitchen, I debated whether I should say anything, and if so, what. She put the grocery bag down on the table. I set mine beside it.
“What kind of dance are you studying, miss? In case he asks.”
Miss Sarah giggled, did a turn around the room, concluding with a court curtsey at my feet. She raised her head to look at me. “Ballet. We’re working here to pay for the lessons. Do you mind?”
A pretty black pot myself, I couldn’t scold, but I could warn her. “You’d be wiser to tell him the truth.”
“Isn’t he wonderful? Did you notice his eyes? And he has a great laugh, but you haven’t heard it.”
Nothing I said would have gotten through to her.
“He didn’t want to come back here,” she told me. “He didn’t want to see me again. He likes me, but he doesn’t want to. At first it was because of what he thought, and now because he thinks I’m not…in his class. But I think that’s why he likes me too, because he doesn’t want to.”
She moved to give me room to work.
“He says Carlie is a real mess, and he’s right, she is. I’ll tell him the truth when the time is right. Do you think he’ll think I’m after his money? I bet he might, and if he still…likes me, in spite of everything…” The vision occupied her for a minute. “I think I’ll wear a denim jumper. That’s the kind of thing I’d wear, isn’t it? I’ll have to get one, this afternoon, with a turtleneck and flats. Where does Theo keep his old yearbooks, Gregor?”
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