“Two, two, two! Corner on wheat!” Jane beamed. “We brought them all. Tench has them. Everyone remembers Pit!”
Mrs. Barnaby looked straight into my eyes. “Have you kept your old games, Isobel?”
Mother answered for me. “I’m afraid she had nothing of that sort. Dolls, of course, and little beds, and a small stove. Childish things that she played with quietly. She was too young for games when she went away and too old for them when she returned.”
“People are never too old!” Joe. Young Joe. Almost shouting.
I began. “I had a—”
“I’m a devotee of Fishpond myself,” Carrie declared. “The cunning little hook, the anxious casting, the steady hand, the reeling in the fish! Properly played, it can be a very graceful game. The turn of a slender wrist, a pretty bracelet There’s nothing like a slender wrist and a pretty bracelet I’ve been admiring yours, dear Mrs. Barnaby. I had a friend who caught a fine husband with The Melody of Love on the piano. She couldn’t play, it was the wrist and her grandmother’s bracelet.”
“I packed the Fishpond in the box.” Jane.
“Isobel,” Mike said, “didn’t you have a music box once?”
“There!” Mrs. Barnaby smiled at Carrie. ‘That’s what I meant by old games. I was sure I remembered a musical game or toy. And the little story about your friend made Mike remember, too.”
“Sure, you had a music box, Issy. Didn’t you?” Joe. Too eager, too tense, too loud.
“Yes. Its in the old playroom.”
“Why don’t we go up and look it over? Any reason why we can’t?” Mike bent over Mother’s hand. “I’m crazy about your party. Now, if I can only play with Issy’s music box—”
“Mike,” Mother said, “is this the result of my poor, simple sherry?”
“I think these children are charming,” Mrs. Barnaby said to the cousins. “These modern children are really sweet. The old playroom, the old, shabby toys. Tell them to run along, Mrs. Ford.”
“But dinner!” Mother looked doubtfully at the clock, at Mrs. Barnaby, at the cousins.
For me, the clock was racing, but time in the room stood still. A log in the fireplace broke with a long, soft hiss. Mrs. Barnaby’s fingers tapped the arm of her chair. Mother’s little foot swung back and forth as it does when she is thinking.
At last Carrie spoke. Her laughter was tolerant and chiding. “My dear Maude, surely not dinner before seven. Even in the country.”
“These modern children are charming, as you say, Mrs. Barnaby.” Bess.
“Isobel is coming out of herself, she’s showing an interest Quite emancipated.” Jane. “And we can have a cozy talk while they romp. I’ve been admiring your brooch, Mrs. Barnaby. Turn out the lights when you come down, Isobel. The dollars take care of themselves.”
Mother waved us from the room, and the portieres swung together behind us. Chit in the hall, Mike spoke distinctly. “Got to get cigarettes from my coat pocket, Issy. Wait here while Joe and I rummage in the closet.”
They returned with the parcel, and we started up the stairs. Back in the library, Mrs. Barnaby’s laughter out-rode the cousins’. I led the way. Mike was close behind me. He gripped my arm—to warn, or to reassure. Joe followed more slowly, as though to guard the rear.
Halfway up the stairs, Mike leaned over the balustrade. “What is it, Tench?”
Tench was in the dining-room doorway, looking up. “Can I get you anything, Mr. Mike?”
“We re looking for our lost youth, Tench. Are you any good at that?”
“I think so, Mr. Mike.”
“Fine. Well yell if we need help. We re going to the playroom, Tench. Bang on the gong with all you’ve got when dinner’s ready.”
We climbed, not looking back. I don’t know how long Tench stood there, watching us.
“Always play it straight when you can,” Mike said. “Keys, playroom, and hurry.”
On each floor of the house there are two wide halls that form a cross. The stairs rise from the center of the cross. There was light below us, there was darkness above. We came to the top of the stairs, to the second floor.
The keys hung from a panel at the end of my hall. My room is at the front of the house, facing north. The playroom is at the opposite end, on the side facing west.
I found the keys; I had been afraid to take them earlier. Our footsteps echoed on the stone floor. I wanted to walk on the rug, but Mike said no.
“This is a noisy, childish frolic,” he said. “Up to and including the next two minutes. After that, hush-hush.”
We unlocked the playroom door and found the light switch. Mike said, “Show Joe where the box is and get it going. This is the wrong side of the house for us. We ‘ can forget all the west windows. We want east.” He unwrapped the parcels as he talked; the long white strips uncoiled and fell to the floor. They should have made a noise, they should have sounded like chains. They were as soft as snow. “Well keep together, always in sight of each other, no chance of duplication then.” He winked. “Having fun?”
I said yes.
My rocking horse had a braided tail tied with a red ribbon. I had forgotten that. My little stove had pots and pans, an oven and lids. It could hold a fire and cook, but I had never cooked on it The little lifter for the lids was tied to the oven door. It was tiny and perfect A shovel for the ashes.
Joe said, “Issy, is this the box?”
He wound it. The box is round, covered with something that looks just like colored beads, with a metal cup in the center. My Christmas tree fitted into the cup. and when the music played, the tree turned. The tree turned round and round, and the music played The Lorelei.
“Not too tight, Joe, the tree won’t turn,” I said.
Mike said, “It’s all right, baby, it’s all right.” The music played, and the empty little cup went round and round. Mike took the keys from my hand. “So much for the sound effects; the burning cigarette on the window sill, if you know your Baker Street. Now set me straight. Your own room is out, this one is out, everything on this side of the house is out. Id say everything on this floor, but we don’t want to take a chance. Well do all the east windows, high and low. Come on, hush-hush now.”
From room to room, walking like thieves, opening locked doors, smelling dust, turning the flashlights on shrouded furniture. Opening unlocked doors, smelling clean rooms; opening closets with small windows. Windows. Opening windows with dean locks and rusted locks, dropping the long white strips and making them fast Up another flight of stairs, the last but one. Up there, the air was thick and old. There was no carpeting. The flashlights found the rows of doors, all labeled. Trunks. Veranda Furniture. Nursery Furniture. Empty. Empty. Empty. Bolls of dust like weather stops against the doors marked Empty. Four doors, studded with nails, at the four corners of the house. The doors to the turrets.
I said, ‘There’s nothing in the turrets.”
“Ever been up?”
“Years ago. They’re useless. Winding stairs and a tiny room at the top, like a platform. My father said the stairs weren’t safe, the mortar is loose between the stones.”
“They have windows,” Mike said. “This is where we don’t skip. North, east, south, and west. This is no man’s land.”
Rooms and closets crowded to the ceiling with things that had no shape. Two windows in each room, one in each closet.
“Were taking too much time!” Joe’s face was streaked with dust. “Can we hear that gong when it rings?”
“Listen,” Mike said. The music box was playing far away. A world away. “Well hear the gong.”
We climbed the turrets. Mike led and I followed. Joe was behind me. In one of them I saw a clean, dustless step—two, three, four clean steps—but when I bent to look, Joe whispered, “Hurry.” One small window in each turret; a slit in the stone. We heard the wind.
Joe said, “I bet nobody knows how thick these walls are. They’re plenty thick. Say, you know what? This part up here was never wired! You’d have t
o use candles, see? This proves I saw what I said I saw. You, too, Issy. How soon can I tell Lucy?”
No one answered him.
His grubby hands caressed the walls, his eyes glistened. “You know what, Issy? I could have had fun up here for years if I’d known what it was like. When I was a kid, I mean.”
North, east; south, and west, across the intersecting halls, up and down the winding stairs until we came to the last high window.
Mike whispered to the trees, “Sister Ann, Sister Ann, do you see anybody coming?”
“I’m having fun,” Joe said.
Mike dusted his hands. “That’s that,” he said softly. “Every window taken care of and two strips left over.” He crushed the white streamers into his pocket. “Come along, we’ve got to wash.”
“Don’t we reconnoiter first?” Joe. “I mean outside. We ought to beat it outside while we have the chance.”
“We will if there’s time. Reconnoiter! Soap and water in the playroom, General.” Mike turned to me as if he had forgotten I was there. He wasn’t convincing. “I could have had fun up here for years, too, Issy.”
Joe says, “Say, you know what? I bet that light we saw was Anna looking for a bat’s nest. She hasn’t got a bat. But anyway, I’ve sure enjoyed it, Issy. That story you told Mike is strictly com, but anyway, I’ve sure enjoyed it. Will I have things to talk about!”
We started down. The music box was silent; there was no sound from below.
“If we find any candle wax or anything, will she give me back that allowance cut?” Joe. “A buck, it adds up.” Mike was the first to hear the other footsteps. We had nearly reached the second floor. “I’ll fix it;” he said.
The steps were coming up.
We moved forward, laughing; we filled the halls with the same foolish sound that had begun the evening. An answering wave surged up the stairs and receded. The, cousins, Mrs. Barnaby, Mother. At the foot of the stairs we came face to face with Tench.
“Coming to get us, Tenth?”
“Yes, Mr. Mike.”
“Did you ring?”
“Yes, sir.” He stood aside.
“Well wash up downstairs then. Dirty work, these little journeys into the past”
Tench smilingly agreed.
The gong rang when we reached the first floor. We met the others leaving the library, clearly answering a first summons. Anna still held the small bronze hammer.
“Did we keep you waiting, Anna?” She shook her head.
Mother looked us over doubtfully.
The tall white candles dripped. The warm white drops rolled slowly down. They fell on the wreathing smilax, and the small leaves trembled. Minute by minute the candles burned away.
The lobsters were red and empty on the pale-green plates, the yellow lemons were squeezed dry; but we had only begun. There were other knives and forks to lift, molds of jelly to break, fruit to peel and nuts to crack, wine to swallow.
Carrie said, “You set a pretty table, Maude.” She pursed her lips. She was telling herself she should have said, “Anna does very well, Maude, but then, of course, you trained her.”
The candles ate the time. Each rolling drop of wax was time consumed.
It was a pretty table. We were black and white and gray, but the table was a palette. The table was a still-life painting, a canvas. We were figures on a canvas, hung in a waiting house. We were framed in light, waiting to be judged.
We were in the center of darkness. The dark garden outside the windows, the dark curtains at the door, the halls and stairs beyond. The dark rooms overhead, locked and unlocked, empty or not empty. In one of them there was no one to see a bowl of red carnations; in another a music box had stopped playing. In all of them, along the eastern wall, the windows were flying flags of truce. Out in the garden, where the wind was high there was no one to see them.
I heard my name. “This reminds me of Isobel.” Bess was talking to Mother. “I hope you made the man give you the feathers, Maude. I’m thinking of a little toque on Isobel’s fair hair. This is guinea, isn’t it? Of course it is. There’s the jelly. A little toque, using the breast and part of the tail.”
“Maude doesn’t have to economize,” Carrie said. “Isobel, your mother tells me you drove yesterday. Did you see anyone I know?”
“She was with me,” Mike said. “And I don’t know anybody you’d be caught dead with.”
“That reminds me, Maude.” Jane turned to Mother. “I haven’t seen that animal. Is he still, you know, well?”
“Isobel, dear, Cousin Jane is asking about Tray.”
“I saw him this morning,” I said. “He’s quite well, thank you.”
“Told you so, did he? ‘Good-morning, mistress, I am well and hope you are the same.”“ Jane was convulsed. “I always said that dog could talk.”
Anna, arranging plates at the side-board, dropped one. The small crash was followed by silence. Anna ran from the room.
“I hope that’s open stock,” Bess said.
“Open or not,” Carrie answered, “Maude doesn’t have to economize.”
Mother shook with quiet laughter. “You see why I love them,” she said to Mrs. Barnaby. “Janie, you frightened Anna, and I won’t have it. Tray is her bête noir. I really think she believes he’s devil-ridden. Sometimes I think Isobel is as bad as Anna.”
“Nonsense,” Mrs. Barnaby said flatly.
“Look at Isobel’s arms!” Jane cried. “Goose-flesh. Would you like my scarf, dear? A Liberty scarf is very light and warm.”
“Nerves,” Bess said. “From her poor father’s side.”
Event before dinner ended, I think I knew we would never be together again, not all of us. Mike says I couldn’t have known that, but he was not in tune with the house. I was; I had been born in tune, and the house played on me. I knew then that we would never be together again. Later the doctor told me that prescience is not uncommon. He thinks events can telegraph themselves like people asking to be met I know they can.
When Tench and Anna served dessert, Mother complimented them. Carrie demanded Mrs. Tench, and she came into the room wearing a white apron over her black uniform and was complimented in turn. We were all together, sitting and standing about a lace-covered table wreathed in smilax and lighted by candles. We had come to the end of something, not only of the dinner itself but of a cycle. I thought of the waiting windows facing the east; they were in the future, they were ahead of me. But the present was growing dim, fading, sinking into the past.
Mothers cigarette smoke curled upward, blue and fragrant The cousins’ fingers stroked the lace doth, furtively worshiping.
“Mrs. Tench, you have surpassed yourself.” Carrie. “The sweet was fit for a king!”
The sweet was ice cream, in a hollow block of ice, around which candles had been set If the house has an emblem, it should be a candle.
The candles on the table had burned low. The bonbon dishes held colored crumbs, the grapes were sprawling stems, the wine was a red remembrance in the bottom of a glass. The talk said nothing new; but the speechless things—empty walnut shells, the stems and cores of fruit, the dregs and ashes said, “This is the end.”
Mike and Joe were quiet Mrs. Barnaby said little. Mother encouraged the cousins and led them on to talk. It was the cousins’ night.
“Our little girl lives in a dream world,” Carrie said. “She lives a dream life, waiting for the prince. Twenty-one years old next month, a woman, and if I may say so, a rich one. Lucky, lucky Isobel!”
“Are you going to sell the house, Isobel?” Jane. “Don’t. It suits your mother. If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a dozen times—not one woman in a thousand can get away with a house like this.”
“Isobel has hardly opened her mouth all evening “ Bess. “Even these young men have hardly opened their mouths. Tell us about the music box, Isobel. What does it play?”
“The Lorelei, Cousin Bess.”
“Ta-ta, ta-ta-ta—how does it begin? I used to know the words,
but I’ve forgotten.”
Mike said, “Ich weiss nicht was soll es bedeuten. That’s how it begins.”
“Mercy, you’re quite a linguist! What’s the English?”
“‘I wonder what it all does mean,’” Mike said. “That’s the English.”
Coffee in the library. The fire rebuilt. The cousins’ box of games opened on a table. Mother’s port and cards on another table in a far corner, waiting for the door to close on her last guest.
I was lost in the room, I was lost to myself, I drank coffee I couldn’t taste. Over the clatter of cups the gibberish rose again. Pit. Flinch. Lotto.
“Please, Carrie,” Mother begged, “not the noisy ones.”
Mike and Joe spoke to Mother and came to my side.
“Were going to take a brisk trot to the gate and back,” Mike said clearly. “Your mother okays it, and so does Miss Carrie. After that, I’m going to court Miss Carrie with my facile wrist and Grandma’s bracelet.”
Carrie’s happy scream followed us to the front door. When the door closed behind us, Mike said, “Never again. Never any of this again. This is strictly for crazy people.”
“Hurry, Mike. I want to get it over.”
“You want!”
“Personally, I go for tins kind of thing,” Joe said. “I could go for this any time.”
We were coatless. The wind fought back when we met it at the corner of the house.
Joe hummed The Lorelei. He said, “That was a lousy translation of yours, Mike. I can do it more colloquially. But your way kind of went to my spine.”
“Mine, too. I was surprised.”
“Hurry,” I said.
The east wall hid behind the trees. The kitchen lights, at the far end, were dim. “We can’t see, we can’t see!!”
“Joe has a flash. Lucy never comments on the bulges in Joe’s pockets. Come here, close to the wall. Look up.” Joe trained the light. The white strips hung in even rows, protected from the wind by the trees. Mike counted with silent lips. I heard myself whispering, “The blue room, the linen closet, the sewing room—“ We didn’t need names, not even words; we needed what we had: dark windows in a high stone wall, each with its long white answer.
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