Rainbow in the Mist

by Phyllis A. Whitney

  “Thanks,” Nona said. “How do you suppose Sinh picked this picture to stare at? Cat’s can’t recognize paintings.”

  “How do you know?” Christy asked. “I wouldn’t put it past Sinh to have special talents. I just wish she could talk.”

  “The witch’s familiar? But Deirdre was no witch. She was a sweet, charming, rather elusive young woman. Perhaps she never really grew up, but she adored that cat. Floris said it had been mistreated and starved. Deirdre would never have done that. Perhaps only Sinh will ever know what happened to her.”

  Christy was no longer sure of anything. The cat’s presence in the studio signified something. Perhaps, even, that Deirdre herself had brought her here? There were so many contrary reports about Deirdre that bewildered and confused. Donny believed fervently that he had seen his mother. Victor said someone else was masquerading in her dress. But where had the cat been all this time?

  “Come on back!” Nona said. “We’re really talking about Lili, remember?”

  “I’m sorry. What sort of plans to do you want to make?”

  “At least we won’t have to entertain her. Lili always has her own ideas and manages everything. She’ll tell us what to do. We’re not being asked to put her up. A suite has been reserved for her—Brewster didn’t say where. I suppose in Charlottesville. Probably at the Boar’s Head Inn. I’m not to concern myself—all is being arranged. Though she will have to be fed, of course, if she comes here. Even Lili doesn’t exist on rainbows and air—the way Deirdre thought she did. Is this meeting going to upset you, Christy?”

  Meetings with Lili were always upsetting, though they could be rewarding as well. It was difficult not to slip back into a little-girl pattern of trying to please her mother, even when this attitude disturbed the grown-up Christy.

  “I won’t let it bother me,” she said. “It’s just that she sometimes pushes me in directions I don’t want to go.”

  “I know. She never leaves much room for the beliefs of others, because of course whoever’s in authority speaks directly to her. We’ll just have to let her do her thing, and then gently encourage her to leave as soon as possible.”

  “Perhaps she will help us,” Christy mused. “It’s possible that she can pick up the trail I seem to have lost. Maybe that’s why she’s coming.”

  “Maybe.” Nona began to walk about impatiently. “I suppose we’d better invite everyone in to meet her—so she can pick up whatever vibrations there are. I mean all those connected with Deirdre and Redlands.”

  “And with Rose?” Christy asked.

  “I suppose so. Though I’d like to think the verdict there was correct—an accident. We’ll invite Hayden, of course, and Eve, Oliver, and Victor—if he’ll come.”

  “What about the Llama Lady?”

  “Floris hates gatherings, but I’ll get her here somehow.”

  “You’d better include Sinh,” Christy said, only half joking.

  Nona threw her a look that was hard to interpret. “Don’t go overboard. Sinh is only a cat. Maybe, as you say, Lili will come up with something. I’ve never discounted what she can manage when that entity she talks to—Josef—comes through. Of course she’s doing this because of you, Christy, so you should feel flattered.”

  “Not flattered,” Christy said. “A little alarmed, perhaps. She must have canceled all sorts of engagements, which means that she’s really disturbed about something.”

  “Well, we’ll find out tomorrow. In the meantime, let’s go shopping and get ready to kill the fatted calf. There’s a grocery store in Nellysford, so come with me and we’ll see what our nearest metropolis, population three thousand plus, has to offer.”

  Christy went downstairs for her purse and put the crystal into it. When she returned, Nona was backing her station wagon out of the garage—a long blue car with a remarkable decal of a rainbow on each of the front doors.

  “We’ll take the back way over the mountain,” Nona said as they followed the dirt road out of Redlands. “There’s a faster highway, but I like this better.”

  Adial Road followed S-turns over the mountain, climbed and dipped and climbed again, with woods and small houses along the way. The Blue Ridge Mountains were close now, rising thirty-five hundred feet and more in this part of Virginia.

  “Nelson County hasn’t a single stoplight,” Nona said contentedly. “There used to be one in Lovingston, the county seat, but when it blew down, they never put it up again. Do you see that long, very high mountain rising out there? That’s Wintergreen—a posh ski resort. Though now it’s open the year round for other sports as well.”

  The road made its last long descent down a steep hill that dropped to a bridge across the Rockfish River and into Nellysford.

  “Legend has it,” Nona went on, “that Nelly drowned fording the river, and the place has been called by her name ever since. This goes back a century or so, of course. Another tale says Nelly was a horse—but it’s apocryphal.”

  A few old farmhouses were left, but most of the scattered dwellings had been more recently built. The shopping center stretched along the Rockfish Valley floor, consisting of a strip of shops, open on one side, that served the area and whose architecture suggested an older, rural Virginia. Nona pulled into the parking lot and they got out.

  For a time Christy had allowed her mind to drift peacefully. Grocery shopping was harmless, and for the moment she wouldn’t think about Lili’s coming, or all that was disturbing that might lie ahead. This peaceful state didn’t last long, however, because they met Hayden and Donny Mitchell coming out of the store, a bag of groceries in Hayden’s arms.

  “Good!” Nona said when she saw him. “We want to talk with you, Hayden. Are you in a hurry?”

  His expression was guarded. “I’ll put this stuff away and wait for you by the car.”

  “While I shop, you can tell him,” Nona said to Christy. “Will you come along and help me, Donny?”

  As his son went off with Nona, Hayden put his bag in the back of his Jeep, and Christy got into the front seat. When he’d climbed in beside her, he seemed to study her again, and under his scrutiny she felt uncertain and uncomfortable. She was always aware of him as a strong, all too compelling presence, and the feeling was unsettling.

  “Nona wanted you to tell me something?” he asked.

  Christy looked off toward the mountains to break the intensity that had seemed to rise between them— as though he always challenged her in some way.

  “It’s so beautiful here,” she said, not answering his question.

  “It will be hot soon,” Hayden said. “We’d better enjoy this cool weather.”

  He had sensed her disquiet and was giving her time, but she had to open up about what was troubling her.

  “My mother will be here tomorrow,” she told him. “We don’t know why she’s coming or how long she’ll stay. Her secretary phoned Nona.”

  “And you’re upset about her coming?”

  “I keep telling myself I’m not, but it’s true—I am,” Christy admitted. “If Lili is willing to drop everything and come here because of me, she must feel that I’m threatened in some way.”

  “Perhaps you should pay attention,” Hayden said.

  “I don’t know. My mother has a way of taking over. Her way is the only right course, and it’s not always the one I want to follow. She behaves as though she’s guided by a higher force than the rest of us can tap into.”

  “You don’t believe in her—whatever they are—powers?”

  “I used to believe more than I do now. If I’d taken all her advice, I’d never be able to be me. I need to learn in my own way at my own time.”

  “What do you think about your own gift?”

  She was suddenly vehement. “I never asked for it—I don’t want it! I don’t believe in it. Something happens and I’m forced to follow a road whether I want t
o or not. Now—with Lili’s coming—”

  Christy leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes. She wasn’t sure why she was afraid of her mother’s coming. She hadn’t told Nona how strongly she felt, even though Nona would sympathize.

  Hayden was watching her again thoughtfully. “Perhaps Liliana Dukas will find something we’ve all missed.”

  There was no answer to that—he might very well be right. But her uneasiness didn’t abate. It was also possible that Lili, with her high-handed approach, might make everything worse. That could happen too.

  “She has a way of hypnotizing everyone,” Christy said. “And that includes me. I’m not sure I even think clearly when Lili’s around and I hate sinking under her spell. But never mind that—before Donny comes back with Nona, I want to tell you something that happened today. Victor Birdcall found me when I went for a walk and the storm came on. He took me into that cabin near Nona’s house. At first he was full of warnings about thunderstorms, and then he spoke of seeing that figure in the woods, just as Donny did. Only Victor claims now that it wasn’t Deirdre but someone who was masquerading in the sort of white caftan she used to wear. Have you any idea what this could mean?”

  He shook his head soberly. “If I could guess at a motive for her leaving—and staying away—I might have an answer. I wondered about that dress when Donny described it. If it’s Deirdre’s I think she gave it away months ago. She often gave her clothes away when she tired of them.”

  “Who did she give it to?”

  “I don’t remember—if I ever knew. Perhaps Donny might recall. But if I ask him he’ll be all the more upset, since he’s so sure he saw his mother in the woods. I don’t know how to let him down easily.” Hayden sat stiffly beside her, his hands on the wheel, looking ahead through the windshield.

  “Have you thought any more about Donny’s feeling of guilt—that it’s his fault his mother went away?”

  “I’ve tried to figure it out. The night before she left, Deirdre and I had a quarrel. Maybe Donny heard something. Some of it concerned him. Just find her, Christy. Whether she’s dead or alive, we need to know. So use whatever it is you have and find her!”

  She had to answer him as honestly as she could. “Look—I don’t read minds or crystal balls. I don’t see the future, or consult tarot cards or tea leaves. I can’t foresee anything. I can only wait for whatever comes. Nothing is coming through right now. My mother says I’ve never used whatever I have—never trained it. Perhaps something in me is resisting because when it happens it’s shattering for me too.”

  He had seen her when she held Deirdre’s scarf—he’d had a glimpse. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I suppose I’m reaching for any help I can find, and I haven’t thought about how this might affect you.”

  She tried to soften her words. “I do understand how you feel, and if I can help I will. I know how much you must love and miss your wife.”

  His hands tightened on the wheel. “You don’t know—how could you? But if you’re to help me, perhaps you’d better understand. This last year wasn’t a happy one for Deirdre and me. It may be that I drove her away. So if something has happened to her, I’m to blame. There hasn’t been much love between us for a long time, though I’ve tried to protect and advise her—when she would listen.”

  Christy had never wanted to help anyone more than she did Hayden. His suffering went deep, and she didn’t need to understand to want to help. Perhaps she wanted this more than was wise—yet there was so little comfort she could offer, and no promise she could make.

  After a moment he went on, speaking now of Lili as though there had been no sudden revelation, no opening of himself in those few moments.

  “Perhaps your mother really will help. Has Nona made any plans for her coming?”

  “Nona wants to invite those who are most concerned to come to her house tomorrow night. That will give Lili a chance to do her thing.”

  “You sound as though you don’t like the idea.”

  “When my mother touches us as Liliana Dukas, everything will become too dramatic. She can’t help being theatrical. But sometimes I think she puts too much trust in whatever voice speaks to her.”

  “You don’t believe in her voices?”

  “It’s not that I don’t believe.” Christy smiled wryly. “I’m just not sure that every one of those entities out there is equally wise and all-knowing. Perhaps there are mischief-makers among them too, and Lili must make a wonderful playground.”

  He thought about this. “I wonder if that’s what Deirdre was—a playground for mischievous spirits? She was always vulnerable—open. Often too trusting. Once she said something strange that I’ve never forgotten.”

  “Anything you can tell me about her might help.”

  “You remember the story of Undine—who was a being from the sea?”

  “And not to be loved by mortal man? I remember.”

  “Deirdre said she was like that—that she had a home somewhere else, but she didn’t know where it was. Sometimes she could laugh and make funny little jokes—she laughed a lot with Donny. But her jokes were never about herself—so when she said that she was serious.”

  Christy felt a twinge of sympathy for Deirdre. “It’s not comfortable to be born different from everyone else.”

  “I suppose you’ve felt that too?”

  “Yes—it makes me a stranger, wherever I go.”

  “But you’re not haunted—not the way Deirdre seemed to be. You manage to live with—whatever it is you do. I’ve never felt that you were a stranger here, Christy. It’s as though this is the place where you were intended to be.”

  That startled her even more—it was so unexpected from Hayden Mitchell.

  “All I really want is to run way,” she admitted. “What happens to me is more like a curse than a gift. No one wants to be close to a person who sees what others don’t. When they believe, it alarms them. And if they don’t believe, they think I’m offbeat and weird.”

  He was looking at her, studying her, as though there were some question he needed to have answered. “I’m sorry all this is adding to your own difficulty.”

  She hadn’t intended to be so revealing about herself, and she stiffened against his sympathy. For her this was quagmire. She’d already been drawn toward something in this man—something she felt wary of.

  He sensed the change in her and returned to a calmly impersonal manner. “What about the satisfaction of having your gift used to help others?”

  “What satisfaction—when it brings misery to those I try to assist? If I could stop something dreadful before it happens—that would be satisfaction.”

  “Would anyone believe even if you were able to warn them?”

  She could only shrug helplessly.

  “Perhaps the very fact that nothing has come to you means that Deirdre is still alive. She could have run away from me—from the things I said to her that last night. I’d begun to be afraid that she was harming Donny.”

  “Would she run away in her nightclothes, taking nothing?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not sure what she might have taken. But I go round and round over that.”

  Divided though his feelings were about Deirdre, she could sense his pain. She remembered Nona telling her that Deirdre was rather like a daughter to him—and one could suffer over a wayward daughter.

  The crystal, tucked away in her purse, seemed to call to her silently. When she took it out and held it up to sunlight, white fire danced around the phantom at its heart. No rainbow colors now—just pure golden light. Was the crystal a charm against dark forces? A charm that Deirdre had forgotten to take with her?

  “Today,” she told Hayden, “I had the strong feeling that the energy in this stone wanted to lead me somewhere. Nona stopped me from going off into the woods to follow where it urged me to go. She said I must wait until someone could
go with me. If it happens again, will you come?”

  “If I’m around,” he said. “Of course.”

  Nona came out of the grocery store, with Donny pushing her cart.

  “Let’s go help,” Hayden said, and then touched her hand. “I’m glad we talked a bit, Christy. Thanks for being concerned. That’s all I have any right to ask.”

  His touch was only meant to reassure, but it made her all the more aware of him, stirring sensations that had been asleep, giving her a feeling of vulnerability.

  They left the Jeep and Hayden went with Nona to unload her bags into the trunk of her car. Donny stayed back with Christy and tugged at her sleeve.

  “I need to tell you something.”

  She stopped beside him. “Of course, Donny. What is it?”

  He looked uncertainly toward his father and Nona. “If I tell you, will you tell them?”

  “Not if you don’t want me to. Anyway, not without asking you first.”

  He seemed satisfied with that. “I know where Rose hid the llama story she was doing.”

  For a moment she didn’t remember. “You mean the manuscript, Donny?”

  “Yes. She had it all finished and she let me see it. But I didn’t like it much, and she said I was right and she would have to do it over. She didn’t want anyone to know about it until she’d fixed it. So she said she would hide it, so no one could see it until she’d done it better. She only told me where it was.” He watched Christy anxiously. “We were real good friends,” he added, “Rose and me.”

  “Of course. She did the right thing to trust you.”

  “But now she’s been—gone—such a long time. And everybody talks about how they can’t find the book. So I wondered—should I get it and give it to somebody? Even though she’d changed her mind about it?”

  It seemed strange that he hadn’t told someone about this before. His mother earlier, or his father. Or even Nona, who had meant to illustrate the book, and might still want to do so.

  Donny sensed the question in her mind. “It wasn’t like the Red Road book. The llamas in the story all had people’s names. They weren’t named like the real llamas.”