Thunder Heights

by Whitney, Phyllis A. ;

  A thin film of dust lay upon the surface of the leather, but not so thick a layer as covered other objects in the attic. A spider had spun a web in the dangling stirrup, but it was no more than a filament. The dark leather shone richly, reflecting the light of Camilla’s candle, and when she touched it she found the surface smooth as satin and uncracked. The silver mountings and the stirrup were faintly tarnished, but not sufficiently so to reveal years of neglect. Someone had been coming up here regularly to care for this particular saddle. She searched further and found the silver-mounted bridle that matched the saddle; it too had been cared for over the years. There were other sidesaddles and bridles, stored carelessly, without attention. Only these things had been treated lovingly.

  Camilla took the polished bridle from its hook and held it in her hands, listening to the small chime of dangling metal parts. What fun if Booth could find a horse for her soon and she could use these things herself.

  Returning the bridle to its hook, she moved toward the stairs, but on the way a wooden chest caught her eye. It was of a pale, oriental wood, with brass handles and a brass lock. She raised the lid and looked inside. This time the odor that greeted her was the pleasant scent of camphor wood. With a sense of growing excitement, Camilla lifted out a pale gray top hat that a lady might wear while riding. Beneath, carefully wrapped, were a pair of patent leather riding boots. Finally, she drew out the habit itself and held it up with an exclamation of delight.

  It was the most beautiful ash-gray riding habit she had ever seen. The style was one of bygone years, but the draping was so graceful, so truly right, that it could surely be worn in any period. Had this habit belonged to her mother? she wondered. Somehow she could not imagine Hortense or Letty wearing it. As she turned it about, she saw that on the right breast a horseshoe had been embroidered in dark gray silk against the pale ash of the material. Within the horseshoe were embroidered the letters AJ.

  Standing there with the heavy folds of material in her hands, it was as if she had come unexpectedly upon the very person of her mother here in this attic. An old sadness and longing swept through her, and she held the gray habit to her heart as if she clung to a beloved presence. In the swift pain of remembering, she could recall details of her mother’s face that she had not thought of in years. She could even catch in memory the faint violet scent that had always clung about her.

  She could not bear to leave this habit in the attic. Quickly she bundled it up, then picked up the hat and boots and blew out the candles. Back in her room she laid the garments upon the bed, where she could examine them more carefully.

  To her distress, she found that a muddy stain ran down one side of the habit, with a jagged tear in the skirt. How strange that these things had been put away without being mended or cleaned. But she would care for them now. She would clean and repair the habit and try it on. The thought was exciting.

  It was almost dinnertime now, however, and for the moment she laid the things aside regretfully. Later she would slip away to her room and put on the habit.

  All through dinner she hugged her secret to her and waited impatiently to escape. She paid little attention to the desultory conversation, though when Booth mentioned that he was thinking of a trip to New York, she encouraged him.

  “Why not?” she said. “Why don’t you take some of your paintings with you and see if there’s any possibility of holding a show?”

  Booth shrugged the suggestion aside and said he was thinking in terms of seeing a play and perhaps looking up old friends.

  Ross said, “I’ll give you a business errand to take care of while you’re in town.”

  Booth agreed indifferently, and after dinner Ross followed him into the parlor to explain what he had in mind. Camilla, glad to be free, left them and hurried upstairs.

  A full-length mirror had been set into the door of the French armoire in Althea’s bedroom, and when she had put on the habit—even to the boots, which were only a little tight, and the top hat that sat so debonairly on her black hair, she approached the glass with an odd hesitance. Now that she was fully dressed in these things that had belonged to her mother, she was seized by a fear that she would fall too far short of what Althea had been. Perhaps her image would mock her for daring to mimic her mother. She drew a quick breath and faced the mirror.

  The girl who looked back at her was someone she had never seen before. The full gray skirt was caught up gracefully to reveal high-heeled patent leather boots, and the ugly tear and stain were lost in the folds. If the leather of the boots had cracked a bit across the instep, that did not matter. The long-sleeved jacket, with its diagonally cut closing, molded her body, outlining the full curve of her breast, the soft rounding of her shoulders, emphasizing her small waist where the jacket came to a point in front. Camilla had tied the darker gray silk stock about her throat and fastened it with a bar pin. The tall hat was pale gray like the habit, and bound with a wide gray veil that hung down in floating streamers behind. If only she had a crop to complete the picture, and more suitable gloves than these of her own, what a dashing figure she would make. But there was more to her appearance than the costume alone.

  For the first time she could recognize beauty in her own face. She could not judge for herself whether it was beauty of feature, or simply that of the high color in her cheeks, of the sparkle of bright eyes beneath long-lashed lids, the look of eagerness and anticipation which gave her a new vitality.

  She moved before the mirror, stepping and turning lightly, and knew that her movements were lithe and graceful—as they told her Althea’s had been. Did she really resemble her mother so very much? Would she light a room when she entered it, as her father had said his Althea could?

  A longing to show herself to someone seized her. Perhaps if she went downstairs and walked into the parlor dressed as she was, she might learn the truth about herself in the faces of others, in the look of eyes that would tell her whether or not she was as lovely as her mother had been.

  She opened the door of her room and listened. In the distance downstairs she could hear the murmur of voices. They were still in the parlor—an audience waiting for her to astonish them. Even Ross Granger, whom she would love to confound, was still with them. And Booth, of whose disturbing presence she was always aware. Eagerly she ran toward the stairs and paused at the first step to gather up her skirt in graceful folds. Light from the stair lamp in its high canopy above spilled down upon her, and she found it regrettable that no one stood at the foot of the stairs to see her descent.

  She ran lightly down and went to the parlor door, stepping into a glow of lamplight. There she waited quietly and a little breathlessly for those in the room to look up and see her.

  TWELVE

  Hortense, the green jade stones in her combs gleaming in her red hair, was reading aloud. Letty listened and crocheted, while Booth sat staring at his own long-fingered hands. Ross had spread some papers on a table and was marking them with a pencil. It was he who saw her first and there was no mistaking his astonishment, even his reluctant admiration.

  Booth was the next to glance around and see her. He sat quite still, but there was shock in his eyes. The very tension of his body made itself felt in the room, and Letty looked up and rose to her feet with a cry, dropping her crocheting. For a moment she stared at Camilla in something like horror. Then, without warning, she crumpled to the floor. Booth recovered himself and hurried to her side.

  Hortense was the last to move. She put down her book and stood up, frowning at Camilla. The frayed ruching of lace upon her bosom moved with her quickened breathing.

  “Go upstairs,” she ordered, her voice rising. “Go upstairs at once and take off that habit.”

  Camilla heard her, too surprised to move. She did not in the least understand the consternation she had caused.

  Aunt Letty moaned faintly as Booth held Hortense’s ever-present smelling salts to her nose.

  Hortense threw her sister a scornful look. “Don’t be a goose,
Letty. It’s only Camilla dressed up in Althea’s old riding habit.” Then she spoke to Camilla. “My sister thought Althea’s ghost had walked into this room. You had no business frightening us like that.”

  Camilla tried to speak, but Booth looked at her and shook his head. It was Ross who got her out of the room. He left his papers, and took her quietly by the arm. She went with him without objection, and he led her across the antehall into the library.

  “Sit down and catch your breath,” he said. “You look a bit shaken yourself. They probably frightened you as much as you frightened them.”

  She turned to him in bewilderment. “I don’t understand what happened. Why should seeing me in my mother’s riding habit upset everyone so much?”

  He sat beside her on the long couch, and a frown drew down his brows. “I can’t tell you all the details. I came here some years after your mother’s death. But I’ve been able to put together a few of the pieces. I suspect, from the reaction in there tonight, that your mother was wearing this very habit on the night she died. I know she went riding just before dusk, with a storm coming up—which seems a wild sort of thing to do. She rode clear up Thunder Mountain and must have reached the top when the storm broke. The thunder and lightning probably frightened her horse, and it ran away. She was thrown, and the horse came home with an empty saddle.”

  Camilla reached up with fingers that trembled and drew the pin from her hat. She took off the hat and set it on the couch beside her. Then she pushed her fingers against the place where a throbbing had begun at her temples.

  “I didn’t know,” she said softly. “No one would ever tell me the truth.”

  Ross went on in the same quiet tone, with none of his usual irritation toward her in evidence. “When your grandfather knew she was missing, he went up the mountain to look for her. He knew that was her favorite ride. He found her there on the rocky crest and brought her home. She was dead when he found her. She must have struck her head against a rock when she was thrown.”

  Camilla fingered the long tear hidden by the heavy folds of the habit, and tears came into her eyes.

  “My father would never talk about what happened. When he came home after her funeral, he was like a different person for a long while. But why should he have blamed Grandfather Orrin for her death?”

  “I can’t tell you that,” Ross said. “There was something queer about her riding out so late that afternoon, with a storm about to break. I don’t know any more about it than I’ve told you.”

  Camilla sighed unhappily. “I can see what a shock it must have been for Aunt Letty and Aunt Hortense when I walked into the room just now. It was a terrible thing to do. I’ll go upstairs and take these things off.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Ross said, his tone surprisingly gentle. “You couldn’t possibly know the effect you’d have on them. Don’t worry about it.”

  His unexpected kindness brought tears, and she covered her face with her hands. She had seemed so close to her mother earlier tonight, and with remembrance all the hurt of losing her had come rushing back, to be painfully increased by what had just happened.

  Ross touched her shoulder lightly. “I’m sorry. Perhaps I shouldn’t have told you.”

  “I had to know!” she cried, and looked up at him, her eyes wet.

  He rose and moved uncomfortably about the room. Perhaps he was impatient with her tears, she thought, but she could not stem them.

  “Look here,” he said abruptly, “you need a change from the burdens of this house. You’ve been taking on too much. Nora Redfern has wanted me to bring you over for tea some afternoon. Will you go with me if she sets a day?”

  Camilla looked at him in surprise. This was certainly a change from his recent attitude toward her.

  “You n-n-needn’t feel sorry for me!” she choked.

  There was no mockery in his smile. “Believe me,” he said, “I waste no pity on you. But perhaps I sympathize more than I’ve let you see. You’ve been without a real friend in this house, and yet you’ve kept yourself busy and reasonably happy, and you haven’t given up trying to crack the guard set up on all sides against you. I may not approve of your actions, but I admire your courage. I don’t want to see it broken.”

  He went to the door and stood listening for a moment. Then he turned back to her.

  “They’ve taken Letty up to her room. Why don’t you slip upstairs before Hortense sees you again?”

  How unpredictable he was. He opposed her at every turn, laughed at her plans for the house, scolded her. Yet now he seemed gentle and thoughtful. Almost like a—friend. Tremulously she smiled at him.

  “I—I’m very grateful for—” She wanted to say more, but the words would not come, and she moved helplessly toward the door.

  When she reached the second floor, Booth came to the door of his room, as if he waited for her. He had changed to a velvet smoking jacket of dark maroon. Cuffs and lapels were of a lighter red satin, and the effect was one of romantic elegance which fitted Booth so well. The look of shock had gone out of his eyes and he studied her coolly, and not without admiration.

  “Althea’s riding habit becomes you, Cousin. Though I must say you stirred up a nest of old ghosts tonight and startled us all.”

  She had no answer for that. She did not want to be drawn out of the quiet mood the change in Ross had induced in her.

  “How is Aunt Letty?” she managed to ask.

  “She’ll be all right. Mother is putting her to bed, and she’s already sorry she behaved as she did. Though I can understand how she felt. You look even more like your mother than we realized.”

  When she turned away because he made her uneasy and she had nothing more to say, he stopped her.

  “Wait a moment, Cousin. I want to show you something.” He gestured to the room behind him. “Will you come in?”

  Booth had a small den adjoining his bedroom, and it was into this he invited her. She stepped uncertainly into a room where lamplight shone warmly on brown and gold surfaces, a room attractively furnished with pieces that were genuinely old, and with a touch of Moorish opulence about them. He drew forward a Spanish chair with a velvet seat and leather back, and brought a small carved footstool for her feet. When she was seated, he stood for a moment studying her face with a strange intensity that made her uncomfortable. If he saw the streaking of tear stains he did not mention her weeping.

  “It’s hard to believe,” he said. “You are so much like her.”

  While she watched him, puzzled, he picked up a picture which had been set with its face against the wall and brought it to her.

  “Do you remember this?”

  She saw it was the unfinished painting of a girl and a horse that he had taken away from her so abruptly when she had visited his studio. But now she saw something about the picture that she could not have recognized before. The faceless girl who stood struggling with the horse wore a riding habit of ash gray and a high top hat with floating gray streamers of veil.

  Camilla looked from the picture to Booth’s dark face, and he nodded in response.

  “Your mother posed for this when she came back to Thunder Heights before her death. She loved to ride, and she was an expert horsewoman. I didn’t want to paint her tamely, without action, and she thought a pose like this exciting. Though of course I had to do the horse from imagination. After what happened, I never finished it.”

  “I wish you had been able to finish it,” Camilla said. “If you’d done her face, it would bring her back to me a little.”

  He set the picture against a table where he could study it. “Why shouldn’t I finish it now? Why shouldn’t I give you her face as she was when she was so vitally alive?”

  He came to her quickly and put a finger beneath her chin, tilting her head to the light. “From life. Will you pose for me, Cousin?”

  The thought gave her an intense pleasure. To help him finish her mother’s picture was almost like a fulfillment.

  “I’d love to pose f
or you, Booth,” she said. The prospect of working with him so closely left her faintly excited. It was not only because of her mother that she would look forward to posing for him. Perhaps now she would have the opportunity to know him better, to get past the strange mask he so often wore and learn what the man himself was like.

  “Good!” He held out his hand, as if to seal a bargain, and she found the touch of his fingers oddly cool and dry. “We’ll begin tomorrow, if you’re willing. You feel better now, don’t you? The tears are over?”

  So he had noticed, after all. She nodded. “Ross told me how my mother died. It must have been terrible for you all that night. And for Grandfather especially. You were here then—what happened afterwards?”

  “I wasn’t in the house when they brought her in,” Booth said. “When she didn’t come home, I took another horse and followed the path along the river to see if she had chosen that trail. One of the stableboys had already gone after Dr. Wheeler, so he was here when Grandfather carried her in. There was nothing to be done. Grandfather went out and shot the poor beast that had thrown her, and later he got rid of every horse he owned. That’s why we’ve had no carriage, no riding horses for so many years.”

  Camilla heard him sadly. “As if that would bring her back.”

  “You won’t be afraid to ride, after what happened here?” Booth asked.

  “Because my mother met with an accident? Of course not. It would be foolish to give up riding for that reason, when I’d love it so in country like this.”

  “You’d better break it gently to Mother and Aunt Letty that you mean to buy a horse,” he said. “I haven’t told them I was looking for one. Grandfather set them both against horses after what happened. They used to ride, too, but they never did again.”

  He came with her to the door and catching her hand, held her there a moment. “I want very much to paint you, Camilla.”

  There was a rising excitement in his voice, and she felt again the strength of his dark appeal striking an echo in herself. She turned hurriedly away and went down the hall, hoping he had not read her response.