Columbella

by Whitney, Phyllis A. ;

  He would not talk to me now, I knew, and I climbed the stairs slowly, more frightened than before. I had expected him to deny or admit. I had not expected this curious claim that he did not know what had happened.

  When I reached my room I found that the hour was past three-thirty. Once more I got ready for bed. But when I went to put my clothes away in the closet I found Catherine’s pale green negligee hanging there. I did not need to touch it to catch the odor of water lily, and the very scent made me a little ill. I carried the soft, clinging thing into the hall and left it there, draped over the upper rail of the stairs. I could not bear to sleep with it in my room—if there could possibly be any sleeping left to me in what remained of the dark hours.

  As I got into bed I knew that no green-eyed woman would come through my doors to sit smoking and watching me while I slept. Yet there was no reassurance in the thought and I was not even sure that it was true.

  The moment I closed my eyes pictures moved behind the lids and would not be still. I could see Catherine on the terrace, scarlet ruffles flaring at her knees, the columbella dancing on her breast. The words of the song which so displeased her ran mockingly, endlessly through my mind.

  How surely she must have been moving toward some danger that drew and enticed her—because she liked to be frightened, even while she hated pain? Had she, after all, reached the goal she had been so recklessly seeking? I remembered Maud’s words about her liking for high places. In the end the danger had been real, and the fall had been from a very high place.

  I could not believe that it was, as Maud claimed, an accident and I wondered if Maud believed that herself. Catherine had engendered too much hate, she had been involved in too much trickery to have escaped violent retribution forever.

  But at whose hands had she died? Whose—if King for some strange reason was not sure?

  He had been there with her. Yet something had held him back, kept him from going at once to tell Captain Osborn the truth as I had expected him to do. Was he trying to protect Leila from the results of so great a tragedy? Or even to protect me? I rejected the last thought swiftly. There was enough of guilt in this for me without that. I had come to detest Catherine. I had truly wished her out of King’s life—and Leila’s. So how much of this unexpressed, unaccepted feeling had I managed to convey to him? How close to violence had he been driven because of me?

  I tossed in self-torment and could not sleep, while all through my troubled thoughts ran the new, dreadful realization that had come to me about King’s daughter. Where Catherine had been the enemy before—now her young daughter might very well have stepped into that same role, holding over her father’s head the power of life or death. Tonight she had not spoken out. Perhaps the things I had said to her while she stood beside her mother’s body had held her back. But for how long?

  Suddenly I remembered something—and understood. King had held me in his arms and kissed me in the hallway last night. Somewhere in the upper part of the house a door had opened and closed softly. Now I knew who had seen us there together—it was Catherine’s daughter, Leila.

  16

  In the morning I awakened after an hour or two of sudden, exhausted sleep. It was a strange, slow awakening in which I did not at first know where I was, or scarcely who I was, but lay enveloped without thought in a warm sense of all-pervading joy. I lay quiet and was happy. Though I did not know why until around the bright outer limits of this quiet bliss a darkness began to intrude, curling in from the edges, creeping toward my consciousness until all the dreadful events of the night swept back and I remembered everything.

  Catherine was dead. She had been an evil woman who had blighted all that was good and decent around her, yet the cost of a human life was too great a penalty to pay and with full remembrance I could no longer be childishly, senselessly happy.

  With full awakening came awareness. Foolish relief gave way to even deeper anxiety. Catherine was gone, it was true, but in many ways everything was worse than before, and not one of us was free of the blight she had set into effect, not only by living, but by her very dying.

  Now I remembered all of last night, and I got hastily out of bed. Too many things remained not only unsettled and unsolved, but alive with immediate threat.

  When I’d taken a quick shower and dressed I opened my door, meaning to look for Leila. As I did so Edith came out of Leila’s room and stood for a moment with the closed door behind her back, unaware of my presence. I could see her face and the sight surprised me. Here was no tense, trembling, frightened woman, but someone bolder than I had dreamed Edith could be. Almost overnight her face seemed to have filled out, its lines lifting into what must pass for her as a semblance of well-being. I understood, since I’d felt the same thing—with the difference that my own relief had not held once I was fully awake. Here, however, was a woman to whom hope had returned.

  It seemed indecent to stare and I spoke, asking about Leila. At once her expression grew more guarded, yet relief lingered in her manner and she made fewer nervous movements with her hands and eyes.

  “The child is up,” she told me curtly. “I just went in to bring her some breakfast, though I don’t think she’ll eat it.”

  “I’ll look in on her,” I said. “How is your mother?”

  “Taking charge,” Edith said dryly.

  She moved toward the stairs, leaving me to my own devices, and I saw her stop beside Catherine’s negligee, still lying where I had tossed it over the rail early this morning. She snatched it up with what seemed an air of triumph, to carry it away downstairs, and I had the feeling that the gown would now find its way into the possession of maid or cook.

  When Edith had gone I tapped on Leila’s door. Without asking who was there, she called, “Come in,” listlessly. I opened the door and found her standing with her back to me, looking out upon a morning bright with sunshine and no trace of rain. She wore shorts and a rumpled blouse and Japanese sandals.

  “I hope you could sleep a little,” I said.

  At the sound of my voice she turned and her sorrowful look, the marks of tears on her cheeks, the dark smudges beneath her eyes were painful to see.

  “What do you want?” she demanded in a tone that told me at once that her feeling toward me had not eased. My conceit of last night had been true—Leila was now the enemy. Yet to me, a dear enemy, whom I could not turn against or abandon to her own dark thoughts.

  “I’d like to talk with you,” I said, and moved toward the untouched breakfast tray. “There’s enough here for two. May I share it with you?” I was scarcely hungry, but I wanted her to eat.

  Without waiting for permission I drew up a chair and sat down, while she watched me in the silence of antagonism.

  “What can we possibly say to each other?” she asked at last.

  The only approach was a direct one, and I made it. “I’m glad you didn’t tell Captain Osborn anything last night that might have made matters more difficult for your father. It was sensible to wait. If there is anything the police should know, your father has the right to tell them himself.”

  “As if he would!” Leila cried. “My father is a—a—”

  I spoke sharply. “Don’t say what you’re thinking. It isn’t true. Don’t say anything you’ll be sorry for later.”

  She stood looking at me as I sat before the tray, and I was aware of something subtly changed about her this morning. This was a different girl from the Leila of yesterday, not only because she had suffered the tragic loss of her mother, but in some other, stranger way. I knew I must find my new course with caution.

  She came a little closer to me, though warily, like some prowling creature that stalked its prey.

  “You don’t have to pretend with me,” she said. “I know what you want, and you needn’t think I’m going to keep quiet forever and help you get it.”

  The look of her young, ravaged face broke my
heart—yet I knew she would accept no gentleness, no sympathy from me. Besides, she spelled danger.

  “What do you think I want?” I asked.

  She tossed her head and I was reminded faintly of Catherine. “My father, of course! You both wanted to be free of Cathy so you could have each other. Didn’t you? Catherine said you were trying to take Dad away from her—and now I know how right she was.”

  I busied myself buttering a piece of toast and took my time about answering her. There was no answer, really, because there were half truths in what she said—yet, for all our sakes, I had to try.

  “Do you think it was possible to take from your mother what she had thrown away a long time before I came here?”

  With a grimace of rejection Leila flung herself across the bed. “What I’m going to do now,” she told me, “is to see that you and my father never have each other—never!”

  “Why don’t you talk to your grandmother about all this?” I said. “Tell her whatever it is you think you know, and ask her to help you.”

  “I tried that last night, but she didn’t want to hear me. It’s no good anyway. She always thinks of the family first and she’ll try to keep everything quiet so as to protect Dad and the family name. I suppose he’ll take her protection and—and what happened to Cathy will be passed off as an accident. That is, it will be unless I tell the truth.”

  “What is the truth?” I persisted.

  She sat up on the bed to stare at me. “That Cathy is dead, of course. That my father killed her. Because of you. And that I’m to blame for what happened because I didn’t do anything while there was still time.”

  I could only repeat what I had asked her last night “Then you saw him fling her down the catchment? You actually saw him do that?”

  “I didn’t have to see it! It must have happened. They were fighting each other—and now she—she’s dead.” Leila’s voice broke. “So what else could have happened?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “But I saw how your father looked when he came back to the house last night and learned about your mother. And if ever I’ve seen anyone stunned and shocked—it was he. I think he truly doesn’t know what happened. And if that’s so, then he can’t be wholly to blame.”

  For an instant hope seemed to flash through her pain and despair, and I pressed my advantage quickly.

  “You told me you were outside last night when you heard them quarreling. Did you see anyone else at the time?”

  “Only Uncle Alex,” she said.

  I would have pursued that with eager questioning, but she began to think aloud about what had happened, moving step by step, and I did not want to stop her flow of remembering.

  “First Cathy came outside. It was long after the party was over, but she said she couldn’t sleep—just as I couldn’t sleep. We’ve always been a night-prowling sort of family, I guess. She wasn’t pleased to find me sitting there on the gallery couch, and she tried to send me back to bed. But I had a feeling she had come outside to meet someone, because she was all keyed up. I was curious, so when she went to walk in the woods I stayed where I was.”

  Leila closed her eyes and I saw her shiver. After a moment she went on.

  “That was when Dad came out on the gallery. I could tell by the way he moved that he was still furious over what happened at the party—and about the scare Cathy gave you with the car. I didn’t speak to him, and he didn’t see me there. He stood on the terrace, staring off toward the lights of the harbor. While he was there Uncle Alex came to the door. I was sitting in the dark and he didn’t see me, but he saw Dad. He waited for a few minutes watching him. Then he went back inside the house.”

  I asked a question. “How was your uncle dressed?”

  “Why—in that silky light suit he had on at the party. What difference does it make?”

  “Probably none,” I said.

  She was pondering something, biting her lip. “I think maybe Cathy went down to the clearing to meet Uncle Alex. She said something about teaching Aunt Edith a lesson, and I know she had missed out on catching him alone earlier. When he went to Aunt Edith’s workroom in that little cookhouse building, you were there, so she had no chance to talk to him alone. She was mad about that. It was just another thing against you.”

  I was learning a good deal, and the enigma of Alex Stair seemed more puzzling than ever.

  “What did your uncle do when he came outside?” I asked.

  “Nothing. He saw Dad on the terrace and I suppose he changed his mind about seeing Cathy. When he went inside I didn’t see him again till afterward. Cathy must have got tired of waiting for him because she came back to the terrace and found Dad there. That’s when they started quarreling. I couldn’t catch the words—just their low, angry voices, as though they were trying not to let the house hear what they said. I think Cathy was taunting him about something, trying to make him wild, the way she liked to do. Finally he reached out and caught her by the arm, but she pulled away and ran back into the woods. She didn’t come out again, so she must have gone to the clearing.”

  “Then you didn’t actually see your father with her down there at all?” I said, hope suddenly rising.

  “Oh, yes, I did! He must have stayed on the terrace for another ten minutes, smoking and walking up and down as though he was in a rage and trying to get himself in hand. Then he started into the woods after her. I had to see what he meant to do, so I followed through the wet trees all the way to the clearing. When I got there he was shaking her—choking her, maybe. I was horribly frightened. I shouldn’t have run away—but I did. I did! And because I did, Cathy is dead.”

  For all her anguished recital, Leila seemed calmer now, more intently thoughtful. There was no comfort I could offer, either to her or to myself. I set down the glass of orange juice I had picked up, unable to swallow a mouthful.

  “I remember how Cathy looked when she came out on the gallery while I was sitting there,” Leila said. “I remember everything about her. I remember what she was carrying.”

  Her own words seemed to remind her of something, for she rolled suddenly off the bed and stood up.

  “I’m going outside. There’s something I want to look for.”

  She hardly seemed to notice when I followed her downstairs. When she stepped out upon the lower gallery I was close behind. The couch where Catherine’s body had lain was empty now. Red dye had stained its coverings and Leila stood looking down at them for a long moment. Then she bent and touched the red stains with a finger.

  “Poor Columbella,” she said.

  I wanted to draw her away from the sight of that couch with its stained coverings, but I dared make no move, lest she run away from me entirely.

  Held there by a terrible fascination, she went on, tormenting herself with memory. “I saw her face last night. Her forehead. Cathy hated to be hurt, and it must have hurt dreadfully when she fell. How awful if she lay out there in the rain suffering and helpless, with no one to save her. Oh, how could he—how could he! He loved her once—I know he did. And she always loved him. That was what made her behave in such an awful way.”

  Again she was speaking half truths and there was nothing I dared say in answer. I could only attempt distraction.

  “Last night when they put her there she was no longer wearing the columbella locket,” I said. “I wonder where it is.”

  My words served better as a distraction than I intended, for she turned upon me in sudden fury. “Yes—where is it? If it’s down there lying on the ground, I want it. It belongs to me now. But there’s something else I want to find as well. Something Cathy brought with her when she came outside last night. She was holding it in her hands all the time she was talking to Dad. And if—if he took it from her—”

  There was a look of such horror in her eyes that I felt the shock of it along my own nerves, even though I did not understand what she mea
nt. Without another word she ran down the steps to the terrace and hurried toward the tropical garden. Again I followed her. There was so little I could do or say to help her—or to help King. I could only be. Just be near and wait—and learn whatever I could.

  In the sunlight of that hot August morning there seemed nothing ominous about the close-twined little grove. Free of their burden of rain, the trees no longer reached branches toward us as we passed, or snatched at our clothes.

  Near the edge of the clearing Leila came to a halt. “He’s there,” she whispered in the same horror-stricken voice. “My father.”

  I looked past her to see King kneeling at the edge of the cliff, his back to us as he worked with lumber, putting up a new railing, pounding in the nails with strong, forceful strokes. Beyond, through the open space, I could see the blue and green of harbor and islands, looking as clear and innocent under the brilliant sky as a postcard picture. Violence had no place in that calm scene.

  Leila drew me back into the trees. “I don’t want to talk to him. So you look for it—will you? I’ll wait for you on the terrace.”

  “Look for what? The columbella?”

  She was impatient with me, as though I had not listened. “That black and white murex shell. Cathy had it in her hands when she came outside last night. I asked her about it and she said it told her secrets best at night. But where is it now? It must be there in the clearing. Look for it, Jessica.”

  “But why? What does it matter?”

  “I want it!” She was stubborn, yet not willing to explain. “If you’re going to stay around, you might as well help me, as long as I decide to wait.”

  When she ran off, leaving me there, I stepped uncertainly into the open. King turned and I saw how dreadful he looked, his face drawn by the strain of the night before. He stared at me without welcome—a stranger whom I did not know.

  “I—I’m sorry,” I faltered, though I was not sure what I was apologizing for. “Leila wanted me to see if I could find that murex shell down here. She has an idea that Catherine carried it with her when she came out last night.”