Another silence fell. The sun had risen enough to clear the windowsill. It spilled obliquely across the bed and crept toward Ginny’s face, imbuing her features with an eerie glow.
Finally, Caroline said, “I guess it’s time. She’s earned her rest.”
Annette was the resister now, pressing closer to the bed, crossing a hand to Ginny’s far shoulder. Leah left Caroline and wrapped an arm around Annette’s waist. Gently, reluctantly, but knowing that it wouldn’t get any easier, Caroline set Ginny’s hand back on the bed.
Lest she lose her resolve, she quickly rounded the bed and picked up the phone. Within minutes she had awoken Downlee’s undertaker and alerted him to their need.
“He’ll be along,” she told Annette and Leah.
“Should we call her lawyer back home?” Annette asked. “Maybe she left written instructions.”
“She might have,” Caroline realized. “Then again, I think she’d have told us. She planned this all out so well. She wouldn’t have left that to chance.” Not weak at all, but tough, determined, smart. Caroline looked at her sisters. “I think we have a fairly good idea what she’d want.”
“She’d want to be buried here,” Annette said.
“Star’s End has its own graveyard,” Leah added. “It’s down the bluff a ways. Will is there.”
“What about Daddy?” Caroline asked, playing the devil’s advocate.
Leah seemed about to say something, then stopped. It was Annette who said, quietly, “She gave Daddy all the years of her life from the time she left Will to the time Daddy died. She felt she owed him a responsibility. I think she’s filled it.”
So did Caroline. Leah’s expression said she did, too.
That settled, there seemed nothing more immediate to do than to wait for the undertaker’s arrival. Caroline sent Annette and Leah to get dressed while she sat with Ginny. She couldn’t leave her alone, not in these few final minutes that she would be theirs. When they saw her again, it would be at the funeral home, and after that, at the graveyard on the bluff, with family and friends all around.
Holding Ginny’s hand, she found herself crying again, but she didn’t fight it. She didn’t have the strength. Or the desire. She hadn’t cried enough in life. Crying was good.
In time, she tried Ben again, desperate to hear his voice, but he didn’t answer. She figured that once the funeral plans were firm—and morning reached the Chicago area—she would start calling friends who might know his whereabouts. Until then, she could only wonder and ache.
Leah returned, and even then Caroline would have liked to have stayed with Ginny. She was the oldest. It was her responsibility—but no, that wasn’t it. The truth was that she had more making up to do with Ginny than the others did.
But she knew that she should be dressed by the time the undertaker arrived, and besides, Leah deserved time alone with Ginny, too. So she retreated into her room, where she eyed the bed in which she’d only slept in fits and starts during the night, and wondered at what point Ginny had died. It struck her as tragic that none of them had been with her at that moment. They’d all been nearby. So nearby. But not there.
It was, in a sense, the story of their lives as a family, and tragic in and of itself.
She was thinking about that when she returned to Ginny’s room, where Annette had joined Leah in the vigil. The picture only underscored the tragedy—the three of them standing beside Ginny in death as they had never done while she’d been alive. There was a comfort in their being together, but it was a bittersweet one.
Caroline was feeling as though a rug had been swept out from under her, which was amusing, given that she hadn’t thought herself dependent on Ginny at all. And she wasn’t, with regard to everyday matters. Still, Ginny was her mother. In the back of her mind, Caroline had always known she was there. Now, suddenly and finally, she wasn’t.
Shortly before nine, the doorbell rang. Caroline’s eyes flew from Ginny’s face to Annette’s and Leah’s. She swallowed and whispered, “This makes it real,” which must have been exactly what they were thinking, if their convulsive nods meant anything.
Annette left to show the undertaker in. During the time that took, Caroline looked alternately from Leah’s face to Ginny’s. Leah looked terrified.
Caroline rounded the bed and held her. Twice, when she’d been with the prosecutor’s office, she had been present during the removal of a body. She knew what to expect. Leah didn’t.
The undertaker and his assistant, even in as small a town as Downlee, were all neatly combed hair, pressed funereal suits, and polished black shoes. Beyond that, there were no similarities whatsoever to those other experiences Caroline had. By the time Ginny’s body had been covered, transferred to a stretcher on wheels, and carried downstairs and out the door, Caroline was as distraught as Leah and Annette.
The three of them stood on the front steps while, beneath the porte cochere, the hearse accepted its burden. They followed it out into the sunlight and watched it cruise slowly down the drive.
Leah choked out an anguished cry. Caroline reached for her hand, but Leah wasn’t watching the hearse. She was looking across the lawn.
Jesse Cray stood there, still at a distance but clearly not knowing whether to approach or turn away. When he started toward them, Leah gave another cry. Breaking free, she began to run toward him. Before Caroline could begin to understand, she was in his arms.
Dawning came then, a slow realization that stunned her. Yet it made sense.
Annette leaned close, sounding as stunned as she felt. “Leah and Jesse?”
“That’s where she went last night.”
“And why the story of Mother and Will tore her up so. Why didn’t she tell us?”
“Would we have understood? Not the me who first arrived here.”
“Nor the me. He’s the gardener.”
“He’s also Will Cray’s son. That makes him far more.”
“Do you think they’re in love?”
“They’re something. Look how they’re holding each other.” Caroline was thinking how much she’d have adored holding and being held by Ben just then, when Leah and Jesse started their way.
Their hands were clasped. Leah looked frightened.
“I’m sorry about your mother,” Jesse said. “She should have had more time at Star’s End. She would have liked what the place has become. I would have liked getting to know her.”
“Did you know of her?” Caroline asked.
He smiled a smile that was a little wry, a little sad, a little knowing. “For years she was all my dad talked about. She meant the world to him. He would have been pleased she came back.”
Caroline had a feeling that Jesse had more to add to what they already knew of Ginny and Will. She had a feeling that he and Leah had already talked.
She had a feeling that he and Leah had done far more than talk. There was something about the way she stood, just slightly to his side and before him, leaning against him almost, sheltered by him almost.
“When you make funeral plans,” Jesse said, speaking to the three of them now, “will you invite the town? They liked your mother. Word got around that she was back, after you all went for ice cream last night. They’ll be sorry they missed her. They’d want to pay their last respects.”
Caroline thought of all the other people who would, too. She thought of the phone calls to be made—to Gwen, to Ginny’s sole surviving brother and a cousin, to scores of friends in Philadelphia and Palm Springs. She thought of calling Ben, thought of the phone he wasn’t answering, thought of the steps she might take to track him down. She had the names of several top investigators whom she’d used on various occasions. If necessary she would call one of them.
Then she heard a noise that was incompatible with the sounds of Star’s End. Her eyes flew toward the drive. She half-expected to see the hearse returning—indeed, had the insane hope that Ginny might have woken up from an absurdly deep sleep.
The sound wasn’t smooth
, like the hearse, nor well muffled. It was familiar, though. She knew it as well as she knew what his bare thighs felt like beneath her hands.
“Ben?” she whispered, afraid to believe as the motorcycle rounded the bend and emerged into the light. “Ben.”
Leaving the others on the steps, she ran to the edge of the circular drive. He stopped the cycle several feet away, dismounted, and pulled off his helmet. His face was pale, his eyes concerned. He glanced back in the direction from which he’d come, then forward again, past Caroline, to Annette and Leah.
“Why was that hearse here?” he asked.
“I’ve been trying to call you for two days, three days.”
“Your mom?”
She nodded.
He squeezed his eyes shut, threw back his head, then brought it forward again, closed the distance between them, and caught Caroline up. She wrapped her arms around his neck, locked them there, and began to cry again.
Ben had come.
twenty
“JEAN-PAUL,” ANNETTE BREATHED IN RESPONSE to his groggy hello. She knew she had woken him up. It was Saturday morning, the one morning when he slept late, and even then only until eight. It was barely seven in St. Louis. But she hadn’t been able to wait a minute longer. Marriage was for sharing things like a parent’s death, and that was only part of what she had to say.
It all spilled out on poor, unknowing, sleepy Jean-Paul, everything she had thought herself strong and independent enough to defer telling him last night. Now, strength and independence were irrelevant. The need to share momentous happenings in her life with her best friend was greater than either.
She told Jean-Paul about the legend of Star’s End, then learning that the legend involved Ginny. She told of the closeness she had shared with her sisters during the discovery, and of Ginny’s arrival and the subsequent outpourings. She told of the trip to the ice cream store and her late-night visit to the kitchen. Weeping softly, she told of returning to her room, oblivious to the fact that Ginny was breathing her last.
“It’s heartbreaking, Jean-Paul,” she cried. “Here we learn incredible things about our mother, things that help explain why she was the way she was all those years, and for the very first time in our lives the air is clear between us, and it is so incredibly good—and she dies.”
“I’m sorry, sweetheart, I’m sorry.”
“It isn’t right that it should happen that way.”
“No. Death is rarely right.”
The words were spoken with quiet conviction, and such a total absence of criticism that Annette was ashamed. Jean-Paul saw death every day. He saw it in people decades younger than Virginia, people who left behind people even younger than that. He saw unexpected death, untimely death, cruel death. Virginia’s had been none of those.
Gathering more positive thoughts, Annette said, “You should have seen her. She looked so different. Her face came alive when she talked of the time she had with this man. She had good color. She smiled, even laughed. Even cried. What an unbelievable thing that was. The first time it happened, the three of us looked at each other, totally floored. We’d never seen her cry before. We didn’t think she had it in her. She’s always been such a stoic.”
“It is interesting that she was able to hold everything in and survive this long. That her heart didn’t rebel sooner.”
Annette gasped. She hadn’t tied the ongoing heart problem to Ginny’s keeping secrets, but it made tragic sense. “She paid the ultimate price for her decisions, then. They say Will Cray died of a broken heart. In a roundabout way, she did, too. We thought she simply didn’t feel things. We were so wrong. You should have seen her. It was like someone had pulled the stopper on her emotions, and they all just spilled out.”
“Was she enjoying herself?”
“Very much. Once in a while she seemed short of breath, but that fit in with the story she was telling. We were all short of breath. I guess hers was more symptomatic than ours.”
“Was she taking her pills?”
“We found them by her bedside. The bottle looked full.”
“She was warned against undue excitement.”
Annette smiled fondly at that. Men were, after all, more mechanical than women. Even Jean-Paul, who was so much more sensitive than most, was that way, where medical directives were concerned. Like his fellow doctors, he wanted his patients to live. He had a hard time understanding that the price of staying alive was sometimes too high.
“How can you tell a woman in that situation not to feel excitement?” Annette asked. “She was relieved to be back here. She had gone out to see Will’s grave. Her eyes were bright. She seemed more and more uplifted, as the night went on. She was so nice to be with, Jean-Paul.” That fact continued to amaze—and dismay—Annette. “It isn’t fair. We find her—then lose her—on the same day. It isn’t fair.”
“I’m sorry, cheri. I wish I was there. How are Caroline and Leah doing?”
Annette steadied herself. “They’re okay. Upset, naturally. Caroline even more so than Leah.”
“Hmmm. Surprising.”
“A week ago, yes. Now, not so much. I’ve had interesting glimpses of Caroline. She isn’t as hard-nosed as she’d like us to believe. I think she’s mellowed.”
“Maybe she was never so hard-nosed, but is only now letting you see that. Kind of like your mother letting you see that she was human after all. Do you or your sisters have any thoughts about a funeral?”
Annette hadn’t made that analogy, the one between Caroline’s professionalism and Ginny’s stoicism. Tucking it away for later thought, she said, “Only that we’re burying her here.”
“There?”
Annette had to smile. “Shocking, huh? But you didn’t hear her story, Jean-Paul. You didn’t see her during the telling. There’s no doubt about it. The three of us agree. She would want to be buried here.”
“Rather than with Dominick?”
Annette took a deep breath and straightened her spine. Her room had only an oblique view of the water, but instead looked out over the lawn, down along the bluff, and its distant cloud of pink. The mere sight of the beach roses conjured their smell. They were part of her history.
She had to explain this to Jean-Paul, had to convey the importance of it in Virginia St. Clair’s life.
“When I first learned about Mother and Will,” she began, “I was offended on Daddy’s behalf. Then Mother kept talking, and we understood all that she felt for Will and gave up for Daddy. If dignity and grace count for anything, she did the right thing by Daddy. She stayed with him and made him a fine home. She was his wife and the mother of his children, and if she lacked emotion in those roles, she still performed them better than many another woman.”
There was a silence, then a quiet, “Whew,” from Jean-Paul. “That’s quite a concession.”
Annette smiled sheepishly. “I guess.” She was feeling stronger, braver. Connecting with Jean-Paul always did that to her. “Want to hear another? At first I identified with Daddy. Mother was married to him—I’m married to you—I wouldn’t dream of taking up with another man. I kept thinking about the immorality of what she’d done. I kept thinking that it was one summer in her life that should have been over and done and forgotten. But she kept talking. She kept mentioning the ways that summer affected the rest of her life. She kept telling us little things that she had experienced with Will, not sexual things but passionate things, and you could see it in her face, the love.” She caught her breath. “I felt it, Jean-Paul. That’s what I identify with.”
He made a soft, aching sound.
“I adore you,” she hurried on, because it seemed the time to confess. “If I overdo it sometimes—”
“Shhhhh—”
“I don’t intend to overdo. I’m just swept up in it.”
“I love you, Annette.”
“But you don’t smother me. I’m trying to stop doing that. But I miss talking with you. I’ve been afraid to call.”
Again came the
aching sound. “Ah, no, no.”
“Maybe you were right, and I was overcompensating for the way Ginny was, but, boy, do I see another side of that now. It’s humbling. I always thought that our relationship, yours and mine, was so much better than my parents’. I prided myself on it. We had done what they couldn’t. But she had the same beautiful relationship with Will that you and I have. So yes,” Annette concluded with a deep sigh, suddenly drained by the outpouring and by the hours of emotion that had followed Caroline’s dawn discovery, “we’re burying her here.”
“Yes. That is right. Do you have a day and time?”
“Not yet. We’ll meet with the minister this morning.”
“Will you call me as soon as you know?”
“Yes.” Her thoughts whirred. “But you don’t have to come.” It was the ultimate in letting go, she realized.
“Of course I do. I’m your husband. She was my mother-in-law. She was never anything less than lovely to me.”
“Jean-Paul, this is really out of the way. It’s a long trip. It’ll be enough that I know you and the children are thinking of us. Besides, it’s going to be out of the way for most of her friends. They won’t understand why we’re having it here, and I’m not sure we’ll want to explain. If she didn’t see fit to tell them during her life, I don’t think they need to know now. So we’ll simply say that she loved this spot from the summer Daddy and she were here, and we’ll have some kind of memorial service next week in Philadelphia. You and the kids can be there. That makes so much more sense.”
“I want to be with you.”
She smiled. “That’s all I have to know.” How proud of herself she was. “The children need you this weekend. Do something wonderful with them, all of you together. Celebrate Mother’s finally returning to the place she loved. She was happy. She died smiling.” Her voice broke. That smile had been so very poignant. “Take the kids to church tomorrow and say a special prayer for her.” More timidly she said, “I’ll call you later, anyway. Just to hear your voice. Is that okay?”
For My Daughters Page 26