“This is madness!” raved Channing. “I read it in the Times! She cannot be alive!” His voice shook with passion and disbelief.
Slowly Logan reached into his pocket and took out a folded newspaper clipping. “I keep this as a reminder of my many blessings.”
He handed it to Channing.
The headline over the two-column article read: LADY JOANNA MACNEIL RECOVERS MIRACULOUSLY FROM NEAR-FATAL HEMORRHAGE.
Channing crumpled the paper into a wad in his fist and threw it on the floor. He glanced around wildly, attempting to make the worn-out circuits in his brain focus this bewildering new information. “But why didn’t . . .” he muttered to himself. “ . . . how could she . . . but, no . . . then why didn’t she notify . . . unless . . . but it could be a fake. . . .”
Again Logan turned to go.
“Wait a minute, Macintyre!” yelled Channing after him. “You can’t go now! You’ve got to . . . got to tell me whether it’s true! I don’t believe it for a second . . . the article’s a sham!”
Once more Logan paused and looked back. “Look, Channing,” he said weakly, “the last thing I would want is for you to know Joanna is alive.” He stopped for a moment and sighed. “But now it is all changed. Suddenly we are on the brink of losing everything. Under the circumstances, I know she would want to see you one last time, talk to you—”
“See me . . . she would want to see me—how . . . ?” he stammered incredulously.
“She is here.”
“What . . . I don’t . . . how . . . ?” As he struggled to find any coherent words, Channing’s tottering body trembled with involuntary emotion.
“She came to Argentina with me. She had to be here to verify the authenticity of the treasure.”
“But we had you under surveillance!”
“I had no idea what kind of people I was about to deal with—we all know the Professor did not gain his reputation by singing in choir. You don’t think I would let her near any danger, do you? I insisted we travel separately, so if it turned rough, she would be well in the clear.”
“She . . . she . . . is here?” Channing’s words were labored as he continued, trying to cope with disbelief and a fierce eagerness.
Logan nodded.
“I must see her! The swine! . . . I will make her pay!”
Logan closed his eyes.
“I must! Do you hear me!”
“I was afraid it would come to this,” Logan whispered in a voice filled with distress.
But Channing was hardly heeding him. His fiery eyes rolled about in his head while he muttered gleefully to himself, rubbing his hands together in sick anticipation, “The impudent hussy . . . she will be the best prize of all! Grovel—that’s what she’ll do! I’ll make her beg . . . beg for her precious Stonewycke! And it will still be mine!”
He laughed cruelly. “The fool . . . to think she could keep it from me! I told her I get what I want. Curse her for not believing me! Curse them all! I will destroy her . . . topple her from that proud perch where she sits with that lout of a farmer looking down on me! I’ll show the little jade what real men are made of! I’ll show—”
“Please,” interrupted Logan, “don’t make her come here. Keep Joanna out of it. I’ll do anything you ask. I’ll sign the deed.”
“Silence, you fool!” screamed Channing. “You think any of that is important now? Only one thing is left . . . the only thing that ever mattered! Oh, you’ll sign the deed! But first I will see her beg in the dust before me! Get her here—now!”
“I will need a vehicle—”
“Not you! I can’t send you!”
He heaved himself up from his chair and began hobbling forward, but his thin cane could hardly support his agitated frame, and his shaking hand did little to steady it.
“I have to think,” he mumbled, “—Joanna . . . here! Unbelievable, yet—yes, it is fitting . . . this is how it should be!”
He turned toward the door. “Mario!” he shouted. “Mario!—where is that fool?” he added to himself. “Order a car immediately!” he yelled again.
68
Reunion Out of Time
That same evening a black limousine wheeled easily through the villa gates.
The dark glass of the windows obscured sight of any passengers, but when the automobile stopped at the guardhouse, it was waved quickly on. It proceeded down the drive, finally coming to a stop before the house.
The driver jumped out, hurried around to the passenger door. He opened it and reached in. A slender gloved hand emerged from the darkened recesses of the limousine, lightly took the offered assistance, and in another moment an elegant woman stepped out.
As she stepped onto the brick pavement, it was clear in an instant that she was graceful and shapely, dressed in a tailored gray linen skirt and pale rose silk blouse with long sleeves and a demure purple bow at the neck. A wide-brimmed, pale pink hat shaded her delicate skin from the late yet still hot Argentine sun, but it could not hide her rich auburn hair, streaked with gray and pulled back from her face. At first glance the woman gave the appearance of youthfulness, but closer inspection revealed lines about the eyes and forehead. She might have been forty or sixty, maybe even seventy. The subtlety of her movements made it impossible to tell.
The driver escorted her to the door, her hand on his arm. When another servant appeared at the door, the driver bowed slightly before departing in deference. The house servant then led her through several corridors, finally stopping at the double doors of the room where Logan had first met the master of the house.
A voice from inside instructed them to enter. It sounded anxious, cold, with almost a disguised hint of nervousness.
Two men stood inside to receive her: Jason Channing and Logan Macintyre. The eyes of both were fixed on the door as it slowly opened.
The woman entered and stood. Exhaled breaths from both men indicated their reactions upon at last laying their eyes upon her.
Channing’s stunned response was a gasp he struggled to mask. In speechless shock he gazed upon the object of his combined attachment and bitterness. For sixty years his depraved mind had misguidedly told himself that he loved this woman. His warped emotions had desired her, yearned for her, lain awake nights dreaming of this moment when he might behold her once more, if only to convince himself she had not all along been some phantasm out of a youthful nightmare. He had never loved her, though even now, as he stood there, his failing heart beat wildly—too wildly to last much longer. He had never loved at all; his was a self incapable of truly loving. He could only possess . . . take . . . control. What he could not possess and control, he desired—desired all the more that he could not have it! This desire, he tried to convince himself, was love.
Now suddenly before him stood the one thing, the one person, in all his life, he had not been able to control, not been able to possess, not been able to buy. If he felt anything beneficial toward her—he was not a man absent of emotion; he was well-endowed with an abundance of keenly-cultivated hate—it might have been something akin to a respect for her determined strength of will, an inner power of character he did not meet in the circles with which he was associated. Certainly he did not meet it within himself.
Meeting such an unknown—a strength that stood up to him, resisted him, denounced him!—was too great a threat to the inner world of a man like Jason Channing. His heart, his mind, his very soul could not cope with being rejected . . . defeated. He was familiar with inner power. Corrupted, Joanna’s strength could have almost offered an equal to his own. Uncorrupted as it was, pure, guileless, determined to turn her back on him, she had become a fixed obsession in his twisted brain, blinding him to all reality.
Silence hung in the room for several moments. The sounds of the ticking clock, a buzzing fly, even the breathing of the three persons standing there quietly, were magnified unbearably as time itself stood still. At last the woman’s voice broke into the hushed stillness, more like the gentle tap of a wave against the shor
e than a hammer against rock.
“Jason Channing,” she said. “It has been many years.”
Channing licked his parched lips. She should be older, he thought. But he wasn’t surprised. She was still beautiful! In his mind’s eye she would forever remain the lovely young woman who had boldly stood up to him that day in the meadow at Port Strathy. Incredibly she was even wearing the same outfit!
“You are alive!” he murmured at last.
“I doubt your eyes would deceive you,” she answered.
“You look . . . wonderful,” said Channing, his breath coming in short spurts. “You have hardly aged!” His eyes began to fill with tears.
“Thank you. You’re very kind to say so.”
“Oh, Joanna! Why did you do it? We could have been so happy—could have had so much together. The world lay at our feet! It is still not too late! You may still share it with me! Joanna, come back with me. We will together have what we should have had long ago.”
“It was impossible then, Jason, and it is equally impossible now. I did what I felt I had to do.”
Channing looked deeply into her face. Suddenly his eyes narrowed. “You have not changed,” he said. “Still proud . . . still impudent . . . I can see it in your eyes.”
She sighed. “But all my pride will not help me now, will it, Jason?”
His mouth twitched, violently fighting against conflicting passions—rage, what seed of love might be attempting to sprout within the stone he would have called his heart, triumph, revenge, bitterness. From somewhere deeper than them all, the most distressing thought he had ever had was knocking on the door of his consciousness—the dawning awareness that even now, in the moment of his supreme and final triumph, he had still not really won over these people; the sense that they were from another world, and that he could do nothing to conquer them, that even in death they would defeat him.
He blocked the hideous notion from his mind, forcing instead a sneer upon his face.
“You admit it, then!” he cried, barking a hard laugh. “You are defeated, and at my mercy!”
“Yes, Jason. After all these years, you at last have your victory. All the life is gone out of Stonewycke and it is now ultimately in your power. The granddaughter I thought I had found has suddenly disappeared. My son-in-law is your prisoner—”
“I have your daughter too! I have everything, Joanna!”
The woman’s hand clasped her mouth in shock, and she staggered back. Logan caught her and gently led her to a couch. Channing remained where he was, as if the very act of standing before her emphasized his triumph.
“Yes . . . I suppose you do, Jason,” she said quietly. “Even the treasure. It is still in your possession?”
“Of course! Your fool of a son-in-law thought he could buy it from me!”
“We should have known it was too good to be true.”
Channing’s eyes again grew blurry as the awareness of time vanished from them. “Joanna,” he said softly, approaching the couch and reaching out to take her hand, “don’t you see? It is not too good to be true. We can still be happy together. It can be ours, Joanna! Yours and mine—Stonewycke . . . the treasure . . . all we wanted . . . we can share it.”
He struggled to pull her up from where she sat, but was in danger of toppling over himself. “Come, Joanna . . . come with me . . . we will get the treasure; we will take it with us back to Stonewycke! We will be happy there . . . together!”
She rose. “Thank you, Jason,” she said. “That will be nice. I would so like to see the treasure.”
“Come . . . come with me,” he said, leading her toward the door.
Just as they reached it, he glanced back at Logan, who had followed them. “Stay where you are, MacNeil! This does not concern you. She is mine now!”
Logan hesitated. Channing continued to eye him carefully.
“Why do you look at me like that, MacNeil? But wait—” As he stared the fog began again to clear from his befuddled brain.
“—you’re not . . . no, of course! You’re not the clodhopper!”
He spun his head around for a moment toward the door, as if to insure himself that Joanna was still there, then back into the room.
“Macintyre! What are you doing here? But . . . I see it now . . . it’s a trick—you’re trying to make me think you’re that fool who passes himself off as her husband! Well, it won’t work, Macintyre!”
“No, Jason. This is my son-in-law, Logan Macintyre. You have known him for many years.”
“Of course . . . I know that! What do you take me for, a dottering old fool?”
“Might we go now, Jason? Grant me the one last pleasure of allowing my eyes to look upon the treasure that has for so long been yours.”
“No! I am not such a fool as to fall for your chicanery. I know you, Macintyre! Bring your wife’s mother in here to beguile me into revealing where I have that worthless parcel of relics! Well, you will not find me such an easy mark! Your lost granddaughter, indeed! You fools! You don’t even yet know the truth: your precious Jo, that you took into your hearts, was my own daughter! Ha, ha, ha! What do you think of that, Joanna! And now she and I will rule Stonewycke! My daughter, Joanna Channing—named after you, my sweet—how do you fancy that? Joanna Channing, mistress and heiress of Stonewycke! Ha! ha!”
Logan caught his breath at Channing’s stunning revelation. Joanna staggered back away from the door and again sought the couch.
“It is true,” she said feebly. “My days are over. I have nothing else to live for.” She cast sorrowful eyes toward Logan. “I am sorry for bringing this upon you, my dear son. So very sorry.” Then she turned back toward Channing. “Where is my daughter?”
“She will be here soon.”
“What will you do with us, Jason?” she said in a pleading tone.
“I don’t know,” he said with superiority, folding his arms. “Perhaps if I yet see the proper compliant attitude, I might show mercy.” He spat out the words with the contempt he felt for the very idea of clemency.
“I will go to my grave destroyed. Will you not grant me the dying wish of seeing the treasure that has been our undoing?”
“Never! No eyes but mine shall ever see it again! The thought of you all going to your deaths wondering where I’ve stashed it away warms my aging heart!”
“Perhaps this is but a ruse,” suggested Logan, “and you don’t have it at all.”
“Oh, you would like to believe that, wouldn’t you, Macintyre? But you are wrong. I fished it from the bottom of the ocean in 1936—your ocean! You never even knew what was going on just a mile from your blessed coast!”
“What would it hurt for me to see it now?”
“Hurt! You dare speak to me of hurt! Well, suffer, Joanna! It is your moment to feel the hurt you have inflicted upon me all these years! Suffer . . . as I have suffered!”
He tightened his grip on his cane, turned away, and hobbled from the room.
Logan and the woman exchanged quick, questioning glances. But before either had the chance to speak, two servants entered and bade them follow.
They were taken to separate rooms, and the doors locked behind them.
———
In the dark of the night Jason Channing paced like a caged lion back and forth across his bedroom floor.
His old bones seemed suddenly enlivened, as if from some fiendish fire burning from deep within. Notwithstanding his apparent energy, the glow came from the dying embers of life. The very lust of his victory was consuming the last remaining vitality from his spirit. In the core of his being sat a cold stone, and thus the peace that should belong to a man who has gained his heart’s desire was instead to him mere emptiness. The passion of his hate fed upon itself, leaving only death in its wake.
His agitation intensified through the night.
She had returned from the dead, but still she would not bend her proud neck before him! Even in defeat, she haunted him! Why could he not, even now, erase from his memory that
picture of the proud, majestic, despicable girl in that confounded meadow? Why could he not see her on her knees? Even in his mind he could not make her bow in front of him!
She had been vanquished today! He had defeated her. She had even admitted as much! Yet still that look remained in her eyes—that smugness, that lovely, irritating, beautiful tilt to her chin! Even as she said the words, “You have your victory, Jason,” inside she had still not been broken. She was still—she would always remain—her own woman!
Would the memory of her face never leave him in peace?
Just before dawn, he collapsed in an exhausted heap upon his bed. He slept like a cranky child, who only gives grudgingly over to fatigue.
69
Final Stroke
Channing did not awaken until about nine.
When he appeared for breakfast, he looked wasted and feeble. He had nothing to eat, only drank black coffee and ordered trays sent to his guests’ rooms.
He still did not know what to do about them. Though he could hardly admit it to himself, he could not bear just yet to see her again. Soon his victory would be complete. Then he would stand before her to mete out his wrath.
At 10:30 the phone rang.
He listened a moment. “Bring her immediately!” he barked into the receiver. “Gunther . . . what do you need him for?”
He paused and listened. “Well, he’s not here. How much help do you need with a woman? Get her here now—I want no more delays!” He slammed down the receiver with a crash.
———
Some time after lunch had been brought to his room, Logan heard the key once more in his door. He was wanted by El Patron.
He followed the servant who delivered the message. Halfway along the corridor he met another servant escorting the Lady of Stonewycke. He cast her a heartening smile, but they dared exchange nothing beyond the commonest of pleasantries in front of Channing’s people. Soon they were back in the salon where Channing had the habit of receiving his visitors.
“I thought you would want to be present with me as I greet my new guests,” he said.
The Treasure of Stonewycke Page 46