by Freda, Paula
The compassion on Val’s face wiped clean. "No, Harriet, I’m sorry, but for this one instance, you’re not in control. You’re lost, confused and frightened.” He ran a hand nervously through his hair. "You’re working here to save enough money for passage home,” he said. "I’ll give you the money.” Harriet’s expression hardened. He guessed what she was thinking. Quickly he added, "A loan, nothing more, no strings. And you know by now I can be trusted.”
Harriet frowned. No matter how she fought the idea, the offer was tempting. In New York, on her own turf, a man like Jesse Mathieson would never have come so close to fooling her. She glanced at Gerard. Not anxious for her to accept Val’s offer, nor against it, he advised, "I will lose my best employee, but I must agree with Monsieur Sands, for her welfare. Go home, Harriette. Go home with your young man.”
Val was not her young man, but she did not have the heart to argue further with Gerard who had been so kind and selfless in urging her to leave. She touched his face, then bent and kissed him on the cheek. "You are the gentlest man I have ever met.” She looked up at Val. "All right, I accept the loan. I’ll send you an amount I can afford each month until the debt is paid off.”
Val nodded, mouth clenched as if he was holding back much of what he wished to say to her.
"So, when are you planning to leave?” Harriet asked.
"Tomorrow night. I made the reservations as soon as Gerard called me tonight.” Harriet glared at both men, but after all it was her safety they had in mind. And she was going home, at last.
CHAPTER SIX
Eighty-six floors up, Harriet leaned against the parapet and gazed through the rail enclosure of the first observatory of the Empire State Building. At this height the air felt lighter. Problems appeared smaller like the tiny creatures and miniature vehicles, and buildings, tall and short, old and new, populating the grey threadlike sidewalks and ribbon streets with white markings.
Reality, this high, had an ethereal quality about it. The clouds were still too high to touch. Why did she always imagine that up so high she could sift the misty vapors through her fingers? She pulled the all-weather coat snugly about her and knotted the tie belt securely, and drew the hood over her head to keep her ears warm. The coat was an expenditure she had not counted on. Per their agreement in Nice, France, Val had paid her ticket back to New York, but she had refused to accept more than a paltry amount to resume her old life. It would take her long enough to repay him, working her old waitressing job at the urban luncheonette. All her few belongings, and the furnished room she’d rented before her trip to the Mediterranean and the months spent stranded on the uncharted island, were history. But another room was available in the same rooming house and her old crusty landlord appeared glad to have her back. No doubt he was secretly hoping she would disappear again some day and he could once more secure her belongings, claiming them as payment for overdue rent.
She left the observatory and took the elevator down to the main floor. She rode the subway to Bowling Green and sat in Battery Park, contemplating the dark green waters of the bay. She caught the ferry to Staten Island and back, during the trips standing on the lower deck, peering over the hull, and inhaling the raw smell of seaweed and salt water, remembering her time spent with Val on the uncharted island. The water’s fine spray and the cold hoarse wind mingled with the tears that the memories brought, and no one on board the ferry grew the wiser. The onward rush of the boat revved her spirits and made crude reality appear surmountable. It was with a more settled mind that she left the ferry and walked to Wall Street.
A weekday and lunchtime, people thronged the streets, going about their business. Harriet joined a group crowded around a man standing on a wood crate, extolling the virtues of truth and fair dealing. She walked on to Maiden Lane and browsed through the stores, then continued toward the World Trade Center where she nearly unhinged her neck to gaze up at the Twin Towers. Despite that she stood in a non-drafty area, a chill crept up her spine. She pulled the ends of her hood and collar closer together. For an instant, she’d felt as though she had walked over someone’s grave. "Dear God!” she prayed. Truly she must be close to a nervous breakdown. She shook her head to clear it and pushed away any further bleak thoughts.
In defiance of the chill and the cold weather, she bought an ice cream pop at a small luncheonette, ate it, and sumptuously licked the stick clean, then headed for Chinatown. Browsing through the tiny shops lining the narrow sidewalks, she stopped to admire a pair of gold-threaded silk slippers and wished she had enough money to buy them. And the Chinese vegetables and fried noodles, so she could try her hand at her own version of the chow mein they served in the small oriental restaurants dotting the crooked streets.
She continued on into Little Italy, glancing into the bakeries. Her mouth watered at the sight of the cream-filled pastries lining the glass shelves. She browsed through a discount shop, examining the wares, and again wished she had a few extra dollars to spend. The wide ceramic salad bowl, hand painted with large maroon flowers, would make a lovely Christmas gift for the mother she had not seen or spoken to in almost seven years.
New murals had been added to the sides of the buildings in her absence. Their meanings as always intrigued her. Some images were incomprehensible to her, others depicted the everyday faces of old and young; a few were deeply sensitive and wonderfully creative.
Her next stop was Greenwich Village. Nostalgia filled her for the quaint garrets and walk-up flats that were slowly becoming extinct under the guise of modern progress and construction.
Strolling alongside shops, apartment buildings, entertainment establishments and what-have-you’s, she observed two young men, arm in arm. A girl who reminded Harriet of the lynx on Henderson Sands, whistled at her and Harriet hastened her step. She had enough troubles. Under the marble arch of Washington Square, poets and painters continued to give substance to their fantasies. Harriet descended into the subway and caught the graffiti-plastered train traveling uptown.
In Central Park Zoo she spent precious minutes regarding the animals. She sat on a boulder by the lake and lost herself in the wintry scene of leafless trees reflected on the smooth surface of the lake. Closing her eyes she imagined the sad, leafless trees draped in the glorious mint and kelly greens of spring and summer, and the riotous auburns and mahoganys of autumn. The trees would not be sad and leafless for long. Soon winter would mantle them in cold white lace like brides waiting for spring that they might give birth to verdant foliage.
Harriet crossed the bridge to the other side of the lake. Her feet ached but she did not mind. Seeing the Manhattan skyline from her window seat on the plane had tempted her to revisit all the places of interest that had often held her spellbound during her years in the city.
Picking up a stone she flung it into the water. It sank in a whirl of concentric circles. She thought of the whirl in which her emotions had spun since meeting Val. She cast aside the confusion his memory caused and concentrated instead on the lake’s mirrored image of the buildings surrounding the park, particularly the large, light-colored structure housing the Museum of Natural History. She decided to visit history and headed for its hallowed portals.
Impossible to see all the exhibits in the short time remaining before night fell, so she headed for the one that always fascinated her the most, the prehistoric skeletal exhibits inside the paleontological halls where she gazed up in awe and trepidation at the sixty-six foot skeletal remains of a dinosaur, and that of his neighbor, the carnivorous tyrannosaur.
With evening was fast approaching, she rode the bus to Rockefeller Center. Inside the sunken plaza, she greeted Prometheus. The golden-hued statue of his body gleamed in the descending sunlight. The name "Prometheus” meant "forethought,” and Harriet wished again that she’d had the forethought to stay in her cabin that unforgettable night on which she had fallen overboard.
In summertime streams of water shot upward from behind Prometheus reminding her of diamonded garlands. During
winter the water was shut down. With Christmas a short time away, a seventy-five foot Norway Spruce had been set up behind the statue. Dwarfed only by the surrounding skyscrapers, it was decorated with over twenty-five thousand multicolored bulbs that tonight, and every night for the Christmas Holidays, would be turned on to illuminate the plaza and the faces and hearts of all those who beheld it. It was a sight not easily forgotten.
The open-air ice skating rink was filled with skaters, from professionals, spinning like children’s tops, to beginners landing on their backsides. On a street nearby, the statue of Atlas strained under the weight of the earth. Like Europe, New York City had its own treasures and its own rotting back alleys. There was good and bad in the melting pot. And though the city might be bruised and beaten, its heart was strong. For the benefit of all those who truly appreciated the treasures it contained, she hoped those same treasures would never be sacrificed through negligence or greed, or the heart of the city stilled.
She crossed the street and visited St. Patrick’s Cathedral, to speak quietly with her Creator. Inside the lofty Cathedral, she knelt and prayed for guidance. She sat for a while, the silence and peace of the church imbuing her with the belief that somewhere someone knew what it was all about. Years ago in religion class, her favorite nun had told her that when she prayed, if she stopped and listened very intently, the good Lord would speak to her quietly in answer. Harriet closed her eyes and listened. Images flashed in her mind, images of her parents, waiting in the angled wing of the Carlson mansion that was their home, for her to return. Val was there also, as unlikely as that might be, since he’d returned to his parents’ home in the Catskills.
She opened her eyes and gazed up at the Crucifix. A quiet peace filled her mind and her soul.
Walking toward the bus stop, her steps quickened. She was tired, tired of loneliness, tired of trying to prove her independence. Hadn’t she already done that? But mostly, she was tired of hiding from the truth. She passed the bus stop and continued to walk briskly until she reached Port Authority. She rushed through the terminal and was down to her last dime when she boarded the bus and handed in her ticket. The driver switched on the motor, closed the doors and eased out of the terminal.
Harriet knew it would be a long time before she returned.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Harriet slept and when she woke the lights were on inside the bus. The darkness outside allowed her to see clearly in the windowpane her cynical withdrawal and unhappiness. Home was the place for her now. She wondered how near she was to it and pressed her face against the window, cupping her temples to keep the lights within the bus from interfering with her vision.
Snow covered the gently rolling hills. The chilled waters of the Hudson River flanking the road shimmered with reflections of snowcoated woodland and silvery moonlight. She had forgotten how beautiful the valley was, whether verdant, warm, vibrant and filled with color, or cold, quiescent and white. Estranged from her parents, the prodigal daughter returned, penniless, broken and stripped of her pride. God! What if they slammed the door in her face? Where would she go? And Val, by now he must be appreciating her refusal to marry him. For sure, some other woman had already piqued his interest and Harriet was but a fading memory. The thought disturbed her. Had she become so used to his presence, that the lack of it now made her feel disoriented and lost?
The bus unloaded in Graymoor, Garrison. She had only the dime left, so she walked, taking a shortcut through the trees. She knew the way by heart. Every tree, every bush, every snow covered dirt mound held a memory for her. The light all-weather hooded coat was no match for the cold mountain air, nor were her white sneakers a match for the deep snow, but she plodded onward and very soon approached the cobblestone walkway to the Carlsons’ house.
She saw again the two-story columned mansion with its white walls, and its windows whose lower sashes were not as high as the upper ones, attesting to the building’s age. She gazed with newly acquired fondness at the angled wing to the right of the mansion, the wing the Carlsons had built specially for her parents and she had found plain and constraining, the wing she now prayed would hide and console her. The steady hum of a motor interrupted her reverie. A burgundy two-door hardtop wheeled into sight and slowed cautiously as it neared the garage. Harriet, not wanting yet to be discovered, hid behind a row of decorative bushes. With the help of the moonlight she made out the sharp, angular profile of a masculine figure in the driver’s seat, and beside him, a smaller, delicate profile of a female.
The door to the garage and the lights inside responded to the remote in the driver’s hand. When he had parked the car inside the garage, both the driver and passenger exited the vehicle. She heard Mark address his companion as "Cybelle,” though the rest of what he said was lost to her as he keyed the remote and the garage door slid down. In that brief moment Harriet had seen them clearly. Mark, the owner, since the death of his parents years ago, and a girl slightly younger than herself. Mark was as she remembered him, sophisticated and reserved from his black cashmere coat and rich black leather brogues to the silver streaks at his temples. The girl reminded her of a nymph, proud and impish, with a small oval face framed by a mass of cocoa brown wavy hair. She looked lost in the white fur coat, and a rawhide drawstring purse would have suited her better than the gold evening purse she clutched in her hand. The two entered the house through the garage. Harriet ran to the front of the house and peered through the sashes into the vestibule. She saw them. Dialogue passed between the two. Cybelle’s chin rose defiantly, and her cheeks flushed pink. Mark’s expression was adamant. He turned and headed into the house proper. Cybelle looked like the ground had fallen from under her. Then, her lips pursed with indignation and her chest heaved. Her expression went from confusion to determination. She marched into the house proper.
Harriet shook her head. She’d been gone too long. She walked to the angled wing, to her parents’ front door. Taking a deep breath, she rang the bell. A few seconds passed, then the outdoor light switched on and a face appeared in the window adjacent to the door. The face pressed against the sash, the brown eyes widening as the housekeeper reassured herself that she was seeing accurately. Her hand rose to her mouth. She turned for an instant and called to someone in the next room. Seconds later the door swung open and mother and daughter gazed at each other, both swallowing, holding back, afraid to touch for fear the image might disintegrate into nothing more than wistful yearnings.
Harriet trembled. For years she had ignored her parents’ existence. How could she have the effrontery to simply ask them to accept her back into their home and their affections? They had loved her and proved that love in a thousand ways. And all she had brought them was unhappiness. One morning she’d packed a bag, left a note saying she had had enough, and gone, only to learn a bitter lesson that being alone and unhampered did not always bring the happiness and fulfillment one longed for. Living was like knitting a sweater. The knots and gnarls in the yarn had to be worked with, not cut and eliminated. Once you cut the yarn, it had to be re-knotted just the same and you ended up with nothing more than a new knot in place of the old. Couldn’t she at least occasionally have called or dropped her mother a line?
The prim housekeeper’s eyes were moist and her expression anxious. How grey her hair had turned, Harriet observed, and when had those wrinkles around her cheeks formed?
"Mother,” she greeted. "The prodigal daughter returns.” Remembering how the Bible story went, she bowed her head and fell to her knees. "Please don’t turn me away. I have nowhere else to go and I hurt inside, mother, I hurt terribly.”
"My own little girl,” Geraldine whispered, drawing Harriet back to her feet and gathering her into her arms. A man came up behind them and extending his arms encircled the two women. Harriet looked up and saw her father. She had been named after him. She saw again the craggy, high-browed face and the tall thin body that seemed perpetually attired in khaki overalls. She felt once more the quiet strength that emanated fr
om his dark eyes, eyes that always held a mysterious hint of sadness, and was blessed anew with his nod of assurance. His hair, too, had peppered with grey. How brown it had once been, brown as the earth he loved to work.
"Come in child,” Geraldine urged. Harry led them both into the house and closed the door, shutting out the cold, the emptiness and the loneliness ...
CHAPTER EIGHT
The following morning, Harriet sat hunched on the kitchen hearthrug, cocooned in her old flannel nightgown and plaid robe, with her chin resting on raised knees, and her arms wrapped about her legs. Towards evening Geraldine would light the logs and flames would crackle zestily in the bricked hearth.
The brown smell of fresh brewed coffee and the salty aroma of sizzling bacon presently filled the room to bursting. Geraldine had finished setting the table for breakfast and was now in the process of buttering oven-warmed bread. The kitchen, part of the main house, served also the angled wing, as Geraldine, besides being housekeeper, was cook as well.
Aside from its modern utilities the room transported one into the past. Generations of Carlsons had walked across the bricked floor under the high-beamed ceiling, and sat at the smooth rectangular, dark wood table, their backs straight and stalwart in the slate-back chairs with rush seats.
Heirloom plates handed down proudly from mother to daughter added color to the white walls and adorned the dark wood shelves of an antique hutch-on-buffet. On the stone mantel above the fireplace stood centuries-old tin plates and pewter tankards, copper teapots and fine porcelain figures. An authentic spinning wheel rested beneath a pair of windows dressed with gathered lace. With Geraldine in and out of the pantry this morning, the door to the food closet had been left partly open. The shelves within were stocked with jars of homemade jams and canned fruits. Aromatic herb sprigs hung from a cord strung high across the pantry’s width.