betrayed even the slightest hint of emotion, and continued on as if uninterrupted.
“Has your household been broken into in any way over the last twenty four hours?”
Ed shook his head.
“Have you noticed anything missing from around your home; food, clothes off your washing line, vegetables from your garden?”
“No,” Ed answered, brows drawing together. “What’s this all about anyway?”
“Have you or any member of your household found anything that looks like this?” the second put in, ignoring Ed’s own question and holding out a piece of paper. Ed took it and glanced over it. It was a color photocopy of what looked like a large feather, white with yellow and blue around its edges.
Ed handed back the paper. “No, I’ve never seen any thing like it. What is it, some kind of feather?”
Today appeared to be the day for unanswered questions, well, his questions at any rate. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Blair. If anything along the lines we’ve just discussed comes to your attention, please call us immediately,” the first man said, holding out a business card which was blank save for a phone number.
Ed was getting flustered. “Along what lines?” he wanted to ask. “What has a feather got to do with house breaking?” But by the time he’d looked up from reading the number on the card, the two men were half way down his front path. He watched them leave the property without a backwards glance.
His wife joined him on the porch just in time to see the two men walk down to the footpath and go up to the house next door. “What was all that about?” she asked curiously.
“I have no idea,” he replied, shaking his head.
7
Seen from her window, the sun was low to the horizon when a knock came at the door and her mother’s voice told her supper was ready and to go wash her hands. Ninah didn’t answer, just slipped off her bed and headed to the bathroom.
After her mother had smacked her Ninah, crying, had stomped up to her room, ignoring Donna’s withering stare from her own door as she passed by, and thrown herself down on her bed. After fifteen minutes she’d cried herself out and had gotten up and gone to the window. It faced out over the backyard and from this height she could just see the roof of the playhouse over the trees. She hoped the angel would be all right and she had said a prayer to God, asking him to take care of his sick child. After that she’d returned to her bed and laid quietly, staring at the ceiling and waiting to be called.
After washing her hands, Ninah stomped downstairs and into the kitchen where her mother was getting ready to serve up. Cassie was apparently staying over tonight and was helping Donna fix drinks for everyone.
Ninah ignored Donna and walked straight over to her mother. “Can I please go and fetch my dolls now?” she asked.
Her mother looked at her, lips pressed in a thin stern line. “Alright, but be quick. Don’t make me have to come get you.” Felicity turned back to what she was doing but glanced around again in curious amusement and concern as Ninah went to the sink and filled a glass with water before heading to the back door.
“Ninah, I’ve already made you a drink,” Donna said a little peevishly, upon noticing what her sister was doing.
“It’s not for me,” Ninah replied loftily as she pushed open the door and went down the stairs.
Donna looked at her mother who just rolled her eyes. “It’s for her angel” she said when Donna didn’t drop her questioning gaze. This time it was Donna’s turn to roll her eyes.
The shadows were getting long as Ninah entered the playhouse. As she made her way down down the yard she’d been afraid the angel had flown away, because she hadn’t returned with the water earlier, but he was still there, lying on the floor.
“Hi, it’s only me,” she said. “I’m sorry I didn’t come back with the water but my Mom…” Abruptly she stopped. The angel hadn’t moved or responded in any way. Her heart started beating faster as she began to fear that he’d died of thirst because of her.
Ninah knelt down beside him, relief flooding through her as she heard the faint, rapid sound of his breathing. Setting the glass down, she pushed her hand up under his longish fringe, placing it against his forehead. It was hot and damp and he whimpered at her touch. Ninah didn’t really know what this was supposed to accomplish, only that it was something her mother did to her when she was sick.
Knowing she didn’t have much time, she dipped her fingers into the glass of water several times, smearing the water on the angel’s forehead to cool him. “I have to go now, but I’ll come back later and bring some food. I’ll leave the water just here okay,” she said, not knowing whether he could hear her. Then on impulse, thinking it couldn’t hurt, she bent down and quickly kissed his forehead before picking up her dolls and running back to the house.
8
When Ninah entered the dining room everyone else was already seated and serving themselves from dishes in the middle of the table. Casting furtive glances at her father and mother, worried she may have taken too long, Ninah took her place and tried to be inconspicuous.
A tense silence prevailed over the dinner table, courtesy of the earlier domestic disturbances in the Blair household, until Ed broke it by saying “Well, we had a visit by a pair of those grey suited strangers this afternoon.”
Both Donna and Cassie looked at him in surprise, feeling guilty for no good reason but paranoia demanding it must be something to do with them. “Really?” Donna asked. “Who were they, what did they want?”
Ed shrugged. “I don’t really know, they just asked me some questions.”
Ninah, her curiosity fit to burst, wanted to ask about the strange men, but decided that in light of current events, she’d do better to keep a low profile. Maybe, if she were lucky, everyone would forget the trouble she was in.
“What kind of questions Dad?” Donna asked, trying to sound unconcerned but secretly sweating that someone had seen her smoking cigarettes with Billy Kennedy and his group at the Drive In last Wednesday night when she was supposed to be studying over at Cassie’s house.
“Oh, they wanted to know if our house had been broken into or if anything was missing from the yard, that kind of stuff. Wanted to know if we’d seen anyone strange hanging about.”
“The only strange people about are them,” Donna sneered.
Ed chuckled. “Yeah, I told them that.”
“Though it’s interesting you should mention missing things,” his wife said. “This afternoon when I brought the washing in, I was short one sheet.”
Ed looked at her, surprised. “Hmm, you’re sure?”
She nodded.
“Well, they told me to call them if anything like this happened but somehow I don’t think a missing sheet would qualify.” He went back to his dinner, amused at the thought of ringing the FBI or CIA or whoever they were, and reporting a missing bed sheet.
Ninah bit her lip for a few seconds before speaking softly. “Mom, I took the sheet.”
Her mother looked at her strangely for a moment and Ninah thought she’d shout at her again. “Why honey?” she asked mildly, instead.
Now Ninah was stuck. She hadn’t wanted her mother to worry over the missing sheet but she couldn’t lie to her parents either. She didn’t mind telling her mother about the angel in the heat of the moment, even if she hadn’t been believed, but now her father was here and worse than that, Donna and Cassie.
“Ninah?” her father prompted, leaning toward her slightly.
Ninah looked at her plate. “I took it to cover the angel, he was cold and shivering,” she said so softly it was almost a whisper.
Ed sat back in his chair, surprise and confusion evident in his expression. He looked to his wife for an explanation as Donna shot Cassie an uncomfortable look, as if to apologize for her crazy sister.
Felicity Blair looked at her youngest daughter and, noting the tense set of her shoulders and the solemn frightened look on her face, she decided she�
�d indulge Ninah’s fantasy, for a while anyway, and perhaps see if she might get to the bottom of this strange behavior.
“Ninah honey, where is the angel?” she asked, ignoring the look on Donna’s face.
“I told you, he’s in the playhouse,” Ninah said, not meeting anyone’s gaze.
“Is the angel still sick?” Felicity asked and Ninah nodded. She could see the girl was close to tears. “Would you like me to come with you and give him some medicine?” she continued and seeing her husband was poised to interrupt, gave him a quick subtle hand signal, stopping him.
“No, he doesn’t want me to bring anyone else to see him,” Ninah said.
“Does the angel have a name, sweetheart?” Ed asked soothingly, following his wife’s lead. Felicity almost expected to hear Gabriel or Michael but Ninah shook her head. “Did he say where he came from, heaven maybe?” Ed persisted gently.
“No, he doesn’t speak, I don’t think he can,” Ninah answered softly.
Ed looked at his wife, head cocked as if to ask how long this had been going on. She looked at him for a split second before turning back to Ninah, leaning down close to her daughter. “If he can’t speak honey, how do you know he’s an angel?”
Ninah looked up at her mother, an expression in her eyes that belonged to someone far older and wiser. For the second time that day her daughter had caught her off guard with the intensity of her emotions.
“I know because of his wings and his
Fallen Angel Page 4