Mermaid

by Margaret Millar

  “That’s understandable.”

  “For sure they’ll demand an investigation of the school and its policies. There’ll be suggestions ranging from your resignation to the complete closure of the school, all from outraged citizens, many of whom have wanted to close the place for years.”

  “What do you propose that I do?”

  “Anticipate. Get your licks in first and fast. Write a letter requesting an indefinite leave of absence until the matter has been fully investigated and steps are taken to prevent further incidents.”

  “Indefinite,” she said. “That could mean a long time.”

  “Yes.”

  “I can’t be held responsible for what happened.”

  “Whether you can be or can’t be, you will be. Harsh criticism is inevitable, perhaps a drop in enrollment and some defections among the faculty. There may also be a decrease in donations and bequests. You’re in for a lot of flak, Rachel. The only way you can avoid it is by leaving town for a while.”

  “Perhaps I should change my name and assume a dis­guise.”

  “Don’t be bitter, Rachel. This thing has affected a great number of people. Some of them will want your hide. So put it out of reach. Take a holiday.”

  “Is that your legal advice?”

  “It’s my advice as a friend. I hope it will be accepted in the same spirit.”

  “Thanks. I’ll think about it.”

  “Pack first, think later,” Smedler said. “There’s only one hitch to the plan. Should the police ask you to stick around, you’ll have to stick. You may be subpoenaed if and when the Whitfield boy comes to trial and there’s some kind of hearing concerning Cleo. But if I were you, right now I’d sit down and write a letter requesting an indefinite leave of absence. Bring it to my office and I’ll have copies made and hand-delivered to all the members of the board. Your request will be immediately accepted.”

  “Thanks for your advice.”

  “Honestly, Rachel, you don’t know how much I hate to do this to you.”

  “Not as much as I hate to have it done.”

  She hung up and reached for a sheet of the school’s best stationery.

  I hereby request an indefinite leave of absence from my duties as principal of Holbrook Hall.

  She signed her name, put the sheet of paper in an enve­lope and addressed the envelope to the president of the board of directors. Then she went outside by the back door.

  Nothing seemed to have changed. There were the usual sounds: screams and laughter from the pool area, the whinnying of a horse, the excited barking of dogs.

  Gretchen was polishing the leaves of a camellia planted in a redwood tub. Only such sturdy leaves as a camellia’s could have withstood her loving attack.

  “Good morning, Gretchen. I see you’re working hard.”

  “I always do,” Gretchen said brusquely, as if she’d been accused of laziness. “Somebody has to.”

  The fig tree was dropping its fruit like small brown eggs onto the grass. As they fell, two boys wearing cowboy boots were squashing the eggs into little yellow omelets.

  The round-eyed girl, Sandy, was shelling peanuts to feed to the scrub jay watching

  impatiently from the edge of the roof. Sandy would place a peanut on her head and the bird would swoop down, grab it with his beak and fly off to hide it. There were pounds and pounds of nuts scattered throughout the grounds, buried in the grass or the vegeta­ble garden, stuffed in the crevices between flagstones and the hollows of trees and underneath the shingles of the roof, dropped into chimneys and even into the goldfish pond. The bird always tired of the game before the girl did and flew off to seek more challenging pastimes.

  In the playground the quiet boy, Michael, sat in the middle of the teeter-totter, using his feet to pump it up and down. Bang thump. Bang thump. He wore a knitted headband which had fallen or been pulled down over his eyes.

  “Michael, I’m going away. I wanted to say goodbye to you. I probably won’t be seeing you for a long time.”

  Bang thump. Bang thump.

  “Michael?”

  “I hate you.”

  “I know you do. I thought you might say goodbye to me anyway.”

  “Goodbye,” Michael said. “Goodbye. Goodbye. Good­bye. Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye.”

  “Thank you, Michael. That’s enough.”

  “Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye.”

  She walked away as fast as possible. But she couldn’t get out of earshot. The others had taken up Michael’s chant. Sandy and the two boys under the fig tree and Gretchen were all chanting in unison with Michael.

  “Good . . . bye . . . good . . . bye . . . good . . .”

  When she reached the corner of the building Rachel Holbrook turned and waved. They waved back, Gretchen and the two boys and Sandy and even Michael. It was an encouraging sign that Michael had responded at all. Per­haps as he grew older, under the guidance of a new princi­pal . . . No, I really mustn’t think about any of them. I must go away and forget them for a long time . . .

  “Goodbye,” she said firmly.

  The room was small and bare except for three steel chairs and a table, all bolted to the floor. The door had a barred window through which a uniformed policeman glanced every few minutes.

  A previous occupant had damaged the thermostat and the air-conditioning couldn’t be regulated. Cold air kept blasting in from a vent high in the wall, making the room as cold as a walk-in refrigerator. Donny sat on the table dangling his legs.

  “How about that,” he said, gesturing toward the door. “My own personal guard. Man oh man, they must think I’m public enemy numero uno. Did you bring me any money?”

  Whitfield shook his head. “They wouldn’t let me hand you any, so I tried to deposit some in an account at the commissary. But they don’t have that system at Juvenile Hall, just at the adult—ah, facility.”

  “So what system are us poor jerks in here stuck with?”

  “You have to earn points.”

  “How?”

  “Good behavior, doing work, et cetera. You earn so many points by doing such and such a job and then you can spend the points like money. If you work and behave yourself you’ll be able to get candy bars and cigarettes, things like that. The idea is to treat rich and poor alike.”

  “Jee-sus.”

  “Well, goddammit, son, this isn’t a hotel. And I didn’t put you here.”

  “You sent the cops after your precious boat.”

  “I didn’t,” Whitfield said. “I swear I didn’t. I would have let you take a little cruise, knowing you’d come back.”

  “So you think I’d come back. Don’t kid yourself. I was heading for the moon, man, straight for the moon.”

  Whitfield focused his eyes on a spot on the bare grey wall. This was his son, his only child, and he couldn’t bear to look at him, to touch him, even to be in the same room with him. “I didn’t put you here, Donny.”

  “But I bet you don’t mind if they keep me here. It’s cheaper than Holbrook Hall.”

  “Listen, son. I’ve hired a lawyer from L.A., the best money can buy. But he can’t get you out on bail. There’s no bail for juveniles, especially ones with a record like yours. And the charges against you are pretty bad.”

  “Like how bad?”

  “I don’t even know if I can remember them all. Kidnap­ping—that’s the worst. Then there’s grand theft, assault with a deadly weapon, assault with intent to do great bodily harm, assault with intent to commit murder—”

  “Okay, okay.”

  “Although you were brought here to Juvenile Hall because you’re not yet eighteen, the chances are ninety-nine to a hundred that you’ll be tried as an adult. That makes things even worse.” The room was so cold that Whitfield’s voice was trembling. “Donny, if you could only show remorse, if you could convey t
o the authorities that you’re sorry for what you’ve done, that you didn’t mean to—”

  “I meant to,” Donny said. “And I’m not sorry.”

  “Son, please.”

  “Screw the son bit. It makes me puke . . . You got any chocolate bars on you?”

  “I brought you two pounds of See’s candies but they wouldn’t let me bring them in.”

  “Those stinking cops are probably gobbling them up right now.” Donny slid off the table. He looked impassive except for a tic in his left eyelid which he concealed by averting his face. “Well, I guess that’s all. You might as well leave. You’ll be late getting to Ensenada.”

  Whitfield once more studied an invisible spot on the wall. “I was going to cancel the trip to make sure I’d be here for your trial. But the lawyer told me not to bother. He said there’d probably be one delay after another, so your case might not come up for as long as a year, and it would be a waste of time for me to wait around and . . .” His voice faded as if suddenly he knew he’d hit the wrong note but there was no right one. “I’m sorry. I’m doing everything I can, everything I possibly can.”

  “Yeah. Sure.”

  “Donny. Donny, couldn’t you at least pretend to be remorseful?”

  “I’m remorseful all right when I think of those damn cops gobbling up all my candies. What kind were they? Any marshmints? Chocolate cherries? Peanut butter crackle?”

  “For God’s sake, Donny, haven’t you anything else to say to me?”

  “Marshmints are my favorites,” Donny said.

  Cleo was still wearing the stained jeans and T-shirt and sneakers without laces when Hilton went to the county jail to take her home.

  Bail had been set high, at twenty-five thousand dollars, because she would be charged as a principal in the case, which one of the lawyers said was the new term used for accessory to a crime. Hilton tried to explain this to her on the way home.

  “You will be accused of helping Donny do some of the things he’s charged with. Do you understand?”

  “All I did was hold the gun.”

  “Did he force you to? Were you acting under duress?”

  “It was hardly even a gun. It was only an itty-bitty thing.”

  “Guns kill. That’s what they’re made for. Did you obey Donny because you were afraid for your life?”

  “Heavens, no. Who could be afraid of Donny? He’s so silly.”

  She sat beside him in the front seat, her legs drawn up and her chin resting on her knees. Her face was almost hidden by a beige curtain of hair.

  “Where are your shoelaces?” he said.

  She told him about Donny tying Ted’s hands behind his back as he lay on the bunk. Hilton listened, feeling the blood flow out of him as if each word she spoke was a puncture wound in his heart.

  He ached with fatigue. He had been up all night, con­tacting lawyers, the judge who set bail, a medical doctor and a psychiatrist recommended by a bail bondsman. Every half hour he phoned the hospital for a report on Ted’s condition. He knew that whether Ted lived or died, Frieda would hold him responsible. His marriage had ended and his son was listed in very critical condition, yet he still knew almost nothing of what had happened since Cleo had walked away from the house with the basset hound on a leash. The psychiatrist had urged him not to question Cleo too closely. What good would it do anyway? A gun was an itty-bitty thing and Donny was merely silly.

  “There was a nasty old doctor at the jail,” Cleo said. “He told me I’m not going to have a baby. How does he know anyway? He can’t see it if it’s no bigger than a grain of sugar.”

  “It’s his job to know. He’s a gynecologist.”

  “Long words don’t mean anything. Curriculum. Curric­ulum—what is that anyway? Donny had one at the school . . . Will I be going back there, to Holbrook Hall?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Oh, well, I don’t care. It wasn’t all that much fun.” She hesitated. “Will I be staying at home all the time like I used to?”

  “That depends.”

  “What on?”

  “The judge will have to decide to what extent you were responsible for your actions.”

  “I didn’t do anything wrong, Hilton. I just held that little wee gun.”

  “Stop it. I prefer not to hear any more about it.”

  “Oh, Hilton, you’re mad at me.” She peeked at him around the curtain of hair, wet-eyed and wistful. “Aren’t you?”

  “No.”

  “I’m glad. I didn’t really do anything much.”

  His hands gripped the steering wheel as if they were trying to squeeze the life out of it. Nothing much. Roger Lennard was dead and Ted on the point of death. Rachel

  Holbrook’s life work was in ruins and Donny Whitfield would almost certainly be sent to the penitentiary. Nothing much.

  “Everything can be the same as it was before,” Cleo said. “Frieda will read to me, and we’ll go shopping and to the movies, and maybe Frieda will teach me how to drive. Roger said that was one of my rights, to learn to drive.”

  “Frieda won’t be living with us anymore.”

  “Why not?”

  “She doesn’t want to.”

  The simple explanation satisfied her because she under­stood it. If you wanted to do something, you did it. If you didn’t, you didn’t.

  “You can hire somebody to take her place, can’t you?” Cleo said. “Somebody like her, only nicer and more under­standing.”

  “I’m afraid I couldn’t find such a person.”

  “That means there’ll just be the two of us, you and me? It doesn’t sound like much fun.”

  “No, I don’t suppose it will be.”

  “Valencia hardly speaks any English and Cook always chases me out of the kitchen because I interfere with the T. V. game shows. I won’t have anyone to talk to unless you stay home.”

  “I can’t, Cleo. I have a job.”

  “We have lots of money already, don’t we?”

  “Quite a bit, yes.”

  “Why do you want more?”

  “To provide for your future. You’re only twenty-two. You may live another fifty or sixty years. You’ll require a great deal of money.”

  “No, I won’t, Hilton. I’ll have a husband to take care of me. Won’t I?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Won’t I, Hilton? Won’t I have a husband?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I bet you don’t want me to. I bet you’re jealous. Look what you did to Roger.”

  “You mustn’t talk like that, Cleo. There’s nothing in this world I’d like better than to see you married to a decent young man who will love you for your—your good qualities.”

  “I don’t believe it. You told me I was never to let another man touch me. Don’t you remember, it was the night Ted and I—”

  “I spoke during an emotional reaction. I didn’t mean it. After you’re married you will have an intimate relation­ship with your husband like any other girl.”

  “But I’m not like any other girl, am I?”

  “No.”

  “I wonder why not.”

  He turned into the long, winding driveway that led to the house. About halfway up, Trocadero was putting the finishing touches on a juniper sculpture, cutting the tiny needles as precisely as a barber. The basset hound Zia sat at his feet but came bounding out to bark at the car. Troc whistled him back and pretended not to see Cleo.

  “Zia doesn’t like me anymore,” Cleo said. “I can tell. He wasn’t even wagging his tail.”

  “We’ll buy you a dog of your own, any kind you like.”

  “No thanks.”

  “Don’t you want one?”

  “I’d rather have a husband and babies.”

  “Of course you would. But in the meantime—�
�

  He couldn’t finish the sentence. It would be a long meantime, impossible to fill with dogs and movies and shopping.

  He stopped the car in front of the house. “You’d better go up to your room and take a shower and put on some clean clothes.”

  “I don’t want to. I like these ones.”

  “They’re dirty. Valencia will wash and dry them for you while we’re having lunch. Please don’t argue with me, Cleo. I’m terribly tired.”

  “I’m just as tired as you are. The jail was so noisy I couldn’t sleep.”

  “Then we’ll both take a long nap after lunch. Right now I have to call the hospital again.”

  She went up to her room and showered and shampooed her hair. Then she stood in front of the full-length mirror in her bedroom, letting the water drip down her body, tickling her skin. She liked the way she looked, a mermaid escaped from the sea.

  Valencia came in without knocking to pick up Cleo’s clothes and take the wet towels away.

  Valencia said, “Hija mala.”

  “You’re mean to say things I can’t understand.”

  “Wicked girl. You done wicked.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Troc say you wicked. Cook say you loco.”

  “What do they know? They’re only servants.”

  She put on one of the bathrobes Frieda had given her and went downstairs to have lunch with Hilton. But he was lying on the couch in his den, his face to the wall. She wondered if he was dead, so she touched him on the shoul­der. It was like switching on one of the mixing machines Cook kept in the kitchen. Hilton began to shake all over as if he were being ground up inside, his liver and heart and stomach and appendix, all ground up into hamburger. It took away her appetite.

  She went into the kitchen to see if Cook would let her watch television with her. But Cook shooed her away like a chicken, flapping her apron at her and making chicken sounds. So she sat at the long dining room table by herself, thinking about Hilton’s insides being all ground up. She left most of the food on her plate untouched and ate only a muffin. Then she went back into the den.