I left her there and went out of the room. From downstairs I could hear Charles’s voice, and Richard’s answering. They were discussing the proper way to display the recovered brooch, as though everything was perfectly normal. This was the beginning of the mending that must always take place after a death, when life begins to go on in the old way, with overtones of the new.
I did not go downstairs to join them. I went back to my room. There was still one person with whom I must talk. I would seek Giles out right after dinner tonight.
14
I did not go downstairs to dine with the others that night. I told Vinnie that I wasn’t feeling very well—which was true enough—and she brought me a light supper on a tray in my room. An hour later I went down to the library to meet Giles. Vinnie had carried a message to him from me, and brought back word that he would see me there after dinner.
The others were gathered in the parlor and I could hear voices as I went past. Aunt Amalie had come downstairs, and Charles and Floria were with her. They did not see me as I went past the doors, and I was glad to step into the quiet of the library without being stopped.
A single lamp burned beside Charles’s empty armchair. The rest of the room crowded dimly around that one focus of light, with springtime darkness pressing blue-gray beyond the open French doors to the veranda.
The library was empty—or so I thought—and I went directly to Giles’s desk and pulled the knob of the upper right-hand drawer. To my relief, it was locked. If I had found it open, I would have called it to Giles’s attention myself. The sight of that gun lying where Richard could so easily reach it, had left me unnerved.
“Are you looking for something, Lacey?” Paul’s voice said from down the room.
I looked around, to see that he had emerged from shadows near the front windows, and I wondered why he was in here, and not with the others. Even by shaded lamplight he did not look well, and I knew that he must still be having a difficult time accepting Elise’s death.
“I wanted to make sure that drawer was locked,” I said. “It was open earlier in the day.”
He seemed to make nothing of that. “I hear that you and Richard have recovered the missing brooch,” Paul said. “The boy is full of the story. It seems to have brought him out of his state of apathy.”
“Yes,” I said. “Apparently Elise had it all along.”
But my thoughts were no longer solely on the matter of the brooch. I was trying to formulate in my mind the things I must say to Giles, and I did not want to talk to Paul now. Like me, he was an outsider, and I was concerned tonight only with those who belonged to the island. I wished he would join the others and leave me to meet Giles alone.
“Floria doesn’t know I’m here,” he said unexpectedly.
“Weren’t you with them for dinner?” I asked in surprise.
He shook his head. “I’m waiting for Charles to go for the evening walk he often takes. I can see him from the windows if he goes down the drive. I’ll join him then.”
My attention was still upon my own affairs and I was not particularly curious as to what Paul might want with Charles in a meeting that avoided Floria.
Paul moved back to his post at a front window and a moment later he said, “There’s Charles now,” and went quickly onto the veranda.
I found a place in a chair where the light would not fall upon me too brightly, and waited for Giles. I did not want to sit on the sofa, with him beside me tonight. I must have him well beyond arm’s length when I talked to him.
But we were not at arm’s length for long when he came into the room. He drew me out of my chair and into his arms at once, and I went to him gladly. For a few moments I could cling to him.
“Darling,” he said, “We’ve been too far apart for the last few days. This is where you belong.”
“I’m going back to New York tomorrow,” I told him. He made a sound of protest, but I went on quickly. “You know I must. There’s nothing to do but wait now—though not here on the island. Giles, when I go this time, I can never return.”
He held me away where he could look into my face. “That’s nonsense, of course. You’ll come here to live, eventually. I’m afraid we must wait for a while. But in the long run Sea Oaks will be your home, as it is mine. You’ve always loved the island. Now you will live here for good.”
I turned away from him and went to my chair. “I had to talk to you tonight. I need to make you understand a number of things. Sit down and listen to me, Giles.”
My tone arrested his attention. He went to the sofa and sat looking at me, suddenly grave.
Quickly I recalled to his mind the things that had happened to me since I had come to the island. For the first time I told him that I thought someone had tried to injure me deliberately that afternoon at Bellevue, when a great chunk of tabby had fallen upon me. I spoke of the loose stone in the sea wall, and of how I had gone to the beach the next morning, only to find it wedged firmly in place. Undoubtedly by someone who did not want it known that it had ever been loose. I told him of Hadley Rikers finding me there, and of the accusation he had made.
“I don’t think he will try to do anything,” I said. “But he’s suspicious and it’s best to quiet that suspicion by having me go away. In time perhaps all the talk will die down. Anyway, I must get away from the island and I must stay away. Someone here has a deep hatred for me, and I think it will be worse since Elise’s death. I don’t know why—or who it is. Perhaps it’s best if I never know.”
“Do you think I could live in peace with someone who wanted to harm you?” he said. “If this is really fact, and not just anxious fancy, then it should be uncovered. Whoever is behind such actions should be exposed, no matter what the consequences are. You must be able to come back here to live, Lacey. There’s no other way.”
I knew I could never come back. But there was more I had to tell him. There was the most difficult part of all. There was no immediate chance, however, because Floria burst into the room, looking thoroughly distraught.
“Vinnie said Paul was here,” she announced, glancing quickly about. “Have you seen him?”
“He was in the room a few moments ago,” I said. “He was waiting to see Charles, and I think he’s gone for a walk with him.”
“I’ll go after them,” Floria said. She started toward the door, and then swung about abruptly. “Are you leaving soon, Lacey?”
“Tomorrow,” I said.
She gave me a look that was somehow spiteful. “And high time too!”
“But she’ll be back,” Giles put in. “She’ll be back as soon as I’m able to bring her here.”
Floria turned her look of spite on him for an instant, and then spoke to me again. “Have you told Giles your big secret yet?”
A chill touched me. I knew what she meant and I could not answer.
“Lacey has been telling me a number of things,” Giles said.
“I mean about Richard,” Floria went on deliberately. “Because it’s time you knew, Giles, and if she hasn’t told you, I will. Richard was not Elise’s son. He belongs to Lacey. And you. She bore him, but they all took part in fooling you from the start. I didn’t know the truth until recently, but Elise and Mother and Lacey conspired to deceive you very cleverly and cruelly. There isn’t any doubt about it. You’ve only to ask my mother. She was the one who planned the whole thing in the beginning. But your worthy, honorable Lacey went along with her plan every step of the way.”
Floria stood there looking at him, taunting and malicious, her hair upon her shoulders, fluffed and fiery. There was nothing I could say. It had all been done for me, crudely, and with none of the extenuation I believed had existed, and which I’d hoped to make Giles understand. If Floria wanted to drive me away from the island for good, she had chosen the best possible way to do it.
Out of his first shock, a deep anger was beginning to stir in Giles. I could see it in his eyes, in the tightness of his mouth, hear it in the coldness of his voice.
> “Is this true, Lacey?”
“Yes,” I said miserably, “it’s true.”
Floria understood fully what he was feeling, but she could not leave well enough alone. She flung me a quick, triumphant look.
“All those wasted years, Lacey! All those years with your son—thrown away! All those years when Giles felt he must hold an empty marriage together because of the son he shared with Elise. A boy who wasn’t Elise’s son at all!”
Giles made a sound of mingled pain and anger, and I could not bear any more. As I knew all too well, he hated dishonesty more than anything else. He could not bear anyone who cheated and deceived him. Near my chair a veranda door stood open. I jumped up and ran outside.
The night was cool, the stars bright in patches of sky above the live oaks. I could not fling myself into the branches of an oak tree to hide, as Richard had done, but the night waited for me, offered me concealment. I ran down the steps and along the path that led away from the white shell drive toward the burying ground. I could not bear the house for a moment longer. I could not bear the sound of Floria’s spiteful voice. Above all, I could not endure the look on Giles’s face. Only darkness and crowding trees could shelter me until I could gather my forces, summon a few last shreds of courage, and face what had to be faced. I had always known how angry he would be. I had always been afraid to tell him. What I had done so long ago would be, in his eyes, unforgivable.
In a few moments I had found my way into that dark place of sweet gums and pines and live oaks. The few tombs that stood among the trees were black solids, where starlight could not reach. The lights of the house were well behind me, and even the rhythmic beat of the Atlantic was hushed in this ancient place. But I was not to be allowed my dark solace for long. Through the night came the sound of footsteps following me, running in pursuit. Someone had come after me. I could not bear to face whoever it was, and I drew myself into the shadow of the largest tomb and stood waiting in utter silence.
“Lacey!” That was Floria’s voice, but curiously hushed and coaxing. “Lacey, where are you? You mustn’t run away from the house.”
I pressed against the brick and tabby of the tomb’s wall until rough shell cut into the palms of my hands.
“Are you there, Lacey?” The voice went on, false and coaxing. “I’m sorry, Lacey. I only did it for your own good. He had to know. Come with me back to the house.”
Not for anything would I have stepped out of darkness into starlight. I could see her now, where she moved like a shadow among other night shadows, tall and slender and deadly.
Again and again she called me, always in that soft, whispery voice that frightened me—as though she did not want anyone else to know that she called. But she had no way of being sure that I was here, and I did not believe she had seen me.
Time seemed to stand still in the lonely grove. The night seemed no longer hushed. The very air hummed with the sounds of insects. The stars hung motionless in the dark blue sky, and no breeze stirred the leaves of the sweet gums. I dared not so much as shift my weight from one foot to another. I was desperately afraid. I could not outrun her, and I knew those strong hands which could conquer an unruly horse would hold me helpless if ever she found me. Why she hated me so much I didn’t know, but her malevolence was something I could almost feel there in the darkness.
Then, quite suddenly, the tension eased. She seemed to give up. I could hear her moving away. Her tall shadow no longer stretched toward me over the ground, and I could hear a crackling under her feet as she went off in the direction of the house. I could shift my weight now, lessen the cramped pressure of my hands against the rough tabby behind me. But I still did not stir from my hiding place. I did not want to step into the open and have her come running back through the trees. For a little while I would wait where I was. I would wait until it was safe to return to the house and go upstairs to my room. The quiet of the burying ground no longer offered me the peace in which to recover a little from what Floria had done to both Giles and me.
“Lacey?”
The call came from not far away, and for an instant I stiffened again. Then the voice went on and I knew I was safe.
“You can come out now, Lacey,” Aunt Amalie called. “She’s gone. Come out quickly and we’ll go back to the house together. She won’t touch you as long as you’re with me.”
I pushed myself away from the cold solidity of the tomb and ran along its side and around the front.
“I’m here!” I cried. “You came just in time. I’ve never been so frightened—”
And then I saw her.
The whiteness of her dress stood out in a pale slash against black trees. Her face was a white oval in the starlight, and one hand was extended toward me. A lopsided moon was rising above the trees and its rays struck a glint from the thing Aunt Amalie held in her right hand. And I knew. It was not Floria I needed to fear. I knew fully and completely in a rush of acute awareness that needed no pause for reasoning. In the same instant I recognized that I stood entirely exposed only a little way from her, with fresh moonlight falling upon me, as it fell upon her.
There was just one thing to do. I stepped backward into the tomb. My foot missed the top step and I lost my balance. With my arms reaching futilely for the wall, I fell down three shallow steps and lay half stunned on the brick floor.
Her voice called to me matter-of-factly. “That was foolish, Lacey. Did you hurt yourself? Because I don’t want you to hurt yourself. Not now. Not yet.”
Painfully, I sat up on the cold brick floor and rubbed the back of my head. I seemed to be all right. I seemed to be able to move. And I was hidden by a dank and musty darkness. From outside, she could not see me. I pulled myself up and stepped silently toward a side wall and flattened myself against it. She could not see me now, even if she came to the opening to the tomb, but I was trapped here as thoroughly as it was possible to be. There was no way out but one. The wide arch of curving masonry rose over my head, shutting me in. The distant back wall of the tomb was flat, without any opening. I could creep back there into slimy darkness, but I could not escape. For me, this might very well be my tomb.
Her voice reached me again. “Floria’s gone now. She came to rescue you from me, you know. And Paul has gone to talk to Charles. He’s been worried about Floria and me. He’s begun to suspect. Floria loves me, poor dear. She’s tried to protect me. She guessed that I’d loosened that rock the night of the ball. She went down later that night to make sure that it wouldn’t move if anyone examined it. Not that I cared any more. Not that I could care—when it was Elise who fell, and not you, as I’d intended.”
I had read a dreadfulness into Floria’s voice, but this was real. There was a cutting, matter-of-factness here that chilled me inwardly, as the stones of the tomb chilled my flesh and bones. I wanted to cry out to her. I wanted to ask her why—why?
Without my asking, she was quite willing to tell me.
“I want you to know,” she said. “This time there will be no pranks to try to frighten you away. Like a sand dollar in your napkin. There’ll be no effort at injury that may fail—as it failed that day at Bellevue, when I rode Mayfair around by the wall and pushed over that block of tabby.”
My breath was coming quickly, my heart pounding. Yet there was nothing I could do. If I tried to storm out, if I tried to rush her and get away, she would shoot me down quite coldly. I knew that now. The gun from Giles’s desk was not locked safely away, as I had thought. It was there in Aunt Amalie’s hand.
As I waited, she ran on. “What happened at the freezing plant that day puzzled you, didn’t it? I’d warned you that you must leave the island and never come back. That you must never interfere when it came to Richard. But you were uncertain. You didn’t know if you could keep your hands off him. So I wanted to frighten you a little. Oh, I wouldn’t have left you inside the freezer for long. I didn’t mean you serious harm. Not then. It was too bad that Richard saw me close the door. I was afraid he might say somethin
g about it. But instead, he decided that if I would do such a thing, then you must be an evil person to be punished, and he took his stand against you. It would have been better for you if he had held to that attitude.”
Once she had loved me, I thought in fearful bewilderment. Once she had been kind to me, concerned about me, but at some time or other all that had changed. I had gone on seeing her as she once was, unaware of the inward change.
The light, calm voice had paused for breath. Now it went on as serenely as ever.
“Do you think I will allow the past to repeat itself? Do you think I loved my sister when she took Charles away from me? Do you think I ever forgave her? And did you think I would let her daughter take away my daughter’s husband, take my daughter’s son? Oh, of course I wanted you here. I wanted to learn what you were up to, and I wanted you to come to the island long enough to be thoroughly defeated, thoroughly frightened away. But you wouldn’t accept that. You wouldn’t take the sensible way out and give Giles up. You began to interfere with Richard. So now—there’s only one ending. What happens to me afterward no longer matters. Not even Charles is really mine.”
I wanted to cry out that there was still Richard, whom she loved. But I dared not speak and give away my position.
“You believed everything, didn’t you?” she went on. “All my pretense of being so fond of you! Oh, it was true enough once, when you were younger. And I could be fond enough of you while you stayed away from the island. But after you became a threat to Elise as Richard’s mother, pretending to love you turned into a role that nauseated me.”
I listened to her, sick at heart to think how fondly and trustingly I had accepted her seeming affection.
“It gave me real pleasure to tell Elise where the emerald brooch was hidden,” she went on almost conversationally. “I knew she would go and get it and defeat Kitty’s intention of having Charles find it where she had left it. Though of course I’d foiled that intention the first time long ago. You said your mother must have left a letter for Charles when she went away. It’s true—she did. But I found it first and hid it away all these years. I wanted Charles to think Kitty had kept the brooch deliberately. I didn’t care whether it was ever found or not. Later I gave the letter to Elise, and she tried to find their mailing place. But she never could until you gave Charles the real clue as to where the brooch was hidden. Then she went and got it at once. Paul was coming across from The Bitterns that morning, and he almost caught her coming out of the tomb with it. She coaxed him away among the trees to talk to her, and while they were walking about, you and Charles went into the tomb. You heard them from there. Elise always wanted that brooch, and in the end she had it for a little while. Though only for—a little while.”
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