On the way to the door he turned and said, “You know, I think I like your house better than Claire’s. It’s friendlier.”
“That’s nice of you to say, but I’m sure Claire’s house is friendly, too.”
“No, it isn’t. I could never be at home there. Helga’s always cleaning and straightening everything. And besides, Cousin Claire keeps part of it locked up.”
“Oh? Which part?”
“I think it must have been Cousin Charles’s study. I looked through the keyhole one day when she was gone, and there’s a desk and lots of papers in there. You know, she is gone a lot, and never says where.”
“James, I think you’re fond of intrigue, and you let your imagination run away with you.”
He turned to go. “Oh, by the way, I didn’t know your father was hard of hearing.”
“What makes you think he is?”
“Well … on the way to the grocer’s today when I went to get baking powder for Helga, I saw him walking ahead of me—two or three houses further up Avenue L. I called out to him several times but he never turned around and I finally realized he hadn’t heard me.”
“Well, he isn’t hard of hearing. Perhaps it was the direction of the wind or something. Or maybe you only thought it was him.”
“Maybe so, though I was pretty sure. Anyway, I only mentioned it because my father was deaf in one ear. Of course, no one ever guessed. He could hear perfectly from the other.”
“That’s too bad.”
“A childhood accident caused it, he always said. Something about a rifle being fired too near him. But, as I said, you’d have never guessed if he didn’t want you to know. Well, good night.”
That evening after dinner, I took the mythology book and turned directly to page 321. There was a sculpture of Apollo depicted at the beginning of his section: a god of muscular body, broad chest, slender hips. His face was beardless, his long hair pulled back and knotted at the nape of his neck.
He was apparently an amorous god, for there followed a long section about his many loves, and my eyes scanned this section for mention of Aphrodite. Her name wasn’t linked with his, though, and, closing the book, I wondered why it should disappoint me so. Greek gods and goddesses! What had they to do with ordinary people in Galveston, in 1899? Still, it bothered me, for James had infected me with his drawing of parallels between the mythological characters and real people, and I decided to look up Aphrodite to see whether she ever found anyone she could truly love.
I fell asleep later, the book resting on my pillow, and awoke the next morning to a glare of sunlight streaming through the window by my bed. I looked at the time: eight o’clock. Why hadn’t Dad awakened me? I looked out across the hall. The door to the little room where he sleeps was closed.
I dressed quickly and went to the kitchen to see if he was up. Then I realized what had happened the night before. There was an Old Saratoga bottle on the table, and an empty glass beside it.
I picked up the bottle. There wasn’t more than a spoonful of whisky left. He would still be sleeping, then. I poured the whisky into the sink, put the bottle into the garbage, and washed the glass, just as I always did, for it made it easier to pretend in front of him I’d never discovered it.
Often I wished he wouldn’t be so careless. If it weren’t for me looking after him, someone would soon find out about his drinking and everything might be ruined for him in the church. What if Claire should come, bringing homemade rolls for breakfast, or biscuits or something? I never could feel certain whether Claire tattled everything she knew to her co-workers on the gardening committee, but there was always the slight chance she might, even though I would have thought it a better guess she would have protected my father and his foolishness to her dying breath.
As I cleaned the table and started breakfast, I remembered the first time I’d discovered my father’s drinking habit. He always kept a decanter of port on a tray in the parlor, but before that time, as far as I knew, he never drank anything else. Then one day when I was twelve years old, still too short to reach the top cabinet in the kitchen, I brought a stool around to stand on so that I could reach the cinnamon kept above the sink. When I opened the cabinet and poked my hand inside, I felt the cool smoothness of the whisky bottle. His keeping whisky didn’t alarm me; his habit of hiding it did. I was so frightened, I ran up to my room and cried. I’d seen a drunkard once, stumbling around down on Market Street and brandishing an empty whisky bottle that he soon dropped on the sidewalk, splattering glass and whisky all over the place. Charles was with me that day, and a large piece of the glass had narrowly missed striking his leg. Charles had taken my hand, and we’d crossed to the other side of the street.
I was convinced, then, that my father was like the drunkard. Of course he wasn’t, and by now I know he drinks mostly in private and doesn’t become obnoxious in front of others. I only hoped on that morning, early this summer, that his condition wouldn’t somehow keep me from going to the beach. I made a pot of oatmeal, and when Mrs. McCambridge appeared at the front door, I grabbed my bag and left the house, not breathing properly until I reached the front gate.
Stupidly, I’d forgotten about James. He was waiting at the fence in his knickers and old shirt, wanting to know if he should get Porky, and obviously puzzled I’d forgotten him myself.
“Oh, Porky … yes, I guess you’d better,” I told him, wondering whether I would ever have a chance at being alone on the beach again. “Are you sure it’s safe for you to go into the water with that leg?”
“Yes’m. Claire said so. She’s gonna buy me a bathing suit today.”
“That’s nice. Come on, then.”
When we were on our way, Porky pulling James along, poking his nose in one place then another, I tried to broach the subject. “Listen, as we pass by the band boys on the beach today, don’t look over, all right? Don’t look interested in whether they’re there or not.”
“Oh, are we interested?”
“Of course not. I just don’t want to leave the wrong impression.”
“Serena, if Roman comes to the Fischer place today, I’ll stay in the water. Don’t worry. I won’t let any fish bite me. Now I know what a man-of-war looks like, I can keep clear.”
“Yes, but their tentacles are sometimes very long, so they can be a good distance from you and still sting, remember.”
“I know. Last night I read all about them in one of Claire’s books. You’ve bathed around here long enough, and never gotten stung. Certainly it’s not going to happen to me again. The law of averages is against it, as my dad would have said.”
“It’s all right if you want to come out of the water. If Roman Cruz should come over, we’ll only be talking anyway. I only pay attention to him because he’s from far away, and he’s interesting.”
“Yes, well, all I want to do is thank him and tell him Claire wants him to come to dinner tomorrow night.”
I stopped short. “What?”
“She wants to repay him for what he did for me. She said if we saw him today, to ask him over, and you too, of course. She’ll invite your father and you can ask Nick to come, too.”
“How nice. Well, I doubt Roman will have time to come to dinner. He’ll probably have a show that night. Besides, we’ll probably never see him again.”
It seemed odd at first, Claire wanting to have a dinner party. She hadn’t even been around when we got home with James that day he was stung. Why bother with a party now? Then I remembered what a flair she once had for entertaining. While Charles was alive, she was always inviting people over, often including Dad. She loves making show, especially when she is the star.
As we passed near the Pavilion I looked straight ahead, as did James, yet I could see from the corner of my eye a group of people at the surf’s edge. “They’re there,” James whispered. “Did’ya see them?”
“Oh, are they? It doesn’t matter. Come, let me find my gate key. Look, the surf’s up today.”
James clearly viewed
his role as co-conspirator, even when I’d tried to be as offhanded as possible about Roman. He had a sixth sense that helped him to see far more than what lay on the surface. Someday, after shedding his callow youth, he will be a bundle for a young maid to handle.
I spread a towel on the pier and James jumped into the water. He loved the sea now that he was used to it, and while most children his age would have been wary after the sting received only two days earlier, he was content to ride the waves as though nothing had happened to him.
Porky, too, had taken to the surf today, and was splashing around happily with his new-found friend. I couldn’t deny I’d cheated Porky lately. He still went to the beach with me, and I’d never failed to feed him or to take care of him properly. But then I hadn’t been a companion for him, over the past year or so. I never seemed to find the time to play with him as I had when he was a puppy. Either I didn’t want him mussing my dress, or I had to wash my hair, or had somewhere to go that he couldn’t conveniently go with me. So, except when I went to the beach, he’d often stayed in his pen, staring between the fence pales as though he wouldn’t mind running away should he have the chance. This was another reason I was grateful for James’s arrival here in Galveston. He was such a perfect friend for the big dog, and was obviously as attached to him as though Porky really belonged to him … as perhaps in some ways he did. James often bathed him, fed him, took him for walks when I was at dancing class, or otherwise busy, roughhoused in the yard with him, and lately was teaching him to retrieve, although this project wasn’t proving too successful, probably because Porky was a little too old for training.…
Lost in my thoughts as I lay there under the queer relaxing power of the sun, I’d almost forgotten about Roman Cruz. Then there was a voice from behind.
“Unlock this confounded thing, will you? What does a man have to go through to get to you?”
My heart speeding to a gallop, I ran up the pier, across the lawn, and opened the gate. “I’m sorry. I had no idea you’d be coming round today.”
“I didn’t either,” he said, and walked with me back down the length of the pier. I was feeling smug already for the way I’d addressed him—so casual, unassuming.
“Hey, young fellow out there, how’s that leg?” he called to James.
“It’s fit, sir, thanks to you.”
I was afraid James would pick this moment to come bounding up on the pier and invite Roman for dinner, yet he stayed in the water. I wished profoundly there were some way I could stave him off, keep him from mentioning the party at all. I’d had misgivings before, and now, in the presence of Roman, I sensed more strongly than ever he would despise the idea.
“You didn’t come to the show last night,” he said, almost scoldingly.
“I didn’t know I was expected.”
“Well, you were. You were supposed to fix up your hair, put on your best dress, and be out in the audience mooning at me as I played. But you didn’t show up.”
I laughed. “I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings. I can’t find time to go to the Pavilion every night.”
“You’re not like most of the girls around here,” he said. “You don’t react the same. I like that.”
“Oh, do you? Well, don’t ever feel you can take me for granted.”
“What makes you think I’d be guilty of such a thing?”
“I know your kind. You’re—”
“What am I? What do you know of me?” he demanded, and I thought for a moment he must be angry at my flippancy.
“Nothing, nothing. I mean, you’re used to having your way with girls, that’s all.”
“You’re right, I am at that.”
“I meant no—”
“I like you, Serena, like you a damn lot. If that kid weren’t out in the bay over there, I’d try to hold your hand. Of course I don’t usually operate that subtly, but for you I would.” He was teasing now, and I could feel the red going to my face.
“You’d like that, would you?”
“Maybe.”
“You wore a different suit today.”
“Yes.”
“I like the other one better.”
“It doesn’t fit right.”
“I know. That’s why I like it.”
I leaned back a little and shaded my eyes. “You’re very fresh.”
“I know it. You really ought to tell me to leave right now.”
It was at that moment James, with his unique sense of timing, came up from the water and told Roman about the dinner. Hanging onto a stair rung, he began a long sermon about Roman’s gallantry and trustworthiness that surely was made up of Claire’s ideas, rather than his own.
Roman rolled his eyes and laughed. “She tell you to say all that?”
“You’ll come, won’t you?”
“You needn’t feel obligated if you don’t want to,” I said quickly.
“What night—Thursday?”
“Yes, tomorrow.”
“I think I will. We’re off tomorrow night—as a matter of fact, it’s odd she happened to pick that night. We just found out last night the show has been canceled because they have to work on the wiring or something—otherwise I’d have had to work. And it isn’t often I get invited up to someone’s house on this side of Galveston. Tell your cousin or whoever she is that I’ll be there. What time?”
“Seven. She’ll be glad,” James said with delight, and jumped back into the water, sending a shower over both of us.
“Really, you needn’t bother,” I said. “I’ve a feeling you couldn’t care less about something like that. It wouldn’t hurt my feelings if you didn’t come.”
“Nonsense. How else am I going to get to see you? We can’t go on meeting at the beach forever, with a boy and a dog as witnesses. Who knows, maybe your father will even like me, though I doubt it.”
“My dad isn’t as prim as you might think. He sometimes—” I continued, but stopped. There was no use going into Dad’s drinking, just to make him seem more daring. When a man’s drinking is a barometer of his sorrow, it’s unfair to use it to impress someone else.
“I’ve got early rehearsals today,” Roman said finally. “See you tomorrow night.”
“You remember where the house is?”
“Certainly. A man could find his way around this island blindfolded, doing back flips. I’ll be there.”
Yet I half believed he wouldn’t as he disappeared on the other side of the Fischer gate that morning, and would worry about it from that moment until the day and night and day after had passed, and it was time to walk over to Claire’s.
Chapter 6
Thursday, June twenty-second, is printed indelibly on my mind: a unit in time with a beginning and end, wedged inside a summer otherwise made up of loose ends, unanswered questions, nameless fears.
Mother awakes that morning looking well rested, and I take this as a good omen. The day is hung over with a cloudless sky Mrs. McCambridge would call “purely blue.” Helga Reinschmidt has four clotheslines hung with linens and clothes, billowing out in the breeze. I can see them from the kitchen window as I make the coffee before going to Madame’s.
I will not be at my best while dancing today. During exercises at the bar, I will be thinking hard about the evening ahead, and will turn the wrong way and wind up backwards to the class, looking directly into the face of Michelle O’Grady, who is not much of a dancer but always at least technically correct in her movements. Madame will first give me a look of consternation (I can see her reflection in the big wall mirror behind), and in a moment will say, “Serena—come, come, where is your mind, girl?”
I will try to concentrate better on my work, but it will be of little use. I will keep wondering at Claire’s desire to throw a dinner party, for I have decided her love of show simply is not sufficient to cause her to go to this sort of trouble. James reports she has spent hours poring over menus, and has had Helga busy polishing all the silverware and the silver coffee service, which is her pride and joy. If for
love of show, why not spend it on some of her friends, rather than on us?
At Claire’s request, Nick will be there, for Dad would have thought odd my reluctance to invite him, and I am being cautious about betraying anything of my attraction to Roman. Altogether there will be six of us. Mrs. McCambridge will spend the evening with Mother.
As I arrive home after dancing class, I see James standing in our yard, below Mother’s window. I open my mouth to call to him, then see a piece of paper flutter down from the window like a bird with broken wings.
James retrieves it, reads it, then looks up. “But what does it mean?” he demands of Mother. She, of course, doesn’t answer him, and I know the frustration he feels. I’ve a thousand unanswered questions for every year since Mother fell down the stairs.
“Come here, James,” I tell him. “May I have a look at it? What is it, a poem?”
He hands it to me.
Were going to Abaddon, our bad sins for to pay.
We’re going to Abaddon, ne’er to see the light of day.
“What’s that word, ‘Abaddon’?” James asks.
“I thought you’d know; I don’t.”
“I brought my dictionary from home. I’ll go and fetch it.”
“All right,” I tell him, but I know by the context the word can mean but one thing, and I wonder again what Mother is trying to hide. There must be something in her past she’s kept secret, but what? There is a chance Dad might be able to tell me, but he always dismisses her poetry as insignificant, and I don’t try hard to persuade him to discuss it, for I can see it grieves him to see her scribbling. Her handwriting is almost bizarre—large, and grotesquely uneven. I have seen samples of it in her younger days. It was round and neatly formed, with circles over the i’s, instead of dots.
In the afternoon I wash my hair and take the curling iron to it. Tonight I will wear it pulled back and tied with a blue bow to match my shirtwaist dress. There is a shameful number of freckles across my nose, but it is too late to worry about them now.
Fifty-eight minutes past six o’clock. I have bathed and dressed. I feel flush and nervous, and watch anxiously from the window to see if he will come. When he does amble nonchalantly past the string of fences down our block, humming a tune, I am so relieved I practically shout down to him. It crushes me that he walks on past without looking toward our house, but then, he isn’t my escort after all; a few moments from now Nick will pull up in a rented rig and we will walk to Claire’s together. The realization of this makes me almost angry at Nick, and when he arrives, bringing a bouquet of daisies, I must concentrate hard to avoid being pesky and short with him.
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