Spindrift

by Phyllis A. Whitney

  “Of course you would come here,” she said. “I knew this room would be the first place you would foolishly head for. How did you get in?”

  So Bruce had not betrayed me, and I would not betray him.

  “I got the key,” I told her.

  “From whom?”

  I was silent, and she shrugged and moved to the desk where the contents of Adam’s pockets lay.

  “Why didn’t you have these things put away?” I demanded, seizing the attack.

  To my surprise she looked a little uncomfortable. I had not thought I could disconcert her. She tucked a strand of red hair into the pile on top of her head.

  “I ran away.” The bleak note in her voice surprised me. “When the police were through I couldn’t bear the place and I shut it up and ran away.”

  “I thought you never ran away from anything,” I said.

  She came toward me across the room, still avoiding those dark stains, and stood quite close to me, looking into my face with those penetrating green eyes that she could widen into beauty when she chose. She was so close that I could see the tiny lines raying out from the corners, lightly masked with powder.

  “You have grown very hard since your illness, Christy. If Hal had been here with me, everything would have been taken care of. But all that happened shocked me so badly that I couldn’t endure Spindrift. Adam’s death, your collapse, all the miserable insinuations surrounding his suicide.”

  “Perhaps if you hadn’t pressed him for money, he might not have died.” I wanted to hurt her, though I didn’t believe my own words.

  “Yes. It will be to my everlasting regret to think that I might have driven him to take his life.” She waited, regarding me steadily, expecting my immediate response.

  I did not give it aloud. I might say to myself, “He would not have died by his own hand, no matter what!” but I would not say it again to her and open myself to those sly looks that meant I was hysterical.

  “I’ll have everything packed up right away,” she said, moving about the room.

  “Please let me do it,” I said.

  “Of course. If that’s what you wish. I’m glad to see that you can take this room now without breaking down. That’s why I locked it against you. When you decided to come here, I wanted to bring you myself and make sure you would be all right.”

  Or make sure she observed me writhing? I was glad I had circumvented that. I did not believe in this new attitude of moderation toward me. Something lay behind it, and I wanted to know what it was.

  She had paused before the portrait of Arthur Patton-Stuyvesant, looking up at it, smiling a little.

  “I remember him when I was small. He was younger than that portrait then—a handsome man with an abundance of self-confidence. They could be arrogant, you know, those men and women who felt themselves born to the blood because of their wealth and position. You’ve no idea of the exclusiveness of Newport society in those days.”

  I wanted to say, “Look who’s talking about arrogance,” but I was silent.

  “Of course Zenia led him a merry round,” Theo went on. “I understand that he couldn’t control her. His best crony, Theron Townsend, lived next door at Redstones, and they were a fine pair of pirates, the two of them. But Zenia and Maddy Townsend outlived them both.”

  I wasn’t particularly interested in this ancient history, but Theo didn’t notice.

  “Arthur didn’t care much for children,” she went on, “except as investments which must be encouraged to grow up properly and take hold when he must leave off, so their children turned out rather badly. Zenia had other interests. Did you know that Bruce Parry is Zenia’s great-nephew?”

  I shook my head. I hadn’t known, and it didn’t matter. Bruce Parry did not interest me, except as someone who might help me. No one interested me any more, except my son. If there was emptiness I was not ready to face it.

  “I think I will go and see if Peter is awake and take him for a walk,” I said. “Just a short walk that won’t tire him.”

  She swung away from the portrait at once. “No! He is to rest now. I won’t have him disturbed.”

  The moment had come. There had been times in the past when I had railed against her. But I had never stood up to her and won my own way. I understood her purpose very well. It was not Peter’s health which concerned her, but any means at all to keep us apart.

  “Theo,” I said, “we might as well understand something right now. I am Peter’s mother. I am well again, and I mean to be his mother. If he feels well enough to take a walk, then I think it will be fine for him to come walking with me. We need to get acquainted again, my son and I.”

  Theo could turn slightly purple when she was thwarted. Now there was a faintly bluish tinge to her color that warned me. I turned my back on her and walked through the door, not wanting to face one of her explosions.

  “I hope you won’t lock this room again,” I said. “I’ll get to work on it as soon as I can.”

  I continued to walk away from her down the corridor toward the opposite wing and Peter’s room. I fully expected to have the storm brewing behind me break into its own particular fury, but nothing happened. Before I made the turn in the corridor I looked back and saw that she was closing the tall window I had opened. She did not mean to blow me down now. Not yet. She was letting me go. But Theo Moreland never gave in. She only plotted new attacks.

  The moment I was out of her sight I hurried, almost running toward Peter’s room, as though armies gathered at my back and there might still be pursuit and defeat. No—not defeat. I needn’t be defeated by her any more. I was alone. I’d have no help from Joel or anyone else, but I was strong enough now to stand against her. I had proved something to myself in this small encounter. I did not think the war was won, by any means, but I had come out ahead in a skirmish.

  Peter was awake when I tapped on the door of his room and went inside. He had dressed himself in jeans and a blue shirt, but his fair hair was rumpled and he sat on the floor listlessly fingering the counters of a game.

  I dropped to my knees beside him and put an arm about his shoulders. “Peter darling, I’m so glad to see you.”

  He edged himself from my touch and there was hostility in the look he gave me. “You’re the one who went away,” he accused.

  “But not on purpose,” I told him gently. “You know I was sick, don’t you?”

  “Grandma Theo said you didn’t feel like coming to see me.”

  “I was in a hospital. Your father must have told you. They wouldn’t let me come.” I tried to keep the shock of this wicked deception from my voice.

  “Grandma Theo said she couldn’t take me to see you because you couldn’t keep me any more and it would upset me.”

  I had no answer except to catch him in my arms and hold him to me. “I’ve missed you terribly, darling. But we’re going to be together again now. I’m going to take you home.”

  He wriggled frantically in my arms and I had to let him go. Released, he stood up and directed a kick at the game he had been playing, so that the counters went flying.

  “I like it with Grandma Theo,” he said, scowling. “She lets me do things you never let me do. She loves me the most. She told me so.”

  I rose from my knees and walked to the window to look out toward the ocean, struggling for my own self-control. When I could speak without a quaver in my voice, I turned back to him.

  “If you’re feeling better we might go for a walk.”

  “I’m okay,” he said gruffly.

  “It’s a nice day outdoors,” I coaxed.

  “Where is Dad?” he demanded abruptly.

  “I think he’s working. He brought some manuscripts along to read.”

  “Where do you want to walk?”

  At least I had won a small advantage. “How about down by the water?” That had always been a favorite place of his.

  The faintest look of interest flickered across Peter’s face and I went to his closet and looked along th
e rack. “Which jacket would you like to wear?”

  He stood beside me and unerringly picked out the shabbiest, the most frayed.

  “Fine,” I said, and waited for him to put it on.

  We went into the corridor together, silent in our separate worlds. No companionship had been established with him, and I knew that. Theo’s destruction was too great for repairs to be made quickly. I was a stranger to him now—someone he was unsure of, someone he distrusted. I wondered if he had seen me when I was so disturbed that what he remembered from the recent past was a little frightening. Now and then he threw me a doubtful look, which might stem from that time, as well as from Theo’s lies about me.

  We found a back door, meeting no one along the way, and let ourselves out onto the long veranda that ran the width of the house and overlooked the ocean. Steps led down in the direction of a white pergola, guarded by a stone greyhound that had once been a favorite of Peter’s. Now he seemed not to see it.

  As with most of these oceanside houses, the trees and formal gardens were around at the front, while the lawns that slanted toward the water were left unplanted so that the wind could do no damage, making green expanses to the sea, with only low shrubbery near the house.

  As we started across the sloping lawn, I spoke to my son quietly. “You must understand that I have been very sick. That’s the only reason why I’ve been away from you. But I’m well again now and I want to be with you.”

  He did not answer, but I sensed that his hostility had not abated. I would have to move gently and give him time to believe in me again. His feet dragged a little as he walked, and I put my hand on his forehead, to find it cool. When I asked him how he felt, he said, “Fine,” but he seemed listless, interested in nothing. Something more than a brief upset had deadened his eagerness for new experiences, his excitement and wonder over daily living that had been so much a part of him.

  I wandered down toward the wall that separated Spindrift property from the Cliff Walk, and he ambled slowly beside me, with no smile on his face.

  For some of the way between Lands End and Ochre Point, the Cliff Walk was in disrepair, and in one place there had been deep erosion, so that the path had to be bypassed, and only the hardy came this far. But we at Spindrift knew how to circumvent the rough, crumbling places of gravel and dirt, and sometimes we still followed the walk. When Peter reached me, he clambered onto the wall and stood sturdily on its top, as I remembered him doing in the past. He didn’t seem weak or sick—I was watching for signs.

  For a long while he stared down toward the rocks where waves were breaking gently, not flinging spray high as they could do in a gale. The sound was soothing and rhythmic, but when he spoke I knew the voice of the ocean had not quieted him.

  “Dad’s brother and sister drowned out there.” He spoke without emotion, matter-of-factly.

  “I know. Did your father tell you about this?”

  “No. Dad won’t talk about it. I asked him and he got very sick-looking and told me not to bother him with questions. Gran told me. She lost two of her children that day, you know. My Uncle Cabot and Aunt Iris. Now she has hardly anybody and that’s why I must stay with her and do what she says.”

  I slipped down from the stone wall on the other side and held out my hand to my son. “Shall we follow the walk for a way?”

  It had been a mistake to hold out my hand, and he ignored it as he hopped down from the wall. We walked side by side, but not really together, picking our way along the broken path.

  Now we could look back and see the great houses stretching along the scalloped ocean front, high above the water, all with an enormous spread of ground around them, each vying in magnificence of stone and brick and marble and timber with its neighbors. We had left Spindrift behind and the house we were passing was closed and neglected. Its roofs pointed upward like pricked ears, and its chimneys made dark slashes into the sky. For some reason I had never liked the look of this particular house and I knew it had a slightly unsavory reputation in the town, though I’d never known exactly why. Theron and Maddy Townsend had once lived here—the close friends of the Patton-Stuyvesants.

  Even from this distance the house suggested the decay that was surely coming unless something was done to save it. Shutters hung askew, there was a great stone urn overturned in the side yard, the verandas sagged and bricks were crumbling here and there, though the main structure still seemed in good condition.

  Peter gave me a sidelong glance. “That’s Redstones. I’m going in there someday. I like places that are old and spooky.”

  “It would be better not to go alone,” I said mildly. “Sometimes floors break through, or ceilings can fall in old places that aren’t kept in repair. There needs to be two people at least, so one could go for help.”

  All his attention was on the abandoned magnificence and he hardly seemed to hear me.

  “The Townsends used to live there. John told me about them.”

  “Who is John?”

  “He’s Grandma Theo’s new gardener, and he’s awfully old. She got him because he knows a lot. His father worked at Redstones when John was a little boy. The Townsends were very rich. He said Mr. Townsend was crazy about collecting old armor and weapons, and he built a special room in the basement, where he kept suits of armor standing all around—just as though men were wearing them. He had lances on the walls and crossbows and swords. He even had a dungeon—just like in a castle.”

  “A dungeon? Whatever for?”

  “Well—a sort of vault. That’s the spooky part. John said it was dug into the floor of the armor room. Maybe he put people into it to punish them.” Again Peter gave me that sidelong glance, as if to see how much I would swallow.

  “That sounds like a flight of fantasy,” I said.

  He paid no attention. “John says it got so servants didn’t want to work for the Townsends any more. They thought the house was haunted. Mr. Townsend was best friends with Mr. Patton-Stuyvesant, who built Spindrift, and John says it was Mr. Patton-Stuyvesant who got Mr. Townsend to board over his dungeon and not use it any more. Then Mrs. Townsend could get people to come and work again. Someday I’m going to explore over there.”

  “I imagine the place is empty of furnishings now,” I said. “Probably all those suits of armor have been sent off to museums by this time. Anyway, I wish you’d take me with you when you go exploring.”

  His look held no liking in it. “I don’t want you. I’d rather go alone.”

  He had become a little cruel, this darling son of mine, but I tried not to let him see me wince. There was nothing more to be said, and I turned back toward Spindrift, knowing that I had lost this particular effort to regain my son. He came with me indifferently and neither of us spoke until we reached the place where we could climb the low stone wall that edged Spindrift’s lawns. Then Peter faced the great white house with a light in his eyes that I hadn’t seen before.

  “Someday all this will belong to me,” he said and I heard the ring of possessive pride in his voice that was an echo of Theo’s. “I’m going to be terribly rich when I grow up, and I won’t have to work or do anything I don’t want to do. Gran says I’m to be her heir—just like in a story. If I stay with her, that is.”

  His words were like a sick blow in the pit of my stomach. This was something to fight with all my strength, yet I had no idea how to counteract so insidious a poisoning. If I had disliked Theo before I hated her now.

  “There are more satisfying things than being rich,” I said quietly.

  “Grandma Theo says money comes first. Then anything else is possible. That’s why Grandpa Adam died—because he didn’t have money enough to pay everybody he owed.”

  I held my breath, held back a wild impulse to shout denials, to denounce Theo. Nothing could be done quickly to cure what had happened to my son, and I had to control my impulse.

  Then, without warning, Peter turned suddenly into the appealing little boy I remembered.

  “Why do people hav
e to die?” he asked, and there was hurt in his voice.

  How do parents answer that question when it comes inevitably? I sought vainly for an acceptable reply and found none—since I didn’t know the answer myself.

  “Everyone has to die,” I said. “Just think how cluttered the earth would be if everyone lived on forever and none of the animals or birds or fish died.”

  He considered that solemnly. “Aunt Iris and Uncle Cabot died,” he said. “And Grandpa Hal and Grandpa Adam.”

  “And all the people who lived before them,” I pointed out. “We all have to take our turn. It’s just that we go at different times and in different ways. It will be a long, long time before you die, Peter.”

  “Even if he didn’t have enough money, why would Grandpa Adam want to kill himself?”

  I was suddenly angry. I knelt on the rough path and put my hands on Peter’s shoulders, looked straight into his eyes, held him when he might have struggled away from me because my sudden move frightened him.

  “Grandpa Adam didn’t kill himself, Peter. Don’t ever believe that. He thought life was wonderful. Even when things went wrong he wanted to fight to make them better, and—”

  “But Grandma Theo says—”

  “I don’t care what she says! It isn’t true, and someday I’ll prove it. Your grandfather was my father and I knew him better than anyone else. He loved living and I know he wouldn’t kill himself.”

  There was a dawning of horror in his eyes that I hadn’t foreseen.

  “But then—if he didn’t—I mean, then someone else must have—”

  Before I could answer that, he twisted from my grasp and ran back along the walk toward Spindrift. I had to let him go. He wanted none of me now. I had shocked him because murder was more dreadful than suicide, and in my anxiety to defend my father I had forgotten the inevitable road his thinking would take.

  As I walked slowly back to the house I tried to tell myself that a beginning at least had been made. But there was no conviction in me. Theo’s damaging influence had gone much further than I’d dreamed, and how I was to counteract that influence I could not yet see. I only knew it had to be done.