Love, or the Witches of Windward Circle

by Carlos Allende

  The first elbowed the second. Rosa had overheard them.

  “You must be strong. For your daughters,” a kinder soul said to the drunkard.

  “I’ll find a job,” the man announced, standing tall among the mourners. “I’ll become a gondolier and I’ll provide for them! I’ll give them everything they never had, to honor my wife’s memory.”

  Rosa and Victoria bobbed their heads, extolling his decision.

  “We’ll be good girls, too,” they said, with mournful faces.

  “We’ll be kinder to each other, and to our youngest sister.”

  “We’ll attend Church every Sunday. We’ll never fail, we promise.”

  Hard to believe, but they meant it. Their mother’s death had been quite a traumatic experience. In particular, the brutish way in which the house familiar had tried to sequester her to the netherworld had frightened them immensely.

  “We will never again attend the Sabbath,” Victoria hissed to her sister.

  Rosa nodded.

  “We will abandon the study of dark magic,” Victoria continued, making sure no one could hear them. “We will break our vows of fidelity with the Dark Lord and start over.”

  “But we’re his wives.”

  “We’ll get an annulment.”

  After the funeral the priest had a private word with the drunkard and warned him about the peril in which the three girls were, without the guidance of a loving mother. With tears in his eyes, the man repeated the promises he had made before and the priest left the house with the satisfaction that after the tragedy, there was still hope for the family.

  But hours later the man was drunk again, sleeping it off by their front door. The young girl attempted to wake him up and get him to go sit with them for dinner. He responded by throwing a punch to her nose.

  “We can’t stay here,” Victoria cried from the table, aghast.

  “He’ll never get a job,” Rosa responded.

  “He’ll ruin our chances to marry.”

  “We’ll end up selling ourselves on the streets to survive.”

  Victoria sank her face into her hands and started crying.

  “I know what we should do,” Rosa said. “We should write to our godparents!” The idea had just occurred to her. “Aren’t godparents supposed to take care of helpless orphans? We will ask them to take us in. We’ve been far too seen in Venice. I’ll move to England, with the fairy, and you’ll move to Los Angeles, with Harris. And—” she interrupted herself, as she and her sister usually did before referring to their little sister, “she could move to wherever the vampire lives, if he takes her—which I very much doubt. Who in the world would want her?”

  “The vampire lives in New York.”

  The young girl, sitting on the opposite side of the table holding a glass full of cold water against her swollen nose, raised her head. She knew nothing about her godfather.

  “New York?” Rosa asked, intrigued. “That cannot be better than living in a castle, can it? My godfather is a fairy from Gloucestershire. What do you think?”

  “Not a terrible idea,” Victoria said. “Harris is quite handsome.”

  “Looks aren’t everything, sister. I pity you. A werewolf living in an apartment.” Rosa served herself some more soup. “Don’t take me wrong, I like Harris and all. I do think he’s handsome. But my godfather lives in a brugh. That’s Gaelic, for castle. The furniture is all velvet and gold. The walls are mother of pearl. The doorknobs are made of diamonds. And he’s almost two thousand years old. You can’t compare.”

  Victoria replied with the condescending tone that elder sisters love to use: “In comparison, yes, Harris is poor. The fairy is the wisest and the most powerful. You are right. But the richest of all our godfathers is hers,” she used her spoon to point at her youngest sister. “The richest one is the vampire.”

  The young girl gasped in surprise. She put down the glass of cold water. The man who had presented her at baptism was a vampire; that’s all she had ever known. He lives in New York? And he’s rich? Richer than the English fairy? These things were unbeknownst to her. How could she have a godfather if she didn’t have a name?

  “That cannot be,” Rosa retorted, pretending to laugh. “My godfather lives in a beautiful castle built on the roots of a sycamore tree.”

  “Yes, with the walls made of mother of pearl and doorknobs made out of diamonds,” Victoria continued. “But dust of diamonds. His brugh is a small hole in somebody’s yard. The dome of his grand salon is the shell of an acorn. The tapestries on its walls were loomed with the barbs of just one feather. You’d be living all curled up, exposed to the elements, for nothing larger than the tip of your little toe could fit inside his teeny little castle. If I remember well, the vampire lives in a life-size mansion.”

  “He cannot be richer than a fairy, can he?” Rosa squealed.

  He couldn’t, the young girl agreed. Fairies had more money than the pope in Rome. Why would a rich and powerful vampire care to present her at baptism? Perhaps he wasn’t a true vampire but a goblin.

  “But he is,” Victoria replied. She took another spoonful of her soup. “He is immensely rich. He is a member of the aristocracy. He was born many centuries ago, in the old continent, and made his fortune marrying mortal princesses. He has so many nobility titles that his full name takes an entire page of his passport.”

  “How do you know that?” Rosa shrieked.

  “Mamá told me,” Victoria responded with a straight face.

  “No!” Rosa cried. Her face had turned red and tears threatened to roll down her cheeks. “My godfather is the richest and the most powerful of the three. You stupid hag. You’re just saying this to hurt me! My godfather is an English fairy, for God’s sake! A fairy! His name is Gillespie Oakenforest, and he lives in a brugh with walls of gold and mother of pearl in Gloucestershire. He has an army of magical servants! One of his wives is related to the king!”

  “Is she?” Victoria asked, feigning surprise.

  “She is a distant cousin of King Edward.”

  “King Edward?” Victoria repeated. “If that’s so, she must be very short. When was the last time you saw him, sister? I’ve never met him. Has he ever come visit us? Harris has. At least a few times. We went to his wedding.”

  At this, Rosa threw her spoon at her sister, but she failed. Victoria reached over the table and smacked Rosa on the nose with her full palm.

  Rosa covered her face with her hands, sobbing quietly. She had a good reason to cry, other than getting boxed. Her sister was right; in sixteen years, Mr. Oakenforest had never visited or even sent so much as a postcard.

  “You are just one among hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of godchildren that Lord Oakenforest has,” Victoria explained, at this point truly pitying her sister. “Mamá wanted the best for us, and that’s why she asked him to be your godfather. He just happened to be in our garden the day they met. You are not that special. That, on the other hand,” Victoria pointed again to her youngest sister, “may inherit millions.”

  The young girl almost fainted.

  “Millions?” Rosa repeated twitching her face.

  “The vampire does not have any children.”

  They started their letters: Rosa and Victoria on beautiful stationery that they bought especially for that purpose; our nameless girl on the back of an old receipt.

  To whom should she address the letter? The young girl wondered. She didn’t know her godfather’s name. She didn’t know anything but what Victoria had said at the table. Too afraid to ask, she simply wrote “To HRH The Vampire, My Godfather.”

  And what should she say to him? Please take me with you sounded too desperate, but that’s exactly what she wanted to say. Take me away from this family, away from all their mistreatment, away from the yelling, the beating, the insults, the taunting, the mockeries, and the derisions; away from
the hard days of doing chores cleaning up after her sisters, away from the ridicule of the freak show, away from everywhere. But why would he? Vampires aren’t particularly fond of ugly little girls, are they? She decided to write the facts as they were, without adornment. Mamá died, she wrote, and now my sisters and I are practically alone in this world, for the man we call father is an irresponsible drunk unable to provide. She scratched irresponsible. Then she scratched drunk.

  She thought she could finalize with a request to move in with him. But what if the vampire thought that she was only contacting him because of his money? She couldn’t be that direct. He might take offense and decide not to respond to her letter. She wrote instead that she would love to hear from him, and that if he had the time, he should visit. I know how to bake a delicious pineapple upside down cake, she wrote. If you ever come to Venice, I can bake one for you to try.

  That would do. Letting him know that she existed was sufficient. Vampires aren’t stupid. He would guess what a terrible existence she had and send for her.

  Since she had no name herself, she signed with an X. If nothing else, the sender’s address would tell her godfather who the letter was from.

  Finally, because she didn’t know where to send it, the young girl simply wrote New York on the envelope. Vampires live in secret, she reckoned, so it would be poor taste to write that title on the envelope. She gave the letter to Rosa in hopes that she would know where to send it.

  “I know where he lives,” Rosa responded. “But I doubt he will respond.”

  Two days later, a package appeared at their door with Rosa’s name written in fancy red letters. Inside, the sisters found a magnificent dress made of spider silk with thousands of fly wings embroidered with golden stitches. There was nothing else in the box—no card and no letter—but they knew instantly it could only be a gift from the English fairy. Only he could have responded that fast and send such an expensive present. The dress shone as bright as if the fabric had been spun out of moonbeaMs. It was the most beautiful garment they had ever laid their eyes on, and so light that if you threw it into the air, it took a full ten minutes for it to float down and hit the ground.

  Rosa immediately tried on the dress, announcing to her sisters that maybe it would magically transport her to her godfather’s castle. It didn’t, and that was a true disappointment. The three girls knew well what the gift meant: a polite and awfully expensive way to say no, I cannot bring you into my tiny castle.

  Hence, Rosa lied. She closed her eyes and reopened them a second later: “My!” she exclaimed. “It feels good to be back home after having spent an entire year at my godfather’s castle!”

  Victoria and the nameless young girl exchanged a look of incredulity.

  “My dearest sisters,” Rosa continued with an affected tone, “I am so happy to see you! Especially you, Victoria. You haven’t changed one bit in all these months. I’m so terribly happy to be back, but so seriously tired too, for I spent most of that time attending elegant balls and hunting. Do pull up a chair for me to sit on, darling,” she begged her youngest sister. The young girl did as requested.

  “I have so much to tell,” Rosa continued, sitting down. “I witnessed so many riches and talked to so many elegant ladies at my godfather’s brugh—the silk, the rubies and diamonds! But first, my dearest, you need to bring me up to date. What has happened during my twelve-month absence? How’s that awful man we call father? Is he still alive? Did you ever got a response from your godfathers?”

  Victoria replied that nothing had happened, that she had never left the room.

  “Wonder of wonders,” was Rosa’s response. “Magically transported to and from my godfather’s brugh in an instant. An entire year in Albion in less than one second. Bloody bollocks,” she added, trying to sound British. “Cockles and mussels, Virgin of Brighton, isn’t that proof of Lord Oakenforest’s infinite power?”

  Victoria didn’t, but everyone else bought her nonsense.

  “Why did he send you back?” their friends at the Boardwalk asked.

  “I chose to come back. I missed you girls terribly.”

  “Did you go to London?” asked O’Leary.

  “A few times. And every time the weather was rubbish.”

  In any case, what a gorgeous, beautiful sight it was to see Rosa wearing that dress! Victoria laughed when she saw her dancing, and not with the bitter sneer common to antagonistic sisters, but truly content at Rosa’s gaiety.

  Even the drunkard had a compliment for her. “You look nice,” he said. “You remind me of the Blessed Virgin.”

  The young girl yipped in delight every time she saw Rosa standing against the afternoon light coming through the window. She truly looked like a Marian apparition, the young girl thought, feeling happy for her sister, especially now that Rosa referred to her no longer as a stinky ass but as a “dahling.” “Dahling” here and “dahling” there; Rosa still treated her like a servant, but it was nice to be given orders in a sweeter tone, accompanied with an affected “please” and followed afterwards by a “thank you.” Maybe she too would receive a dress like that sometime soon, the young girl dared to think. Maybe she too would be magically transported to New York in an instant. But, no, she wouldn’t come back. Not for the love of nothing. Not after one year, not after twenty. Not to this horrible house and not to this city. Not ever. Wonder of wonders, she kept repeating to herself, examining up close the fine embroidery in her sister’s dress but not too close as to actually touch it. She only needed to be patient.

  Rosa forwent mourning attire and wore the dress every day and every night for a full ten days. She became the best dressed debutante in Venice; the most photographed, and the most solicited. Alas, the dress was so delicate it tore apart on the eleventh day, when she tried to wash it—more tears, more fists thrown into the air, and more heartbreaking drama!

  Thank God she had not been appointed with the task to wash it, the young girl thought with horror. Rosa would have killed her.

  A few days later, they received a telegram from Harris: “‘Magnolia and I delighted to have you,’” Victoria read aloud. “‘Rosa welcome too.’”

  Anticipating that the fairy may not give a favorable response to her sister, Victoria had asked her godparents to also take Rosa.

  “We fight, but we are the best of friends too, aren’t we? It would break my heart to live away from you. I wouldn’t wait a year to come back if I couldn’t take you. I wouldn’t ever leave if it was without my favorite sister.”

  Rosa was stupefied. She would have preferred to move to England, of course, and Venice was still fun—the beach, the rides, the dance halls and the gaming houses—but it couldn’t compare to the thrill of living in the burgeoning city of Los Angeles, “a city of over three hundred thousand,” Victoria said, “a size commendable enough to justify our presence.”

  Rosa begged for a tissue to clean up her nose. She was moved.

  “Magnolia is a bore,” Victoria continued, “but Harris is a lot of fun. What do we have to lose? We’ve worn out all our welcomes in Venice. In the city, we will be incredibly happy!”

  What other choice she had? Rosa said yes.

  They obtained their father’s permission—it took only one trip to the liquor store—under the condition that the youngest would stay behind to take care of him and of the house.

  “But she wasn’t invited,” the girls laughed.

  They packed their bags, said good-bye to a few friends and acquaintances, and that same afternoon they took the Red Car to Los Angeles.

  In little over an hour the two of them were trudging up the hill on Olive Street, singing Christmas carols (in mid-September!) and congratulating each other on their good fortune.

  “We’ll go to the theatre every day,” Rosa commented, admiring the majesty of the high rises along their way.

  “And to the opera,” Victoria stroked a
column made of alabaster with the tip of her fingers.

  “And to the shops on Broadway.”

  Back then Bunker Hill was a petit paradis, a Mount Olympus on the outskirts of the city, full of tall apartment buildings, houses with intricate window frames, turrets, steep pitched roofs, and dainty rose gardens, all less than a five minute walk away from Central Park (today’s Pershing Square), a more suitable place, the two sisters reckoned, than Windward Avenue or the Boardwalk to trap a husband.

  “I’m going to marry a millionaire,” said Rosa.

  Why wouldn’t she? Los Angeles was full of millionaires!

  “So will I,” replied Victoria.

  “I will marry first, though. My husband and I will live in a two-story house with a grand salon and a piano.”

  “We’ll have to be good,” Victoria reminded her sister one last time before they knocked the door.

  “Of course.”

  “Amenable,” Victoria adjusted her skirt. “Courteous—” she pinched her and her sister’s cheeks to make them look healthier. “And well mannered.”

  “We’ll be so happy!”

  “Happier that we ever were at the beach.”

  “Happier than we would have ever been doing witchcraft.”

  They had done one last thing before they left Venice that afternoon, their little sister found out when she entered to clean their bedroom: They had gotten rid of all their magic supplies: the dolls, the rusty knives, the books of incantations. Everything was gone. Everything the young girl had hoped to inherit. She ran downstairs to search in the mother’s closet. All of her notes, all of her potions, they had left nothing behind but a few worthless items.

  “Welcome!” Harris hollered from the second floor window. “Welcome to Los Angeles,” he repeated one minute later, opening the downstairs door and lifting up both girls at the same time.

  My, Harris was handsome! A well trimmed beard, a curled mustache, and just the right amount of hair coming out from his chest and arms to make a lady tremble, victim of her own lustful imagination.

  He put the girls down and kissed both of them twice on the cheeks. He had the manners of a French gentleman and the build of an Irish boxer.