Dancing Ladies

by Marilyn Gardiner

  "I can never look at it without remembering Leah as she danced, flirting with the audience, appearing weightless, elfin and magical.” She swallowed down a painful stricture in her throat. “Apparently, she isn't finished dancing through my life."

  "She's beautiful.” Cass said, warily.

  "This is Leah,” Kate said, softly. “My twin. The other half of myself. Can you see—?"

  She broke off with a cry of horror. From each of the statue's eyes trickled a rivulet of moisture. The cheeks were wet.

  Leah was crying!

  Eighteen

  Free Spirit: Lea

  Sometimes called “moth orchid,” up to three inches across with pure white sepals, plump petals, and a buttery yellow throat. Phalaenopsis Amabilis.

  "Leah!” The anguished cry broke from Kate's lips. She took one horrified step back and came up against the hard wall of Cass's chest.

  "Easy. Easy. What the hell is happening?"

  Kate closed her eyes to the sight, and with a moan she turned and buried her face in Cass's shirt. His arms came around her, protecting, shielding.

  "She's hurting. Leah never cried. Never. Until the end. She didn't want anyone to know if she had pain of any kind. She's hurting!"

  "Kate. Honey. I don't know what to say.” His voice wasn't steady. “Shall we cover her up and leave?"

  She shook her head, both fists clenched in his shirt. “No. Give me a minute."

  With great effort Kate pulled herself together and turned, leaning against Cass. The black marble statue stood as before, silently weeping, arms outstretched, butterfly poised.

  What is it, Leah? Don't cry. Please don't cry. Didn't we cry enough tears at the time to last a dozen forevers?

  The overpowering scent of gardenias suddenly filled the small tool shed. Kate stiffened.

  "She's here,” she said. “Leah's here. Can you smell her?"

  Against her back she felt Cass's chest swell as he inhaled. “I don't smell anything,” he answered.

  She slanted a quick look up at him. He shook his head. “Nothing. What do you smell?"

  "Gardenias. Her special scent. She used it all the time. She's here."

  Cass's arms tightened. “She won't hurt you. I won't let anything hurt you."

  Kate shook her head. “She isn't here to hurt me. You don't understand."

  "You got that right.” He expelled a nervous lungful of air. “This is well beyond the league of bending spoons."

  Katey-did. The voice seemed to expand out of thin air and magnify. Kate's heartbeat accelerated. Katey-did-did-did.

  "I'm here, Leah. Talk to me. Tell me."

  Cass's voice rumbled from behind. “You're communicating with her?” he asked in disbelief.

  "I can hear her. Feel her. She's here."

  Careful, Katey-did. Please! Be careful.

  "Careful about what, Leah?"

  Silence.

  "I'm waiting, Leah. Careful about what?"

  Nothing.

  "Why are you crying?” Kate pleaded. “Maybe I can help."

  No! No! It was an agonized wail in Kate's head. Careful, Katey. Be careful.

  Without thinking, only feeling the pain, the fear, in Leah's voice, Kate moved out of Cass's arms and took a step toward the statue. And another. She knelt and reached out a hand, taking the tiny, cold, marble fingers in hers.

  The voice in her head was louder. Tortured. Kate winced.

  Go! Get out! Now! Leave!

  "You want me to leave the shed? Leave here? But why?"

  Go away! Far away! Go now!

  "You want me to leave you and go far away?"

  "Yes!"

  Still holding the hand of the statue, Kate looked up at Cass. She would try and explain later, for the look on his face plainly spoke of his confusion. “She wants us to leave. Do you think the two of us together could lift this statue and put it into the pickup?"

  No! No! No! Go, Katey-did. Careful! Quick! The tears coursed more freely than ever down the cheeks of the statue.

  "But ... I don't want to leave you."

  Yes! Go! Now!

  Reluctantly, Kate rose and took a step back, never taking her eyes from the statue. “She says we should go away. Away from her, the shed, and maybe...” She frowned. “Cass, maybe even away from the house. That's what she said, anyway."

  "Got it.” Cass turned Kate with a hand in the small of her back and propelled her toward the door. “Let's get out of here."

  "But why?” Kate looked over her shoulder.

  "To please her. You said yourself this is what she wanted."

  "I can't leave her."

  "Just go! Katey-did, GO!"

  "But I don't want to go!"

  "Please!"

  Reluctantly, she moved away from the statue, toward the door. Then her feet stopped. She tried to turn back but Cass refused to let her. “If you don't come on your own, I'm going to throw you over my shoulder. We're getting out of here."

  Kate turned away and then swung back. “Leah...” She went cold and stopped dead in her tracks, Cass plowing into her back.

  "What the hell? Move, Kate!"

  "Look. Cass, look. The butterfly—It's gone!"

  Cass hesitated, looking over his shoulder. “My God. It's disappeared."

  For one stunned second they both stared at the statue, the small finger bare, then Cass opened the door and abruptly thrust her outside and into the storm. The wind and rain caught them with a vengeance. With Cass's arm around her they fought their way across the yard, past the rose bush and the wildly gyrating swing and into the house.

  "Wait!” Kate shouted, as Cass was about to shut the door. “Babe is out there."

  He looked out at the storm and the wind and the night and shook his head. “He'd never hear us calling. We'll keep watch at the doors if he comes home."

  "He's never been loose. The gate must have been left open. Max ... I don't know what he'll do if Babe is lost."

  "He'll come home. He's probably taken shelter under someone's porch."

  Kate pulled her dripping hair back with one hand and held it at the nape of her neck. She turned toward the bathroom. “Let me get a couple of towels for us to dry off and..."

  Without warning they were plunged into profound darkness.

  "Well hell!” Cass said from somewhere across the room, in the dark. “There went the power. Hope the oil lamp is where you can get at it."

  With the aid of the flashlight, but somehow, hampered by a feeling of impending doom, she was able to locate the oil lamp in the pantry and light it. They set it in the middle of the kitchen table and looked at each other across the flickering flame.

  "Now what?” Cass asked.

  Something was going to happen. Kate knew it. And apparently Leah knew it, too. “Leah wants us to leave. Get out, she said, and I think she meant out of the house."

  "Best news I've had all night. Let's go."

  "But why? She didn't say why."

  "I don't know why, but I like the way she thinks, in this instance anyway. Come on. The way it's raining the lake might overflow. And in that case I don't like our chances here."

  "Cass, I don't want to go anywhere."

  Clearly frustrated, Cass came around the table and took her in his arms. With his chin resting on her head, he rocked back and forth.

  "I know you don't. And I know this is hard. But I think we need to go as Leah said, no questions asked. Let me get you out of here if only for the night. Please Kate. Don't dig in your heels on this. Just until morning. Okay?"

  Finally, she nodded. “Until morning. Okay. But I have to take a few things. I can't go without—” She drew away. “Where will we go? Bree and Max think I'm here."

  "We'll call them and let them know where we are when we get there. My house is the obvious place at this point, but we'll discuss it when...

  Suddenly, the night was split by a loud siren. Kate's mouth went dry. The sound undulated louder and fading, louder and fading, for several seconds before Ca
ss moved.

  "That's the disaster signal from the top of the water tower. It's pulsing and that means evacuate. Something big is threatening. Likely the levee. Let's go."

  Heart pounding, Kate ran for the stairs. “I'm not going without..."

  "Without what? There's no time for anything. Kate!"

  But Kate was already halfway up the stairs. She called, “Grab as many orchids as you can handle from the table in the sun room and take them to the truck, will you? I'll be right behind you."

  Within minutes she was down the stairs carrying a full laundry basket. She stopped only long enough to snatch the package ready for mailing to Joe Kinicki from the table, lift the portrait of herself and Leah from the wall and stuff the new Sharrie Baby orchid pot down the side of the basket. Slamming the front door closed, she fled down the steps and to the pickup with the siren still screaming in her ears.

  She was filled with a wild terror. The sounds of the night were so loud she felt deaf. The rising wind. The harsh clash from the neighbor's wind chimes. The keening in her own throat that she couldn't quite stop.

  Cass had the engine running and his cell phone in his hand. “It's rained five inches in the last hour to the northeast and the levee's been breached up river. We've got to get out of here."

  "Max!” she cried, dumping the basket behind the seat in the club cab, climbing into the pickup, and slicking back her rain-drenched hair from her face all in one movement.

  "Bree's apartment complex is on high ground, to the east, well away from the river. They're okay, but you'd better call. I already called Stace."

  Kate dug in her purse for the cell phone and punched in Bree's number.

  "We're okay,” Bree said, striving for an even tone. “Don't worry about us. But you get out of the valley. Fast."

  "Right. We're on our way. Call me, will you, if anything changes?"

  "Sure. Just go, Kate! Go!"

  It was what Leah had said. They went.

  Cass gunned the engine and tromped on the gas pedal. “I called the police station. They estimate the water will be over our own levee in ten minutes, tops. My house is in as much danger as yours so we'll head for Shooter's Hill. It's the nearest high ground. Hang on."

  It seemed that everyone in town was trying to leave. Cars were thick on Main Street, swerving, trying to hurry, their drivers half-blinded by the sheeting rain. Limbs were down, trash lay in the streets, and water pooled in the roadways so that in some spots traffic was slowed to a standstill.

  "Can you see?” Kate asked, peering through the windshield.

  "Not much.” He was hunched over the wheel. “If you spot anything in the road, yell."

  The relentless rain poured down as the windshield wipers slapped ineffectually back and forth.

  "There're the Junes!” Kate pointed. The license plate could belong to no one else. “And all the dogs are in the back seat."

  "Yup. WUPEDO's hard to miss!” Both Cass's hands gripped the wheel and his eyes focused on the road. He negotiated the flooded street in water well up the hub caps of the pickup.

  "It looks like Babe in the back seat. I think it's Babe! It is Babe! They found him!"

  As they cleared the city limits, the congestion lessened. One line of traffic headed west onto the Interstate, but Cass turned north onto a country road. Though she couldn't see well, Kate had an impression of ditches beside the road flowing with a hard, fast current. From time to time Cass slowed to a crawl as they made their way through water standing across the highway.

  "Dangerous to do this—we don't know how deep it is,” he muttered. “But we have no choice. We have to get further away from the river and to a higher elevation."

  Kate clung to the door and willed them through.

  The road narrowed to a single lane bordered on both sides by so much water they couldn't see dry land. The flooded fields lapped at the blacktop. For the first time, Kate was truly afraid they might not make it to the hill.

  When, finally, the road began to climb, fields that had become lakes vanished and trees began to appear beside them. Cass relaxed somewhat and put out a hand to grip Kate's. “We'll be fine. And so will Max. Don't worry. We're okay."

  "I know.” Kate said through chattering teeth.

  "Just pray we make it up Shooter's Hill."

  Visibility was so poor Kate could only guess how Cass kept the truck on the road. Rain poured on the roof so hard and loud it was necessary to shout to be heard. Cass squeezed her hand for a moment before gripping the wheel again.

  "Are you cold? I know you're wet, but it's warm."

  "Just scared, I think. And wishing I'd had another five minutes to collect things from the house."

  "I have a couple of blankets and an almost full thermos of coffee behind the seat. And,” he shook his head ruefully, “a magnificent door that won't be worth spit if I don't have a house in which to hang it when dawn breaks."

  "Oh Cass! I never thought about the house you're building. It's almost done! Will you lose everything?"

  "It might be okay. It's on the other side of town, away from the river, but we'll have to wait until dawn to see. And yeah, I'll lose a bundle if the house goes, but not everything."

  "What about your own house?"

  He shrugged. “It isn't all that far away from yours. We might lose them both, Kate. You need to be prepared for that."

  She slumped back in the seat and peered sightlessly out the windshield. The wipers did little to clear vision, anyway. Her house, her home, might be gone before morning. Her haven, with no mortgage. All her mother's beautiful furniture, some antiques, her own silk frames ... The list grew. Her grandmother's sewing table. Grandpa's ball peen hammer that he'd given her when she was five years old. She'd used it as she followed him the around house puttering at odd jobs. The dollhouse in the attic she and Leah had played with and loved with all their little-girl hearts. The rose and lily beds. Her orchids. Oh God, her orchids. So much. She would lose so very much.

  She stared out the windshield, unable to look at Cass. They had each other. That was the most important thing. They were all safe and not riding the roof of a house down a rampaging river.

  To fill the silence she had to say something. Words. Normal words. “I'm not totally sure that was Babe in the back seat. If not, he's still out in this, somewhere. We'll never find him."

  "I'll look for him the first chance I get. He's likely all right. Try and think that, anyway."

  They were on a gravel road now, steadily climbing. Trees whipped wildly above them, blotting out the sky. Gusting wind pummeled the truck, rocking it alarmingly. Cass hung on to the wheel and eased up even more on the gas pedal.

  If possible the rain came down harder than ever. It was like driving through a waterfall. Solid sheets of water. The windshield wipers were useless.

  "Where are we?"

  "Almost up Shooter's Hill."

  "Isn't Shooter's Hill where we used to bring sleds in the winter and shoot down the incline?” Kate knew she was chattering, but didn't care. Talking helped. “It was the steepest hill anywhere near. Never thought it would turn out to be a safe haven in a flood. That's also where we looked at the stars from the back of the pickup. Right?"

  "Right. Only we were on the other side of the hill.” He spared her a quick glance with one raised eyebrow. “Quite a view. There used to be a spot about half way up the bluff ... Yes, right here.” He cranked the wheel, hard, and they were off the road at an angle and stopped.

  No landmarks were visible through the storm and the wail of the wind and the pounding of the sheeting rain was more pronounced than ever. Sound seemed magnified within the confines of the cab.

  "This is an overhang where, on a good day, you can look over the entire valley. I figure we'll have a bird's eye view when there's light enough to see."

  He backed the pickup into the side of the hill. They were almost snuggled into the trees and brush with a narrow opening to one side. “We'll be protected here from the worst of the
weather and a possible tornado, should there be one."

  "I don't remember this."

  "Just built it about five years ago. There are some picnic tables off to the side. It's a nice little park. On a good day."

  He stretched out an arm back of the seat and came up with the thermos of coffee. “Here, have some. It'll warm your innards, as my dad used to say."

  Kate poured the hot liquid into the lid of the cup and they took turns sipping from it. Long minutes passed while she tried to absorb what was happening. A flood was coming. Was already here. In the dark. In the night. And her house might be washed away. No, probably had already been washed away. Her house and everything in it.

  Yet despite all this, she was filled with a sense of enormous relief at being safe. She and Cass were okay, and Max was with Bree. And Stacey was with her mom in a high rise across the river. She prayed the Junes had escaped to high ground as well. All the important people in her life.

  As if he'd read her mind, Cass asked, “What did you bring from the house? In the basket that you shouldn't have taken time to fill,” he added wryly.

  She sighed and brought her mind back from wandering out over the edge of the overhang, over the blackness of the abyss that might, even at this moment, be filling with muddy, black river water.

  "Max's clown pillow. The one his grandma made him when he was a baby. He sleeps with it every night. Lambie. A photo album, mostly pictures of Max as a baby.” Kate wrapped her arms around her waist and took a deep breath. “A couple of orchids, including the Sharry Baby you brought me tonight. The silk I just finished for Joe. It's ready for mailing and means a fat commission. I scooped in all the paints I could reach in a hurry, and brushes. And two packages of silk I haven't even opened yet. Two containers of Max's matchbox cars. I balanced the portrait of Leah and me on top of the whole thing."

  She was silent for a moment. “Not much really."

  "You got the important stuff. But you wanted to bring Leah's statue."

  "I hated to leave her.” She turned in her seat to face him. “Cass, do you think it possible that she was trying to warn me all along of the coming flood? That somehow she knew and was afraid for me? I'd like to think that."