“Oh, no . . .” I was shocked, thinking I didn’t know Jory nearly as well as I’d thought.
“Don’t blame him; it was my own doing. Dancing was his world,” Melodie continued in a gasping way, as if she’d been running uphill for weeks. “I shouldn’t have done what I did. I told him I’d just forgotten. I knew on our wedding day that dancing came first with him, and I was second. He never lied or told me differently, though he loved me. Then, because I was pregnant, we abandoned our tour, came here . . . and look what happened! It’s not fair, Cathy, not fair! On this very day we’d be in London but for the baby. He’d be on stage, bowing, accepting the applause, the bouquets, doing what he was born for. I tricked him, and in so doing, I brought about his accident, and what’s he going to do now? How can I make up for what I’ve stolen from him?”
She trembled all over as I held her. What could I say? I bit down on my lip, hurting for her, for Jory. We were so much alike in some ways, for I’d caused Julian’s death by deserting him, leaving him in Spain—and that had led to his end. Never deliberately harming, just coincidentally doing what I felt was right, as Melodie did what she considered right.
Who ever counted the flowers that died when we pulled up the weeds? I shook my head, pulling myself out of the abyss of yesterdays and turned my full concentration on the moment.
“Melodie, Jory’s just as scared as you are, much more so, and with good reason. You aren’t to blame for anything. He’s happy about the baby now that it’s on its way. Many men protest when wives want babies, but when they see the child they helped create, they’re won over. He lies there on his bed, as you lie on yours, wondering how his marriage is going to work out now that he can’t dance. He’s the one who is crippled. He’s the one who has to face up to everyday life, knowing he’ll be unable to sit when he wants to; knowing he can’t sit in a regular chair and get up and down when he feels like it; nor can he walk in the rain, or run on the grass, or even go to the bathroom in a normal way.
“All the simple normal everyday things he took for granted will now be very difficult for him. And think of what he was. This is a terrible blow to his pride. He wasn’t even going to try and cope for fear he’d burden you too much. But listen to this. This afternoon when I was with him, he said he was going to make a big effort to cheer up and lift himself out of his depression. And he will. He’ll make it, and a lot of it will be because you’ve helped by just visiting and sitting there with him. Each time you go you convince him you still love him.”
Why did she draw from my arms and turn her face away? I watched her brush the tears from her face impatiently; then she blew her nose and tried to stop crying.
With effort she spoke again. “I don’t know what it is, but I keep having scary dreams. I wake up frightened, thinking something even more dreadful is going to happen. There’s something weird about this house. Something strange and frightening. When everyone is gone, and Bart is in his office, and Joel is praying in that ugly, bare room, I lie on my bed and seem to hear the house whispering. It seems to call to me. I hear the wind blow as if it’s trying to tell me something. I hear the floor squeak outside my door so I jump up and race to throw open the door—and no one is there, no one is ever there. I suspect it’s only my imagination, but I hear, as you’ve said you do sometimes, so much of what isn’t real. Am I losing my mind, Cathy? Am I?”
“Oh, Melodie,” I murmured, trying to draw her close again, but she put me off by moving to the far end of the sofa.
“Cathy, why is this house different?”
“Different from what?” I asked uneasily.
“From all other houses.” She glanced fearfully toward the door to the hall. “Don’t you feel it? Can’t you hear it? Do you sense this house is breathing, like it has a life of its own?”
My eyes widened as a chill stole the comfort from my pretty sitting room. In the bedroom I could faintly hear Chris’s regular, heavy breathing.
Melodie, usually too reticent to talk, gushed onward breathlessly. “This house wants to use the people inside as a way to keep it living on forever. It’s like a vampire, sucking our lifeblood from all of us. I wish it hadn’t been restored. It’s not a new house. It’s been here for centuries. Only the wall-paper and the paint and the furniture are new, but those stairs in the foyer I never climb up or descend without seeing the ghosts of others . . .”
A kind of paralyzing numbness gripped me.
Every word she said was only too frighteningly true. I could hear it breathe! I tried to pull myself back to reality. “Listen, Melodie. Bart was only a little boy when my mother ordered it reconstructed on the foundations of the old manor home. Before she died it was up, but not completely finished inside. When her will was read, and she left this house to Bart, with Chris as trustee to manage until he came of age, we decided it was a waste not to have it completed. Chris and our attorney contacted the architects and contractors, and the job went forward until it was finished, only the inside needed furbishing. That had to wait until Bart came here in his college days and ordered the interior decorators to style it as it had been in the old days. And you’re right. I, too, wish this house had been left in ashes . . .”
“Maybe your mother knew this house was what Bart would want most to give him confidence. It’s so imposing. Haven’t you noticed how much he’s changed? He’s not like the little boy who used to hide away in the shadows and lurk behind trees. He’s the master here, like a baron overseeing his domain. Or maybe I should say king of the mountain, for he’s so rich, so terribly rich . . .”
Not yet . . . not yet, I kept thinking. Nevertheless, her frail, whispering voice disturbed me. I didn’t want to think Bart was as overbearing as a medieval lord. But she went on. “Bart’s happy, Cathy, extraordinarily happy. He tells me he’s sorry about Jory. Then he telephones those attorneys and wants to know why they keep postponing the rereading of his grandmother’s will. They’ve told him they can’t read it unless everyone mentioned in the will is here to hear the reading, and so they put it off until the day when Jory comes home from the hospital. They will read the will in Bart’s office.”
“How do you know so much about Bart’s business?” I asked sharply, suddenly very suspicious of all that time when she was alone in this house with my second son . . . and an old man who spent most of his time in that tiny, naked room he used as a chapel. Joel would quite happily see Jory destroyed if that would satisfy Bart. In Joel’s eyes a dancing man was no better than the worst sinner, displaying his body. Leaping and bounding in front of women, wearing nothing but a loincloth . . . I stared again at Melodie.
“Do you and Bart spend much time together?”
Quickly she stood. “I’m tired now, Cathy. I’ve said enough to make you think I’m crazy. Do all expectant mothers have such fearful dreams—did you? I’m afraid, too, that my baby won’t be normal since I’ve grieved so much for Jory.”
I gave her what comfort I could when I felt sick inside, and later that night while I lay beside Chris I began to toss and turn, to flit in and out of nightmares, until he wakened and pleaded with me to let him get some sleep. Turning, I wrapped my arms about him, clinging to him as if to some unsinkable raft—as I’d always clung to the only straw that kept me from drowning in the cruel sea of Foxworth Hall.
Homecoming
Finally the decorators I’d hired to do over Jory’s suite of rooms were finished. Now everything there was planned for his entertainment and comfort and convenience. With Melodie beside me, we stood and surveyed all that had been done to make the room bright and cheerful.
“Jory likes color and lots of light, unlike some who want only darkness because it’s richer appearing,” explained Melodie with a strange look haunting her eyes. Of course I knew she meant Bart. I gave her a quizzical look, wondering again how much time she spent with Bart, and what they talked about, and if he’d tried anything. Certainly all that wistful yearning I’d seen in his eyes would force him to make advances. And what better t
ime than while Jory was away and Melodie was desperately needing? Then my safety valve turned on . . . Melodie despised Bart. She might need him to talk to, but that was all.
“Tell me what else I can do to help,” I said, wanting her to do most of it so she’d feel needed, useful. In response she smiled for the first time with some show of happiness. “You can help me make the bed with the pretty new sheets I ordered.” She ripped open the plastic wrappings, the movement making her fuller breasts jiggle. Her jeans were just beginning to show a slight bulge.
I was almost as worried about her as I was about Jory. An expectant mother needed to eat more, drink milk, take vitamins, and then there was this unexpected reversal of her former heavy depression. She was now completely accepting of Jory’s unhappy situation. It was what I had wanted, yet it had come about too quickly, and that gave me the feeling it was false.
Then came an explanation of her newfound security. “Cathy, Jory’s going to get well and dance again. I dreamed last night he was, and my dreams always come true.”
Now I knew she was going to do what I’d done in the beginning, convince herself that Jory would recover someday, and on that kind of fantasy she was going to construct her life—and his.
I started to speak, to say what Chris had to me, but Bart stepped into the hallway outside, his large feet clumping heavily down the long, dim hall. He glowered at the once dark paneling that was now painted off white so that painting of the sea and shore would show up beautifully. Easy enough to see he was displeased with our changes.
“We did it to please Jory,” I said before he could object, while Melodie stood silent and stared at him with the wide-eyed, helpless look of a child caught in a sticky situation. “I know you want your brother to be happy, and no one loves the sea, the surf, the sand, and seabirds more than Jory. So, into this room we’re putting a bit of the sea and shore—giving him the knowledge that all the important things in life will still exist for him. The sky above, the earth below, and the sea in between. He’s not going to lack for anything, Bart. He’s going to have what it takes to keep him alive and happy, and I know you want to do your part.”
He was staring at Melodie, not half listening to me. His eyes riveted to those larger breasts, moving to study the curve of the baby swelling her belly. “Melodie, you could have come to me and asked before you did anything, since I’m the one who’ll pay the bills.” I was completely ignored, as if I weren’t there at all.
“Oh, no,” denied Melodie. “Jory and I have money. We can pay for the changes we’ve made in here . . . and I didn’t think you would mind since you seem so concerned about him.”
“You don’t have to pay for anything,” said Bart with surprising warmth. “The day Jory comes home, attorneys will be coming in the afternoon to read the will again, and this time I’ll know exactly my full worth. I’m damned sick and tired of having that day postponed.”
“Bart,” I said, stepping so I was between him and Melodie, “you know why they haven’t reread the will. They want Jory to be here and fully cognizant of what’s going on.”
He walked around me to deliberately lock his eyes with the huge, sad ones of Melodie. He spoke to her and her alone. “You just tell me what you need, and I’ll deliver it yesterday. You and Jory can stay as long as you like.”
They stood staring at each other across twenty feet of sea-blue velvet carpeting. Bart’s dark eyes probed into her blue ones before he said softly, winningly, “Don’t worry so much, Melodie. You and Jory have a home here forever if you want. I don’t really give a damn what you do with these rooms. I do want Jory to be as comfortable and happy as possible.”
Were they formula words to satisfy me—or calculated words to seduce her? Why did Melodie blush and gaze down at her feet?
Cindy’s tale resounded like distant church bells in my memory. Insurance for all the guests . . . in case of accidents. Wet sand that should have been dry sand. Sand that clumped into cement and didn’t instantly pour out to make the papiermâché columns safe.
Into my thoughts flitted memories of Bart when he was seven, eight, nine, and ten . . .
Wish I had legs as pretty as Jory’s. Wish I could run and dance like Jory. Gonna grow taller, gonna grow much bigger, gonna be more powerful than Jory. Someday. Someday.
Bart’s mumbling boyhood wishes, said so many times I’d grown indifferent to them. Then when he was older . . .
Who is gonna love me, like Melodie loves Jory? Nobody. Nobody.
I shook my head to rid myself of unwelcome memories of a little boy wanting to equal the stature of his older and more talented brother.
But why was he looking now at Melodie with such significance? Her blue eyes lifted to meet his briefly; then she looked away, blushing again, positioning her hands in the ballet position all dancers used to keep from drawing attention away from the main performer—her feed toed out. On stage, Melodie was on stage, playing a role.
Bart strode off, his legs confident and sure, as they’d never been when he was a young boy. I felt sad and sorry he had to wait until he was out of Jory’s shadow before he could find even the ability to use his body coordination with skill. Sighing, I decided to think of the present and all that had been done to give Jory’s convalescence the perfect environment.
A large color TV was at the foot of his bed, and he had a remote control unit to change channels and turn it off and on from his bed. An electrician had arranged a way for Jory to open and close his draperies when he chose. A stereo was within his reach. Books lined the back of his adjustable bed, which would sit him up and turn him into almost any position he wanted. Melodie and I, with Chris’s help, had wracked our brains to come up with every modern convenience that would enable him to do what he could for himself. Now all we had to do was to see he stayed busy with some occupation of real interest, enough to absorb his energies and challenge his innate talents.
A long time ago I’d started reading books on psychology, my poor attempt to try and help Bart. Now I could help Jory with his “racehorse” personality that had to compete and win. He couldn’t endure boredom, lying about doing nothing. There was already a barre along the wall without windows, put there recently, to give him the promise that one day he’d stand up, even if he would have to wear a back brace connected to leg braces. I sighed to think of my beautiful, graceful son stumbling along like a horse in a harness; then tears were streaking my face. Tears I quickly blinked away so Melodie wouldn’t see them.
Soon Melodie was tired and left to lie down and rest. I finished up in the room, then hurried to oversee the ramps being constructed to take Jory down to the terraces and the gardens. No effort was being spared to see he would not be confined to his room. There was also a newly installed elevator put where once there had been a butler’s pantry.
* * *
At last came the wonderful day when Jory was allowed to leave the hospital and come home. The cast was still on his back, but he was eating and drinking normally and had gained back his color and a little of the weight he’d lost. My heart ached with pity to see him flat on a stretcher, being rolled to the elevator, when once he’d taken the stairs three at a time. I saw him turn his head to stare at the stairs as if he’d sell his soul to use them again.
But, smiling, he looked around the grand suite of rooms all refurbished and his eyes sparkled. “It’s great, what you’ve done, really great. My favorite color combination, white and blue. You’ve given me the seashore—why, I can almost smell the surf, hear the seagulls. It’s wonderful, truly wonderful what paint and pictures, green plants and planning can do.”
His wife stood at the foot of the narrow bed he’d have to use until the cast came off, but she took pains not to meet his eyes. “Thanks for liking what we’ve done. Your mother and I, and Chris, too, really tried to please you.”
His blue eyes turned navy as he stared at her, sensing something I, too, felt. He looked toward the windows, his full lips thinning, before he drew back into his shell.
Immediately I stepped forward to hand him a huge box, saved for this kind of uncomfortable moment. “Jory, something meaningful for you to do while you’re still confined to the bed. Don’t want you staring at that boob tube all the time.”
Seeming relieved not to have to trouble his wife with words she didn’t want to hear, he feigned childish eagerness by shaking the huge box. “A compressed elephant? An unsinkable surfboard?” he guessed, looking only at me. I ruffled his curly hair, leaned to hug and kiss him and ordered him to hurry and open that box. I was dying to hear what he thought of my gift that had traveled all the way from New England.
Soon he had the ribbons and pretty wrapping off and was staring down at the long box containing what appeared to be neat bundles of super-long matchsticks. Tiny bottles of paint, larger bottles of glue, with spools of thin cording, carefully packaged cloth. “A kit to make a clipper ship,” he said with both wonder and dismay. “Mom, there are ten pages of instructions! This thing is so complicated it will take me the better part of my life to complete. And when it’s done—if ever—what will I have?”
“What will you have? My son, you will have when you are finished an heirloom that will be priceless, to leave to your son or daughter.” All said so proudly, so sure he could follow the difficult directions. “You have steady hands, a good eye for details, a ready understanding of the written word and such determination. Besides, take a look at that empty mantel that demands a ship smack in the middle.”
The Flowers in the Attic Series: The Dollangangers: Flowers in the Attic, Petals on the Wind, If There Be Thorns, Seeds of Yesterday, and a New Excerpt! Page 134