Envy flashed through his dark eyes before he growled, “What about Lance Spalding? I thought you felt that way about him. Or did I ruin his pretty face permanently so you can’t bear to look at him?”
Cindy paled. “Unlike you, Bart Foxworth, Lance is beautiful inside and out, like Daddy, and I do still love him, and Dennis, too.”
Bart’s frown deepened. “I know all about your nature loving! You want to sprawl on your back and spread your legs for some village idiot—and I won’t have it!”
“What’s going on here?” asked Chris, appearing dumbfounded to come back from the telephone and find all the peace gone.
Cindy jumped to her feet, took her stance, and put her hands on her hips. She glared down into Bart’s face, struggling to hold fast to that adult control she was determined to have with him. “Why do you always presume the worst about me? I just want to walk in the moonlight, and the village is ten miles away. What a pity you don’t understand what it’s like to be human.”
Her answer and her glare seemed to infuriate him more. “You’re not my sister, just a smart-ass little bitch in heat—the same as your mother!”
This time it was Chris who jumped up from the table and slapped Bart hard. Bart drew back and raised his fists, as if ready to punch Chris in the jaw—when I jumped to my feet and placed myself in front of Chris. “No, don’t you dare ever hit the man who’s tried to be the best father possible! If you do, Bart, you and I are through forever!” That was enough for him to turn his dark, fiery eyes on me, so furious his look could have started a blaze.
“Why can’t you see that little whore for what she is? You both see everything wrong about me, but you close your eyes to the sins of your favorites! She’s nothing but a tramp, a god-damned tramp.” He froze, his eyes wide and startled.
He’d taken the Lord’s name in vain. He looked around to see Joel, who for once was out of sight and hearing. “You see, Mother, what she does to me? She corrupts—and in my own home, too.”
Looking at Bart disapprovingly, Chris sat down again. Cindy disappeared into the house. I stared forlornly after her, as Chris spoke harshly, confronting Bart. “Can’t you see that Cindy is doing her best to please you? She’s been trying since she came home to do her utmost to appease you, but you won’t let her. How can you take a stroll in these lonely woods as anything but innocent? From now on, I want you to treat her with respect—for if you don’t you may well drive her into doing something rash. Losing Melodie is quite enough for one summer.”
It was just as if Chris had no voice and Bart had no ears, from all the effect those words had. Chris ended by giving Bart an even harder look and more reprimanding words before Chris stood and disappeared inside the house. I suspected he would follow Cindy upstairs and do what he could to comfort her.
Alone with my second son, I tried to rationalize, as I always did. “Bart, why do you talk so ugly to Cindy?” I began. “She’s at a very vulnerable age and is a decent human being who needs to be appreciated. She’s not a tramp, a whore, or a bitch. She’s a lovely young girl who is very thrilled to be pretty and attracting so much attention from the boys. That doesn’t mean she’s giving in to every one. She has scruples, honor. That one episode with Lance Spalding has not corrupted her.”
“Mother, she was corrupted long ago, only you don’t want to believe that. Lance Spalding wasn’t the first.”
“How dare you say that?” I asked, really enraged. “What kind of man are you, anyway? You sleep with whom you please, do what you please, but she’s supposed to be an angel with a halo and wings on her back. Now you go upstairs and apologize to Cindy!”
“An apology is something she’ll never get from me.” He sat down to finish his meal. “The servants talk about Cindy. You don’t hear them, for you’re too busy with those two babies you can’t leave alone. But I hear them as they clean and dust. Your Cindy is a red-hot number. The trouble is you think she’s an angel. You think that just because she looks like one.”
I sank down to lean my elbows heavily on the glass-topped wrought-iron white table, feeling overwhelmingly tired, just as Jory did, and he hadn’t said one word for or against Cindy. To be for any length of time around Bart was so exhausting; the tension of saying one wrong thing kept you wired tight.
My eyes fixed on the crimson roses that were this evening’s centerpiece. “Bart, has it ever occurred to you that Cindy may feel she’s been contaminated, so that now she doesn’t care? And certainly you don’t give her any reason to value her self-esteem.”
“She’s a wanton, loose slut.” Said with absolute conviction.
My voice turned as uncompromising as his. “Apparently from what I overhear when the servants whisper, you are drawn to the very type of woman you condemn.”
Standing, he threw down his napkin and stalked purposefully into the house. “I’ll fire every damn one who gossips about me!”
I sighed. Soon we wouldn’t be able to hire any servants if he kept hiring and firing.
“Mom, I’m going to hit the sack,” said Jory. “This pleasant evening meal on the terrace has turned out just as I could have predicted.”
That very evening Bart fired every servant but Trevor, who seldom said anything except to me or Chris. If Trevor had left every time Bart fired him, he’d have been gone long ago. Trevor had an understanding way of knowing just when to believe Bart was serious. Never, never did he rebuke Bart, nor did he meet Bart’s eyes squarely. Perhaps because of this, Bart thought he had Trevor cowed. I thought Trevor forgave Bart, because he understood and pitied him.
I headed for Cindy’s room, meeting Chris as he came down. “She’s very upset. Try to calm her down, Cathy. She’s talking about leaving here and never coming back.”
Cindy was face down on her bed. Small grunts and groans came from her throat. “He ruins everything,” she wailed. “I never knew my own father and mother—and Bart wants to chase me away from you and Daddy,” she sobbed as I perched on the side of her bed. “Now he’s determined to spoil my summer, drive me away like he did Melodie.”
I held her slight body in my arms and comforted her as best I could, thinking I’d have to send her away to keep her safe from being hurt again by Bart. Where could I send Cindy and not injure her feelings, which didn’t need another cruel blow? I went to bed thinking about that, as Cindy escaped the house to meet a boy from the village.
I was to hear about this later.
As Bart had predicted, Cindy’s nature-loving experience did have a name. Victor Wade. And while I lay on my bed, and Chris slept beside me, pondering what to do with Cindy, and still keep her love, how to keep Bart from being his worst self, our Cindy sneaked out of the house and went with Victor Wade to Charlottesville.
* * *
In Charlottesville Cindy had a glorious time, dancing with Victor Wade until she wore holes in the thin soles of her fragile, sparkling sandals with the four-inch glass heels (really only Lucite and not as heavy as glass). Then Victor, true to his word, drove back toward Foxworth Hall. Near one of the roads leading to our hill, he parked and drew Cindy into his arms.
“I’ve fallen in love,” he whispered huskily, raining kisses expertly on her face, behind her ears, traveling down her neck to end up on her breast that he bared. “I’ve never met a girl who was half the fun you are. And you were right. They don’t grow ’em better in Texas . . .”
Half drunk on too much wine, intoxicated, too, with the expertise of his foreplay, Cindy’s efforts to resist his lovemaking were weak, ineffectual. Soon her own passionate nature was responding, and eagerly she helped him to undress as he unzipped her dress and soon had it off, along with everything else. He fell upon her—and that’s when Bart showed up.
Bellowing like an enraged bull, Bart rushed the parked car, catching Cindy and Victor in the very act of copulating.
Seeing their naked bodies with arms and legs entwined on the backseat confirmed all his suspicions and enraged him more. Bart threw open the door and yanked
Victor out by the ankles, forcefully dragging him off the top of Cindy so he fell face downward upon the rough gravel of the roadside.
Not giving the body a chance to recover, Bart attacked, using his fists brutally.
Screaming her anger, disregarding her nudity, Cindy hurled her dress directly into Bart’s face, blinding him momentarily. This gave Victor the chance to jump to his feet and deliver his own blow that momentarily gave Bart pause, but already Victor’s nose was bleeding and he had a black eye.
In the moonlight his nakedness seemed blue in Cindy’s eyes. “And Bart was so ruthless, Momma! So awful! He seemed like a madman—especially when Victor managed to smash a good right hook into his jaw. Then he tried to kick Bart in the groin. It did hit him there, but not hard enough. Bart doubled up, cried out, then rushed Victor with so much fierce anger that I was scared he’d kill him! He came out of that pain so fast, Momma, so fast—and I’d always heard that stopped a man cold.” Cindy sobbed with her head on my lap.
“He was like the Devil straight from hell, screaming abuse at Victor, using all the obscene words he never wants me to use. He knocked Victor down, then beat him into unconsciousness. Then he came at me! I was terrified he’d batter my face and break my nose and make me ugly, like he’s always threatened to do. Somehow I’d managed to pull on that dress, but the zipper was wide open down the back. He grabbed me by the shoulders, shook me so hard the dress fell to my ankles and I was naked—but he didn’t look to see anything. He kept his eyes on my face as he slapped one cheek and then the other and my head was rocked from side to side, until I felt dizzy and faint. My head was reeling before he picked me up like a sack of grain, threw me over his shoulder and took off through the woods, leaving Victor lying on the ground.
“It was awful, Momma, so humiliating! To be carried like that, as if I were cattle! I cried all the way, pleading with Bart to call an ambulance in case Victor was seriously hurt . . . but he wouldn’t listen. I begged him to put me down and let me cover myself, but he ordered me to shut up or else he’d do something terrible. Then he took me to—”
She cut off her words abruptly, staring before her as if mesmerized by fear.
“Where did he take you, Cindy?” I asked, feeling sick, as if her humiliation was mine, and so furious with Bart, feeling sorry for her shocking plight. At the same time I was so angry that she’d brought this upon herself by disobeying and disregarding everything I’d tried to teach her.
In a small, weak voice, with her head lowered so her long hair fell to hide her face, she finished, “Just home, Mom . . . just home.”
There was more to it, but she refused to tell me anything else. I wanted to scold her, to chastise her, remind her again that she knew all about Bart and his fierce temper, but she was too traumatized to hear more.
I got up to leave her room. “I’m taking away all your privileges, Cindy. I’ll send up a servant to take out your telephone so you can’t call one of your boyfriends to help you escape. I’ve heard your side of the story now, and Bart just this morning told me his side. I don’t agree with his method of punishing you or that boy. He was much too brutal, and for that, I apologize. However, it seems you are very free with your sexual favors. You can’t deny that any longer, for I’ve seen you with my own eyes when that boy Lance was here. It hurts to know that you’ve heeded so little of what I’ve tried to teach you. I realize it’s hard to be young and different from your peers, but still I was hoping you’d wait until you knew how to handle intimate relationships. I couldn’t bear for an unknown man to lay a finger on me—much less take me totally—and you just met that boy, Cindy! A complete stranger who might have hurt you!”
Her pitiful pretty face lifted. “Momma, help me!”
“Haven’t I done my best to help you all your life? Listen to me, Cindy, for once really listen. The best part of loving comes with learning to know a man, by allowing him to know you as a person before you begin to think about sex—you don’t pick up the first man you meet!”
Bitterly she railed back. “Momma, all the books write about sex. They don’t mention love. Most psychiatrists say there is no such thing as love. You’ve never explained to me exactly what love is. I don’t even know if it really exists. I think that sex is as necessary at my age as water and food, and love is nothing but excitement; it’s your blood heating up; your pulse racing, your heart pounding, your breath coming faster, heavier, and in the end it’s only a natural need no worse than wanting to sleep. So despite you and your old-fashioned ideas, I give in when a boy I like wants to make out. Victor Wade wanted me . . . and I wanted him. Now, don’t blaze your eyes at me that way! He didn’t force me. Didn’t rape me—I just let him! I wanted him to do what he did!”
Her blue eyes defied me as she jumped up and stared me in the eyes. “Now go on and call me a sinner like Bart did! Yell and scream and say I’ll go to hell, but I don’t believe you any more than I believe him! If so, ninety-nine percent of the world’s population are sinners—including you and your brother!”
Stunned, deeply hurt, I turned and left.
* * *
The beautiful summer days dragged by while Cindy sulked in her room, angry at Bart, at me, even at Chris. She refused to eat at the table if Bart or Joel were there. She stopped showering two and three times a day and allowed her hair to become just as stringy and dull as Melodie’s, as if proving to us she was now on her way to abandoning us as Melodie had, and it was Melodie’s manner she tried to duplicate as much as possible. However, even in sullenness her eyes still sparked with fire, and she managed to look pretty even when she looked messy.
“You’re not accomplishing anything but making yourself miserable,” I said when I saw her quickly turn off the TV set she had in her bedroom, as if she wanted me to believe she didn’t have a single pleasure left to enjoy when her room contained every luxury but the telephone, which I’d removed so she couldn’t arrange secret dates with Victor Wade or anyone else.
She sat on the bed, staring at me resentfully. “You just let me go, Momma. You go and tell Bart to let me go and I’ll never bother him again. I’ll never come back to this house again! NEVER!”
“Where will you go and what will you do, Cindy?” I asked with concern, afraid she’d slip out one night and we’d never hear from her again. And I knew she didn’t have enough money saved to see her through longer than two weeks.
“I’LL DO WHAT I HAVE TO!” she screamed, tears of self-pity streaking her pale face, which was already losing its rosy tan. “You and Daddy gave to me generously, so I won’t have to sell my body if that’s what you’re thinking. Unless I just want to. Right this moment I feel like being everything Bart doesn’t want me to be, and that would show him, really show him.”
“Then you stay in this room until you feel like being everything I want you to be. When you can speak to me with respect, without yelling, and express to me some mature decisions on what you intend to do with your life, I’ll help you escape this house.”
“Momma!” she wailed. “Don’t hate me! I can’t help it if I like the boys and they like me! I’d like to save myself for that special Mister Right, but I’ve never met anyone that special. When I refuse to let them, they go straight from me to some other girl who doesn’t refuse. How did you manage it, Momma? What did you do to keep all those men loving you, and only you?”
All those men? I didn’t know how to answer.
Instead, like other parents put on the spot, I avoided giving the straight answer I didn’t have anyway. “Cindy, your father and I love you very much, you should know that. Jory loves you. And the twins smile just to see you come near them. Before you decide to do something rash, let’s sit down with your father, with Jory, and then you have your say, and let us know what you want for yourself. And if it is at all reasonable, we will do what we can to see that you obtain your goals.”
“You won’t let Bart in on any of this?” she asked suspiciously.
“No, darling. Bart has proven he d
oesn’t reason when it comes to you. Ever since the day you joined our family he’s resented you, and at this late date there doesn’t seem to be much any of us can do about that. As for Joel, I don’t like him, either, and he has no place in our family discussion about your future.”
Suddenly she flung her arms about my neck. “Oh, Momma, I’m so ashamed I said so many ugly things. I wanted to hurt you the other day because Bart had shamed me so much. Save me from Bart, Momma. Find a way, please, please.”
After Chris, Jory, Cindy, and I talked, we found a way to save Cindy not only from Bart but from herself. I tried to calm Bart, who wanted to punish her more drastically.
“She’s only adding fuel to the fire already burning in the village,” he shouted when I entered his office. “I try to lead a decent, God-fearing life—now don’t you yell at me and say you’ve heard differently. I’ll admit I was rolling in filth for a while, but things have changed. I didn’t enjoy those women. Melodie was the only one who gave me anything that approached love.”
I tried to keep the frown from my face. How easily he had turned away from her once he knew he had her loving him . . .
Looking around at all the valuables in his office, I wondered again if Bart didn’t love things more than he loved people; I stared at the luxurious antique Orientals that he’d purchase at auctions, costing hundreds of thousands. His furniture put that in the White House to shame. He would be the wealthiest man in the world if he kept doubling his five hundred thousand a year every few months, the way he was somehow managing to do now. Even before he came fully “into his own” he’d have made his billion or so. He was clever, quick, brilliant. What a pity he couldn’t be more to mankind than just another greedy, selfish millionaire.
“Leave now, Mother. You waste my time.” He swiveled his chair around and stared out at the beautiful gardens now in full bloom. “Send Cindy away—anywhere. Just get her out of my hair.”
“Cindy told us last night she’d like to spend the remainder of the summer in a New England drama school. She had the name and address of the one she preferred. Chris called to check them out, and they seem reliable and have a good reputation. So she’s leaving in three days.”
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 149