Ammie, Come Home (4 page)

“Let's get out of here,” he muttered. “That shameless old—”

The epithet, which presumably applied to his mother, was cut off just in time by the appearance of that matron, who advanced upon him with a purposeful stride.

“Oh, no, you don't, Patrick James,” she said severely.

“Mother, you know I hate that nonsense!”

“I know, and I can't imagine why, you dabble in much nastier and less likely subjects all the time. You've never seen Nada, she's the latest rage, and I
insist
you stay. You can't be so rude to Mrs. Bennett, if you won't consider me.”

“Oh, all right.”

“What on earth is this all about?” Ruth whispered, as they followed Mrs. MacDougal's triumphantly billowing skirts into the drawing room.

“Didn't you recognize that bloodless bean pole I was stuck with at dinner? Another of the old harridan's tricks, she knows I hate people like that…. She's the latest thing in the rich spiritualist circles. A medium.”

“I've never attended a séance,” Ruth said sedately. “It should be interesting.”

“It won't be. These babes don't know any of the good tricks. Someday I'll show you a Hottentot shaman at work. They are masters at crowd psychology.”

Despite his jeers, Pat behaved himself very well. Ruth suspected that he was professionally interested after all; just before the lights went out she caught a change of expression that reminded her of her boss's face when a particularly complicated problem arose.

The spirits, Mrs. MacDougal explained, were sensitive to light. That was why most séances were held in semidarkness. It was not—this, with an intent stare at her son, who responded with a bland smile—it was not intended to conceal fraud. No such question could arise with Madame Nada in any case, for that lady was a mental medium and did not indulge in the vulgar demonstrations with tambourines, trumpets, and ectoplasmic hands which were so popular with so-called physical mediums.

Throughout the lecture Madame Nada sat with folded hands, smiling faintly. Only her eyes moved. But they contradicted her studied air of repose as well as her pastel blandness; they were small, dark brown, and piercing, and they darted ceaselessly around the circle of spectators, taking in every detail.

When the lights went out there was a general murmur compounded of nervous giggles, sighs, and one loud yawn, whose source Ruth immediately identified. They were holding hands, since this increased the sympathetic vibrations. On Ruth's right was Mrs. MacDougal. Her fat hand was surprisingly cool and dry, and felt pleasantly like that of a chubby little girl—a little girl wearing lots of dime-store jewelry, which scratched the palm. Ruth thought, “All diamonds are paste in the dark,” and realized, with a grin which she hastily suppressed for fear of damaging the vibrations, that she was a little bit drunk. The wine at dinner had flowed freely and it had all been too good to pass over.

The boy on Ruth's left was perspiring, and she wondered whether it was a natural weakness or a bad case of nerves. According to Mrs. MacDougal he had just opened a new psychedelic shop on Wisconsin Avenue, which sold posters of the Beatles in various incredible costumes, luminous pinups of Indian mystics, and atrociously made handcrafted leather sandals.

As her eyes adjusted Ruth realized that the room was not entirely dark; the glow from the fireplace made it possible to see shapes, and glinted redly off objects such as Mrs. MacDougal's diamonds and the silver fillet the medium wore in her hair. After a long silence, broken once by a giggle, and a concerted shussshing sound directed against the giggler, Ruth felt herself getting drowsy. Warmth and firelight and a little bit too much wine…. What a disgrace it would be, she thought comfortably, if she fell off the chair.

The medium's voice made them all jump. It was slow and soft, drawling the words. Accent and tone had changed, but the voice was still recognizably Madame Nada's. The words were strikingly commonplace.

“Good evenin', ladies and gentlemen.”

“Good evening, Maybelle,” Mrs. MacDougal said in a bright, social tone. “How are you this evening?”

“Very well, thank you kindly. But we're always well here, you know.”

“Yes, dear, I know. Maybelle is Madame Nada's control,” Mrs. MacDougal explained, in a piercing whisper. “A gently bred young Southern girl. Poor child, she was raped by a Yankee soldier during the War Between the States. But she has no hatred now.”

“Love,” said the mellifluous voice of Maybelle. The shaggy young man on Ruth's left stirred uneasily. “Only love and sunshine and peace, here.”

“Do you have any messages tonight, dear?” Mrs. MacDougal asked.

“Jes' a few. Strange….” The girl's voice sounded puzzled. “There's somethin' holdin' back…. A hostile thought….”

Someone across the circle—Ruth was sure it was Pat—coughed suggestively, and Madame Nada's voice hardened momentarily.

“But I'll try. Some of them want so badly to come through, to help…. There's someone here who wants to speak to—a lady?—yes, a lady in the room. I can't get the name…. The first letter seems to be a G.”

There was an audible gasp from someone in the listening circle. The voice went droning on.

“G-R-A—That's the name of the lady. Is there a lady named Grace?”

“Yes, yes,” squealed an excited voice.

“Grace, darling, it's Daddy.” The medium's voice changed; it was a man's now, deep but shaky, as if with age. “Remember the party? The birthday party, and the pink dress?”

“Oh, my goodness,” gasped the invisible Grace.

There was further conversation about the party—Grace's sixth birthday party, said Daddy, and Grace enthusiastically agreed. However, this was fairly dull for the rest of the group, who shared neither Grace's memories nor her susceptibility to suggestion, and before long Daddy was supplanted by a new voice, which described itself as that of an Indian chief named Wamasook, who had lived on the site now occupied by the house, “in the days before the white men came to rob us of our land.” Wamasook spoke excellent English. He described his beautiful Indian sweetheart, who had leaped from the Rock of Dumbarton after he was killed in battle, and added that one of the settlers had buried a hoard of gold coins in the well before his tribe was attacked. Since there was now no trace of a well anywhere on the grounds, and since Wamasook's knowledge of the modern geography of the site was somewhat vague, this hint did not arouse much interest among the auditors.

The next visitor from beyond announced himself in a thick Scottish accent as “George,” and was promptly identified by Mrs. MacDougal as George Barton, the builder of the house. He remarked that the regions where he was presently living were filled with sunlight and flowers and love. Shortly thereafter Maybelle announced abruptly that Madame Nada was tired.

The lights went on. Ruth almost burst out laughing when she saw Pat; he looked so smug, not only at the confirmation of his predictions, but at his own admirable self-control. Mrs. Mac-Dougal also saw and interpreted his expression. Her voice, as she addressed the medium, had something of the tone of a lady complaining to her dressmaker about the fit of a gown.

“Well, Nada, I'm afraid this was not one of our better demonstrations.”

The medium, who was rubbing her eyes and yawning, like someone just awakened from sleep, looked surprised.

“Indeed? I am sorry to hear that. Did not May-belle come through?”

“Yes, but the messages weren't very—significant.”

“But I got a marvelous message from Daddy,” said Grace, a well-upholstered elderly lady with a black velvet ribbon around her sagging throat. “All about flowers, and love—”

“And sunshine,” said Pat, unable to control himself any longer. “Not very characteristic conversation from your daddy, Grace, if the tales I hear about the old shark are true.”

“Pat, you bad boy, you know people change when they pass on. What use would it all be otherwise?”

“What, indeed?” said Pat charmingly.

His mother gave him a furious look.

“I am so sorry it was not successful,” said the medium smoothly. Ruth was reminded of something…. Cream? No, olive oil.

“Antagonistic influences, I suppose,” Mrs. MacDougal said coldly. The medium gave her a quick, wary look.

“Possibly. Possibly it is simply the house. You know, Mrs. MacDougal, that some places lack the proper atmosphere.”

Later, looking back on it, Ruth was never able to understand how it had happened. Surely she hadn't been that drunk! And certainly she was not particularly intrigued by the séance, which had seemed to her both dull and embarrassing. Not even in the light of those events which were now close upon her was she willing to admit another explanation…. No, there was no reason, except her loose tongue, which frequently got her into trouble, and some vague idea of being gracious to her hostess, who was visibly vexed with the medium's performance.

When they left the house, with Mrs. MacDougal's enthusiastic thanks ringing in their ears, Ruth was meekly silent. She expected an explosion from Pat; his grim forbearance, which lasted all the way home, was in its way even more uncomfortable.

“Won't you come in?” she asked, when the car had stopped. He nodded.

“I'll give you moral support while you break the news to Sara.”

“She'll probably be delighted.”

“I expect you're right. What made you do such a thing?”

“I thought it might be fun,” said Ruth.

“You're a liar.” His long arm swept out and caught her by the shoulders, pulling her to him in a quick, casual embrace. She was relieved to hear him chuckling. “You sure there wasn't a touch of ‘screw Pat' in your mind? Excuse the language; I'm trying to clean it up for you, but it's damned hard.”

“If you mean what I think you mean, the answer is No. I'm too old for such adolescent jokes. And,” she added, moving, “far too old for necking in the front seat of a car.”

“It's these damned bucket seats.” He released her, and began the complicated operation of extracting his bulk from the little car. “These kids must be contortionists. I've always wondered how they manage to—”

The rest of the sentence was lost as he came around to open her door.

When they entered the hall Ruth heard the voices in the living room, and a jolt of unreasonable irritation struck her. She had forgotten Sara's guest, or had assumed that he would have left. She had smoothed her face into a smile by the time she walked into the living room, there was really no reason why she should let the boy irritate her so.

He rose at once. He had beautiful manners, almost too courteous, as if he were mocking the standards of the society he despised, or considered them so contemptible that they were not worth fighting. His clothes were almost, but never quite, too, too much; an occasional ruffle on a shirt, or a flowery waistcoat, or a pair of trousers that fitted his lean hips and long legs almost, but not quite, too tightly. At least his clothes were well tailored and beautifully kept. His hair was long enough to curl under at the neck; the beard was a neat sort of beard, dark and short and trimmed, with tongues of hair outlining the jaw and the lines between nose and lips—the sort of beard worn by Mephistopheles, or a sixteenth-century Spanish nobleman. As he stood beside Sara, his dark face and Sara's olive beauty and sleek black hair made them look like two young members of the old Spanish royal house—except that none of the Hapsburgs had ever been so handsome.

Sara's flushed cheeks might have been the result of the fire's warmth, but a curve still lingered in the shape of her mouth that made Ruth fairly sure of what she and Bruce had been doing. Then Ruth remembered, joltingly, those few moments in the car out in front, and she decided to forget the whole thing.

Pat greeted the younger man with the ease of old acquaintance.

“Haven't seen you on campus lately. Still protesting?”

“Always, inevitably.”

Even his voice, Ruth thought irritably, sounded affected. It was a mellow baritone, but the pronunciation was overprecise and emphatic.

“What's the latest?” Pat asked interestedly. “Segregation, the draft, Vietnam—”

“You didn't get my latest petition?”

Bruce bared his teeth in a gesture that was not even intended to resemble a smile. As he probably knew, the dental effect was heightened by the frame of beard around his mouth.

“I get so many of them,” Pat said apologetically.

It was an outrageous remark, and Ruth expected, not an explosion—Bruce was abnormally well controlled for such a passionate defender of causes—but a snarl. Instead, the boy's grin turned into a genuine laugh.

“You know what terrifies me?” he demanded. “The thought that I may end up just like you.”

“You almost certainly will.”

“I know. That's why it terrifies me.”

“Okay, pax. Come into my office next week, and we'll fight some more.”

“Yes, let's not argue here,” Ruth said firmly. “What are you two drinking? Thanks, no; I don't think I could face vodka in any form at this hour. Pat, would you like brandy?”

“What I really would like,” said Pat, “is a cup of tea.”

“You constantly amaze me. So would I.”

“I'll get it,” Sara said. She went out, with Bruce following.

“Now,” Pat said, when the tea finally made its appearance; it had taken quite some time. “Tell Sara what you've done.”

“Good heavens, you make me sound like a murderer. I've invited a few people to dinner next week, that's all. Mrs. MacDougal and a friend of hers.”

“The friend's name,” said Pat, “being Madame Nada.”

Bruce leaned forward, elbows on his knees, black eyes mocking.

“I didn't know you were interested in spiritualism, Mrs. Bennett.”