Brass Ring (13 page)

“Damn.” He looked away from her. “I never even thought of that. Of clothes. I should have gotten her things. It never crossed my mind. I’d bring her food when I’d go to visit. She wouldn’t eat it, but that seems to be the only thing I know how to do—feed people. I never thought of clothes. Shit.”

She felt the pain in him, as she had the last time they’d met. This time, though, he wasn’t trying to hide from it. He was letting himself step into it, surround himself with it.

“Maybe she had more suitable things, but she just didn’t care what she wore,” Claire offered, wanting to relieve his suffering. “I’m sure they would have told you if her lack of clothing was a problem.”

Randy looked unconvinced. “Go on, please. What did she say to you?”

“At first, nothing. She seemed to be in a world of her own, although I’m certain she knew I was there.” She remembered how Margot had reminded her of an ice sculpture, she had been so completely covered by snow. She couldn’t tell him that. “There was a peacefulness to her,” she said instead. “Really, there was.”

He nodded but didn’t look at her.

“She kept asking me to leave her alone. At one point, she said she had died on that bridge years ago.”

Randy looked at her sharply.

“After you told me about the accident, I realized that she must have been referring to that night. She must have felt like she died when Charles died.”

Randy nodded. “Yes, I think she did. Margot’s life—the life that had any quality to it—ended that day, too. After that, she might as well have been dead.”

“She said she could hear music. Chopin, she said. Nocturne in C-sharp Minor, which is very beautiful. I listened to it for a few days after…I met her.”

Randy said nothing.

“And she said something weird. Something about how he couldn’t hear the music.”

He frowned. “Who couldn’t? Chopin?”

Claire shrugged.

“She must have her composers mixed up,” Randy said. “Beethoven’s the one that went deaf, wasn’t he?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“She must have really been losing it to get them mixed up.”

“Or maybe she meant Charles? Since he was no longer alive to hear it?”

“Maybe,” Randy agreed.

“I tried to hold on to her, and for a while, she let me.”

“Hold on to her? How?”

“Just my hand on her arm.” She circled her hand around Randy’s arm, through his sweater, then let go quickly.

He leaned away from her, his eyes wide. “Damn, lady, you are nuts, you know it?”

“Jon called the police from the car. Maybe that was a mistake, because that’s when she panicked. When she heard the sirens. Maybe I could have talked her out of it if the police hadn’t come.”

“Yeah, and maybe you’d have ended up in the river along with her.”

She didn’t try to argue the point with him. She thought about what had happened next and found that she didn’t want to talk about those minutes of negotiation between herself and Margot. She didn’t want to talk about letting go and not letting go.

“So, she got scared when the police came,” she said, “and that’s when she jumped.”

The crystal angel, flying, in slow motion
. Claire’s stomach lurched. She grabbed for the back of the pew, knocking her fork and most of her grapes to the floor.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” She couldn’t bend over to retrieve the fork. The chapel was spinning enough as it was.

“I’ve got it.” Randy reached down and picked up the fork and three grapes. He set them on his own plate. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, just…embarrassed.” She could feel the heat in her face. “I keep getting this dizziness,” she admitted. “I know it’s linked somehow to being on the bridge. I really didn’t feel dizzy up there at the time, but now every once in a while, I remember being there, and suddenly I feel as though I’m falling.”

There was sympathy in his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I made you think about it.”

She looked away from the warm blue of his eyes. She thought she might cry.

He took her empty plate from her lap and put it in the basket along with his own. Then he pulled out the thermos. “Are you ready to switch to some very weak coffee?”

“Yes,” she said.

“I should have made it black and brought some milk along for myself,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking.”

“I like it this way. Honest.”

He poured the milky coffee from the thermos into a Styrofoam cup. “I fell down some stairs a few years ago,” he said, handing the cup to her. “I missed the top step and—” He made a plane with his hand and sent it into a nosedive, and she shuddered. “Broke a couple of bones in one foot, and for weeks afterward, every time I’d close my eyes, I’d feel like I was falling again.”

“Yes,” she said. “That’s exactly what it’s like.”

He smiled at her, a little sadly. “You were really very kind to talk with me about her when it shakes you up so much.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t easy for you to tell me about the night Charles fell from the bridge, either.”

“No. It wasn’t.” Randy looked into his cup. There was a long silence. Somewhere outside the theater a car horn honked, and the sound seemed to float just below the beamed ceiling for a few seconds before fading away.

“All right,” he said finally, drawing in a long breath. “She seemed to be at peace. That’s what I’ll try to remember.”

“Good,” Claire said. “That’s what I’m trying to keep in my mind, too.”

Randy stroked his meticulously trimmed beard again, his eyes on the high arched windows. “You mentioned your own sister last time,” he said suddenly.

She was surprised he remembered her talking about Vanessa. He’d seemed so distracted at the time.

“Yes, and I wrote to her after we spoke.” She had written Vanessa a short letter, telling her how much she wanted to talk with her. “I realized after you and I spoke that I wanted to try to get in touch with her. I haven’t heard anything back, but it’s really too soon to expect a response.”

“When was the last time you saw her?”

“When I was ten.”

“Wow. What do you remember about her?”

Claire smiled and took a sip of coffee. “I remember that we shared the most idyllic childhood imaginable.”

“But you said something about your parents getting divorced and your father taking your sister away and you never getting to see her again.”

Claire shrugged. “In spite of all that, it was wonderful.” She saw the doubt in his eyes. “Honest. It was.”

“Convince me.” He blotted his clean lips with a corner of the napkin. “I’m a skeptic about the existence of happy childhoods.”

“Well, my great-grandfather was Joseph Siparo,” she said. “Have you ever heard of him?”

“No. Should I have?”

“He was one of the top carousel horse carvers in the country in the early nineteen hundreds.” She could feel herself lighting up as she spoke, and she saw her smile reflected in Randy’s eyes.

“Really?” He seemed intrigued.

“Uh-huh. He died long before I was born, but he taught his son—my grandfather, Vincent Siparo—how to carve, and my grandfather built a carousel in his backyard.”

“No kidding! Wasn’t the era of carousel horse carving over by the time your grandfather got into it?”

“Yes, but he was”—Claire hesitated, then smiled at the memory of her grandfather—”an eccentric. He’d been a farmer all his life, but the older he got, the more he wanted to carve, and finally he just stopped farming and started carving. People would come from all over to see his carousel. And that’s what I grew up with. At least in the summers. During the school year, I lived here in Virginia. In Falls Church, with Vanessa and Mellie—that’s my mother—and my father. But I barely remember those nine or ten months of the year. All I really remember is Pennsylvania and the farm and the carousel.”

Blood on porcelain
.

She ran her hand across her eyes as if to wipe away the image and was relieved when it quickly faded.

“That does sound like a pretty seductive way of life for a child,” Randy said. “Cary—my son—is ten, and I can just picture how he’d feel having an amusement-park ride in his backyard. Not sure a carousel would do it for him. Sidewinder, maybe.” Randy seemed lost in thought for a moment.

“You have a family,” Claire said, surprised. For some reason, she’d pictured him single and was pleased to know he was taken care of, that after this difficult discussion he would have someone to go home to.

“I’m divorced,” Randy said, quickly dashing her fantasy. “It’s been almost a year now. My son lives with my ex-wife, but I see him quite a bit.”

“Well, I’m glad you have some time with him.”

“So.” Randy was quick to change the subject. He brushed a crumb from his gray wool slacks, then stretched out, his back propped up against the end of the pew. “Did you ride on this carousel a lot?”

“Yes.” Claire smiled. “My childhood was one long, wonderful carousel ride.”

His own smile was slow in coming, and indulgent, she thought. “Well,” he said, “if that’s the case, then you’ve been very lucky. I’m glad for you, and I envy you. But I still don’t believe you. The words ‘happy’ and ‘childhood’ don’t belong in the same sentence.”

She shook her head at him. “I think it’s a matter of what you focus on,” she said. “Of course there are bad times in a child’s life, and if you limit your thinking to those times, the whole picture will be distorted. What about your own son? Can you honestly say he’s having an unhappy childhood?”

“Oh, yes. I can say that with absolute certainty, and it tears me up inside. And your daughter?”

“Blissful,” she said, although a knot formed in her stomach at the memory of the fights in those last few years before Susan left for school. Normal, though. Perfectly normal in adolescence.

“You called your mother ‘Mellie’?”

“Yes. She said it made her feel too old to be called Mom.”

He gave her one last dubious smile as he sat up straight again and put their empty cups in the basket. “Listen,” he said, “how would you like to see The Magician of Dassant?”

“We’d love to,” she answered, and then quickly realized that he might not have meant to include Jon in his invitation. She colored at the presumption, but before she could say anything, Randy spoke again.

“Fine. There’ll be two tickets for you at the window on Sunday night—is Sunday okay? Saturday’s sold out.”

“Sunday’s fine.”

“And be sure to come backstage afterwards. I’d like to meet…Jon, is it?”

“Yes.” Jon. She looked at her watch. One-forty-five! They were supposed to meet with Tom Gardner at two. She would never make it. She could call Jon from the theater, but that would put her even further behind. Better to simply drive to the foundation and be late. She could have sworn she’d been in the theater no longer than an hour.

“I’ve got to go,” she said. “I’m late for a meeting.”

She stood up slowly, alert for the dizziness. It was there, but short-lived this time, and she steadied herself easily with her hand on the pew

Randy followed her up the aisle and into the foyer, where the sandwich-board poster beckoned her to come to the play. She pushed opened the front door and stepped outside.

Randy caught her arm. “Thanks for this, Claire,” he said. “For talking with me.” He didn’t let go of her arm, and their bodies brushed against one another through their heavy wool coats. “How would you feel about having lunch together again sometime?” he asked.

The question surprised her, and she was tempted to say yes, but she couldn’t. Shouldn’t. How was she going to put Margot behind her if she continued a friendship with Randy?

Randy misread her hesitation. “Purely platonic,” he said. “I’ve become a hermit since my divorce. My life’s been made up of work and isolation and some brief, lovely moments of theater when I can pretend to be someone else.” He looked up at the spire jutting into the gray sky. “I’ve been living that way for more than a year. It feels good to talk to someone. To really talk. You’re a nice person. Kind and brave.” He smiled. “I’m only looking for friendship, though. I know you’re married. And probably very busy, and I’d understand—”

“I’d like it,” she said, the words coming out with a life of their own. She stood on her toes to buss his cheek. Muttering a good-bye, she turned away from him quickly and headed for her car. She’d rather he didn’t see the mix of emotions in her face. Not until she’d had a chance to scrutinize them herself, a chance to understand why the comfort and safety she felt with Randy Donovan seemed somehow tinged with danger.

JEREMY, PENNSYLVANIA

1959

MORNINGS IN THE BIG
upstairs bedroom of the farmhouse were blindingly bright and filled with the scent of coffee. The sun poured through the open windows, washing over the yellow flowered wallpaper and warming the oak floor. The two little girls slumbered in their beds, burrowed beneath airy patchwork comforters their grandmother had stitched together from a lifetime’s collection of fabric scraps. Seven-year-old Claire was usually first to open her eyes, and she would stretch, reaching her arms behind her to touch the glossy brown wicker headboard as she breathed in the scent of coffee and sunshine. Her five-year-old sister, Vanessa, rarely woke up before Claire called to her across the room, and even then she would sometimes squirm down in the bed and wrap the comforter around her like a cocoon.

On one particular morning in July, Claire awakened later than usual. She woke up Vanessa, who was grumpy and sulky, as she always was in the morning until she’d had a chance to wash her face and brush her teeth. Claire helped the younger girl get dressed, although Vanessa was pretty good at it by then and insisted on buttoning the little round buttons on her shirt by herself. It was still early when they clattered down the wide staircase and ran into the kitchen.

“What beautiful daughters I have!” Mellie stood up from her seat at the table and, as she did every morning, pulled the girls into her arms, smothering them with noisy kisses. Tucker, the spotted dog, leaped around their feet. Mellie looked up from her daughters to her own mother, busy frying doughnuts at the stove. “Aren’t they beautiful, Mother?”