"Well, I guess that explains Cindy's tangled hair," said Dad. But he didn't look relieved. He put Cindy on her feet and began to make a series of phone calls to all Mom's friends, and Madame Marisha. My grandmother said she'd drive right over.
Then he was talking to Emma, who couldn't return until tomorrow because of the storm. I thought of my grandmother on the road, trying to drive here in the downpour. Even in perfect weather, she wasn't what I'd call a safe driver.
"Dad, let's check all the rooms, even the attic," I said, jumping up and running toward the linen closet. "She may have gone up there to dance like she does sometimes, and accidently locked herself in, or fallen asleep on one of those beds . . . or something." I concluded this lamely, thinking he was looking at me in an odd way.
When Dad started to follow me up the attic stairs, Cindy let out a loud wail of fright. Quickly he returned to the hall and picked her up as if to take her with us.
Bart pulled out a new pocketknife and began to whittle on a long tree branch. It seemed he was going to skin off all the tree bark and make a smooth switch. Cindy couldn't take her eyes off of that knife or switch.
Dad, Cindy and me looked all over our house, in the attic, in the closets, under the beds, everywhere. Mom was nowhere to be found. "It's just not like Cathy to do anything like this," Dad said worriedly. "Especially I know she wouldn't leave Cindy alone with Bart. Something is very wrong."
Yeah, I thought, if there was a fish in the house, it was watching us and whittling away on a limb that should be used on his bare bottom.
"Dad," I whispered as he stood in the middle of his bedroom again, looking around with bleak eyes, "why don't we presume Bart knows where she's gone? He's not the most honest kid ever born. You know how crazy he's been acting lately."
We set off together, Dad still carrying Cindy, and hunted now for Bart. Now we couldn't find
him.
He was gone.
Dad and I stared at each other. He shook his head.
I stared around, knowing Bart had to be hiding behind a chair, or was crouched down low in some corner that was dim, or perhaps out in the rain, acting like an animal.
But the storm was getting worse. His cave in the hedges wouldn't keep him dry. Even Bart had more sense than to stay out in the cold and wet.
My thoughts in a turmoil, I felt wild inside, like the storm. I hadn't done anything to deserve all this trouble--yet I was in the midst of it, suffering along with Dad, with Mom, with Cindy. . . and maybe Bart too.
"Are you hating me now, Jory?" asked Dad, looking at me squarely. "Are wheels churning in your head saying your mother and I brought this all on ourselves and we deserve to pay the price? Are you thinking you shouldn't have to pay any price? If that's what you're thinking, I'm thinking the same thing. Maybe your mother's life would have turned out better, and yours and Bart's too, if I had gone away and left her to live in Paul's home until she found another man. But I still loved her. I love her now, tomorrow and forever. God help me for not being able to think about life without her."
Dully I turned away. So that was what everlasting burning love was like, destroying everything that got in its way.
On my bed I lay down and sobbed.
Finally, I sat up and wondered again where Mom was. For the first time it really hit me--she might be in danger. She wouldn't leave Dad. Something terrible must have happened or she'd be here, setting the table as she did every Thursday when Emma had her day off. Thursdays were very special to them for reasons I was just beginning to
understand.
Thursday, the day the maids of Foxworth Hall went into the city. Thursday, the day Mom and Dad could climb out the attic dormer window and lie on the roof and talk, and as they talked, as they looked at each other in their high and lonely place, they fell mindlessly, uncontrollably in love.
For now I knew why Mom had married one man after another. Trying always to escape the sinful love she felt too.
I got up. Decided. It was up to me to find Bart. When I found Bart, I'd find my mother.
In the huge kitchen of the mansion John Amos had everything under control. The maids and cook were scurrying about. "Madame had to leave early," he told them. "Now you are to pack up what clothes she'll need for her trip to Hawaii, and be quick about it. Lottie, I want you to drive her bags to the airport and put them on the plane. Don't just stand there and stare at me with your blank face looking so stupid. You understand English. Do as I say!"
Boy, he could act mean when he wanted to. They scattered like scared birds, one this way, one that, and then we were alone and he was grinning at me with his cracked teeth. "How did your end go?"
Just like the movies, him and me. I swallowed over some lump that stayed in my throat and wouldn't go away. "They don't know where Momma is. They're worried, and keep asking, where is she?"
"Never mind about them," he said in his funny old voice that made me wonder why God had chosen him for such a special job, "I'll take care of everything until God sends his signal that your mother and grandmother have been redeemed, and saved from hellfires. You just go home and keep quiet."
Fire in my mind, growing bigger, hotter. "You told me my momma would be my attic souvenir. And now you won't even tell me where you put her. I've looked in the attic and they're not up there. You tell me where they are, or I'll go home and tell my daddy what you've done."
"What I've done?" he asked with a curling sneer. "It's what you have done, Bart Winslow Sheffield. Do you think for one moment, with your violent psychiatric history that you can be believed and not blamed? The law will take you and find you guilty, and you will be locked away."
When he saw the red Malcolm anger in my eyes he tried to smile. "Come now, Bart, I was only testing you, trying to see if you'd break and lose your courage. But you're strong and full of the righteous power, the same as your great-grandfather, Malcolm. Every power he had you have. And now is your chance to use those powers. For now you'll be in charge of the adults--your mother and grandmother. You will control their lives, and feed them--if you will--or let them starve if you are so inclined. But you have to be careful. You must keep them a secret until . . . well, remember always your father and brother will be suspicious, and they may betray you if you give them the least hint of what you're up to."
People always suspected me. If something was broken it was always my fault. If the toilet stopped up and overflowed it was always because I'd thrown down too much paper. If Momma lost her jewelry, that was my fault too. Whatever bad thing happened in our house, they said it was my fault. I'd show 'em now how wrong it was for them not to love me.
"Bread and water," I said. "Bread and water is good enough for women who are unfaithful to husbands and sons."
Down, down the narrow cellar steps John Amos led me, carrying a small flashlight. Made eerie shadows on the walls, felt clammy. Long time ago when this house belonged to Jory and me we'd found every nook, every cranny. But this was where ghosts lived, where I'd never felt comfortable, so I stayed close at the heels of John Amos, terrified if he moved more than a yard ahead of me. "They'll look down here," I whispered, scared of waking up things that might be sleeping. "No, they won't look where I have them hid," answered John Amos. He chortled. "Your father will be sure they are in the attic, and why not? That would be the perfect revenge. But they'll nevernever find the snug little cage the workmen made when they put up a new brick wall to reinforce the wine cellar."
Wine cellar. Didn't sound nearly as good as the attic. Wasn't nearly as scary, but it was very cold and dark down here.
John Amos began brushing away spiderwebs, then he shoved old furniture aside, and finally came to a board door that was very hard to open. "Now you go in and peek through the little door at the bottom of that door over there," he said. "We used to have a stray kitten your grandmother took in, but it
disappeared shortly after you started coming over here. She had me cut this little door in the larger one so the cat could come and go when it wanted to."
With the flashlight held beneath his chin he looked like something dead and dug up. Didn't trust him not to slam the door shut behind me, and I'd never be able to wiggle through that little kitty door.
"No. You go in the wine cellar first," I ordered like Malcolm would. For a moment he didn't move. Maybe he thought I might slam the door behind him. Then he gave me a long look before he went slowly into the wine cellar. He put the flashlight on one of the wine racks while he tugged and tugged at the back rack holding many bottles of dusty ole wine bottles.
Finally it creaked open. Smelled bad in there. I held my nose and stared, and then stared some more. John Amos held his flashlight high so I could see the two women prisoners better.
Oh, oh. Momma, Grandmother --how pitiful my momma looked, lying on the damp concrete with her head held on my grandmother's lap. Both of them raised their hands to shield their eyes from the bright light come so suddenly into their dark evil cell. I could barely see, it was so dim.
"Who is it?" asked my momma weakly. "Chris, is that you? Have you found us?"
Was my momma blind now? How could she think John Amos was my daddy? If my momma went blind and crazy too, would God think that enough punishment?
My grandmother spoke up. "John, I know that's you. You let us out of here this minute. Do you hear me--let us out immediately."
John Amos laughed.
I didn't know what to do, but Malcolm came in my brain and told me. "You give me the key, John Amos," I ordered sternly. "You go up the stairs and let
me
give the prisoners their bread and water."
Wonder why he obeyed? Did he really think I was as strong as Malcolm? I watched until he was out of sight, then I ran to bolt another door so he couldn't sneak up behind me.
Feeling more like Malcolm than like Bart, I crept on my hands and knees, shoving along the silver tray with its half loaf of bread, and its silver pitcher of water. It didn't seem to me funny to be serving prison meals from a silver tray, for that's the way my grandmother always did things, elegantly.
Big door was shut now. It appeared only another of the wine shelves full of dusty old bottles. Flat on my stomach I reached under the lower shelf and opened the little door that would swing inward, or outward-- wonder why the kitten liked it back in the darkest part?
"Bread, water," I said in a hard gruff voice and quickly shoved in the tray. I slammed the little door shut and picked up a brick to wedge it so they couldn't see me if they pushed.
I stayed to spy on them. I heard my mother moaning, and crying out for Chris. Then she surprised me. "Momma, where has Momma gone, Chris? It's been so long since she visited us, months, months, and the twins don't grow,"
"Cathy, Cathy, my poor darling, stop thinking about the past," said my grandmother. "Please hold on, eat and drink to keep up your strength. Chris will come to save us both."
"Cory, stop playing that same tune over and over. I'm so tired of your lyrics. Why do you write such sad songs? The night will end, it will. Chris, tell Cory the day will begin soon."
I heard sobs then. From my grandmother?
"Oh, my God!" she cried. "Is this the way it's going to end? Can't I do anything right? This time I was so sure I could work it out. Please, God, don't let me fail all of them, please." I listened to her pray out loud. Praying for my mother to get well, for her son to come and find them before it was too late. Over and over she said the same words as my mother asked crazy questions.
I sat and listened for a long time. Legs got cramped and uncomfortable, got old and weary inside, like I was locked up in there with them, crazy too, hungry, hurting, dying.
"Goin now," I said in a whisper. "Don't like this place."
Nobody was home and it was dark. Now I could run to the refrigerator and steal the food. I was stuffing in another ham slice when Madame Marisha opened the door from the garage and stalked into the kitchen. "Good evening, Bart," she said. "Where's your father and Jory?"
I shrugged. Nobody told me nothin. Didn't know why Daddy and Jory would go off and leave Cindy alone with me. Then Emma was calling out from another room. "Hello, Madame Marisha. Dr. Sheffield told me you were due here any moment. I'm sorry you went to so much trouble. Once I knew Cathy had disappeared, I couldn't stay away. I have to know what's happened to her, and she was so sick, so feverish, I should have known better than to leave her." Then Emma saw me. "Bart! You wicked little boy. How dare you add to your father's worries by disappearing too. You are a bad boy, and I'll bet my life you know something about where your mother is!"
Both old women glared at me. Hating me with their mean-mean eyes. I ran. Ran from knowing soon I'd be crying and I couldn't let anybody see me cry-- now that I had to act just like Malcolm--the heartless.
The night was not fit for man nor beast. It was raining like when Noah was building his ark. The wind howled and shrieked and was trying to tell us something, like wild music that would destroy your brain. I kept pace with Dad, though that wasn't easy since I'd yet to grow legs as long as his. His hands were balled into fists. I fisted mine too, ready to do battle beside him when the need arose.
"Jory," said Dad, striding on without pausing, "how often does Bart come over here?" We'd reached the black iron gates by this time, then he leaned to speak into the box which sent his voice into the house.
"I don't know," I said miserably. "Bart used to trust me, but now he doesn't trust anybody, so he doesn't tell me what he does anymore."
Slowly, slowly, the black gates swung open. They seemed like black skeleton hands welcoming us into our graves. I shivered, thinking I was getting as morbid as Bart. I had to run then to keep up with Dad. "I've got to say something," I yelled so I could be heard above the wind. "When I first found out you are Mom's brother and our own uncle, I thought I hated you and her too. I thought I could never forgive either one of you for making me so ashamed, so
disappointed. I thought I'd dry up inside and never love or trust anyone again. But now that Mom's gone I know I'll always love her and you. I can't hate either one of you, even if I want to."