Galveston (45 page)

Dad was in one corner of the yard, talking with Claire. She was dressed head to toe in white gingham that night, her dress altogether too frilly for one so small and buxom. I could tell Dad was trying to get away, for he kept stepping back and nodding and smiling. Still, she kept him there for a long time, talking of heaven only knows what—probably her beloved garden at the church. Claire has a way of dominating conversation to suit herself.

I thought of Mother then, and glanced up at her window. She'd rolled her chair within view of the party, and her body was outlined by the half-light of the bedroom beyond. Her face was encased in shadows, and I wondered as I watched what she might be thinking. Did she simply watch mindlessly the movings of the people below, puzzled by the presence of so many people? Was she thinking of nothing at all?

Or did she, even in her present state, suspect Claire of occupying too much of my father's time? Had she kept an eye on them as they chatted in the corner?

Chapter 12

With the dawn of the next morning, the summer's pace doubled itself, as, near the end of the race, a horse speeds his gallop at the feel of the whip across his flank.

The period was over. It had been unusually light, amounting to only a scant showing the day of the party, and when I awoke I was tired again and half relieved this was the day Roman and his fellow band members would be in Houston for their benefit performance there. They wouldn't return until the night train pulled into Galveston.

It was a pleasant morning, a cool breeze rolling in off the Gulf, and by ten o'clock I'd decided to put on my practice clothes and go through some steps on the back porch. I'd forgotten about Helga's leaving until I saw her go to the barn and bring the rig round. A fickle wind loosened the ribbons on her black bonnet, sending her hat aflight across the yard, where it landed among the craggy edges of a shrub. I met her there as she went to free it.

“Have a good time, and don't worry about anything,” I said. “James is a good boy, and will help Claire see to things while you're gone.”

She nodded stoically and started back across the yard. I felt foolish for having opened my mouth, and went back to practicing. I kept stopping in the middle of steps, taking sips of water or resting. What had sapped my energy I couldn't guess, but supposed at the time it must be a combination of all the summer's events coming down on me like a thousand pressing fingers.

I'd been out an hour or so when I heard James and Claire returning in the rig. James jumped out before they reached the barn and said, “Cousin Claire wants you to come for lunch.”

“All right, but I'll have to change first.”

“No, wait. I want to take a picture of you in your dancing outfit. I haven't got to use my camera yet, because Helga wouldn't let me take her picture at the station.” He had the camera hanging from his shoulder by its leather strap. “Would you mind, though, if we do it on your front verandah? I've studied on it, and think I can get a better shot from there because of the light.”

He wouldn't have, I thought to myself, if I hadn't finally persuaded Dad to cut back the giant oleanders last summer, which had for so long enclosed the porch in darkness. I'd never been able to guess why my mother would have wanted to allow them to grow to such immense proportions …

“Now,” said James. “Do one of those things where you curve your arms around and lift your leg in back.”

“An arabesque.”

“Yes! You look so pretty when you do that. There now, stand up on your toes and pretend there's an audience out there, cheering you.”

“Good gracious, James. All right. Let me know when you're ready.”

“Yes, but don't look directly into the camera. Look away, like out at the audience, when I take it.”

“All right,” I said, and when I allowed my mind to wander I could almost hear the shouts of praise, conjure up the glorious feeling of performing before hundreds of adoring fans. This is how it would be, then, to …

James clicked the camera once, then said, “I'd better take two or three more, just to be sure.” He didn't seem to trust the little black box, and as it was a model new on the market, I didn't much blame him. You could never guess how long some newfangled gadget would last. I hoped, for his sake, that all his pictures would turn out well.

“All right, that's it. I think it takes a couple of weeks to get the pictures back,” he said. “Hope the mail hasn't been picked up yet.”

“No, I don't think I've seen the postman.”

“You will hurry, won't you? Claire says lunch is almost ready.”

I should have known better than to subject myself to Claire's prying that day. Before finishing the first course of oyster stew, I was tired of trying to satisfy her curiosity while avoiding a betrayal of myself.

“… It was nice of you to bring your young man Nick with you last night. I suppose we'll soon be hearing wedding bells pealing at St. Christopher's. Perhaps I'd better bone up on raising appropriate wedding flowers in the garden.”

“No, ma'am. We've no plans to marry.”

“Oh? That's odd, I mean, seeing you've been keeping company with him so steadily. At least, before this summer. We haven't seen quite so much of him this summer as usual, have we?”

James cleared his throat, and kept his eyes on the bowl of milky liquid in front of him.

“Well, he has five or six students now,” I told her. “They keep him pretty busy when he isn't practicing organ or coaching the choir.”

“Hm. But you say you're not serious about Nick?”

“No.”

“Well, there must be someone else then. After all, a girl your age, pretty as you are, must have a beau hidden somewhere. Charles used to say when you were a child, that you were so pretty some young man would snatch you away from us before you turned eighteen.”

I looked across at her, trying to see behind the words. “No, no one.”

“I see. Well, I wasn't married at your age either, although James's grandmother Betsey was, and his own mother was on the verge of marriage at nineteen, I believe.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“It's a lovely thing, two people finding each other and striking out together. Of course … it doesn't always work out beautifully in the end. Yet if one is careful to look for the right things in another … Ah well, dear, you don't want to hear my philosophies on marriage, do you? By the way, you know I haven't gotten down to the Seaside Pavilion one time this summer, to see that band play, much as I intended to after meeting Mr. Cruz. And only the other day Jassie Norton, on the gardening committee, mentioned how much she and her husband Howard had enjoyed their music this summer. Oh well, I suppose they'll be back next year. But then, perhaps I might still go before they leave. Have you any idea when they return to New York? I had lunch with Esther Harrington last week … you know, Stuart Harrington owns the Pavilion … but I didn't think to ask her. Wasn't that silly?”

“I … believe I read somewhere, less than two weeks from now. I don't know how many performances it said between now and then.”

“Oh? And where did you read that?”

“I don't know. The
News
, I guess, or maybe the
Tribune
.”

“Funny, I didn't notice any ads in the papers. You know, since Charles and I came here we've always taken the
News
. That paper was kind to him when Charles was running for mayor. But I do find most of the time, ads about amusements are duplicated in both papers, don't you?”

“I guess so. Perhaps I saw it somewhere else. I don't remember,” I said, wondering with disgust why I hadn't been bright enough to have told her I didn't know, instead of allowing her an opening …

“I know. Maybe it was
The Opera Glass
. Do you take that paper? Mine hasn't been brought around in two or three weeks, and I've been meaning to call them. Lands, when one pays two dollars a year for something really elite and cultural, you would think they'd see it got delivered, wouldn't you?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Oh, Serena, I've been meaning to tell you how nice your skin stays—I mean, the coloring. Are you spending much time at your friend's place lately?”

“Some.”

“James has been busy crabbing with that Driscoll boy, or I'm sure he'd have accompanied you down more often. That would have been nice, wouldn't it, James?”

James nodded and sipped his stew.

“I don't know why this boy prefers the company of that undertaker's son to all the other kids around the neighborhood. You know, he comes from a long line of undertakers. What a thing to be!”

“Someone has to do it, I guess.”

“I suppose. When I'm gone, though, I shall fix it so there won't be anything left for an undertaker to prepare. I've been having some changes made in my will lately, and I've had it put in that I want to be cremated. When Charles was alive he wouldn't hear of it, but it's something I've always wanted to do. I won't have anyone touching me after—”

“Yes, some people prefer it that way. Everyone ought to have his choice.”

It was stifling conversation, and something about the stew was repelling me more with every spoonful. As we proceeded along through crab salad and ice cream, I was unsure whether Claire knew what I had been doing all summer, or was only making conversation in her usual way.

But then she did an odd thing. As we were about to leave the table, she spotted something on the windowsill behind me, and walked toward it. “A spider's web,” she announced, slicing through it with her arm. “Busy things, spiders … they can build a web within twenty-four hours that will make it look as though you haven't dusted your house in months. Seeing one always reminds me of the old adage, ‘Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive'…”

She looked at me then, and I was convinced she knew.

“I'd better be going soon. Let me help you with these dishes,” I said.

“Oh dear, I wouldn't think of it. James, see Serena to the door, will you?”

When we were out on the porch he said, “Do you think she knows?”

“It looks as though she might. But how?”

“Who knows?” he whispered. “I haven't said a thing. But Helga might have been snooping. I never know where I'll find her next, and she often peers at me when she thinks I'm not aware. Oh well, that's irrevelant, no, I mean irrelevant, I always mess up that word. Helga's gone now, and if Claire knows anything, what could she do about it anyway, except just love knowing? That's how she is, you know.”

“She could tell my father, and probably would.”

“Oh. Maybe she already has.”

“No, I don't think so. I could tell …”

“Yes, probably. Well, think what she said about young love, though. Maybe she thinks it's very romantic—like a fairy tale—and hopes you'll tell her about you and Roman so she can help.”

“Maybe. No matter, though. Don't act as though anything were wrong. I've got to talk to Roman.”

“Serena, you're not going to run away, are you?”

“I don't know. I don't know what to do.”

“Maybe I could pry it out of her.”

“No, don't say a thing. We might both be wrong. Perhaps she doesn't know anything, and is just being meddlesome,” I told him, trying without much success to keep the alarm from my voice.

Chapter 13

Madame D'Arcy's office is but a small nook just off the main floor of her studio. Centered there is an oversized desk, usually piled high with papers and odds and ends she never gets around to putting away. On the walls are pinned pictures of former students, many of whom have gone on to bright careers in ballet, either following their instruction from her here in Galveston, or in a studio she used to own up East somewhere, before coming here twenty years ago. There are, among the pictures, several of her, taken many years ago, when she herself was a professional dancer.

I was gazing over the pictures on the day she asked me to wait for her after class, the same day I'd chosen to speak with her about the school in New York. I remember how it surprised me, her calling me while I was changing clothes, almost as though she'd guessed in advance I needed to speak with her.

How foolish we look to ourselves in hindsight.

I was anxious to tell Roman about Claire. He would be back at the Pavilion today, and I would go to him directly from the studio. The fact of Claire's possible knowledge of our summer together made it all the more urgent I get all the loose ends tied up, get something definite worked out about what we would do. There was the slight possibility Madame would feel I was even now ready to audition in New York, and if so, I might be able to persuade Roman to take me there within a week, rather than a year from now. My stomach was churning as she entered and closed the door.

“Serena, dear, this won't take long,” she said, sitting down across from me and wiping the perspiration from her brow. She looked older from this distance, more gray strands showing in her dark hair, her face a little longer and thinner, her eyes not quite so bright as they seemed on the studio floor. Her firm, muscular body, though, defied the years at any distance. She put her hands together and hesitated as though she hated to begin.

“I've been wondering whether you're having some difficulty at home.”

“No, why should you—is my dancing not good? Am I losing ground?”

“No, no, hardly that,” she said, and looked down at her desk. “It's your fees, dear. Your father has paid me nothing since last April, though I've sent many notes to his office. No answer ever comes.…”

I could scarcely speak. “I'm sure there must be some explanation. Please forgive—oh dear, I'll talk with my father first thing.”