Memories of Another Day (38 page)

Finally she smiled, her teeth white and crinkles at the comers of her eyes making them even bluer. Her voice was low and soft but very clear and distinct. ''Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall."

**Humpty Dumpty had a great fall," I answered.

*'A11 the king's horses—"

*'And all the king's men—"

We finished together. "Couldn't put Humpty Dumpty together again." We laughed.

'*Are you Humpty Dumpty?" she asked.

*'I don't know," I answered. ''Do you think I am?"

''You could be," she said seriously.

"No. That's a nursery rhyme."

"Then why are you sitting on the wall like that?"

"I didn't know until you came along. Now I do. I've been waiting for you. I almost left but I was talked out of it:"

Her eyes glanced around quickly. "By whom? I don't see anyone."

"A friend. But he's gone now."

Her eyes came back to me. "I thought I heard you call me. That's why I stopped."

I didn't say anything.

"I did hear someone call me," she said.

I climbed down from the wall. "I called you, Princess." I picked up my backpack and slung it over the side of the car into the back seat, then got in beside her.

"Princess," she said thoughtfully. "Only my mother has ever called me that. My name is—"

I cut her off. "Don't tell me. Princess. I don't want to know."

"And what do I call you? Humpty Dumpty?"

"Jonathan."

She nodded her head. "I like it. It suits you." She put the car into gear and it moved silently, effortlessly onto the road. We were doing 60 before I could count that far. "I'm taking you home."

"Okay."

She glanced at me. "How old are you?"

"Eighteen," I answered. I wasn't pushing too far. Only two months.

"You look older," she said. I didn't answer as she reached into the well between the two bucket seats and came up with a gold cigarette case. She flipped it open. '' Light one for me."

Machine-rolled, chocolate-brown paper, gold-tipped thin marijuana. I was impressed. I lit the joint. It was good shit, maybe the best I'd ever had. Two tokes and I was up there. I passed the cigarette to her. She stuck it in the comer of her mouth and let it hang there. Two

seconds later when I looked at the speedometer, we were doing 85. I reached over and took the joint from her mouth.

''Why did you do that?" she asked.

I gestured at the speedometer. ''You said you were taking me home. I just want to make sure we get there.''

The car slowed down to 60. "I can handle it."

"Fm sure you can," I said, pinching out the joint. "But Vm the cautious type."

She was silent. A few minutes later she turned into the West Palm Beach exit ramp and coasted to a stop at the tollbooth.

The toll collectors all seemed to know her. She gave her card with a five-dollar bill attached to it to the man in the booth. He stepped out of the booth with the change in his hand. The red light on the meter showed $3.50. "Fine day, Mrs, Ross," he said. "How's the new car running?"

"Real good, Tom," she said.

"Highway Patrol radar clocked you at ninety back there, but you came down real quick. We told them to clear you."

"Thanks, Tom," she said, holding out her hand to him again. This time there was a twenty-dollar bill in it.

It disappeared as he turned back to his booth. "Don't push it, Mrs. Ross," he said in a polite voice. "Never can tell when someone who doesn't know you might be on duty."

"I'll remember that," she said, starting the car again. We rolled on down the ramp and onto the highway. Ten minutes later we crossed a small bridge over a waterway and down a small private street. She pressed the Genie on the sun visor in front of her and a pair of electric gates opened before us as we turned into the driveway. They were closed by the time we pulled to a stop in front of the house.

She turned to look at me. "We're home."

*'Okay," I said. I got out of the car and walked around to her side and opened the door for her.

"You'll have to carry your own bag," she said. "It's August and all the servants except the gardener are on vacation."

"I'll manage." I pulled the backpack from the car and followed her into the house. She led me down a hallway and opened a door. I followed her into the room.

"This is your room," she said. "The door over there is to the bathroom. The door next to the window leads you right outside to the pool or the beach, whichever you prefer. The closets are on the near wall."

There was one door she hadn't explained. "What about that one?" I asked.

"That's the door to my room," she said. "This room was my ex-husband's. Anything else you want to know?"

I looked at her for a moment. "Where's the washing machine? I've got some laundry to do."

I rolled over in the bed and opened my eyes. The sun had gone and dusk shadowed the room. I moved slowly, feeling the luxury of real shee,ts against me. It had been a long time since I had slept in a bed. I hadn't known how good it would feel until just now.

I sat up in the bed. I had thrown all my clothes into the washing machine. I still had time to get them into the dryer so that I would have something to wear tonight instead of the one pair of shorts I had kept out. I was out of the bed and into my jean shorts before I saw the clothes, all neatly pressed and folded, lying on the couch against the wall.

I really must have been out, because I hadn't heard her come into the room at all. I touched the clothes. It couldn't have been that long ago, because they were still warm. I rubbed my cheek. A shave now and another shower and I could feel almost human again. The

shower I had taken just before I fell into bed had been just to get me clean.

I stood in the shower stall luxuriating in the hot water. Steam obscured the glass of the shower door, and when I came out, the faint scent of marijuana hung in the air and there was a large bath sheet hanging where I could reach it. I took it down and began to dry myself and walked back into the bedroom. Her door was still closed. I went over to the window and looked out toward the front driveway. The Rolls was gone. I finished dressing and knocked at her door.

There was no answer. I knocked again. Still silence. I opened the door and went in. The room was empty. I went back into my room, then out into the hall. I went all through the house. She was nowhere in it.

I took a can of beer from the refrigerator, snapped it open and went through the living room onto the veranda. I sank into a chair looking out over the ocean. On the horizon a freighter slowly made its way south, and while I was watching, night fell and it was gone. Slowly the stars began to come out, and soon the sky was blue velvet filled with diamonds. It all belonged together. The Rolls Comic he, this house, now a diamond-filled sky. Rich was rich.

Her voice came from behind me. ''Hungry?"

I got to my feet and turned around. She had a large white bag with the Colonel's smiling face imprinted on it in each arm.

'Tve got ribs, chicken, salad and french fries," she said. ''I didn't feel like cooking."

"I'm not complaining," I said. I reached for the bags. ''Let me help."

There was four times as much food as we could eat. Finally I pushed myself away from the table. "I'm gonna bust if I don't stop."

She laughed. She hadn't eaten much at all. Maybe one rib and one piece of chicken. No more. "We'll put the rest in the fridge. Maybe you'll feel like some later."

We put the dishes into the dishwasher. Then she took a glass of red wine, I took another beer and we went back outside to the veranda. She sat down in a chair next to mine. From nowhere the gold cigarette case appeared. I watched while she lit the chocolate stick.

'' You do a lot of that?'' I asked.

She shrugged. "It's better than Valium."

She passed it to me. I took a few tokes. It was even better than before. Floaty and clear and very up. "Can't argue with that. But why?"

She didn't look at me. "It eases the pain of loneliness."

I took another hit and gave it back to her. "Why should you be lonely? You seem to have everything."

"Sure," she said. She dragged on the chocolate stick again. '' Poor little rich girl.''

"I didn't mean that," I said quickly. "You're beautiful; you don't have to be alone."

Her voice was bitter. "I'm not in the habit of picking up young boys on the Sunshine State Parkway."

"Hey, cool it," I said. "You're going off on the wrong track. I called you, remember?"

"I was stoned," she said. "I imagined it all and you went along with it."

"Princess."

Anger seeped into her voice. "Don't call me that! My name is—"

I leaned toward her. With one hand I took the chocolate stick from her fingers; with my other hand holding the back of her head, I covered her mouth with mine. At first her lips were hard, then they were soft, then they were warm, and when I took myself away from them, they were trembling. There were liquid blue shadows in her eyes.

"You have your mother's eyes, Christina," I said.

I could hear the catch in her voice. "If you knew my name all along, why did you call me Princess?"

I said the words, but my father spoke them. "If you had been my daughter, that's what I would have called you."

Her fingers clutched at my hands in fear. ''Jonathan, what's all this about? Either I'm going crazy or there's something in this dope that's making me hallucinate."

I put her hands together and held them to my lips. "Don't be frightened," I said. "We're just playing catch-up."

"Catch up?" She was puzzled.

"We're finishing something our parents never did." I got to my feet and drew her up after me. "Are your mother's scrapbooks still in the library?"

She nodded. "On the top shelf in the comer."

There were five books. Large, leather-bound, one on top of another. I took them all down and placed them on the desk. But I opened only the second and went right to the page I sought. "Here we are," I said, pointing to the photograph.

She stared at the picture of the young woman and the man smiling at each other in quarter-profile. Wonder crept into her voice. "It could be you and me."

"It could be. But it's not," I said. "It's your mother. And my father." I began to turn the pages. "There are more pictures."

Her voice was suddenly angry. "I don't want to see any more!" She ran from the room, slamming the door behind her.

I closed the book carefully and followed her. I found her sobbing on the bed in her room. I stood there for a moment. "I'm sorry," I said. "I think I'd better go."

She turned, sitting up on the bed. "No."

"I didn't come here to upset you," I said.

"I know that. I'm upset with myself. I'm ten years older than you are. I should be able to handle the way I feel."

I didn't speak.

**Daniel,'' she said. And when I looked into the familiar depths of her eyes, I knew it wasn't she who was speaking. It was her mother. "I still love you. And I still want you."

I had all I could do to keep myself from being sucked into the vortex of her eyes. I leaned over the bed and kissed her forehead gently. 'Try to get some sleep."

''I don't want to sleep," she said. ''I have so much to tell you." Her hands drew me down to the bed beside her. '*You were filled with anger. I never knew a man so filled with anger. That's why I left you."

I pressed her slowly back against the pillow. ''You didn't leave me," I said quietly. "You never left me."

Her hand found mine and squeezed it tightly. Her voice was a whisper. "Yes, in a way that's true. I never left you." Then she was asleep.

I waited for a long moment, then quietly, so that I would not awaken her, went back into my room and began loading my backpack.

''Jonathan/'

"'Stop messing with my head. Let go, Father. You're dead."

*7*m not messing with your head. I need you."

"It's over for you, Father. You don't need anything or anybody now."

*7 love her, Jonathan."

''You're mixed up, Father. She's not her mother."

*'She is as much her mother as you are me."

*7 can't help you, Father. Go away and let me lead my own life." A thought flashed through my head. "Is she your daughter. Father?"

"No." There was a sighing sibilance in his voice. "If she were, I wouldn't need you to tell her how I feel."

"Her mother is dead, Father. Why don't you tell her yourself?"

'*The dead cannot talk to the dead, my son. Only the living can talk to each other,'*

"Were you talking to someone, Jonathan?"

She was standing in the open doorway connecting our rooms. I didn't answer. She came into the room. '' I thought I heard voices.''

"There's no one," I said.

She looked down at the half-packed backpack on the bed. "You're not going?"

I picked up the backpack and spilled my clothing over the bed. "No," I said. "I'm not going."

There was a curiosity in her voice. "What happened between my mother and your father?"

"I don't know. I just feel things. But something led me here because it's important that I do know."

"I feel that too," she said. A sudden comprehension came into her eyes. "My mother kept a diary. Maybe—"

"That could be what we want to know," I said quickly. "Do you know where it is?"

"Yes," she said. "This was my mother's home. After her death all her personal things were boxed and put away. The scrapbooks were never touched because they were on the top shelf of the library and we didn't find them until afterward. By then it didn't pay to bother."

"Can we get to them?"

"Everything is in storage in Miami. We could drive down there tomorrow."

I began to feel better. "At fifty-five miles per hour."

She smiled. "At fifty-five. I promise." She turned back to her room. "Good night, Jonathan."

"Good night, Christina," I said. I watched the door close behind her, then undressed and got into bed. I felt exhaustion seethe through my body and dived into a deep sleep.

June 30, 1937

Philip Murray came to the hospital today to see Daniel, It was the first time anyone had come from the union in the month he had been there. It was almost a week after the doctors had told Daniel he would never walk again. Two men came with him. Mr. McDonald and Mr. Mussman. I was sitting beside the bed, so I was the first to see them as they walked down the ward past the curtains that separated the patients from each other. I got to my feet when they stopped in front of Daniel's bed.