The Promise (5 page)

“How?”

“There's a man in San Francisco who could make you beautiful again. Who could make you able to paint again. It would take a long time, and a lot of money, but it would be worth it, Nancy … wouldn't it?” There was the tiniest of smiles at the corners of Marion's mouth. Now she was on familiar ground. It was just like making a multimillion-dollar deal. A hundred-million-dollar deal. They were all the same.

A small jagged sigh emerged from the faceless bandages. “We can't afford it.” Marion almost shuddered at the “we.” They were not a “we” anymore. They never had been. She and Michael were the “we.” Not this… this … She took a deep breath and composed herself. She had work to do. That was the only way she could think of it. She couldn't think of the girl. Only of Michael.

“You can't, Nancy. But I can. You do know who I am, don't you?”

“Yes.”

“You do understand that you've already lost Michael? That he could never survive the pressure and tragedy of what has happened to you, if he survives at all. You understand that, don't you?”

“Yes.”

“And you know that it would be a vicious thing to do, to try to put him through it, to make him prove his loyalty to you?” She wouldn't say the word “love.” The girl wasn't worthy of it. Marion had to believe that “Do you understand that, Nancy?” There was a silent pause. “Do you?”

This time it was a very tired little word. She was sounding spent. “Yes.”

“Then you've already lost everything you can lose, haven't you?”

“Yes.” The word had no tone, no life to it. It was as though life itself were seeping away from the girl.

“Nancy, I'd like to propose a little deal to you.” It was Marion Hillyard at her best. If her son had heard her, he would have wanted to kill her. “I'd like you to think about that new face. About a new life, a new Nancy. Think about it. About what it would mean. You'd be beautiful again, you could have friends again, you could go places—to restaurants, to movies, to stores—you could wear pretty clothes and go out with men. The other way … people would shriek when you walked near them. You couldn't go anywhere, do anything, be anyone. Children would cry if they saw you. Can you imagine what that would be like? But you have a choice.” She let the words sink in.

“No, I don't.”

“Yes, you do. I want to give you that choice. I will give you that new life. A new face, a new world. An apartment in another city while the work is being done—anything you need, anything you want to do. There'll be no struggle, Nancy, and in a year or so, the nightmare will be over.”

“And then?”

“You're free. The new life is yours.” There was an endless pause as Marion prepared to lower the boom Nancy was waiting for. “As long as you never contact Michael again. The new face is yours only if you give up Michael. But if you don't accept my … my gift, you know that you've already lost him, anyway. So why live the rest of your life as a freak if you don't have to?”

“What if Michael doesn't honor the agreement? What if I stay away from him, but he doesn't stay away from me?”

“All I want from you is the promise that you'll stay away from him. What Michael does is up to him.”

“And you'll honor that? If he wants me … anyway … if he comes after me, then it's up to him?”

“I'll honor that.”

Nancy felt victorious as she lay there. She knew Michael infinitely better than his mother did. Michael would never give up on her. He'd find her, and want to help her through the ordeal, but by then she'd already be on her way to becoming herself again. His mother couldn't win this one, no matter how hard she tried. Accepting the deal would make Nancy a cheat, because she knew what the outcome would be. But she had to do it She to. There was no other way.

“Will you do it?” Marion almost held her breath as she waited for the one word she prayed for, the word that would free Michael, and at last it came.

But it would be a word of victory, not of defeat. It would be filled with all Nancy's faith in Michael. She remembered the words he had said to her at the rode where they'd hidden the beads the morning before. “I promise never to say good-bye to you.” She knew he never would.

“Your answer, Nancy?” Marion couldn't wait any longer. Her heart wouldn't bear it.

“Yes.”

Chapter 5

Marion Hillyard stood in the doorway of the hospital in a black wool dress and black Cardin coat watching them load the girl into an ambulance. It was six o'clock in the morning, and she had never spoken to her again. They had made their agreement the night before, and Marion had immediately asked Wicky to call the man he knew in San Francisco. Wickfield had been overjoyed. He had kissed Marion on the cheek and gotten hold of Peter Gregson at his home. Gregson would do it. He wanted Nancy out west immediately, and Marion had arranged for a special compartment and two nurses in first class on a jet heading for San Francisco at eight o'clock that morning. She was sparing no expense. “She's a lucky girl, Marion.” Wickfield looked at her in admiration as she crushed out another cigarette.

“I think
so
. And I don't want Michael to know, Wicky. Is that clear?” It was, and so was the “or else” in her voice. “If someone does tell him, I cancel her treatment.”

“But why? He has a right to know what you've done for the girl.”

“It's between the two of us. The four of us, including you and Gregson. Michael doesn't need to know anything. When he comes out of the coma, you're not to mention the girl to him at all. It will only agitate him.”

If he ever came out of the coma. Marion had dozed in the chair at his side all night long despite Wicky's protests. But she had felt strangely revived after her talk with the girl. She had freed Michael at last. Now he could live. In a way, she had given them both life. She knew she had been right to do what she'd done. “You won't say anything then, will you, Robert?” She never called him that, except to remind him what the Hillyard money had done for his hospital.

“Of course not, if that's what you want.”

“It is.”

There was the dull clank of the ambulance door closing, and the last of the blue blankets swathing the girl disappeared with the two nurses' backs. The nurses would be with her for the first six or eight months in San Francisco. After that, Gregson had said, she wouldn't need them. But for those six or eight months, she would spend much of her time with her eyes bandaged, as he worked on her lids and her nose, her brow and her cheekbones. He had a whole face to reconstruct. There would be other expenses involved, too. Nancy would need almost constant care by a psychiatrist as she underwent the emotional shock of becoming a new person. There was no way Gregson could give her back the self she had been. He had to create a whole new woman. And Marion liked that idea just fine: the girl would be that much more removed from Michael. It took away the possibility of an accident, a chance meeting in an airport five years later. Marion didn't want that to happen. Her mind ran over the list of arrangements she had made with Gregson on the phone at four o'clock that morning, one o'clock San Francisco time. He had sounded bright and alive and dynamic, a man in his forties with an extraordinary international reputation in his field. She was a damn lucky girl. He said he'd have his secretary work it all out. The apartment, the clothes. They had quickly run over the cost of eighteen months of surgery, and the additional expense of psychiatric help, constant nurses for a while, and even general support. They had settled on four hundred thousand dollars as a reasonable figure. Marion would call the bank at nine and have it transferred to Gregson's account on the coast. It would be there when his own bank opened at nine. Not that he was worried. He knew who Marion Hillyard was. Who didn't?

“Why don't you come inside and have some breakfast, Marion?” Wickfield was losing hope of having any influence on her at all, and Calloway had said that he couldn't leave New York until that morning. Wickfield didn't know that Marion had told him not to. She had wanted to be alone to work out her “business” arrangements. And everything had worked out just perfectly. “Marion?”

“Hm?”

“Breakfast?”

“Later, Wicky. Later. I want to see Michael.”

“I'll go up and take a look at him now.”

Marion stopped in the ladies' room for a moment, while Wickfield went ahead to see Michael. But he didn't expect any immediate change; he had checked him only an hour before.

But there was a strange stillness when Marion came into the room five minutes later. Wicky was standing back from the bed with a look of solemnity, and the nurse had left the room. The New England sun was streaming across the bed, and from somewhere there was the steady sound of water dripping into a sink. Everything was much too still, and suddenly her heart flew to her mouth. It was like when Frederick … oh God… her hand went unwillingly to her heart and she stood frozen in the doorway looking from Wicky to the bed. And then she saw him, and her eyes filled with tears. He was smiling at her … her boy. It wasn't like Frederick at all. A sob caught in her throat and she walked to the bed with trembling legs, and then she bent down and touched his face with her hands.

“Hi, Mom.” They were the most beautiful words she had ever heard, and the tears poured down her face as she smiled.

“I love you, Michael.”

“I love you, too.” Even Wickfield had tears in his eyes as he watched them. The boy, so young and handsome and alive again, and the woman who had given so much in the past two days. He slipped quietly from the room, and they never heard him go.

She held her son gently in her arms for a long moment as he ran a hand over her hair. “Take it easy, Mom. Everything's okay. Christ, I'm hungry.” Marion laughed. He sounded so good. He was alive again. And all hers.

“We will get you the biggest, bestest, superest breakfast you've ever seen, if Wicky says it's all right.”

“To hell with Wicky. I'm starving.”

“Michael!” She couldn't be angry at him, though. She could only love him. But then as she looked at him, she saw his face cloud over as though he were suddenly remembering why he was there. Before that, he had acted as if he had just awakened from having his tonsils out. All he wanted was ice cream and his mom. But now there was a great deal more in his face, and he tried to sit up. He didn't know how to say the words, but he had to ask. He searched her face, and she kept her eyes on his and his hand tightly held in hers. “Take it easy, darling.”

“Mom … the others … the other night … I remember …”

“Ben has already gone back to Boston with his father. He's pretty badly banged up but he's all right. A lot more all right than you were.” She said it with a sigh and tightened her grip on his hand. She knew what was coming next. But she was prepared for it.

“And … Nancy?” His face was ivory white as he said her name. “Nancy, Mom?” The tears already stood out in his eyes. He could see the answer in his mother's face as she sat down carefully in the chair next to him and ran a gentle hand along the outline of his face.

“She didn't make it, darling. They did all they could. But the damage was just too great.” She paused for only the slightest of seconds and then went on. “She died early this morning.”

“Did you see her?” He was still searching her face for something more.

“I sat with her for a while last night.”

“Oh, God … and I wasn't there. Oh, Nancy… ” He turned his head into the pillow and cried like a child as Marion held his shoulders. He said her name over and over and over again, until at last he could cry no more. And when he turned to look at his mother again, she saw something in his face that she had never seen there before. It was as though he had lost something of himself in those moments when he said Nancy's name. As though part of him had bled away and died.

Chapter 6

Nancy heard the landing gear grind out of the plane's belly, and for the hundredth time since the flight began she felt the touch of the hand that had touched her aim before. It was strangely comforting to feel the nurse's hand, and it pleased her that she could already tell the difference between them. One woman had thin, delicate hands with long narrow fingers; her hands were always cold but there was great strength in the way she held on to Nancy. It made Nancy feel brave again just to touch her. The other nurse had warm, chubby soft hands that made one feel safe and loved. She patted Nancy's arm a lot, and it was she who had given Nancy the two shots for the pain. She had a soft soothing voice. The first woman had a slight accent. Nancy had already come to like them both.

“It won't be much longer now, dear. We can see the bay now. We'll be there in no time at all.”

Actually, it would be another twenty minutes. And Peter Gregson was counting on that as he raced along the freeway in the black Porsche. The ambulance was meeting him there. He could have one of the girls from his office pick his car up later that morning. He wanted to ride into the city with the girl. He was intrigued by her. She had to be Someone for Marion Hillyard to be so concerned about her. Four hundred thousand dollars was quite a sum, and only three of that was going to him. The other hundred was to keep the girl comfortable in the next year and a half. And she would be. He had promised Marion Hillyard that. But he would have seen to that anyway. It was part of what he did. He would get to know the girl's very soul. They would become more than friends; he would mean everything to her and she to him. It had to be that way, because by the time that new face was born, she would be the person she looked like. Peter Gregson was going to give birth to Nancy McAllister, after a pregnancy of eighteen long months. She was going to have to be a very brave girl. But she would be. He would see to that. They would face it together. The very idea excited him. He loved what he did, and in an odd way he already loved Nancy. What he would make of her. What she would be. He would give her all that he had to give.

He looked at his watch and stepped on the gas. The car was one of his favorite releases. He also flew his own plane, went scuba diving whenever he had time, skied, and had climbed several mountains in Europe. He was a man who liked to scale heights, in every possible way. To defy the impossible and win. It was why he loved his work. People accused him of playing God. But it wasn't really that. It was the thrill of insuperable odds that stimulated him. And he had never yet been defeated. Not by women or mountains or sky, not even by a patient. At forty-seven he had won at everything he touched, and he was going to win now. He and Nancy were going to win together. His dark hair blew softly in the breeze and his eyes almost crackled with life. He still had a tan from his recent week in Tahiti, and he was wearing gray slacks and a soft blue cashmere sweater that was just the color of his eyes. He was always impeccably dressed, perfectly put together. He was an exceptionally good-looking man, but there was more to him than that. It was his vitality, his electricity, that caught one's attention even more than his looks did.

He pulled up to the curb at the airport precisely at the moment Nancy's plane was touching down. He showed a special pass to a policeman, who nodded and promised to keep an eye on the car. Even the policeman smiled at Gregson. Peter was a man no one could ignore. He had an almost irresistible charm, and a strength that showed through everything he did. It made people want to be near him.

He wove his way expertly into the airport lobby and spoke rapidly to a ground supervisor. The man picked up a phone, and within moments Peter was ushered through a door, down a flight of stairs, and into a tiny airport vehicle, then rushed out to the run-way, where he saw the ambulance standing by, the attendants waiting for the patient to be taken off the plane. He thanked his driver and hurried to the ambulance, where he quickly checked inside to see that his orders had been carried out. They had been, to the letter. Everything was there that he needed. It was hard to tell what kind of shape she might be in after the flight, but he had wanted her in San Francisco immediately, so he could keep a close eye on things. He had a lot of planning to do, and work would begin in just a few days.

The other passengers were held back a few more minutes while Nancy was carried out through the forward hatch. The stewardesses hung back, looking grave, averting their gazes from the bottles and transfusions that hung over the bandaged girl, but the nurses seemed to be speaking to her as she was carried out. He liked the look of the nurses, young but competent, and they seemed to work well as a team. That was what he wanted. They were all going to be part of a team for the next year and a half, and everyone was important. There was no room for reluctance or incompetence. Everyone had to be the very best they could be, including Nancy. But he would see to that. She was going to be the star of this show. He watched her being carried toward him and waited until the stretcher had been gently set down inside the ambulance. He smiled at the nurses but said nothing, and held up a hand gesturing them to wait as he eased in beside Nancy and sat down on a seat next to her. He reached for her hand and held it.

“Hello, Nancy. I'm Peter. How was the trip?” As though she were for real. As though she were still someone, not just a faceless blob. She could feel relief wash over her at the sound of his voice.

“It was okay. You're Dr. Gregson?” She sounded tired but interested.

“Yes. But Peter sounds a little less formal between two people who're going to be working together.” She liked the way he said it, and if she could have, she would have smiled.

“You came out to meet me?”

“Wouldn't you have come out to meet me?”

“Yes.” She wanted to nod, but she couldn't. “Thank you.”

“I'm glad I did. Have you ever been to San Francisco before, Nancy?”

“No.”

“You're going to love it. And we're going to find you an apartment you like so much you'll never want to leave here. Most people don't, you know. Once they dig in their heels, they want to stay here forever. I came out here from Chicago about fifteen years ago, and you couldn't get me back there on a bet.” She laughed at the way he said it, and he smiled down at her. “Are you from Boston?” He was treating her as though they had been introduced by friends. But he wanted her to relax after the long flight. And a few minutes without movement would do her good. The nurses were also glad of the opportunity to stretch as they chatted with the two ambulance attendants. Now and then they glanced in to see Dr. Gregson still talking to Nancy, and they liked him already. He exuded warmth.

“No, I was from New Hampshire. That's where I grew up anyway. In an orphanage. I moved to Boston when I was eighteen.”

“It sounds very romantic. Or was the orphanage straight out of Dickens?” He gave everything a light touch, a happy note. Nancy laughed at the question about Dickens.

“Hardly. The nuns were wonderful. So much so that I wanted to be one.”

“Oh, God. Now listen, you—” And she laughed at the tone of his voice. “When we're through with our project, young lady, you're going to be ready for Hollywood. If you go hide in a convent somewhere I'll … I'll … why, I'll head off the bridge, damn it. You'd better promise me you won't go off and become a nun somewhere.” That was easy. She had Michael to get ready for. Her dreams of being Sister Agnes Marie had faded years ago, but die wanted to tease Gregson a little. She already liked him.

“Oh, all right.” She said it begrudgingly but with laughter in her voice.

“Is that a promise? Come on, say it … I promise.” “I promise.”

“What do you promise?” They were both laughing now.

“I promise not to be a nun.”

“Whew. That's better.” He signaled to the two nurses to join them, and the attendants moved toward the front. She was ready to go now, and he didn't want to tire her with too much patter. “Why don't you introduce me to your friends.”

“Well, let's see, the cold hands are Lily, and the warm ones are Gretchen.” All four of them laughed.

“Thanks a lot, Nancy.” Lily laughed benevolently as Nancy smiled to herself. She felt safe with her new-found friends, and all she could think of now was what she would look like for Michael after it was all over. She liked Peter Gregson, and suddenly she knew that he was going to make her someone very special, because he cared.

“Welcome to San Francisco, little one.” Lily's cool hands ware replaced by his strong, graceful ones, and he kept a light hand on her shoulder all the way into the city. In an odd way, he made her feel as though she had come home.