Wayward Winds (56 page)

 114 
Into Vienna

Amanda lay awake the rest of the night with only one thought in mind—she had to get out of here!

If she could just reach France. There she might wire her parents or Cousin Martha—anybody!—for money. But how to get across Austria-Hungary and Germany!

She lay the rest of the night as one paralyzed, knowing that next to her slept one she could no longer trust, whose mistress was somewhere under this same roof waiting for him until she herself was out of the way!

It was all she could do not to scream out in outrage and shame. Yet she had to lie motionless as each slow, lonely minute passed.

She must
not
wake him! One look, one word . . . and he would know that she knew.

Gradually a madcap plan came into her brain.

When morning arrived, still pretending to be asleep when he woke, she waited until Ramsay was gone. Then slowly she too rose and dressed.

There was already one actress in the house. Now there would have to be
two
. If she wanted to get away, she would have to give the most convincing performance of her life!

Summoning what little courage she possessed, she put on as normal a face as she could muster and went downstairs to breakfast. Ramsay sat with his mother at the table. At least Mr. Barclay was nowhere
to be seen, nor the sensuous Sadie Greenfield. Amanda didn't think she could cope with the eyes of the one and the pretense of the other just now.

Ramsay and Mrs. Halifax greeted her as she entered. How could they not see the fear and deceit in her eyes! She sat down to her tea and did her best to throw a few occasional crumbs into the fragmentary morning conversation.

Fearing Ramsay would be suspicious of her every word, midway through as much breakfast as her knotted stomach could tolerate, and after he had divulged that he would be in and out most of the afternoon, trying to sound casual, Amanda spoke.

“Ramsay, could I . . . uh, have a little money?” she said. “I would like to go into town today.”

“Of course, my dear,” he replied. “What for?”

“I . . . uh, want to buy a new dress.”

He glanced up from his newspaper.

“I need a dirndl,” Amanda went on cheerily. “If I'm going to be Austrian, I ought to look the part, don't you think?”

Ramsay and his mother glanced at one another, then nodded their approval of the suggestion, delighted that Amanda seemed to be adapting so well to her new life.

“All right,” said Ramsay, “A new dress sounds like a great idea.”

“I will go with you, dear,” said Mrs. Halifax.

“That is very kind of you,” replied Amanda. Her heart was pounding. If only her quivering voice didn't betray her! “But I really like to be alone when I shop,” she added. “Buying clothes . . . is so personal. Otherwise I get embarrassed and always come away with nothing.”

The hint of a frown creased Mrs. Halifax's forehead. But it seemed a reasonable explanation. Reluctantly she consented.

Throughout the morning Amanda did her best to carry out her normal routine. Keeping to herself, she watched and listened. Ramsay gave her two hundred Austrian schillings. She still had ten pounds of her own she had secretly kept back when Ramsay asked for the rest of her money after their wedding. That still wouldn't get her across Europe. She must get her hands on more.

She saw no sign of the Greenfield woman, or whatever her name was, although she came upon a few whispered conversations. She only saw Mr. Barclay once. He was occupied most of the morning in
meetings upstairs. Several uniformed men came and went throughout the day, but no one paid attention to her. About ten-thirty she dozed off in one of the downstairs sitting rooms.

Amanda awoke groggily. Gradually the nightmare of the previous night returned to her mind, and with it her plan. She rose from the chair and listened. Ramsay appeared already to have gone. His mother was talking with one of the servants, saying she would be leaving for about an hour as well.

This was her chance!

The conversation came to an end. Quickly Amanda sat down again and leaned her head back and closed her eyes. A moment later she heard a slight noise of the door swinging open. She felt Mrs. Halifax's gaze upon her. With great mental effort she breathed deeply in and out pretending to be asleep.

Several long seconds passed. Then the footsteps retreated.

Amanda opened one eye a slit. She was alone.

Mrs. Halifax ascended the stairs to her small apartment, then returned a few minutes later to the ground floor. Two minutes later the front door opened, then closed.

Amanda sprang from the chair and flew to the window. She peeked out a crack between the curtains. Mrs. Halifax hailed a taxi on the street.

Calmly, though with heart racing, Amanda left the sitting room and walked upstairs to her room, pulled out the smaller of her two bags from the closet, then frantically threw what she could carry into it. The day was warm, but she would have to take her heavy coat, for autumn was in the air. And her best walking shoes. As for the rest of the possessions she had brought on the cruise . . . she would have to leave them behind.

And money . . . she had to get more money.

She went to Ramsay's bureau and tore hurriedly through the drawers. Nothing.

Where did he keep money? There was no time to search further.

She crept into the corridor. Gertrut Oswald's room was just down the hall. She had heard her in the kitchen with Mrs. Halifax.

Amanda tiptoed toward her room. As lightly as she could, she knocked faintly. No answer. She tried the latch . . . the door swung in . . . there was no sign of Gertrut.

Amanda entered, glanced about, then rapidly began searching drawers and cabinets. Three minutes later she was on her way back to her own room.

She changed her shoes, put on her coat, took one last hurried glance about the room—which had briefly represented her future but would now forever remind her of a brief, bitter moment in the past—then picked up her bag, drew in a sigh of final determination, and walked into the hall and toward the stairs.

She reached the landing and started slowly down the stairs. She heard a few voices at the other end of the house and a floor above her, but still saw no one. For another few moments her luck continued.

One floor above suddenly a door opened. She heard Mr. Barclay's voice in conversation with two or three other men. They were walking toward the stairs!

As hurriedly as she dared, Amanda ran down the rest of the way to the ground floor and continued, half running, across the entry. She hurried toward the door. The voices above were almost in view.

She put her hand to the latch. What if Mrs. Halifax was just returning! She opened the door. No voice from Mr. Barclay came from behind her. No presence stared back from in front of her!

Quickly she stepped out, then carefully closed the door behind her.

She was walking down the steps now. She reached the sidewalk, turned left so as to avoid being seen from the side entrance, then hurried along.

Quickly she turned at the first side street, walking more rapidly now, changing directions randomly at every block.

Several cabs were parked ahead on the street. The first appeared empty and available.

Amanda ran toward it.

 115 
Maggie Prays

Maggie's brain was alive with questions and thoughts, prayers and possibilities.

Like Amanda, who filled her thoughts, she had hardly slept a wink the rest of the night.

She had to write it all down, that much Maggie knew, for there was no telling when or how she would see Amanda again. Steadily the conviction had grown upon her that what she had been given this night was a revelation for the three young people of Heathersleigh. She did not know why. She must leave a new clue, just as the one she had discovered had been left for her.

Why so much time had elapsed . . . Maggie could not explain, other than by recalling that the Lord had his own timetables for the carrying out of his purposes.

“Lord, I've been
lax in my praying for them all,”
she began.
“Just because I've lost my Bobby doesn't mean
I can lose sight of your business. There's still
work to be done . . . your work. Amanda and Catharine and
George are part of it, and so am I. Forgive
me for not holding up my end these last days.”

She rocked awhile longer, reflecting on many things.

“And
I haven't lost my Bobby anyway,”
she said after a few minutes, both to herself and to the Lord.
“He's only gone to be with you. So
there's no better way for me to be with him than praying, for that keeps us both connected with you.”

She closed her eyes and sat silent for many long minutes. When at length she began praying again, even her voice took on the sound of the ages. Little did she know how much her prayer resembled that prayed by her great-grandmother so many years earlier toward the same end. God's ways often require generations for their fulfillment. And this petition, prayed by many saints in many ways for many of his wayward ones, was at last approaching its appointed time.

“Lord God,”
Maggie prayed,
“again I ask that you would draw the girl Amanda
to yourself. Bring to a close this season of her
prodigal sojourn in the far land spoken of by the Master. It is time, Lord. It is time for her
to rise up and remember from whence she came. Bring
all the mysteries connected with the Hall and the cottage to light, and in the end may good come of all that was done before. Prepare the lass Amanda even
now for her part in it. Show her in your
way and in your time what you want her to do. Bring her home, Lord . . . bring her home.”

 116 
Suspicious Eyes

When Mrs. Halifax returned to Ebendorfer Strasse after about an hour, she felt immediately that something was wrong.

The look on Gertrut Oswald's face confirmed her suspicions.

“What is it, Gertrut?” she asked.

“The girl . . . she left,” replied the keeper of the door.

“Which girl?”

“The English girl . . . Amanda.”

“Yes—she planned to go shopping,” replied Mrs. Halifax. “I was aware of it. How long ago was that?”

“About forty minutes. I heard the front door close,” Oswald went on. “I went to look. Out the front window, I saw her just as she walked out of sight—”

Mrs. Halifax waited, not sure what was Gertrut's point.

“—she carried a bag.”

“A handbag?”

“A carpetbag . . . a traveling bag—”

Mrs. Halifax's brow clouded.

“—and she wore a heavy coat, a winter coat,” added Gertrut.

Only a moment more did Mrs. Halifax delay.

“If you see Mr. Barclay, or if my son returns, tell them to wait for me,” she said in a voice of command. Immediately she turned and again left the house.

She knew exactly which shops Amanda would be likely to find the kind of dirndl she said she wanted. She would go to each . . . and quickly.

Whatever might be going on, she would not let Amanda out of the sight of one of them again until she had satisfied herself that the girl's loyalties were not wavering. But first she had to find her!

In less than two minutes Amanda's mother-in-law was seated in a cab speeding toward the city.