Barbara Greer (39 page)

She went out into the hall to the top of the stairs. She looked down at the hall below. It was empty. After a while, she heard Mary-Adams deWinter's car drive up for Woody, and, for another while, she heard fragments of talk as her mother told Woody's mother the story of Danny and the pool. Then Mary-Adams drove away. Her mother came into the house and disappeared in one of the rooms downstairs. Barbara felt disappointed then. She had wanted the tumultuous climactic scene now. Instead, her mother was going to make her wait for it. She went down the stairs slowly and out the front door.

A little breeze was blowing. The haze had lifted now and the sky was blue and clear and the thick maple leaves on the trees on the lawn were astonishingly green. The grass beneath her still bare feet was rough and dry and warm, and she walked slowly and thoughtfully across the gravelled driveway, lifting her feet gingerly from the hot pebbles, across the lawn beyond the drive and under the trees. She walked to the stable and found Charlie Muir, the groom, sitting on the bench inside the door, in the sunlight, cleaning his fingernails with the blade of a jack-knife. She smiled at him. ‘Mother says I may go for a ride,' she said.

He folded the knife and stood up. ‘All right,' he said and smiled at her. ‘Shall I go along with you?'

She considered this. ‘All right,' she shrugged.

He saddled both horses.

They rode out. No one saw them go except Emily, who waved from the kitchen window. They took the back path, behind the garden, through the cluster of hemlocks, toward the road that led around the lake.

They said nothing. She had heard, a few weeks before, about the thing that Peggy and Charlie Muir sometimes did when they rode together; she thought of this now and began to wonder idly if Charlie would want to do the same thing with her, or if he was thinking about it. And when they reached the deep shade of the wood road and Charlie reined in his horse ahead of her and stopped, she came up beside him and stopped, too, curious to see what he would do next. He pulled a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lighted it. He said, ‘Want a drag, Bobbie?' He held the cigarette toward her, its end wet from his lips.

She shook her head. ‘No thanks.'

‘Your little sister likes a drag now and then,' he said.

‘It's very naughty of her to smoke,' Barbara said primly. ‘She's just a child and smoking will stunt her growth. Daddy'd be very mad if he knew you let her.'

‘Aw,' he said, ‘you wouldn't tell him, would you, Bobbie?'

‘No,' she said. ‘But still you shouldn't do it.'

He chuckled softly and rested one hand on her horse's rump. She was riding the chestnut gelding who, because he had been a Christmas present, had been named Blitzen. Blitzen raised his head and shook his dark mane. For a while Charlie rested this way, smoking, and then she realised he was looking at her and she looked at him. His was a sly, somewhat questioning look and she looked quickly away, nonchalantly, through the trees. Then Charlie said, ‘Peggy and I've got a little game we play.'

‘Yes,' Barbara said. ‘So I've heard.'

He straightened up and looked hard at her. ‘She told you?'

‘Yes.'

‘She tell anybody else?' he asked sharply. ‘Did
you
tell anybody, Bobbie?'

‘No,' Barbara said. ‘Why should I?'

His shoulders eased. ‘Just wondered,' he said. And then, ‘Want to try it? What do you say, Bobbie?'

‘No,' she said.

‘Why not, Bobbie?'

‘Because I'm not a child,' she said. ‘And it's a very childish game.'

‘Then how about a kiss, Bobbie?'

‘No.'

‘What harm's a kiss?' he asked.

She considered this. ‘All right,' she said.

He reached out then and, awkwardly, circled her waist with his arm and instead of offering her lips to him, she turned her face away and let him kiss her cheek, and for a moment or two, swaying slightly on the horses' impatient and quivering backs, they balanced, leaning together, and when she felt his other hand reaching for hers she pressed her heels gently into Blitzen's soft sides and pulled away from him, trotted a few yards ahead.

She remembered feeling an overpowering urge to laugh out loud, but they continued on, Barbara in the lead, under the sheltering trees, in silence. It was true, she decided, that only a child, only someone like Peggy, would find anything interesting, or even darkly fun, in what she did with Charlie. Only a child—or a man, like Charlie, because men, after all, were children too, weren't they?

So she had concluded at fourteen or so.

She felt superior to Charlie—superior in knowledge and understanding, and superior in position because he was, she reminded herself, a servant. Still, she knew that riding with him like this might be dangerous and it was reassuring to feel Blitzen's smooth, strong back beneath her. By simply digging her heels into Blitzen's sides she could break away from any danger, and escape.

Men, it seemed to her at fourteen, had so many curious, contradictory problems, so many crazy wishes and wants! They derived their intensest pleasures from the silliest things! And yet she did not regret having let him kiss her just now, that way, on the cheek. It had helped her to discover some of the interesting facts she was discovering. And discovering facts was a part of growing up.

They came to the guesthouse.

‘Let's go in there,' Charlie said.

‘No,' she said.

‘Aw, Bobbie, why not?'

‘Because I don't want to.'

‘Why not?'

‘Because.'

‘What do you mean, because?'

‘Just because.'

‘Aw, come on, Bobbie. I've got the key.'

She hesitated. ‘All right,' she said. It was as though the simple fact that he had the key was enough to change her mind. She got off her horse and tied the reins about the trunk of a sapling. She waited, then, until Charlie had tied up his horse and unlocked the door. They went inside and Charlie closed the door behind her. The room was dark, its curtains drawn, and smelled damp and musty and unused. She stood in the centre of the room and Charlie stood facing her, a few feet away. She studied him. Then, in his face, she saw again the crafty, questioning look.

‘Well, here we are,' he said. He stepped closer. ‘You won't tell your ma,' he said.

‘No.'

‘Promise? Swear to God?'

‘Swear to God.'

‘Swear to God that if you tell your ma or your father or anyone the devil will come and throw a burning sword right through your stomach? Swear to God that if you ever tell a single, living creature …'

‘What are you going to do?' She was suddenly wary, hearing the sound of her voice asking this uncertain question. She looked at him and his eyes were bright slits. A phrase, as they stood there facing each other, came to her head. It was a phrase—a term, an expression—that she and Woody had come across in a newspaper and had speculated about, wondering what it meant. The phrase was ‘statutory rape,' and they knew, from the dictionary, what rape was, but what ‘statutory' meant applied to it they couldn't imagine, unless, as Woody had decided, it meant rape that was committed from a standing position. It flew into her head now, and she asked him, ‘Are you going to do statutory rape to me?'

He drew back, his shoulders hunched, his eyes suddenly wide and frightened. ‘What're you talking about?' he asked her. ‘What're you talking about? Listen to me—I never—look here, I never said—'

She turned and ran. She ran out the door, down the steps, untied her horse and jumped on the horse's back. She dug her bare heels into Blitzen's soft sides and rode off under the trees. She had discovered that all men were cowards, too.

She did not tell her mother. But it was not because she had sworn to God or feared the devil's sword. She had gone to the guesthouse for revenge against her mother; she felt that she had had her revenge now, for her mother punishing her, treating her like a child.

Her mother had punished her like a child because she had acted like a child. She had wanted to punish Peggy, too, for having the dollhouse. So, like a child, she had destroyed it. Like a child—but like a woman, too—she had gone to the guesthouse with Charlie; that way, she had punished them both. And of course later, when the broken dollhouse was discovered, she herself was punished again. What that punishment had been she couldn't remember now, and it hadn't mattered. Punishment, as it often seemed to her, was circular. It hadn't mattered because it simply completed the circle.

But was that why tonight—fourteen, fifteen, sixteen years later—she had suddenly thought of the guesthouse? She wondered whom she was punishing now. It had been all right then, long ago, with Charlie because she had been only a child, it had been only a part of growing up. But now she was thirty years old.

She stepped out of the dark shadows and walked slowly across the intervening space of grass, up the steps and unlocked the door. Immediately the remembered damp, closed, unused smell assailed her as she stood inside the doorway and groped for the light switch. Her hand found the switch and it was only then, all at once, that she remembered: she and Carson had come there, too! How queer to have forgotten! How queer to have forgotten that she and Carson had come there too, so many times!

At one o'clock, Peggy awoke. She turned on her side and saw the empty bed next to hers. She had fallen asleep in her clothes, in the white shorts and shirt, and after looking at the dark and empty room for several minutes, hearing no sounds in the house, she decided to get up and look for him.

She tiptoed down the hall and down the darkened stairs. She turned on no lights. Downstairs, the house was dark also. She went out the door and into the garden.

She found him standing beside the pool, looking at the water, a solitary figure against the shadows of the shrubbery.

‘Barney?' she called softly.

He turned quickly.

‘It's me—Peggy,' she said. She came toward him. ‘What are you doing here?' she asked him.

‘I went for a walk,' he said.

‘What are you going for a walk for? It's after one o'clock …'

‘I couldn't seem to sleep.'

‘Why don't you try? Why don't you come to bed?'

‘I wasn't tired. I thought a walk would help.'

‘You're always going for walks!' she said. ‘You went for a walk last night, too.'

‘Yes,' he said.

‘Is something bothering you, Barn-Barn?'

‘No,' he said.

‘You're always running off—trying to be alone.'

‘I'm sorry.'

They were both silent. Then she said, ‘Come for a walk with me.'

‘No thanks,' he said.

‘Oh, please. Come on.'

‘No …'

‘Why not? Please.'

‘No, I'm tired, now. Let's go in, Peggy.'

‘Please!'

He looked for a moment across the still water. Then he shrugged. ‘All right. Whatever you say …'

She linked her arm in his. ‘Where do you usually walk?' she asked.

‘Just—anywhere,' he said.

‘Let's walk down to the lake.'

He hesitated. ‘Well,' he said, ‘no—let's walk out to the drive and back.'

‘The lake is so pretty at night,' she said.

‘No—it's too far to go.'

‘Oh, come on!' she said roguishly. ‘What's the matter? Scared of the dark?'

They started up the steps.

‘I'm sorry about tonight,' she said. ‘Really, I shouldn't have lost control like that.'

‘It's all right,' he said.

‘It isn't all right. I hate to lose control. But I've been thinking—I was wrong to insist that we stay here, at the farm. It was my mistake. I thought at the time it would be easier—to work at close quarters. But it was wrong. Do you know what I'd like us to do? Let's move out of here, Barney. Let's get a little apartment in Burketown, or—what do you think, Barney?'

‘I don't care.'

‘Oh, I shouldn't have lost control tonight! If we hadn't been living here with them, it wouldn't have happened. I wouldn't have made a scene like that. I hate to lose control, you know that.'

‘Yes,' he said.

‘I still can't believe it, what Daddy said. If it's true—if it's really true—then it's one hell of an awful blow. All our plans. If it's true—well, I really don't know what we
will
do …'

‘Yes,' he said.

‘Can you imagine it? What sort of—idiocy—could have made him agree to it! I really think we should have him declared an incompetent! I can't see any other course. He
is
an incompetent!
Non compos
, half the time, with drink! Everybody knows it. He should be put away.'

‘Yes.'

‘Do you agree?'

‘I suppose so,' he said.

When they reached the terrace, he stopped. ‘This is far enough,' he said. ‘Let's go back.'

‘Let's go to the lake.'

‘I want to get to bed, Peggy.'

‘Oh, come on! Don't be such a sissy. It's just down the hill. It'll be pretty—'

‘No,' he said. ‘I don't want to go any farther.'

‘Please!'

‘No.'

She looked up at him. ‘Why not?' she asked. ‘Why don't you want to go down there?'

‘I just don't want to.'

‘Why?'

‘Because I'm tired, I want—'

‘Barn-Barn,' she said, ‘what's the matter? You're acting very funny. What's going on?'

‘Nothing.'

‘Then come on. I want to talk. I've got things I want to get off my chest.'

‘Let's go upstairs and talk.'

‘I want to walk down to the lake,' she said. ‘There's some reason you don't. What is it?'

He stood stiffly beside her, saying nothing. Then quietly he said, ‘All right. Let's go.'