Bless the Child (4 page)

T
he school-bus yellow of her new coat made Maggie feel cheery. She Tossed a black-and-white houndstooth silk scarf around her neck, tied it jauntily, and took one last look at herself in the hall mirror. Not bad for a middle-aged granny, she thought with a grin. The fact that the couple in the park had mistaken her for Cody’s mother, yesterday, had made her feel young again. In truth, Cody made her feel young again, full of possibilities.

Maggie heard the gleeful contrapuntal laughter of Cody and Maria Aparecida coming from the kitchen—the child’s voice, trilling giggles into the air, the older woman’s, deep and merry. They were great pals, which made it feasible for Maggie to work half days at the shop without worry. And as Amanda had taken up the slack in hours without whimper, Maggie could be surrogate mommy for part of every day, as well as nights and weekends.

She checked her handbag for all necessities, and let herself out the front door, glad to be alive.

The black stretch limo glided to a halt, just as Maggie reached the bottom step. She watched with mild surprise that such a splendid car should be in her neighborhood. Somebody’s son must have become a rock star while she wasn’t looking.

A uniformed driver alighted, opening the rear door, so a handsome forty-year-old man could emerge. Maggie’s curiosity was piqued by the impeccably cut Italian clothes, and the air of polished confidence that made him look so European. He moved like a polo player, self-assured, used to commanding notice. His glance met Maggie’s with a small smile of acknowledgement, then he reached inside the darkened car to help a young woman make a graceful, leggy exit.

Tall, slender as a reed, blond hair swinging freely at shoulder length . . . Maggie caught her breath in shock. The girl was Jenna.

“Permit me to introduce myself, Mrs. O’Connor,” the man said in a faintly European accent that Maggie couldn’t place. “My name is Eric Vannier. Your daughter has told me so much about you, I’d have recognized you even without the photograph she carries.” He extended a manicured hand, which Maggie took automatically in her own. She could not tear her eyes away from her daughter. Armani suit, Hermès bag, hair and makeup culled from the cover of
Vogue
—but Jenna, nonetheless. The gray-green eyes with their fringe of dark lashes . . . the pale oval face and full pouty lips, all heartbreakingly familiar.

Without thinking Maggie reached out to touch the girl tentatively. Jenna didn’t reach back.

“It’s good to see you, Mother,” she said blandly, pushing back her hair, with the nervous flick of a colt in fly season. “Eric and I have just gotten back from our honeymoon in Europe, and we’re anxious to pick up Cody.”

Pick up Cody . . .
The words hit Maggie’s brain like buckshot.
Pick up Cody!
As if she were a package left behind on the subway, now to be retrieved from the Lost and Found. She tried to calm herself enough to manage an appropriate response, whatever that might be. Sensing the tension, Eric took control.

“We’ve moved into a family estate in Greenwich, Mrs. O’Connor, less than an hour away from here. We were certain you’d want to continue to see Cody, so we’ve decided to live here in the States for a time, to make the transition easier on all of us. Jenna told me what an angel you’ve been, caring for her daughter while she was unwell.”

To see Cody . . . transition . . . for a time . . .
His words tumbled over and over each other inside Maggie like a silent scream. Who are these people? How can they even
think
of taking Cody away?

“This is quite a shock,” she stammered. “I haven’t even heard from my daughter in years. I had no way of knowing if she were alive . . . if she would ever return . . .” She let the words dwindle, unable to imagine how to say all she meant.

Eric’s smile was dazzling. Perfect teeth, perfect jaw, perfect aplomb . . . but there was something imperfect beyond it. Maggie’s mind, on overdrive, reached out to grasp the flaw, but Jenna interrupted.

“Not return? How could you even think such a thing, Mother? I’ve simply been unwell. You do remember that I had a drug problem, don’t you?”

“Remember that you had a drug problem?”
Maggie gasped out the words. “Are you demented? Of course, I know you had a drug problem! Why on earth else would you have left me with a ten-day-old baby and not come back for three years?” She was suddenly furious; at their unruffled cool, at the blatant manipulation of her life.

“You act as if I’m a post office box where you can just drop things off and pick them up when the spirit moves you. Do you think your daughter is an
object
for retrieval at your convenience? Where the hell have you been, Jenna? What have you been doing with your damned life? Why did you never send so much as a postcard? It doesn’t look to me like you couldn’t afford a stamp. I think I deserve a few answers here, before we talk about picking up anything other than a blunt object!”

Jenna turned to Eric, all tranquility replaced by anger.

“I told you she’d be like this, Eric. Selfish and hostile.”

The commotion of voices had roused Maria from inside the house; she stood in the doorway with Cody tagging close behind.

Eric leaped on the diversion. “What a breathtaking little beauty you are,” he announced to Cody with seeming sincerity. “You have your grandmother’s exquisite eyes and your mother’s glorious hair.” The dazzling smile beamed its way to Cody and she took it in, without returning the greeting. She peered out, instead, from behind Maria’s bulk, to investigate the smile’s owner.

Maggie moved up the steps, in a daze, motioning them to follow her into the house.

“Mim?” Cody whispered urgently, tugging at her grandmother’s sleeve. “Who’s that lady?”

Maggie bent down to the child’s level, struggling for words; her heart pounded so hard she could barely breathe. “I have a wonderful surprise for you, sweetheart,” she managed, forcing her voice steadiness.

“Remember all the stories I’ve told you about your beautiful mommy? The lady in the picture by my bed?” She waited for Cody to nod her head before continuing.

“Remember, I told you about how much she loves you, and how she would come back one day to tell you so herself?” Reluctantly, the little girl nodded; some note in Mim’s voice, was making her nervous.

“My dear love,” Maggie said gently, trying to keep the tears form her inflection. “This beautiful lady is your mommy.”

Cody’s head turned slowly at this startling revelation, she looked at Jenna, with intense concentration. The gaze was clearly one of appraisal. And something else, indefinable.

Jenna stared at the child, entranced. She moved forward with outstretched arms, but Cody turned her head away and buried it for safety, in Maggie’s breasts. Rebuffed but determined, Jenna tried to pluck her out of Maggie’s arms. Cody cried “No!” and clung to Maggie with a death grip.

Maggie, distraught, clung too. She saw Eric assess the situation.

“It’s only natural for her to be a bit unfamiliar with you, darling,” he interjected in a voice of warm oil. He was very handsome, she noted; a Spanish dancer’s sensuality, the hauteur of a grandee. “She’ll get over it as soon as we’re home.”

“Home?” Maggie blurted. “You can’t possibly mean you intend to take her with you,
today?
That’s absurd! This is the only home Cody’s ever known!”

“She’s
my
child, Mother, not yours,” Jenna cut in. “I left her with you while I was ill, not forever. I’m back now and I
want
my daughter.”

Maggie straightened, still holding the clinging three-year-old child tight against her pounding heart. “You may
want
to do that, Jenna, but that doesn’t mean it’s the
right
thing to do. This is entirely too sudden for me to cope with, how can you expect a little child to adjust? You’ll have to give us some time to take this all in.” She took a deep breath, fighting for calm.

“You say you have a house in Greenwich? And you’re married? Are there any other surprises you’re saving for me? Like that you’re the president of General Motors, or you’re planning to take over a Third World country later on today? . . .” Maggie’s Irish temper was slow to engage but once it did . . .

Eric moved to defuse the escalating anger. “Mrs. O’Connor, I assure you, both Jenna and I totally understand your surprise, and your reluctance to part with the child, whom you’ve obviously become attached to. Perhaps I can set your mind at rest by telling you a bit about myself, so I don’t seem so much the mysterious stranger.”

Maggie nodded, thwarted by his civility. She motioned vaguely toward the couch, and both visitors sat.

“My family’s an old and respected one in Europe, Mrs. O’Connor…”

“Where exactly in Europe?”

Eric smiled. “Originally, we were from the Middle East. But many generations ago, the Vanniers moved to Paris and, although we have banking offices and philanthropies throughout Europe, you might safely think of us as Parisians.” Something about Eric’s unctuousness, covering the raw animal power she sensed in him, was unnerving.

“If you’ll permit me to continue, I promise to give you enough of my
curriculum vitae
to assuage at least a few of your fears, Mrs. O’Connor. Although our family fortune is primarily engaged in international banking, my own particular area of endeavor is that of running the Vannier Foundation, a rather large philanthropic enterprise, which distributes a great deal of money to worthy causes. The nature of my work forces me to travel quite a bit, although as I said earlier, in deference to your obvious devotion to my wife’s child, I have taken residence in one of my family homes, near enough to you so that your transition from surrogate motherhood to grandmotherhood . . .” He smiled ingratiatingly again. “No matter how absurd a title ‘grandmother’ seems when one sees you, Mrs. O’Connor . . . will be less traumatic.”

Maggie acknowledged the compliment with a small nod and tried to force herself to fairness. He was certainly civilized; perhaps he could be reasoned with.

“May I ask how you met my daughter, Mr. Vannier?” she countered. “When last I saw Jenna she didn’t appear to be moving in the circles you describe.”

“Do call me Eric, Mrs. O’Connor. I am, after all, your son-in-law,” the man responded, the dark eyes alight with charm. “And perhaps I might call you Maggie?” He didn’t wait for a reply.

“It’s really quite serendipitous that Jenna and I ever met at all. You see, I had a slight injury to my spine, sustained in a riding accident in Central Park, and I was taken to Roosevelt Hospital, where, as fate would have it, Jenna happened to be recovering from her addiction. Part of her therapy entailed doing volunteer work within the hospital complex, caring for other hospitalized patients in a variety of ways—rather like a candy striper, if you will. She was particularly kind to me, as I lay restless as a caged tiger.” Eric smiled at Jenna suggestively.

“I’m afraid I was smitten by her, rather intensely, and when I found I was able to escape the hospital, I asked Jenna to return with me to our château in Lucerne, to help me through my recuperation. Jenna said she had no ties that would preclude this . . . and the rest, as they say, is history. We recovered together . . . and much to my delight, we have been together ever since.”

During this extraordinary soliloquy, Cody had relaxed her grip on Maggie and was now sitting quietly in her lap, watching the others in the room with studied curiosity. Jenna was trying to gain the child’s attention, and Cody was watching her mother judiciously, but making no move in her direction.

“I love my daughter, Mother,” Jenna suddenly interjected, a pleading note in her voice. “Very much. And I have missed her dreadfully. I know you don’t have much reason to trust me, but you must see that I’m well now. I’m happily married to a wonderful man who’ll take good care of both of us. I finally have the chance to make Cody’s life perfect. Please,
please
help me put our life together the way it should have been from the start . . . for my sake and for Cody’s.” Her large eyes glistened with a hint of tears and Maggie felt torn between loyalties. What if Jenna really was recovered from her addiction? What if she really
could
care for Cody, and wanted to? What if Cody could finally have, not only a real mother and father, but all the privileges this obviously wealthy man could provide? She owed it to everyone concerned to try very hard to be fair and unselfish.

Maggie encouraged Cody to slide to the floor, in hopes that she would show Jenna some sign of affection, but the child’s reluctance was unyielding.