Night of the Candles (4 page)

“A lizard?”

“One of them … change-lizards.”

“Chameleon.”

“That’s right. I ain’t puttin’ up with no such carryin’-on in my good clean kitchen. You tell him to take himself off. I ain’t havin’ no lizard runnin’ around on the table where I eat!”

Jason sighed. “What can it hurt? You have to make allowances for Carl.”

“I’m through making ‘lowances. A kitty-cat I can stand, but I ain’t standin’ no scaly lizard with beady eyes and a wicked, forked tongue! What if that little beast gets loose in the stranger’s bedroom tonight? It’s me that’ll…”

“All right, all right. I’ll speak to him.”

Mollified, Proserpine nodded and moved with head held high and a slow step from the room, her skirts rustling from the paper she had sewn to her petticoats to imitate the sound of taffeta.

“IF you will take my advice, you will throw that madman out of the house for good,” Sophia said dispassionately.

“I can’t help but agree with Sophia,” her brother supported her. “I never have understood your soft spot for that crazy man. Nobody else would let a lunatic have the run of the house to the point of keeping a bed ready for him. What’s he to you?”

“He is a victim of divine wrath. You remember. Those whom the gods would destroy they first make mad. Let us say I have a certain fellow feeling.”

“Oh come, Jason. Don’t let’s begin in that vein again,” Sophia said in a scathing tone.

“Why not? It is a perfect night for it. My dear wife has returned to me in the image of her cousin. We have gloom enough for a dozen morbid soliloquies. Let us speak then of love and madness and despair, and, finally, of death. It was not so long ago after all, the night Amelia died. Amanda, lovely Amanda, who is so like our own Amelia, burns with curiosity — a curiosity she is too much the lady to display. Let us remember then the night Amelia died. Drag forward the shuddering memories of flowers and funereal draperies. Put them on display. The coffin on its bier, her marble face, her crossed hands, the golden gleam of her wedding ring in the glow of the candles, her hair, so alive. God, so alive!”

Theo stirred uncomfortably. “Jason…”

“Let us remember. Why forget? Why should we try to suppress the memory of the pain and the screams in the night or the terrible pleading in her eyes? There were demons in her head, she said, tiny monsters slowly cutting her mind into slivers with sharp knives. Don’t stare so, Amanda … the end was near, no one could help, no doctor would try. And so the nights and the hot cloudless days of July ran on, and then one midnight that is nothing more than a miasma of cringing horror and fatigue and helplessness — she died. She died at last, and we were glad.”

It was with an effort that Amanda looked away from the twisted smile on his bronze face and the glitter of his eyes. With a trembling hand she crumpled the napkin in her lap, dropped it beside her plate, and got to her feet. She felt raw, lacerated, by the intensity of the grief Jason had shown her. Vaguely she was aware of a noisy sobbing, coming from the nurse, Marta, and of tears standing in her own eyes. She felt torn between a desire to offer some form of comfort to Jason and a longing to get away from him.

But as she stood she was brought up short. The hem of her dress was caught beneath the leg of Theo’s chair. Hastily he rose and touched her elbow. “Perhaps you would like to come into the parlor?” he asked. “Proserpine will bring coffee there.”

“I … no. No coffee. I would just like to go. Please.”

“You can’t, not in this storm. Try a little coffee.”

“No, really, all I want is to go.”

“I insist,” he said, drawing her away from the table.

For the first time in her life Amanda found herself hating all the polite mouthing that people use to cover their real feelings. What did Theo care whether she went or stayed? It could make no possible difference to him. “I only want my bonnet, my reticule, and my gloves so that I can remove myself from this house!”

“I’ll get your things,” Sophia said.

“No,” Theo said, but his sister paid no attention, moving past him toward the door.

“My … horse … and gig?” Amanda clasped her hands together, trying to appear imperious, determined — wishing her voice would not tremble so when she was upset.

Without a word Jason rose and left the room. In a moment they heard the slam of the outside door.

Theo shook his head. “It’s folly, but if nothing can turn you away from it, at least come in and sit down in the parlor while you wait. I hope Jason has the good sense to put my mare on a leading rein and my saddle in the gig. I still mean to come with you, and I will not take no for an answer.”

Amanda obediently moved beside him, leaving Marta alone, hiccupping at the table and consoling herself with a second piece of pie. In the parlor Amanda seated herself on the green striped settee. There was a crewel-embroidered cushion beside her, and she began to play nervously with the long green fringe that edged it.

Somewhere in the house, in the hall, she thought, there was a grandfather clock for she could hear it ticking. The sound of the rain had dwindled. She was glad since it made her leaving easier.

Theo stood beneath the brass chandelier in the center of the oriental carpet of once rich colors on gold. “You mustn’t blame Jason for what he said just now. He took Amelia’s death hard. I have the idea sometimes that he blames himself, though it’s hard to see what else he could have done for her. You … the way you look … brought it all back.”

“I can see that. However, Jason seems to have forgotten that I can feel grief too.”

“Possibly. Grief is a selfish emotion bound up with the sense of personal loss. Still, he meant nothing against you, and I don’t want you to … to take too much to heart all the hurtful things he said.”

“I appreciate your concern…”

‘Theo … call me Theo,” he broke in.

“…Theo. Really there’s no need to worry about me. I’m not, truly, a very emotional person. I don’t believe a few words spoken in anger can hurt me.”

That was certainly true. Now that she was calmer she could feel her usual self-control returning, wrapping around her like a protective comforter. How often in the past had she regretted her inability to expose her emotions? Amelia had not been like that. Amelia had been quick to anger, her rage flaring up, then quickly dying away. Her joy had known no bounds; her affection had been swiftly given, conveyed without restraint or embarrassment. When she cried she had wept aloud, not suffered the aching constriction of silent tears that Amanda knew. How had it come about? Look at Amanda, her grandmother had said often in those early days. She knows the conduct becoming in a lady. And the young Amanda, only a year older than Amelia, had tried to be a model of poise and reserve to keep her grandmother’s approval. Well, it didn’t matter now. Still, how wonderful it must have been for a time to beloved with such desperation. Desperation — a strange word to use in conjunction with love. What she had meant was that degree of intensity.

Theo was still standing before her.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t like something else while you wait? Another glass of wine?”

“Thank you, Theo, but no. I’m all right. It … it is nice for you to be concerned about me … and about Jason.”

He looked almost embarrassed. “As to that, Jason has been a good friend. We grew up together, neighbors, until after the war. My family lost everything. The shock was too much for my parents. They’re still living, if you can call it that, with an older sister in town. Jason’s people died during the war — his father on the battlefield, his mother and younger brother of typhoid — along with quite a few of the hands here. We were alone. Jason took me in as a sort of overseer. And then, of course, Sophia came to help keep house when Amelia got so bad. Yes, we owe Jason a great deal.”

Amanda murmured something agreeable, looking up as Sophia came into the room carrying her things and also a long cloak, thrown over her arm.

Sophia handed the bonnet with the gloves inside it and the reticule to Amanda, and then draped the cloak over the arm of the settee. “I thought you might need this to protect you from the rain. It is coated with rubber. Theo will have one like it, and this will keep him from having to play the gallant and give it to you.”

“Sophia…” Theo began.

“Well I’m sure Amanda has no wish to shelter with you under yours, and the gig does have open sides.”

“Thank you,” Amanda said, quietly holding the other girl’s chilled gaze. Sophia did not look away.

“There is an oiled silk umbrella beside the door you can use. You can give it, and the cloak also, to Theo when you get into town.”

“Yes, I’ll do that.” When had the other woman become so antagonistic? Had it been when she had learned that Amanda was independent with property of her own? Or was it later, when Jason had shown himself so disturbed by her presence, when he had called her lovely?

Sophia started to speak again, then stopped as the sound of footsteps crossing the gallery came to them. Amanda rose as Jason, his hair and his clothes dripping with rain, came in the door.

He stood a moment staring at Amanda, and then abruptly he moved to one side. “The gig is ready,” he said tonelessly.

Theo reached for the cloak and, shaking out its folds, placed it on Amanda’s shoulders. With fingers gone suddenly numb, she placed her bonnet on her hair and thrust the bodkin through the crown to secure it. Then pulling on her gloves, she walked past Jason out onto the dark gallery. Theo and Jason followed her. Sophia came last, carrying a lamp to light their way down the steps.

Then at the top of the steps Sophia suddenly exclaimed, “Wait!”

Theo swung around. “What is it?”

“The necklace, Jason.”

“Oh, yes.” Amanda began to take her purse from her wrist.

“Never mind,” Jason said. “It is yours. Keep it.”

“What necklace?” Theo asked, his eyes moving from one to the other. “I don’t understand.”

“The collar of something. A valuable piece of jewelry Amanda was bringing to her cousin, a part of some legacy. It belongs to Jason now.” Sophia spoke impatiently, her eyes on Amanda, her face hard in the lamplight. Beyond the circle of light a soft rain fell. The horse snorted, shaking his head so the bit and harness jangled. Out in the dark behind one of the tall columns a shadow moved, or was it only a windblown gust of rain?

Then Amanda had her bag open. “Here,” she said, distaste for this house and the people in it making her voice cold as she pushed the collar of gold and gems at Jason. “Take it. I don’t want it.”

His brows drew together in a scowl. “You think I do? What use would I have for that, or for all the jewels of Arabia? Let it adorn your own milk-white skin. Let it be a token of remembrance for you. For me, I need none.”

For a moment longer Amanda stood there, then she let her hand drop. Turning she started down the steps.

At that moment the shadow beside the column started forward.

“My Madame!” The cry was loud, joyous. A shambling form came running toward her. A bearded and wild-eyed man took the first of the steps, then dropped suddenly to his knees and caught up the hem of her dress, lifting it to his lips.

Amanda, already beginning her descent, was thrown off balance. She lurched, reaching blindly for support, then she was falling, falling away from the shouts and clutching, jostling, confusion into a bright well of pain with darkness at the bottom.

Her head was on fire, her brain burning with a flame that flared high as she was lifted, but left her body cold. There was a roaring of an angry voice in her ears, and she felt as if she was tied by steel bonds to a moving rock. Andromeda, she thought dazedly, sacrificed to the sea serpent. Then she knew no more.

Amanda opened her eyes. Above her was a silver cloud pierced by a gold sun … the underside of the canopy of Amelia’s tester bed. Within her skull a drum beat a monotonous rhythm to the pulsation of her heart. Beneath her were sheets of smooth starched linen, and over her was a comforter of padded silk. The nightgown she wore was her own plain dimity, laundered many times into a soothing softness.

She turned her head a little, frowning in concentration that sent throbbing waves between her temples. What was she doing here? Then as she remembered the night and the storm and her fall, there was a rustle nearby, and a wide white figure moved into her line of vision.

“How do you feel now?”

With difficulty Amanda focused on the woman. She was familiar, and yet the name hovered out of reach. She wanted to answer the question that had been put to her, but there seemed to be a great distance between her mind and her lips.

“I’m Marta. Don’t you remember?”

Slowly she nodded. Marta, a sickroom nurse. For Amelia. She moistened her lips. “My … head.”

“You hit it when you fell. You have a concussion, I think. I have seen it before, during the war. It should not be so bad.”

No, it couldn’t be. The steps were not high, little more than five or six feet. The throbbing went on and on. She lay very still, hoping it would diminish if she did not move.

Two lamps were burning in the room, one on the marble-topped washstand, and one on the table near the bed. Darkness still lingered beyond the windows, and she thought she could hear the whisper of falling rain on the wooden shingles above.

“It was kind of you to put me to bed.”

“It was nothing. I can’t say to you how shocked I was when Herr Jason came carrying you up the stairs with you pale, so pale, and that great bruise there just under your hair. Such a commotion. One would have thought you were dead with that Carl weeping and wringing of his hands, and Sophia cold, so cold, toward her brother while Herr Jason just walked away from them all, his face, as he carried you, ach, so … so like death.”

The German woman’s eyes were wide with wonder, but there was a sympathetic understanding also in her face.

“My head aches,” Amanda said, her voice sounding faint to her own ears.

“Yes, I have just the thing. Eau de cologne in water cold from the cistern. Let me put this cloth on your forehead…”

The smell of violets, sweet and fresh, scented the air as the excess water was squeezed from the pad made of a small linen towel. It was cool and refreshing, but it did not stop the pain. In a few moments the smell of the violets, warmed by her skin, began to intensify until she felt as though she were drowning in the scent.