Of Bees and Mist (16 page)

“Papa!”

Eva, flooded in tears, enfolded Daniel in her arms. “It’s all my fault, son. I knew from the start she wasn’t right for you, and yet I let you marry her. It’s best to let her go.”

“
You
let go, Mama. Meridia isn’t leaving without me.”

Without warning, Elias punched the wall two inches from Daniel’s head.

“Enough! Follow her out that door and you won’t see the inside of this house ever again.”

Meridia watched in silence as Daniel, who stood well above his father, stepped back. The air had grown so still that his heart was pounding audibly in her ear. When their eyes met, she laid bare with all her soul the gentle memory of their caresses, and when it did not draw him to her, she began to pity him without anger. He looked so pained and aggrieved that she thought she must take it all back, take back her words and her pride as long as he was spared this anguish. Yet no sooner did the thought occur than a steel rod slid up her back and made her say the one thing Ravenna never could to Gabriel.

“Good-bye, Daniel.”

Meridia turned. Silenced Eva with a look. Sailed past Elias as if he did not exist. Clutching the velvet box to her chest, she strolled past the door where Permony sobbed and Malin stood openmouthed, transfixed with awe. She did not look back when she reached the terrace and the front door slammed behind her.

There she waited.

The caged birds were silent and the marigolds clamored and she waited.

She waited and still he did not come.

R
avenna had been mute for three months, three weeks, and three days, and not a soul knew it. The morning after Meridia’s wedding, she had been midway through addressing a bowl of pea shoots when she realized that her mouth was making no sound. For the first time in sixteen years, her dark and private language failed to animate the kitchen. Astonished into silence, the knife cut without zest, the bread did not rise, the kettle refused to boil. The maids, by then accustomed to their mistress’s odd habits, took little interest in the sudden quiet. Gabriel noticed nothing. Since the morning she outraged him by smashing eighteen dishes in the dining room, he had yet to spare her more than a moment’s glance.

Muteness had a way of beating Ravenna. By the end of the first week, she had grown so weary she could not shake her fist when she saw the yellow mist swirl up the stone steps. When morning came, a gulp was all she could muster when she smelled the baboon-faced mistress on Gabriel. Meridia’s absence had done it. Took away her speech and rusted the hate she had so meticulously preserved. Despite her years of training, Ravenna missed her in the dreadful quiet of the plates, in the empty doorways—she missed the footfalls that
no longer filled the house. She missed Meridia as if she were missing a limb; the only thing worse was the certainty that her child was gone forever.

Many times the silence nearly drove Ravenna to Orchard Road. Before her feet started, however, a memory stopped her: a flash of metal slicing in the dead of night. Along with this came shame and sorrow. She would slap her hands over her tears, twist her knuckles deep into her eyes, but not once, not ever, would she allow doubt and regret to come between her and her daughter.

Ravenna remembered the night the cold wind knocked her to the ground. All she did was fasten the window, but before she knew it, she was pinned helplessly against the wall while Meridia’s bassinet flew across the room. That night the world suddenly teemed with dangers, herself helpless and a stranger in it, and in the days that followed she lost her reason and her strength. For months after, she saw Gabriel shiver and she could do nothing. He could not sleep a wink, he said; the bed was colder than snow, and she could not help him. Even when she saw ice forming on Meridia’s lips, she could do nothing. “The wind will run its course,” she had assured him. “Try to keep warm a little longer.” He gave her his word that he would stick by her. Three months after the wind turned the house upside down, the yellow mist appeared. The next day she twisted her hair into a knot because she knew he had not kept his promise.

She tried her best to exonerate him. Failing that, she gave him ample opportunities to explain. But Gabriel said nothing. He sulked and watched her nurse Meridia and went out into the mist and said nothing. Her pride revolted. She had asked for understanding, and in turn, he had let another woman desecrate what belonged to her. There was nothing in the world that would make her forgive.

When she suspended the blade above his head, her only wish was to forget. Shush the anger that was howling in her heart. Obliterate his lies and the damage they caused. When she swung, she did not think of it as an end, but as a beginning. Of all the things that happened next, she only remembered one—Meridia howling in her
bassinet, a second before the metal struck. That cry had saved Gabriel’s life, but not her own. The blade might have missed, but her child had witnessed what she should not have. After what she had done, Ravenna could only view her daughter through a curtain of forgetfulness.

The passing years diminished neither her shame nor her anger. By degrees the curtain thickened, made opaque by misunderstandings and stifled intentions. To vent her rage, she stormed the mist and took up a dark and private language. Neither of these brought her closer to Meridia. Gabriel’s ultimate victory was not in smashing her heart, but in condemning her to watch their child grow without feeling adequate to love her.

When the girl asked for her freedom, Ravenna thought it was the least she could give her. Little did she know that the days of muteness would be long and vengeful. Not since she wrestled with the cold wind had she felt so tired, so exposed and beleaguered by the tenacity of memories. Not even the thought of Gabriel’s mistress stirred her. In the night she no longer had strength to storm the mist. The stillness that answered when she called for Meridia convinced her that she was shouting from beyond the grave.

Then three months, three weeks, and four days after Meridia left, the muteness came to a halt. That afternoon, seasoning a goose in the kitchen, Ravenna seized up all of a sudden and dropped the pepper mill she was holding. Someone was approaching the front door, and from the way the mist bellowed, she understood it was no ordinary visitor. Sharply, she lifted her chin and tossed back her shoulders. Before her brain could articulate the miracle, her feet had flown of their own accord. Reaching the front door, she threw it open and was overcome by the sight of a nymphlike figure shambling up the stone steps. She ran on ahead of the mist and pulled the limping phantom into her arms.

“Child!” she cried, just before Meridia’s knees scraped the earth.

WHEN GABRIEL HEARD ABOUT
his daughter’s expulsion, he did not burst into laughter or throw her out of the house. Instead, he shattered a table with his fist and swiftly dispatched an ultimatum to Orchard Road. Meridia, moved, observed his reaction with gratitude, even though a part of her suspected he was outraged chiefly for his own name.

That night, the first in her memory, Gabriel let the yellow mist drift by. When the doorbell rang, he emerged from the study in a solemn black suit and took his place in the center of the hall. “Go to your room,” he ordered her sternly. Meridia climbed the stairs and hid behind the banister. A moment later, a maid ushered Eva and Elias into the hall, followed by a terrified Daniel. Eva was high-colored and defiant, Elias pale and frazzled. Before they said a word, Gabriel lunged for Daniel, seizing his collar without ceremony.

“Son of a bitch! I wouldn’t wish a cockroach to have you for a husband!”

Reeling with terror, Daniel sputtered for breath.

“Control yourself, sir,” said Elias. “There’s no need for this kind of behavior.”

Though he sounded grave, Elias made no move to help his son. It was Eva who jumped and placed herself between the two men.

“My son has done nothing wrong! It’s your daughter who’s perverse and impertinent! She said she couldn’t care less if we live or die.”

Gabriel’s violent turn forced Eva to step back. For a moment it seemed that he would throttle her as well. Spying from the top of the stairs, Meridia was seized by affection for her father.

“Watch what you say, madam. I can spot a lie from miles off.”

“She’s dishonored us!” shouted Eva with equal violence. “She abused me in my own house and refused to apologize. I don’t know what kind of daughter you think you raised, but it’s clear she’s selfish, spoiled, callous, and arrogant. It’s a pity you never took a whip to her back when she was little!”

Before a word could escape Gabriel, a thin shadow sliced in between him and Eva. Twice the room exploded, stunning the men and jolting Meridia from behind the banister. The next thing they saw was Eva nursing her face. Towering over her with a splendid calm was Ravenna.

“How dare you!”

Livid, Eva turned to Elias, who stood immobile with his jaw open.

“Are you going to stand there and let her assault me? Do something!”

Eva’s narrow eyes were gutting him. Seeing no reaction from Elias, she turned to Daniel with a deathly aim.

“First the daughter, now the mother. Brand this moment into your memory, son. Tell your sisters they weren’t conceived from the seed of a man, but from the sap of a coward!”

Elias shuddered. Slowly a faint smile surfaced on Ravenna’s lips. Gabriel, who had been watching his wife with a mixture of wonder and disbelief, hollered with laughter at the other man’s expense. It was this laugh that snapped Elias into action.

“Let me handle this!” Looking at the far wall behind Gabriel, avoiding Ravenna’s eyes at all costs, Elias bellowed, “Your daughter must apologize to my wife. I don’t see any other way to resolve this.”

Gabriel smirked. “What if she doesn’t?”

“But she must!”

“What if I forbid her? What are you going to do?”

Elias swallowed hard. Sidling up to his side, Eva declared decisively, “Then we won’t take her back. She can stay here and look for another husband.”

“You’ve gone too far, Mama!” Daniel broke his silence for the first time. “Meridia is accountable to no one but myself. I intend to have her back at any price.”

“Quiet!” rebuked Elias, suddenly emboldened. “That woman you married is more trouble than she’s worth.”

“Don’t bully me, Papa. I’m taking my wife home no matter what you say. If I lose her then you’ll lose me. I’m prepared to fight anyone who comes between us.”

A slow and chilling applause stunned the room for the second time. Without losing her calm, without even clenching her eyes, Ravenna inspected Daniel as if she might reduce him to ashes.

“How noble of you,” she said. “If only you had delivered that speech before it came to this. You’re mistaken now if you think I’ll let my daughter return to hell.”

Gabriel stared at his wife as though he had never seen her before. At that moment something he had condemned to die stirred suddenly within him.

“You heard the mistress.” Gabriel said. “Meridia stays here. I’ll send for her things in the morning.”

Eva gasped furiously. “What do you take us for? Have we no say? No weight in this matter? So be it. From now on, your daughter can consider herself a free woman.”

Meridia was on the verge of exclaiming, but Daniel beat her to it.

“Have you all gone mad? She’s my wife, for heaven’s sake! I’m not leaving this house without her!”

Ravenna swung on him without a warning.

“Listen to me, little boy! I delivered her to you once, and you failed to honor and protect her. I’ll be damned if I should do so again. Now leave my house and never enter it while I still have breath in my lungs.”

Eva was screaming now, spurring Elias to defend their name, but to Daniel, all else had become silent. Ravenna’s eyes had cut him, deep in a place he could not heal. In the years to come, it was those eyes he would remember and refuse to forgive.

Gripping the banister, Meridia bit her lip to keep her tears from falling. The staircase reared, galloped to the roof, and sud
denly a thousand steps stretched between her and the mayhem below. From that great distance she began to shout as she watched the speck that was Daniel leave without a single glance in her direction.

EVA DID NOT WAIT
for Gabriel to carry out his threat. Early the next morning, she dispatched Gabilan to Monarch Street with a sack full of Meridia’s clothes. Sweaty and breathless, the servant girl barreled right through the mist and hollered for Meridia.

“Oh, Young Madam, they turned your room upside down as soon as you left!”

“Slow down, Gabilan.” Meridia took the sack and stowed it in the hallway. “What happened?”

“Master ransacked all your drawers, even pried the ones that were locked. He snatched your dresses from the hangers, your undergarments from the drawers, tossed them to the floor, and spat on them. Madam egged him on. She made him smash your dressing table and your jars and powder bottles. Miss Permony cried and cried in the hallway, but Miss Malin went up to Madam and shouted at her. She tried to rescue your wedding pictures, but Master was like a man possessed. Madam had him go at it for a good hour, then she took some of your things and carried them upstairs—your brooch, your lace, your gloves, the pearl earrings she herself had given you for your wedding!”

Gabilan was in tears and Meridia found it increasingly difficult to swallow. Had she not taken the jewelry set at the last second…

“And Young Master?” she forced herself to ask. “Where was he during all this?”

“Young Madam, I haven’t told you the worst of it. It was wrong and cruel, what they did to him…”

Gabilan, overcome by sobs, needed a minute before she could speak again.

“When Young Master tried to chase you, Master grabbed him by the throat and wouldn’t let go. ‘You weakling!’ he shouted. ‘No son of mine runs after a woman like a whipped dog!’ He began calling him names, things too ugly to come from a father’s lips. Whenever Young Master tried to speak, Madam drowned him with her cries. Provoked to the limit, Master then did something unthinkable. He dragged out your wedding dress from the bridal trunk, wrestled it to the floor, and began clawing it like a mad beast. It was the ghastliest sound I ever heard, all that cloth and lace screaming in pain. Young Master backed away from the room and stood very still and I could see something go out of his eyes. He looked as if he was watching an animal being gutted.”

While Gabilan continued to sob, a cold sensation clamped down on Meridia’s spine. She could not speak, could not move, could not locate the outrage she ought to have felt. All she could see was Daniel’s face, lost and wounded, washing itself up on the plundered wall of her heart.

TOO RAW, TOO BROKEN,
Meridia would not see Daniel that day. Though he knocked and pleaded, she did not allow the front door to open. Angry on her behalf, the ivory mist attacked him, and finally succeeded in driving him away by yanking off all his clothes and sending him to chase after them. He did not give up. When the next day found him standing with three layers of clothes on the stone steps beneath her window, it was another force that came charging to her defense.

It seemed he had stood there for hours. She could hear him arguing with one of the maids when a furious voice blasted him like a whirlwind.

“Why are you still here? Can’t you see she doesn’t want you? Whatever claim you had on her, you gave it up when you proved yourself a coward!”

Ravenna wielded a broom, chased him off the steps as she
might a stray pup. As Daniel scurried, mortified, into the street, the ivory mist pelted him with laughter. Then and there, though she did not know it, Ravenna made herself his enemy for life.