Olivia (33 page)

"Well, have you really thought this out, Olivia? Are you sure this is what you want to do?" she asked.
"Yes, Louise, it is."
She saw my determination and she sat back, her lips trembling.
"It took every bit of strength I could muster to come over to speak with you, Olivia. Nelson told me your mind was made up, but I think he believed I might be able to change it, that once you knew he had confessed all to me, you might reconsider."
"Why should he think that?"
"I don't know," she said.
"Then perhaps you don't know everything, Louise." She took out a handkerchief and blew her nose. Then she sucked in her breath and stood.
"This is such bad business, such a terrible turn of events," she complained. "Our lives were so perfect up until now."
"Life isn't meant to be perfect," I said. "That's an illusion and if you let yourself think it is, you only suffer when disappointments come."
She looked at me with admiration and shook her head.
"How I envy you for your strength. You've always been so powerful." She smiled. "Somehow I think you'll work all this out," she concluded. "And you'll all be safe," I said.
She bit her lower lip, glanced at me and then turned to go.
"Louise," I said when she reached the doorway. She paused, turning.
"Yes?"
"If you want to be stronger, never let your husband get you to do his dirty work again."
"I didn't come here for him. You were right, Olivia. I came here for myself. Or maybe for my children, too," she added. "You once said something I never forgot."
"What was that?"
"Family, family should be the most important thing of all," she replied. "If there is every anything I can do, please don't hesitate to ask me."
I watched her leave, hating her for being strong enough to come.

17
Penance
.
I didn't believe Samuel was capable of the rage

he demonstrated in front of me the following afternoon. His eyes were so filled with it that they looked bloodshot. His normally tan cheeks had eggshell white spots and the skin on his temple was so taut, it could have been used over a drum. He nearly took my office door off its hinges when he entered and he slammed it so hard, the walls shook. I was about to protest when he extended his arm, his long right forefinger jabbed at my surprised face.

"Don't," he commanded. "Don't say a word until I'm finished speaking."
After saying that, he fumed a few more moments, pacing in front of me. Then he paused, took a deep breath and put his hands palms down on my desk as he leaned toward me. I could feel the heat radiating from his eyes of fire. I half-expected he would burn his palm prints into the wood.
"Your sister came to you and told you she was pregnant with Nelson Childs' baby and you met with Nelson and told him you and I were going to keep the child as our own? Does that sum it all up in a nutshell?"
"Hardly," I said, "but for now, yes."
"But for now yes? When exactly were you going to tell me any of this? When exactly was I going to learn what would happen in my own home? When . . ."
"Please, Samuel. Stop it!" I cried.
He glared. His lips firm. He was shooting so many daggers across the desk at me that I had trouble looking at him.
"Stop it? Stop it, you say? I know I'm not the businessman your father was. I know you do a great many things better than I do here, but I know I'm still your husband, the father of your children. All I ask, Olivia, is you treat me with this much respect," he said holding up his forefinger and thumb as if he were showing a pinch of salt.
He paused, waiting for my response.
"You're right," I said after a moment. "You're absolutely right." His eyes widened with surprise. He had been expecting my characteristic fortitude. "I should have involved you sooner in all this. I was wrong, but I was just so upset over Belinda and what had happened, I saw red and took matters into my own hands."
"Which is what you always do," he said nodding.
"I am who I am. I'm not perfect, Samuel."
"Well." He stepped back. "I must say it's a novelty to hear you say that, Olivia." He gazed at me a moment and then sat in front of the desk, sinking into the seat. "What do you expect to accomplish here? Why are you permitting Belinda to have the baby and keep the baby at our home?"
"It's her child, our niece or nephew, isn't it? We don't give away children like so much extra fish," I said. "But for an unmarried woman to have a child fathered by a married man and for us to keep the child, bring him or her up alongside Jacob and Chester . . . it will simply complicate matters so much more, Olivia. You haven't thought this through and considered all the aspects," he concluded, shaking his head.
"Did he send you here to tell me all this, to plead with me, to have me give the child to some agency so that his conscience is clear and he has no worries? Well? Did he?"
"He asked me to reason with you, yes," Samuel admitted.
"I thought so."
"He's quite distraught about it."
"Oh please," I said turning my chair. "He's quite distraught. Why is it men can only see the suffering they endure?" I thought a moment and then looked at Samuel again. "Is this what you would do, Samuel, if it were all reversed? Would you have gone to him and asked him to go to his wife and plead your case, asking for the same things?"
"That's a ridiculous question. I don't have affairs."
"Of course you don't. You're better than that, Samuel. I realize that. Haven't you told me time after time that you believe in family, as I do? Didn't you tell me my father was right in building that belief in us all?"
"Yes, but . . . well, what does Belinda want?"
"Belinda?" I laughed. "She wants everything unpleasant to disappear. She always has. She's a lot like my mother in that way, but this time it won't work."
"You mean you won't let it."
"I mean we'll bear the burden of our
responsibilities. What she has done affects us. Surely, you won't want me to turn the child out of our home, Samuel. You're not that sort of a man and that's why I wanted to marry you in the first place," I said. "You credit me with intelligence; credit me with the perception to see your good qualities, too, Samuel."
He gazed at me and I kept my eyes so fixed on him and so full of sincerity, he swallowed down my words and felt good about it. I could see his ego inflate like a life raft.
"Well, if you put it that way, I suppose we could manage it fine. It's not a question of money or anything and as you say, the child carries your family blood. Is it what you really think we should do, Olivia?"
"I wouldn't do it otherwise, Samuel. I'm sorry I didn't come right to you with the problem, but I was sorting it out in my own mind first. I was going to tell you everything today."
He nodded.
"All right then," he said. "I do feel sorry for Belinda though," he said in a wistful tone. "She's made some mess for herself."
"With someone else's help," I reminded him. He raised his eyebrows.
"Yes. Well," he said slapping the arms of the chair as he stood, "every family has its skeletons in closets, Ours won't be the first, huh?"
"Hardly," I said.
"Is there anything I should do?" he asked.
"Tell Nelson Childs to stop sending emissaries and accept his responsibility. Tell him to be half the man you are, Samuel," I said.
He smiled.
"I don't think he'd like to hear that, Olivia." He started for the door and stopped. "How are we going to handle Belinda? I mean . . ."
"Leave it all to me, Samuel. It's mostly all female problems anyway from here on until she gives birth," I said.
"Yes. Yes, I suppose you're right." He thought a moment. "Sorry I came bursting in on you like that."
"It's all right, Samuel. I understand and once again, I'm sorry I didn't speak to you sooner."
He smiled.
"Would you like me to take you to lunch today, Olivia? We haven't done that in a while."
I thought a moment.
"Yes, Samuel," I said. "Yes, I would."
His smile broadened and then he left. I sat there quietly in my office listening to the tick-tock of the miniature grandfather clock on the shelf. Was I a monster for handling Samuel that way? The only one left for Nelson to petition was Belinda and that would be the most futile effort of all. She would do exactly as I told her to do and he wouldn't understand why. He wouldn't understand that I had really been more of a mother to her than our own mother.
The next evening that was exactly what he tried. He pleaded with
^-
her on the phone and offered to take care of everything if she would just do what he wanted. She came down to the living room where I was reading and listening to music to tell me. She was very excited. In her mind it solved the problem.
"He knows a place where I can go to have the baby and he'll make sure the baby has a good family. He's right, isn't he, Olivia? I can't raise a baby and I can't put that on you and Samuel. You have your own children to raise."
"He's not right. We've had this conversation. I don't want to hear another word on it."
"But I don't want to have a baby, Olivia. I don't want to . . ."
I rose from my seat with such fury, she cowered before me.
"You don't want to have a baby? You don't want . ." "Olivia, please."
"Shall I remind you of a night not so long ago, a night filled with screams, a night that aged your father years in seconds? Shall I take you for a ride tomorrow and march you out to the back of our old house? Should I show you where he's buried?"
"Stop it!" She put her hands over her ears.
I drew closer, relentless.
"Did I ever tell you how it drove Daddy mad? How he heard a baby crying in the night? Did I ever tell you how he cried like a baby?"
"Stop it! Please," she begged.
"You will have this baby, Olivia, and it will be brought up in this home. We will bury no more children, not in the ground and not in someone else's family," I said through clenched teeth. "Don't you ever speak to him again. Do you understand? If he calls you, hang up the phone or tell him to talk to me. Are you listening?"
"Yes, Olivia. Yes."
"Go upstairs. You need your rest."
"I'm starting to show, Olivia. I have to wear something to hide it. I can't go out and meet people without their knowing eventually," she moaned.
"Don't worry about it. Soon, you'll stop going out and meeting people anyway," I said.
"What?"
"We're going to tell people that you're away and you're going to stay confined to the house and grounds until you give birth, Belinda. Don't worry about it."
"Confined?" She looked about, dazed.
"Just go upstairs. Do as I say," I told her firmly. "But . . ."
"How many women would be willing to take on the burden of their sister's illegitimate child, Belinda? How many? He or she will grow up with my boys and have the benefits they enjoy. When are you going to show me some gratitude and at least be cooperative enough to help me help you? When?" I screamed.
"Okay, Olivia. Okay," she said in a small voice. "What should I do?"
"Just . . . go upstairs," I said. She nodded, lowered her head and left the room.
The days turned to weeks and the arrangements I had described for Belinda came to pass. To ensure she didn't disobey, I had her phone disconnected. When her bubble gum friends called after that, I had them told she was visiting relatives for a few months. In time, the calls stopped and our lives settled down for a while.
Samuel did his best to amuse her during this period. He brought her presents, newspapers and magazines, records and tapes to occupy her time. By the middle of the ninth month, Belinda took to remaining in bed most of the day and never getting dressed. She let her hair go and she ate constantly, satisfying every craving, driving Effie mad with requests for this and that.
"It's not good for her, Mrs. Logan," Effie complained to me. "She's getting too fat. Thelma agrees."
"When I want opinions on diet, I'll ask. For now just give her anything she wants," I ordered.
However, I had to admit that when I looked in on her now, she reminded me of one of her stuffed animals, her face bloated, her stomach lifting the blanket into a small hill. Her arms resembled balloons. This pregnancy was a tumor eating away her beauty and good looks. She seemed to have lost all concern about herself anyway. Without her doting friends and her stream of boyfriends, she stopped using makeup. Even her hygiene began to suffer and if I didn't insist she take baths, she wouldn't wash her face and her hands for days. She got so she didn't get off the bed to urinate, but used a bedpan and left it for hours beside the bed until either I or Effie came by to empty it.
Eventually, I instructed Thelma to keep the children away from Belinda's room.
"She'll give them nightmares," I said.
Thelma was very worried about Belinda and how we were handling the pregnancy. She wasn't the type to interfere, but she stopped by my den-office one night to express her concern.
"I appreciate that, Thelma," I told her, "but for now it has to be this way."
"Why, Mrs. Logan?" she pursued.
I put aside what I was doing and sat back.
"It's really none of your business, but you've become part of our family so I'll tell you," I said and then went on to describe the disgrace. Without mentioning a name, I explained that Belinda was carrying an influential person's baby and we were trying to protect the child as well as Belinda. I asked her to just cooperate and understand and it satisfied her.
"I'll need you to spend more time with the children. I have to give more to Belinda right now," I said.
"Oh, of course, Mrs. Logan. Please call on me for anything," she said and I thanked her.
For Belinda every day seemed harder than the one before it now. She knew she was drawing closer and closer.
"When's the doctor coming, Olivia?" she asked me one evening. "He's never been to see me."
"We're not having a doctor, Belinda. I told you. I have made arrangements with a midwife. It's more discreet." "Why does it have to be discreet?"
"People don't know about the pregnancy. Let's try to keep it that way as long as we can. I'm only trying to protect your reputation," I said.
"My reputation? My reputation?" She laughed and looked at the wall as if someone was standing there, as if the room were crowded with male admirers the way it once was. "Did you hear that? She's worried about my reputation." She laughed again, each roll of laughter coming like a cough and then continuing like uncontrollable hiccups.
"Stop it, Belinda."
"My reputation." She shrieked and laughed madly.
I stepped up to the bed and hovered over her, my hands in fists.
"Stop this nonsense this instant!" I commanded.
Her laughter wound down until it became a subdued sob and then she closed her eyes and sighed as if she had passed away. I stood there, waiting. Her eyes opened and she smiled up at me as if nothing in the world was wrong.
"Please tell Effie I'd like some ice cream-- strawberry. No, butternut crunch with chocolate syrup and some marshmallow sauce."
"Fine," I said.
"I had a pain today, Olivia. It hurt a lot," she said.
"It's no wonder you have pains lying there like some pig in mud, but you know what labor pains are. That's when we've got to become concerned."
"It was a labor pain. It's starting," she said with a nod. "I should see a doctor. I don't care about my reputation."
"I'll call the midwife and she'll examine you tomorrow," I told her and gave Effie her request for ice cream.
The midwife was a Brava who ministered mainly to poor people, but had on occasion handled situations for the well-to-do that had to be kept as secret as possible.
Her name was Isabella and she looked like she was nearly seventy, although I knew she wasn't much more than fifty-four, fifty-five. She wore her smokegray hair long and stringy to her shoulders. Her face was leathery with wrinkles even in her chin. Belinda gasped the first time she set eyes on her. Later, she told me she thought she was a witch.
"She's put a curse on me!" she said.
"Don't be ridiculous," I told her, but she looked even more maddened after the examination.
Isabella predicted that it wouldn't be much longer before Belinda delivered, maybe a week. As it turned out, she had underestimated, for the very next day, Belinda went into such terrific labor, Effie had to call me home from work. I sent for Isabella immediately, but she was delivering another woman's baby just north of Hyannis. All afternoon, Belinda shrieked and squirmed in her bed. Effie and I did all that we could to make her comfortable, but nothing seemed to help.
"She oughta go to a hospital, Mrs. Logan," Effie finally said.
"The midwife will be here soon," I told her. Samuel, who had come home, too, stood outside the door looking very somber.
"We're making a mistake trying to do it this way, Olivia. Let's just bring her to the hospital."
"She'll be all right, Samuel. Many women have had their children at home. In fact, most have."