Whitefern (8 page)

He was right. I wondered what he knew about
Sylvia and what he didn't. I didn't want any brutal disappointments to occur. I was afraid of how that might disturb Sylvia, especially if someone rejected working with her because he thought she wasn't capable of learning. Arden, of course, would feel vindicated and say something like “I told you so.”

“Do you know anything about my sister?” I asked.

“I know she's been homeschooled?”

“She was born premature and had to remain in an institutional setting until she was about two and a half. If she had attended a public school, she would surely have been placed in special education. She still needs me to look after her, but she is very pleasant and courteous. However, she is quite sensitive,” I added, loading my voice with warning. “She can tell when someone is talking down to her or looking down at her.”

“I taught special education students,” he said. “No worries at all.”

“She has taken to art, loves to draw and paint. She can spend hours and hours doing it. I've been doing the best I can with other aspects of her education, but when it comes to art, no one has taught her anything formally. She doesn't have that long an attention span except when she's working on her art, but I'm not sure how she would pay attention to instruction.”

“A challenge. Love it,” he said.

I had to smile. He was truly a bored man. “Okay, then let's see how it works out today at three.”

I immediately started up to the cupola to tell Sylvia and to talk to her about our lunch, but the phone rang before I reached the stairs. It was Arden. Apparently,
telling him I had called had become possible for Mrs. Crown.

“What?” he said sharply when I answered the phone.

“What? Can't you at least pretend to be courteous, Arden, and ask how I am first?”

“I'm busy, Audrina. There is no time for small talk here. I know women feed on small talk like birds on grass seed, but it's a particularly busy day. There's been a big drop in crude oil this morning. You know what crude oil is?” he asked, raising his voice bloated with sarcasm.

“Stop it, Arden. Of course I know what crude oil is. I called to tell you I'm arranging for an art tutor for Sylvia. I'll be paying him from the household account.”

“Waste of money,” he said. “What about the papers I want you to sign? I'll tell you where to meet me, and . . .”

“We'll talk about that later, Arden. I'm just letting you know I have the art tutor coming at three today to meet Sylvia. Unless there's a problem the teacher sees, I will contract with him today.”

“Who is he?”

“Arthur Price, a retired high school art teacher.”

“How old is he?”

“He's not that old, Arden.”

“I'm not worried about him being
too
old.” He sighed. “All right, do what you want. I repeat, it's a waste of time and money, but I have to get back to important things.”

“This is important, Arden. She's my sister, and
she's your sister-in-law. My father expected we would look after her.”

“Oh, spare me. Your father expected . . . Well, I expected things, too. Women can get so emotional. It's like they have a trigger finger on their emotions, which is why they don't belong in business, especially a business like this,” he emphasized. “ 'Bye,” he said, and hung up before I could say a word in my defense.

I was so frustrated that I wished I could strangle the phone and squeeze every last word he uttered out of the wires and out of my mind. Up the stairs I went, pounding every step as if I was stamping on Arden's face. When I entered the cupola, I found Sylvia sitting and staring at a blank sheet of paper, her pencil in her hand, poised in the air like a knife she was about to stab into something.

“Where's your picture?” I asked.

She turned to look at me, her face twisted in an expression of anger and frustration. “Done,” she said, nodding to the picture now lying on a long table.

I looked at it and saw that not much more had been added to it. It still fascinated me. I put it down and turned back to her. She had returned to staring at her blank sheet.

“What are you trying to draw and paint now, Sylvia?”

She looked at me, deciding whether to answer, I guessed. “What makes a baby a boy?” she asked.

“What?”

“Boys and girls come from the same mother, so who's first? And why didn't Papa ever have a boy?”

How was I going to explain this? Explain the X and Y chromosomes? No way. “Why do you want to know?”

“Because Papa told me a baby, but he didn't tell me if the baby was a boy or a girl,” she said. I nearly laughed at the way she said it. She sounded condescending, like I was dumb not to realize that.

“Why is that important right now, Sylvia? Many people, maybe most, like it to be a surprise. Except for those people who want to paint nursery rooms and choose clothes way ahead of time,” I added, more for myself. “So?”

“I have to draw the baby, Audrina. If I don't draw the baby, the baby will not come,” she said.

I was beginning to get a headache. How was she coming up with these crazy ideas? Maybe Arden wasn't so wrong. Maybe the time had come for me to find some help with Sylvia. After all, I did have a life of my own, or I thought I did. The truth I didn't want to face was that what was holding Sylvia back from the world was holding me back, too, as long as I was chained to her daily. For a good part of my life, I had spent most of my time inside one house. For a short while, I had broken free of it, but I was right back in it now, its walls hovering around me, making me feel cloistered. Sometimes I felt I had been swallowed. The walls seemed to quiver like the inside of its lungs.

Taking walks outside around the house wasn't enough, and our short shopping trips were all full of purpose, with little or no fun. There was nothing left to explore here but my own demons, and I was tired
of that. I certainly didn't want to start down a path similar to the one Sylvia had to follow, taking in everything outside slowly, in small, careful bites, but what choice was I giving myself? I wasn't trying to make friends, and I certainly wasn't joining any organizations that would lead to making friends. Sometimes I feared that someone who didn't know us would look at us and wonder who was the slow-witted one.

“Maybe whether it's a boy or a girl will come to you,” I said sharply. It was not unreasonable of me to run out of patience, especially when I chastised myself for using Sylvia to justify my being such a prisoner of Whitefern. “Forget about all that, and listen to me. I have found a good art teacher for you. He used to teach in the high school. His name is Mr. Price, and he will be here this afternoon to meet you. Do not tell him what you want to draw just yet. Let him teach you the things you have to know in order to draw and paint better, okay? He might start you drawing an apple or a banana or something like that. You do what he asks and what he tells you to do. Okay?”

She didn't look happy.

“This is what you wanted, isn't it? To learn how to do this well? I'm not going to spend the money if you don't want to do it, Sylvia. Well? Do you or don't you?” I asked, practically shouting.

“I do.”

“Good. Let's have you change your clothes and fix your hair. We'll talk with Mr. Price in the living room, and afterward we'll show him what supplies you have here. We'll get you whatever else you need. I'm sure
he'll give us a list, and tomorrow morning you and I can go shopping.”

She looked at the blank sheet without answering me.

“Sylvia!” I said sharply. “Did you hear me? Concentrate on what I'm telling you.”

I rarely snapped at her like this, but she was making me nervous. Papa, the rocking chair, babies . . . I had driven all the visions and dreams, all the ghosts and whispers, down as deeply as I could in my memory. Stirring it was like throwing rocks at the hives of hornets.

She stood up reluctantly and, with her head lowered, followed me out and down to her room.

“Now, it's important that you make a good impression on your art tutor, Sylvia,” I said in a calmer, more motherly tone. “I know you don't meet many strangers, and you're very shy, but I don't want you looking at other things or letting your attention wander when he asks you questions or speaks to you,” I said while laying out her fresh clothes. “Teachers think girls and boys who do that are unteachable, and you don't want him to think that, right?”

She shook her head and listened to me as I went on with instructions, but I could see her mind was still elsewhere, pulling her away every few moments to look up toward the cupola, as if she had left a half-baked new baby up there. She could be like this from time to time. Once her mind enveloped a thought or an idea, getting her to put it aside, even temporarily, was like prying open a stubborn clam.

Would she be like this with Mr. Price? He'd see immediately that he was wasting his time with her. I'd
feel like a fool, and Arden would strut around with his arrogant, masculine superiority and his infuriating “I told you so” look, which he could put on as quickly as a Halloween mask.

Nevertheless, I remained hopeful. I fixed Sylvia's hair and straightened her clothes to make her as presentable as possible. I had to be ready for anything, but I had to be realistic, too. If Mr. Price thought she was unteachable, even he, a man bored with his present life, would not attempt the lessons. Money didn't seem to matter to him. I hoped he was sincere when he said he welcomed a challenge. She was certainly going to be that.

“We'll prepare some nice biscuits and tea now, okay, Sylvia? I'd like you to do most of that and bring it out when I tell you to, understand?”

“Chocolate biscuits?”

I recalled the last time we had made them and how she had gotten the chocolate all over her dress and had to be continually told to wipe her mouth.

“I think he likes the plain ones,” I said. Little lies were often the glue that held more important truths together. Papa had taught me that.

Disappointed, Sylvia followed me out and down to the kitchen, where I put her to work making biscuits while I vacuumed the living room and polished the furniture to brighten things up. Then I went to the powder room to make myself presentable, too. I hated how haggard I could look sometimes. Frustration, worry, and anger were like the three witches of
Macbeth
in this house, toiling and mixing their evil brew.

Promptly at three, the doorbell rang. Being on time was probably embedded in a schoolteacher after as many years as Mr. Price had worked. Part of the daily instruction I gave Sylvia, especially in the past few years, was how to greet people who came to our door. I spent hours and hours role-playing with her to show her how to introduce herself and be courteous to guests. Papa was very proud of the success I'd had. Aunt Ellsbeth, along with Arden and especially Vera, often ridiculed my efforts and said things like “You're trying to put clothes in a closet without any hangers.” I ignored them, and whenever Sylvia did perform perfectly, they usually smirked and looked away with the comment that she'd forget next time.

I stepped into the kitchen. “Go answer the door, Sylvia,” I ordered. “It's your art teacher. Introduce yourself after you greet him.”

She looked annoyed for a moment. I kept my stern gaze on her and was reminded of how Vera could pout and stomp when told to do something she didn't want to do. Petulant, Sylvia went to the front door. I stayed back, holding my breath.

“Well, hello,” I heard Mr. Price say. “I'm Arthur Price.”

“Hello,” Sylvia said. “Welcome to Whitefern. I'm Sylvia.”

She did that well enough, but she didn't step back, leaving him in the doorway. It was awkward.

I hurried toward them. “Oh, do come in, Mr. Price,” I said. “I'm Audrina Lowe.”

“Yes, yes,” he said, stepping in. He was short,
barely a few inches taller than I was, with a trim, graying goatee like some French artist on the Left Bank of Paris. He was balding, the patches of gray-black hair over his temples looking pasted onto his scalp. He had a jolly, Santa Claus face with bright blue eyes and was wearing a dark blue jacket and tie.

I nodded at Sylvia to close the door behind him. The afternoon breeze was quite cool and sharp. I led Mr. Price into the living room. He looked about with great interest, like some buyer of antiques who had wandered into one of the biggest discoveries of his career.

“What an amazing house,” he said. “These paintings are most interesting.”

Like any man, he focused quickly on our famous naked lady on the chaise eating grapes. He glanced quickly at me.

“And the clocks and vases, all family heirlooms, I imagine?”

“Some are,” I said. “Please, have a seat.” I indicated the sofa Papa had redone only a year ago. Momma had loved lying on it. “Sylvia will bring us some tea and biscuits,” I said, and I nodded at her again.

“Thank you,” he said, rubbing his palms together. “Winter's coming earlier this year for sure. You can smell the snow.”

Sylvia looked at us. “Smell it?” she asked. “Snow? It doesn't smell.”

“Well, not snow, exactly,” he said, smiling. “It's just . . . I mean, it feels like winter's coming.”

Sylvia glanced at me as if we had let a madman into the house and then continued to the kitchen.

“What a beautiful young lady,” he said immediately. “I know a lot of artists, some not so amateur, who would love to have her for a model. Those eyes, startlingly beautiful, almost exotic, and a complexion like alabaster.”

“She wants to be the artist, not the model,” I said, probably too sharply. It occurred to me, maybe for the first time, that I could actually be jealous of Sylvia. It made me a little ashamed. It was like envying a poor girl's single doll when you had dozens.