A Different Light (39 page)

“Oh, okay. I’m going to bed, Mom.” Callie stooped to kiss the top of her head. “I’m pooped.”

Meg leaned back against the sink and sighed. “It went great, Athen. Chapman really seems to like me. He wants me to meet with one of their candidates for news producer to see what I think of her. Can you imagine? He wants my opinion.”

“I take it they offered you the job?” Athen smiled.

“There are some details that need to be worked out, but yes,” Meg said, a look of amazement on her face. “As she’s walking us to the car after dinner, Brenda says, ‘Dad and I both feel there’s no need to look for anyone else for our lead anchor. We’d like you to think about when you could start. We’d like you to work with us as we get this thing rolling. And no pressure, but the sooner the better.’”

“Meg, that’s wonderful.” Athen got off the floor and hugged her.

“I can’t wait to go back to Tulsa and stick this in Cal Robbins’s smug face.” Her eyes narrowed. “He has been jerking around with my contract the past two months.”

“When does it expire?”

“October first,” Meg said with a grin, “after which time I will belong to CCN—that’s Chapman Cable Network—body and soul.”

“Will he make you work through September?” Athen inquired.

“Probably not,” Meg told her. “Cal really doesn’t like me any more than I like him. I think he’ll be just as happy to see me leave as I will be to go.”

“How was dinner?” Athen asked casually.

“Wonderful. Man, what a cook they have. And what a lifestyle: cocktails on the veranda, dinner in that lovely dining room.”

“The big one?” Athen pressed.

Meg nodded. “The one with the enormous Waterford chandelier and the Degas on the wall.”

“Were there a lot of people there?” The Chapmans’ dining room was cavernous, not suited, Athen thought, for a small gathering.

“A larger group than I would have expected, considering we were supposed to be conducting a job interview,” Meg noted. “The formality of the house aside, I got the impression that the Chapmans are pretty loose at home. There was some cousin of Lydia’s there from St. Louis, with her husband and four children. And Lydia’s daughter, Caitlin.”

“Lydia’s daughter?” Athen’s eyebrows rose. Quentin had never mentioned a sister.

“She’s wrapping up her residency at a hospital in Chicago.” Lowering herself wearily into a chair, Meg kicked off her shoes. “Caitlin is quite a gal. She wants to work in an inner-city hospital or clinic, working with low-income families. With their money, she could probably build her own damned hospital. Did you know that Lydia Chapman’s
father founded Bradford International? And that she controls the trusts? We are talking major Yankee dollars here.”

“Bradford International?” Athen’s eyes widened. Had Quentin really given up a major position with the well-known corporation?
“The
…”

“Yeah.
The
Bradford International. Majorly huge dollars there.”

“What’s Caitlin like?” Athen wondered aloud.

“She’s the image of her mother, except that she’s a strawberry blonde, and taller.” Meg studied her sister-in-law’s face carefully. “Aren’t you going to ask if Quentin was there?”

“No.”

“Of course you were.” Meg laughed. “Stop acting like you’re not interested.”

“Okay, was he?”

“Yes, he was.” Meg lifted her legs onto the chair next to the one in which she sat.

Looking for something to distract herself, Athen picked up Hannah’s water bowl, rinsed it out in the sink, and refilled it.

“Athen, I love you dearly, you know that, but you’re a fool,” Meg said levelly. When Athen started to protest, Meg said, “No, don’t interrupt me. Quentin Forbes is one mighty miserable guy, though not, perhaps, any more miserable than you are. If you do not straighten this out, you will regret it for the rest of your life, and deservedly so.”

“I know,” Athen replied softly.

“You know?” Meg sat up straight in the chair and wrapped her feet around the lower rungs. “Then what are you going to do about it?”

“I guess I’ll have to call him,” she said.

“Don’t ‘guess,’ Athen, do it.” Meg reached down and scooped up her discarded shoes. “I suggest you start rehearsing what you’re going to say. Get it down, then get it over with.” She yawned widely. “God, I’m tired.”

“Let’s lock up, then.” Athen bolted the back door and turned off the light over the sink. “Come on, Meg, we can talk more tomorrow.”

Meg dragged herself up the steps, Athen following thoughtfully behind, mentally searching for an opening line.

 24 

Damn! I overslept!” Meg blew into the kitchen at ten the next morning. “Brenda said she’d pick me up at eleven.”

“Calm down.” Athen shoved a mug of coffee in Meg’s general direction. “You still have an hour.”

“An hour to shower and find something to wear. I only brought the suit I wore yesterday. What was I thinking? I can’t show up in the same thing.” Meg tried to untangle her hair with her fingers. “And anyway, the skirt’s wrinkled.”

“I’ll iron the skirt while you’re in the shower, and you can borrow a top from me.” Athen stuck the mug into her hands and pointed her in the general direction of the stairs. “Go take your shower. I’ll find something for you to wear.”

Forty-five minutes later, Meg was trying on shoes pulled from Athen’s closet.

Meg admired the brown heels. “It’s amazing when
you consider that as tall as you are, and as short as I am, we wear the same size. Of course, what looks like a tiny delicate foot at the end of your long leg looks like a tugboat on me. It’s the Moran curse, you know. Big feet and short stubby legs.”

“Your legs are not stubby.” Athen laughed. “You’re petite.”

“A marketing term for short and stubby,” insisted Meg as she draped a belt around her hips.

“Blouse the front of the shirt a little,” Athen suggested. “That’s better.”

She peered out the window at the sound of tires crunching in the driveway.

“Brenda’s here,” she told Meg. “And you look terrific. Go knock ’em dead.”

“Thanks, Athen, for everything.” Meg gave her sister-in-law a quick hug. “For the blouse, the ironing job, the shoes, the belt, the earrings.” Meg sang off the list of borrowed items as she ran down the steps.

Athen collected the empty coffee mugs and took them to the kitchen. On the counter lay the reprinted newspaper photo Meg had given her the day before. As much as she’d stared at the picture, she could not come up with the name of the man in the background. If she had ever known his identity, it was gone from her memory bank now. After searching unsuccessfully for the phone book, she lifted the receiver and called information.

“I’d like the number for Diana Bennett on Rosedale, please.”

THE HOUSE AT 417 ROSEDALE
Avenue looked exactly like a house that Diana Bennett would live in. Small and compact, little more than a cottage built in the 1920s, it had
charm and beauty and an air of romance about it. From the rose-covered arbor that framed the neat front door to the airy and light interior, it had Diana’s name all over it.

The entire first floor was white, providing a simple background for Diana’s collection of beautifully painted pottery.

“They’re all American pieces.” Diana volunteered after Athen admired the pastel vases that paraded across the deep windowsills. “Grueby, Van Briggle, Weller—I’m partial to the Weller since I grew up in Zanesville, Ohio, where it was made, and my mother was a painter there. From time to time I’ve been able to find some pieces with her initials on the bottom where she signed her work.”

Diana lifted a tall pale green vase adorned with white flowers and held it, base up, to show Athen the letters scratched in the bottom, but Athen’s eyes were glued to the photograph that stood importantly at the center of the small stone mantel. Ari and Diana beamed—
glowed—
in full living color, Ari handsome as an aging movie hero, Diana soft and beautiful in a champagne-colored lace dress.

“What a beautiful picture.” Athen quickly masked her embarrassment at having been caught gaping.

“That was taken two weeks before Ari’s stroke,” Diana told her.

Athen was unable to take her eyes from it. “You both look so happy.”

“We were.”

Athen swallowed hard. “I guess now is a good time to apologize to you for … for …”

“For thinking I was just a good time for a lonely old man?” Diana smiled gently.

“I don’t know if I’d put it that way.” Athen squirmed
uncomfortably.

“Sure you would,” Diana jabbed with more good humor and grace than Athen thought she could have mustered under the circumstances. “At least, once upon a time, you might have. But you don’t owe me an apology, Athen. Neither Ari nor I gave you any reason to think otherwise.”

“All those years, I should have made things easier for him, and for you. I should have included you in our holidays.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself.” Diana patted her hand. “I probably wouldn’t have come anyway.”

“You wouldn’t?” Athen had never considered this possibility.

Diana sat on the ottoman in front of the oversized, overstuffed chair and shook her head.

“We’d made such a happy little world for ourselves here, I never wanted to share him. So on Christmas, he’d spend the day with you and John, and come home to me, and we’d have our own holiday together.” Diana wiped a slow tear from her face and looked around the room. “The only truly happy birthdays, the only really merry Christmases I’ve ever had have been here, with Ari. This is the only place I’ve ever felt safe.”

“Safe?” Athen asked cautiously.

Diana went into the kitchen and returned with a box of pale green tissues.

“I have the feeling I might need these,” she said as she sat again. “I suppose the simplest way to explain is to say that I went from being an abused child to being an abused wife. I married Donald Bennett right out of high school. I thought he’d take me far away, and he did. He’d gotten a job with a pharmaceutical company about eight
miles from here and went to graduate school at night. I got a job as a clerk in the finance department at City Hall. One of the girls in the office invited me to a campaign workers’ meeting one night. Sam Tarbottom was running for mayor that year, do you remember?”

Athen shook her head. “Not really.”

“Well, I had nothing else to do. Donald would be at school. We’d made no friends, and I guess I was lonely, so I went. Ari was one of the organizers of Sam’s campaign. I thought he was so wonderful. So European and suave and handsome.”

Diana laughed, just a hint of blush rising to her cheeks. “Everyone was so nice to me. It was the first time in years I felt that I had a place to go, a place where I had friends. I didn’t care who the candidate was. I’d have gone every week, just for the companionship, you know? Just to feel that I belonged somewhere.”

Athen silently nodded. She too had felt isolated once.

“And so I went back, every week. I knew Donald would have a fit if he knew, he was so jealous, but I didn’t care. For those few hours, I could be like everybody else, out for an evening with friends. We’d laugh and talk and drink beer. Once your father brought bottles of Metaxa and Tarbottom got drunk as a skunk.” She laughed at the memory. “But mostly it was stuffing envelopes and laughing. That’s what I remember most about those nights. Then one night I got back a little late and Donald was already at the apartment.”

Her tongue flicking across her lips nervously. “He was not happy. I paid for my night out with two black eyes and a couple of broken ribs.”

Athen was stunned at the thought of anyone striking this gentle soul.

“Of course, I had to call in sick the next day, and the next, until the bruising subsided a bit. And I had to plaster makeup on my face before I could appear in public. I didn’t dare attend the next week’s meeting, or the next few. But three weeks later, when Donald had exams, I went back. Carol Parker—she was my friend in the office— I know she knew, but she never asked. She promised she’d get me home early, but her car broke down. And Donald was waiting for me again. I decided maybe I didn’t need friends after all.”

She paused and blew her nose.