A Prologue To Love (79 page)

“My father — no matter what anyone did or could have said about him, it wouldn’t have mattered to me. I had to have my fantasy because I had nothing else. It is quite different with Amy. Is that good or bad?”

“I don’t know, madam,” said Griffith. Again he hesitated. “I am only your son’s servant. May I ask a favor of you? I should like to remember that I shook the hand of a great lady, if only once in my life.”

“What nonsense,” said Caroline, but she stuck her hand out to him, and when he took it she smiled.

When she was in the hired car with Amy they were both silent, though Amy watched the streets and the people eagerly, as if she had been delivered from a dark prison. Her young face took on color; her eyes sparkled. She had put almost a year of her life from her and was not looking back. Youth? Resilience? Caroline asked herself these questions. But once she had been young, too, and had had considerable resilience. They had not helped her in the least.

Caroline saw that there was no doubt in the girl’s mind that she would be accepted by her parents and her brothers. But Caroline doubted. Timothy would not accept his daughter into his house without pressure and threats. She was certain of that. In Caroline’s mind Timothy and John Ames had begun to merge.

When the cab halted before the Bothwell house Amy jumped out joyfully. She was a little impatient at Caroline’s slow descent. The warm sun shone rosily on the brick walls. Amy ran to the white door with its fanlight and rang the bell. The door was opened by a new maid, who stared without recognition.

“Please tell Mrs. Winslow her daughter has come home, with Mrs. Sheldon,” said Amy in a newly peremptory voice. She assisted Caroline into the quiet and massive hall. When the maid went away Amy sighed with delight. “It’s good to be home,” she said. Caroline did not reply. She stood in the cool dusk like a large statue of black marble.

Amanda, though stout and not young any longer, came running into the hall. Mother and daughter rushed into each other’s arms, Amy crying happily, Amanda sobbing. What emotion, thought Caroline. For just an instant she remembered how she had once rushed into Beth’s arms, and she put her cold damp palm behind her to steady herself against the wall. What if she had listened to Beth all those years ago? Her flesh seemed to drag her down, to be more that she could support. Then she saw that Amanda, over Amy’s shoulder, was staring at her incredulously. Amanda held her daughter tightly in her stout arms, but she was looking only at Caroline.

“I’ve brought your daughter home to you,” said Caroline. “To stay. She’s left Ames. The rest is your affair.”

“I must see Daddy,” said Amy.

Amanda’s face changed. Caroline thought she was frightened, but Amanda was only resentful. “Don’t be afraid,” said Caroline quickly. “I’ll manage Timothy.”

“What?” said Amanda. She was still incredulous that it was Caroline who was standing there, leaning against the wall, and was overwhelmed with warm gratitude for Griffith.

“I said,” Caroline repeated, “that I will manage Timothy.”

Amanda, stroking her daughter’s wet face, thought: Why, she thinks she has to browbeat Timothy into accepting his ewe lamb! This is ridiculous. She opened her mouth to tell Caroline that, as Amy had left Ames, Timothy would be more than happy to take back his daughter. Then, shrewdly, she closed her mouth. “Timothy,” she said carefully, “is upstairs. This is the time for his afternoon nap, since his illness.”

“Then have someone wake him up,” said Caroline. “Where may I wait for him?”

“The library,” murmured Amanda. She could hardly speak for joy and excitement. Caroline had brought Amy home. Caroline was in this house for the first time in her life. Caroline with the large gray face. And the innocent eyes. The innocent eyes, Amanda repeated to herself. She had never pitied Caroline before, but now she was sick with her pity. Compassion did not come easily to Amanda Winslow, who had known nothing but love, strength, assurance, and money all her life, and everlasting protection since birth. She had detested and feared Caroline and all Caroline’s children. Now she was ashamed. She felt tears in her eyes again. True compassion could be devastating, she thought. Strange that I never really felt it before. Why should I have? I was always loved.

“I’d like to talk with you for a moment in the library before you send for Timothy,” said Caroline.

“Dear God, how can I thank you?” Amanda asked Caroline. But Caroline did not hear her. The old worrying pain was in her chest again. It was very stuffy in the hall, she thought. Why was Amanda staring at her like this? But women like Amanda were slow-witted. “Where shall we go?” asked Caroline.

Holding Amy’s hand, Amanda led Caroline to the library with its large windows and cool and leathery chairs and walls of books. Caroline said, “I thought Timothy cared for the girl. It appears he never did, or he wouldn’t have forbidden her his house or refused to see her.”

Amy was startled. She could not understand her mother’s quick frown, the pressure of her hand. Caroline said with her old grimness, “You must let me manage this. I’m quite capable.”

She went into the library and settled herself in a brown leather chair, and Amanda sat near her on a brown couch, firmly holding her daughter’s hand and keeping the bewildered girl quiet by the pressure of her fingers. Caroline was having some difficulty in breathing. Chill water began to run from under her arms, down her back, her chin, over her forehead. She opened her large sound purse and wiped her face. She took a sheaf of papers from the purse, glanced through them quickly, and nodded. Then she looked at Amanda.

“Tell me,” she said abruptly, “are your sons like their father?”

Amanda did not answer for a moment. She looked into Caroline’s suffering eyes, and she understood.

“No,” she said. “Not at all. Not in the least, Caroline. They are like me.”

“And what are you like?” said Caroline bluntly. “What do you know of what is going on in the world today? What do you care about anything?”

Amanda was not shocked or angered. She understood exactly what Caroline meant. She said very slowly, “I am like my father. I think you knew him a little, Caroline, when you were a girl. My father had very few illusions about the world. Before he died he was worried about — things. And then I was in England some years before this war. With Elizabeth,” she added, not taking her eyes from Caroline’s.

“Yes,” said Caroline. She looked at the papers in her hand. “What did you think of England, Amanda?”

“I knew something was happening, though Timothy laughed when I tried to explain. Something terrible. No one listened to me. Henry doesn’t listen now, not too much. But my younger son, Harper, does. Is that what you want to know, Caroline?”

“Yes. That is what I wanted to know.” Caroline stared at her. “You were right, of course. You are still right. Timothy knows too. That’s why I wanted to know about your sons. Now everything is clear to me.” She glanced away. “I don’t want to see your sons; I just wanted to be sure they aren’t like their father.”

“They aren’t,” said Amanda earnestly, leaning toward Caroline. “Believe me, they aren’t.”

Amy sat up indignantly. But her mother’s hand tightened on hers.

“I believe you,” said Caroline. “You were never a liar, like Timothy. Now, would you please take Amy away and send for Timothy? I want to see him alone.”

Amanda took Amy to her old bedroom and closed the door behind her. The girl looked at her furniture, at the serene warm sunlight filtering through the silk curtains, at her girlhood bed, and she began to cry in relief and happiness. Amanda watched her with a grimness very much like Caroline’s and waited as Amy ran from chair to chair and opened one closet door after another and touched the draperies lovingly.

“Everything is just the same!” she exclaimed.

“No,” said Amanda. “Nothing is ever the same. I hope you’ve grown up now, Amy. I hope you’ve learned a little.” Amy was standing here in her room before a wardrobe and inspecting an old pink dress she had worn nearly two years ago, and her expression was full of remembrance.

“Yes, Mama,” said Amy, lifting the rustling lengths in her hand. “I’ve learned. I’m not quite as stupid as I was.” She let the dress drift from her hand but continued to look at it. “You think I left Ames too easily, don’t you? It wasn’t easy, Mama. When Cousin Caroline came today she didn’t know that I’d begun to leave Ames in my mind several days ago. Or perhaps several weeks, or even months. Today was the final leaving.” She stroked the dress. “I know what the doctors have said, that I’ll never have any children. I don’t believe it, Mama. I think I will have, later. Much later.”

Amanda was touched. Her daughter continued, “I think I’d have left Ames much earlier and wouldn’t have taken to drinking” — and she turned and looked at her mother fully — “if Daddy hadn’t refused to see me. I thought there was no one. You and I didn’t meet very often; I rarely saw my brothers. But Daddy’s refusing to see me, to have me in my old home, that was the worst. I love him. But not as I did before. Do you think he will let me stay?”

“You know he will,” said Amanda, and came to her daughter, and they kissed as women who understand each other. Amanda said, “One of the sternest lessons we have to learn is that we should never be too dependent on anyone for love or consolation. We live alone, really, and die alone.”

Amanda went to Timothy’s room. He was already sitting up in his bed and fumbling for his slippers. “What was all that talking?” he asked irritably. “Who is here? What is the matter?”

His wife was sorry for him, for his weakness and his isolation. She closed the door behind her and said without preliminaries, “Amy has come home. To stay.”

He dropped the slipper in his hand. “What? What! What are you talking about? Amy here? To stay? Has she left that scoundrel?” He glared at her disbelievingly. “And if so, why?”

“She couldn’t stand him any longer. Timothy, I’ll let someone else tell you about it. Your cousin Caroline. She brought Amy home.”

His face became blank with amazement. “Caroline Ames? Here? Have you lost your mind? What are you telling me? She’d never come here. What has she to do with Amy?”

“I told you, she’s brought Amy home. She’s here, Timothy. You mustn’t excite yourself. I just want to tell you something, and it’s very important. You must let Caroline talk, and you mustn’t disillusion her. You see, she thinks that you don’t want Amy. She thinks you’re like her father. She’s going to battle you for Amy’s sake.”

“Are you mad?” cried Timothy. He tried to punish his wife with his voice, with his coldly furious eyes. “I still don’t believe it! I don’t believe that old hag is here! Are you trying to drive me out of my mind with your stupidities? You were always a stupid woman, Amanda.”

“Yes,” said Amanda. “Several people thought I was very stupid to marry you, Timothy. They couldn’t understand how a girl in her right mind could have loved a man like you, and frankly, I don’t understand, either.”

He tried to beat her down with his look, but she was not intimidated. Then he began to smile slightly, a crooked smile which was distorted by his stroke. But immediately his mind, which had not been in the least affected, enveloped the whole astonishing situation.

“Let me understand, get matters straight,” he said, stroking his feeble hand with the strong fingers of the other hand. “You say Caroline Ames has brought my daughter home. The question is why? I know her only too well; she’s a schemer and a liar — ”

“No,” said Amanda. “She never was. You are.”

Her words, her quiet voice reached Timothy. He twisted his head on his thin neck to glance at her.

“I’ve told you,” said Amanda. “She thinks she will have to browbeat and threaten you to get you to accept Amy again and let her stay home. She isn’t throwing Amy at you, taking her from Ames. She brought Amy home, knowing that our child would probably die if she remained with that wretch.”

“I don’t believe it,” said Timothy. “You’re all demented. She took Amy from me in revenge. She thinks it was because of — ” He paused.

“She knows you had more than a little to do with Elizabeth’s death,” said Amanda. “You thought I didn’t know, didn’t you? But I do. Melinda told me. Timothy, you are a very wicked man. I love you, I think, but I know you’re wicked.” Amanda wanted to cry suddenly. She knew that Timothy must not be upset, for fear of another stroke. But she could not help herself, could not keep from speaking, even though he appeared newly sunken and white. “I don’t know if Caroline’s forgiven you. But she won’t take revenge on Amy. She never wanted that. When she found out how Ames was treating our child she went to rescue her, she who hasn’t left her house for years. Can’t you understand that?”

“How has Ames been treating Amy?” asked Timothy, and he sat up very straight.

“We never told you, because you were so ill. He has been abusing her. When Caroline found out she went to Amy at once. She took Amy away.” Amanda found it too hard to speak any longer. She merely held out her strong arms to help Timothy get to his feet. She helped him down the stairs in silence. She could feel him trembling. She took him to the closed door of the library. Then she could whisper, “You must listen. You must let her believe what she wants. It’s little enough to do for her, poor Caroline.” She opened the door quickly and left her husband on the threshold.

Caroline looked up. Her black eyebrows drew together in surprise. Was this tall bent man with the thin white hair and ghastly face actually Timothy Winslow, this man who leaned on a cane, who shuffled in slippered feet, this old man who was still only in his fifties, this emaciated, narrow-featured man with the slack arm and leg? Caroline would hardly have recognized him except for the gray eyes, undiminished in their steady malice and coldness. Only his virulence remained, as powerful as ever.

“Well, Caroline,” he said, and the old contempt was there and the hatred. These, she thought, would never die because they were part of his spirit, and he had been born with them. She had a sudden startled thought; was it possible that at the very moment of conception a man’s character was completely formed? Who was the poet who had said: ‘So must thou be. Thou canst not self escape. So erst the sybils, so the prophet told. Nor time, nor any power, can mar the shape impressed — that living must itself unfold’? Was ‘free will’ only the ability, if used, to heighten or depress the innate personality? Caroline, thinking, did not speak while Timothy made his way slowly and carefully to a chair behind his vast library table. He took the position of authority, while she sat before it like one being interviewed by the grand seigneur. He thought he was diminishing her, she told herself, even in his decay. But he had, all through his life and hers, tried to diminish her, with a gesture, a smile, or a look, and he had never succeeded.

Their last interview had been violent in impact and words, but Timothy, Caroline reflected with some humor, was always the Boston gentleman. He actually bowed toward her in his chair.

“What brings you here, dear Caroline?” he asked. “This is such an honor, you know.”

“Don’t waste my time with lies,” said Caroline in a loud voice. “I’m not here to visit you or exchange casual conversation. I’ve brought your daughter home, from her husband who doesn’t want her.”

Timothy looked at her, blinking. He had carefully folded his good hand over his weak.

“If you had cared for that child, she’d never have married my son, in spite of the money I offered him,” said Caroline. “This affects me personally, but that is no matter. There must be no argument; we must speak from premises we both know.”

The old stupid witch, thought Timothy. She is out of her mind. But his caution and wariness kept him silent, made him keep his face impassive.

He had always listened in his life; one learned a great deal by listening, and nothing much by talking.

“For some reason,” said Caroline, “that poor silly girl loves you and thinks you love her. I’d advise you to keep up the illusion. I’d also advise you to let her stay here where she thinks she is wanted. By you.”

She averted her large and livid face. She was remembering the houses in Lyme and in Lyndon where she had lived as a child and a young girl, cherishing the delusion that her father loved her. The very memory was anguish almost beyond bearing. It was the young Caroline who said now, “Is it so necessary for you to lie to your daughter? Is there nothing about her that you can love? Is she so ugly, deformed, hateful? Have you ever really looked at her?”

Why, she’s absolutely insane! thought Timothy, his strong fingers tightening over his feeble ones.

“Had you cared anything about her,” Caroline continued, her voice rising, “she’d never have come to this condition, to loneliness and drunkenness.”

Timothy stirred abruptly. “What are you talking about?”

“Your daughter. My son didn’t care enough about her; he really only wanted my money. He thought she’d have children to inherit my money. But it seems she is incapable of having children, so he doesn’t want her.”

Now Timothy moved violently in his chair. He looked at Caroline with fury.

“You’re insane!” he cried. “Drunkenness! Amy! Children — what do you mean? What’s wrong with Amy?”

Caroline was glad she had reached him in his impervious coldness. It was her father again who sat across from her.

“It wasn’t Ames’ neglect entirely that almost killed Amy through drinking. It was yours. Because you hated the child. Why? Because she believed you and loved you? Were you revenging yourself on Amy because of your mother, whom you hated?”

(She was utterly mad!) Timothy struck the table with the flat of his hand. His eyes glared with angry fear at Caroline. “Will you stop blabbering? Will you tell me what is wrong with my daughter?” How he hated her sitting there, a huge grimy mound of stinking flesh, as ugly as the devil, as powerful as the devil, this monstrous woman who had ruined him!

“I told you,” said Caroline. “Amy began to drink when she found out that Ames despised her. No matter how I discovered these things. But I went for her today and brought her home. To safety and to her mother, at least.”

(But I never had a mother, thought Caroline. I had no one to go to who would care for me just for myself, who would accept me as I was.)

“Amy? Drinking?” Timothy’s voice was becoming shrill. He could not believe this; it was all part of this nightmare gibberish he was hearing from a demented woman.

“Yes. Can’t you understand anything? I thought I spoke clearly enough.”

“And Amy’s here?”

“Yes. With her mother. Do you intend to drive the child away?”

The shrewd hard wisdom of many years prevented Timothy from speaking. But he watched Caroline now with intense alertness, silently listening, his thoughts shut away in himself, but rapid and conjecturing.

Then as Caroline appeared to be waiting, he said slowly and cautiously, “But it was you, as you’ve admitted, who caused this disastrous marriage.” (Drunkenness!) “You probably thought you had valid reasons. Now you want this marriage to end. I’m not a young man; I’ve been very sick and am still sick. Would you mind enlightening me why you’ve changed your mind about this marriage — if you have?” (He had it! She had taken his daughter, degraded her, and then was throwing her back at him, revenging herself for Elizabeth.)

“I thought I explained,” said Caroline, and now her voice was as truculent and heavy as he remembered it. “Ames doesn’t want her. I saved her for her mother because she is only a child, and I’m sorry. I didn’t know the marriage would end this way; Ames had persuaded me he wanted the girl and that she wanted him. It was calamitous for both of them. I don’t know which of them should be more pitied.” She paused.

Timothy’s twisted mouth jerked involuntarily.

“Are you trying to say that you’re sorry, remorseful, for what you did to my daughter through your money?”

He could not believe it when Caroline said, “Yes. You deserved to have it done to you. I had, and have, no pity for you. But I regret that Amy was so hurt; she is a nice, good child. She is happy to be home. Are you going to reject her again?” She leaned toward him, and he saw her threatening face.

“Do not think,” said Caroline, “that I’ve changed my mind about you only because of Amy. I changed it also because of your sons and because you are powerless now, or I’ll make you powerless.”

She’s only my age, thought Timothy, but she’s senile. My sons. ‘Powerless’. I must humor her. He imagined that Caroline had brought into this room not only the dark and dusty horror of her ruined house but the very essence of the ruin which was herself.

“Certainly, Amy may remain here,” he said, making his slowed voice good-humored. “Does that satisfy you, Caroline?”

“Not entirely. I’m here for another reason, and to give you warning.”

“About what, may I ask?” He was beginning to enjoy himself a little. He watched with some curiosity while Caroline opened her purse and brought out a thick sheaf of papers. She perched glasses on her big nose and studied the documents. She began to speak carefully, dispassionately.

“A long time ago, when I was only a young girl, my father took me among his associates. They had a great plan, which was really an old plan, a very ancient plan. It had been revived periodically in Europe. It was revived disastrously during the French Commune, following the Robespierre violence.”

A cold stillness settled over Timothy.

Caroline’s eyes became full of hazel light as she studied him. Then she returned to her papers. “There’s nothing simple in living or in any of our motives,” she said. “As we are human we are naturally evil, and so we have a dozen motives for anything we do, being devious. So my plan to destroy you, once and for all, didn’t arise only because of what you did to my daughter Elizabeth. Eventually I’d have come to this very moment, in this room, remembering my father, who couldn’t betray his country when it came down to that. But it would have taken a little longer, perhaps a lot longer, when it was too late. Your treatment of my daughter precipitated, in short, what I should have eventually been compelled to do to you, Timothy.”

She’s insane, Timothy tried to tell himself, to stop the sudden clamoring of his fear. But he strained toward his cousin. “I haven’t the slightest idea,” he murmured.

“Oh yes, you have. Don’t interrupt me, Timothy. Let me tell you what I’ve done and what can happen to you if you make one single move after today.

“You mustn’t ask me where I’ve received much of my information about you, because I don’t intend to tell you. From our earliest childhood you hated me. I understand why. You envied me because I was the heiress to my father’s fortune; you always wanted money more than anything else, even when you were a child. It’s strange,” said Caroline thoughtfully, “that money should have obsessed you even when you were in knickerbockers, and living quite comfortably, even luxuriously, with your mother. It didn’t obsess me until many years later, and I had lived in absolute penury as a child. No matter,” she said abruptly. “There are things which one just has to accept as facts, even if there is no explanation for them.