Antonia Lively Breaks the Silence (25 page)

Another Fan in the Graveyard

_____

A hot, muggy morning a couple of days later, Catherine got into her car and tried to start it, but the engine just kept turning over without catching. While she pumped the gas, she stared at the cottage, willing Henry to walk out the door with his suitcases. She had left him a note:
Dear Henry, This is your last warning. You have one more day to find another place to live, or I will have you forcibly removed
. Today was Saturday; she'd left him the note the previous night. So far he showed no sign of honoring her wishes. Yet did she really want to get the police involved? Maybe that's just what I should do, she thought, imagining the cottage empty and putting Antonia inside it, as she should have from the start.

The car backfired a couple times, but then Catherine was reversing out of the drive. She parked in her usual spot on Broad Street, then, approaching the bookstore, got out her keys only to find Jane already standing at the register. The sight of her chilled Catherine's blood. Though she'd phoned her a dozen times, Jane had not bothered to answer or to return a single call. Now she entered the bookstore, walked right up to Jane, and said, “Good morning,” not expecting her friend to reply. Not only didn't she reply, she didn't even look up, and Catherine, deflated, took this as a further sign. So this is how it's going to be, she thought as a customer wandered through the door, and she went to help him, all the while wanting to explain herself to Jane. She wanted to tell her about Royal, though in telling her about Royal she would have to tell her everything. Well, maybe it's time for that, she told herself as the sun rose over the park and turned the day to fire.

By late morning, Catherine had taken all she could and so during a lull in customers went up to Jane again, more determined. “Tell me what to do. How can I make this up to you? You're my best friend, my dearest friend. You can't possibly believe that I meant for this to happen.” Yet Jane just kept on restacking the books, as if she hadn't heard her. “Jane, I'm sorry, you know I'm sorry. It just went off. You can't think I—”

“I don't know what to think anymore,” Jane said at last, though she still refused to look at her. “You could have killed me. All I really want to know is what you were doing with Harold's gun?”

Tell her everything, Catherine told herself. She's your best friend and deserves to know. Yet there were even some things, she knew, that she couldn't possibly tell even her best friend, that she couldn't possibly tell anyone. Like about Wyatt's novel, she thought.

“If you ever want me to talk to you again, you will tell me exactly what happened.”

So, sighing, Catherine broke down and told her about Royal, about the night in front of her house, everything.

“Oh, my heavens!” Jane said. “Catherine, what do you think he wanted? Why didn't you call the police? Do you think he'll come back?”

The questions dazed Catherine, not because Jane had asked them but because she simply didn't know the answers.

“And you thought I was her uncle,” Jane said, laughing a nervous laugh. “I just needed to use the bathroom!” As Jane laughed, Catherine began to cry, the tears running down her face. “Oh, no, don't do that,” she added. “It's okay. You didn't know it was me.”

“But I could have killed you,” Catherine said, sobbing bitterly now, though she was also sobbing because of what she'd read about herself in Wyatt's manuscript. Sobbing also for what Henry had done to Antonia and what Antonia had done to her father and what Royal was going to do to Antonia once he found her. She sobbed for Wyatt, who would never write another book, and for her terrifying future without him. “You could have died, and it would have been my fault,” she said.

“I didn't die,” Jane said, drawing Catherine to her. “I'm here. I forgive you.” And they stood like this, holding each other, although Catherine could still feel the tension in Jane's body and didn't quite believe she'd been forgiven.

A
ROUND NOON, SHE
said good-bye to Jane and went to meet Louise, who was leaving on a family vacation to Italy for the rest of July. As she made her way through Danvers Park, she pictured Louise's Tuscan villa, the vineyards, the brown-eyed men and women taking their evening strolls, the sweet country air, the cheeses, the bread, the wine. Except for her one disappointing night in Manhattan, Catherine hadn't been out of Winslow in ages. They were meeting in Maddox Cafe, which was closing down for a week. Like the cafe, the town, too, was closing down, as it did around this time every summer, which Catherine never understood, since it was the height of the tourist season. Though the unusual heat this summer lingered on, it had no effect on the glut of vacationers. She remembered how much Wyatt had disliked Winslow in the summer, citing the litter in the park, the lines at the grocery store and the movies, the general chaos and noise.

She found Louise sitting at a table near the window, buttering a piece of bread. The air was cool and dry. Thank God, Catherine thought, taking a seat across from her. She looked into her friend's face and found nothing in it to indicate that she'd even heard about the incident at the bookstore. Maybe Jane never told her, she thought. Or maybe she just wants to ignore it.

“I can't believe you're really leaving us,” Catherine said after she'd ordered.

“Oh, I'll be back sooner than you think,” she said. “I'll send you a dozen postcards.”

“Just send me a handsome Italian man to do my bidding,” she said, and they laughed.

They ate and talked, and when the check came, Louise took care of it. Then they were strolling through the park and past the gazebo, where a band of kids was smoking cigarettes and listening to music.

“Ugh, these ragamuffins,” Louise said, scoffing.

“Teenagers,” Catherine said.

“I never wasted my time like that,” she said.

“Oh, Louise,” she said. “I really am going to miss you.”

A skinny girl with frizzy blond hair looked up at Catherine as they passed. In her face, she couldn't help but see Antonia. Was this how she'd spent her young summers in Vermont? No, Catherine mentally put Antonia in the library, devouring book after book, like a voracious little shark, darting through the waters of literature. She also saw herself in the girl's face, the taunted girl who'd had no friends and had been forced to eat lunch alone in the library. Every day, she strolled passed the elderly, nearsighted librarian who never acknowledged her. Now there was no school, just work, and she was no longer the skinny, tormented girl she'd been. Now she had friends, like Jane and Louise and Antonia, and she was miles and years from those awful days. Yet sometimes she felt that girl rising up and out of her again. She didn't like her and wished her gone, as she did today, thinking jealously of Louise's trip and wishing she were the one going to Italy. I can't afford to go anywhere, though, she thought as Louise asked her when she wanted the movers to come.

“I'm sorry,” Catherine said. “The movers?”

“Now don't be angry with me, but I did you a favor and hired a moving company to haul that man's things away,” she said.

“Louise!” she said. “I can't believe you. It's a thoughtful gesture but completely unnecessary and utterly inappropriate. I can handle Henry myself. But thank you very much.”

They were on Broad Street, the sun beating down upon them. From her bag, Louise produced a compact umbrella and opened it, further darkening her already darkened face. “Look, I wasn't going to say anything—I was hoping you would have taken care of this before I left—but now I see I have no choice,” she said, leaning into Catherine and lowering her voice. “People are talking. I won't repeat what they're saying, but it isn't flattering.”

“What people?” she asked.

“I've defended you from the moment you let that man into your cottage,” she said, “but I can't keep protecting you from three thousand miles away.”

“Protect me?” she said. “Louise, what are you talking about?”

“I'm talking about the affair you've been having with him. Deny it all you want, but I know you; you haven't been acting like yourself for weeks. Besides, someone saw him sneaking out of your house in the middle of the night. There, I've said it,” she finished, and adjusted the umbrella in her hand. Catherine didn't know what to say in response, and glanced away so that Louise couldn't see the hurt in her face. “I'm just repeating what I was told,” she said. “I just thought you'd have better sense. From what you've said, you and that girl have become quite friendly.”

“We have,” Catherine said softly.

“Then why on earth would you do such a thing to her?” she asked. “I told you it would all come to grief if you rented him the cottage.”

“Well, if I had a husband who owned a successful business, which gave me the freedom to lunch all day long,” she said, exploding into anger, “and I got to have my hair and nails done whenever I wanted, I wouldn't have been forced to rent the cottage to anyone. Maybe, if my husband were still alive—”

If my husband were alive, she thought, I wouldn't have been able to rent the cottage to Henry. I wouldn't have gone up to see him at the college, because there wouldn't have been a reason. I wouldn't have let Antonia into the house that afternoon, which meant I never would have met her and in not meeting her, I never would have heard Henry's name again.

“I see,” Louise said. “Just forget I said anything, then.”

Catherine couldn't forget it, however. “You're going to cancel those movers, Louise,” she said, “and you are never to mention any of this again. There is nothing remotely sexual between Henry and me, and you and the gossips have it wrong.”

Then Louise was walking away from her without saying good-bye and another part of Catherine's life had come undone.

T
HE MOMENT
C
ATHERINE
returned to the bookstore, she told Jane what Louise had said and done. “She was only trying to help,” Jane said.

“You don't need to defend her, and I don't need her help,” she said.

“So you aren't having an affair with Henry?” she asked innocently.

“Jane,” she said, “I can still shoot you, you know.”

W
HEN
C
ATHERINE GOT
home that night, she was surprised to see Antonia on the porch, smoking while turning the pages of a book. When she heard Catherine say hello, she lifted up her head and said, “We're going to a party.”

“No, not tonight,” Catherine said, gazing at the cottage and thinking about her quarrel with Louise. I just want today to end, she thought, sitting down beside the girl and taking a drag off her cigarette.

“We could both get lucky and meet the next loves of our life,” she said energetically.

But beneath Antonia's bravura, Catherine could sense the same shattered little girl who'd sat and listened to Henry disown her. You're so young, she thought. Go to your party and find your next love without me.

“If it's boring, we'll leave. I promise.”

Catherine gazed at the dark house, imagining the evening ahead, when night fell and she went around locking all the windows and doors again and then locking herself in her bedroom with a book. Suddenly the idea of spending some time away from the ghost of Wyatt and his festering novel seemed like a good idea. “Okay,” she finally said. “An hour, that's all.” Antonia laughed. Then they were in the house and Catherine was saying, “Help yourself to a drink,” as she slipped into her bedroom to change. She put on a black sundress and black heels, then brushed her hair and put on some lipstick.

“Oh, that's a beautiful shade on you,” Antonia said, eyeing her lips.

“Well, that's a beautiful dress on you,” she said.

“Vintage, naturally,” she said, showing off the yellow baby-doll dress. She wore pearl studs in her ears, and her hair fell in bouncy corkscrews around her face, which made her seem coquettish. Even adorable, Catherine admitted, as they climbed into her car, which stalled three times before they'd even made it out of the drive. “It's a hundred degrees out. How much warmer does the car have to be?” she asked, laughing.

Yet as they drove and Catherine told her about the movers Louise had hired—omitting the part about her alleged affair with Henry—the girl's face took on a new gravitas, which made her wonder if she weren't mulling over the last week, if she weren't thinking about Henry. Stop it, she wanted to say. Just stop it, but then Antonia was directing them across the railroad tracks into Winslow's gloomier east side.

“Take a right here,” Antonia said, as Catherine turned down a sinuous street, the yards neglected and the curbs crumbling. “It should be up ahead.” And there it was, a big, dingy pink yet dignified-looking Victorian house that seemed to Catherine to bow as the land bowed under it. In the front yard, a lone juniper tree sagged like the unsightly tangle of telephone lines that hung above it. At the house next door, a rusty car carcass sat on cinder blocks.

Before they got to the door, Antonia turned to her and squeezed her arm. “I'm glad you're here. I really didn't want to come alone.”

Catherine, too, was glad, though she couldn't help recalling that other party, the one in Manhattan and Henry's undeserved attack on her. She thought about how the girl had suffered through it and about her novel, the resolve and determination it had taken to dig so deeply into her father's past and to write so honestly about it. How painful it must have been for her, she thought. How painful it must have been for Wyatt, too, to learn about her involvement with Henry. Oh, Wyatt, she thought, feeling again the sadness rising through her even as she'd felt it rising off the pages of his manuscript. Oh, Wyatt, please forgive me, she thought as they stepped through the door and into the strange house.