Beverly Byrne (2 page)

2

"
AMERICA'S GOING TO GET INTO THE WAR," TOMMY announced. He didn't look up
to see how his remark affected the assembled company, just continued his
complicated task at the small table serving as a bar. He was squeezing oranges,
and his aunt avoided looking at the acid stains forming on the polished wood.

"Any
idea when this catastrophe is to come to pass?" Warren Westerman asked. He
made the remark with little movement of his lips, and without removing the stem
of his pipe. Neither did he lift his head from the book he was reading.

"Soon
maybe," Tommy said. He poured a portion of champagne into five stemmed
crystal goblets. "Wilson doesn't want it of course. The privilege of being
gassed in a trench isn't one of his New Freedoms. But after the Lusitania,
well, someone's got to put the Huns in their place."

Amy's
head jerked up. Tommy didn't seem at all embarrassed by mentioning the ship in
her presence. But then, why should he be? His parents had gone down with the
Lusitania too. If it didn't bother him, why should it offend her?

She
glanced round the room. It was large and square with a high ceiling and
book-lined walls. There was a big fieldstone fireplace, filled with greenery on
this late June evening, and a deep bay window looking out over an expanse of
lawn. Luke Westerman sprawled on the windowseat. His long legs were stretched
across the flowered cushions, and his white duck trousers were bright against
the vivid pink cretonne. He was leaning against the wall, and his blond hair
contrasted with the soft green paint. Only his face was dark, but the frown
seemed to have little to do with what Tommy said. Luke wasn't paying any
attention to his younger brother.

Amy
looked away and her eyes met Lil's-Aunt Lil, she'd asked to be called.
"You're among family here," she'd told the girl when she arrived a
few days ago. "Or at least near enough as makes no difference." Amy
was grateful for the gesture, but she still didn't feel at ease.

"Do
switch on the lamp, Amy," Aunt Lil said. "You'll hurt your eyes
sewing in that dim light."

The
girl did as she was bid, and returned to her embroidery. Tommy added cherries
to his creations and lifted the tray of drinks to be admired.

"
Voila
!
The TWS is ready for your delectation."

"What
does TWS mean?" Lil asked.

"Tommy
Westerman Special." He walked with the tray toward his aunt, and Amy
caught her breath slightly, afraid he'd spill the drinks. His limp was
pronounced at this time of day. The specially builtup shoe he wore on his right
foot always seemed less effective by evening. None of the others offered to
help him. Amy had guessed that he resented assistance. Now there was no
accident, despite her concern. Lil took one of the glasses, and Tommy moved to
where Amy sat.

"Your
evening libation
memsahib
," He bowed with exaggerated deference.

"I've
never had anything but sherry before. And do stop calling me that." She
laughed nervously as she reached for her drink.

"Why?
It's what you're used to, and we want you to feel at home. Don't we, Luke? And
isn't that what everyone called her when we were there?"

Luke
turned and smiled for the first time that evening. He had an incredibly sunny
smile that lit his face. "You're forgetting, I wasn't along on that trip
to Africa. Had to go to summer school if I was going to get into
Hotchkiss." He laughed and walked over to collect his own drink.
"This little brat tormented me for the next year about all I'd missed,"
he told Amy. "You should have heard his stories. Lions and tigers and
giraffes eating out of his hand. Black men bowing and scraping and calling him
b'wana for all he was the ripe old age of eleven."

"They
did," Tommy said. "And they called Amy
memsahib
. And she couldn't
have been more than six."

"Seven,"
Amy corrected. "But it doesn't mean anything. It's just their way."

"Damned
right too," Tommy said. "Keep the natives in their place and all that
sort of thing. Wot?"

His
British accent was very good, and he produced a monocle from the pocket of his
vest. Luke wore a blazer and an ascot, but Tommy, as always, was in a
three-piece suit and bow tie. He held the tray with one hand while he fitted
the monocle and crossed the room to deliver a drink to Uncle Warren. Now he was
Jeeves rather than an African.

Amy
giggled in spite of herself. Luke sat down on the arm of her chair. "Don't
be fooled by him. It's not humor. It's delusion.Stark mad, my poor brother.
Fancies himself Napoleon every time there's a new moon."

Tommy
turned to face them. "Yes, too bad isn't it? And the lad showed such
promise too. Never had to go to summer school, that one. Straight A's and never
seemed to do a lick of work."

Amy
heard the undertone of bitterness in Tommy's voice, but she saw no answering
anger in Luke's blue eyes.

"This
is really quite good, Tommy." Lil sipped her drink with appreciation.
"Isn't it good, Warren?"

"Mmm,
yes, all right if you say so." He returned to his book. Neither his
sister, his nephews, nor their guest fascinated him. He didn't try to hide the
fact. "Fellow here says he's had marvelous results by leaving roses
unpruned. Extraordinary. Have to write to him."

Luke
smiled ruefully at Amy. "We must all seem a little mad to you," he
said softly.

"Why
do you say that?" she asked.

Luke
started to answer, but Tommy came back to where they were sitting and occupied
the other arm of her chair. Amy could see his heavy leather invalid's shoe
where it gleamed in the lamplight. "I've arranged for the car tomorrow morning,"
he told her. "I'm taking you on a tour of the countryside." To his
brother he added, "Care to join us?" His voice now held none of the
hostility of the moment before.

"Sorry,"
Luke said. "I've some letters to write that can't wait."

Amy
had not thought it would be so easy to laugh again. She still wore black, as
did Lil, but the house in Cross River was not a place of mourning. The
Westermans were deft at handling their grief. It was acknowledged in tiny
silences and the occasional bittersweet comment about what Charles or Cecily
might have said or done were they there. Sadness was an interstice in the
pattern of life. They all seemed to accept that eventually the gap would silt
over and only memory remain.

Amy
felt guilty. She did not understand such an attitude, nor was she sure of her
right to share it. But her guilt was a sometime thing, deep and poignant when
it surfaced, but often forgotten.

Cross
River was a leafy haven near the Connecticut border where rich Manhattan folk
had summer homes, and the locals seemed to be born in spring and die in autumn.
The next day Tommy took her outside its privileged environs to the rural
countryside.

He
drove slowly past perfect little farms with red barns and shining silos and
pacific cows that seemed placed by an artist with an unerring eye. Once they
saw a couple of pigs wallowing in a muddy puddle by the roadside, truants from
an enclosed yard most likely. Tommy regaled her with an endless story of a pig
that won so many prizes at the country fair that the proud owner moved into the
sty and gave the pig the run of the house. She laughed until the tears rolled
down her cheeks.

On
the way home he felt less obliged to show her the sights, and he drove very
fast instead. The Pierce-Arrow could do better than thirty miles an hour, and
Tommy pushed it to its limit. After lunch Amy said she wanted to take a walk.
Tommy didn't offer to join her-rambling through the countryside was one of the
things he couldn't do-and Luke had already disappeared, so she was alone.

The
guilt came over her in waves then. Crying, she walked only as far as the duck
pond and sat there, solitary under the willow trees.

Luke
appeared from the direction of the tennis courts. Amy knew how well he played.
She'd watched him a few days ago. He moved across the grass with a dazzling
blend of speed and elegance.

The
neighbor who was his frequent opponent was good too, but Luke always won.
"As good as young Bill Tilden," the loser said. Amy heard talk of
Luke's entering the national championships, or competing at Wimbledon. The
suggestion always came from someone else. Luke only laughed. "I play for
my own amusement, that's all," he'd told her.

Now
he dropped the racket and came to sit beside her. For some seconds neither of
them spoke. "Would you rather be alone?" Luke asked finally.

"Yes,
no ... I don't know. I'm sorry."

"Don't
be. I feel the same way lots of times. That's the nice thing about being a
girl. You can cry and no one thinks less of you for it."

"I
didn't think any of you ever felt like crying."

He
looked startled. "What ever gave you that idea?"

Amy
wiped her eyes with her handkerchief. "The way you all act," she
said. "Laughing, making jokes, playing tennis. It's just two months since
it happened."

"Maybe
it's because we know that's how Mother and Dad would have wanted it." It
was a lame explanation and he knew it.

"That's
got nothing to do with it," she said. "I'm not just crying for them.
I'm crying for me, because I want them back. I want things to be as they were
before we came here. I want to be at Jericho and I want them there too. Do you
understand?"

"Of
course I do. You're very wise for such a young girl." He reached for her
hand, and Amy let him take it. "You're honest about your feelings. That's
a long way toward mastering them."

"I
don't care about mastering my feelings. Just about  making it different. Making
the Lusitania never happen. "

"Can't
be done, I'm afraid," he said softly. "Amy, if I talk to you about
the will of God, will you try and understand?"

She
pulled her hand away. "I'm not a Catholic, you know that."

Luke
chuckled. "That's not what I mean. The will of God is a bigger concept
than anyone religion."

Amy
shook her head impatiently and he dropped the approach. "Would you like a
change from Cross River?" he asked suddenly.

"What
kind of a change?"

"I
have to go into the city day after tomorrow. I plan to leave right after
breakfast and be back around dinner time. Why don't you come?"

She
turned to him with a smile, although her enormous dark eyes were still shiny
with tears. "Yes, I'd like that. Will it be just you and me? Is Tommy
coming?" She felt her cheeks redden. He'd think she didn't want to go
anywhere without Tommy.

"Nope,"
he said. "Just you and me. Ok?"

"Fine."

"Good.
I'll tell Aunt Lil."

They
arranged to take the 8:00 A.M. train. The night before their departure Lil came
to Amy's room when she was preparing for bed. "I've a couple of errands
that need doing in the city. Would you mind, darling?"

"No,
of course not. I'm not very good at shopping, though. Mummy took me with her a
few times when we first arrived, but I'm not used to big stores."

"I
know you're not, poor thing," Lil said indulgently. "How could you be
after all those years in the bush?" Her tone indicated what a deprivation
she considered a girlhood in Africa, but Amy didn't bother to correct the
notion. "It won't matter," Lil continued. "They're very helpful
at Altman's and they know me. It's just these gloves. I've lost two buttons,
and they've nothing to match them in the shops here."

She
handed over a pair of white kid gloves missing two tiny pearl buttons and a
note with the name of the sales clerk for whom Amy was to ask. It struck the
girl that she'd never seen Lil wear the gloves. Not even on her Sunday trips to
the local church. "Is there anything else, Aunt Lil?"