Burnt Offerings (Valancourt 20th Century Classics) (13 page)

She moved around it, turning off the night lamp and
opening the drapes, and with every motion a bit more of the
uneasiness she had felt beside the pool passed away. She skirted the table where the photographs stood polished and rearranged (by her) on the velvet covering.

From the rear windows she could see the pool, a bright turquoise rectangle, framed with white. She looked at it a long time, brushing the hair back against her temples. There was a transformation, that was clear enough; but from the vantage point of the sitting room, there was more wonder than shock or surprise in her reaction. The pool was now exactly as it should have been all along, and that, some part of herself insisted, was the most important consideration.

She turned away from the pool and looked across the room at the intricate rose window the door’s carved pattern had become.

But there was another part, another voice, still filled with shock and surprise, that was resisting the insight and clarity the room was trying to give her. There had been the incident with Ben and David, and then the transformation, overnight.

It was absurd, totally unreasonable, to associate the two; as absurd as Ben’s retelling of the incident. And to accept it would be to accept the presence of some inexplicable malevolence. And what then? Flight? Give up the house?
The house?

She lifted her eyes to the cornice above the door and the gold silk covering the walls. What sort of malevolence could there be in something so perfect, something that could draw her so irresistibly, until it seemed almost an extension of herself?

It was Ben’s failing: seizing on something, magnifying and distorting it; manufacturing complexity.

The pool was as it should be. And maybe if she stared at the door long and hard enough and lost herself in the hum, she’d accept it without question, for the wonderful mystery it might be.

Ben slept late. Marian had over an hour to put the finishing touches on the large, panelled library she was setting up for him. She put the textbooks he’d be using on the oval Hepplewhite desk, beautifully grained mahogany with a red leather top, and on the Hepplewhite library table in the center of the room, under the gilt-bronze chandelier. The center of the ceiling was coved, set off by a circular band of stucco molding. She unpacked his set of Arden Shakespeare, even though there were several impressive sets, large and beautifully bound, in the bookcases that lined one end of the room; Chaucer, and commentaries on the
Canterbury Tales
: and a whole brace of nineteenth and twentieth century novels, some of which Marian had read.

She wanted everything just right for him, a perfect retreat out of bounds to all of them. And whether it was the work that was absorbing her, or the reassurance she had found in the sitting room, the mystery of the pool seemed less pressing at the moment. She accepted it, and the only possible difficulty would be Ben’s reaction to the transformation. If somehow she could manage to keep him away from it, or at least prepare him.

She met him in the entrance hall where the rug, another project, was still rolled against the wall.

“Morning,” she said, studying the mood.

He said, “Morning,” and reached out and hugged her. “I overslept.”

He was holding onto her, tightly. “You were out cold when I got up,” she said. “That’s a good sign.” She drew back a little. “How are you feeling?”

“Better,” he said, dismissing it. “David up?”

“Nope. Just me. I’ve been puttering around for hours; inside, outside.” She moved away and reached for his hand. “Want to see?”

She led him toward the study, wondering whether she should mention the pool. What could she say? That she’d been out, polishing the rails; that she’d managed, with a fumbling competence that shocked her, to get the filter going, and it was incredible the difference that made?

She said, “Close eyes,” when they reached the library door, opened it and said, “All yours,” watching with pleasure as he examined the books and ran his hand over the polished wood of the desk. “Like it?”

“It’s great,” he said, and finally there was a full, untroubled smile.

She pointed to a table beside the window. “Typewriter’s there, paper too. Your attaché case is next to the desk.” She pulled open drawers, cataloguing, “Yellow pads, pens, writing paper, envelopes. That television goes; I’ll set up something in the servants’ quarters. It’s wrong for the room anyway, you should forgive the expression.” She came up to him and threw her arms around him, rubbing her fingers against the back of his neck. “Nothing to distract you, nothing to disturb you. Your very own turf.”

He tightened his lips and nodded, impressed. “Now,” he said, “if we could just think of something for me to do.”

“You’ve got loads to do. There are two new courses, and if Byron’s pressing on that Master’s, well, now’s as good a time as any to start thinking about it.”

“You don’t just think about a Master’s.”

“Whatever you do with it. I’m dumb, remember?” He smiled again and she said, “Do that a little more around here, hunh?” She kissed him, and what kind of malevolence could there be in a house where she felt such warmth and tenderness? “It’s okay, Benjie, isn’t it?”

“The room?”

“Everything. Yesterday’s such a long time ago that I’m not even sure it ever happened. Let’s start all over, hunh?”

He raised his eyes and looked at the rows of leather-bound books. “It’s a good room,” he said. “Thanks.”

They heard Aunt Elizabeth’s voice calling down the corridor: “Anybody?”

“In here,” Marian called back; “Ben’s study.”

She appeared in the doorway, carrying the almost-finished watercolor she’d been working on; her other arm was around David’s shoulder. He was carrying her paint box. She nudged him into the room.

“David’s decided to take up painting,” she announced. Her voice was strained and her face pallid under the large sunhat. “We’re off to search out a view after breakfast. Isn’t that so, David?”

He said, “Yes,” shyly, sneaking looks at Ben and trying not to look too hard at the bruise on his face. Aunt Elizabeth gave him another small push.

“Isn’t this nice?” she said, inspecting the room. She had slept fitfully and it showed in her walk as well.

“And out of bounds to all of us,” Marian warned. “Daddy’s got work to do.”

“Marvelous room,” Aunt Elizabeth said, “good vibrations. Don’t you feel that, David?”

David said, “Uh-hunh,” and stayed close to Aunt Elizabeth, shifting the paint box to his left hand.

Ben held out his hand, a little stiffly, smiled, and said, “Come on in, Dave.” Marian and Aunt Elizabeth watched without saying anything. David took a few hesitant steps forward, and when Ben asked, “Friends again?” he nodded very positively, as though that’s all he’d been waiting for, and threw himself into Ben’s arms, really meaning it this time.

Marian let out a relieved sigh. “Hey, everybody!” she called out, “I’ve got a great idea. A picnic lunch; someplace we haven’t even explored yet. Maybe that rickety old summer pavilion.”

“With a game of softball,” Ben added. “How’d you like that, Dave?”

David said, “Great!” enthusiastically.

“Girls against the boys,” Aunt Elizabeth said, and Ben clapped his hands and said, “We’ll clobber them, right, Dave?”

“Right!” David said, and softball struck him as a really fine idea, better even than painting with Aunt Elizabeth. Either way, he wouldn’t have to go anywhere near the pool.

She had, as she suspected, been magnifying the problem. Ben didn’t see the pool, not that day which was warm, cloudless and perfect for a picnic. (“It’s worth the whole summer, isn’t it?” Marian said, lying back on the grass; “just this moment?” Ben agreed.) And not the next day which was gray and threatening; providentially, as far as Marian was concerned. He began to spend his time in the library, more and more each day. And while the dark mood had passed, she noticed a certain distraction in him which she attributed to whatever he was working on behind the closed library door. She mentioned it at one point and he said, “I didn’t sleep much last night,” and changed the subject.

Aunt Elizabeth finished her seascape,
L’Été
, which she would show to Mrs. Allardyce whenever she might appear. She set up her easel near the summer pavilion for a picture to be called
Temps Perdu
, or
Time Past
. It would be moody and impressionistic, she decided, “representing loss.” She avoided the pool, and so did David who became briefly interested in his painting lessons, then bored, wondering where all the neighborhood kids hung out, and why hadn’t they been smart enough to bring his bike with them for the summer. He spent a good deal of time in the sewing room where Marian had sent the ancient television set. Once, Marian took time out from the greenhouse, which she had finally gotten to, and watched him try to swim in the bay. Ben had said, “No. Busy,” through the closed door when she had asked him to come along.

Once again, just as Marian began to feel some concern about Mrs. Allardyce, she found the napkin unfolded on the lunch tray, and the soup dish nearly empty.

She stayed in the sitting room for hours at a time, locking the outer door now, even though no one had come near it in the nine days they’d been in the house. Mrs. Allardyce remained invisible, and there was still no sound but the hum behind the carved door. The room had been empty, shapeless except for the wingchair and the table of photographs (which Marian arranged and rearranged with endless fascination). And of course the door. She was filling it now, shaping it, with no interference, with a silence that had to indicate approval on Mrs. Allardyce’s part, shaping it to her own taste. She had carried up small consoles and endtables and enameled chests from other parts of the house; and Chinese bowls and vases, Dresden figurines, and delicate Venetian glass, most of which had been hidden in closets or coated with dust.

She had even steeled herself one morning and gone down to the basement which, as the Allardyces had said, went on and on, with narrow passages and sub-basements and locked steel doors. It was dark and damp and frightening, with sheeted, spectral heaps shadowy against the stone walls. As she suspected, there were treasures among the broken tables and andirons and piles of ancient magazines (and, spookily, rusted wheelchairs, two of them). She salvaged a round Italian mirror in a gilded frame, a beautiful rococo piece, which she hung in the sitting room and flanked with bronze wall sconces.

It never occurred to Marian to question the reason behind the activity, or the secrecy of it all. It was giving her pleasure and enormous satisfaction; the most complete expression of her responsibility to the house and to Mrs. Allardyce. And if it should manage to draw the old woman out of the bedroom finally, that would be gratifying of course, but purely incidental. Or reasonably incidental.

Ben, fortunately, was spending as much time in the library, and David had rediscovered his “Hot Wheels” toy and, miraculously, was reading for something approaching pleasure. Gradually, they were finding a routine, casual and refreshing, and gradually too the pool incident would fade completely, and that would become part of the routine as well, with enough time elapsed to make the transformation less conspicuous; she hoped.

Marian never left the grounds. Once or twice she thought about a trip, preferably secret, to the local drugstore, wherever that might be. There was a bit of gray now, easily concealed, at the base of her neck. The problem was becoming less momentous, however, the more she got involved in the house.

Ben went into town once during the week, for milk and the mail (the larder, packed with the Allardyces’ beneficence, was holding up beautifully). When he returned he found Marian winding the clocks and actually succeeding in making the brass Regency clock on the mantel work for exactly three minutes; the “Hallelujah!” died on her lips.

“I’ll get it eventually,” she swore; “all of them.”

Ben had that same, vaguely distracted look. He was complaining about the driveway again. “It’s barely passable,” he said.

“So you’ve told me. Why not fool around with the clippers?” She pinched his cheeks. “Get rid of some of that scholar’s pallor.”

He found the clippers, spent a few hours trimming the foliage, and then, overwhelmed by the magnitude of the job, gave up. He wondered what the hell they would do in a week or so.

“Hole up and disappear,” Marian said later. “Everything we need is right here.”

From the way she said it, Ben couldn’t quite tell whether she was kidding or not.

One night, toward the end of their second week in the house, Marian came into the bedroom late – after midnight; she had been working in the sitting room since nine. The lamps were on beside the bed; Ben’s side was rumpled, with a paperbound copy of
The American
open, print-side down. His clothes were thrown on the chair – pants, shirt, shorts; the bathroom was empty. Marian started to unbutton her shirt, walking toward the window.

The past two nights, when she’d finally come to bed, he had been asleep; both times she was aware of movement in the middle of the night, and when she stretched out her right arm, he wasn’t beside her. He was, he admitted, sleeping badly; but it would pass.

The outside lights, she saw from the window, were on, flooding the terrace. When she looked down and couldn’t find him, she buttoned her shirt again and went downstairs.

There was a breeze on the terrace and the lights across the bay were soft and blueish. She could hear leaves and the sound of crickets. She called, “Ben?” very lightly, several times, and was about to go in and check the library, when a bit of light appeared in the distance, below the rise of lawn. He was at the pool.

She left the terrace and walked across the lawn, out of the light spilling over from the terrace, faster as she approached the rise.

There was a single lightbulb on, hanging at the door of the poolhouse which was gray and shadowy against the vague outline of trees. Ben was standing at the edge of the pool, his white terrycloth robe catching the pale light. Marian stopped and watched him for a moment; the uneasiness about the pool, which she had all but forgotten, settled in her stomach again. But just briefly: the water was dark, flecked with bits of moving light, and the rails and concrete border barely visible. She called out to him, her voice sounding unnaturally loud in the silence.

“I didn’t feel like sleeping,” he explained when she had come beside him.

She looked up at the sky and the stars she could see all the way to the horizon. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” she said. “Just like Northern Boulevard.”

The water was lapping the side of the pool, lazily. Ben was silent, not moving, and Marian tried to divorce what she had seen in daylight from what was visible now. The filter working in the poolhouse was the only aspect of the transformation that might draw his attention.

“For a minute I got worried,” she said, and slipped her hand under his arm. “I’m hooked, I suppose; I don’t like going to bed without you.”