Casteel 05 Web of Dreams (33 page)

Tony wasn't at the house when Troy and I returned. When Troy asked after him, Curtis reported that Tony had to go to Boston much earlier than he had anticipated. Curtis said he had left a message for me, however--my horse would be ready if I wanted to ride in the afternoon.
I didn't. I spent the day reading and playing games with Troy in his suite. Just before dinner, I took him for a walk through the gardens. We brought along pieces of old bread and fed the birds at the fountains.
Tony did not return for dinner, which made me happy. And then Curtis came in with news of a telegram my mother had sent announcing she would be returning from her European spa late in the day tomorrow.
Oh, thank Heaven, I thought. I would tell her everything, every little detail, so she would
understand what a horror I had gone through and what a horrible man she had married. I was positive that we would be leaving this place in a matter of days. Tony would pay for what he had done to me. When my mother was angry at a man, she could be a most formidable opponent. I made up my mind that no apologies, no promises, no expensive gifts, nothing would get me to forgive him. I half expected he would come begging me for that forgiveness once he discovered how soon my mother was to return.
As darkness fell, I became more and more anxious. Wherever I was in the great house, I kept an ear toward the front entrance, anticipating Tony's arrival. As the hours ticked away, the tension built within me, ticking like a grandfather clock and building toward that moment when he would come home and surely look for me. No matter what I tried to do to distract and occupy myself, it didn't work-- not listening to the radio, not watching television, not reading, not talking to Troy--nothing kept my mind from turning back to the events of the night before.
Finally, more out of fear than out of fatigue, I retired to my suite; but the moment I closed the door behind me, I felt trapped and vulnerable. After all, it was here where it had happened, where he had come and where he might come again. Only my mother's bedroom suite had a lock on the door. It was something she had insisted be built in, for she prized her privacy and, I realized now more than ever, her opportunity to be away from her demanding young husband.
An idea came to me. I put on my robe, slipped my feet into my slippers, scooped up Angel, and left my suite. I went directly to my mother's suite, closing and locking the outer door behind me. Not only did I feel safer because of that, but just being in my mother's room, smelling her jasmine scents and seeing her makeup, her clothing and her shoes, gave me a sense of security. I put on one of her nightgowns and dabbed some of her jasmine perfume on my neck. Then
I
crawled into her bed just the way I used to when I was very little in Boston. Her sheets and pillowcases and her blanket smelled as fresh and clean as she always demanded they be.
"Oh, Momma," I moaned. "I wish you were really here." I set Angel down on the pillow beside me and turned off the lamp on the night table.
The moon was larger tonight, its silvery light brighter and unhampered by passing clouds. A small patch of stars had gathered at the moon's feet and I imagined a kingdom in the sky ruled by a beautiful princess, the moon, who had dozens of handsome suitors always at her beck and call, the stars. Up there, there was always soft, sweet music and there was no cruelty and meanness, no children with parents who despised each other, no men twisted and deceitful and no jealous women and girls looking to harm each other,
"It's the world we should have, Angel," I whispered. "The world we belong in,"
I closed my eyes and tried dreaming of it, dreaming of a world with candy-coated streets, with happy children, bright and handsome as little Troy, laughing and playing safely; a world of warm, cheerful homes filled with loving families, with Daddies who rushed back after work to be with their children and their wives. It was a world without the harsh winds Troy feared so, a world without gray skies where all the girls my age had portrait doll faces and devoted boyfriends.
If I could only drift away, rise slowly toward the moon and be part of that world . . .
I fell asleep, but awoke hours later to the sound and the sight of the lights in the sitting room being turned on. I sat up quickly in my mother's bed. Tony was standing in the doorway, his face and body in shadows. Suddenly, he laughed. I couldn't speak; my heart began to pound.
"Locking me out again," he said and laughed again. Could it be that he thought I was my mother, that he misread the telegram and thought she had returned tonight? He held a key up in the light.
"I never told you I had a copy made for the time when I finally grew tired of your . . . your ridiculous antics: shutting me, your husband, out of your bedroom, keeping me away from you, denying me my conjugal rights. Well, I'm tired of it now, tired of being made the fool. When we first met, I was handsome and desirable enough. Now that we're married and you made me sign that ridiculous marriage contract, you think you can drive me away. Well, I won't have it. Not anymore. I've come for what is rightfully mine and what you should rightfully want as well."
He stepped farther in.
"Tony," I said in a loud whisper. "I'm not Momma. I'm Leigh."
He paused and there was a long moment of silence. Because he had moved from the light into the darkness, I couldn't see his eyes or the expression on his face, but I felt his confusion.
"I'm sleeping in my mother's bedroom tonight. She's not home yet. Now go. You've done enough to make me hate you forever!"
Suddenly he laughed again, this time with a cold, sharp tone,
"So, you want to be your mother," he said. "You want to be just like her. You crawl into her bed, wearing her nightgown and her perfume. You dream of being Jillian, being my wife after all. This is your fantasy."
"NO! That's not why I came in here. I came in here to keep you away from me! Get out!"
"Just like your mother, you refuse to admit to what you really want, what you really need. I understand. It's a family trait," he added and laughed.
"Get out," I pleaded desperately.
"You locked me out just the way she does," he snapped. "It's not right. I won't have it." He came closer. When he was only a few feet away, I smelled the whiskey on his breath. That frightened me even more. I cringed, pulling the blanket up against my body.
"Please, go away, Tony. I'm afraid of you and I can't stand what you did to me. Just thinking about it makes me sick. Please, just leave."
"Oh, you must not feel that way. You must fight these fears. Is that why you lock your door and find excuse after excuse to stay away from me?" he asked, confusing me with my mother again.
"No, Tony. I'm not Jillian. I'm Leigh. Can't you understand? Don't you listen?"
"Still full of anger, but anger is a passion. Don't you see? You're full of desire, full of yearning and lust. You must not ignore that voice within yourself," he said and sat down quickly on the bed. I backed away, thinking I would hop off the bed on the other side and run from him; but he was too quick, anticipating my avenue of escape. He reached out and seized my wrist, turning it until I could keep my hands clasped to the blanket no longer. I cried out in pain and he released me, but he leaned over my legs and waist.
"It's a beautiful night, a romantic night, a night lovers dream of having."
"We're not lovers, Tony," I moaned through my tears. "Sure we are. Forever and forever, I am linked to you through my work."
"GET AWAY FROM ME!" I cried when he put his hand on my thigh. "My mother will know of this, of all of it. She will know what you did to me last night and she will hate you forever and ever and leave you," I said, spitting my words. Anger was better than fear.
But he laughed again.
"You're going to tell your mother? Tell her what? What she already knows, or I should say, hopes. Who do you think drove me to you, pushed me forward, encouraged me? Who suggested I use you as my model, my nude model? I'm not stupid. I know why she's done this; but I've accepted it, desired it myself. You are beautiful, and will be more beautiful than she is. Don't you think she knows that too and don't you think it eats away at her?"
"No," I screamed. "These are all lies."
"Are they?" He laughed. "She thought you and I made love in the cottage and tolerated it.
"Liar!" I swung out at him, but he caught my tiny fist in the air and held
^-
it.
"We don't keep secrets from each other. I tried to get her jealous, to get her to want me more, so I told her, told her how you got excited and demanded I make love to you once I had you pose and once I touched you. Do you know what she said? She said at least you learned from a master, from a consummate lover. Oh, I knew she was just flattering me, but she really wasn't upset."
"She wouldn't say that," I said shaking my head. "She wouldn't." I pulled my wrist free. "You don't even know her. You say you don't keep secrets from each other, but she has kept a big one from you," I said as spitefully as I could. "You don't even know her true age. You think she's years and years younger than she really is. She would never confide in you completely."
"Oh, I know her true age, my sweet," he said calmly, so calmly it made my heart sink. "I looked into her past fully. Unfortunately my love for her blinded me and I waited until after the wedding to do so. She'll never know how betrayed I felt--that she would have kept such a thing from me--ME who worshipped the very ground she walked on. Now I let her live in her dream world. What harm does it do?"
"No, you're lying again. Get away, get out!" I pushed at him, but he took hold of both my wrists this time and pulled me to him, kissing me roughly on the lips. I struggled to break free, but he was too strong. My mouth was left with the taste of his whiskey and it made me sick.
He stood up on his knees to lean over me and press my hands back to the pillow.
"You're more beautiful now because you're fresh and far more innocent. You're right: there's no deceit in you. You are truly the portrait doll," he added and brought his lips to my neck again.
Once again, I twisted and turned beneath his body, and once again he fit himself between my legs, taking me the same way. It was like a recurring nightmare. I cried, I pleaded, I begged, but his ears were closed to everything but the voices he heard within himself, voices of desire and lust that would not be denied.
All through his forced lovemaking, he confused me with my mother, alternatingly calling me "Jillien" and then moaning, "Leigh." I closed my eyes and turned my head away from him to deny what was happening, what he was doing to me. My body lifted and fell beneath his. There was no way I could stop it.
Opening my eyes before he was finished, I saw Angel on the pillow beside me. I struggled to get my right hand free of his and worked it loose enough to take hold of my precious portrait doll and turn her face away, for in her eyes, I saw my own terror and sorrow.
After that, I just squeezed my eyelids shut and waited for it to end.
After he had spent himself, he lay over me for some time before rising like a sleepwalker and leaving me. I didn't move. My wrists ached and my face felt as if he had brought sandpaper to it. I wept until I thought my heart would break.
Finally when I had cried ten waterfalls of tears, I closed my eyes and pulled the blanket back over me and Angel. Then I turned, buried most of my face in the soft pillow, and waited for sleep.
In the morning I rose with the first rays of sunlight and scurried out of my mother's suite and back to my own, where I crawled into bed. Troy came looking for me, but told him I wasn't feeling well. He went running out to tell Tony and the servants. Moments later, Mrs. Carter, one of our older maids, appeared to see what was wrong, All I told her was I wasn't feeling well. She said she would bring up some breakfast.
"Do you want me to have Mr. Tatterton see you?"
"No," I cried quickly. "I don't want to see anyone until my mother arrives."
"No doctor?"
"No one, please," I pleaded.
"Very well.I'll bring you something hot to drink and something hot to eat. Perhaps that will make you feel better," she said.
Make me feel better? No food, no doctor, not a roomful of friends could make me feel better, I wanted to tell her; but instead I turned away and pulled my blanket up to my chin. Troy looked in on me again, disappointed that I wouldn't be coming out of my suite to play with him or take a walk. I ate a little of the hot oatmeal Mrs. Carter brought up and sipped some sweet tea.
Tony didn't come to my suite. I was prepared to throw him out, to shout and be hysterical and draw the attention of all the servants if necessary. Perhaps he anticipated that and stayed away.
Mrs. Carter returned with some lunch. Again, I ate like a mouse, nibbling at a sandwich, drinking a little juice. Late in the afternoon, she returned and asked again if I would like her to send for a doctor.
"No, a doctor can't help me," I replied. "Just send my mother to me the moment she arrives."
"Very well," Mrs. Carter said, shaking her head. She took away the tray of dishes and food. I dozed off a few times until the late afternoon. Finally, I heard a commotion in the corridor outside my suite and knew Momma had arrived from Europe. I waited with great anticipation, positive the servants had already told her about my not leaving my suite all day and not eating very much.
The outer door burst open and Momma came in quickly, sweeping through my bedroom and up to my bed like a gust of fresh air. I pulled the blanket down and gazed up at her. Her hair was swept up in a stylish chignon and she wore a dark blue silk suit, the jacket buttoned snugly about her waist. She looked svelte, her complexion clear and smooth, her eyes bright and happy. Crystal earrings in the shape of tiny icicles dangled from her lobes. They captured light around them and glittered.
"Leigh VanVoreen," she declared, her hands on her hips, "how dare you be sick the day I return. Now what's wrong with you? It's summer. People don't get colds in summer."
"Oh Momma," I cried. "Momma." I pulled the blanket down and sat up. "A terrible thing has happened. And twice!"
"What is this nonsense, Leigh? I thought you were sick. As soon as I came through that front door, that Mrs. Carter came running to greet me, wringing her hands and crying about how sick you are and how you wouldn't let her send for a doctor and how you refused to see anyone. Do you have any idea what it's like traveling to and from Europe? How tired I am?