Come to Castlemoor (18 page)

I tripped and almost fell.

He snorted. “You're stoned!” he whispered hatefully. “My God! Three glasses of dinner wine—just three glasses!”

“You counted,” I admonished.

“What would your gallant Edward say if he knew you were in this condition? If it weren't for Mother, I'd let you go to blazes, but she'd be upset and blame herself. You little lush! What other secret vices do you indulge in?”

“I think you're detestable,” I said primly.

“I know that. We're going into the room now. I'll take your arm. Try to walk straight. Don't trip. Sit down. Keep still.”

He led me across the wide parquet floor toward the fireplace. Edward and Dorothea were already seated, talking in low voices. They looked up as we came toward them. I smiled. Burton Rodd gripped my arm. He led me to one of the sofas and set me down, very graciously, very casually, as though he were merely performing his gentlemanly duties. The servant came in with a tray of coffee. When Burton insisted on pouring himself, Dorothea looked bewildered.

“Why all this sudden attentiveness?” she inquired. “You've been solemn as the grave all evening, and now—”

“Now I'm trying to make up for it,” he replied, handing her a cup. “Are you complaining?”

“Heavens no! I merely wondered—”

“Cream or sugar?” he asked me, holding a cup of coffee toward me. His back was to the others, and he gave me a savage expression. “Black? Fine. Need a cushion?”

“I'm perfectly all right,” I said, taking the coffee. The cup rattled in the saucer, and I almost dropped it in my lap. Rodd shot me another fierce look. I managed to take the cup out of the saucer without spilling any of the beverage.

“Why don't you play for us, Mother?” he said, sitting down across from me.

“Me play? What
is
this, Burton? You
hate
to hear me play. It drives you right up the wall.”

“Miss Hunt would love it,” Rodd informed her. “Wouldn't you, Miss Hunt?”

“I—well, I suppose—” I stammered.

“Delighted,” he said. “Do play, Mother.”

“I'm all out of practice,” Dorothea said, plainly flattered. “I suppose I
could
. Fancy your asking me, Burton. What would you like to hear? Mozart, Chopin, Bach—”

“Chopin,” he said firmly.

Dorothea set her coffee cup down and moved over to the piano nearby. I watched as she brushed her rustling skirts, flexed her fingers and sat down at the instrument. As she ran her fingers over the keys, Burton Rodd grimaced. He settled back with a look of resignation as she began to play. She played horribly. The piano was old and out of tune, but the finest of instruments would have been to no avail. Dorothea banged and pounded, executing something that must have caused Chopin to turn briskly in his grave. Dorothea, plainly enjoying herself, was plainly unaware of her own ineptness. She finished the piece, turned, smiled, her eyes radiant.

“More?” she said.

Edward groaned. Burton asked her to play some Mozart. Edward looked at Burton as though Burton had taken leave of his senses. Burton poured another cup of coffee for me, sat down, and watched as I drank, gritting his teeth. Dorothea played three more pieces on the piano, and I drank three more cups of coffee. The giddiness was gone now, and so was the sharp magnification of my senses. There was a dull throbbing at the back of my head, and I had a suspicion that the pain would grow worse before the night was over. Rodd watched me closely. I prayed that he wouldn't ask her to play more.

“Well,” she said, rejoining us by the fireplace. “That was stimulating. Quite! I do so love to play. Ordinarily, Miss Hunt, I haven't the opportunity. Burton loathes it, and even Edward, gallant though he is, shows very little enthusiasm. Do you play, dear?”

“A little. Not well.”

“Marvelous! You must play for us.”

“Mother,” Burton Rodd said warningly.

“Yes, dear?”

“We've had quite enough music for one night, don't you think?”

“I suppose so,” she said, sighing. She settled back in the chair. The amethysts at her throat and ears gleamed radiantly in the candlelight, purple with red fires. Edward poured another cup of coffee and handed it to her. Burton Rodd took out a slender black cigar and lighted it.

“Edward?” he said, indicating the box of cigars.

“No, thank you,” Edward replied.

“I forgot,” Rodd said maliciously. “Bad for you, what? Must keep up the standards. No cigars, no whiskey, cold baths first thing in the morning, and plenty of exercise. Hale and hearty, and lots of red blood. That's the ticket.”

“You could use a little more exercise yourself, Burt,” Edward informed him. “A few push-ups in the morning—”

“God forbid,” Burton Rodd said nastily.

“Tell us about your new song, Edward,” Dorothea said quickly, sensing the tension in the air. “Did you finally locate it? You said the butcher's grandmother might remember all the words.…”

“Saw her yesterday,” Edward replied. “Magnificent old woman. Not only did she know the song I was telling you about, but she gave me three others I hadn't even heard of. One's really remarkable, all about May Day and the tragic accident that befalls a young man who …”

Edward talked about his work. I found it fascinating. He recited the song for us, and Dorothea asked him to recite others. One of them was terribly explicit. I asked if his publishers would permit him to include it in his collection. This caused us to swing into an animated discussion of censorship. All three of us had definite views on the subject, and I almost forgot my headache in the heat of discussion.

Burton Rodd leaned back on the sofa, his legs spread out in front of him, his arms folded over his chest. He held the cigar clenched in one corner of his mouth, and spirals of pale-blue smoke curled up to the ceiling. He flicked the ashes occasionally, the butt glowing bright orange. He made no contribution whatsoever to the conversation. He watched us with a rather mocking expression, indifferent now that my intoxication had passed. I was humiliated that he had seen me in such a condition and thankful that Edward and Dorothea had not noticed it.

We had been talking for perhaps half an hour when Rodd interrupted the conversation rudely. He took the cigar out of his mouth and pointed it at his mother. “Haven't you forgotten something, Mother?” he said abruptly, breaking in on Edward, who was making a comment about a recent novel.

Dorothea looked up, startled, then puzzled. She plainly didn't understand what her son meant.

“The study,” he said.

“Oh! Oh, yes. I'd forgotten.” She turned to me, smiling. “I want to show you my study,” she said. “I have so many interesting things there—books, souvenirs, art objects. Won't you let me show them to you?”

“I'd be delighted,” I replied, wondering why on earth her son should be so eager for her to take me there.

The men rose. Edward looked a bit disgruntled. Rodd stood with his arms folded, the cigar clamped in his mouth, his heavy lids hooding the dark eyes. Dorothea took my hand and led me out of the room. We went down a short hall, our heels tapping loudly on the hardwood floor. I moved with normal poise, with no desire to slide on the floor, no wish to stop and examine the portraits on the wall. My head throbbed violently, and I resolved never to touch wine again, under any circumstances. Dorothea led me into a small, crowded room brilliantly lighted with halt a dozen oil lamps.

It looked more like a storage room or attic than anything else. Charts and pictures and maps were tacked on every available wall space. One corner was piled high with books and magazines that tumbled from their stacks, a Ouija board leaning across them, a huge, dusty harp with broken strings standing beside them. There was a shelf that held pots of plants, and from the acrid, bitter odor I guessed that they were herbs. There was a round table with fringed red cloth, astrology charts and crystal ball on it, and a bench, canvas-draped, with chisel and hammer and half-finished bust. Many exquisite art objects stood in a glassed-in cabinet—Egyptian vases, golden idols, an Arabian mosaic. The roll-top desk was incredibly cluttered with stacks of paper.

“This is where I really live,” Dorothea said, sweeping magazines off a chair and indicating for me to sit there. “All the things I'm interested in—plants, astrology, sculpture, books! This is my retreat. I allow none of the others to come here, not even the servants. That's why things are in such a mess! Are you interested in astrology?”

“I know nothing about it.”

“Fascinating! I couldn't make a move without consulting my charts. You should investigate …”

Dorothea sat down at the desk and talked about astrology. She seemed a little nervous, her hands moving restlessly over the surface of the desk, straightening papers, fondling paperweights, jamming pins in and out of a red velvet pincushion. I knew she had brought me here for some specific reason, and the chatter about astrology was just a stall. I wondered what she wanted—rather, what her son wanted. I had no doubt that he had prearranged all this.

“My son tells me you write,” she said abruptly.

“Not exactly. I helped my brother with his first book. I plan to write another, one he had started.”

“I see. You must have great talent.”

“Not talent. Just determination and a knack of organizing material.”

“Excellent!” she exclaimed. “That's precisely what I need—organization!”

“I don't quite follow you,” I said.

Dorothea turned to the piles of paper on the desk. She lifted a batch and laid them in my lap. I examined them. They were covered with neat, tiny handwriting. I read a few lines describing a ruined temple in the middle of the Arabian desert. The sentences were awkward, ungrammatical, rambling, yet they conveyed vivid impressions of sight and sound. I realized Dorothea had been writing her memoirs.

“Memoirs?” she said when I inquired about them. “Hardly. Just a few recollections of my travel experiences. I've read so many travel books recently, all written by prim, prissy individuals who have no idea what it's all about, really. I said to myself—why, I could do it better! So
much
better. The things I saw! The things I did! How much more exciting than the solemn, tedious accounts I've read. I've spent the past year putting it all down on paper—quite abominably, as you can see.”

I handed the papers back to her. She examined them fondly.

“How many delicious hours I've spent with pen in hand, recalling all those splendid days! It would really be a shame if the book weren't published, don't you think? And no publisher in his right mind would accept it in its present condition.” She paused, looked at me with a frank expression. “I need someone to organize this mess for me, someone to put it in orderly, coherent prose.”

“And—and you think I'm that someone?”

“Exactly!”

“But—”

“My dear, let me explain! I could hire some impoverished college student, of course, some legal clerk, some hack journalist, but this book is a woman's book—written by a woman, with a woman's reaction to everything around her. If I let a man handle it for me, it would lose that particular
feminine
flavor that makes it unique.”

“I wish I could help you, but—”

“Let me finish! I would pay you
handsomely”
—she named a price that was more than handsome; it was incredible—“and you could go anywhere you wanted to work on the manuscript: the south of France, Brighton, rent a cottage by the sea—”

“Why couldn't I work here?” I inquired.

“Well, you see—”

“I don't mean to be rude, Mrs. Rodd, but I see all too clearly. Your son put you up to this, didn't he? For some reason—some reason I can't comprehend—he wants me to leave Castlemoor. This—this manuscript, and the exorbitant salary you would pay me to rewrite it for you is just—just a kind of bribe. Isn't that correct?”

Dorothea sighed and dropped her hands in her lap. “Well, I tried,” she said. “I told him it wouldn't work—not if you were half the woman Edward described to me. I told Burton you wouldn't rise to the bait, but he insisted I offer it. I've done my bit. It's rather a shame about the book, though. I really would like to have it prepared for publication.”

“I'm sure you'll be able to find someone to do it for you,” I said.

“I imagine so. My dear”—she looked into my eyes—“would you mind telling me what this is all
about?
I'm completely at sea.”

“What are you referring to?”

“You—and Burton. I've never seen him in such a state. From the moment he heard that you were coming to Castlemoor, he was in a tizzy. Said you had no business being here. Said he didn't intend to stand for it. For days he grumbled and cursed, and the day your trunks arrived and he saw you were really and truly going to come—” She made an expansive gesture. “What is it all about?”

“I have no idea, Mrs. Rodd.”

“But—surely? You don't—well, I assumed Burton had met you before, in London, that there had been something—between you.”

“I never laid eyes on your son until yesterday morning at the ruins.”

“Incredible,” she said. “Then why is he in such a state? Why does he want you to leave? I've seldom seen him like this. I don't understand it. Not at all.”

“Neither do I,” I said, “but I can assure you I have no intention of leaving Castlemoor.”

Dorothea smiled wryly. Her beautiful eyes sparkled. “Bravo!” she exclaimed. “You're a remarkable woman! Burton has met his match at last. He's so spoiled, you know, where women are concerned. It'll do him good to find one he can't push around. You bother him—that's a good sign, a very good sign. I suspect you could have him if you wanted him.”