Daughter of Light (19 page)

“Maybe I should send Liam over to read his great-aunt’s walls,” he said. He started to turn to go back into his office but stopped, smiling at me. “Something tells me he’ll be around there more often, and it won’t be because I tell him to visit.”

I took a deep breath when he closed his door. Mr. Dolan’s terrible marriage experience not only made him cautious and skeptical when it came to other women he might date, but it also gave him grave concern for Liam’s relationships. What I had learned already was that Liam was in and out of so many so quickly that he appeared incapable of having any substantial involvement.

How difficult it must have been growing up under the circumstances Liam experienced. Surely, at a young age, he had witnessed his father’s great sorrow and disappointment. I realized that it would be harder for a son than for a daughter, because he would have his father’s disastrous relationship as a prime example of how it could be with women. I didn’t have to be an amateur psychiatrist to realize how his home life and his mother’s desertion had affected the way he conducted himself with women and reacted to his own feelings.

Probably the thing I had anticipated the least after I fled from my father and sisters was my feeling sorry for someone else in this world. Right now, I was feeling sorry for poor Jim Lamb, Mr. Dolan, and Liam. They added to the heavy bag of sorrow I was carrying because of how I’d had to leave Buddy. It was impossible not to envision him standing there in that restaurant, stunned, his heart sinking when he discovered I was gone. What I kept thinking about now was the possibility that he
thought my father and my sisters had found me while he was in the bathroom and taken me off. I hoped he had asked someone about me and that someone had seen me walk out freely. Perhaps they had seen me getting into Moses’s truck. Eventually, he would understand my reason, but that wouldn’t diminish his pain. I had deserted someone who loved me, too, but I’d had very good reasons to do so.

Even though I wanted to walk home after work and could certainly do it easily, Mr. Dolan insisted that I let him drive me. I was surprised at his offer at first, but then I realized that he was looking for any opportunity where he could be more personal. I saw Liam standing in the front window of one of the showrooms, watching enviously when his father and I left together. Mr. Dolan had explained that Liam, on his own, had decided to work overtime to catch up on things he had let slide.

Whom was he trying to impress more, I wondered, his father or me?

“My aunt told me your story, of course,” Mr. Dolan began as we left the parking lot, “but only in a brief outline in her special Aunt Amelia way. To be honest, I was positive she had exaggerated about you and agreed to the interview more to please her than anything. What a wonderful surprise to find that she was more than right.”

“Thank you, Mr. Dolan.”

“If it doesn’t disturb you to talk about it, tell me how you came to decide to up and leave your father.”

“It’s painful to remember all of the details. The
situation simply became impossible for me. My father was no longer capable of seeing anything from my point of view or, more accurately, of tolerating it. It was better for all of us.”

“He’ll come to regret it someday,” Mr. Dolan said. I knew that deep in his heart, he was hoping that was also true for his ex-wife. “Whatever spell he’s under now, he can’t be sorry he had enjoyed you for so long. He must have been very proud of you very often.”

“I like to think so,” I said.

“Well, I hope you can be happy here and enjoy working for us. I have some big ideas for expansion but have held back on them until I was certain that Liam would be a real part of my efforts. I’m not totally convinced yet. Let’s just say I’m a little more hopeful.”

“He’ll come through for you,” I said.

He was silent for a few moments. “I know he’s very fond of you already. To be honest, I think what’s impressed him the most is your reluctance to ask how high when he said to jump.”

“Yes, well, I’m not quite ready to start a relationship, and I told him so. However, I’d be a liar if I told you he wasn’t very good-looking and personable. But don’t tell him I said so,” I added quickly, and he laughed.

Just before we pulled into the driveway at the Winston House, I told Mr. Dolan about Naomi Addison hoping to get to him through me. He listened but didn’t say anything until we stopped and he turned off the engine.

“I don’t mean to influence you to be against her, but
I don’t like being thought of as anyone’s little spy. She strikes me as someone who’s capable of saying something like that in the end. People who are disappointed can be cruel,” I said.

“Very, very true. Don’t worry about it. I know about Naomi. My aunt doesn’t let anything get past her. I’ve never given Naomi Addison any indication that I would be interested in a relationship with her. Don’t you give it a second thought.”

He followed me into the house so he could say hello to his aunt. She and Mrs. McGruder were just setting the dinner table. I saw that there was one place setting missing and felt sorry again for Jim Lamb.

“Hello, Auntie,” Ken said. They hugged. He hugged Mrs. McGruder, too.

“What a nice surprise. You’re welcome to have dinner with us,” Mrs. Winston said immediately.

“Oh, thank you, but I have a dinner meeting all set.”

“You have to relax a little once in a while, Kenneth Sullivan Dolan. Your mother was always worried about you burning out. Even as a young boy, he was ambitious and a determined worker,” she told me.

“I will, Auntie Amelia. Promise. Well, our new girl seems fine. But keep your eye on her. I don’t want to lose her this soon,” he added, winking at me.

He visited for a while longer and then left. Before I went up to change for dinner, Mrs. Winston told me that Naomi Addison had checked out.

“I’d hate to think it was my fault. I didn’t mean to bring you any problems,” I said.

“Nonsense. I regretted taking her in almost the day
she moved in. I knew what she had on her mind. If I even hinted that my nephew might stop by, she would plant herself in that living room like a piece of furniture.”

I told her I had spoken to Jim Lamb and that he was planning to return the next day. She already knew about it. Mrs. McGruder and she were thinking about how they would accommodate his recovery. They were obviously very fond of him.

Most of my young life, either Mrs. Fennel, Daddy, or one of my older sisters would warn me about people. From the way they spoke, we were immune to the seven deadly sins that at one time or another took over their lives. They had spoken about it as if we were more in danger of becoming their victims than they were in of becoming ours.

But so far in this, my first experience of living among them, I had found much to recommend them. The kindness and loving concern in Mrs. Winston and Mrs. McGruder especially made me question the harsh sketches and depictions of people that my family had imposed on me. Perhaps, I thought, they lived with these thoughts to rationalize what they were destined to be and to do. It was always easier to kill a poisonous snake or spider than to kill a graceful bird whose only fault was being too trusting. Jim Lamb reminded me of a fragile, gentle bird.

I didn’t see him until I returned from work the following day. At my determined insistence, I refused all offers for a ride home and finally took the walk I had wanted to take from the first day. The late-spring sun
held the eager darkness back a little longer every day now. Despite always being told that darkness was our friend, I walked at a pace that would get me to the Winston House before the shadows began their snaillike crawl toward one another.

All along the street, men and women were returning from work. At some houses, children who had been waiting at windows anticipating the arrival of their fathers or mothers came running out to greet them as soon as they were out of their cars. I couldn’t help but remember the times I had been there to greet my father after he had been gone for days. When I was very young, I couldn’t wait to hear him call for me the moment he came through the front door.

“Where’s my Lorelei? Where’s my little angel?” he would cry, and I would come around the corner, shyly at first, and then, bursting with happiness, rush into his powerful arms. I had thought he had the strength to toss me into a cloud. His laughter had resonated throughout the house. Ava would appear behind me, her eyes two pools of green envy.

“And you, my darling?” he would ask her. “How have you been? Didn’t you miss me just as much?”

More timidly, more reserved and ladylike, she would approach to hug him. More often than not, he would have some sort of gift for us, such as new necklaces or rings or bracelets. Even if he had been gone for only two days, he would want to hear about every moment that had passed and how we had filled it. I had always felt as if he were memorizing the sound of my voice, the music of my laughter, and the love for him in my eyes. His
attention had been so strong and so intense that I had felt absorbed into him.

Right now, I paused to listen to some children laughing. I heard people greeting each other, asking how they were, how their day had been. No one watching me and seeing me seize on every syllable, every smile and hug, would understand how much it all meant to me. I was like a visitor from another planet, amused and delighted in the joy these inhabitants had in their world. I yearned to be a part of it. If Daddy were there and saw the smile on my face, he would know that there was no longer any reason to pursue me. I would never return.

Of course, if he was pursuing me or sending Ava after me, bringing me back might not be his purpose.

Out of nowhere, a cold chill slipped under the sunshine and down my back. I shivered and then walked faster toward the Winston House. When I drew closer, my attention was drawn to the windows of my room. I was sure that I saw a curtain parting and Thaddeus Bogosian looking down at me.

He was gone as quickly as he had appeared.

Please,
I thought,
let that be my overworked imagination.

“Well, thank goodness you’re home,” Mrs. Winston said as soon as I entered.

I barely heard her. My first thoughts went to what I thought I had seen up in my room. Was he waiting for me there? I doubted that Mrs. Winston would permit any guest to wait in a tenant’s room without the tenant present.

“Lorelei?”

“What? Oh. I’m okay, Amelia,” I said, thinking that she had heard that I was walking back and had been worried about me. “I had no problem.”

“Yes, I can see that, and I’m glad, but you have a stubborn young man in the living room who won’t go up to his room and rest as the doctor ordered until he sees you to confirm that you are indeed all right.”

She stepped back from the living-room entrance so I could enter.

“Jim?”

“Who else? Please tell him he has to follow the doctor’s orders, or he’ll only make things worse for himself.
Apparently, he needs to hear it from you,” she added firmly when I didn’t move.

“Yes, of course,” I said, and hurried in.

Jim was sitting back on the sofa. He wore a light blue robe and black fur-lined slippers and looked as if he had been in a brutal prizefight in which his opponent didn’t wear gloves. Days later, the bruises from the airbag were larger, darker, and deeper. He was also in a neck brace.

“Why aren’t you upstairs in bed?” I demanded, looking as cross as I could.

“I’m not as bad as I look,” he said, leaning forward. He was staring up at me, almost as if he didn’t know who I was. He looked as if he had fallen under a spell. He smiled. “I’m truly amazed at you, Lorelei.”

“Why?” Had he seen something, realized something, and learned something that I’d rather no one there knew?

“You really didn’t get a scratch. I’m so happy.”

“Oh,” I said, relieved. “I told you I was fine. Now, you had better listen to Mrs. Winston and your doctors and go back to your room.”

“He knows we’re bringing his dinner up to him,” Mrs. Winston said. She was standing right behind me. “And he knows he’s not to be walking around the first day home, for sure.”

“I feel terrible having everyone wait on me. I can walk up and down the stairs and sit at the dinner table. The doctor didn’t say I was confined to my room. Exactly.”

“Maybe we don’t want to look at you,” Mrs. Winston said, half kidding. “It could ruin our appetites.”

“Oh. Well, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“Look at him,” she told me. “He’s ready to burst into tears.”

“Jim, she’s only kidding. You should follow the doctor’s orders and give yourself a chance to heal. I’ll stop by to see you after dinner.”

That put a smile back on his face. “I never properly apologized for all of this,” he said, rising. “I know I must have looked like a fool driving into that mailbox, but I would swear on my mother’s grave that there was an elderly man standing right in front of us.”

“Sure, put it all on your mother, even now,” Mrs. Winston said. “Just like all you young people these days,” she added, as if she had actually lived during the time of John Adams.