Here I Stay (30 page)

"I feel cheerful." Euphoria rose like a fountain from her feet to her smiling face; she threw her arms
in the air. "Martin, I'm going to make it! We've done even better than I dared hope. I took such an awful risk when I poured every penny we had into this place; sometimes I'd lie awake all night adding up those endless bills and thinking I must have been crazy—but now I'm sure. It's going to be all right."

"That's great. You deserve it, Andy."

"You helped a lot." Andrea hugged herself in sheer exuberance. "This is going to be the best Christmas of all time. And I haven't even started my shopping! What would you like for Christmas, Martin?"

She heard him catch his breath, and her smile faded. "Sorry. I keep feeding you straight lines, don't I?"

"You have a deplorable weakness for cliches. I wasn't thinking what you thought I was thinking. You looked like a little girl counting the days till Santa Claus comes. I think it's the first time since I've known you that you appeared to be completely, gloriously happy."

"It's the first time I've had reasons to be happy." She counted, solemnly, on her fingers. "I'm solvent—what a drab word for that marvelous condition! Jim is completely recovered. I own a beautiful, charming home; I have friends..."

"I think I prefer you in your caustic mood," Martin said judiciously. "This sweetness-and-light routine is out of character."

"You're an old grouch." Andrea propped her chin on her hand. "We'll have a huge Christmas tree," she murmured. "I kept mother's ornaments, and there are boxes and boxes of Bertha's in the attic...A twenty-pound turkey and all the trimmings...Holly and pine boughs and wreaths all
over the house...Church on Christmas Eve, carols, and the organ playing...You are going to spend Christmas with us, aren't you? Or—I'm sorry, I didn't think. Is Christmas against your principles?"

"I'm extremely ecumenical," Martin said gravely. "I don't find any harmless celebration offensive. I'd be honored to spend the day with you. I'll even go to church. What do you want for Christmas, Andrea?"

"You don't have to—"

"Forget I asked. You'd only mention something useful and dull, like a new broom. I'll use my imagination."

Andrea pulled a pad of paper toward her. "I've got to start my shopping. I want to get something really nice for Jim. Some parts for his hi-fi, or even a video tape recorder..." She turned back to Martin. "Did you come in here for some reason?"

"I brought you the mail. There's a package from John William Holderman."

"He said he'd send me copies of the photographs." She took it eagerly.

"I thought as much. I'm curious to see how they came out."

The parcel had been packed with the finicky care she might have expected from Holderman. Inside the brown paper, painstakingly sealed with yards of tape, was a heavy cardboard box to which a white envelope had been affixed.

"Cheating the U.S. mails," Martin said, with satisfaction. "Personal letters are supposed to go first class. What's he say?"

Andrea handed him the note. Martin read it aloud; like many lecturers and speakers, he loved the sound of his own voice.

" 'Dear Miss Torgesen, I cannot thank you enough for your charming blah, blah and so on...Greatly enjoyed...hmm hmmm...The incisive wit of Mr. Greenspan...' " He gave Andrea a sheepish grin. "It was more incisive than witty, wasn't it?"

"You were rather churlish," Andrea replied, picking at the tape around the box.

"Whereas you were 'a fitting hostess for a home of distinctive elegance.' Then he says, 'It is curious how the camera can bring out features unseen by the human eye.' What does he mean by that?"

"We'll soon see." Andrea finally succeeded in wrenching the lid off the box. The photographs were five-by-seven glossies, and there were almost a hundred of them. "They are superb," Andrea said admiringly. "Look at this detail of the parlor mantel. I never realized this part of the carving was meant to be a sea horse; I always thought it was just a meaningless ornamental curve. That must be what he meant, about the camera showing things the eye doesn't see."

"No," Martin said. "I think he was referring to this."

His voice was so odd that Andrea looked at him in surprise. Silently he handed her the photograph he had been examining.

It was a shot of the exterior of the tower, not from ground level, but from a point about halfway up. She couldn't imagine how Holderman had taken it from that height until she remembered the apple tree. He must have climbed practically to the top and leaned out at a perilous angle, for the camera had been aimed straight up at the roof of the tower. It was an unusual and rather frightening viewpoint; the entire structure appeared to be toppling slowly
toward the photographer, who seemed in imminent danger of being crushed.

Two windows of the tower room were visible. In one of them—the north window—was a pale shape, like a featureless human figure.

"Jim must have been standing at the window," she said.

"It isn't Jim."

"A reflection, then. A cloud."

"There were no clouds in the sky that day. It was perfectly clear."

"What is it, then?"

"Dunno."

Andrea looked again. The closer she looked, the less distinct the shape became. "It could be anything. A trick of the light—"

"It's hard to make out," Martin admitted.

"All right, Martin." Andrea leaned back and folded her hands with an air of exaggerated patience. "I know that tone. What do you think it is?"

"That's how she died. Alice Fairfax. She fell, or jumped, from that window."

After a moment Andrea said, "How do you know?"

"The newspaper, of course. The font of all knowledge. It took me a while to find the paragraph. There's no index, and I didn't know the month."

"Fell, or jumped?"

"That's what it said in the paper. In a case of that sort no one could be certain, unless she left a note. Which apparently she did not."

"But you, of course, think she jumped," Andrea said. "Are you inventing a new plot, or what?"

"I'm evaluating the evidence," Martin said, refusing to take offense. "Your experience at that same
window—and now this."

"This isn't evidence." Andrea pushed the photograph away. "It's a light streak. You said yourself that a lot of people have an impulse to jump when they stand in a high place."

"Oh, right. I said a number of things, most of them stupid."

"So you're becoming a believer—in ghoulies and ghosties and Reba's upset stomach?"

"I'd be happier if I did believe," Martin said plaintively. "Anything would be better than the state of amorphous indecision in which I exist these days."

"That's your problem, not mine. I'm perfectly satisfied, and I don't intend to think about it again. I'm going Christmas shopping."

"Fine with me. What can I do to contribute to the jollity of the season? I'd make a pretty fair Santa Claus, don't you think?" He patted his stomach.

"You've lost weight, haven't you? I'm afraid you'd need a pillow to fit the part."

"Flattery will get you anything you want," Martin said offhandedly. He looked pleased, though, and Andrea smothered a smile. Men accused women of being vain, but they were just as bad.

"We're all a little too old for Santa Claus, more's the pity. I'm going to insist that Reba come here for dinner. It's time she got over those absurd notions of hers."

"You don't cure people of irrational ideas by pointing out that they are irrational," Martin protested.

"Maybe they weren't completely irrational." Martin's eyebrows rose, and Andrea laughed. "No, I'm not a believer either. But I was impressed by what Mr. Holderman said the other evening, about
strong emotions leaving a sort of psychic imprint. That would account for Reba's experience. Once she understands that it is impersonal and harmless, she won't be afraid of it."

"It's possible," Martin said, without conviction.

"Well, when you talk to her about it, don't sound so doubtful. We've got to make her believe that's all it is. Half the battle is believing something is true."

"Oh, dear, it must be wonderful to know all the answers," Martin said.

"If he is, I'd like the name of his supplier," Martin muttered. "He's on a permanent high. It's as if he—"

"This tree is nice and thick," Andrea interrupted. "Do you want to pick up pine cones or cut boughs?"

"My knees don't give so good, as Mrs. Horner might say. I'll cut."

"You poor old codger."

"I'm forty-six," Martin said. He clipped industriously for a few minutes and then added, "Old enough to be Jim's father."

Andrea did not reply, so Martin increased the intensity of his provocation. "Found any more poems in his desk?"

"Damn it, Martin." Andrea threw a handful of pine cones into the basket and stood up, pushing her hair back under her knit cap. "Have you been spying on me?"

"People who live in glass houses—"

"You don't think I wanted to pry, do you? I had to. I never did it before—well, not very often. There was all that drug business when he was in high school, and I felt it was my duty—"

"Don't defend yourself so vehemently." Martin dropped the secateurs and lowered himself, grunting, onto a fallen log. "Did you find any drugs?"

"He was growing a marijuana plant. In the closet, with a plant light."

"Ingenious," Martin said with a grin. "You still haven't answered my first question."

He touched the log beside him and after a moment Andrea shrugged and sat down. The woods were very quiet. In summer the paths were almost impenetrable, a jungle-thick interlacing of honeysuckle and waist-high weeds, grown wild and exuberant in the damp, hot climate. Now the frail
skeletons of stem and leaf lay flattened underfoot and the pine needles gave off a faint spicy scent. The globe of the declining sun hung like a giant crimson fruit in the network of branches west of them.

"I haven't looked since he moved to the tower," Andrea said.

"Why not?"

"I told you. I hated doing it..."

"You don't like that room, do you?"

"That has nothing to do with it. The main reason is that I don't feel any longer that it is necessary. You said it—he's happy."

"I keep thinking of that first little masterpiece you showed me."

"I've forgotten it," Andrea said.

"The hell you have. It was a rotten poem, but the images continue to haunt me. The road map and the bridges fallen...That figure of speech describes his behavior these last months. He was searching for something. One frantic attempt after another— one road after another found to be impassable..."

"And now he's found what he was looking for."

She expected Martin to disagree. Instead he nodded. "Yes, he's found it. I only wish I knew what it
was."

A few days before Christmas Andrea sat in her room wrapping presents. The door was closed. On it hung a sheet of paper on which she had scrawled: "No Admittance. Knock Before Entering. This Means You!" Jim was sequestered in his room, presumably engaged in the same activity. The sign on his door was even more emphatic.

Coils of ribbon, crimson and green and gold, strewed the bed. The crisp bright paper made soft crackling sounds as she folded it around her parcels. The radio was tuned to a local station that had promised an afternoon of Christmas music. Andrea's spirits were so high that even gems such as "Jingle Bell Rock" and "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" only made her smile. The sole traditional item missing was snow; there was little chance of that, according to the weather forecast, although the low-hanging gray clouds looked threatening and a sharp wind rattled the branches of the trees outside the window.

Business had been slow the past week, but she was fully booked from the nineteenth to the twenty-fourth. Many of the nearby communities sponsored Christmas open houses and walks and celebrations; next year, perhaps, Ladiesburg would have a festival of its own. Andrea had formulated plans which she meant to present at the next Merchants' Association meeting; the inn would, of course, play a large part. Her Christmas decorations were intended to show the town what she could do along that line— a traditional Victorian Christmas, with wreaths and greenery, big red velvet bows, and Cousin Bertha's spun-glass ornaments. Everything was done except for the tree itself and the ropes of boxwood and pine boughs that would frame doorways, mantels, and mirrors. Greens dried out so quickly in the house; they couldn't be arranged until the last minute. It would be an all day job, but it would be fun, with Jim and Martin helping.