Paper Dolls (22 page)

A statue stands next to a far rock wall—a man with a beard and long robes. I step over and touch the face of the statue. It seems that I’ve seen it before, but the memory hurts and my mind shuts the memory out before I can see it.

“That is Saint Jerome,” says grandfather. “This is a replica of a statue that is very important to me. You won’t remember, but recently we had a bit of an accident and landed at his feet. And we ended up okay. He’s like a lucky charm. Don’t let him scare you.” He gives a short chuckle.

He places his hands around the statue and heaves it out of the way. It takes all his strength and he grunts and sweats. Behind the statue is a small cave in the wall, about as high as my chest and packed with brownish sacks.

“The contents of the bags are worth a great deal of money, Jessamine. I brought quite a bit of the gold and diamonds that I own with me from America. You’re to tell no one that it’s here, but if something should happen that you need money, it’s yours.”

“What do you mean, grandfather? Why should I ever need money?”

“You won’t, of course, because I’ll be coming back for you soon. But just in case, it’s here. It’s enough to buy many houses and live a comfortable life.”

He pushes Saint Jerome back into place and we head back through the secret door and out of the dark tunnel. I don’t ever want to go back in there again. To the left is an enormous, brightly lit room. My heart leaps at the sight of my favorite carousel from the circus. I run and hug my horse—the horse that has been always been mine. It is blue and shiny with jewels on it.

“I had it brought over from America too.”

From the corner of my eye I see people sitting on a daybed. No, not people. Big dolls. Dolls that are bigger than grandfather. Stepping down from the carousel, my feet walk cautiously over to them. I know these dolls.

“Do you like them? You lost all your dolls in the… I mean, you lost all your dolls at the last place we were at. But I had them all made again, just for you."

The dolls confuse me. I know them but I don’t know them. There’s a bear and two dolls with pretty dresses and a set of rag dolls. The rag dolls sit together on a rocking chair—grandfather’s old rocking chair. And standing proudly near a wall is the wooden clown daddy gave me—only stretched and huge.

“Thank you.” My voice sounds as stiff as new shoes.

“I had them made large, so that if you spent much time down here, they could be friends for you. And look over here…” Grandfather gestures towards huge shelves of books. “A library. With more books than you could ever read. I know how much my little Jess loves her books.”

I wander over to the colorful spines of the books, running my fingers along them. “Some of these are Miss Kitty’s books. Is she here?”

Grandfather sighs heavily. “No.”

“Where is she? Will she still give me lessons?”

“Miss Kitty… has gone away.”

“Has
everyone
gone away?” My head feels floaty again.

“Not everyone. Henry and Audette—“

“I don’t care about stupid Henry and Audette. Where’s Miss Kitty gone? And mother and daddy? Where are they? Where is the circus?” Fat tears squeeze from my eyes.

Grandfather takes the rag dolls from his rocking chair and places them by a fireplace, then returns to sit in the chair. “Come here, Jess-of-mine.”

I sit in his lap and feel small again.

“Everything will be okay, you’ll see.”

“I don’t feel okay. I feel very, very bad.” I stare around at the dolls and books and wallpaper and carpets until it all whirls inside my head. “What is all this for?”

“It’s all for you.”

“But why down here?”

“It’s just a safe place to come and play, when you need to.”

“But when will I need to?”

“Henry will know. Now don’t you worry.”

I lay my head on his shoulder. “Am I going to see my parents again?”

He holds my arm. “You will.”

“Is that where you’re going? To find daddy and mother? Are they lost?”

“Yes,” he says in a loud breath. “But I’ll get them back for you, if it’s the last thing I do.”

My forehead tightens. “But where are they? Are they far away? Like on an island in the middle of the ocean?”

“Something like that. But don’t worry. You’ll be with them again.”

He rocks the chair and my head grows heavy. I wish I could sleep until daddy is back again. I think I can see stars, but that’s silly, because there aren’t any stars here under the ground.

“Grandfather, you’re not going to the other worlds, are you?”

I don’t even know why I say that. It’s a mindless, little-girl thing to say.

I hear nothing for a few moments but his long, sighing breaths.

“Jess, what do you remember?”

“I don’t know.” My throat feels half-strangled. “I keep remembering things that aren’t true….”

“Ah, my poor Jess, how you have suffered. Whatever happens, wherever I end up, just know this… I’ll be back for you. We’ll start again, we’ll start new. And everything will be wonderful this time. I won’t make the mistakes I made… before. Money is not nearly as important as I thought it was. I’ll take you somewhere where you can have everything—everything that’s important.”

“Will you be taking Henry and Audette too? And the circus?”

He shakes his head. “You and only you,” he whispers. He brings his face down close to mine, his blue eyes red-rimmed and wet. He presses a small, round object into my hand. It’s his locket. I know what’s inside it—it’s a picture of me and grandfather. “Now you need to promise me something, Jess-of-mine. You need to promise me you won’t open this until I return. Inside this locket is my promise to you – my promise that I’ll be back for you. Just be patient. Can you do that?”

I pull the chain over my neck, placing the locket close to where daddy told me my heart was.

I know he’s gone, but I run downstairs and out to the grounds, and I look for him anyway.

Thomas the gardener tips his hat at me. His skin is tanned and smooth.

“Are you going to put in flowers?” I ask him.

He shakes his head. “Just a hedge. But I’ll put in flowers in for you if you want them.”

“My grandmother liked Red Buckeye. They could make a good hedge.”

“Sorry darlin’, we don’t have those flowers out here. How’s about I put in some Bottle Brush for you? The flowers are red and look like the brushes you clean bottles out with.”

Grinning, he stoops and collects some yellow wildflowers from the ground. He twists them into a halo and puts it on my head. “Pretty.”

My cheeks grow warm. The gardener is a lot older than me, but quite young for a gardener—perhaps no older than nineteen. I step away shyly.

“Jessamine…”

I didn’t know he knew my name. I eye him expectantly.

“I saw you go into those tunnels under the ground the other day. Now that your grandfather’s gone away, don’t go back there. I don’t think that’s a good place for you to go.”

There isn’t anything I can think of to say to that. I don’t want to go to the tunnels anyway. I spin on my heel and march away to the river, a long way from Thomas the gardener.

The air stifles me, even though it’s early morning. So strange to think its December and it’s so hot here. I unlace my boots and pull off my stockings. My halo of wild flowers tips into the river and floats downstream. I try to catch it but the water takes it away too quickly. The face of Thomas is still in my head and it makes me want to run, and so I do. I run through the tall, dry grasses beyond the lawn.

Audette watches from my bedroom. She’s always in there, watching.

When I return, Audette looks like she’s sitting in a cloud of poisonous gas, painting furiously at her easel. She’s been painting strange pictures of me outside, running into tunnels of fiery trees. She’s even painted a picture of herself to give to Henry as a birthday present. I have to say that she’s good at painting, because the painting looks sour, just like her.

Dinner that night is what Audette calls fine French cuisine. Snails and fish eggs and everything goopy.

“You’re not eating, cousin.” Henry raises his eyebrows.

“I’m not hungry. Where’s Sister Daniels tonight? Is it her day off?”

Audette admires a new bracelet Henry has bought her. “Oh her. She was a nuisance. We let her go.”

“Let her go where?”

She laughs, throwing her head back. “We fired her. Told her services weren’t wanted here anymore.”

“But grandfather said she has to stay here with me.”

“Well, too bad.” Her eyes are cold, as cold as in the painting she made of herself. “She’s been sponging on this family for long enough.”

I excuse myself from the table and run upstairs. I don’t care that she is gone, but I’m tired of people leaving me.

The tiny dolls in my room sit in the dollhouse lonely and still. Kneeling beside the house, I peer inside. This house has a daddy and a mother and six beautifully-dressed children. The dolls go where I put them and do what I want them to do. None of them yell at me or do strange things.

And none of them will ever leave me.

Six days pass. Six days without grandfather. My dreams are filled with bad things. Trains in pieces on the ground, dead animals, spinning wheels, knives… and death. Always death. Thomas the gardener walks through my dreams too, but everything he plants withers and dies. I have no Sister Daniels to come into my room at night and give me water and a white pill to help the dreams go away.

Audette says she can’t stand my screaming during the night anymore. She begins bringing me cups of tea just before bed. She picks up strange dark cubes with her long red fingernails and drops them into the steaming cups of water. The tea helps me sleep better than anything the pretend-nurse ever gave me. So much so that I don’t know which day it is anymore. But I don’t care, because the only thing I care about is grandfather coming back with my parents, and then I can leave Henry and Audette and this terrible place.

Thomas the gardener plants three small rose bushes near the tree where I like to sit and watch the river. The roses are pink, white and red. “Not sure if they’ll survive this soil, but I hope you like them.” A grin spreads across his face like sun first thing in the morning.

At this moment I think the roses are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. “Thank you!” I tell him in a breathy voice. Without realizing what I am about to do, I lift myself onto the tip of my toes and kiss him. I’m sure I mean to kiss him on the cheek, but somehow I kiss his lips. A strangeness enters my body—a fuzzy warmth. I feel big and tall and my lips feel swollen from the kiss.

Thomas blunders backwards a few steps. “Jessamine… you don’t need to thank me… I’d best get back to work.”

He goes back to planting his hedge at the front of the house. I stay out of his way, watching from where he cannot see me. He wears overalls with no shirt underneath, and the muscles in his strong back move over each other when he hoes the ground. He stops for lunch, wiping his brow with the back of his arm. He eats quickly, like daddy eats. As soon as he’s finished, he glances about him everywhere, like a fox looking for hunters. Some small hope fires inside of me, a hope that he’s looking for me. But he steps towards the garden shed and disappears inside. I kick stones into the river, waiting for him to return.

The curtain in my room moves aside. I’m not the only one watching. I can barely see Audette but I know she’s there.

I wake in a haze of Audette’s tea. Loud curse words cut the air below my window. Henry pushes the pipe organ across the grounds, huffing and puffing and growing angry. Audette wears baby doll pajamas and a new pink and white striped dressing gown. Her arms are crossed and the smoke of a cigar streams from her hand.

“Do you think you could actually help?” Henry roars at her.

She studies the fingers that hold the cigar. “Not with these nails.”

He throws up his hands and tilts his face to the sky. “Bloody hopeless.” He notices me at the window. “Kid, get down here. I need you.”

I shake my head. How can I help move such a heavy object?

“Just come.” His voice has a harsh edge.

I run downstairs, still wearing my night slip. My legs show through the transparent material. “I’d best go get dressed. I don’t want the gardener to see me like this.”

“Don’t sweat it,” says Henry. “He won’t be coming back anyway.”

My heart squeezes. “He’s not coming back?”

“No. We don’t really need a blasted hedge or gardens. He’s been told he’s not needed here anymore.”

I turn my head so that Henry doesn’t see tears filling my eyes. “Where are you taking that thing?” I ask him.

“Underground.” He heaves his shoulder against it. “And I can’t get anyone else to help, because people…” He pushes again. “…are bloody busybodies…” He frowns deeply. “…who can’t mind their own damned business.”

I take the ropes and try to pull the organ as Henry pushes. It is slow, hard work. But we manage to get it all the way to the shed.

“Get in front and help steady it as I slide it.”

My legs are weak and rubbery. “I don’t want to go down there.”

“For Christ’s sake, is everyone around here useless? Just do it.”

He slides the organ onto the lid and I try to keep it from falling over. I am stronger than I thought I could be. We descend into the cave and move the organ down a ramp. Bits and pieces of brass tubing lie scattered on the floor.

“What is all that?”

“A warning system.” His mouth stretches into a cold smile. “Can’t have people just wandering around where they shouldn’t be.”

With the organ in place against the back wall of the cave, Henry begins hammering and welding. My job is to hand him pieces of tubing when he asks for them.

I notice a massive circle of wood has been placed across the tunnel opening. It fits almost perfectly. I wander over and trace my hand along the edges of the blue star at its center.