The Towers of Love (32 page)

“No,” he said.

“And I did a very foolish and hysterical thing. I was very young, younger than Pansy. I thought—I guess I thought that I was going to show him, just show him that he couldn't run away from me free and clear! I thought—I was very young—I thought, wherever he goes he'll have Reba Pryor's death on his poor conscience. Well, that isn't much of a reason for doing what I did. And maybe that's why I made such a botchy, unsuccessful job of it!” She laughed softly. “I didn't really want to die. Because I didn't really love him that much. I realise that now. My reasons were just—simply pique at being jilted. And that isn't reason enough.”

“But Pansy had reason enough, didn't she?” he asked her.

“Oh!” she said. “I don't know, I don't know.”

“I think she did,” he said.

“Oh, Sandy is so much like Papa, I sometimes think. So—so strong-willed. Like Papa—”

“Yes, isn't it funny?” he said. “That from one generation to another generation—”

“Oh, don't talk to me about generations!” Reba said. “I don't understand generations. I have no generations. I'm an old maid.”

“But Papa and Sandy—”

“I just wish,” she began. “Oh, sometimes I just wish Sandy weren't so strong-willed! Sometimes I think she's too good at doing things. Sometimes I think she wants too
much
to be perfect. Oh, I know that sounds disloyal to poor Sandy. And I don't mean to be disloyal. But she sets such high standards for herself, and she sets such high standards for everybody else. I—even I, who understand them, have trouble meeting those standards. I disappoint her, let her down, often enough. But sometimes I think—sometimes I think that it just isn't possible for anyone to ever meet such high standards as she sets!”

“And this,” he said, “is what has resulted from the high standards that she sets for everybody.”

“Oh, don't say that. Don't say that, Hugh! She didn't want this to happen. She's had so much tragedy in her life. She didn't want this to happen. Don't ever say that, Hugh. Don't ever blame her—it's enough for her to bear, that she blames herself.”

“Does she blame herself?” he asked her. “Does Sandy Carey say to herself, ‘Gosh, but this is really all my fault, and I shouldn't have done what I did, and gosh but I'm sorry—'”

“Oh, you haven't been with her these last few days as I have, Hugh! Of course she blames herself. She says she killed Pansy, she says she killed her daughter. I've been with her while she's simply been crazy with guilt. She knows she did the wrong thing, she knows she broke her promise, she knows she never should have written that letter. She knows it, and it's enough that she knows it. Don't ever accuse her, Hugh. Don't ever put your thoughts into words, because she knows what your thoughts are, anyway. She knows, and her own knowledge is terrible enough to live with, Hugh. Don't ever accuse her, because no amount of accusations will ever bring Pansy back.”

“I'm glad she knows,” he said. “She deserves to know, she deserves to suffer.”

“Oh, Hugh!” she said. “It's your mother you're speaking of. Don't say such cold and hurting things. Your mother doesn't deserve to suffer. No one deserves to suffer. Don't say such a terrible thing about your mother—ever. Don't forget. Don't forget this room—and this mirror—and the exercises she made you do here. Don't forget—don't forget Warm Springs and all she did, how she worked with you, how she—”

“I know all that, Reba,” he said. “My God, I've been reminded of it for half my life!”

“Well, it's true! Don't forget it. The doctors—all the doctors, even Zimmerman, who said that you might never walk again, that you might have to spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair. Don't forget how she refused to listen to them, how she refused to even listen to their predictions. And how she took over, and all she did, and how if she hadn't done what she did—”

“I'm not forgetting any of that, Reba!”

“Then don't say she should suffer! Remember—remember the
good
things that her strong will has done. For you, for me. A strong will like hers can't
always
do the right thing, can it? There have to be mistakes, and things that go wrong. But don't think about those things—think of the good things, and the selfless things. And don't blame her for this one—this terrible miscalculation.”

“Yes,” he said. “Miscalculation is the right word, isn't it? So let's just chalk it up to miscalculation.”

She turned away from him and walked slowly towards the mirror. In front of it, she stopped. “Hugh,” she said, “may I share an awful secret with you?”

“Of course,” he said. “What is it?”

“Hugh—there was a note.”

“A note? What sort of note?”

“On Pansy's writing-table. It was there—when I found her, the other night. It was addressed to him—to James Lord.”

“Oh,” he said. “I see.”

“Yes! Oh, I
know
I should have given it to Sandy—or to someone—right away! But I didn't.”

“Why?” he asked her. “Why should you have given it to Sandy?”

“Because she would have wanted me to. But I didn't—I kept it. I've carried it with me for two days, not knowing—”

“Where is it now?”

“I couldn't bring myself to—to break the seal—to read it. And then, this morning—it was very simple—it was all addressed—I put a stamp on it and mailed it to him.”

He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “You did the right thing, Reba.”

“Oh, did I? Did I?” she asked, turning to him again. “It's the first disloyal thing I've ever done to Sandy—to keep that from her. But I felt, somehow, that whatever words Pansy had to say to him he should read, and know, and keep—whatever those words were!”

“Yes,” he said. “And if you'd given it to Sandy, you know what she'd have done with it.”

“I know. She'd have ripped it open, read it—and touched a match to it.”

“Yes,” he said. And then, “Reba, I'm going to go away.”

“Oh,” she said. “I've been in terror you might say that. I was afraid that might be what you were planning.”

“Yes.”

“Where are you going?”

“I don't know yet,” he said. “But I'm going.”

“Don't let it be far away, Hugh.”

“I'm afraid it's going to be, Reba—far away from here.”

“Hugh, I know how you must feel. I know you think you want to get away. But don't go far and don't go—permanently. She needs you too much.”

“I'm afraid I'm planning to go both far and permanently, Reba.” He smiled at her. “I'm sorry.”

“Oh, don't!” she said. “Think it over. Don't do something in anger. Don't do it that way, Hugh. Don't do it the wrong way.”

“I'm going to do it the only way I can do it,” he said.

“But don't go yet!” she cried. “Don't go for a while. Don't go soon, Hugh.”

“It will be soon,” he said.

“Oh, please! Please don't do a hasty thing, Hugh. Think it over for a little while—for a few weeks at least. Please promise me you'll do that. Please—for me. Please, for Reba, for your Aunt Reba!”

He reached for the jacket of his suit. “Let's go down,” he said. “Let's go down and face the mob.”

“Please, before we go, promise me that.”

He put on his jacket, squared his shoulders in it before the mirror, and pulled down the white cuffs of his shirt. He buttoned the centre button. He reached in his pocket for a comb and ran it quickly through his hair. From his dresser drawer he took a clean white handkerchief and arranged it in his breast pocket.

“Promise me!”

He turned to her. “Come on, Reba,” he said. “Down we go.” He took her gently by the arm.

At the door, she stopped him. “You smell so nice,” she said. “Won't you please promise me?”

“Come on, Reba,” he said.

And, taking her arm, he went with her out of the room and down the hall, and down the stairs to where the family waited.

At exactly ten minutes to eleven, Alexandra Carey started down the stairs, and the family talk hushed and faces turned to watch her as she came. She was all in black and, under her black hat, a black chiffon veil hung about her shoulders, gathered at her throat, concealing all but the barest gleam of her yellow hair. She was pulling on her long black gloves as she descended the staircase, pushing the fingers of the gloves, finger by finger, over the rings on her hands.

At the landing, she paused, pushing at the fingers of her gloves, and said, “These damn' rings. You know, I always said that my children were the only children I knew of who had emeralds in their diapers. I said that to one of the nurses I used to have—that I expected my children were probably the only children in the world who had emeralds in their diapers. Whenever I changed the children's diapers, the damned emeralds kept falling out of my rings!”

She finished the gloves, and then said, “Well, I'm ready. Let's get this thing over with, shall we?” And she came the rest of the way down the stairs.

Sixteen

He had promised himself not to look at Pansy's face.

Once, when she was about eighteen, he had come up to the house for a week-end and, walking into the living-room with his coffee cup on Sunday morning, he had found Pansy curled on a sofa, fast asleep. Her head was resting on a white satin evening purse, her hair had fallen across her flushed cheek, and her feet were tucked beneath the ballooning folds of her white taffeta ball gown. She had come in, very early in the morning, from a party, had got no farther than the green sofa, and had kicked off her silk pumps and gone to sleep there. He had stood there in the room, sipping his coffee, for several minutes watching her quiet and regular breathing. Then she had opened her eyes. She sat up abruptly.

“What are you doing?” she had asked him.

“Just watching you.”

“I think that's mean,” she had said. “I think it's mean to watch a person while she's sleeping—just stand and stare!”

“I'm sorry, Pansy.”

“Well, I think it's mean. What time is it?”

“After ten.”

“Oh, God!” she said, and rubbed her eyes. “I just meant to lie down for the shortest
minute.
”

“How was the party?”

“Oh, another deb was launched,” she said, and yawned. Then she lay down on the sofa again. “I'll go upstairs in just one more minute,” she said. She closed her eyes. “Now don't just stand and stare,” she said. And then, with her eyes still closed, she said sleepily, “You know, I always think that the most awful thing about being dead would be having all those people come to stare at you. Just to pass by and stare at you. I think that's the most awful thing about it.”

He had remembered this, in the car on the way to the funeral, and so, when he entered the little chapel with Reba at his side, a few steps behind his mother and father, he carefully did not look in the direction where he knew she was and, instead, looked at the people who had gathered—the family and the close friends.

He saw Edrita, sitting with her mother and father and, when she saw him, her lips formed a small soundless word of greeting. Then she bowed her head.

They were ushered to their seats and, he was happy to see, the immediate family had been placed in a small alcove at one side, and his view of Pansy was blocked by a spray of spring flowers—white narcissi, daffodils, and pale-pink tulips.

His mother was in the seat beside him and, because she never missed anything, she whispered to him when they were seated, “What was Edrita
smiling
at you for? Have you been seeing more of her?”

But he said nothing, merely bowed his head, listening to the changeful pattern of the organ music and presently, beside him, she too bowed her head.

Then, in the vestibule afterwards, there were the solemn greetings—the soft perfumed kisses, the handshakes—from the old friends and those of the family who had not already appeared at the house. His mother now stayed close by his side, holding his arm, and suddenly, for an awkward moment, he realised that the two of them were totally alone in the moving crowd of people, and that no one else seemed to be coming forward to speak to them, and he thought: My God, what do we do now?

“It was a nice service,” he said to her.

“Yes,” she said. “But I wish the rector hadn't felt he had to use those lines—‘Suffer the little children to come unto me.' I've always found those lines terribly presumptuous. Besides, she wasn't a little child. She was a grown woman.”

Then Clara Everett, Edrita's mother, was coming towards her, holding out both gloved hands in a supplicant gesture towards her, saying, “Oh, my dear Alexandra! Oh, my dear. She was an exquisite child, an exquisite child. Such a loss—irreplaceable!”

“Irreplaceable,” his mother had said, and the two women had kissed.

Then, to Hugh, Clara Everett had said, “Hugh, dear. Your mother has only you now. Thank heaven she has you!” And Mrs. Everett had kissed his cheek, and said, “Yes, she's at peace now!” And for a bewildering moment, Hugh was not sure what she meant, not sure why his mother should be at peace now. Then he realised that she meant Pansy.

“Thank you,” he said. “Thank you very much, Mrs. Everett,” though she had not really said anything that called for gratitude.

He and his mother had separated now and he was moving, on his own, through the people who touched his arm, who reached for his hand, towards the door and the sunlight and the line of cars outside that would take them all to the cemetery. And near the door a woman's voice had said, “Excuse me, Mr. Carey,” and he turned to face a woman he did not recognise. He reached for her hand with a spontaneous movement, even though her hand had not been outstretched to him. After all, in a moment like this, what else does one do but quickly and automatically reach for the touch of another human hand? Everywhere, all about the vestibule, hands reached for hands, lips felt for cheeks. For what other ways are there, but these few, for the living to comfort the living? He took the woman's hand and said, “Yes?”