11
RYDER AND I were happy that no one on the bus had asked us anything about the day’s events, but we were aware that everyone had been watching us and whispering our whole trip home. When we reached our stop at Wyndemere, we got off the bus and stood there a moment, silently contemplating the mansion as the bus pulled away.
Dr. Davenport’s car was parked right behind the limousine.
Ryder looked at me and reached for my hand. What a shocking picture we would make for Bea Davenport, I thought. We walked like two people on their way to their own funeral.
Before we reached the steps, however, Ryder stopped. “My dad’s rarely home this early,” he said. “I can only imagine the hysterics she performed on the phone. You’d better go around to your entrance.”
“Don’t argue with him, Ryder. Riding the school bus with me is not that important. I’ll be fine by myself.”
“Yeah, well, I’d rather be on the bus to make sure of that,” he said, and headed for the front entrance. I watched him go in and then started down the walkway toward the rear of the mansion.
The spring blue sky had been battling streaks of gray clouds all day. Pulling reinforcements from a storm in the Midwest, the clouds were overtaking the more welcoming azure and now looked more like forecasts of rain. Above, on the mansion, the gargoyles looked down angrily at me for bringing grief to Wyndemere. Down to my right, across the lawn and between the patches of woods, Lake Wyndemere was a darker gray, the surface looking more like the shade of an aged and well-worn quarter. There were no boats out. The wind strengthened, and the newly sprung leaves on trees young and old looked like they were struggling to remain attached.
I opened the door and entered the kitchen. All was quiet. I was sure my mother was somewhere in the main house overseeing some work or helping with dinner preparations. I dropped my books on my desk in my room and practically dove onto my bed, facedown. For a while, I lay there feeling stunned and helpless. It had been a horrible day, a day that should have been wonderful for me as the reigning prom queen. What a joke. My crown was stuffed in a hall locker. I quickly put an end to my self-pity and thought about Ryder and what he must be facing at the moment. How could I let him face this all by himself?
I got up, hesitated, and then hurried out of my room.
The hallway from our living quarters to the main house was not very long, but it was always poorly illuminated with some simple low-wattage wall fixtures, as if the original owners and now the Davenports always wanted to impress everyone with the fact that the help lived in a place so different from Wyndemere’s interior that it was truly like leaving the property, even going beneath it to some dark, unpleasant world. I hated walking through it. Whenever we were invited to something in the main house, something usually all the servants were welcomed to attend, I’d go around to the front of the house, even though my mother wouldn’t.
Occasionally, when I was much younger but old enough to be left on my own, I would sneak down the hallway, especially when my mother was working in the main house, and then snuggle in a nook that housed a large black Egyptian pot that the original owners, the Jamesons, had brought back from one of their world trips. I could easily fit in between it and the wall and remain fairly well hidden. From there, I would look out at the comings and goings of the servants, Bea Davenport, her friends, my mother, and often Ryder and Sam. The nook was only around a half dozen feet from Dr. Davenport’s office doorway.
Once as he was entering it, I thought he had seen me, but he had said nothing. I liked to think that he had smiled to himself, thinking I was cute or amusing, but it could just as well have been a grimace of annoyance. At least he hadn’t yelled at me or chased me away.
Older and taller now, I was less dependent on the black pot to hide my presence and more dependent on the shadows. I saw two maids chatting in subdued voices as they crossed the hallway and went into the dining room. Neither looked my way. A moment later, my mother hurried along and went toward the stairway. She was carrying a vase of red and white roses. Sam was following her just the way I would when I was her age, talking incessantly and probably asking one question after another.
All was quiet again, and then I heard what was definitely Bea’s high-pitched, whiny voice coming from inside Dr. Davenport’s office. Considering all the trouble that had occurred today, it was very risky for me to step out of the shadows and quietly approach the office doorway. Anyone seeing me eavesdropping there would surely cry out, and I’d be in bigger trouble, certainly with Bea. Nevertheless, my curiosity and concern for Ryder were too great for me to succumb to fear.
I approached the door.
Now inches away, I stood, practically holding my breath, and listened.
“Your stepmother is right, Ryder,” I heard Dr. Davenport say. “I have seen a dramatic change in your behavior. You should have been more concerned with your sister Samantha’s feelings. The talk about this disastrous past weekend spreads into the middle school, too, and her classmates might be teasing her or asking her embarrassing questions. You have to be a big brother and let her feel you’re there to protect her. Now, Bea is the mistress of Wyndemere, but, more important, she is my wife and your legal guardian. Her orders and instructions are to be obeyed as if they came directly from me. Is that understood?”
I heard nothing but imagined Ryder had nodded or perhaps simply stared at the floor stone-faced, the rage in him swelling his shoulders. He’d never cry, but I had seen his eyes glaze over with trapped tears whenever his father reprimanded him. I felt like rushing in and throwing my arms around him. Let him alone! I’d scream. Stop hurting him!
“You will accompany Samantha in the limousine to school every morning,” Dr. Davenport continued. “It’s admirable that you have been a friend to Fern, but you’re both young adults now, and I agree with your stepmother that in light of all that’s happened, anything more than that is inappropriate.”
“What do you mean?” Ryder asked. “What’s inappropriate? What did she tell you?”
I could easily imagine him glaring hatefully at Bea, who surely had a self-satisfied smile smeared over her face.
“I don’t want you sneaking off to spend time with her in her room, and I don’t want you encouraging her to come into the main house unless either your stepmother or I have a specific reason for it,” Dr. Davenport said quickly and sternly.
“Why not? What did she do? She’s the victim here. Her prom evening was ruined, and she’s had to deal with all the questions and comments some of the bitches made.”
“She hasn’t done anything I know of, but we both think it’s wrong for you to encourage too much familiarity,” Dr. Davenport said in a more reasonable tone of voice. “It was unquestionably a mistake to arrange this double date for the prom in the first place. Your stepmother is already fielding too many inquiries from important people in Hillsborough. We have to be concerned about the family’s reputation.”
“The family’s reputation? That’s the first time I can recall when you’ve sounded like a snob, Dad. I guess she’s rubbing off on you after all.”
“Ryder! I can’t tolerate your being so insolent to your stepmother. I’m not going to warn you about it again. Until you show proper respect and decorum, we’ll be putting the idea of your getting your own car on your next birthday on hold.”
“That was something you promised me. Now she has you breaking your promises,” Ryder said. “I’ll say it the way you like to say it, Dad. Let me be perfectly clear. She will never be my mother. I will never treat her like I would my mother.”
“Then treat her like my wife!” Dr. Davenport responded, his voice raised unlike I had ever heard it. “Until I believe you are doing that, confine yourself to this property every weekend. Parker will be instructed not to drive you anywhere but to school and back. I want you to spend your time thinking about all this and what you can do to tone it down. Is that perfectly clear enough for you?”
Ryder did not respond. I turned away quickly, my heart pounding, my heart breaking for him. I started to cry on my way back to my room, and when I got there, I closed the door and sat on my bed and stared at the wall. Who was more loyal to Dr. Davenport than my mother, and yet look how he thought of me, her daughter. I was like an untouchable in this house. If I never said another word to him again, it would be too soon.
Lying on my side, I closed my eyes. I felt hollow inside. My sobbing put an ache in my chest. The strain of this terrible day and what I had just heard exhausted me. In moments, I was asleep and grateful for that. My mother didn’t wake me until she had our dinner ready. I was sure she had looked in on me and left me sleeping. When I finally did open my eyes, I saw her standing there, looking down at me.
She immediately felt my forehead. “You’re a little warm, Fern. I’d like to take your temperature.”
“If there’s anything wrong with me,” I said, sitting up, “don’t call on Dr. Davenport.”
“What? Why?”
“I overheard him tell Ryder basically to stay away from me. According to Bea, I’m dirtying the Davenport name. I don’t want to live here anymore. I don’t!” I shouted, hopefully loud enough to be heard in the main house.
“Calm yourself. How did you overhear this?”
“I went out and listened just outside Dr. Davenport’s office door.”
“But why would he say such a thing?”
“Ryder went to school with me on the school bus this morning, and Bea had a meltdown.”
“He did?”
“And rode back on it as well. Sam was upset about having to ride alone in the limousine.”
“I see.”
“He’s confined to Wyndemere on weekends until further notice, and Dr. Davenport might not buy him the car he promised for his birthday. I don’t care how many people he has saved. Ryder’s right. He’s a snob and very unfair.”
She nodded. “We have to let things calm down, Fern. People say things they really don’t mean when they’re upset.”
“Like your father said to you? Get out? Get out of his and your mother’s and your sister’s life?”
“Yes. I think there were many nights when he regretted it, but it had gone too far, and he didn’t know the way back. Neither did I, but that doesn’t have to happen here. You know Bea Davenport almost as well as I do, as well as all of us who work here do. She doesn’t like looking foolish or being the object of unpleasant gossip, especially in the circles where she dwells. The weekend brought unpleasant attention to Wyndemere, and she’s just flailing about like some overwrought spoiled brat. As I’ve said many times, ignoring people like that is the best defense.”
“Ryder can’t. He’s being punished because of her and because he’s helping me.”
“Dr. Davenport will ease up as soon as the fire dwindles,” she said. “Now. Let’s take your temperature. When people get so upset, their immune systems suffer, and they get ill.”
She went for the thermometer, and I lay back on my pillow.
I really did want us to leave now, leave at all costs. I even considered running away if she wouldn’t leave. Maybe I would go to England and find her sister. All sorts of fantasies began to play in my imagination.
She returned with the thermometer. I didn’t have any fever, but I was burning up inside with rage.
“Let’s just get some good, hot food into you, and then you know what? We’ll take a nice walk down to the lake. How’s that?”
“Maybe I’ll jump in and drown myself,” I said.
“Take a shower and change your clothes,” she ordered. “Stop this tantrum.” She smiled. “I’m making one of your favorites, one Mrs. Marlene taught me well, chicken piccata.”
I did smell the aroma, and despite my fury, my stomach churned with hunger. I had barely eaten anything at lunch. I nodded and did what she asked.
After a shower and a good dinner, I did feel better. My mother had tried to change the topic while we ate, but I didn’t think she was doing that solely to get me to stop thinking about it all. She was genuinely excited about what she was telling me. She had received a note in the mail from the doctor who had delivered both Ryder and me, Dr. Bliskin. It was like she had won the lottery or something.
“He wanted to know how we were and said he was doing some traveling involving a medical convention and just might take a short detour on the way home and stop at Wyndemere. Wouldn’t that be nice?”
“Probably mainly to visit Dr. Davenport and kneel at the throne.”
“Oh, Fern, that’s not nice. Of course he wants to see Dr. Davenport, but he specifically wanted to be sure we’d be around, too.”
“Oh, we’ll be around.” I thought a moment. “Where would we have gone?” I asked. “Well?”
Was there somewhere we could go, somewhere she had kept secret? Had she been thinking of returning to England to what remained of her family? A new start in life might have been just the right thing for both of us.
“We wouldn’t have gone anywhere special, Fern. He simply meant he wanted to be sure we were still here when he visits,” she said.
When she told me about this, she held the note as if it was a precious historical document or something. Then she put it back in her purse. Why was she saving it in her purse? Was she going to take it out and reread it as if it was a beautiful poem or something? Whatever pleasure it had brought her was meaningless to me.
“I don’t remember him,” I said petulantly. It was certainly not anywhere nearly exciting enough news for me to forget the misery I felt for myself and for Ryder.
“Well, he remembers you and me, of course, very well. C’mon. We’ll take that walk now before it gets too late. You need some fresh air. Put on a light sweater, love.”
My mother and I rarely took walks together on the Wyndemere property, but I refused to get happy about it. I didn’t want to do what she suggested and ignore what was happening by distracting myself. Dr. Davenport’s words still circled my head like annoying flies.
Folding my arms under my breasts, I left the house with her and walked the pathway that led over the grounds and down to the Davenports’ boat dock.
“Dr. Bliskin occasionally took time out when he made a house call for us or for Sam and walked down to the lake,” my mother said. “Most of those times, Dr. Davenport was at work and couldn’t accompany him, so I did. He was always very envious of Dr. Davenport, you know. Men always accuse women of being very competitive, but the truth is, they are far more vulnerable to suffer envy than we are. They’re so concerned about their manliness, proving it.
“There isn’t that much of an age difference between them, either. Dr. Davenport is only three years older, but because he is this highly respected and regarded cardiac specialist, Dr. Bliskin talked about him as if he were some venerable old man. I teased him about that,” she said.
I didn’t know if she was rattling on like this as a way to get me out of my funk or because she was really remembering some happier moments in her life here. Obviously, Dr. Bliskin was someone she had liked very much. She wasn’t even looking at me when she spoke. She was gazing ahead at the lake and walking. I could have stopped yards back, and she wouldn’t have noticed.
“ ‘You have to remember,’ I told him. ‘It’s true, Dr. Davenport is an exceptional man, brilliant and skilled, but he was someone born with a silver spoon in his mouth. Like Americans say, he was born on third base and thought he hit a home run, whereas you came from a far, far more modest background. In some ways,’ I pointed out, ‘you have accomplished more.’ ”
I was impressed that she remembered her conversation with him word for word.
“I mean, Dr. Bliskin had to work and win scholarships, and his parents sacrificed so much so he could have a medical degree. Why, he was still paying off loans until the day he left Hillsborough, you know. I think that was what made him a compassionate man. Too many doctors treat the disease or the illness and not the patient.”
“Like Dr. Davenport,” I said.
“What?” She paused as though she had just realized I had been walking with her. “Oh. Well, not exactly. I mean, Dr. Davenport cares for his patients. He just views them as more of a . . . a challenge. That’s not a bad thing, either, Fern. He takes his failures very personally, not that he fails that much, but when he does, when he loses a patient, he’s very difficult to live with, I’m sure.”
“I doubt Bea even notices or cares,” I said.
We had reached the dock. The Davenports’ motorboat bobbed in the water next to a pair of rowboats as the strong early-evening breeze stirred the lake. It wasn’t overcast any longer, however. The winds had blown the storm farther north. Mr. Stark was always giving us weather reports. I think it rubbed off on me.
“Dr. Davenport had given Dr. Bliskin permission to use his boat anytime he could. The Davenports didn’t have as elaborate a boat back then, but it was quite nice.”
“Did you go on it with Dr. Bliskin?”
“Once. I brought you along, too. You were only six months old. You were quite fascinated, even at that young age,” she said, and looked out at the lake.
The breeze toyed with her hair. She brushed some strands from her eyes and kept that soft smile, what Mr. Stark called her “clotted-cream English smile,” on her face. At the moment, her jewel eyes sparkled.
My mother was very beautiful, I thought, far more beautiful than Bea Davenport or any of her posh friends, for that matter. Why hadn’t Dr. Davenport seen that and, instead of having himself fixed up with the hospital administrator’s daughter, probably to continue his meteoric climb to the head of cardiology, married my mother instead? To me, his marrying Bea was the same as selling your soul to the devil.
“Everything’s going to be all right, Fern,” my mother said, as if she had just heard the lake whisper it in the breeze. “Just let a little time pass. The amount of harm done to us in this life is proportional to how we accept it. That was the one lesson I permitted my father to teach me.”
“What does that mean?”
“When you’re young, everything is far more dramatic. A pimple on your face is as bad as a scar. If age does anything worthwhile, it certainly is the way it thickens your skin, hardens your resolve, and helps you endure disappointments and defeats. That’s the conundrum, our riddle we have to solve as human beings. Would you rather remain young and vulnerable or grow older and wiser and calmer?”
“What’s your choice, Mummy?”
She widened her smile and nodded at the lake, at some memory, for sure. “It’s a common tragedy we share, I guess. We’d rather be young and suffer emotional pains. What’s that quote? ‘’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.’ ”
Why was she talking about love?
She put her arm around me, but I was thinking she was doing it for herself more than for me. She was suddenly more vulnerable than I had ever seen her. I wondered if this was the moment when I could get her to reveal who my father was. It was on my lips to ask, but I had a terrible sense of guilt taking advantage of her, too. I couldn’t do it.
“Let’s go back,” she said. “You probably have homework to do.”
We walked like that for a while, slowly, her arm still around my shoulders. Wyndemere loomed ahead of us. It always seemed to be looking down at me. It was never just there. It was always towering, impressive, and demanding respect. It was the only world I had known. I wanted to hate it. I often did, but now more than ever.
And yet I couldn’t deny the power it held over me, over us all. It gave us a special sense of security. It was like a fortress, full of secrets, yes, and visited daily by the winds of family turmoil. But I recalled when I was very little and was permitted to follow my mother about that the chandeliers drove back the darkness, and the halls were filled with the laughter and conversations of the important political and social guests, all dressed in tuxedos and gowns, glittering with expensive jewelry. To me, it was more like a castle, a house of fantasies. It was no wonder that invitations to a Davenport event were highly prized and sought. It was no wonder that my classmates and people I met in the community wanted to know more about Wyndemere. Maybe that was why it was no wonder that my mother hadn’t left or still didn’t talk of doing so.
Back in my room, I did my homework but occasionally paused and thought about Ryder, surely sulking in his room. I was afraid to reveal that I knew what he was suffering, that I had eavesdropped on Dr. Davenport reprimanding him. I thought he might be embarrassed, and I would only bring him more pain. In the end, I decided it was better that he tell me anything he thought I should know.
I dreaded tomorrow, beginning with him sullenly getting into the limousine with Sam and then later at school, when surely the famous second shoe would be dropped, and we’d all know more about what was going to happen to Paul and Barry and anyone else tied to the prom-night events. How many would resent me—and Ryder, for that matter? What would our teachers have learned, and how would they act toward us? What would Alison be like? Would she spread stories about me now? Those who had been envious of me would bask in the nasty comments. I would read that forever dreaded question on the faces of many. Why expect anything better from an illegitimate child who couldn’t be sure who among all her mother’s lovers was her father?
My mother came in to check on me, and then she went to bed. Slowly, I did the same, trying to hold back time. The faster I went to sleep, the faster morning would come. Maybe I would pretend I was sick and not go to school, but then I thought it would be worse to stay home. Nothing would change by skipping a day.
I slipped under my blanket and stared up at the dark ceiling, where some of the full moonlight was streaking along it and down the wall to my right. If there really were ghosts in Wyndemere, tonight was going to be a party night for them for sure.
I closed my eyes and began to drift into a welcoming sleep. I didn’t know how long I was asleep before I heard something that snapped my eyes open again. The shadow I saw moving toward me did look ghostly. I was about to scream just before it moved into a slight glow of the starlight, and I saw it was Ryder.
I knew that, especially now, this visit was strictly forbidden, that he was defying his father and Bea and risking getting himself into even more trouble, but I didn’t want to say it.
I sat up quickly. He was in his robe and slippers. He didn’t say anything at first. He simply sat near my legs and leaned forward, taking the posture of Rodin’s famous sculpture The Thinker. I reached for his left hand, lying on his knee. He turned to me slowly, his face pale in the starlight coming through my open window.
“I won’t be riding with you on the bus,” he said.
“I told you that would be all right, Ryder. I won’t let anyone bother me.”
“You tell me who does,” he said. “I’ll deal with them.”
“Right. I get you into more trouble and give Bea more ammunition.”
I was still holding his hand. He looked down at our hands and put his right hand over mine. “I’ll tell you what my mistake was, Fern. My mistake was not taking you to the prom myself.”
I couldn’t speak. Had I heard correctly?
He lowered himself beside me. I moved over slightly. He pulled himself up so he was able to share part of my pillow, and he turned fully on his back.
“I always wondered what it would be like sleeping here. Did your mother ever tell you that I often cried to have a sleepover night when I was about six and you were about four?”
“No.”
“It always seemed like an adventure to follow your mother into this section of Wyndemere. I think I thought I was going to another country or something.”
“You were; you are.”
“I’d probably be better off,” he said. “I had a bad fight with my father and Bea. He’s forbidden me to go anywhere on weekends and is telling Parker not to take me anywhere until I basically kowtow to Bea. He’s rescinded his promise to buy me a car on my birthday until he’s confident I’ll be obedient and respect whatever Bea tells me.”
“Do whatever you have to, Ryder. Don’t defy her just for me.”
He turned. “That’s the best reason to defy her,” he said. He raised himself a bit and suddenly kissed me on the neck. The warm electric feeling shot through my breast to the pit of my stomach so quickly that it took my breath away. When I turned slightly to him, he brought his lips to mine. It wasn’t a kiss so much as a soft brush of his lips, and then he lowered his head and brought his mouth to my chest, nudging the buttons of my pajama top open with his fingers, his lips traveling between my breasts first and then to my nipples. He turned his face so the fullness of my breast was against his cheek. Then he rose again and kissed me on the lips, this time a long kiss.
I hadn’t moaned; I hadn’t spoken. It seemed more like one of my fantasies. The moment I uttered a sound, it would go away. He wouldn’t be in my room. I would realize I had dreamed it all.
But he didn’t disappear when I said his name. Instead, he twisted himself around, slipping under my blanket, and embraced me. When he pressed himself against me now, I felt his hardness and shuddered. His hands were on my waist. I was excited, happy, but frightened, too. He lay like that for a while, his head now resting on my shoulder.
“I guess I’ve shocked you,” he whispered.
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s all right. I’m glad you kissed me, touched me.”
He lifted his head and kissed me on the tip of my nose. “I’m angry and frustrated,” he said. “I almost wish Bea would come walking through that door and find us together.”
A frightening thought came to me. “You’re not doing this for that reason, are you?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe.” He pulled back. “Maybe not. I don’t know. I was thinking about you, imagining myself here beside you. I didn’t hesitate to go down the stairs and come here.”
He sat up when we both heard what sounded like my mother going into the kitchen. Neither of us spoke; both of us were holding our breath. I could hear her footsteps. Would she look in on me to see how I was?
Ryder moved very, very slowly, lifting the blanket away. Then he slipped off my bed and lowered himself to the floor just as my mother opened my door. I had pulled my blanket up and turned on my side. I didn’t move. She was standing there watching me. Seconds felt like minutes, but finally she closed the door softly and returned to her bedroom.
Ryder rose. “That was close,” he whispered. “I’d better get back. I’ll be waiting for you in the school lobby when the bus arrives tomorrow.”
“Okay,” I said.
He started for the door.
“Ryder,” I whispered.
He turned back. “What?”
“I’m glad you came here tonight. For whatever reason.”
“Me, too,” he said, and quietly opened the door and slipped away.
Go on, Fern, I challenged myself. Just try to fall asleep.