Feather on the Moon Page 2

  With Larry dead, and Debbie gone, I’d moved into my parents’ home. They needed me and I needed them as I tried to pick up the pieces of my life. I joined groups of other parents like me—it seemed terrible that there were enough of us to form “groups.” Part of our work was to educate parents who still had their children—to teach others to guard and protect, yet without instilling destructive fear.

  In the living room we’d all been still for a while. Silence was normal in this house, when it came to a lack of speech, though my father could sometimes be noisy without realizing it. My mother had the memory of sound that she would never lose, and she was careful of pot-banging in the kitchen, careful not to turn up the television, lest it be too loud without her knowing it.

  In the silence my father had been thinking. Now he signed, asking a question: “Where place you go?”

  I got out the atlas and we looked for Canada’s British Columbia—for Vancouver Island, which is separate from the city of Vancouver across the water. Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, clings to the lower tip of the island, close to the United States, with the Strait of Juan de Fuca between. Vancouver Island is the largest island on the Pacific coast, stretching north for two hundred and eighty-five miles along the coast of mainland Canada.

  Mother had read about Victoria. “Very beautiful. British influence. Many flowers and gardens,” she told me, interpreting for my father.

  Dad flung signs at me in warning. “Planes. Dangerous. Go train.”

  I smiled at him and nodded. It was better to agree and not upset him. Mother would bring him around. All I wanted was for the days to pass until mail came from that far island and I could be on my way.

  I didn’t tell them the strange thing Mrs. Corinthea Arles had said—that she didn’t want the little girl in Victoria to be mine. That was something I could only deal with when circumstances had been explained to me and I had seen the child.

  2

  In my anxious state of mind, the flight from Kennedy Airport seemed endless. All I could do while the plane ate up the miles was read and nap a little, and try not to think of what might lie ahead.

  I’d had an exchange of letters and phone calls with Mrs. Arles and was now familiar with her expensive stationery that bore the name RADBURN HOUSE at the top. Her “references” were of course superior. I’d learned that she was a widow, and that her husband’s family had once owned an important printing house in Vancouver. Radburn was her maiden name, so the house where she lived belonged to her side of the family.

  There was no question about her background of wealth and respectability. All this reassured me, in spite of her continued warning that the child in question was unlikely to be mine. So far, I knew no more about the little girl than I had in the beginning—not even the name by which she was called. Mrs. Arles would discuss nothing until she could talk with me face to face, though she’d made one troubling request.

  “It’s best if you don’t use your own name when you come, Mrs. Blake. Perhaps your maiden name would serve?”

  I was Jennifer Blake, but my friends called me Jenny, so I told her I would be Jenny Thorne.

  By the time we landed in Seattle it was late afternoon, and I had just enough time to board a small plane for the half-hour flight to Victoria. We flew over water dotted with wooded islands that would have been interesting to see, if only I could have kept my mind quiet and my heart from thudding.

  Mrs. Arles had told me on the phone that her car would meet me, and as I waited in the small airport building a dark-haired, muscular man, probably in his late thirties, approached to ask if I was Mrs. Thorne. An impressive pirate’s mustache drooped on each side of his mouth, but I couldn’t see his eyes because of smoky dark glasses. He wore a gray uniform and chauffeur’s cap, and while his manner was courteous, there seemed a slight flourish to his movements. I had the curious sense that he might be performing the role of chauffeur. He touched his cap, told me his name was Kirk, and took over capably with my bags as he led the way outdoors.

  The air of mid-September seemed wonderfully clean and fresh, and the grounds about the airport displayed colorful plantings and emerald spreads of lawn. Mountains on Vancouver Island were visible to the west; the Gulf Islands to the east.

  “This way, Mrs. Thorne.” Kirk gestured toward an elderly gray Mercedes that was probably a valuable antique. Once or twice he had given me a direct look that was out of character for this “role” he played, and I began to be curious about him.

  “Have you been with Mrs. Arles for long?” I asked as he opened the door of the car for me.

  He answered cryptically, “Long enough,” and I must have looked surprised, for he grinned and touched his cap again in an apology that wasn’t entirely genuine.

  “Sorry, madam. I haven’t really been on this job for all that long. Only about six weeks, so I’m still learning.”

  His manner might be just short of impertinent, yet it was somehow engaging. As though he played a good-natured joke.

  “An actor out of work?” I guessed.

  He started to laugh and then restrained himself. “You’re way off, Mrs. Thorne. But I’m an expert driver, and that’s all Mr. Dillow has required.”

  He waited for me to get into the back seat, and I settled into leather luxury while he went around to store my bags in the trunk.

  The well-paved highway to Victoria cut inland, with traffic coming toward us from the city, heading out to suburban homes after work. At times, tall stands of fir or cedar followed the road, so that I had the sense of a north country. The airport was surrounded by farms—market gardens for the city.

  Perhaps Kirk could be a source of information about the house I was to visit, and I tried a question.

  “This is my first visit to Victoria, and I’m not acquainted with Radburn House. Who is Mr. Dillow?”

  The chauffeur answered readily. “He manages the house, and I guess he’s been in the service of the family for years. He’s more than a butler. He’s secretary, housekeeper, sometimes nurse—name it, and that’s what Elbert Dillow does. Since Mrs. Arles had her stroke, he runs everything.”

  I hadn’t known she’d had a stroke. On the telephone Corinthea Arles had sounded vigorous and very much in charge.

  “She’s recovered, hasn’t she?”

  “Some, I suppose. I don’t see much of her, except to take her for a drive once in a while, but she seems to be a pretty powerful lady, even in a wheelchair.”

  “Who else makes up the family?” I asked.

  He didn’t seem to mind my questions, and as he answered he kept his attention properly on the road. “There’s just the old man left, it seems. Mrs. Arles’s younger brother. Which doesn’t make him very young. Mr. Dillow claims he’s a little daft and they hide him away up on the third floor.”

  “And there’s no one else in the house?”

  “You said family.” His tone changed and I sensed hesitation. “Right now there’s a visiting magician and his wife and child.”

  “Visiting magician?”

  Kirk, whose last name I had yet to learn, experienced a sudden attack of propriety. “Mr. Dillow and Mrs. Arles had better answer your questions. I’m too new on the job, madam.”

  Thus reproved, I kept still for a time, though propriety was not my governing virtue. I didn’t need to ask whether the child was a boy or a girl, or how old she was. I knew. But that her “father” was a magician sounded somehow both ominous and promising. The word had an itinerant, circusy ring—people who might easily snatch a child and disappear.

  After a time Kirk spoke again. “We’re in Victoria now, Mrs. Thorne, and since the sun’s going down the lights will be on. We’ll drive along Government Street, so you’ll catch the nighttime view. There—look ahead—you can see the Parliament Buildings.”

  The sight was dramatic. A wide spread of stone buildings, all etched in light, stood against the darkening sky. The tall central dome, and every smaller dome, column, window, all glowed with do
ts of gold—like a stage set.

  Kirk took on the role of guide. “The Victorian architect who designed those buildings—Francis Rattenbury—was mixed up in a sex and drug scandal and went off to England, where he was murdered by his wife’s lover. Pretty colorful stuff! Look over there across the corner of the Inner Harbor, Mrs. Thorne—that’s another grandiose Rattenbury creation. The Empress Hotel.”

  These tidbits were delivered in what managed to be a mock-respectful tone. As though Kirk knew himself out-of-order, and enjoyed stepping over lines.

  The hotel, set at a right angle to the Parliament Buildings, was immensely impressive—massive, sturdy, foursquare, its front covered with ivy.

  “The Empress dates back to early in the century. When you go sightseeing, you’ll visit it and catch a glimpse of the way things used to be in the days when retired British colonists came here from India.”

  Sections of slate rose steeply, with rows of peaked windows, and corner towers with their own vertical roofs. All the front of the hotel shone in the glow of spotlights, and the central facade gleamed a warm amber. Tall letters above the door spelled EMPRESS in white lights that were large enough to read as we drove along.

  The lights of all the buildings were reflected in harbor waters, multiplying the effect.

  My interest was passing, only momentary. I wasn’t here for sightseeing, and what lay outside this car couldn’t matter to me for long. In a little while we would arrive at Radburn House, and after that there could be a meeting at any time with the child who might be my daughter. But I mustn’t anticipate and make up imaginary scripts. It was better, for now, to talk to the man who was driving me.

  “Are you from Victoria?”

  “I’m from all over,” he told me lightly.

  Obviously, he wasn’t going to talk about himself. I was silent again as we left the central buildings of the city behind, following a long street where rows of lighted houses stood side by side, fronted and separated by gardens. The street climbed and the car wound its way toward the top of a hill that must command a splendid view in the daytime. Houses and streets were left behind as the car’s headlights picked out a winding drive that climbed toward a structure commanding the hilltop.

  “Here we are,” Kirk said, and I looked out to see the house that was to figure in my life for a longer period than I expected.

  The front grounds were lighted, and there were lights in several tall windows. At first the house seemed narrow and cramped, but as I left the car and Kirk brought my bags around to steps that mounted from the side, I saw that it widened and ran back a considerable distance. There were two main stories, and a smaller addition that added a third floor at the top.

  “Do you like gardens, Mrs. Thorne?” Kirk asked as we mounted the steps. “I expect you know that Victoria’s a city of gardens, but Mrs. Arles’s private garden is something special. It drops down a level or so at the back, and runs along the hill. Mr. Dillow says her parents planted it early in the century.”

  I did indeed like gardens, thanks to my father, but now the front door of the house had opened upon the entry porch, and my attention was held.

  A man who could only be Elbert Dillow stood in the lighted doorway—a small man, dressed in black, probably in his late fifties, with a straggle of graying hair around his otherwise bald head. His bright dark eyes examined me sharply, and I had an immediate sense of dignity, as well as an air of competence and authority that would compensate for his slight size.

  “Good evening, Mrs. Thorne,” he said. “Please come in. I am Dillow.” Apparently I was to dispense with the “mister.” He nodded to Kirk. “Just take Mrs. Thorne’s bags up to her room. You know which one?”

  The chauffeur’s manner was properly restrained again as he picked up my bags and went into the house.

  “Perhaps you would like to go to your room first, Mrs. Thorne?” Dillow asked. “Then Mrs. Arles wishes to greet you. She would like you to dine with her tonight.”

  This seemed fine, and I stepped into a lighted foyer, where a lower hall reached back behind the stairs, with doors opening down its length. Ahead, a staircase, carpeted in dark red, rose to a landing. Polished golden oak banisters ran upward, wide to my hand, with wings curving right and left. When I took the right-hand stairs at Dillow’s direction, I could look down toward the entryway to see two long stained glass windows on either side of the front door, gleaming blue and ruby red under electric lights.

  “Your room is at the front, Mrs. Thorne,” Dillow said behind me.

  The upper hallway was dimly lighted, but a door stood open and lamplight welcomed me. Kirk placed my largest bag on a luggage rack at the foot of a double bed and bowed slightly as he passed me and went quickly away. At another time I would have been very curious about that young man.

  The butler cast a critical eye about the room and seemed to find everything in order. The bathroom across the hall would be mine, he said, and moved toward the door.

  “I won’t be long,” I told him. “Where will I find Mrs. Arles?”

  “Just come down the stairs, Mrs. Thorne. Since Mrs. Arles’s illness she prefers to stay in a first-floor room that overlooks the garden at the rear and is more convenient. The door will be open.”

  When he’d gone I stood staring around the spacious, turn-of-the-century room. The walls, which had probably been papered when the house was built, were painted a pleasing blue-gray that reached to an oak picture rail. Above that, the strip of wall blended into the ceiling—a pale fawn color.

  Patterned red Turkestan rugs lay scattered upon the dark parquet floor, at the foot of the bed and at the sides. A fireplace with an oak mantel, again dark and golden, had been set with, wood, though no fire was needed as yet. Long windows on each side of a french door were framed with flowered blue draperies. I opened the door to step outside, where carved wooden railings enclosed the small private porch. Beyond, the view was tremendous. I could look toward city lights and follow the shining, spangled water of the harbor where it cut into a right angle before the Empress Hotel and the Parliament Buildings.

  Immediately below was the driveway, curving down from the house. I could look out upon one side to the steps by which I’d entered, and on the other to a rock garden that ran along the outside of the house. Daylight was nearly gone, and the evening was cool, so I went back inside.

  When I stepped into the hall to look for the indicated bathroom, I heard a sound at the far end and saw that a man stood under a dim overhead light, leaning on a banister of the back stairs. I couldn’t make him out clearly, but he seemed to be watching me.

  “Hello,” I called.

  He didn’t answer but hurried away up the stairs. Was this Mrs. Arles’s younger brother, who had been referred to as “daft”?

  When I’d washed in the old-fashioned bathroom that still displayed a tub on claw feet, I returned to my room to change from slacks to a gray skirt. A blouse came reasonably unwrinkled from my suitcase and the citron color cheered me a little.

  It seemed to me that the reflection in the mirror as I combed my short brown hair bore little resemblance to the way I’d looked seven years ago, when Debbie was taken. I’d been heavier then, and my hair had hung below my shoulders. Now my eyes looked wide and shadowed in the glass and my expression had an anxious cast. I turned away, not liking what I saw.

  Too much that was important hung on this meeting with Mrs. Arles, and a sense of panic was ready to stir in me at the very thought of meeting the child who lived in this house. So far I’d seen no one except the man on the stairs, and I wanted no sudden chance encounter until I had talked with Corinthea Arles.

  On the first floor I walked past a spacious dining room, where the table was unset. At the rear of the hall I caught the flicker of firelight through an open door. Mrs. Arles heard me and called to me to come in.

  The big room I stepped into was a library, now adapted to a different purpose because of need. Books still lined two walls, and walnut paneling around t
he rest of the room made it dark in spite of lamps and spears of flame in the grate. An old-fashioned bed had replaced other furniture, its headboard high and carved with grape clusters and leaves. A dressing table and bureau had further changed the room from a library. Near the fire that made the room seem overly warm to me sat a woman in a wheelchair. As I hesitated in the doorway, she turned her head to greet me.

  “Thank you for coming, Mrs. Thorne. I am Corinthea Arles. Please come and sit down. No one else is home just now to interrupt us. I’ve seen to that.”

  Apparently the man I’d glimpsed on the stairs didn’t count, any more than Dillow did.

  Even in a wheelchair Mrs. Arles looked thoroughly in charge. Light from the fire played over her thin nose with its delicate aristocratic nostrils, and upon rouge-touched lips that might have been full, if the habit of suppressing all smiles hadn’t long ago been imprinted. Her gray hair shone like dark silver and was waved high and pinned with amber combs. Cut in an ageless princess style, her garnet-red robe had been embroidered with touches of gold at the collar and in the looped frog closings. I had an immediate impression of pride that would probably govern this woman in all things.

  As I took her outstretched hand, feeling its sculptured bones in my own, I was aware of a light scent of violets—sweet but faint. None of this perfection of grooming was for me, I was sure. I suspected that when Corinthea Arles was entirely alone she would give just such attention to personal details for her own satisfaction.

  At her invitation I sat down in an armless slipper chair on the other side of the hearth and waited for whatever pleasantries about my trip would begin our conversation. I was to learn quickly that Mrs. Arles never bothered with such conventions. She studied me for a moment, her expression neither approving nor disapproving. She must have been in her early seventies, but her face was so surprisingly unlined that I was reminded of a mask. Only her dark eyes flashed with a light she couldn’t altogether conceal.