Petals on the Wind

  "How could I forget? That little catalog was the one thing you took of yours that wasn't clothes, when we went to Foxworth Hall. And every time he swatted a fly, or killed a spider, Paul, Chris would long to have a John Cuff microscope. And once he said he wanted to be the Mouseman of the Attic, and discover for himself why mice die so young."

  "Do mice die young?" asked Paul seriously. "How did you know they were young? Did you capture baby ones, and mark them in some way?"

  Chris and I met eyes. Yeah, we'd lived in another world back when we were young and imprisoned, so that we could look at the mice who came to steal and nibble on our food, especially the one named Mickey.

  Now I had to go back to New York and face Julian's wrath. But first I had to have a little time alone with my brother. Paul took Henny and Carrie to a movie while Chris and I strolled the campus of his university. "And you see that window up there on the second floor, the fifth from the end there--that was my room I shared with Hank. We had a study group of eight guys, and all through college and med school we stuck together, and studied together, and when we dated, we dated together."

  "Oh," I sighed. "Did you date a lot?"

  "Only on the weekends. The study schedule was too heavy for socializing during the week. None of it was easy, Cathy. There's so much to know, physics, biology, anatomy, chemistry, and I could go on and on."

  "You're not telling me what I want to hear. Who did you date? Was there, or is there, someone special?"

  He caught my hand and drew me closer to his side. "Well, should I begin to list them one by one, and by name? If I did it would take several hours. If there had been someone special, all I would do is name one--and I can't do that. I liked them all . . . but I didn't like any well enough to love, if that's what you want to know."

  Yes, that was exactly what I wanted to know. "I'm sure you didn't live a celibate life, even though you didn't fall in love. .

  "That's none of your business," he said lightly.

  "I think it is. It would give me peace to know you had a girl you loved."

  "I do have a girl I love," he answered. "I've known her all my life. When I go to sleep at night, I dream of her, dancing overhead, calling my name, kissing my cheek, screaming when she has

  nightmares, and I wake up to take the tar from her hair. There are times when 1 wake up to ache all over, as she aches all over, and I dream I kiss the marks the whip made . . . and I dream of a certain night when she and I went out on the cold slate roof and stared up at the sky, and she said the moon was the eye of God looking down and condemning us for what we were. So there, Cathy, is the girl who haunts me and rules me, and fills me with frustrations, and darkens all the hours I spend with other girls who just can't live up to the standards she set. And I hope to God you're satisfied."

  I turned to move as in a dream, and in that dream I put my arms about him and stared up into his face, his beautiful face that haunted me too. "Don't love me, Chris. Forget about me. Do as I do, take whomever knocks first on your door, and let her in."

  He smiled ironically and put me quickly from him. "I did exactly what you did, Catherine Doll, the first who knocked on my door was let in--and now I can't drive her out. But that's my problem--not yours."

  "I don't deserve to be there. I'm not an angel, not a saint . . . you should know that."

  "Angel, saint, Devil's spawn, good or evil, you've got me pinned to the wall and labeled as yours until the day I die. And if you die first, then it won't be long before I follow."

  Gathering Shadows

  . Both Chris and Paul, to say nothing of Carrie, persuaded me to go back to Clairmont and spend a few days with my family. When I was there, surrounded by all the cozy comforts, the charm of the house and the gardens had their chance to beguile me again. I told myself this was the way it would have been if I'd married Paul. No problems. A sweet, easy life. Then, when I let myself wonder how Julian was faring, I thought of all the mean and spiteful ways he had of annoying me by opening my mail from Paul or Chris, as if he were looking for incriminating evidence. No doubt when he flew back from Spain, he'd deliberately let my house plants die as a way to punish me.

  There must be something weird about me, I was thinking as I stood on the balcony overlooking Paul's magnificent gardens. I wasn't that beautiful, or that unforgettable, or that indispensable, to any man. I stayed there and let Chris come up behind me and put his arm about my shoulders. I leaned my head against him and sighed, staring up at the moon. The same old moon that had known our shame before, still there to witness more. I didn't do anything; I swear I didn't, just let his arm stay about me. Maybe I moved a little to contour myself against him when he had me in a tight embrace. "Cathy, Cathy," he groaned, pressing his lips down into my hair, "sometimes life just doesn't have any meaning without you. I'd throw away my M.D. and set out for the South Pacific if you'd go with me. . . ."

  "And leave Carrie?"

  "We could take her with us." I thought he was playing a game of wishing, like we had when children. "I'd buy a sail boat and take out tourists, and if they cut themselves I'd have all the training to bandage their cuts." He kissed me then with the fervor of a man gone wild from denial. I didn't want to respond, yet I did, making him gasp as he tried to coax me into his room.

  "Stop!" I cried. "I don't want you except as a brother! Leave me alone! Go find someone else!"

  Dazed and hurt-looking, he backed off. "What kind of woman are you anyway, Cathy? You returned my kisses--you responded in every way you could-- and now you draw away and pull the virtuous act!"

  "Hate me then!"

  "Cathy, I could never hate you." He smiled at me bitterly. "There are times when I want to hate you, times when I think you are just the same as our mother, but I don't ever stop loving once I start!" He entered his room and slammed the door, leaving me speechless, staring after him

  No! I wasn't like Momma, I wasn't! I'd responded only because I was still seeking my lost identity. Julian stole my reflection and made it his. Julian wanted to steal my strength and call it his own; he wanted me to make all the decisions, so he couldn't be blamed when a mistake was made. I was still trying to prove my worth, so in the end I could disprove the grandmother's condemnation. See, Grandmother, I am not bad or evil. Or else everyone wouldn't love me so much. I was still that selfish, ravenous, demanding attic mouse who had to have it proven time and time again that I was worthy enough to live in the sunlight.

  I was thinking about this one day when I was on the back veranda, and Carrie was planting pansies she'd grown from seed, and beside her were little pots with tiny petunia settings. Chris came out from the house and tossed me the evening newspaper. "There's an article in there that might be of some interest to you," he said in an off-hand way. "I thought about not showing it to you, but then I decided I should."

  The husband and wife ballet team of Julian Marquet and Catherine Dahl, our own local

  celebrities, seems to have parted company. For the first time Julian Marquet will partner a ballerina other than his wife in a major television production of Giselle. It has been rumored about that Miss Dahl is ill, and also rumored that the ballet team are about to split.

  There was more to read, including the fact that Yolanda Lange was to replace me! This was our big chance--another of many, to make stars of ourselves, and he was putting Yolanda in my part! Damn him1 Why didn't he grow up? Every chance we had he blew it. He couldn't lift Yolanda easily, not with his bad back.

  Chris threw me a strange look before he asked, "What are you going to do about it?" I yelled back, "Nothing!" For a second or two he didn't say anything.

  "Cathy, he didn't want you to come to my graduation, did he? And that's why he's put Yolanda in your role. I warned you not to let him be your manager. Madame Zolta would have treated you more fairly."

  I got up to pace the porch. Our original contract with Madame Z. had expired two years ago, and all we owed her now was twelve performances a year. The rest of the time Julian and I
were freelance, and could dance with whatever company we chose.

  Let Julian have Yolanda. Let him make a fool of himself--I hoped to God he dropped her! Let him have all his teeny-bopper playmates for sex games . . . I didn't care. Then I was running in the house and up to my bedroom where I flung myself face down and bawled.

  Everything was made worse by the fact that I had made a secret trip to the gynecologist the day before. Two missed periods didn't really mean anything for a woman like me, who was so irregular. I might not be pregnant; it might be just another false alarm . . . and if it wasn't, I prayed I'd have the strength to go through with an abortion! I didn't need a baby in my life. I knew once I had a child, he or she would become the center of my world, and luv would again spoil a ballerina who could have been the best.

  Ballet music was in my head when I drove Chris's car to visit Madame Marisha one hot spring day when all the world seemed sleepy and lazy except for those idiot children being instructed by a shrill little bat wearing black, as always. I sat in the shadows near the far wall of a huge auditorium and watched the large class of boys and girls dance. It was scary to think of how soon those girls would grow up to replace the stars of the present. Then I too would become another Madame Marisha and the years would flow like seconds, until I was Madame Zolta, and all my beauty would be preserved only in old, faded photographs.

  "Catherine!" called Madame M. joyfully when she spied me. She came striding swiftly, gracefully my way. "Why do you sit in shadows?" she asked. "How nice to see your lovely face again. And don't think I don't know why you look so sad! You're one big fool to leave Julian! He's a big baby; you know he can't be left alone or he does things to hurt himself, and when he hurts himself, he hurts you too! Why did you let him get control of management? Why did you let him burn up your money as fast as it hits your pockets? I tell you this, in your place, I would never, never have let him put another in my role of Giselle!"

  God, what a blabbermouth he was!

  "Don't worry about me, Madame," I said coolly. "if my husband doesn't want me for his partner anymore, I'm sure there will be others who will."

  She scowled, advanced. She put those bony hands on me and shook me as if to wake me up. Up close, I could see she'd aged terribly since Georges had died. Her ebony hair was almost white now, and streaked with charcoal. She snarled then, baring teeth whiter than they used to be and far more perfect. "You gonna let my son make a fool of you? You let him put another dancer in your place? I gave you credit for having more backbone! Now you hightail it back to New York and push that Yolanda out of his life! Marriage is sacred, and wedding vows are meant to be kept!"

  Then she softened and said, "Come now, Catherine," and led me into her small cluttered office. "Now you tell me about this foolishness going on between you and your husband!"

  "It is really none of your business!"

  She swung another straight chair to where she could straddle it. Leaning forward upon her arms, she stabbed me with her hard penetrating glare. "Anything, and everything concerning my son is my business!" she snapped. "Now you just sit there and keep quiet, and let me tell you what you don't know about your husband." Her voice turned a little kinder. "I was older than Georges when we were married, and even so I dared putting off having a child until I believed the best of my career was behind me, and then I became pregnant. Georges never wanted a child to hold him down, and back, and so, from the beginning Julian had two strikes against him

  "I tell myself we didn't force the dance upon our son, but we did keep him with us, so the ballet became part of his world, the most important part." She sighed heavily and wiped a bony hand over her troubled brow. "We were strict with him, I admit that. We did everything we could to make him what was perfect in our eyes, but the more we tried, the more determined he became to be everything we didn't want him to be. We tried to teach him perfect diction, so he ended up mocking us with all kinds of vulgar street language-- gutter talk, Georges called it. You know," she went on with a wistful expression, "only after my husband was dead and buried did I realize that he never spoke to our son unless it was an order not to do something, or an order to improve his dancing technique. I never realized that Georges could have been jealous of his own son, seeing that he was a better dancer and would achieve more fame It wasn't easy for me to become only a ballet mistress, and for Georges to be only an instructor. Many a night we lay on our bed and held to each other, craving the applause, the adulation. . . . It was a hunger that would not be satisfied until we heard the applause for our son."

  Again she paused, and birdlike craned her neck to peer at me and see if I was paying full attention. Oh, yes, she had my attention. She was telling me so much I needed to know.

  "Julian tried to hurt Georges and Georges got hurt because Julian made light of his father's reputation. One day he called him only a second-class performer. Georges didn't speak to his own son for a whole month! They never got back together after that. Farther and farther they drifted apart . . . until one fine Christmas Day when another prodigy drifted into our lives, and offered herself. You! Julian had flown back to visit us, only because I had pleaded with him to try and make it up with his father . . . and Julian saw you.

  "It is our responsibility to pass along our skills of technique to the younger generation, and still I felt some apprehension in taking you on, mostly because I thought you would hurt my son. I don't know why I thought that, but it seemed obvious from the very start, it was that older doctor you loved. Then I thought you had something very rare, a passion for the dance that is seldom seen. You were, in your own way, equal to what Julian was, and the two of you together were so sensational I couldn't believe my eyes. My son felt it too, the rapport between you two. You turned those big, soft, admiring blue eyes on him, so later he came and told me you were a sex kitten who would fall easily under his spell and into his arms. He and I always had a close relationship, and he confessed to me what other boys would have kept secret."

  She paused, flicked her stony eyes over me and went on breathlessly, "You came, you admired him, you loved him when you were dancing with him, and when you weren't, you were indifferent. The harder you were to win, the more determined he was to have you. I thought you clever, playing a skillful woman's game when you were only a child! And now you, you . . . you go and leave him when he was in a foreign country, when he couldn't speak the language, when you should have learned he has weaknesses, many of them, and that he cannot bear to be alone!"

  She jumped up like a black, scrawny alleycat and stood above me. "Without Julian to give you inspiration and enhance your talent with his own, where would you be? Without him would you be in New York, dancing with what is fast becoming one of the leading ballet companies? No! You'd be here, raising babies for that doctor. God knows why you said yes to Julian, and how you can keep from loving him. For he tells me you don't, and never have! So you drug him. You leave him. You take off to see your brother become a doctor, when you know damn well your place is at your husband's side, making him happy and taking care of his wants!

  "Yes! Yes!" she shrilled, "he called me long distance and told me everything! Now he thinks he hates you! Now he wants to cut you off. And when he does, he won't have a heart left to keep him alive! For he gave you his heart years and years ago!"

  Slowly I rose to my feet; my legs felt weak and trembly. I brushed a hand over my aching forehead, and held back tired tears. All of a sudden it hit me hard, I did love Julian! Now I saw how very much we were alike, him with his hate for his father who had denied him as a son. And me with my hatred for my mother, making me do crazy things, like sending off hateful letters and Christmas cards to sadden her life and never, never let her find peace. Julian in competition with his father, never knowing he'd won, and was better . . . and me in competition with my mother-- but I had yet to prove myself better. "Madame, I am going to tell you something Julian might not know, and I didn't really know until today; I do love your son. Perhaps I always loved him, and jus
t couldn't accept it."

  She shook her head, then fired her words like bullets. "If you love him, why did you leave him? Answer me that! You left him because you found out he has a liking for young girls? Fool! All men have yearnings for young girls--but still they go on loving their wives! If you let his desire for young flesh drive you away, you are crazy! Slap his face; kick his behind--tell him to leave those girls alone or you will divorce him! Say all of that, and he will be what you want. But when you say nothing, and act like you don't care, you tell him plainly you don't love him, or want him, or need him!"

  "I'm not his mother, or a priest, or God," I said wearily, sick of all the passion she used. Backing toward the door, I tried to leave. "I don't know if I can keep Julian from young girls, but I'm willing to go back and try. I promise to do better. I'll be more understanding, and I'll let him know I love him so much, I can't abide the thought of him making love to anyone but me."

  She came to take me in her arms. She soothed, "Poor baby, if I have been hard on you, it was for your own good. You have to keep my son from destroying himself. When you save him, you save yourself, for I lied when I said you would be nothing without Julian. He is the one who would be nothing without you! He has a death wish, always I've known it. He thinks he's not good enough to live on because his father could never convince him he was, and that was my fault too, as well as Georges's. Julian waited for years and years for his father to see him as a son, worthy of being loved for himself. He waited equally as long for Georges to say yes, you will be even a better dancer than I was, and I'm proud of what and who you are. But Georges kept his silence. But you go back and tell Julian Georges did love him To me he said it many times. Tell him too that his father was proud of him Tell him, Catherine. Go back and convince him of how much you need and love him Tell him how sorry you are to have left him alone.

  Go quickly before he does something terrible to himself!"