Petals on the Wind

  "There is nothing to suspect. It's over," I answered, but I didn't meet his eyes, guessing, even then, that it would never be over. Oh, Momma, look what you started by putting the four of us in one locked room, and leaving us there to grow up, knowing how it would be! You of all people should have known!

  "Don't," Chris whispered. "Kiss me good night, and there won't be any bedbugs here."

  He kissed me, I kissed him, we said good night, and that was all. With tears in my eyes I watched my brother back down the hall, still holding his eyes on me.

  In our room Carrie let out a loud howl. "I can't sleep in no little bed all by myself!" she wailed. "I'll fall off! Cathy, why is that bed so little?"

  It ended up with Chris and the doctor coming back so they could take away the nightstand that separated the twin beds. Then they shoved the narrow beds so close they appeared one wide bed. This pleased Carrie enormously, but, as the nights passed, somehow the crack between our beds grew ever wider until I, the restless sleeper, finally woke up with one leg and one arm in the crack and Carrie being pulled along with me to the floor.

  I loved that room Paul gave us. It was so beautiful with its pale blue wallpaper, and matching curtains. The rug was blue; each of us had a chair with lemon-yellow cushions and all the furniture was antique white. It was the kind of room a girl should have. No gloom. No pictures of hell on the wall. All the hell I had was in my mind, put there by thinking back much too often. Momma could have found another solution if she'd really wanted to! "She didn't have to lock us up!

  It was greed, avarice, that damned fortune. . . and Cory was in the ground because of her weakness!

  "Forget it, Cathy," said Chris when we were again saying good night.

  I was terribly afraid to tell him what I suspected. My head bowed low against his chest. "Chris, it was a sinful thing we did, wasn't it?"

  "It won't happen again," he said stiffly, then broke away and almost ran down the hall as if I were chasing. I wanted to lead a good life and hurt no one, especially Chris. Even so, I had to leave my bed around midnight and go to Chris. While he slept I crawled in the bed beside him. He wakened when he heard the bedsprings squeak. "Cathy, what the hell are you doing here?"

  "It's raining outside," I whispered. "Just let me lie beside you for a moment or so, and then I'll go away." Neither of us moved, or even breathed. Then without even knowing how it came about, we were in each other's arms and he was kissing me. Kissing with such ardent fervor it made me respond when I didn't want to. It was evil and wrong! Yet I didn't really want him to stop. That sleeping woman inside of me woke up and took over, wanting what he felt he had to have, and I, the thinking, calculating part, pushed him away. "What are you doing? I thought you said this would never happen again. '

  "You came . . ." he said hoarsely.

  "Not for this!"

  "What do you think I'm made of? Steel? Cathy, don't do this again."

  I left him and cried in my own bed, for he was down the hall and not there to waken me if I had a nightmare. No one to comfort me. No one to lend me strength. Then my mother's words came to haunt me with a horrible thought--was I so much like her? Was I going to be the kind of weak, clinging-vine female who always needed a man for protection? No! I was sufficient unto myself!

  I believe it was the next day that Dr. Paul brought me four pictures to hang. Ballerinas in four different positions. For Carrie he brought a milk-glass vase filled with delicate plastic violets. Already he'd learned about Carrie's passion for ail things purple or red. "Do what you can to -make this room yours," he told us. "if you don't like the color scheme, we'll have it changed in the spring." I stared at him. We wouldn't be here, conic spring.

  Carrie sat holding her vase of fake violets while I forced myself to speak up and say what I had to. "Dr. Paul, we won't be here in the spring, so we can't afford to let ourselves become too attached to the rooms you've given us."

  He was in the doorway, ready to depart, but he halted and turned to look back at me. He was tall, six two or more, and his shoulders were so wide they almost filled the doorway.

  "I thought you liked it here," he said in a wistful tone, his dark eyes gone bleak.

  "I do like it here!" I quickly answered. "We all like it here, but we can't take advantage of your good nature forever." He nodded without replying and left, and I turned to see Carrie staring at me with a great deal of animosity.

  Daily the doctor took Carrie to the hospital with him. At first she'd wail and refuse to go unless I went along too. She made up fantastic stories about what they did to her in the hospital, and complained about all the questions they asked her.

  "Carrie, we never tell lies; you know that. The three of us always tell the truth to each other--but we don't go around telling everybody about our past lives upstairs--understand?"

  She stared up at me with those big, haunted eyes. "I don't tell nobody Cory went away to heaven and left me. I don't tell nobody but Dr. Paul."

  "You told him?"

  "I couldn't help it, Cathy," Carrie buried her head in her pillow and cried.

  So now the doctor knew about Cory, and how he was supposed to have died in a hospital from pneumonia. How sad his eyes were that night when he questioned Chris and me, wanting all the details of Cory's illness that ended in his death.

  Chris and I were huddled up close on the living room sofa when Paul said, "I'm very happy to report that arsenic has not done any permanent damage to any of Carrie's organs, as we all feared it might have. Now don't look like that. I haven't let out your secret but I had to tell the lab technicians what to look for. I made up a story about how you'd taken the poison accidentally, and your parents were good friends of mine, and I'm considering making you three my legal wards."

  "Carrie's going to live?" I whispered, drowning in relief.

  "Yes, she'll live--if she doesn't go swinging on trapezes." He smiled again. "I've made appointments for the two of you to be examined tomorrow--by me--unless you have some objections."

  Oh, I had objections! I wasn't keen about taking off my clothes and having him go over me, even if a nurse was there. Chris told me I was silly to think a doctor of forty would get any erotic pleasure from looking at a girl of my age. But when he said it, he was looking the other way, so how could I tell what he was really thinking? Maybe Chris was right, for when I was on that examination table, naked and covered by a paper robe, Dr. Paul didn't seem the same man whose eyes followed me around when we were in the "home" side of his house. He did to me the same things he'd done to Carrie, but asked even more questions. Embarrassing questions.

  "You haven't menstruated in more than two months?"

  "I've never been regular, really! I started when I was twelve, and twice I skipped from three to six months. I used to worry about it, but Chris read up on the subject in one of the medical books Momma brought him, and he told me too many anxieties and too much stress can make a girl miss. You don't think . . I mean . . . there isn't anything wrong with me, is there?"

  "Not that I can tell. You seem normal enough. Too thin, too pale, and you're slightly anemic. Chris is too, but because of his sex not as much as you are. I'm going to prescribe special vitamins for all three of you."

  I was glad when it was over and I could put on my clothes and escape that office where the women who worked for Dr. Paul looked at me so funny.

  I raced back to the kitchen. Mrs. Beech was preparing dinner. Her smile shone big and wide when I came in, lighting up a moon face with skin as slick as oiled rubber. The teeth she displayed were the whitest, most perfect teeth I'd ever seen. "Golly, am I happy that's over!" I said, falling into a chair and picking up a knife to peel potatoes. "I don't like doctors poking me over. I like Dr. Paul better when he's just a man. When he puts on that long white jacket, he also puts a shade over his eyes. Then I can't see what he's thinking. And I'm very good at reading eyes, Mrs. Beech."

  She grinned at me with teasing devilry, then whipped out a pink notepad from the huge squ
are pocket of her starched white apron. With the apron tied about her middle she resembled nothing more than a rolled-up goosedown comforter, waddling about speechless. By now I knew she had a congenital speech defect. Though she was trying to teach Chris, Carrie and me to understand her sign language, as yet none of us had caught on enough to carry on a quick conversation. I think I enjoyed her notes too much-- notes she could write lightning-fast in a very abbreviated style. Doctor says, she'd written, young people need lots of good fresh fruit and vegetables, plenty of lean meat, but go easy on starches and desserts. He wants to put on you muscle not fat.

  Already we'd gained some weight in the two weeks of eating Mrs. Beech's delicious cooking, even Carrie who was so darn finicky. Now she ate with enthusiasm, and for her that was remarkable. So, as I peeled the red potatoes, Mrs. Beech wrote another note when her signals failed to communicate. FairyChild, from now on call me only Henny. No Mrs. Beech.

  She was the first black person I'd known, and though at first I'd felt ill-at-ease with her and a little afraid of her, two weeks of intimacy had taught me much. She was just another human being of another race and color, with the same sensitivities, hopes and fears we all had.

  I loved Henny, her broad smiles, her loose, flowing gowns with flowers blooming riotously, and most of all I loved the wisdom that came from her small pastel paper sheets. Eventually, I did learn to understand her sign language, though I was never as good at it as her "doctor-son."

  Paul Scott Sheffield was a strange man. So often he looked sad when there was no apparent reason for him to be sad. Then he'd smile and say, "Yes, God favored Henny and me that day he pit you three on that bus. I lost one family, and grieved for them, and fate was kind enough to send me another, ready-made family."

  "Chris," I said that evening when we had to reluctantly part, "when we lived in the room upstairs, you were the man, the head of the household. . . . Sometimes it feels funny to have Dr. Paul around, watching what we do and listening to what we say."

  He blushed. "I know. He's taking my place. Be honest," and here he paused and blushed a deeper red, "I don't like him replacing me in your life, but I'm very grateful for what he's done for Carrie."

  Somehow all that our doctor did for us made Momma seem a thousandfold worse in comparison. Ten thousandfold worse!

  The next day was Chris's eighteenth birthday, and though I'd never forget, it surprised me that the doctor had planned a party with many fine gifts that sparkled Chris's eyes, and then saddened them with the guilt both he and I felt. Already we'd accepted so much. Already we had been making plans to leave soon. We just couldn't stay on and take advantage of Dr. Paul's good nature, now that Carrie was well enough to travel on.

  After the party Chris and I sat on the back veranda, mulling this over. One look at his face and I could tell he didn't want to leave the one and only man who could, and would, help him reach his goal of becoming a doctor. "I really don't like the way he keeps looking at you, Cathy. His eyes follow you about all the time. Here you are, so available, and men his age find girls your age irresistible."

  They did? How fascinating to know. "But doctors have plenty of pretty nurses available to them," I said lamely, knowing I would do anything short of murder, to see that Chris reached his goal. "Remember that day we first came? He spoke of the kind of competition we'd be up against in the circus. Chris, he's right. We can't go work for the circus; that's only a silly dream."

  He stared off into space with knitted brows. "I know all of that."

  "Chris, he's just lonely. Maybe he only watches me because there isn't anything else as interesting to watch as me." But how fascinating to know that men of forty were susceptible to girls of fifteen. How wonderful to wield over them the power that my mother had.

  "Chris, if Dr. Paul says the right thing, I mean, if he really honestly wants us, would you stay on?"

  He frowned and studied the hedges he'd so recently clipped. After long consideration he spoke slowly, "Let's give him a test. If we tell him we're leaving, and he doesn't say anything to prevent us, then that will be his polite way to let us know he doesn't really care."

  "Is it fair to test him like that?"

  "Yes. It's a good way to give him the chance to get rid of us and not feel guilty about it. You know, people like him often do nice things because they feel they should, not because they really want to."

  "Oh."

  We were not ones to procrastinate. The next evening after dinner, Paul came to join us on the back veranda. Paul. I was calling him that in my thoughts-- getting familiar, liking him more and more because always he looked so casually elegant, so clean, so nice, sitting in his favorite white wicker rocker, wearing a red cable- knit sweater with gray slacks and slowly, dreamily puffing on a cigarette. We three wore sweaters too, for the evening was chilly. Chris perched beside me on the balustrade while Carrie crouched on the top step. Paul's gardens were fabulous. Shallow marble steps nine feet across took you down a few feet to other steps which took you to a higher level. There was a small Japanese footbridge lacquered red, arching over a small stream. There were nude statues of men and women, placed at random, which lent to his gardens an atmosphere of seduction, of worldly sensuality. They were classic nudes. Graceful, and elegantly posed, and yet, and yet . . . I knew that garden for what it was. For I'd been there before in my dreams.

  The doctor was telling us, even as the wind turned colder and started to blow dead leaves hither and yon, that he traveled abroad every other year to search out the beautiful marble statues he'd ship home and add to his collection. He'd been so lucky the last time to come across a full-sized copy of Rodin's The Kiss.

  I sighed with the wind. I didn't want to go. I liked it here with him, with Henny, with the gardens that held me in thrall and made me feel enchanted, beautiful, desirable.

  "So all my roses are old-fashioned roses that haven't had the heady scent bred from them," said Dr. Paul. "Why have roses at all if they don't reek of perfume?"

  In the fading, purplish light of the failing day his glimmering eyes met with mine. My pulse quickened and forced another sigh. I wondered what his wife had been like, and how it felt to be loved by someone like him. Guiltily my eyes fled from his long, searching look, afraid he'd see what I was thinking. "You look disturbed, Cathy. Why?" His question teased me, as if he knew already my secrets. Chris turned his head to give me a hard look of warning.

  "It's your red sweater," I said foolishly. "Did Henny knit it for you?"

  He chuckled softly, then glanced down at the handsome sweater he wore. "No, not Henny. My older sister knitted the sweater for my birthday, then mailed it to me parcel post. She lives on the other side of town."

  "Why would your sister mail you a gift and not bring it in person?" I asked. "And why didn't you tell us you had a birthday? We would have given you gifts too."

  "Well," he began, settling back comfortably and crossing his legs, "my birthday came and went shortly before you arrived. I'm forty in case Henny hasn't told you. I've been a widower thirteen years, and my sister, Amanda, has not spoken to me since the day my wife and young son died in an accident." His voice faded away and he stared off into space, moody, solemn, distant.

  Dead leaves scuttled on the lawn, chased over the porch and came to nestle near my feet, like brown, dried-up ducklings. All this took me back to a certain forbidden night when Chris and I had so desperately prayed while we huddled on the cold slate roof under a moon that looked like the scowling eye of God. Would there be a price to pay for just one terrible sin committed? Would there? The grandmother would quickly say, yes! You deserve the worst punishment! Devil's spawn, I knew it all along!

  And while I sat there floundering Chris spoke up. "Doctor, Cathy and I have been talking this over, and we feel now that Carrie is well we should be leaving. We deeply appreciate everything you've done, and we intend to repay you every cent, though it may take us a few years. . . ." His fingers squeezed tight around mine, warning me not to say anything di
fferent.

  "Hold on there, Chris," interrupted the doctor, jerking upright in his chair and planting both his feet solidly on the floor. Clearly he meant business. "Don't think for one minute I haven't seen this coming. I've dreaded each morning, fearful I'd wake up to find you gone."

  "I've been looking into the legal ramifications of making the three of you my wards. And I've found out it isn't as complicated as I thought. It seems most children who run away say they're orphans, so you'll have to give me proof your father is really dead. If he's alive, I would need his consent, as well as your mother's."

  My breath caught! My mother's consent? That meant we'd have to see her again! I didn't want to see her, not ever!

  He went on, his eyes soft as they saw my distress. "The court would petition your mother to appear at a hearing. If she lived in this state she'd be forced to comply in three days, but since she's in Virginia, they'll give her three weeks. If she doesn't show up, then instead of having only temporary custody of you, I will be granted permanent custody-- but only if you're willing to say I've done a good job as a guardian."

  "You've been wonderful!" I cried out. "But she won't come! She wants to keep us a secret! If the world finds out about us, she'll lose all that money. Her husband might turn against her too if he knew she'd hidden us away. You can bet your life if you dare to try for permanent custody, you'll get it--and you might be sorry in the end!"

  Chris's hand tightened more on mine, and Carrie looked up with huge, scared eyes.

  "In a few weeks Christmas will be here. Are you going to leave me to spend another lonely holiday by myself? You've been here for almost three weeks, and I've explained to everyone who asked that you were the children of a relative of mine who died recently. I'm not going into this blindly. Henny and I have given this a great deal of thought. She feels, just as I feel, that the three of you are good for us. We both want you to stay on. Having young people in the house makes it more like a home. I feel healthier than I have in years, and happier too. Since the death of my wife and son, I've missed having a family. In all this time I've never gotten used to being a bachelor again." His persuasive tone grew wistful. feel fate wants me to have custody of you. I feel God planned for Henny to be on the bus, just so she could bring you to me. When fate steps in and makes the decisions, who am Ito deny it? I accept the fact you three are godsent to help me make up for the mistakes I've made in the past."