Petals on the Wind

  He seized me then hard and ruthlessly, then pressed his lips down on mine with a savagery that hurt! I fought him off with my fists, battering his arms as I tried to twist my head from beneath his, but whichever way my head went, right or left, up or down, he kept his kiss, demanding my lips to separate and yield to his tongue! Then, realizing I couldn't escape the arms of steel he banded about me to mold my form to his, against my will, my arms stole up around his neck. My unruly fingers betrayed me and twined into his thick, dark hair, and that kiss lasted, and lasted, and lasted until both of us were hot and panting--and then he thrust me from him so cruelly I almost fell from the bench.

  "Well, little Miss Muffet--what kind of lap dog do you call me now? Or are you Little Red Riding Hood who has just met the wolf?"

  "Take me home!"

  "I'll take you home--but not until I've enjoyed a little more of what you just gave." He lunged again to seize me, but I was up and running, running for his car, running to seize my purse so that when he got there I held my manicuring scissors ready to stab with.

  He grinned, reached out and wrested them from me. "They would deliver a nasty scratch," he mocked. "But I don't like scratches except on my back. When I let you out you can have your little two-inch scissors back again."

  In front of my cottage he handed me the scissors. "Now, do your worst. Cut out my eyes; stab me in the heart--you might as well. Your kiss has begun it, but I still demand my total payment."

  Tiger by the Tail

  . Early on a Sunday morning a few days later I was warming up at the barre in my bedroom. My small son was earnestly trying to do as I did. It was sweet to watch him in the mirror I'd moved from the dresser over to the barre.

  "Am I dancing?" asked Jory.

  "Yes, Jory. You are dancing!"

  "Am I good?"

  "Yes, Jory. You are wonderful!"

  He laughed and hugged my legs and looked up

  into my face with that ecstatic rapture only the very young can express--all the wonder of being alive was in his eyes, all the wonder of learning something new every day. "I love you, Mommy" It was something we said to each other a dozen or more times each day. "Mary's got a daddy. Why don't I have a daddy?"

  That really hurt. "You did have a daddy, Jory, but he went away to heaven. And maybe someday Mommy will find you a new daddy."

  He smiled because he was pleased. Daddy's were big in his world, for all the children in the nursery school had one . . . all but Jory.

  Just then I heard the front door bang. A familiar voice called my name. Chris! He strode through the small house as I hurried toward him in my blue tights, leotards and pointe shoes. Our eyes met and locked. Without a word he held out his arms and I ran unhesitatingly into them, and though he sought my lips to kiss he found only my cheek. Jory was pulling on his gray flannel trousers, eager to be swept up in strong, manly arms. "How's my Jory?" asked Chris after he kissed both round, rosy cheeks. My son's eyes were huge as they stared at him. "Uncle Chris, are you my daddy?"

  "No," he said gruffly, putting Jory again on his small feet, "but I sure wish I had a son like you." This made me shift around uncomfortably so he couldn't see my eyes, and then I asked what he was doing here when he should be attending his patients.

  "Got the weekend off, so I thought I'd spend it with you; that is, if you'll let me." I nodded weakly, thinking of someone else who was likely to come this weekend. "I was as good as a resident can be and was rewarded and given a weekend without duty." He gave me one of his most winning smiles. "Have you heard from Paul?" I asked. "He doesn't come as often as he used to, and he doesn't write much either."

  "He's away on another medical convention. I thought he always kept in touch with you." He put just a little stress on the "you." "Chris, I'm worried about Paul. It isn't like him not to answer every letter I write."

  He laughed and fell into a chair, then lifted Jory up on his lap. "Maybe, dear sister, you have finally met a man who can get over loving you."

  Now I didn't know what to say or what to do with my legs and hands. I sat and stared down at the floor, feeling Chris's long, steady gaze trying to read my intentions. No sooner did I think that than he was asking, "Cathy, what are you doing here in the mountains? What are you planning? Is it your scheme to take Bart Winslow from our mother?"

  My head jerked up. I met his narrowed blue eyes and felt the heat that sprang up from my heart. "Don't question me like I'm some ten-year-old without a brain. I do what I have to--just as you do."

  "Sure, you do. I didn't have to ask, I know. It doesn't take a crystal ball to read you. I know what makes you tick and how your thoughts range--but leave Bart Winslow alone! He'll never leave her for you! She's got the millions and all you have is youth. There are thousands of younger women he can choose from--why should he choose you?"

  I didn't say anything, just met his scowling look with my own confident smile, making him flush, then turn aside his face. I felt mean, cruel and ashamed. "Chris, let's not argue. Let's be friends and allies. You and I are all that's left out of four."

  His blue eyes grew soft as they studied me. "I was only trying, as I am always trying." He looked around, then back to me. "I share a room with another resident at the hospital. It would be nice if I could live here with you and Jory. It would be like it used to be, just us."

  What he said made me stiffen. "It would be a long drive for you every morning, and you couldn't be on immediate call."

  He sighed. "I know --but how about the weekends? Every other weekend I have off-duty time--would that bug you too much?"

  "Yes, it would bug me too much. I have a life of my own, Christopher."

  I watched him bite down on his lower lip before he forced a smile. "Okay, have it your way . . . do what you must, and I hope to God you won't be sorry."

  "Will you please drop the subject?" I smiled and went to him and hugged him close. "Be good. Take me as I am, obstinate as Carrie. Now, what would you like for lunch?"

  "I haven't had breakfast yet."

  "Then we'll eat brunch--and that can do for two meals." From then on the day went swiftly. On Sunday morning he came to the table ready for the cheese omelet he favored. Jory, thank God, would eat anything. Despite myself I thought of Chris as a father to Jory. It seemed so right to have him at the table, like it used to be . . . him and I playing at being parents. Doing the best we could, all we could, and we had been only children ourselves.

  We ambled through the woods after breakfast, using all the trails I followed when I jogged. Jory rode on Chris's shoulder. We looked at the world that was just outside Foxworth Hall, all the places we hadn't been able to see when we were on the roof or locked away. Together we stood and stared at that huge mansion. "Is Momma in there?" he asked in a tight thick voice.

  "No. I've heard she's down in Texas in one of those beauty spas for very wealthy women, trying to lose fifteen extra pounds."

  Alerted, he swiveled his head. "Who told you that?" "Who do you think?"

  He shook his head violently, then lifted Jory down and set him on his feet. "Damn you for playing with him, Cathy! I've seen him He's dangerous--leave him alone. Go back to Paul and marry him if you must have a man in your life. Let our mother live out her life in peace. You don't believe for one moment, do you, that she doesn't suffer? Do you think she can be happy knowing what she did? All the money in the world can't give her back what she's lost--and that is us! Let that be enough revenge."

  "It isn't enough. I want to confront her in front of Bart with the truth. And you can stay one hundred years and get down on your knees and plead until your what I must!"

  The time Chris stayed with me he slept in the room that had been Carrie's. We did very little talking, though his eyes followed my every movement. He looked drained, lost . . . and, most of all, hurt. I wanted to tell him that when I'd finished what I had to do I'd go back to Paul and live a safe life with him, and Jory would have the father he needed, but I said nothing.

  Mountain ni
ghts were cold, even in September when the days were warm still. In that attic we'd nearly melted from the sweltering heat, and I guess this was on both our minds as we sat before the guttering log fire on the night before Chris had to leave. My son had been in bed for hours when I rose, yawned, stretched wide my arms, then glanced at the clock on the mantel which read eleven. "It's time for bed, Chris. Especially for you who has to get up so early tomorrow.'

  He followed me toward Jory's room without speaking and together we looked down on Jory, sleeping on his side, his dark curls damp and his face flushed. In his arms he cuddled a stuffed, plushy pony, much like the real one he said he had to have when he was four.

  "When he's sleeping he looks more like you than Julian," whispered Chris.

  Paul had said the same thing.

  "Good night, Christopher Doll," I said as we paused by the door of Carrie's room, "sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite."

  What I said made his face contort in pain. He turned from me, opened the door to Carrie's room, then swung back to face me. "That's the way we used to say good night when we slept in the same room," he said, then he turned and closed the door behind him

  Chris was gone by the time I got up at seven o'clock. I cried a little. Jory stared at me with widened, surprised eyes. "Mommy 7" he asked fearfully.

  "It's all right. Mommy just misses your uncle Chris. And Mommy is not going to work today." No, why should I? Only three students were due and I could teach them tomorrow when the class would be full.

  My plans were moving too slowly. lb speed them up I asked Emma to come and stay with Jory while I jogged through the woods. "I won't be gone longer than an hour. Let him play outside until lunchtime, and by then I'll be back."

  Dressed in a bright blue jogging outfit trimmed with white, I set off down the dirt trails. This time I used a right fork I'd never tried before and into a denser pine forest I ran. The trail was faint and jaggedly crooked, so I had to keep a keen eye on the ground for tree roots that might trip me up. The mountain trees that grew between the pines were a brilliant blaze of fall colors, like fire against the emerald green of the pines, firs and spruces. And it was, as I'd told myself long ago, the year's last passionate love affair before it grew old and died from the frosty bite of winter.

  Someone was jogging behind me. I didn't turn to look. The crispy crackle of the dead leaves pleased my ears, so I ran faster, faster, letting the wind take my loose hair just as I let the beauty of the day take my grief, remorse, shame and guilt and make them transparent shadows that didn't hold up beneath the sun.

  "Cathy, hold up!" called a man's strong voice. "You run too fast!"

  It was Bart Winslow, of course. As it had to be sooner or later. Fate couldn't always outwit me, and my mother couldn't always win. I threw a glance over my shoulder, smiling to see him panting as he ran in his stylish jogging costume of maple-sugar tan, trimmed with bands of orange and yellow knit at the cuffs, neck and waistband. Two vertical lines of yellow and orange ran down the sides of the loose pants. Just what a local runner should wear when on the prowl.

  "Hello, Mr. Winslow," I called back as I speeded up. "A man who can't catch a woman is no man at all!"

  He took the challenge and put more speed into his long legs and I really had to put out to keep ahead! I flew, my long hair bannering behind. Squirrels on the ground scrounging around for nuts had to scamper to get out of my way. I laughed with the power I felt, then threw out my arms and pirouetted, feeling I was on stage playing out the best role of my life. Then from nowhere a knobby tree root caught beneath the toe of my dirty sneaker and down I fell, flat on my face. Luckily, the dead leaves cushioned me.

  In a flash I was up and running again, but my fall had given Bart the chance to draw nearer. Panting, gasping, clearly indicating he didn't have nearly the stamina I had, despite the advantage of his longer legs, he cried out again, "Stop running, Cathy! Have mercy! This is killing me! There are other ways I can prove my manhood!"

  I had no mercy! It was catch me if you can, or else I'd never be taken. I shouted this back to him and ran on, rejoicing in my powerful dancer's legs, my supple, long muscles and all that ballet training had done to make me feel a blue streak of light.

  No sooner did this self-conceit flash through my mind than my stupid knee suddenly gave way and down I went again, on my face in the dead leaves. And this time I was hurt, really hurt. Had I broken a bone? Sprained an ankle, torn a ligament--again?

  In a few moments Bart was beside me, down on his knees, rolling me over so he could see my face before he asked with a great deal of concern, "Are you hurt? You look so pale--what's paining?"

  I wanted to say of course I was all right, for dancers knew how to fall, except when they didn't know they were going to fall--and why was my knee aching so badly? I stared down at it, feeling betrayed by a knee that was always the one to foul me up and hurt me in more than one way. "It was my stupid knee. If I bump my elbow on the shower door, my right knee hurts. When I have a headache, my knee hurts along with it to keep it company. Once I had a tooth filled, and the dentist was careless enough to let the drill slip and cut my gum, and my right knee shot right out and kicked him in the stomach. '

  "You're kidding."

  "I'm serious--don't you have anything peculiar about your physical makeup?"

  "Nothing I'm going to speak of." He smiled and the devil made his dark eyes sparkle, then he assisted me to my feet and felt my knee as if he knew what he was doing. "Seems a good, functional knee to me."

  "How would you know?"

  "My knees are functionally good, so I know one when I feel one--but if I could see the knee I could tell more."

  "Go home and look at your wife's functional knee."

  "Why are you being so hateful to me?" He narrowed his eyes. "Here I was, delighted to see you again, and you act so antagonistic."

  "Pain always makes me antagonistic--are you any different?"

  "I'm sweet and humble when I'm suffering, which isn't often. You get more attention that way-- and remember you threw down the challenge, not me."

  "You didn't have to accept it. You could have gone along your merry way and let me go along mine."

  "Now we're arguing," he said, disappointed. "You want to fight when I want to be friendly. Be nice to me. Say you're glad to see me. Tell me how much better looking I've grown since you saw me last, and how exciting you find me. Even if I don't run like the wind I have my own bag of tricks."

  "I'll bet you do."

  "My wife is still in that beauty spa and I've been all by my lonesome for long, long months, bored to death by living with an old lady who can't talk and can't walk, but manages to scowl every time she sees me. One evening I was just sitting before the fire, wishing someone around here would commit murder so I'd have an interesting case for a change. It's damn frustrating to be an attorney and be surrounded by nothing but happy, normal people with no suppressed emotions to erupt suddenly."

  "Congratulations, Bart! Before you stands someone full of aggressive resentment and mean, hateful spite seeking revenge that will erupt--you can count on that!"

  He thought I was joking, playing a cat and mouse, man and woman game, and willingly he rose to that challenge too, not at all suspicious of my real purpose. He looked me over good, stripping off my sapphire jogging suit with the sensual eyes of a man starving for what I could give. "Why did you come to live up here near me?"

  I laughed. "Arrogant, aren't you? I came to take over a dance school."

  "Sure you did. . . . There's New York and your home town, wherever that is, and you come here--to enjoy the winter sports as well?" His eyes insinuated the kind of indoor winter sport he had in mind, if I didn't.

  "Yes, I do like all kinds of sports, inside and outside," I said innocently.

  Confidently he chuckled, assuming as all conceited men do that already he'd scored a point in the only intimate game a man really wanted to play with women.

  "That old lady who can't talk, d
oes she get around at all?" I asked.

  "A little. She's my wife's mother. She speaks but her words come out jumbled and unintelligible to anyone but my wife."

  "You leave her there all alone--is that safe?"

  "She's not alone. There's a private duty nurse there with her all the time, and a staff of servants." He frowned as if he didn't like my questions, but I persisted. "Why stay there at all then, why not go and have fun while the cat's away?"

  "You do have a shrewish way about you. Though I've never cared much for my mother-in-law, as she is now I feel sorry for her. And human nature being what it is, I don't trust servants to take proper care of her without a family member in the house to keep check on what's done to keep her comfortable. She's helpless and can't rise from a chair without assistance, or get out of bed unless she's lifted out. So, until my wife is home again, I'm in charge to see that Mrs. Malcolm Foxworth is not abused or neglected or stolen from."

  An overwhelming curiosity came over me then. I wanted to know her first name, for I'd never heard it. "Do you call her Mrs. Foxworth?"

  He hadn't understood my interest in an old lady, and tried to turn the conversation elsewhere, but I persisted. "Olivia, that's what I call her!" he said shortly. "When I was first married, I tried not to speak to her at all, to try to forget she existed. Now I use her first name; I think it pleases her, but I can't be sure. Her face is of stone, fixed in one expression--icy."

  I could picture her, unmoving but for her flintstone eyes of gray. He'd told me enough. Now I could make my plans--just as soon as I found out one more small thing. "Your wife, when is she due back?"

  "Why should you know?"

  "I too get lonely, Bart. I have only my small son after Emma, his babysitter, goes home. So . . . I thought maybe some evening you might like to have dinner with us. . . ."

  "I'll come tonight," he said immediately, his dark eyes aglow.