Oh, I didn't want to hear anymore. I had to stop her before I felt pity and sympathy for her, for Bart.
"I don't want to hear anymore, Melodic," I said coldly, jerking my head so I didn't have to look at the love marks that Jory might notice if she went to him now. "So now when Jory needs you most, you intend to fail him and turn to Bart," I said bitterly. "What a wonderful wife you are, Melodic."
She sobbed louder, covering her face with her hands.
"I remember your wedding day when you stood before the altar and made your vows of fidelity, for better or for worse--and the first worse that turns up, you find a new lover."
While she sniffled and tried to find better words to win me to her side, I thought of how lonely this mountainside home was, how isolated. And we'd left Melodic here thinking she was too upset to want to drive anywhere. Thoughtless about what she and Bart could be doing, never suspecting she'd turn to him-- the very one she'd seemed to dislike so much.
Still sniffling and crying, Melodic fiddled with her strap, while her washed-out eyes took on a certain wariness. "How can you condemn me, Cathy, when you have done even worse?"
Stung, I rose to leave, feeling that my legs had turned to lead along with my heart. She was right. I wasn't any better. I, too, had failed, and more than once, to do the right thing. "Will you forget Bart and stay away from him, and convince Jory you still love him?"
"I do still love Jory, Cathy. It may sound strange, but I love Bart in a different way, a strange way that has nothing at all to do with the way I feel about Jory. Jory was my childhood sweetheart and my best friend. His younger brother was someone I never really liked, but he's changed, Cathy, he has, really. No man who really hates women can make love as he does . . ."
My lips tightened. I stood in the open doorway condemning her, as once my grandmother had condemned me with her pitiless steel-gray eyes alone telling me I was the worst kind of sinner.
"Don't go before I make you understand!" she cried, putting forth her arms and beseeching me. I closed the door, thinking of Joel, and backed against it. "All right. I'll stay, but I won't understand."
"Bart loves me, Cathy, really loves me. When he says it, I can't help but believe him. He wants me to divorce Jory. Bart has said he will marry me." Her tearful voice diminished to a husky whisper. "I don't truthfully know if I can live out my life with a husband confined to a wheelchair."
Sobbing more than before, she broke and from her kneeling position fell in a crumpled heap on the floor. "I'm not strong like you are, Cathy. I can't give Jory the support he needs now. I don't know what to say, or what to do for him. I want to turn back the clock and bring back the Jory I used to have, for I don't know this one. I don't even think I want to know him . . . and I'm ashamed, so ashamed! Now all I want to do is vanish."
My voice took on the steely edge of a razor. "You're not going to escape your responsibilities that easily, Melodie. I'm here to see that you live up to your marriage vows. First, you will cut Bart out of your life. You will never allow him to. touch you again. You will say no every time he tries anything. I am going to confront him again. Yes, I've already faced him down, but I'm going to be tougher. If I have to, I will go to Chris and tell him what's going on. As you know, Chris is a very patient, understanding man with a great deal of control, but he won't condone what you're doing with Bart."
"Please," she cried. "I love Chris like a father! I want him to keep on respecting me."
"Then leave Bart alone! Think of your child, which should come first. You shouldn't be having sex now anyway, it's sometimes not safe."
Her huge eyes closed, squeezed back the tears; then she was nodding and promising never to make love with Bart again. Even as she vowed, I didn't believe her. I didn't believe Bart either when I spoke to him before I went to bed.
Morning came and I hadn't slept at all. I rose, tired and listless, putting on a false smile for Jory before I tapped on his door, announcing myself. He invited me to come in. He appeared happier than he had last night for some reason, as if overnight thought had calmed him down. "I'm glad Melodie has you to lean on," said Jory as I helped him to turn over.
Each day Chris, the nurse and I took turns moving his legs and massaging them when the therapist wasn't there to do it for him. This way his muscles wouldn't atrophy. His legs, due to the massaging, had regained a little of their former shape.
I took that as a huge step forward. Hope . . . in this house of dark misery we were always clinging to hope we colored yellow--like the sun we'd seldom seen.
"I was expecting Melodie to come in this morning," Jory said with a bit of wistfulness, "since she failed to even stop by and say good night last night."
Days passed. Melodie disappeared often, as did Bart. My faith in Melodie had eroded. No longer could I meet her eyes and smile. I stopped trying to talk to Bart and turned to Jory for companionship. We watched TV together. We played games together. We competed in silly jigsaw competitions to see who could find the right pieces faster. We sipped wine in the afternoon, grew sleepy by nine and pretended, pretended that everything would work out fine.
There was something about being in bed most of the time that made him exceptionally fatigued. "It's the lack of proper exercise," he said, pulling on the trapeze fastened to his headboard. "At least I'm keeping my arms strong--where did you say Melodie was?"
I put down the bootee I'd just finished and picked up the yarn to make another. In between games I knitted and watched TV. When I wasn't with Jory, I was in my room typing the journal I was keeping of our lives. My last book, I told myself. What more did I have to say? What else could happen to us?
"Mom! Don't you ever listen to me? I asked if you knew where Melodie was, and what she's doing."
"She's in the kitchen, Jory," I said quickly. "Busy preparing just the kind of dinner you like most."
A look of relief brightened his face. "I'm worried about my wife, Mom. She comes in and does small things for me, but her heart doesn't seem in it." A shadow fleeted through his eyes, quick to disappear when he saw my piercing look. "I say to you all the things I need to say to her. It hurts to watch her pulling away from me bit by bit. I want to speak out and say I'm still the same man inside, but I don't think she wants to know that. I believe she wants to think that I'm different because I can no longer dance or walk, and that makes it easier for her to break away and release all the ties that bind us. She never talks to me about the future. She hasn't even discussed names for our child. I've been looking in books for just the right names for our son or daughter. I tell myself, like you said, that she's pregnant, and I've been reading up on that subject, too. Just to make up for my former lack of interest . . ."
On and on he talked, convincing himself with his own words that it was her pregnancy that was responsible for all the changes in his wife.
I cleared my throat and used my chance. "Jory, I've been giving this serious thought. Your doctor said once you'd be better off in the hospital than staying here and having someone come to help with your rehabilitation. You and Melodie can rent a small apartment near the hospital, and she can drive you each day to Rehab. It's almost winter, Jory. You don't know about winters in this western mountainous part of Virginia. They're freezing. The wind never stops blowing. It snows often. The roads leading here from the village are often blocked. The state keeps the highways and expressways open, but the small private roads to this estate are often closed. I'm thinking of the days when your nurse won't be able to come, or your physical therapist, and you need daily exercise. If you live near the hospital, all your physical needs can easily be met."
He stared at me in hurt surprise. "You mean you want to get rid of me?"
"Of course not. You've got to confess you don't like this house."
His eyes darted to the windows where the rain was coming down hard, driving dead leaves and lateblooming roses into the earth. All the summer birds had flown away.
The wind whipped around the house, finding its way through
small crevices, shrieking and howling in this replica just as much as it had in the old, old original.
Jory said from behind me, as I just continued staring out, "I like what you and Mel did to these rooms. You've given me a haven safe from the scorn of the world, and right now, I don't want to leave and face those who used to admire my grace and skill. I don't want to be separated from you and Dad. I feel we've grown closer than we've ever been, and the holidays are coming up.
"And if the roads from here to there might be closed for my nurse and my therapist, they'll also be closed for you and Dad. Don't put me out, Mom, when I most want to stay. I need you. I need Dad. I even need this chance to grow closer to my brother. I've been thinking a lot about Bart recently.
Sometimes he comes and sits nearby, and we talk. I think, at last, we're beginning to be the kind of friends we were before your mother moved into that house next door, way back when he was nine . . ."
Uneasily I fidgeted, thinking of Bart's dual face, coming in to be his brother's friend and seducing his wife behind his back.
"If it's what you want, Jory, stay. But give it more thought. Chris and I could move to the city just to be with you and Melodie, and we can make things as comfortable for you there as they are here."
"But you can't give me another brother at this late date, can you, Mom? Bart's the only brother I'm going to have. Before I die, or he does, I want him to know I care what happens to him. I want to see him happy. I want him to have the kind of married life I share with Mel. Someday he's got to wake up to the fact that money can't buy everything, and most certainly, it can't buy love. Not the kind of love Mel and I have."
He looked thoughtful, as I inwardly cried for him and his "love"; then a blush rose up from the neck of his sports shirt covered with a red sweater that put color in his wan cheeks. "At least, I should add, the kind of marriage we used to have. It's not much of a marriage now, I'm sorry to admit. But that's not her fault."
A week later I was alone in my room, furiously writing in the journal, when I heard the pounding of Chris's footfalls as he ran and burst in on me. "Cathy," he said excitedly, throwing off his topcoat, hurling it to a chair, "I've got wonderful news! You know that experiment I was assisting with? There's been a breakthrough." He pulled me up from my desk, shoved me into a chair before the roaring fire. He explained in minute detail all that he and other scientists were trying to accomplish. "It means I'll be away from home five nights a week, now that winter's come. The snow isn't cleared until around noon, and that gives me so little time in the lab. But don't look sad, I'll be here on weekends. But if you object, tell me honestly. My first duty is to you and our family."
His excitement over this new project was so evident I couldn't dash his enthusiasm with my fears. He'd given so much to me, to Jory and Bart, and received so little appreciation. My arms went automatically around his neck. I scanned over his dear, familiar face. I saw faint etchings around his blue eyes that I hadn't noticed before. My fingers in his hair found silver that was coarser in texture than the gold. There were a few gray hairs in his eyebrows.
"If this is going to make you unhappy, I can always quit and forget about research, and devote all my time to my family. But I'll be very grateful if you give me this opportunity. I thought when I gave up my practice in California that I would never find anything to interest me more, but I was wrong. Perhaps this was meant to be--but, if necessary, I can give it up and stay here with my family "
Give up medicine entirely? He'd centered the major portion of his life on the study of medicine. To feel useful gave added zest to his life. To keep him here just to please myself, doing nothing that would contribute to mankind at this crucial point when he felt vulnerable by being middle-aged, would destroy him.
"Cathy," Chris said, interrupting my thoughts as he pulled on his heavy woolen coat again, "are you all right? Why do you look so strange? So sad? I'll be back every Friday evening and won't leave until Monday morning. Explain to Jory everything I've told you. No, on second thought, I'll stop by his room and explain myself."
"If it's what you want, then it's what you have to do. But we're going to miss you. I don't know how I can sleep without you beside me. You see, I talked to Jory, and he doesn't want to move to Charlottesville. I think he's grown to like his rooms very much. He's almost finished that clipper ship. And it would be a pity to deprive him of all the comforts he has here. And Christmas isn't too far away. Cindy will be coming home for Thanksgiving to stay until the New Year. Chris, promise to make real efforts to come home every Friday. Jory needs your strength as well as mine since Melodie fails him entirely."
Oh, I'd said too much.
His eyes narrowed. "What's going on that you're not telling me?" He pulled off the heavy coat and carefully hung it up. Swallowing first, I started to speak, faltered, tried to pull my eyes from the strong hold of his . . . but those blue eyes forced me to say, "Chris, would you think it terrible if you knew that Bart has fallen in love with Melodie?"
His lips twitched. "Oh, that. I know Bart's been infatuated with her since the day she came here. I've seen him watching her. One day I found the two of them in the back salon, seated on the sofa. He had her dress open and was kissing her breasts. I walked away. Cathy, if Melodie didn't want him, she'd slap his face and make him stop. You may think their affair is stealing Jory's wife when he needs her most, but he doesn't need a woman who doesn't love him anymore. Let him have her--what good can she do Jory now?"
I glared at him with total disbelief. "You're defending Bart! Do you think it's fair what he's done?"
"No, I don't think it is fair. When is life fair, Cathy? Was it fair when Jory's back was broken, and now he can't walk? No, it's not fair. I've been in medicine too long not to know justice isn't doled out equally. The good often die before the bad. Children die before grandparents, and who is to say that's right? But what can we do about it? Life is a gift, and perhaps death is another kind of gift. Who am I, or you, to say? Accept what has happened between Bart and Melodie, and stay close to Jory. Keep him happy until the day comes when he can find another wife."
Reeling from his words, I felt hazy and unreal. "And the baby, what of the baby?"
Now his voice turned hard. "The baby is another matter. He or she will belong to Jory, no matter which brother Melodie chooses. That child will help see Jory through--for he may never be able to sire another."
"Chris, please. Go to Bart and tell him to let Melodie go. I cannot stand the thought of Jory losing his wife at this point in his life."
He shook his head, telling me that Bart had never listened to him, and it wasn't likely he would now. And already he'd spoken without my knowledge to Melodie.
"Darling, face up to the facts. In her heart Melodie doesn't want Jory now. She won't come out and say that, but behind every word she doesn't say, behind all her excuses, is the plain fact that she just does not want to stay married to a man who can't walk. In my way of thinking it would be cruel to force her to stay, and even harder on Jory in the long run. If we do try to force her to stay, sooner or later she'd strike back at him for not being the man he was and I want to spare him that. Better to let her go before she hurts him even worse than by just having an affair with Bart."
"Chris!" I cried, shocked that he would think as he did. "We can't let her do this to Jory!"
"Cathy, who are we to judge this matter? Right or wrong, should we, who are considered sinners by Bart, sit in judgment on him?"
In the morning Chris drove away after telling me he'd be back Friday evening around six. I watched from my bedroom window until his car was out of sight.
How empty the days when Chris was away, how bleak the nights without his arms to hold me and his whispers to assure me everything would work out fine. I smiled and laughed for Jory, not wanting him to know that I was suffering from the lack of having Chris in my bed every night. Jory slept alone, I told myself, and I could manage if he could. I knew that Melodie and Bart were still lovers; howeve
r, they were discreet enough to try and hide that from me. But I knew from the way Joel glared at Jory's wife that he considered her a bitch. Strange that he didn't glare at Bart, when he was just as guilty. But then men had a way of thinking what was right for the gander was wrong for the goose, even pious religious ones like Joel.
We were two weeks into November, and our plans for Thanksgiving were complete. Our weather turned more severe and hurled blustery winds and snow our way, stacking snow around our doors, freezing it overnight to ice so we couldn't leave the garage in one of our many cars. One by one our servants deserted until there was only Trevor to prepare the meals with my off-and-on help.
Cindy flew home and helped cheer our hours with her easy laughter, her winning ways that charmed everyone but Bart and Joel. Even Melodie seemed a bit happier. Then she took to her bed, to stay there all day long, trying to keep warm now that our electricity went off so often, and that meant our furnaces controlled by electric thermostats refused to give out heat. We then had to resort to our coal furnace auxiliary.
Freely Bart carried in the wood he wanted to burn in his office fireplace and forgot the rest of us would enjoy a fire.
Bart was secreted away with Joel, whispering of the Christmas ball he planned, so I had to carry in enough logs to build a fire in Jory's room, where Cindy was playing a game with him. He sat in his chair, wrapped with an afghan, his shoulders covered with a jacket, and smiled at my futile attempts to set the kindling ablaze. "Open the damper, Mom, that always helps a little."