“No, no,” she said, embarrassed. “I don’t have any money.”
“You have pots of money. I’ll buy it for you,” said Kaytha. “You can pay me back.”
“No, no. No, thank you.”
“Where is your purse, Hopey?”
“I don’t know, Kaytha. I don’t even know if I’m Hopey.”
“Who else would you be?” said Kaytha. “Give me a name.”
It was not yet noon, but the city was very hot. And Kaytha, too, seemed overheated. She was burning with fevers. Love and greed and fear.
“Let’s set this up differently,” said Mitch. “Let’s you tell us all about Hope, Kaytha, and see if it flicks a switch as she listens.”
“Hopester’s switches are usually on dim,” said Kaytha. She handed Cotton’s leash over to Hope, so Hope held both dogs, and Kaytha instead held both of Mitch’s hands.
Her crimson fingernails looked too long and too hard to be real. Was there such a thing as fake fingernails? Mitch tried, and failed, to imagine gluing red nails onto his big broad hands.
“I am not dim!” said Hope, insulted. Kaytha gave her a funny cousinly look and Hope found herself smiling back. “Kaytha, please tell me about myself.”
Kaytha shook her head. “That means I go along with the whole amnesia thing, and I don’t, Hopey, you know that. You’re making it up. I think I know why, too.”
“Why?” said Mitch immediately. “Explain it to me, too, Kaytha. Why would she make it up?”
“Because she snitched a very valuable necklace of Uncle Ken’s and now she’s lost it. In typical dumb pointless Hopester fashion, she’s decided to pretend she isn’t even Hope, or can’t remember being Hope.” Kaytha rolled her eyes. She was wearing a tremendous amount of makeup. Great blue shadows arched over her little green eyes.
“I don’t steal,” said Hope quickly.
“How do you know?” demanded Kaytha. “If you claim not to remember being Hope Senneth, then how do you know for sure what disgusting things Hope Senneth does—or doesn’t do?”
Hope had no argument for that. She flushed.
Streets narrowed and buildings closed in. They entered a lovely brick-walled garden, with an unused fountain and many plaques. Hope wanted to pause, and read all the inscriptions, stop and think about the men who created the Revolution, which would certainly be easier than thinking about whether she was a thief. But the three of them strolled on, as if they often went out together.
“Are you all right, Hope?” said Mitch suddenly.
Or was it sudden? She felt as if she had drifted, been drifting a long time, and people had been staring at her without her even knowing. Hope’s smile faded like color in the sun, and a note of fear penetrated her voice. “It isn’t coming back, Mitch. None of it.” She tried to find the smile again. “The clothes fit me. People recognize me. But …”
She landed him with that close-to-tears look. He touched her hair a third time. It might look like bronze, but it felt like silk. He wondered if they would always be together, and he would always keep count of the number of times he had touched her hair.
“Hopester is fine,” said Kaytha angrily. “Just obnoxious as always. Starting scenes and not finishing them.”
Kaytha was not in love with her cousin. In fact, if Mitch had to define it, he’d say Kaytha was in hate. Under the oppressive sun, Mitch shivered slightly.
“I suppose,” said Kaytha, her voice high and thin, sort of floating above the action, “that Hope thinks Uncle Ken won’t kill her if she can’t remember who she is.”
“And will Uncle Ken kill her?” Mitch wanted to know.
“Definitely. She has only a few days to live at best.”
Mitch had the sick sensation that Kaytha meant this.
“Which is why, Hopesy,” said Kaytha sharply, “I think you should ’fess up. Tell me where you put the necklace. I’ll get it back to Uncle Ken and you won’t get punished. Or at least, not too much.”
They walked past burial grounds and churches. They walked under lovely old trees and past a hundred ice cream vendors. They passed the beautiful old State House and stared across the green expanse that was Boston Common.
Hope took refuge in silence. What if Mitch wandered off, never to be seen again, now that he had a picture of her as a thief? Am I a thief? she thought. Does that define me? A common, garden-variety thief? But what can I do about it? How can I get that necklace back?
“Want to ride on the swan boat, Hope?” said Mitch.
“What is a swan boat?” How romantic it sounded! Would they sit together among feathers, pillowed in white down? Would tiny blue waves tickle their ankles?
Kaytha said, “Just inviting Miss Amnesia, are you?”
“Of course not. I want to take both of you on the swan boat.”
The dogs could see grass and were excited. They needed to run. “Come on!” said Hope. “Let’s race! I’ll win!” She took off, dogs flying beside her, holding their leashes out on either side to prevent tangling herself or them. Mitch caught up quickly and easily, and the two floated over the wide public lawns, swooping and curving, playing at tag and dance.
Kaytha screamed for them to wait up, like a five-year-old left behind.
“She has a lot of nicknames for you,” said Mitch. “Don’t you have any for her?”
“Mitch, I don’t remember her, never mind her nicknames.”
They stared at each other. The dogs whimpered, wanting to run more.
“I can’t make up my mind about you,” said Hope.
He laughed. “You’re not the one who gets to say that.”
“I mean it. You’re so many characters. Are you acting, or did you really fall for me so fast?”
Oh! thought Mitch, girls! It isn’t the acting she cares about—it’s whether I mean it. “I really fell for you that fast,” he promised her. “And I’m still falling. You’re incredibly beautiful. And it’s pretty darn unusual; rich and a world traveler and living at The Jayquith—and not remembering yourself to top it off. What does that feel like inside?”
“I’d rather talk about you,” she said quickly. “Tell me what it’s like to be a guy who can call Mother and get the keys to The Jayquith.”
He did not attempt to answer that. He said, “Hope?”
“Mmm?”
“Are you for real?”
“You don’t believe me?”
“No, actually, I don’t. Kaytha is weird, letting you go out shopping for the day if you’re hurt. But the other story, that you’re a nutcase spoiled brat—it doesn’t fit you! And the necklace story is weirdest of all.”
“I am a nutcase spoiled brat.”
Her answers were too quick, too flippant. “I don’t believe that,” said Mitch. Or is it that I can’t bear believing that? I don’t want her to be off center, off base, I want her to be just right, all the way through.
“Tell me the truth, Hope.” Slowly, he moved closer and closer to Hope, and then he was bending, so that their faces were only a fraction of an inch apart, and his lips could all but feel hers.
“Rats,” said Mitch, straightening up, “here comes Kaytha.”
Hope giggled. It was such a cute, fifties kind of expletive: rats! “Next, you’ll be saying, ‘Aw shucks,’” she whispered.
“No. Next I’ll be saying, Kiss me.”
Hope stared at him: the precious beauty of him, mixed with such wholesomeness, as if Mitch had come into the world, and would go out of the world, a good thoroughly decent person. Just don’t let him go out of my world! she prayed. “I didn’t mean to fall in love,” she whispered, for that was the only truth she could give right now.
“I don’t think anybody does,” said Mitch, although this was a complete lie, because he had always planned to fall in love.
Kaytha caught up. She was terribly out of breath, even though she had not run, only walked quickly.
How thin and weak she is, thought Mitch, comparing her very unfavorably with the athletic Hope. I could
whip Kaytha with restaurant toothpicks, or even the mints.
They crossed Charles Street to the Public Garden. The swan boats were quite large. They didn’t seem to have motors, but moved soundlessly over the water. Passengers sat on a flat gondola, while the swan herself rode in back, like a great white queen.
Hope’s heart jumped.
Where the crowds lined up to buy tickets, along the edges of the lovely placid little lake, was something she needed.
Hope held her breath. She said, “Mitch, you and Kaytha go. It looks so romantic. I’ll wait on a bench.”
It was clean. That was the only thing she was sure of. And had a distinctive smell. But she could not identify it.
It had motion. A strange swaying that was completely unfamiliar.
She herself could not see. Could not talk. Could not move. She could only hear.
Fear rippled through Susan, her teeth chattered behind her sealed lips. Where am I? What is going on?
How were you supposed to function when you couldn’t move or talk? How were you supposed to know what was going on when you couldn’t see? So this was how Miss Amnesia had felt, trapped in the meaninglessness of her own mind, with nothing to go by.
Susan held onto herself. She was a problem solver. She would solve this one. It was merely a matter of thinking calmly.
What reasons could there be? Was she in a hospital? Had she been in a terrible accident; was she in traction, in casts? Was her jaw wired together, and had she had eye surgery as well?
If she’d been hurt that much, she’d be in pain. Serious pain.
All I’m doing is lying here, she thought. And the smell—it’s—varnish, I think. Old-fashioned varnish. Where do people use varnish? Refinishing furniture?
She tried to arch her back, and succeeded. She tried to move her hands and didn’t. Okay, her fingers were free; it was her wrists that didn’t move, and the feeling was not metal, not cord, not rope.
I’m tied up, thought Susan. I’m tied up with some unbreakable-even-with-sledge-hammers-from-outer-space plastic.
And I’m gagged. With tape. I can feel it pulling at my skin. I’ve been taped shut.
She wiggled her eyebrows and cheeks and turned her head back and forth and back and forth. She was blindfolded, not with the tape on her mouth, but with fabric. You can’t screw a blindfold down. If she kept this up, rubbing her head, arching her eyebrows, she was eventually going to get the blindfold off.
And see what?
Who would do this to me? What does he have in mind? What have they already done—when I wasn’t awake to know it?
Where am I?
And can I ever get home?
Kaytha was blinded by Mitch McKenna. He was so incredibly handsome.
It had been worth all those little purchases from him, the flirting, the endless giving of her phone number, slowly awakening him from that thick slumber in which boys so often lay. Boys were wonderful, and life without them was bland, but they were so dense.
Kaytha saw herself dancing with Mitch, sailing with Mitch, making love to Mitch.
She wanted his big firm hand resting on the bristles of her short hair, letting it tickle his palm.
They sat on a bench for two, Kaytha much closer to Mitch than necessary. He was in his usual jeans and T and everything about him was absolutely, totally right.
For a minute she worried about leaving Hope. Her job, her assignment, was not to leave Hope for a moment. But how could she be expected to baby-sit Hope when she had a chance at Mitch?
Mitch chattered about boats he had known. Big boats, little boats, power boats, sailboats.
Kaytha picked up his hand and examined each of his fingers separately, tracing the lines on his palm.
Mitch took his hand back, and folded his arms across his chest. “I always wanted to have this for a summer job, you know, Kaytha.”
“What?”
“Pedaling a swan boat.”
“You’re kidding,” said Kaytha. He really was kind of dumb. Selling T-shirts or pedaling swan boats were his life goals? On the other hand, he could crew on Lady Hope, and that way Kaytha would have him handy.
“I like using my muscles,” said Mitch, “and that’s how the boat is powered. The legs of a college boy.” Mitch babbled. He was amazed at how badly hurt the heart of this college boy was right now. How could Hope, right after she said, I didn’t mean to fall in love, next tell him that since the swan boat was romantic, he should take Kaytha? What normal American boy would want to be near Kaytha? Especially with Hope for contrast? Had she forgotten what she looked like, along with everything else?
Or had Hope not really fallen in love with Mitch?
What if Hope was more similar to him than he wanted? What if boys fell for her in such droves that she was accustomed to signing them off to other girls? Maybe her affection for Kaytha was enough that she’d just deal Mitch to her cousin like a deck of cards. Who was Hope—the spoiled brat, the amnesiac, the thief?
I don’t even care, he thought, I just want to be with her.
My life is working out just like my father’s. Love at first sight, and then—well, no. I don’t want a wedding next week. But I sure want to go on a date!
It seemed reasonable to Mitch McKenna to trust Hope’s cousin with a fact. He took both Kaytha’s hands in his and completely misinterpreted her softened look. “I’m really crazy about her, Kaytha. Please talk to me about Hope. I’m dying to know everything there is to know about her.”
Kaytha withdrew her hands. She stared at him. “Are you dying to?” she asked in a raw voice. A strange expression crossed her face … as if she might just allow Mitch to have that very wish.
“No, I asked Betsy, too,” said Laurie. “None of us has seen Susan lately, Rusty.” Laurie didn’t sound interested in seeing Susan later, either.
“But she must be somewhere,” objected Ben Franklin.
“I’m sure she is, Rusty,” said Laurie, in the voice of one who can just barely waste her valuable time with the slug telephoning her. “But she’s a grown woman and she’ll come home when she comes home. As for Mitch’s little friend Derry, forget it. I’m not interested in having her sleep over here. I mean, it’s hard enough to get along with Betsy and Jenny.”
“Is it hard to get along with Susan?” asked Ben Franklin.
“It’s impossible to get along with Susan,” said Laurie.
“Will you tell her to call me when she gets in?”
“I’m never here, Rusty. I’ll leave her a note. She might see it.”
Ben Franklin never wished ill on people, but he could not help hoping that if there were to be a mugging that night, Laurie would be the victim.
It did not bother him at all that Susan was impossible to get along with. In fact, it made her seem more of a sterling character to Ben Franklin: unyielding and tough.
The blindfold lay halfway across her face, annoying one eye terribly but leaving the other free to open and close.
She was in a tiny bunk, incredibly narrow, with a bend in it, as if made for something other than humans. There were no windows. The bunk was curtained, for privacy, perhaps, and on the other side of it, Susan could hear somebody crying. It was muffled. Either the weeping person was far away, or stifling his sobs in a pillow.
The tape was driving her crazy. It yanked at the tiny, hitherto unnoticeable hairs along her lip and cheek. It was drying out her lips like the worst winter wind on a ski slope. She started wetting the tape with spit, hoping to soften the glue, free up some of her mouth.
I won’t cry, thought Susan. I won’t cry.
She cried.
Under the tape it sounded perfectly normal. You could cry without having your mouth open.
“Are you awake?” said a woman on the other side of the curtain.
Susan froze.
She did not necessarily want notice, did she? Because what would they do to her once she was awake?
Poor Miss Amnesia, thought Susan. I’m sorry I was suspicious.
I’m sorry I was skeptical. How terrified she must have been, without any landmarks! Going home with people she didn’t know, to a room she didn’t remember!
But I’d rather be in her position. At least she could see. And run if she had to.
Susan looked at her wrists. A pale fleshy circle of plastic, like a heavy bracelet, circled each wrist: two separate pairs of handcuffs, each fastened to a sort of brass railing on the edge of the bunk.
I couldn’t run if I wanted to, thought Susan Nevilleson. Whatever they do to me, I have to lie here and let happen.
A phone booth.
The swan boat moved so slowly over the glassy blue pond. Kaytha and Mitch waved. Hope waved back. Go, go, go, she thought at them.
She watched the phone booth. It was not a booth, actually, just three little phone boxes facing out on a pole. For some tourists, they ruined the ambiance of the Garden with their gleaming metal surfaces. Hope thought they were beautiful.
The swan boat turned very slowly and, very slowly, a large leaf-laden maple tree came between her and the two riders who mattered.
Hope gathered the leashes of Butter and Cotton and headed for the phone booth.
“You’ve already acquired his dogs?” said Mr. Senneth, smiling. “Hope, you move very quickly.”
She whirled, horrified by his presence. Had he followed them? He must have!
“Don’t be afraid,” he said. “Really, Hope, you are overreacting to everything these days.”
“Did you follow me?”
“Of course. Hope, you’re a very sick girl. I’m trying to be a very understanding father, but it isn’t easy.”
He took Cotton’s leash and they walked out on the grass and circled two huge blooming shrubs. The dogs were ecstatic. The scents must have been many and unusual.
Was she very fortunate that Mr. Senneth had not realized she was heading for a telephone? Or very unfortunate?
Hope only wished she could read what to do next as easily as the dogs could read those bushes.
Her own personal T-shirt god—in love with somebody else.
Kaytha had been jealous before in her life. It was a major reason why she disliked school. She was richer than most of them, with a life infinitely more interesting and more complex, but other girls were sometimes prettier and almost always had more friends.