Willow

  "Well, I don't know what she told you. but I'll try to live up to the good things," I said. and Thatcher laughed, She raised her eyebrows at him and then looked at me with more curiosity.

  I thought Hans was polite and nice enough, but he was quickly distracted by the food and some friends he recognized. Standing behind them during the introductions were their two children. Thatcher's niece Laurel and nephew Quentin. They were like two well-trained puppies. Fortunately, while Quentin was nearly a clone of Hans. Laurel looked as if she had inherited the softer features of Thatcher and Whitney's side of the family. As I would expect, they looked as if they had been forced to come and were bored the moment they stepped into the house. It was painfully obvious to them that they were the only teenagers attending.

  I was introduced to so many people so quickly my head began to spin. Asher seemed as eager to bring me around as did Thatcher or Bunny, stealing me away to hold onto his arm as if he had discovered me. They made me feel a bit like Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady, the poor girl who was changed into a sophisticated princess. Bunny even embarrassed me a bit by announcing that I was wearing her pearls. Out of the corner of my eye. I saw Whitney shaking her head in disapproval and whispering into some woman's ear, turning her expression into a mirror of her own critical one. It was as if her words were eardrops that could make all the women at the party of one face.

  Thatcher finally rescued me and took me out onto the dance floor they had created over the pool. Under the streaming lights and the blazing stars, with the twenty-six-piece orchestra seemingly playing for us and us alone. I felt swept up in his arms. When I looked about. I saw that most eyes were on us. Whitney's the most envious of all. perhaps. Asher and Bunny were standing by, looking like the duke and duchess who had found and even created the proper woman for their prince. Eventually, other people joined us. and I didn't feel as self-conscious about every step and turn we made.

  The food was as extravagant as could be: fresh lobster and prawns, prime rib and filets with sauces that came directly off menus from France's best restaurants, vegetables so dressed and seasoned I didn't recognize carrots and peas, and tables of fish dishes from Dover salmon to octopus. The Viennese dessert table seemed a mile long, with pastries and cakes that reeked of calories.

  "You can gain weight just looking at it." I told Thatcher.

  He looked so handsome, happy, and lighthearted. I didn't think it was possible to give him a better gift than the gift of truth I had given him earlier. He as much as said so when he leaned over to whisper. "Willow, you are the first girl I have been with who makes me feel safe and with whom I don't have to put on airs or be defensive. Thanks for trusting me."

  His words lifted me. We stole a quick kiss and then danced again. I didn't think I would enjoy such an opulent, ostentatious party. but I wished it would never end. that Thatcher and I would somehow get stuck in time, that the earth itself would stop spinning, and we would be like the figures on John Keats's famous urn, whose beauty would never fade, whose love would never wilt. I'd willingly surrender forever to this wonderful night. I thought.

  But nights do end, and stars do sink into the light of day.

  When Thatcher and I twirled to the corner of the dance floor, I was able to see beyond the stream of lights and the party. I could see the dock.

  My mother was standing there, holding her lantern.

  My heart skipped a beat. and I squeezed Thatcher's arm so tightly he paused.

  "What is it?"

  "Something's wrong," I said. "Grace." I nodded toward the dock, and he looked at me with concern.

  Quietly, we slipped away and hurried down to her.

  "Grace," he called as we hurried onto the dock. "What's wrong?"

  "Linden," she said, turning to me, her eyes blood-red with worry.

  She didn't have to say it. I said it for her.

  "He hasn't come back."

  16

  The Search

  .

  "What are you talking about, Thatcher?* Bunny

  Eaton cried. We can't call the Coast Guard here now! I have a party going on. Do you realize who is here?" He had pulled his mother and father into the study to tell them what was happening.

  "He's out there somewhere, maybe injured." Thatcher said calmly.

  Asher shook his head and stared at the floor,

  "Of course he's not," Bunny insisted. "It's just like him to disappear like this. You know he's not mentally well. We'll be the laughingstock of the town if we react. You just don't interrupt a path, for something like that. It will remind all these people who the landlords are and what an embarrassment they are."

  "A man's life could be in danger, Bunny," I said, fighting to control myself. 'Grace is sick with wori7,"

  "Well, what of it? She's probably sick with worry every day, having a son like that. Asher, will you say something!" she screamed at Thatcher's father.

  He looked up at Thatcher. "Gone all day, you say?"

  "From sunrise, according to Grace."

  "Oh, I'm sure that's some idiotic exaggeration. She probably doesn't know what time of day it is." Bunny muttered.

  "That's not true," I snapped back at her.

  She looked up at me, her eyes blazing with fury. "Can you tell me what has happened here that you are such a cheerleader for those two loonies?"

  Thatcher and I exchanged a look that she plucked like a butterfly out of the air.

  "What is it? Well?" she demanded of him. "What's going on, Thatcher?"

  He glanced at me again and then turned to her. "It's nothing but concern for someone's life. Mother."

  She folded her arms across her chest and fumed.

  "I think Thatcher will have to make the call. Bunny," Asher said.

  "Let Grace Montgomery make the call herself. At least we can blame that on her when the boats and the spotlights and the alarms and bedlam begin." she said.

  "I don't understand how you can be so cruel. Bunny," I couldn't help but say. This is a mother who is concerned for her son, whose child might be in some terrible danger."

  "Oh, you just met the woman. You don't know them the way we know them," she replied.

  "Yes, I do." I was so sick of the pretending.

  "How? How could you possibly know anything significant about them?"

  "I do."

  She started to grimace at me disdainfully, as if to say, "You don't know what you're talking about," when I blurted it out.

  "I'll tell you how, Grace Montgomery just happens to be my real mother."

  If a bomb had gone off in the room, it wouldn't have had a greater effect on her. Her eves seemed to explode in her head. Her face flushed. Her hands fluttered up toward her throat like birds with injured wings, and she stepped backward as though she had just been struck in the face. She gasped and turned to Asher, who was looking at me with almost as much surprise.

  "Grace Montgomery is your mother?" he asked, to confirm what his ears had heard.

  "Yes. It's the real reason I came to Palm Beach, I just learned about it recently. and I wanted to meet her and get to know her."

  "Oh, my God!" Bunny cried, looking up at the ceiling, her eyelids fluttering as if she were on the verge of losing consciousness. "All this happening on the night of our party!"

  "Mother, take it easy. Sit. and I'll get you some water." Thatcher eased her into a chair. Asher went to the door and called to a maid to get a pitcher of cold water and some glasses quickly. Bunny's head slumped a bit, and then she raised it and shook her head at me.

  "How could she possibly be your mother?"

  "My father and she were lovers." I said calmly. "How else?" She continued to shake her head but turned to Asher.

  "I don't understand. What is she saying?"

  "My father was the chief psychiatrist at the clinic she went to. It was there they fell in love," I told her.

  The doctor had a love affair with her?" She shifted her eyes to Thatcher quickly. -Did you know all this time?"

&n
bsp; He shook his head. "No. Actually," he said, looking at me. "not until today."

  "Today? Oh dear, dear, dear... today..."

  "Thatcher, we have to call the Coast Guard," I said. "Are you going to do it, or should I?"

  "Go down to your so-called mother's home and do it," Bunny snapped at me. "Deceiving us like this, pretending to be someone you're not, enjoying our hospitality... making me have this party to introduce you to... to... my God," she said, pressing her hands to the base of her throat again. "The former governor of the U.S. Virgin Islands is out there!"

  "Take it easy, Mother." Thatcher urged.

  The maid arrived with the tray of water and glasses. Thatcher poured a glass for Bunny. She drank it and sat back, her eyes closed.

  "I'm going down to the beach house to call. Thatcher," I told him, and started away.

  "I'll be right there." he said.

  "I think I'm having heart failure." Bunny cried, and squeezed his arm. "Can you imagine the scandal? Her father was that woman's doctor. Get Whitney in here. Asher. Quickly. She'll know better how I should handle this. Hurry!" she ordered as he followed me out.

  "I'm sorry," Asher said as we split to take two different paths.

  "It's just too much of a shock and at the wrong time."

  "I don't think there would have been a right time for her, do you?"

  He didn't reply. I hurried down to the beach house to make the call.

  Nearly half an hour later, the Coast Guard cutter arrived at the dock. and Grace and I went out to speak with them. I could see that their arrival had indeed caused some commotion and interest at the party. The orchestra even paused. All the while I was waiting with my mother. I had expected Thatcher to come join us, but he still hadn't, even with the arrival of the Coast Guard.

  Grace explained as much as she could to the captain, and I did my best to describe where I thought Linden's beach was. He promised they would do a vigorous search and call for a helicopter immediately. Ten minutes later, the sight of the helicopter combing the beach with its powerful beam brought the party to a standstill.

  As if any sort of trouble, tension, possible serious injury, and even death were like a giant hand snapping its fingers to break the spell they were all caught in, the mega-millionaires, chiefs of industry, politicians, and television and movie stars began to flee the scene.

  "It's like the sinking of the Titanic,"I muttered. 'All of them fleeing to save their reputations from drowning."

  My mother smiled and then looked out toward the boat lights again. She and I were now glued to our seats on the front loggia, waiting to hear the phone ring, waiting to see some sign. of a returning sailboat or Coast Guard cutter.

  Finally, I saw Thatcher coming our way.

  '"Sorry," he said as he approached us. "We had to get Dr. Anderson to prescribe a sedative for my mother. She just isn't capable of dealing with any sort of crisis, no matter how large or small."

  "I never saw anyone as spoiled as that." I said "She can't think of anyone but herself. You've all made her that way. Thatcher."

  "Probably," he admitted, then slanted a look at my mother. "But you know, we all have to live with what we've created."

  "Not always," I said. "Sometimes, we can change things."

  He nodded, but not with any real agreement, and looked out at the sea.

  "Any word at all?" he asked.

  "Not yet." my mother said. "How could they not have found him or what happened to him by now? He couldn't have gone that far in such a small boat."

  "He's been gone all day. Grace," Thatcher said softly. "He could have gone pretty far.-

  "I need something to drink, something cold," she said. "Anyone else?"

  "No, thank you." Thatcher said. I shook my head and watched her go inside.

  -She's the one who is supposed to be

  unbalanced, and she's the one we tell the cold, hard truth. Doesn't that strike you as a bit odd, Thatcher? A bit unfair, how the rich and the privileged are so protected?"

  "I'm not making any excuses for my parents. Willow. They are what they are None of it matters at the moment."

  I agreed with that. "What do you really think happened to him?"

  He might have one too far out, or he might have gone ashore someplace, hidden the boat, and traipsed off somewhere. He's capable of something like that. Who haws? A search at night isn't easy."

  "I feel so responsible," I moaned, and swayed back and forth. embracing myself.

  "Nonsense," Thatcher said, coming to my side. "You can't blame yourself for his erratic behavior. You didn't come here to hurt him, or anyone else for that matter."

  It doesn't matter what your intentions were if the results are the same." I said.

  "Of course it does. You can't say something like that to an attorney." he joked. "Intent is nine-tenths of the settlement,"

  "Right." I said. I looked back at the front of the beach house. "I'm staying with her now, Thatcher."

  He nodded, "Okay,,"

  "I'll go back for my things in a while.- "No one's throwing you out. Willow."

  I raised my eyebrows. "I don't think I'm up to brunch with your parents tomorrow."

  "After a day or so. they'll put this all behind them. and..."

  "But I can't. Let's just leave it be," I said. "Until this ends, let's just leave it be."

  "Sure," he said, pulling back. "Whatever you think best. Willow."

  We were both silent, staring out at the water and the beam from the helicopter. Suddenly, it pulled back and away, the beam shutting off. Minutes later, we heard the phone ringing inside the beach house. My heart paused and then pounded. Thatcher and I looked at each other and waited. neither speaking, holding our breath.

  My mother emerged, "It was the Coast Guard," she said, pressing her hand against her heart. "They found him some distance from that beach. The boat was caught up in some vegetation and rocks."

  "How is he?" I asked.

  "They said he suffered some sort of accident, a blow to his head. He was conscious but very confused. They really couldn't tell much more about his condition. The cutter is taking him to the pier in Fort Lauderdale, where an ambulance will bring him to the hospital."

  "Let's go," Thatcher said quickly, "I'll take you both."

  I reached for my mother's hand, and we followed Thatcher out to his car.

  "What could have happened?" I asked as we drove away,

  "Lots of things," Thatcher said. "Tossed by a wave, he lost his footing and fell against the side of the boat. A gust of wind caught him unaware, and the boom struck him. When you're out in nature, a man alone is always in danger," Thatcher added.

  "Linden has always been alone." my mother murmured. "In nature or otherwise."

  I pressed my hand to hers, and we rode on in silence.

  The ambulance had already brought him to the emergency room, and the doctors were attending him by the time we arrived. We waited anxiously until the ER doctor came to see us.

  "I am his mother," my mother said quickly, and he turned directly to her, "How is he?"

  His head wound required nearly fifty stitches. He has suffered a shill fracture and a concussion. Preliminary tests indicate the presence of a subdural hematoma."

  "What does that mean?" my mother asked.

  "The head injury causes blood to collect between the inner and outer membranes of the brain. This, in turn, creates pressure which we have to relieve."

  "How?"

  "A surgical procedure. I'm afraid." he said. "I have sent for Dr. Parker Thombera, a very highly respected neurological surgeon."

  "Yes," Thatcher said. "I've heard of him."

  The doctor turned to him and smiled, "He'll be here very soon to confirm the diagnosis." he said.

  "Can I see my son?" my mother asked,

  "You can. but I have to tell you he has some amnesia at the moment, which is not unusual or uncharacteristic of the condition. It's rarely lasting. Its longevity is directly related to the severity of th
e injury, and once we get him on the mend--"

  "He doesn't know who he is?"

  "He's very confused."

  "Maybe when he sees her, he'll remember and realize what's happened to him." Thatcher suggested.

  "Maybe," the doctor said, but the way he smiled and glanced at him told me probably not.

  She started away with him, paused, and looked at me. 'For now. I think it's best I go myself"

  "Of course," I said, and sat down, my eyes dropping to my fingers twisting and turning on themselves nervously in my lap.

  "Don't you even think of blaming yourself for any of this. Willow. I told you he's always been impulsive, stubborn, and high-strung. You heard Grace in the car. Linden has always been a loner. Who knows how he tore up the waves out there, having himself a tantrum,"

  "I just wish that when I packed my bag to come here. I had brought along happiness and hope, not more trouble and sadness," I said.

  "Your coming should have been a wonderful thing-- is a wonderful thing. Anyone who takes it otherwise has no one to blame but him- or herself." Thatcher assured me.

  I leaned back. Suddenly, I was feeling so tired, the fatigue going to the '11' bottom of my soul. I thought I could sleep forever, put my head on a pillow and, like Rip Van Winkle, not wake up for years and years. Maybe I would be better off. How I wished I was a little girl again and Amou was at my side, a willing pillow against whom I could rest my head and dry my tears to the sounds of her soft voice, her singing, her reassurances and promises.

  I missed her so.

  I closed my eyes and actually did drift off. When I opened my eyes again. Thatcher was standing in the doorway, speaking to a tall, thin, distinguishedlooking man in a dark blue suit. They shook hands. and Thatcher turned to me. I sat up quickly and ground the sleep out of my eyes.

  "Who was that?"

  "Dr. Thornberg. They are going to operate on Linden as soon as possible. He thinks he can relieve the pressure easily enough and get him on the mend physically but warned about the potential for what they call posttraumatic stress disorder," he said, lowering his voice.

  "What's that, exactly?"

  "When someone experiences a life-threatening event, he or she can have some psychological problems afterward, Willow. I've done some malpractice cases. so I had to prepare some research that touched on this. I'm no expert, and I'm just giving you the doctor's standard warning. Complicating matters." he added, gazing down the hallway to be sure my mother wasn't nearby. 'are Linden's personality and psychological problems before he was even injured. They could be inflamed. exaggerated."