Household

by Stevenson, Florence

  “You bet she will!” Gareth said excitedly. “She’s a natural for the screen.”

  “You don’t need to tell me that, Gary. I saw her from across the room. It’s like she’s got a light shinin’ inside of her. And she’ll photograph like a million bucks. She’s got the right features.” He moved around Juliet. “Yeah, from all angles she’s perfect. You let me run some film on you, honey, an’ then you come to my office and we’ll talk contracts.”

  It had been difficult for Juliet to keep herself from telling Mr. Arno that his manners were atrocious. He had been talking as if she were not there. She could have been a slave girl she had once seen in a Moroccan market half a century ago. It was a marvel he hadn’t wanted to examine her teeth. It gave her considerable pleasure to say, “I can’t do that, Mr. Arno.”

  “Of course you can, darling,” Gareth said. “I’ll do the test with you.”

  She shook her head. “I’m really not interested.”

  “You’re never tellin’ me you’re turnin’ down a chance to star in an Arno film,” bellowed the producer.

  “I must,” she said unhappily.

  “But Juliet,” Gareth began, “we could be together, dance...”

  “Please don’t press me,” she interrupted, hating the hurt she read in his eyes, hating the way it was making her feel. “I must go now,” she added. Turning toward Arno, she said, “Thank you for a very pleasant evening.”

  He glared at her. “I think you’re nuts.” Turning on his heel, he walked away.

  Gareth stepped forward, his fists knotted.

  “No, my love,” Juliet said, placing her hand on his arm and holding him there. “It’s your career.”

  “He has no right...”

  “Shhhhh,” she begged. She made herself smile. “I guess nobody’s ever turned him down. It’s a new experience for him, so you have to make allowances.”

  “Why did you turn him down?”

  “I don’t want it, darling.”

  “We could have been together.”

  “We are together. Please take me to my corner, dearest. My aunt...”

  “If you’d only agree to the test, you wouldn’t have to cater to that old witch,” he said hotly.

  “Shhhh.” She ran her hand down the side of his face.

  Catching her by the wrist, he pressed a kiss into her palm. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too, Gareth.”

  “Will you go with me to Kitty’s tomorrow night as planned? I hate the place, but they do have a great orchestra. And I want to see you in that costume you mentioned.”

  “I’ll be there.” She managed a smile, difficult in view of all she was feeling.

  ❖

  It was early when Juliet came back to the cellar, but she was tired and dispirited as she had never been before in all her lengthy existence. It seemed to her that she was looking down a tunnel of times to come, and now she remembered a talc her nurse had once told her about the goddess Aurora.

  The deity of the dawn had loved a mortal, Tithonus, a Prince of Troy. Aurora begged Jupiter to grant her lover eternal life, but she forgot to ask that he remain forever young. And he had grown old, old, old—as Gareth would, as most of her victims had because she could seldom bring herself to kill them and condemn them to this weary immorality. Yet there never had been one whom she loved as she did Gareth. She had never loved anyone except Colin, whom she still loved but in a different way—as a sister, she realized with a feeling of shock. She realized something else, too. She had never experienced such anguish in all the years of what, for want of a better term, she called “life.”

  Colin returned shortly after she arrived. Looking at his face and his tortured eyes, vulnerable as she had never seen them, she said, “There’s a costume ball at Kitty’s Place tomorrow night. We’re supposed to wear costumes from our favorite period in history. Shall we go?”

  “Of course,” he said brightly.

  His assumption of gaiety was so unconvincing that she almost wept, but at the same time she was glad of it. “Colin...”

  “Yes, my love.”

  “I’m tired.”

  “So am I.”

  “Really?”

  “You hardly need ask.”

  “I know.”

  They gave each other detailed descriptions of their evenings.

  “Isn’t it odd,” Juliet murmured when Colin had finally finished speaking, “that we should feel the same way at the same time.”

  “Haven’t we always?”

  “Out here, it is such a beautiful place.”

  “There are always serpents in paradise,” he said ruefully. “I didn’t think I would call mine—love.”

  “Nor I.”

  Juliet cocked her head. “Listen to Molly.”

  “She knows,” he said.

  “I hope she doesn’t say anything to father.”

  “She’s never been one to keep her own counsel, but it can’t matter.”

  “It’s growing early,” she reminded him, as she moved toward her coffin.

  “Yes.” He hastily undressed. “Until tomorrow night.”

  “Until tomorrow night.”

  They smiled at each other lovingly.

  Three

  Toward morning on the second night of the full moon, Livia awakened with a start. Edging away from Septimus, she looked through the windows, thinking that Molly and Letitia Lawrence must be on that segment of roof right overhead. She wondered why they were howling so loudly. They were a weird trio, Molly with her shrieks, Letitia with her choking gurgles, and Gremalkin joining in with his usual squall. That she usually did not hear them so clearly worried her. Generally they were like rain on a tin roof, something that readied you but didn’t rrtake any real impression. Tonight they were making an impression. She envied Septimus his ability to sleep through their caterwauling. Even though he possessed the psychic sensitivity to hear them, he could always blot them out, something she could never do. It was impossible to guess what had started them off, but it was all of apiece. Kathie and Richard were also disturbed, coming back from the studio both miserable, both sure that something was about to happen to send them forth upon the road again.

  Until this moment she had been reasonably sure that the trouble was borrowed, born out of all their previous experience. If Richard had been relieved of his acting chores, Septimus had agreed to take his place. Kathie was doing very well, and that timorous but nice Miss Fiske had praised Richard’s cleverness with contracts. It had seemed to Livia that for the first time in their gypsylike existence, they stood a chance of settling down. She had almost been afraid to think about it, but staying did seem feasible with three members of the Household gainfully employed here in Hollywood. She had said as much to her children, but now she was uncomfortably aware that the rooftop residents were definitely opposed to this opinion.

  What could happen?

  Mark?

  Septimus had been nervous about the reinforced cellar walls being as strong as they should be. He had spoken about putting Mark in his special trunk, but by the time he had arrived at that opinion, it was too late for such precautions. Mark had already been given the freedom of the room. He had been restless today. Passing the door leading to the cellar, Livia had heard the rattling of his chains, suggesting that he was pacing back and forth. Yet, it did seem a shame to keep him in that trunk. He always complained of severe muscle cramps when released.

  Juliet and Colin?

  She had seen very little of them of late. They seemed to be very happy, but they always were. She dismissed them and concentrated on Kathie and Richard again. Until today, Kathie had been in very good spirits. She had spoken a great deal about Matthew Vernon, whom she had met briefly on the road. That was a pleasant coincidence—or perhaps it wasn’t. Matthew might actually have been, instrumental in getting her this job. Probably he was in love with her—so many young men had been. And Kathie? It suddenly struck Livia that her daughter might very well be in love with the d
irector. She was sure that Richard yearned for Ruth Fiske. Her eyes widened. That could be why both were so melancholy! They were in love, and of course unhappy. The Household weighed heavily upon their shoulders. Livia frowned. The Household was a problem. Not everybody was fortunate enough to marry a witch or a sorcerer. Probably Molly and Letitia were equally cognizant of that. Maybe Richard and Kathie were unaware that their fears of being uprooted again were actually based on the fact that neither was willing to tell the object of their desire the truth. Maybe they really wanted to leave. Her thinking was becoming convoluted, and she hoped she was wrong. She did not want to leave. She loved everything about this area, which among its many virtues was the lack of a main street. She had walked up and down so many dusty, depressing main streets. Livia yawned and gratefully resigned herself to sleep. Her last waking thought was that everything would be all right. She could not remember when she had last believed that.

  ❖

  She had waited until the coffin lids were closed. She had waited until Livia, waking nervously from sleep, had slipped back into oblivion again. Then she oozed into the room where the beast lay drowsing and hovered over him with her headful of dreams, willing him to receive what she was sending.

  He lay there, his long grey shape stretched upon the floor, his horrible half-human head resting on his front paws, paws with sharp curved talons that could tear the living flesh from the bones, fangs that could bite and destroy and infect—and which in the course of his life had accomplished none of these three acts! Instead he had been impotent, surrendering himself to chains, lulled by his intrinsic kindness. Kindness! How she loathed the word!

  For a century it had mitigated the force of her vengeance. The Veringers and those of their blood had suffered and would still suffer, but not as she, living and dead, had intended they should suffer. Their plight had not driven them apart but had brought them ever closer together. Consequently her anguish remained unappeased, her hatred unsatisfied.

  Oh, how she abominated them for thwarting her plans, thrusting her forth upon the roads when she had been so very near to discovering the power that would have rendered her beautiful and immortal! The elixir had been strained of nearly all its impurities. The ceremonies and the sacrifices had raised the demon who had told her of the final ingredient needed to achieve the proper consistency. Another night, only one more night, and she would have had the world at her feet! Then, he had come, Richard Veringer, accompanied by the louts that knocked down the house, hammers and mallets crushing the old stone, destroying the beakers, letting the precious fluid sink into the earth. She had been forced out upon the road, a ragged vagabond again, with nothing but the virulence of her curse to comfort her—and now it was weakening, due to her own foolishness and her belief that there was never a place that would receive them. How could she have known about Hollywood? If she were not careful, they would soon be free of her malevolence.

  Mark was her one hope. Let him out, let him run over the ground, let him destroy, and in destroying cut the thread that might have become a lifeline. She could not sever the chains nor batter down the steel, but he was strong and unaware of his strength. He must be made aware of it, of the thrill of earth beneath his unfettered feet, of the smell of blood. None of them had ever preyed on their own, but let him dream of tearing their flesh, as he had last night and the other night she had invaded his dreams. On the second and brightest night of the full moon, let him be guided by her hatred!

  She stood before him, knowing that he saw her with the eyes of his mind, knowing that he heard her with the ears of his mind. And when she asked him her name, she heard it come hissing out of his slavering jaws.

  Erlina Bell.

  She laughed silently and poured the dreams into his moon-maddened brain. Under their onslaught, he twitched and snarled and howled, while outside the knowing bats darted into the holes under the roof, the snakes slithered into the shrubbery, the horned owls sought their hollows, and the smaller insects died, their tiny bodies plummeting into the rose bushes. And she, with her load of dreams, rose from the monster and slunk into the house.

  ❖

  Kathie awoke from a strange dream in which her brother had predominated. In it she felt that he was in deep trouble, and she had wanted to comfort him and be with him as she had when they were children, when they had slept in the same bed, entwined together in scruffy boarding houses where the sheets were mended and old and sometimes even unwashed. The mattresses had been hard or lumpy or both, the blankets thin. They had clung to each other for warmth. They had been very small then. Later Richard slept with Septimus and she with her mother or, when they could afford it and the act was prospering, they had the luxury of their own bedrooms. Now, quite suddenly, she longed to be with Richard and feel his arms around her, shielding her from her fears of strange houses with strange sounds in them and lately the continuous wailing of the banshee.

  She heard them both now—Molly and Letitia. She craved the comfort Richard could give her. She did love him so much. It occurred to her that she really resented Ruth Fiske, who wasn’t nearly good enough for him, but then again nobody was. Richard was so handsome, so kind and gentle. Her resentment against Matthew Vernon overflowed, firing poor Richard! How could she act with anyone else? She was used to her dear brother, needed him with her, wanted him. She flushed. She wanted him in ways that had never crossed her mind before, ways that were making her heart beat faster and her throat pound. Impelled by desires that both terrified and excited her, she slipped out of bed and started down the hall to his room.

  ❖

  Richard stirred in his sleep and woke up, thinking of Kathie. He had been dreaming about her, her beautiful face, her slender virginal body. She had seemed incredibly desirable. To think about her was to forget that he had ever been attracted to Ruth Fiske. He felt the depression that had sent him to bed early that night magically lifting. If they were on the road again, he would have Kathie to himself. He thought of Matthew Vernon, hating him because Kathie had a notion she loved him. He wanted her and needed her; it did not matter that they were brother and sister!

  There as a little tap at his door.

  “Yes,” he called. “Who is it?”

  “Kathie... may I come in?”

  “Kathie, yes!”

  She stood in the doorway, wondering suddenly what had prompted her to come to him. She was really so tired. It must be very late or extremely early; she wasn’t sure which. She said crossly, “I’m so sleepy.”

  “Do you want to... crawl in with me?”

  “No, what an idea! I think I must have been walking in my sleep or something. I’m sorry I woke you up.”

  “That’s all right.”

  “I did have a funny dream, but I can’t remember it now.”

  “So did I,” he said, feeling much the same way she obviously did. “This house is conducive to dreams.”

  “I agree. We’ll have to move once we get enough money salted away.”

  “Right.” he said enthusiastically. “I’d like to be in Hollywood proper, maybe near Gower.”

  “I’d rather be farther out by the beach.” She yawned. “But I don’t really see us leaving town, do you?”

  “No, I like the idea of being an agent, or rather an ‘artist’s representative.’ Honesty doesn’t seem to be the best policy among most of them out here. I’d like to change all that.”

  “I’m sure you will,” she assured him. She yawned a second time. “I think I’d better go back to bed. Good night, darling. Sorry I disturbed you.”

  “That’s okay, babe. Anytime.”

  After his sister left, Richard was annoyed, wondering what had brought her out of bed at this hour. A dream? He, too, had dreamed, something about her, but he couldn’t remember what it was. He lay down and was asleep at the same time he put his head on the pillow.

  ❖

  Erlina Bell seethed in the hallway and fled back to her one hope in the cellar. She had been more successful with Colin and
Juliet, but unfortunately they were no longer of any use to her.

  ❖

  Kathie awoke to the sound of her alarm clock which she had set the previous evening for seven. She must have automatically reset it for five last night and was glad she had. She felt much better today, better about the part and better about Richard, who would certainly be a more successful agent than actor. To be absolutely honest, he had given her nothing in the way of a response. She might have been acting opposite a wooden pole. The difference between them was that she enjoyed acting and he did not. She much preferred it to being sawed in half, being made to disappear, and generally assisting her father and brother with the illusions, which included feeding the rabbits and tending the baby chicks and the goldfish. Furthermore, all that had been required of her on stage was her capacity to look well in a series of low-cut skintight blouses or close-fitting leotards. Of course there had been her smile and sustaining that had required considerable acting ability. She had smiled while the saw seemed to grind across her middle, and she had smiled while disappearing and reappearing. She had smiled when Richard’s daggers skimmed over her head, her shoulders, her arms, her hips, her legs and ankles. She had smiled even when one of them had gashed her side and another had clipped her on the ankle—on two separate occasions three years apart. Richard was usually very accurate.

  As Lorenza de Cagliostro, she did not have to smile quite so often, and she could speak with Matthew Vernon, who did seem to like her. She really felt much, much better about everything. And she would go to the studio after all with her father. They had to be there at seven, so she had better get up.

  Coming down the stairs a half hour later, Kathie looked up at the new chandelier which Mr. Goldbaum had insisted on installing. She half-expected to see Letitia Lawrence dangling from it looking horridly blue as she did at unexpected moments. Fortunately these were few and farther between, since the actress seemed to have found a kindred soul in Molly. She suddenly remembered her conversation with Richard in the night. Why had she gone to his room? She hadn’t done that since they were children and living in all those miserable old boarding houses. That life was at an end; she was sure of it. Their combined salaries could get them a comfortable house. Maybe they even could afford separate houses, and the Old Lord hopefully might prefer to stay with her parents.