The Carousel

by Belva Plain

  “Little brother or not,” she said aloud. “I will fight for myself. That’s how it has to be. Good night, Sheba.” And suddenly she found she was crying again.

  Chapter Four

  May 1990

  Dr. Vanderwater looked like a doctor. When, leaving his office after their first visit, Sally had made that comment, Dan had been amused.

  “What does a doctor look like?”

  “It’s something indefinable. Probably just a manner. But I liked him, didn’t you?”

  He agreed. “I was sure we would. The man has an established reputation without being old, and he’s solid. He’s a commonsense guy, no alarmist. Sally, we’re going to get at the bottom of this, and Tina’s going to be okay.”

  Now, with a vast mahogany desk between them as she sat opposite Dr. Vanderwater, she remembered that. On the desk stood a leather-framed photograph of his four cheerful boys, whose identical heads of curly dark hair copied his own. He was a father. It meant practical understanding to add to the dozen certificates and diplomas that hung on the wall. All of this was reassuring, as was the man’s easy bearing.

  “How’s Tina this week?”

  “It was a pretty good week.”

  “Fine, fine. She’s a nice little girl. My wife and I often wonder how it would be to have a little girl in the house,” he said, looking fondly toward the photograph. “So then, you feel she’s making some progress?”

  The very word “progress” had a bright ring to it. Still, needing to be accurate, Sally added, “There was one dreadful scene last Sunday when some friends came to see Susannah. I was holding her, and naturally everybody crowded around, talking to her the way people talk to a baby. Then when somebody very thoughtfully remembered Tina and said something to praise her, she wouldn’t answer, started to cry, screamed when this nice old gentleman patted her head, and kicked his ankle.” Sally made a rueful face. “It was embarrassing. Yet not, I suppose, too unusual?”

  The doctor nodded. “Not too unusual. It’s obvious that Tina’s an excitable child, her reactions are somewhat extreme, either very positive or very negative. But then, when we look at the adult population, we see the same thing in many of us. We see every possible variation in temperament, don’t we?”

  “You’re saying that what we are looking at now is Tina grown up?”

  “In a sense, yes, but she’s certainly not going to remain at a five-year-old level, is she? Essentially, inwardly, I would doubt that she will ever be exactly a phlegmatic person, but there’s nothing wrong with that. Right now she’s in a temporary phase of great anxiety because she’s being challenged. In her mind, the baby has moved in and usurped her place in the family. Therefore, we have to teach her how to find her way toward acceptance, toward reality and understanding, that her place has not been usurped, that there is room enough for her and for the baby. This understanding will take time.”

  “Very long?”

  “Mrs. Grey, I have no crystal ball. Psychotherapy isn’t orthopedic surgery, where you can either walk after the operation or you cannot. But I’m sure you’ve done enough reading about sibling rivalry, anyway, so you don’t need much more explaining on my part.”

  Now Sally was able to smile a little. “Then my husband was right. I have to tell you he didn’t think much of the first diagnosis. My husband is a believer in common sense.”

  Dr. Vanderwater returned the smile with a slight reproof. “Common sense, unfortunately, is often more common than sensible. In Tina’s case, though, I do agree with your husband. I have, of course, no idea who made the first diagnosis, and I don’t want to know. But after having had twelve sessions with Tina, I can find no basis at all for it. Frankly, Mrs. Grey, it troubles me to encounter faddism in my profession. Now that we have come so far in uncovering so many of the evils that used to be hidden and denied, we sometimes tilt in the opposite direction. We speak, we anticipate child molestation, for example, where there is none, uncovering a ‘memory’ of something that happened thirty years before—something that did not happen. It’s the misuse of a very useful concept.”

  Sally wanted to laugh. Bubbles, impetuous and airy, filled her throat and turned into a trickle of tears that she blinked away.

  “I feel,” she said, “I feel a relief that I can’t begin to describe. You’ve given me a mountain of gold dust, a hundred years of life—” She had to wipe her eyes. “All this spring, it felt like carrying a ton of lead on your shoulders. I couldn’t understand how this horror was possible. Tina knows very well where you mustn’t let anyone touch you. No. I couldn’t understand.”

  The doctor said kindly, “So now take the load off your husband’s shoulders too. Go home and live hopefully and normally.”

  “Do you still want to see Tina, Doctor?”

  “Oh, yes. Bring her here once a week.”

  “And my traveling? I’ve been asked to go to Mexico for an article on migrant workers. Do you think I should still keep it on hold?”

  “Yes, do for a while. Stay home and keep on with what you’re doing. You’re a good mother, Mrs. Grey.”

  Departing, Sally thought what a difference this was from the day she had left that other office. Dr. Vanderwater’s confidence was contagious. He was what Dan called a “can-do” person. Having always been such a person herself, Sally liked the feeling. It was healthy. It was strong. Driving home, she turned on the radio and sang along with it, all the way.

  “Well, Tina, here she is!” cried Clive. A diminutive pony, marked in cocoa brown and creamy white, was led out of the stable. “Came all the way from Pennsylvania yesterday, a long trip and none the worse for it. Isn’t she beautiful? What do you say, Tina? What do you think of her?” He could barely contain his excitement, his pleasure, in the bestowal of so superb a gift.

  The child’s eyes were stretched almost round, and almost, thought Sally, as large as the pony’s.

  “Maybe you thought I forgot my promise,” said Clive, urging a response. “Did you? Did you think so?”

  Still holding Dan’s hand, Tina shook her head.

  “No, of course you didn’t. You knew I wouldn’t forget. But I had to find just the right pony for you. Come, I’ve some sugar and a bit of apple for you to feed her. That way she’ll get to know she belongs to you. Come, Tina.”

  “Go on. You’ve had pony rides lots of times before. See how gentle she is! Here, take the apple and hold it to her mouth,” Dan instructed, taking Tina’s hesitant hand. “Watch me. Feel how soft her nose is.”

  “It’s wet.”

  “That’s all right. It’s supposed to be.”

  The small hand ventured and drew away. “Her tongue feels funny.”

  “Yes, rough. It’s the way her tongue’s made.”

  The pony, reaching for Tina’s withdrawing hand, prodded it, and suddenly seized the apple; as suddenly, then as unexpectedly, Tina gave a shriek of delight.

  “Look what she’s doing! She likes me. She wants me to feed her.”

  For an instant, Sally felt a small leap of the heart. The familiar, original Tina had flashed back—the changeling gone—with her distinctive, quick enthusiasm, her own vivid, bold expression. And she knew that Dan, meeting her look, had seen it too.

  “Of course she likes you! She’s going to love you. Shall I lift you onto her back? She’s saddled and ready,” he said.

  Clive’s satisfaction swelled. “I bought a hat for Tina, a safe hard hat. I would have bought a whole outfit, breeches and jacket, but I don’t know anything about sizes, so I’ll leave that to you, Sally. How about a little ride now? A mile or two down the trail and back?”

  “I want to go, I want to go!” Tina cried.

  Dan assented. “Okay. We’ll wait for you.”

  Sally sat down with him on a bench near the stable’s wall until Clive appeared, mounted on a splendid black mare. Out of earshot, she murmured, “His one luxury. He paid fifteen thousand for that quarter horse.”

  Nervous, in spite of good resolutions not to
be, Sally and Dan watched the horse and the pony walking their riders very slowly away. Clive was straight-backed and at ease in his impeccable boots and habit, while Tina, equally straight-backed, was proud in purple sweater and new velvet hat. When they had disappeared around a curve in the trail, Dan reassured Sally.

  “Don’t worry, he’ll make a rider out of her. She was really thrilled, wasn’t she? This may be just the thing. Did you think she’d take to the pony like that? Frankly, I was afraid it would take a lot of patience to convince her. But I guess she’s a plucky gal at heart. Like her mother,” he said, putting his arm around Sally.

  The May day was a late reminder of March, the sun having abruptly gone in behind gray-white clouds that, colored and curled like a sheep’s back, lay low in the sky. The riding academy was deserted this Saturday afternoon, the paddock vacant. Horses and people were all indoors.

  “Gray or not, it’s too nice outside to be stuck in under a roof,” Dan said. “Quick, Sally, look up. Red-tailed hawks. They fly two hundred miles a day.”

  Following the line of his raised arm, she saw a swift parade in the sky. Rising and dipping, it was moving northward.

  “You will see them from now on up into October. They’re on the way to nest.” He stood up, the better to follow the circling, erratic flight. “Watch how they follow the wind, the updrafts. What a sight!” Then, swinging around to face the greening forest, he exclaimed, “Chilly as it is, I can still make myself smell summer. Grass and heat. It’s in the air. Oh, Sally, can you imagine cutting all this down to run roads through here? It sickens me to think about streets and shopping centers here.”

  It had been some weeks since Dan had talked about the project, so she knew how deep his distress must lie. His most troubled moods were always kept to himself. She knew that well. And, like a very amateur psychologist, knew, too, that in doing so, he was denying the existence of the trouble.

  “Has Ian said anything since Oliver’s birthday?” she asked.

  “No, nor have I. We care about each other too much, you know that, to want to become enemies, so we’re both avoiding the subject. We’re putting it off as long as we can. But when the interminable paperwork is finished and the time arrives when we sign on the dotted line, or we refuse to sign there, then we’ll have to talk. And it won’t be pleasant,” he concluded grimly. “I don’t look forward to it at all, Sally.”

  Yes, it was an ugly conflict that loomed before them all. For even if the foreign investors were to withdraw their offer, there would still be Amanda Grey. Where was the money to come from that would pacify her? A strange woman, contradictory and eccentric …

  On the day of their wedding, she had been waiting on the steps of the country church for the bride and groom to come out. They had not expected her; she had sent them a wonderful set of English dinnerware, along with an excuse for not attending.

  “Bless you both,” she had said. “I suddenly decided to come after all. I’m glad you’ve married my brother, Sally. I looked up your work when Dan wrote to me, and I can tell by your photographs what you are. You have compassion.”

  “But where are you running to, Amanda? Aren’t you coming to the reception?”

  “No, no, I have to catch a plane. I’m going straight home. I only wanted to see you.”

  How very odd …

  “If it’s not one problem, it’s another,” she said now, bitter that Dan should be so afflicted.

  He stood over her, raising her face up by the chin. “No it’s not, Sally. You solve one thing and go on to the next. That’s what life’s all about. We’re almost over the worry about Tina, aren’t we? Think about it. Why, when I told Clive that she—”

  “You what? You told Clive about Tina?”

  “Just that we’ve been having some problems with her—”

  In one second, compassion turned to anger. “You discussed our child with Clive? I don’t believe it.”

  “Hey, wait a minute. I only—”

  “You spilled out our most private business. I thought we agreed it wasn’t going past our four walls.” She was furious.

  “Hell, Sally, Happy sees the kid in school. She’s been reporting to you. And everybody else has seen Tina acting up now and then. Where’s the secret? It’s all in the family, anyway.”

  “Family or not. I think the world of Happy, yet even to her I haven’t confided the whole thing. But Clive—my God, you didn’t tell him what that first doctor, the woman, said, did you?”

  “Well, not exactly, but—”

  “What does that mean, ‘exactly’? Yes, you did, didn’t you? I can tell you did.”

  “I didn’t, but if I had, it wouldn’t matter. He’d never repeat anything told in confidence. Clive’s an honorable man.”

  “He’s sad. He’s a strange, pathetic misfit.”

  It was Dan’s turn to be angry. “That’s an exaggeration, and it’s grossly unfair. I never knew you disliked Clive.”

  “I don’t dislike him. But that doesn’t mean I want to make a confidant of him.” She paused, seeking words to define a vaporous, vague feeling, perhaps impossible to define, that had not even begun to take shape until a moment ago. “He’s odd, he’s lonely, he’s got problems—”

  Dan interrupted. “I hope you don’t think you’re making any sense, because you’re not. You’re talking like an idiot. ‘He’s odd, he’s lonely, he’s got problems,’ ” he mocked. “So we shun him. We only like tall, good-looking, happy people. Right?”

  “That’s not what I meant and you know it perfectly well, Dan Grey. I’m just terribly upset that you told him about Tina. He knows nothing about children, he—”

  “Seems to be getting on very well with this child, anyway,” Dan said sharply. “Here they come.”

  The horse and the pony emerged from the woods at a brisk walk, on the verge of a trot. Tina’s braids were bouncing, and her round face was reddened by the wind. She was laughing.

  “Let’s do more,” she said immediately when the two animals came to a stop.

  Dan lifted her down. “So you liked it. You liked having your own pony.”

  “Yes, and we gave her a name. Do you know what it is?”

  “No. Tell us.”

  “You have to guess.”

  Sally said promptly, “Princess.”

  Dan said, “Brownie.”

  “Whitey.”

  “Speedy.”

  “Wrong. All wrong,” Tina shouted. “Susannah. Her name’s Susannah.”

  The parents looked at each other in a kind of dismay. Dan was the first to object.

  “No. That’s your sister’s name, not a name for a pony.”

  Sally followed him. “We can’t have two Susannahs. Nobody would know which one we were talking about.”

  “We won’t have two,” Tina retorted, “because you’re going to take the other one back.”

  “Now, that’s enough of that,” Dan said firmly. “We’re not taking our Susannah anywhere. She’s ours, you’ve been told that a hundred times, and you’ll have to think of some other name for the pony or you won’t keep the pony.”

  “Take it easy,” murmured Sally, putting her hand on Dan’s arm. “Tina, I’ll help you think of a much nicer name for the pony.”

  “Uncle Clive said I can call her anything I want because she’s mine.” Saying so, Tina screwed up her face in preparation for defiant tears.

  “I didn’t mean your sister’s name,” Clive said hastily. “Come on, don’t cry. Here, give over the reins”—for a man had come out to lead the animals into the stable—“and we’ll go back to the Big House for hot chocolate with marshmallows. Plenty of marshmallows. How’s that?”

  Undeniably, he had diverted Tina and squashed the argument, but bribery was not the way. No matter how well meant, interference was unwelcome and made more complications in the end. Somewhat resentfully, then, Sally went along to the Big House.

  In a moment, the tea wagon would appear at the door to the library. You could hear it bein
g trundled down the hall, could hear the clink of china cups. It seemed as if the kitchen must be a mile away. Two large families could fit easily into this house, Sally thought. It must be dreary for Clive here in these echoing spaces, especially when Oliver was away, as he often was, and was right now.

  “Father phoned from Washington this morning,” Clive said. “They’ve put him on another museum board. And there’s some sort of project, going to bring art to inner-city schools. Of course, that’s the kind of thing he feels is so important. He sounded pretty pleased about it.”

  Clive was sitting on a cushioned, low chair that might well have been specially ordered for him so that his feet might rest on the floor. Known as a “slipper chair,” it was a kind that was usually placed in bedrooms. The jaunty, erect appearance he had presented when on horseback had gone; he looked not merely frail as usual but ill, Sally thought. Here now he was drawn and wasted, as if he had suddenly lost weight.

  Taking a cigarette from his pocket, he asked politely, although surely he knew what the answer would be, “Do you mind, Sally?” And when the reply was as always a shake of the head, he struck a match, tilted his head back in a movement almost luxurious, and let the smoke drift from his nostrils.

  “Your cough,” Dan chided gently. “Your lungs. When are you going to stop?”

  Clive grinned. “Probably never. Or until it kills me.”

  “A man with your brains! Maybe you should go teach graduate mathematics at Harvard or someplace. Then you’d have to wear corduroy jackets with elbow patches and smoke a pipe. At least a pipe would do you less harm than what you’re doing to yourself with cigarettes.”

  “Trying to get rid of me, are you? No, I’m satisfied the way things are. More or less.”

  Clive was positively jovial today. He was rarely so, especially when Ian was present, when his spirit seemed to retract into a shell.