“What did she say?”
Jan grinned. “She said she was going to be the Wicked Witch of the West.”
“I see.” Rina was disappointed.
“And I said, no, really. So then she said she was going to be Baryshnikov’s mistress.”
“I see. Teasing you.” Rina remembered that Ginny and Jan had shared a crush on the Russian dancer when they were in ballet classes together.
“Yeah, we were joking around. And she said he would teach her Russian and she would become a famous spy. And she said she was going to be a cat breeder.” She looked at Rina, a little frown in her eyes. “She said, in America she could be anything. As though it meant something.”
“Mm.” Rina tried to think what it might mean. One of her mother’s pet phrases. But Ginny had repeated it to her yesterday too. What was its significance? Could it have anything to do with this trip to Philadelphia? She’d think about that. “Did she say anything else?”
“No. About then she got off the bus.”
“And she didn’t mention anyone? These Philadelphia friends she has?”
Jan shook her head definitely. “No. We were just joking around, honest.”
“Well—” Rina adjusted the strap of her handbag. “Thanks so much, Jan. I’ll see if I can get in touch with Linda and Buck. On the phone last night Buck said he had no idea where she was, but maybe she said something about Philadelphia to him. Anyway, I’ll try him. Linda too.”
“Yeah. They’ll know more than I will.”
“Thanks so much.”
“Sure.” Jan started to close the door, then blurted, “I really hope she’s okay.”
“Jan, you’re very special to her. I hope, someday—well, you know.”
“Yeah. I hope so too.”
Rina returned to the car. Jan’s affection for Ginny, even in the face of parental disapproval, was heartwarming. Rina was glad she had decided to come in person instead of just phoning again. In fact she had learned little here. But somewhere, Ginny must have left a clue to the address or name of those friends in Philadelphia. Rina headed for Monroe Boulevard.
It was a neighborhood of broad lawns, huge houses, burglar alarms. She drove up the arc of a driveway and walked to the trellised porch, feeling small and dowdy. A Burberry was all very well, but this front door demanded mink. She firmed her jaw and punched the doorbell. No one answered. She punched it again.
There was a clatter of locks, and the massive door was eased open. A broad, brown woman with incurious eyes gazed at Rina. “Yes, ma’am?”
“It’s all right, Maria, I’ll get it!” sang out a voice from within. Maria withdrew silently, and the voice hurried closer. “Coming, com—why, Rina Marshall!” Rosamond Landon of the champagne-colored hair blinked at her in surprise. “I thought you were the paper boy! See, I had the money all ready!” She laughed and waved a couple of dollars. “Here, come in. But you know, Rina, we have a bone to pick with you!”
Rosamond’s cashmere sweater and slacks matched her hair but couldn’t hide the fortyish droop of a once Barbie-like figure. Rina followed her into the living room. Maria was nowhere to be seen. Rina said, “I’m sorry to bother you again. I wanted to talk to Buck, if he’s here.”
“Oh, well, he has football practice on Fridays,” said Rosamond. She had opened a teak cabinet at the end of the long room and extracted two glasses. “Sherry?”
“Thank you, no, I’ll come back later when Buck is home,” Rina said, halting in the middle of the room. “Unless you can tell me, does he have friends in Philadelphia?” She couldn’t help glancing around the room, at the Italian leather sofas and Breuer chairs, at what looked like a genuine Braque over the fireplace.
“Philadelphia? Not that I know of.” Rosamond turned back to her, sipping at her sherry. “You know, Rina, it wasn’t very kind to mention Buck to the police,” she said reproachfully.
“They asked us who had been at the house yesterday, and Buck had stopped by for a moment.”
“But that was all he did! Just stopped by!” Rosamond waved her sherry glass, already empty. “He doesn’t deserve to be grilled by the police just because he stopped by! Rina, I don’t know what kind of trouble your daughter has gotten herself into. But we really don’t appreciate having Buck dragged in too.”
“We didn’t drag—” Rina began hotly, then caught herself. Ginny’s trouble was Buck’s fault, probably, but this was not the time for a scene. “I’m sorry this happened, Rosamond, but it’s none of our doing either. It’s just that a man we’d never met before happened to visit our house, and later a mugger killed him. So the police are asking questions. They want to talk to everyone.”
“Sure you won’t have a sherry?” Without waiting for an answer Rosamond refilled her glass. She hadn’t even asked Rina to take off her coat. “You just have the one girl, Rina. I have three boys, and believe me, it’s much harder. Much.” She turned back, propping herself against the darkly gleaming teak cabinet. “Well, John Jr., he’s the oldest, you know, he wasn’t such a problem. But Drew and now Buck, it’s just so difficult with athletes, you know. John tells me it’s natural. Healthy high-energy kids, he says. I mean, John’s hours are terrible, of course, a doctor’s hours are always terrible. Not much time at home. But he played touch football with them, did all he could. We’ve sent them to the best summer camps, got the best equipment. And they’re good boys, you know that.”
“Yes, Rosamond, but—” Rina looked down at the champagne-beige carpet, unable to confess that Ginny had left home, not to this woman.
“Of course you know it. But boys don’t grow up as fast as girls, I mean mentally. They’re so easy for a smart girl to lead, you know that. So what can a mother do? When Drew smashed up his Porsche—well, of course the girl denied it, but it was clear that she was distracting him. Young men find it hard to resist. And then they said he’d been taking drugs, can you imagine? A boy from a good family? Oh, Rina, you can’t imagine how hard it is to cope with boys. Everyone always wants to blame them.”
“Do you know when Buck will be home?” Rina broke in.
“Home? Oh, late. He’s usually invited to a friend’s house afterward. He’s very popular, you know that. Sure I can’t pour you a sherry while I’m at it? But what I wanted to say, Rina, is that you mustn’t mention Buck to the police again. His father gets very upset. And it’s bad for the boy to think people blame him.”
That was bad for any child. But what if the child deserved the blame? Rina said, “Yes, you’re right, Rosamond. Well, I’ll be going now. I’ll try to catch Buck later.” She backed toward the door, almost bumping the leather sofa.
“Good. I knew you’d understand. It’s so difficult with boys, really! Well, thanks for stopping by.” Rosamond opened the door for Rina and waved her out with her third sherry.
Rina shivered as she drove down Dr. Landon’s long drive to the boulevard. Rosamond was blinding herself, clearly, to a lot of problems. A lot. But what frightened Rina was her own instinctive sympathy for Rosamond, her own sense that Rosamond’s defense of Buck was heroic and motherly.
Was she too blinding herself about her child?
Nick was frowning at some small pimples on Will’s tummy when he heard the rapid steps downstairs and the slam of the front door. Damn. He pulled up Will’s clothes, lifted the little boy to a firm seat on his shoulders, and trotted downstairs.
He didn’t see Maggie at first. She wasn’t in the dining room, and when he went through the swinging door into the kitchen and unloaded his giggling, ear-pulling burden, she wasn’t there either. Kakiy was on the refrigerator. Nick picked him up. There was a half-healed scratch on the cat’s side, and he wondered again about how Ginny had come here. He showed Will how to tickle Kakiy behind the ears, and left the cat to the attentions of his son and of curious Zelle. Nick hurried to the living room with the big shuttered bay window. Maggie was there, forehead bowed against the side window frame. He put his hand on her shoulder and felt her shaking.
> Damn that girl. Didn’t she have any sense at all? Any feeling for her own mother?
He looked through the louvered part of the shutters and saw Ginny on the stoop, face hidden in her hands. Well. Damage on both sides. He squeezed Maggie’s shoulder. “What have you two done to each other?”
“Oh, Nick, those assholes! God, if I’d known—” She turned to him, thumped her fists against his chest harder than she knew. He put both arms tight around her until she relaxed, if that was the word for a shift from shaking to mere trembling.
“Is there anything we can do to help?”
“The damage is done,” she sobbed into his shoulder. “Assholes! How could they tell a helpless kid she has bad blood?”
“Mm, I see.” Nick was angered too. Naked infants spitted upon pikes, while the mad mothers with their howls do break the clouds…. But anger wouldn’t help now. He said, “When I was a kid it was Uncle Hal. He was a drunk, never could hold a job. So every time I had a beer, or complained about my boss on a summer job, my mother got upset and told me how important it was not to turn out like Uncle Hal.”
“Yeah, but Nick, for you there were other choices! You knew other people in your family. You knew you were a lot like the good guys too. But Ginny is defenseless! How could they say that to her?”
“Yeah. Although it seems to me she’s not defenseless anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s met you, Maggie.”
“But Nick, she doesn’t understand! She thinks they’re right about me! I just don’t know how to explain.” Grief pooled in her eyes.
“You’ll find a way. She’s bright. It’s just that she’s young, Maggie, it may take her a few years.” Damn kid, why was she in such a hurry? Why hadn’t she waited until she could hear and comprehend the truth? Deaf as the sea, hasty as fire.
Maggie nodded. “Yeah. You’re right, I’ve got to be patient. And honest with her, no matter what.” She straightened.
“That’ll help.” He kissed her nose. “Are you up to hearing some more bad news?”
“Oh, God. What?”
“News fitting to the night, black, fearful, comfortless, and horrible. Will has some pimples on his tummy.”
“Oh, God,” Maggie groaned. “This is, what, two weeks plus a couple of days? Yeah, that’s about right. Chicken pox. And you going to St. Louis Sunday. And everyone coming for brunch tomorrow! Well, let’s go have a look.”
At least it distracted her to another child’s needs. Over the next hour Nick collected what he needed for tonight’s new play reading, put in a load of laundry, played “Five Fools in a Barrow” on the piano for Sarah. Maggie worked beside him, sympathizing with Will, picking up toys, starting a pot of soup, singing along with them, but always Nick was aware that a piece of her attention was still at the front door. Two or three times she slipped away to peek through the louvered shutter at the stoop.
Was Ginny trying to torture her? Why the hell couldn’t the girl at least come inside to sulk?
But nothing happened until after he’d had his soup and was ready to leave for the reading. He was in the hall buckling his trench coat when there was a knock on the door. He opened it for her and said, “Hi.”
“Hi. Um, is there a tissue around somewhere?”
Her face was red and streaky. Nick was jolted back to his own teenage years, to his father’s death. His youthful grief had been tainted by rage that in death his father had abandoned him, totally, unfairly. Not true, he knew with his head, but the heart had its own logic. Nick’s anger toward Ginny dissolved. He fished in his pocket and pulled out a little cellophane packet of tissues. “Take it. I’ve got more at the theatre.”
“The theatre? Oh, yeah, you work there, right!”
“Acting silly,” he said solemnly.
She tried gamely to grin, blowing her nose and eyeing him over the white tissue. “What a funny family you turned out to be.”
“Yeah. We like it.”
“Yeah, I like it too,” she said, and seemed astonished at her own words.
Nick grinned. “I’m glad. Even Kakiy has made a great hit with the kids.”
“He’s a good cat.”
“Question. He looks very healthy. But he’s got a scratch on his side that looks fresh.”
“Yeah, that’s Gram. Kicked him. She’s always hated cats.”
“She kicked him?”
“Yeah, he wasn’t supposed to be in that room.” Her lip quivered. “But it’s impossible to keep him away from her a hundred percent of the time! I mean, he’s curious.”
“Yes, he’d be hard to keep in line,” Nick agreed, relieved at her defensiveness. It showed a sense of responsibility and laid to rest the nagging worry that this angry youngster tortured pets. “Listen, I think there’s soup in the kitchen for you.”
“Okay. Hey, Nick, thanks.”
“Sure.” He saluted and went out to simpler tasks.
Ginny watched him lumber down the stoop steps. A big, comfortable man. She was sorry he was entangled in this mess. But she could not spare a lot of pity for him just now. Other questions came first. She squared her shoulders and headed back to the kitchen.
The other three with their black curly heads were sitting around the oak table with soup, salad, a crusty round loaf of bread. Kakiy rubbed against her ankles.
“Hurray!” said Will when he saw her.
“Hurray yourself!” She smiled at him. Her brother. Her brother! It hit her suddenly that all of them here in this room were blood relatives. Biologically related. What Gram calledfamiglia, what Grandma Marshall called kin. Until today she had never ever seen her own kin. A rush of joy she’d never known overwhelmed her. She sagged against the wall and blew her nose noisily, too high for a minute to even look at them.
Maggie said cautiously, “There’s soup on the stove. Help yourself.”
“Thanks.” She gathered her forces, thrust the tissue into her jeans, and ladled herself a bowlful. “My favorite kind,” she said as she sat down. “Made out of old shoelaces.”
Will crowed with delight. “Old shoelaces!”
Sarah was laughing too. She hauled a bit of noodle from her bowl with thumb and forefinger, and displayed it proudly. “Hey! Where’s the shoe?”
Maggie gave her a rather misty smile, and Ginny bowed her head and applied herself to the soup, trying to disguise the singing in her blood.Famiglia. Kin. She felt herself suddenly connected, part of an organic whole. A family tree. Stretching back in time, reaching forward into the future. And she was part of it. Forever linked. No judge could destroy this cellular cement. The legal papers in Mrs. Farnham’s file were lies, helpless against the infinite power and connectedness of their microscopic genes. Suddenly it came clear to her how Mom could put up with Gram.Famiglia. Kin.
“Gin-nee!” Sarah was insistent, exasperated.
“I’m sorry. I was thinking. What do you want?”
Sarah looked wicked. “Do you like worm soup?”
“Worm soup? Yuck!” She made a face. The children giggled.
“What about bug soup?” Will offered with evil anticipation.
“Yuck!”
Each reaction sent them into fresh spasms of laughter. Ginny suggested, “Eye of newt and toe of frog soup!”
“Yuck!” chorused Will and Sarah gleefully. From the corner of her eye Ginny caught a look of delight on Maggie’s face.
“Tongue of dog soup!” Ginny continued.
“Yuck!”
“Finger of—”
“Cool it,” said Maggie sharply. Ginny, horrified at what her mind had selected from all those Shakespearean ingredients, glanced at her in panic. “Cool it with a baboon’s blood,” Maggie finished quoting smoothly. Will laughed again dutifully, but Sarah’s wise brown eyes were on her mother, troubled.
“I think that’s enough of that game,” said Ginny shakily. “What do we do next?”
“Dessert,” announced Maggie briskly. “You can have some cheesecake now with Will
and Sarah, or wait till Nick gets back and have some with us.”
“I’ll wait.”
“Okay. Now, our big news is that Will is getting chicken pox.”
“See?” Will pulled up his shirt proudly. Ginny could see pimples coming on his face too.
“Mine are gone.” Sarah held out an arm.
“Hope you’ve had it,” Maggie said to Ginny.
“Yeah. Long ago.”
“Good. Anyway, after dessert we usually turn a few somersaults on the top floor, and have a bath, and read a story, and go to bed. Will you be staying the night?” She was cutting cheesecake, her back to them.
“Oh, Jesus. I’m sorry. I haven’t thought.”
“It’s okay. Nobody expects anyone to think much today. You have a choice between the sofa in the study or a mat on the top floor. If you decide to stay.”
Ginny laid down her spoon slowly. “Yes, please, if it’s okay. But maybe we shouldn’t, um—”
Maggie plunked the cheesecake in front of the two children, then straightened to look full at Ginny. “Me too,” she said. “I want to tell you everything you need to know, Ginny. But all these revelations are damn hard on us both. Maybe tomorrow.”
“You too?” Ginny was a little surprised, but only because she hadn’t thought. She’d done a hell of a lot of not thinking today.
“Yes, of course me too.” Maggie struck a gallant pose, fist on chest, for the benefit of the children. “Beneath this calm exterior lies total emotional devastation.”
“Me too. Obviously. Okay, nothing new tonight.”
“It’s a deal.”
“What’s motional?” asked Sarah. Will was methodically stuffing cheesecake into his mouth.
“Emotional?” Maggie sat down next to Sarah and put her arm around her. The way Mom used to do with Ginny. “That has to do with your feelings. Loving and hating and being happy and so forth.”
“What’s that other word?” Sarah took another bite.
Maggie rolled her eyes helplessly at Ginny. “Devastation?”
Bad Blood (Maggie Ryan Book 8) Page 7
