Ilsa

by L'Engle, Madeleine;

  She bridled like a wet hen. “Henry Randolph Porcher, I will not have you talking about Dolph like that.”

  I shrugged my shoulders in despair.

  “But I am perfectly sorry for Ilsa,” she went on, “though I don’t see why she wanted to run off to the beach like that and leave her own good home and family. I never did trust that Ira person. People are going to begin talking if she doesn’t come home soon.”

  I scowled down at the floor and didn’t answer.

  After a while Violetta heaved herself, in her expensive pink chambray dress, out of the black wicker chair. “I can see you’re determined not to be sociable today, Henry. I’ll get along home. I gave Willie May the sugar and told her to tell Silver, so you don’t have to remember about it. I know you’d forget, anyhow. And mark my words, you better get Ilsa back from that beach.”

  I was so mad I wouldn’t walk with her to the car but stayed sitting on the porch and watched her drive off. When Silver came back she came alone.

  She came up to the porch where I was waiting and sat down wearily, kicking off her sandals. Grains of sand from the beach dropped onto the pine boards of the porch floor.

  “You couldn’t get her to come?” I said.

  She shook her head. “Go out in the kitchen and get me a dope or something, Brother. I’m parched to death.”

  When I came back out with her drink her stockings were off too, and she was fanning herself with the paper.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  She took the glass from me and gulped half of the iced liquid down. “Well,” she said, “I stopped the car at the edge of the road because there hasn’t been a shower for a week, and I thought it would be better if Ilsa didn’t hear me drive up to the house anyway. It’s a good thing I didn’t try to make it because the road was filled with soft shoulders and I’d have gotten stuck for sure. The sand got into my sandals and it was hotter than Tophet. But you should have seen the flowers, Brother. Sunflowers all over the place, and prickly pear, Gaillardias, lavender Bee Bane, and those lovely purple sea morning-glories. They were all over the road. You’d think it was months since a car’d driven over it instead of a few weeks. Goatsfoot-Gillia, you know their lovely scarlet stalks, and scuppernong vines in bloom all over the sand—I’m going to ask Ilsa if I can pick some of the grapes later on and put up some jelly.”

  “Go on,” I said. “What about Ilsa?”

  “Well, I picked my way to the house, pushed open the screen door, and went in. It was very quiet, very bare, clean as a pin. A broom was leaning against the big table Dr. Brandes used to use, so I knew someone must be about. The shutters were almost closed to keep out the sun, and the light filtered through and lay on the floor in sandy yellow stripes. It was so hot I most couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t hear a sound except the ocean and a little old mockingbird out in the chinaberry tree singing and singing. And I felt so peculiar, Brother, sort of the way you feel going into a deserted house when you’re not sure who you may see coming through the sagging door and suddenly you find you believe in ghosts. When I heard the screen door slam behind me I didn’t dare turn around because I had the strangest feeling that Dr. Brandes was standing behind me, holding a rare plant in his cupped hands.”

  “Ilsa?” I asked.

  “No. Ira, and not a bit pleased to see me. He just said what was I doing there and did Ilsa know I was coming. I told him no, that I’d come to take her back with me, and he got real mad, said she was much better off where she was and why couldn’t we leave her alone when that’s what she wanted. I didn’t know what to do. I asked him where she was, but he wouldn’t tell me. He just stood there glowering at me and looking at that big old hunting knife of his. I bet he cuts his hair with it. It certainly looks it.”

  “Well, what did you do?”

  “I just sat down and said I’d wait. He said I’d be a long time waiting, but I said I’d wait anyhow. He stood chewing tobacco and staring at me like I was a snake or something. Finally he said, ‘You never much liked her, did you?’—‘Who?’ I asked—‘Ilsa.’ That made me kind of mad. It’s not that I don’t like Ilsa. I just don’t understand her. And now—oh, I guess I do kind of like her after all. So I told him that and then I asked him how she was. He just said, ‘All right. How else would she be, being her?’ Then he told me if I wanted to look for her she was walking down on the beach. So I went put. And when I knew that I’d have to go up to her on the beach—Brother, I don’t know when I’ve been so scared.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose because I thought her being blind would make her different. I didn’t know how I ought to behave. I just stood on that cement ramp and looked around as if I’d never seen the place before. That Ira surely is a good worker. Keeps the ramp clean of sand and it’s so white as it goes down through the scrub it hurts your eyes. I’d kind of forgotten how wild it was, what a heavy dark green, the bushes and weeds, palmettos and myrtles—they grow so close together there doesn’t seem any room for anything to breathe, and I felt stifled. And you know how hot it’s been today. The sun was banging down and even right by the water there wasn’t much breeze. I guess it’s seemed worse today because yesterday was so cool.”

  I felt nervous and impatient, but I knew there was no use hurrying my sister. She always told a story her own way and that was usually the longest way.

  “I stared up and down the beach,” she said, finishing her Coca-Cola and putting the glass down on the floor beside her black wicker chair. “At first I couldn’t see anything in either direction; then, far in the distance, I saw a small black speck. It was so far away I couldn’t tell whether it was coming or going, but I knew it must be Ilsa because there isn’t another house around there for miles. So I went in that direction. I surely was relieved when I saw she was coming toward me. She had on a pair of old blue jeans, rolled up, and a red shirt. That moron hound of hers was beside her, walking close to her feet in the funniest way, as though she thought she was protecting Ilsa. I started to call, and then I just couldn’t. I couldn’t even go on walking. I stood still, right where I was, and let Ilsa come up to me. And I still couldn’t say anything, Brother. I just stared at her and then I went on walking beside her. She didn’t look any different, Brother, she looked just the same, only I knew she couldn’t see me because when she looked as if she was looking at me, it went right on through me, it didn’t stop anywhere at all, it just went on and on. So I just went on and walked with her. That dog didn’t pay me any mind at all. And Ilsa was walking so fast—I almost had to run to keep up. Sometimes she started to walk crooked—she’d get into the water, or the loose sand, but then she’d straighten out again. And then, Brother, all of a sudden she said, ‘Well, Silver?’ I was so startled I almost dropped dead in my tracks. And then she began to laugh, and when she laughed like that, just the way she always did, I wasn’t scared of her any more. She said, ‘If you don’t want me to know when you’re around you shouldn’t wear that perfume I gave you Christmas. What are you doing here?’—‘I just came,’ I said.—‘Monty send you to spy on me?’—‘No,’ I said, ‘he just wanted to know how you were. He’s lonely.’—‘How is he otherwise?’—‘All right, I guess,’ I said.—‘And Brand?’—You know that funny sort of tenderness her voice always gets when she talks about Brand, Brother? ‘She misses you awfully,’ I told her. We walked along without saying anything for a minute; then she said, ‘How are you, little Silver Woolf?’ And Brother, when she said that I had the funniest feeling that if anything went wrong she would fix it—and there I was, supposed to be helping her! She asked about Eddie and the children and you. Then I asked her to come home with me. She just laughed and said Ira wouldn’t like it. And I told her how much Monty and Brand missed her and needed her. We’d come to the house by then. The dog ran on up the steps to the ramp and started barking and Ilsa turned up the beach after it. I wanted to take her arm when we got to the soft sand but I was afraid she wouldn’t like it. When we got near the steps s
he started walking very slowly, and frowning, as though she were trying to hear something. But she found the steps all right and started up. I could see she was counting the steps till we got on the ramp; then she kept her hand on the rail. The screen door was closed but the big door was ajar and she banged right into it. She must have given her head an awful wallop, but she didn’t turn a hair. She went in and yelled for Ira and then she blessed him out for leaving the door ajar. You should have heard her. It was real frightening, she was so mad. And he just stood scowling at her till she was finished and then he said she’d have to learn to be careful about doors because people weren’t going to remember about them for her. I thought it was awful of him to speak to her like that, but she didn’t seem to mind. She kept striding about the room as though nothing was wrong and mostly she managed pretty well, but every once in a while she’d knock into something, and oh, Henry, it was right pitiful. I wanted to take her into my arms and tell her to stop fighting, but I guess she just has to fight. I guess there isn’t anything else for her to do. She said once after she’d knocked into something, ‘You see, I wouldn’t be any good to Monty or Brand yet. Go away and leave me alone. I’m in a vile mood. I’ve got a temper like a madwoman. I’m much better off down here.’ I just couldn’t bear to think of her there alone with no one but Ira, and him not much comfort, it didn’t seem to me, so I begged her again to come back, but she just kind of laughed and said, ‘I’m not like you. You know I don’t give a damn about the comforts of life when I can have the ocean, and Ira takes wonderful care of me. I’ve told you I’m in a hellish mood. It wouldn’t be good for Brand to have me around. It wouldn’t be good for Monty. If he’s behaving well because I’m away, maybe I’d better not come back for a year. But don’t you see—I want to be down here where my roots are, where it’s wild and lonely and I can learn things and make my mistakes in private. I want to stay until I’m—sufficient unto myself again, and the ocean has breathed peace back into my heart. Come back later.’ ‘When?’ I asked her. She laughed again, but this time it wasn’t a good laugh. ‘Oh, in a few years.’ I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to do. She just sat there, her elbows on her knees, her chin in her hands, looking as though she were seeing right through me. Then she said, ‘Listen, Silver. I’m not ready to come back. Give me two weeks more. Go home and give my husband and my child my love. Tell them that when I come back I’ll be all right—that everything will be all right.’—‘And you promise to come home in two weeks?’ I asked. Well, I got her to promise. That was the best I could do.”

  Eddie had come up while we were talking and now he sat down on the steps. “How is she for money?” he asked. “Does she need anything?”

  “I don’t know,” Silver answered. “Oh, she asked me to tell the mothers of her piano students that she’d start teaching again the first of October.”

  Eddie looked skeptical. “How can she?”

  “That’s what I wondered,” Silver said. “But she played for me. I don’t know much about music but it sounded all right to me. She said she’d spent about five or six hours a day at it.”

  “I wish there were something we could do for her.” Eddie frowned unhappily. “I’ve always liked Ilsa and I think she’s had a rotten deal. Wish there was some way to help.”

  “There isn’t. Not till she gets back, at any rate,” Silver said. “You staying for supper, Henry? There’s plenty.”

  48

  But Ilsa came back from the beach in less than two weeks.

  Three mornings later I went over to the house to see how things were, on my way to the mill. Brand was sitting alone at the breakfast table. I sat down near her.

  “Where’s your father?” I asked.

  Brand took a swallow of milk. “I don’t know, Uncle Henry. At supper last night he said he had to go to town on business and not to worry if he didn’t get back till today, but he’d surely be back in time for dinner. I wish he’d come soon. It’s awful lonely here with both of them gone.”

  Mattie Belle came in with a plate of porridge for her. “You here, Mr. Porcher? Good morning.”

  “Good morning, Mattie Belle,” I said. “How are you?”

  “I can’t complain, though a hoot owl kept me awake awhile. It was so close it sounded as though it was on my window sill, hooting and hooting so scary, it never does mean no good. I choked it, though, and it quit hollering.”

  My eyes opened. “How on earth did you catch it?”

  “Oh, Lord, Mr. Henry, I didn’t catch it. If you hear a hoot owl hollering and catch hold of the wrist of your left arm with your right and squeeze hard, you choke the owl and it stops. Some people tie a knot in the sheet but the fust way’s the best. It’s purely sure to work. I didn’t hear it hollering no more after that. You hear it, Baby?”

  “No,” Brand said.

  “I don’t like them hoot owls. They come so close, they always mean no good. You eat all your breakfast now.”

  She went back out to the kitchen and I to the mill.

  Shortly after lunch I had a frantic phone call from Violetta and I went tearing down to the beach in the car, faster than anyone ought to drive, recklessly turning off the oyster-shell road and bouncing along the sandy ruts to the house.

  No one was there. I called and heard no answer. I flung out of the screen door and ran down the ramp, shouting. To my left I heard Médor barking wildly and saw Ilsa rise from the shelter of a dune and stand listening. I ran, stumbling and slipping, toward her.

  “Ilsa! Ilsa!” I called. She didn’t move, but stood very still, waiting in her damp bathing suit until I had come up to her. Médor barked and pranced around me in greeting, nipping at my trouser legs.

  “What is it, Henry?” Ilsa asked. “What’s the matter? What brings you here in such confusion?”

  “Ilsa, come quickly,” I gasped. “Monty’s terribly sick.”

  She started back toward the house with rapid steady steps, her bare toes feeling the sand beneath them. I took her arm but she shook me off. “What’s the matter with him?” she asked.

  “I don’t know, but he’s dreadfully sick. Violetta and Dolph were over. Dolph went for the doctor. Violetta’s with Monty. He kept calling for you. We thought I’d better come.”

  “Of course. Write a note for Ira, will you? You’ll find pencil and paper in the drawer of Father’s table. And we’d better leave Médor.”

  I scrawled a note to Ira.

  “The car’s outside,” I said.

  She was halfway upstairs. “I’ll just get into some clothes.”

  In a few moments she hurried down, and we went out to the car. This time she let me take her arm, walking carefully over the rough ground, balancing herself delicately like a tightrope walker. “What do you think it is? Do you think it could be that rotten gin he gets from Togni’s?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know what bootleg gin does if it’s bad.”

  “Has he been drinking much?” she asked. “I thought silver said he hadn’t.”

  “I didn’t think he had,” I answered. “I’ve been going over about every other day for some reason or other, the way you asked me to. He wasn’t always there, but when he was he seemed pretty all right. But he wasn’t in last night.”

  “And Brand?”

  “She just keeps asking for you.”

  “Poor baby,” Ilsa said. “All this has been hellish for her.”

  We drove for a good while in silence, then. I dislike driving very rapidly because I never feel that I’m really in control of the car, and I have to concentrate so desperately on the driving that it is difficult for me to talk. I kept wishing that I could ask Ilsa to take the wheel for me, knowing how she adored to speed.

  “It smells like autumn,” she said once. “It’s been a long summer.”

  We got into traffic as we crossed the bridge and had to slow down. I could sense Ilsa’s nervousness as she sat beside me. “I bet it’s the gin,” she said.

  When we
got into the house she took my arm and we hurried upstairs. We could hear Violetta talking in a terrified voice that I guess was meant to be soothing.

  “It’s all right, Mont, just you don’t worry and everything’s going to be all right. Here comes somebody and it’s either Henry with Ilsa, or Dolph with the doctor. Oh, Lord! I don’t know what’s taking Dolph so long. I guess the doctor’s out on his calls this time of day. Here, Monty, let Violetta wipe your mouth. Could you hold a piece of ice in your mouth to take the taste out? Could you do that for Violetta, Monty?”

  Monty groaned.

  “Get Violetta out,” Ilsa said as we went into the room. Monty began to retch violently into a basin Violetta was holding for him. Brand was sitting on a chair by the window, her eyes wide and frightened, her body tense.

  “Mamma!” she cried as Ilsa came in, and ran to her. Ilsa held her closely for a brief moment, then said, “Henny, take Brand downstairs. Send her into the kitchen with Mattie Belle. Tell Mattie Belle to bring me up a big pitcher of milk and a glass. Violetta, please go downstairs and wait for Dolph and the doctor.”

  “Ilsa, what are you talking about!” Violetta cried. “I’m certainly not going to leave my own twin brother when he’s sick and needs me.”

  “Henry!” Ilsa stormed at me. “Get Violetta out of this room. Brand, go ask Mattie Belle for the milk, quickly! Obey me, both of you!”

  She fumbled for the bed, sat down, and took the basin from Violetta.

  “Ilsa,” Monty groaned. “Ilsa, please—”

  “It’s all right, Monty, I’m here, I’ve come home,” she said, putting the basin on the floor at her feet.

  Brand ran from the room, and I pushed Violetta, protesting, ahead of me. “Stay at the door and don’t you dare come up those stairs,” I said.

  She was so astonished at being ordered about in this rude fashion by me, of all people, that she obeyed. I ran out to the kitchen, grabbed the pitcher of milk from the weeping Mattie Belle, and ran back up, slopping milk on the stairs.