“What else am I to do, swing Aunt Emma in a hammock from the bathroom ceiling? Mr. Lackridge is in Mr. Alexander’s bed. When he wakes up, give him coffee or whatever he wants, then straighten that room and change the bed for Cousin Mabel. Cousin Frederick will have to sleep on the library couch, but we can’t do anything about that now. Get things set up for tea and keep an ear peeled for the doorbell. Have you a clean apron to put on?”
“Yes’m.”
That was the meekest syllable Edith had ever been heard to utter. Even Leila was impressed.
“My God, Sarah, you are a tiger when you get going. What else would you like me to do?”
“Stay here, if you will, and answer that ghastly telephone while I run out for some groceries. I shan’t be long. If Harry wakes up, ask him how I go about getting some money.”
“Do you need cash right now?”
“No, they’ll let me charge down at the corner. Thank you, Leila.”
It was a relief to get out of the house for a while, but when Sarah struggled back with two great bags of provisions, she found another lot of messages waiting. The undertaker wanted to see her about the caskets and the minister about the service, and could she please be punctual because of his tight Sunday schedule? She ran upstairs, changed into a black-wool dress and coat of her mother’s, and ran down again. Mariposa was there by then, dressed in a crisp white uniform instead of her usual insouciant garb. Like the Prodigal Son, Sarah fell on her neck.
“You’re an angel to give up your Sunday. Don’t do any heavy cleaning, just tidy around and make things presentable. I expect scads of people will start dropping in, and there’ll be three staying overnight, so we’ll have to get started on some food. Could you take telephone messages, do you think?”
“I can sure try, Miz Alex.”
“Good, then you’re relieved, Leila. I expect you’ll want to go home and change.”
“I can take a hint,” Mrs. Lackridge replied with no apparent rancor. “What about His Highness?”
“Let him sleep as long as he will. Surely he’ll have come to by the time we need the room. You wouldn’t care to meet Aunt Emma at the airport, I don’t suppose, and come back for drinks and supper with the mob?”
“Why not? Anything else?”
“Probably, but I can’t think of it just now. You’re being marvelous, Leila, and I do appreciate what you’re doing. You understand, I hope?”
“Forget it. I’d feel the same, no doubt. See you later, then.”
“Right. I have to fly.”
Sarah flew. Ten minutes later she was in a place of subdued lighting and soulful Muzak, contemplating polished walnut and satin padding in the company of a black-clad dignitary who oozed understanding and quoted prices with hushed reverence; as well he might, considering what they were. The loved ones had arrived, he told her, but he was quite sure she’d prefer not to see them at this time. Under the circumstances, the whole problem of viewing was going to present difficulties. Sarah swallowed hard and said there would be no viewing.
Nor did she wish to select from a well-stocked wardrobe of available garb. Nobody was going to see the clothes, anyway. Aunt Caroline could wear the gray lace she’d always looked so regal in, and Alexander might as well get his money’s worth at last out of that dress suit. Her darling would enjoy the joke, if he were somehow able to know.
Sarah began to cry, was enveloped in professional solicitude and gently led to put her mind on flowers. She decided on a blanket of white carnations for Aunt Caroline, red for her husband. Red for Ruby Redd. She changed her mind and ordered bronze chrysanthemums. She must get out of this place before she started to howl like a wolf.
“Thank you,” she babbled, “I’ll have the clothing ready for you. Call if there’s anything else you need. If I’m not at home, somebody will take a message.”
“Yes, Mrs. Kelling. Certainly, Mrs. Kelling. You can rely on us, Mrs. Kelling.”
She was eased gently out the door and rushed off to meet the minister in his study, trying not to take up too much of his time crying because he still had a wedding to perform and evening service to conduct. She made it back to the house by about half-past two. Edith answered the door, wearing her best black uniform and lace cap.
“I hope you’ve had your lunch,” was her cheery greeting.
“No, I haven’t,” Sarah snapped. “Make me a sandwich—I don’t care what—and a cup of tea as quickly as you can. I have to get some things for the undertaker, then meet Mrs. Cobble at Back Bay. Mrs. Lackridge has gone to the airport. What’s Mariposa doing?”
“Helping me peel potatoes.”
From the pristine condition of Edith’s apron, it was obvious who was doing the work and who the heavy looking on. Sarah wasn’t about to stand for that.
“You can finish them yourself. Tell Mariposa to bring my lunch and whatever messages she’s taken, as soon as the tea’s ready. I’m going upstairs for a minute, then I’ll be in the library.”
She packed Alexander’s dress suit and a white tie, along with fresh underthings and a stiff-bosomed shirt. Harry Lackridge was still snoring in her husband’s bed, which was probably a good thing since his presence made her less disposed to linger and weep. She went and got Aunt Caroline’s gray lace and brought everything down to the front hall. She was warm with all the rushing about, but felt the need of a fire to take the chill out of her soul. The kindling was catching on nicely when Mariposa brought the tray into the library.
“My, don’t that look cozy. I made you a cheese omelet instead of a cold sandwich, Miz Alex. I bet you haven’t eaten anything all day.”
“I had some chowder. No, that was yesterday. Who’s been calling?”
“Everybody, seems like.”
Mariposa pulled a sheaf of notes from her pocket. The spelling was creative, but the facts appeared to be straight. Sarah read them over while she toasted her toes and ate her omelet. This was the first moment’s peace she’d had all day and was likely to be the last. She was still sipping her tea when visitors began to arrive.
From then on there was no letup. Harry roused himself and came downstairs, fortunately in time to go and meet Cousin Mabel’s train at Back Bay since Sarah couldn’t very well walk out on her guests. Edith hovered near the front door, hanging up coats and accepting condolences as if she were the chief mourner. Mariposa was everywhere, trotting about with trays of sandwiches and pots of tea, coping with the telephone, finally strong-arming Sarah upstairs for a brief rest before supper.
“Miz Alex, there are so many people in this house right now everybody’s going to think you’re in the other room talking to somebody else. You sneak up the back stairs and catch yourself forty winks, else you’re going to fall flat on your face in the soup.”
By this time, Leila was back, looking rather handsome in dark gray wool with a high rolled collar, being a great success with friends and relatives who knew Leila Lackridge far better than they did this white-faced, hollow-eyed Sarah Kelling who wasn’t Walter’s little girl any more. She might as well do the hostessing for a while. Sarah slipped up to her room, took off her mother’s dress, and lay down on the bed. She thought she’d barely shut her eyes when Mariposa was beside her saying folks were beginning to wonder about supper and what should they do?
“Start setting out the buffet. I’ll be down in two minutes.”
Feeling a trifle better for the nap, Sarah ran a comb through her hair, put on the black dress she was learning to hate, and went down to her company. She’d forgotten to put on any make-up and looked ghastly without it, but nobody would expect her to appear otherwise.
The meal was excellent, partly because Sarah had planned a simple but generous buffet, and partly because it was not Edith but Mariposa who’d somehow found time to prepare most of the food. The old retainer was on hand to dish up and take full credit, however.
Sarah got through it as best she could, answering the same questions over and over like a talking doll. No, she hadn’t had ti
me to decide what she’d do about the properties. Yes, it was a shame to lose the Milburn on top of everything else. Yes, she’d have a tremendous adjustment ahead of her. No, she didn’t suppose she’d quite taken it all in yet and would Cousin Mabel care for more ham?
It was an unspeakable relief when the visitors were gone, the house guests bedded down, and Sarah at last free to go to bed; but as soon as she woke on Monday, the whole thing started again. There was breakfast to get, lunch to plan, more shopping, more telephone calls, more petty annoyances like springing a run in her last pair of panty hose and not having a dollar left to buy another.
Leila, unable to stay away from the eye of the cyclone, was at the house almost at the crack of dawn. She monopolized the telephone for half the morning reassigning various projects and committee obligations Caroline Kelling had been involved in, but Sarah didn’t mind that. It was a relief not to hear the thing ringing every few minutes.
The doorbell was bad enough. It had been a mistake not to have visiting hours at the undertaker’s. As it was, everybody who’d ever sat on a platform with Caroline Kelling felt free to pay his respects at the house. Most of the callers were total strangers to Sarah. Leila knew everybody, though, so the widow left her to play hostess again and went to keep the appointment Harry had made for her with the family lawyer.
He was inclined to pussyfoot. Sarah was in no mood to listen.
“Mr. Redfern, I have a houseful of relatives to feed, a funeral to pay for, a great deal of money in trust, and not one cent in my pocket. I don’t need words, I need cash, and I need it right this minute!”
Hysteria, she was finding, has its uses. After a little more backing and forthing, Mr. Redfern decided there would be no serious impropriety in Sarah’s continuing to draw the not very generous household allowance Alexander had been in the habit of drawing each week. Large bills, such as the undertaker’s, could be sent to him for payment until such time as her estate was transferred to a different trustee.
Sarah didn’t see why there had to be any trustee at all, but for the moment she must be satisfied with what she could get. She went to the bank and cashed the check he had given her, bought her panty hose and a fresh supply of loaves and fishes, and went back to feed the multitudes.
The funeral was set for three o’clock that afternoon. She had no time to sit brooding over her bereavement, which was perhaps a good thing. Mariposa had other commitments today, so Sarah had to make do with Edith’s help, which didn’t amount to much. They’d barely got the luncheon dishes cleared away when it was time to make herself presentable before the hired limousine came to pick up herself, her house guests, and Edith, who could not in decency be left out of the cortege. Alexander would have deplored the extra expense, but how else was she to cope with Aunt Emma’s rheumatics, Cousin Frederick’s heart, and Cousin Mabel’s general cussedness?
She was told afterward that the church was crowded. She saw nobody. By keeping her mind absolutely blank and her face rigid, Sarah managed to get through the service. It wasn’t until the graveside ceremony was almost through, and she had to realize they were actually going to bury her darling Alexander forever and ever, that she broke down.
Leila, who’d managed to get to the forefront, shook her savagely by the arm. “For God’s sake pull yourself together,” she hissed. “You’re making a public spectacle of yourself.”
“Oh, shut up!” Sarah screamed. “He was my husband and I loved him, and I’ll cry for him all I want. Anybody who doesn’t like it can go to hell!”
Everybody heard, of course. A few gasped, one or two snickered. Jeremy and Dolph started to Sarah’s side, but it was wizened old Cousin Frederick who threw his arm around her in a most uncharacteristic gesture of spontaneous affection.
“You tell ’em, Sadie. Alex was a man worth crying for. If that scrawny bitch had anything but gin and vinegar in her veins, she’d be crying, too.”
“Damn right, Fred,” bellowed Dolph. “Furthermore, Sarah knows enough to stay home and attend to her family obligations, instead of jumping around like a whirligig, shooting her mouth off, and getting her name in the papers. Mabel, if you don’t quit tugging at my coattails—”
The minister hastily pronounced the benediction. Cousin Dolph and Cousin Frederick, feisty as a pair of superannuated gamecocks, took Sarah’s arms between them and got her back to the limousine before she could be driven to shrieking frenzy by overtaxed nerves and the sight of those two elegant mahogany coffins propped over those two six-foot-deep holes in the ground.
19
SARAH HAD BEEN SUSTAINING herself with the expectation that once the funeral was over everybody would go away, but it wasn’t that simple. Old friends had to be asked back for a final glass of sherry, relatives fortified with cold beef and salad for their homeward journeys, luggage collected, rides arranged, parting speeches listened to, Cousin Mabel dissuaded from staying on a few days to be a prop and mainstay.
When the rest had cleared out, the Lackridges and Edgar Merton were still to be got rid of. The three of them haunted the library where they had spent so much time with Caroline and Alexander, looking as bereft as they must be feeling. Overnight Edgar had turned from middle-aged to old, his cameo features pinched and bleached, his small frame shortened by a stoop. Harry, in contrast, was redder and thicker, his waistline bloated, his high-bridged nose flushed with emotion and liquor. With loose skin hanging in wattles below his insignificant chin and that potbelly swelling out above those overly long, spindly legs, he looked like a plucked turkey. Sarah knew how they felt, but she did wish they’d go away. At last, when she’d all but fallen asleep in her chair, they did. Even then remained Edith and her litany of woes. At the old retainer, Sarah drew the line.
“You’re absolutely right, Edith,” she said. “This place will never be the same again. Nor do I intend to keep it up one day longer than I have to, so there’s no earthly reason why you should feel duty-bound to stay on. As you know, Mr. Alexander has been paying Social Security for you, and don’t try to make me believe you’re not old enough to collect. I don’t know whether he’s made any provision for you in his will, but I’ll see that you get a reasonable pension, although candidly I don’t know what you’ve ever done to deserve it. With that and what you’ve managed to salt away over the years, you should be able to live very comfortably, and you might as well start thinking right now about where you want to go.”
“I knew this would happen,” cried the maid. “Before they’re cold in their graves, you’re throwing me out in the street”
“Edith, you can’t have it both ways,” Sarah said wearily. “Just now you were moaning that you couldn’t bear to stay, now you’re throwing a snit because I’m taking you at your word. I know these past days have been hard on you, but they’ve been no picnic for me, either. I’m going upstairs, and you may do as you please.”
What Edith chose to do was flounce down to the basement, pack everything she’d accumulated over the years into two enormous suitcases, a vast number of cardboard cartons and shopping bags and a nice old steamer trunk that had belonged to Sarah’s grandmother, to which she had no right whatsoever. She then called her nephew from Malden to come and get her with his pickup truck and sat down to compose a letter to Sarah, stating in haughty detail where to send the pension checks.
Sarah stayed upstairs till all was over. She’d meant to go straight to bed, but there was no sense in that. Edith would be sure to leave lights blazing and doors unlocked. It would be quite in character for her to march up and deliver a valedictory blast, dragging her nephew along by way of audience. If that happened, Sarah didn’t want to be caught in her nightgown.
She puttered around the bedrooms, stripping off used linen and making the beds up fresh, though she couldn’t think who was ever going to sleep in them again. What she’d told Edith was true, she knew now. She was definitely going to move out as soon as Mr. Redfern would let her put the white elephant on the market.
Sarah was im
mensely relieved when the loaded pickup truck drove away with no disagreeable final scene. Then she realized that for the first time in her life, she was all alone in the house. And what if she was? Plenty of women lived alone. She went downstairs and started checking doors and windows, making sure everything was secure.
The basement, she found, had been stripped to the walls. Edith had taken everything but the vast iron cookstove. Perhaps the old retainer honestly believed the furniture was hers, she’d lived with it so long. More likely, she’d succumbed to the urge to grab what she could while she had the chance. Sarah didn’t care, the stuff couldn’t have been worth much anyway.
But what about Edith herself? Wasn’t it stupid to let her go without at least making an effort to question her? Sarah was too tired to care any more about things that had happened in the past. The only death she could think about was Alexander’s, and there was just no way Edith could have tampered with the Milburn. She’d been here in Boston, soaking her corns and drinking port.
Or had she? They’d never called the house until some hours after the so-called accident. For all Sarah knew, Edith could have been anywhere in the meantime, perhaps visiting that nephew in Malden, the one who’d just left here in a truck that had “TV Repair” painted on the sides. A man who could cope with modern electronic devices must know all sorts of clever ways to short-circuit the simplest kind of electric motor.
Would any nephew, however devoted, do such a thing to oblige his dear old auntie? He might, if he thought Auntie was down for something handsome in her supposedly rich employers’ wills.
Sarah’s insides growled and she laughed with relief. Thank God for bodies! There was nothing like a clamorous stomach to quiet an anxious mind. Although she’d bought and cooked and served enormous quantities of food during the past couple of days, she couldn’t recall having eaten much of anything herself. Part of this appalling hollowness she felt might be plain, old-fashioned hunger.
Edith had scooped out most of the leftovers as part of her loot, but Sarah managed to find some cold meat and a little salad. She made herself a pot of tea and ate at the kitchen table, not bothering to set a proper place. She was rinsing her cup under the tap when the telephone rang. Sighing, she picked up the extension phone and was surprised to hear the voice of Max Bittersohn.
Family Vault Page 17
