Doria dared to whisper, “Signora, surely your children . . .”
Elvira closed her eyes again. “My children! My children have no time for me. They have their own families, their work, their homes—what do they care for their mother, who did everything for them?”
Doria couldn’t speak her thought aloud, that Elvira had driven everyone away from her with her rages and tantrums. In any case, what good would it do now? Her mistress looked so utterly miserable, so lost.... It wouldn’t help to point out the ways in which she had created her own problems. “Signora Puccini,” Doria ventured, “why don’t you—why not let me make you a cup of tea, and while you drink it, I’ll brush your hair for you? That’s always so relaxing, don’t you think?”
Elvira’s eyes opened and fixed on Doria. “Brush my hair?”
Doria, pinned by that dark gaze, squirmed a little. “I just thought . . . perhaps . . .”
Elvira sighed suddenly, and looked away, toward the darkness of the night beyond the kitchen window. “My mother’s maid used to brush my hair,” she said sadly. “When I was small. My mother didn’t like to do it, because it was so curly, and it tangled. If I cried—because it hurt—my mother would throw down the brush and walk away, and her maid would finish for her.”
“It’s still curly,” Doria said. “And so thick.”
“Yes,” Elvira said absently. “It’s hard to brush even now.” She turned her head to look at Doria again, but she didn’t seem to see her. “If I had a lady’s maid,” she said, “that would help. If only Giacomo would agree to hire someone, find someone to do some of these things for me.”
Someone else for Zita and me to look after, Doria thought, and probably take my bedroom, as well. She heard the crackle as the fresh wood caught fire inside the stove, and she moved to the sideboard to fetch the teakettle and fill it at the sink.
“Tea,” Elvira said. “You’re right. Tea would be good. Bring it to my room.”
“Sì, signora.” Doria didn’t turn as Elvira swept out of the kitchen. She heard her padding up the stairs, and she shook her head in bemusement. She had worked in this house nearly six years, and Elvira had never once, in all that time, told her anything personal. She had no real relationship with her mistress other than trying to anticipate her wishes and stay out of her path when she was in one of her moods. Was it possible the signora’s moment of weakness might improve things between them?
It was past midnight by the time she carried the tray up the stairs. She had wrapped a cozy around the teapot, and laid a cup and saucer and two biscotti on a clean pressed napkin. There was still no sign of Puccini. He had gone to the café, no doubt, and was now drinking vin santo with his friends. Doria suppressed a yawn as she shouldered the door open into Elvira’s bedroom.
The signora was seated at her lacy dressing table, massaging cold cream into her cheeks. Doria set the tea tray next to her, and poured out a cup. Elvira, without speaking, picked up the cup with one hand and pointed to a hairbrush with the other.
It felt strange to Doria to pick up Elvira’s hairbrush, to clean a few strands of the signora’s coarse black hair from its bristles. She had often brushed Puccini’s hair, and washed and shaved him as well, when he was bedridden for so long, but Elvira was another matter. Even though it had been her own idea, now the thought of touching her, of being so close to her, made Doria’s stomach quiver unpleasantly.
Elvira sipped from her teacup and set it down as Doria started on her hair. Doria did it the way her mother had when she was a little girl, brushing and brushing with regular strokes, smoothing snarls, loosening the long tangles. Elvira sighed, and her eyelids fluttered and grew heavy. In the mirror Doria saw her thick shoulders relax, the lines of her face soften and nearly disappear. She kept working, gathering Elvira’s thick hair into a plait, smoothing it away from her temples and behind her ears. It felt rough and oily against her fingers, but she tried not to think about that. Elvira slumped a little, and for a moment Doria thought she might have fallen asleep, right there on the stool.
She reached the end of the braid, and tied it with a bit of ribbon that lay on the dressing table. When she released it, and stood back, Elvira’s eyes opened. She glanced at herself in the mirror, and then at Doria. Her eyes suddenly narrowed, and her face tensed. “You think I’m old and ugly,” she said.
“No, signora, of course I don’t!”
Elvira went on as if Doria hadn’t spoken. “You’ll see one day,” she said. Everything about her seemed to change all at once. Her lips thinned. Her shoulders hunched. Her forehead creased as if she had suddenly remembered all her complaints. She said in a sour voice, her mouth pulling down, “You’ll see what it’s like.” She pointed a long, sharp-nailed forefinger at Doria.
Doria’s own shoulders tightened. She still held the hairbrush, and she cast about her for a place to put it down.
Elvira’s eyes began to glitter with incipient temper. “That smooth skin, that slender waist! You’re going to find out it doesn’t last. When I met Giacomo I was so slim, he used to say he had to shake the sheets to find me! But now—”
With a sudden motion, she shoved herself to her feet. She turned swiftly around, and Doria flinched. Elvira said, “You’ll see! One day you’ll be old and fat like me, and then you’ll—”
“Signora,” Doria interrupted. “Don’t speak of yourself that way.”
“I don’t like the way you talk to me!” Elvira put her hands on her hips. “I never wanted you in this house, did you know that?” As her voice rose and sharpened, the fragile moments of peace evaporated like soap bubbles on a cold breeze. It was startling, Doria thought, how swiftly her mood could change. Perhaps Old Zita was right. Pazza.
Now Elvira thrust out her heavy chin. “Oh, yes! I wanted someone older, someone who knew how to nurse Giacomo. I certainly never wanted an ignorant village girl, but Father Michelucci told Giacomo—”
She broke off, listening. The door had opened and closed downstairs, and footsteps sounded through the studio. “It’s Giacomo!” Elvira hissed. Her temper had brought the lines back to her face. The cold cream settled into them, thin white worms outlining every crease and wrinkle. “Out! I don’t want him to find you here!”
Doria understood, with swift feminine instinct, that Elvira didn’t want her husband to compare the two of them. She backed toward the door, but she said as soothingly as she knew how, “Signora—I’m in your room every day, the signore knows—”
Elvira lunged at Doria, her big feet slapping on the carpet. She thrust at her shoulder with her extended fingers, as if she would push her bodily out of the room. Doria stumbled against the doorjamb, and rubbed her shoulder where Elvira’s sharp nails stung through her dress. She wondered if Elvira had been this way with her children, pushing and shoving at them when words failed her. That would explain why they never wanted to see her. Her own mamma, though they quarreled so often, had never struck her, would think such behavior beneath her dignity.
Doria pulled the door open. Behind her, Elvira said, “Hurry! Hurry!”
It was too late to hide the fact that she’d been in the bedroom, though. Puccini was already at the foot of the stairs, and when he heard Doria’s step on the landing, he tipped up his head, then, laughing, caught at the banister for balance. He was now very, very drunk; she could see that. She started down the staircase, and Puccini, his braces hanging loose over his trousers, started up it.
As they met, he said blurrily, smiling at her and grasping at her hand, “Doria mia! Not in your bed?” He glanced up at the landing, squinting as he tried to focus his eyes. “What are you doing up here at this hour, little nurse?”
She pulled her hand free, afraid the signora would come out of the bedroom and see. “I was—I braided the signora’s hair for her,” she said.
“Oh! Oh! That was sweet of you,” Puccini said. His hair was tumbled over his forehead, and he reeked of wine. He fumbled in his pocket for a cigarette even as he leaned toward her, nearly
falling as he bent to smile into her face. “Such a sweet little nurse, aren’t you? L-l-lucky Elvira!” and he did stumble then, missing the next stair and landing hard on his bad leg.
He groaned, and she put out her hand to support him. “Signore, go to bed,” she said firmly. “And no more smoking, or you’ll likely catch the house on fire.”
He straightened with difficulty, still grinning, and released the cigarette back into his pocket. He gave her a mock salute, the edge of his hand unsteadily meeting his forehead. “Yes, signorina!” he said. “Nurse’s orders! I’m off to bed.”
Doria stood where she was, watching him struggle up the stairs and cross the landing to the bedroom. The door opened and closed, and she heard the thunk of his boots on the floor. She waited a moment, to see if Elvira would scold. Instead, she heard a soft murmur of voices, and Puccini’s sudden laughter. The light went out, and seconds later she heard the noise of the bedsprings beginning to squeak.
Doria turned toward her own room, pursued by the rhythmic sounds of the marital bed, creaking and thumping and complaining. The house had grown cold, and she shivered as she unpinned her hair and hurried into her nightgown. By the time she slipped between her icy sheets, hugging herself for warmth, the sounds upstairs had ceased.
Perhaps the signora would be in a better mood tomorrow. She hoped Elvira had rubbed off the face cream before her husband saw her.
Or, Doria thought wickedly, as she nestled into her pillow, perhaps she didn’t.
Tory woke, shivering this time instead of perspiring. She sat up, finding her blanket gone and the sheet pulled down to her waist. Blinking in the predawn darkness, she reached for the bedspread. She tugged at it, but it didn’t move. She flicked on the bedside lamp.
The dog, though she had made a bed of towels for him on the floor, now lay next to her on the bed, a skinny length of brown-and-white fur stretched across the foot in a tangled fold of beige chenille. His eyes slid sideways when the light came on, but his big paws didn’t move. Only the plume of his tail moved, silently beating against the blanket.
Dogs. There had been dogs in her dream, scratching and whining at a closed door.
She lay down again, frowning into the vague dawn light, searching for meaning in the strange succession of her dreams. She didn’t find it.
She reached toward the dog, and curled her fingers into his long fur. The gesture felt familiar somehow, natural. It must be instinctive, this link between canines and humans, bred into them both by centuries of cooperation. The dog’s long pink tongue lolled, and the corners of his mouth curled upward as he panted.
“Are you smiling at me?” she demanded softly. “And who raised you to think you belong on the bed?”
His tongue disappeared, and his eyes closed again. Once his fur had dried, it proved to be silky and long, matted in places under his forelegs and along his ribs. She had spent a good part of the evening brushing him, an operation he was clearly accustomed to, lifting his paws when she wanted him to, submitting to scissors when some of the mats wouldn’t give way to her hairbrush.
Gently, Tory tugged the bedspread out from under the dog, and smoothed it up again over her side of the bed. She was about to pull on her sweatshirt and go out to make a cup of tea to watch the light rise over the water, but on an impulse she slipped back under the blanket, and turned out the light. The quilt was warm from the dog’s body, and having him there—calm, accepting, another breathing, living being—soothed her restiveness.
She snuggled deeper under the covers, washed by a comforting tide of drowsiness. Just as she fell asleep again, she felt a weight on her ankles, and heard the slight, contented groan as the dog settled his head across her legs. Tory, her dream forgotten for the moment, slept again.
16
Mi piaccion quelle cose, che han si dolce malìa . . .
che parlano di sogni e di chimere. . . .
Those things please me, which have such sweet magic . . .
which speak of dreams and of chimeras....
—Mimì, La Bohème, Act One
There was no veterinarian’s number in the slender telephone directory for Cannon Beach, but when Tory called information, it turned out a new vet clinic had just opened. She called the number, and the doctor himself answered. When she had explained the situation, he said, “No collar or tag? We’d better check to see if he’s chipped.”
“Chipped? I don’t know what that means.” Tory was standing beside the counter in her little kitchen, a cup of coffee in her hand. The dog lay on the rug in front of the fireplace, his eyes following her, his ears twitching at the sound of her voice.
“It’s a microchip, usually inserted in the skin at the back of the neck. If it’s there, it will tell us who owns the dog.”
“Oh.” Tory turned to face the back wall, not wanting to look at the dog—who might belong to someone, who might need to be restored to his rightful owner, his proper place. She tried to achieve a matter-of-fact tone. “I understand,” she said. “I have an appointment this morning, but I’ll bring him in after that, if that’s all right.”
“Oh, sure,” he said. “We’re not busy yet. We’ve just opened our doors this month.”
“It will be about ten, I think. Maybe ten-thirty.”
He chuckled. It was a nice sound, baritone-deep, resonant. “Walk-ins welcome,” he said cheerfully. “Like a barbershop. See you then.”
Tory drew a deliberate breath, closing her eyes for a moment to pull herself together. The dog wasn’t hers, after all. Someone was probably desperate to find him, and she had to do the right thing.
She opened her eyes to find that the dog had come to sit in front of her, tongue lolling, ears pricked forward. She crouched down to stroke his smooth head, and his tongue lapped at her cheek. It felt warm and dry and slightly prickly.
“Clearly,” she said to the dog in a husky voice, “I’ve been alone too long.” The dog put his head to one side, watching her. “Breakfast?” she said, and he stood up, ears turned forward, tail wagging.
The night before she had fed him hamburger. He had drunk all of the bowl of water, and after she refilled it, drunk even more. The liquid sound of his eager lapping had been oddly satisfying. He ate all the hamburger, and when he was done, he flopped down on the rug with a sigh she interpreted as relief. This morning she gave him scrambled eggs, which seemed to suit him just as well as the hamburger. He made a circuit of the yard while she watched, a little anxiously. He seemed to have no inclination to leave, and he already looked significantly stronger than he had the night before. When she opened the door, he was right at her heels, eager to follow her back inside. He drank more water, then sat down in front of the door as if he was worried she might go somewhere without him.
She checked her appearance in the small mirror in her bathroom. She supposed she might have to buy some clothes, but for now the black Costco sweater and jeans and sneakers would have to do. The no-cosmetics look seemed to fit Cannon Beach just fine, as did the flame-red hair dye. She ran her fingers through her hair to fluff it, dipped her little finger into a jar of petroleum jelly and smoothed some on her lips, and she was ready.
She went back into the bedroom for her black coat. It looked really dilapidated now, the down shifted here and there to make lumps in strange places, but there wasn’t much she could do about it. She paused for a moment, as she often did, beside the bureau where the file lurked in the bottom drawer. It was no wonder she had bad dreams. The file lay there like a monster hiding under the bed, waiting to pounce the moment she made a mistake. Another mistake, that is. It reminded her of all that was wrong, the mess she had created and that now she didn’t know how to fix.
Jack. Son. Be safe.
She drew a deliberate breath, turned away from the bureau, and marched out of the bedroom toward the front door. As she reached it, the dog rose, tail waving, ears lifted. The sight of him moved something in her, softened her despite her resolve. She stroked him, and wondered, as she shouldered he
r handbag, if she was making things worse for herself. Ice Woman was impervious. This dog-patting, vet-visiting person was vulnerable.
She meant for the dog, big as he was, to ride in the back seat of the VW. She moved the driver’s seat forward and urged him in. He jumped in with an impressive flowing motion, and she said with some surprise, “Good boy.” Why had she thought dogs were difficult? He was as obliging a creature as she’d ever met.
Then, as she settled herself in the driver’s seat, he slid past her right arm, his feet slipping as he scrabbled over the console. It took him only seconds to arrange his big body in the cramped passenger seat. Tory opened her mouth to object, but found herself laughing instead. The laugh felt strange, as if some involuntary process had seized her, a sneeze or a shiver. She couldn’t remember when she had last laughed aloud. The dog turned his head, his long tongue lolling, the corners of his mouth curling in that expression that looked exactly like a grin. When she didn’t object, he faced forward, looking out the windshield in the manner of one who knew just what he was doing.
“I guess I’ve been missing out on the whole dog thing,” Tory told him. “Jack would have something to say about that. I wish he could see you.” The dog cocked his head in her direction, listening. Her heart fluttered at the strangeness of the morning as she fired the engine, backed down the short driveway, and turned toward town.
She left the dog in the car, the window open, as she went into the florist’s shop. The place was easy to find, right on the main street. As she opened the door, a bell above it tinkled, and someone called out, “Don’t leave! I’ll be right there.” Tory glanced around at the shelves and racks holding assortments of souvenirs and postcards, ornaments and stationery. She walked forward, and found herself in a bower of vegetation, poinsettias, miniature pine trees with Christmas ribbon around their pots, bunches of carnations dyed red and green, a few arrangements with candy canes or snowmen stuck into them.
The Glass Butterfly Page 19
