Window on the Square

by Whitney, Phyllis A. ;

  “I think the collar hasn’t been damaged,” I said. “And we’ve found most of the beads. I’ll get you more tomorrow.”

  He emptied his own handful into the empty candy box that served to hold them and did not answer me at all.

  While Miss Garth had behaved in an outrageous fashion, the boy was at fault too, and I could not let his threatening words pass without comment.

  “Why did you borrow her things?” I asked softly.

  He gave me a troubled look from wide, dark eyes. “I don’t know,” he said. “Do you think it’s because I am what they say I am—mad?”

  I couldn’t endure his white, solemn expression and I made a move to put my arms about him. He stepped back at once, rejecting the gesture.

  “Of course you’re not mad,” I went on as reasonably as possible. “All of us do foolish things we’re sorry for afterwards. The next time you feel like doing something you know is wrong come and tell me first. If we talk it over together, perhaps you won’t want to do it after all.”

  “How can I tell you when I’m going to do something like that when I don’t know ahead of time myself? How can I not say dreadful things when I don’t know I’m going to say them? Like what I said about killing her.”

  “You didn’t mean that threat,” I assured him. “She upset you, and you wanted to pay her back. Though paying people back doesn’t serve us very well most of the time.”

  He looked straight at me, his eyes cloudy with emotion. “Once I made a threat like that and I meant it,” he said.

  So unsettled was the look in his eyes that I shivered involuntarily. At once he noticed this evidence of weakness.

  “You’re afraid of me, aren’t you?” he said, dark triumph in his voice. “You’re afraid of me too!”

  I suppressed the shiver and shook my head firmly. “Of course I’m not afraid of you, Jeremy. I’m never afraid of someone I trust.”

  For a moment longer he stared at me; then his thoughts seemed to turn inward and his stare lost its focus. I knew he was slipping away and out of my reach, yet I could not bring him back.

  We had supper alone in the downstairs dining room that night, for, true to her word, Miss Garth had left the house. We dined in loneliness at one end of the long table, and it was a somber meal, with no conversation between us. Jeremy scarcely ate, and I did not urge him. I had little taste for food myself, and it was a relief to leave the big room and the watchful eyes of Henry and return upstairs.

  How empty the house seemed that night. Not only because Jeremy and I were alone in the upper story, but also because Brandon Reid was away. The vigor of his presence always filled the house and gave it life. When he was not indoors, the house seemed to wait for his coming. When he was home, the noises of everyday living were present and a voice that spoke out with no fear of raising the echoes. When he was away altogether, the house whispered and creaked and murmured, but it did not speak aloud reassuringly.

  That evening was long to get through. Jeremy retreated behind the book on Egyptian archaeology, yet he turned the pages so seldom that I sensed how active his mind must be beneath the pretense of reading. There was no way to draw him out, no reassurance I could offer. I sewed on a frock for Selina until my eyes wearied and then I too sat in silence, staring at the plaid wool in my lap.

  When bedtime came, Jeremy startled me. He put his book aside and stood beside my chair.

  “Miss Megan,” he said, “will you please lock me in my room tonight?”

  I considered the suggestion soberly and felt the quick beating of my heart beneath my calm reception. It seemed a dreadful thing he suggested. Why should he need forcible restraint when Garth, with whom he was angry, was not in the house tonight? Or did he fear a return to his father’s room and a repetition of the wild hysteria of sobbing he had indulged in once before? I knew he still had the key to the room, for I’d seen it in a box on his bureau, though he had not used it again.

  Quickly I sought for a counter suggestion. “I’ve a better plan than that,” I told him. “Come and help me and I’ll show you.”

  He followed me doubtfully into his own room and watched while I stripped his bed.

  “Now then,” I said when the covers were off, “you can help me with the mattress. It’s too heavy for me to manage alone.”

  “What are you going to do with it?” he asked.

  “Help me and you’ll see,” I said with as lighthearted a smile as I could manage.

  He took one end of the mattress, and I led the way, backing, as we carried it into my room. With a little rearranging of the furniture, we were able to spread it out on the floor near my bed.

  “There!” I said. “This is where you may sleep tonight. We’ll keep each other company, since there’s no one else upstairs in the house.”

  He did not answer or come with me when I ran back for the bedclothes, but stayed where he was, staring at the mattress.

  “You won’t mind sleeping on the floor, will you?” I asked. “It will be like something from a story—like camping out. We’ll put an extra quilt over you to keep away the drafts, and you’ll be cozy warm.”

  I glanced at him and saw that he was watching me in a queer, tense way.

  “What if I try to hurt you in the night?” he said.

  I was on my knees beside the bedding and I could look into his eyes more nearly at his own level. I took his hands and held them lightly in my own. Somehow I even managed what sounded like a laugh.

  “Jeremy, you are only a little boy. I’m much stronger and bigger than you are. I won’t let you hurt me, and I won’t let you hurt yourself. There now—that’s a promise!”

  For once I had found the right words. The heavy load of anxiety seemed to slip away from him. He gave me a smile that was strangely sweet, and I knew that for the moment he had given me his complete trust. Again I held back an impulse to catch him to me and let him know the feeling of arms that loved and protected. But I could go so far and no farther until he was ready to come to me.

  Though Jeremy slept quickly, I could not fall asleep at once. I lay listening to his light, even breathing and thought about the incidents of the last few days. Of Brandon Reid and his apology to me, his change of attitude. Of yesterday, when we had skated in Central Park and everything between us had been strange and different. Beguilingly, dangerously different. My hands knew again the pressure of his, warm despite the cold, and I grew warm again remembering. Such thoughts frightened me because of my very willingness to indulge them. I pulled my imaginings up short and chose another course.

  With Mr. Reid on my side, wonders might now be achieved with Jeremy. If only we could weather such setbacks as occurred, real progress might be possible. Miss Garth, of course, should be kept away from the boy. He must be left wholly to Andrew and me.

  When my thoughts turned to Thora Garth, it was with sick distaste. Yet I could not entirely condemn her. If Jeremy was caught in a web of circumstances he could not overcome, she too was similarly trapped. Behind all that was unpleasant hid a woman whom life had cheated. Or was it possible for life to cheat us? Did we not do the cheating ourselves when we could not meet with wisdom and courage and joy what befell us? Had Thora Garth allowed herself to indulge too long a fantasy that would now destroy her? Which of those two miniature portraits had attracted the fervent expression I had seen on her face? To what extent did her dressing up in Leslie Reid’s gowns mean an identification with Leslie so that she might share vicariously experiences her mistress had known?

  These thoughts were not conducive to sleep, and again I tried to change their course. It was of Andrew I must think. He was the one person in this house I could count on, whether I always agreed with him or not. At least he spoke the truth as he saw it, even though his words might sometimes sting and bite. He was fooled by no one. He could find good in a pickpocket and be disdainful of those in high position. There was a sharpness to his view that cut through to the secret self a man might hide beneath pretenses. Or a woman.


  I knew he disliked Brandon intensely. I knew he pitied Leslie. Garth he simply detested and tormented. Yet I suspected that he would understand very well if I told him what Jeremy and I had seen today.

  Thinking about Andrew did not, after all, help me to fall asleep. I knew Andrew would have been horrified by the fact that Jeremy lay asleep on the floor beside me. I would be in for a lecture tomorrow if I told him. Yet nothing anyone could say would stop me in my course. Some of the love I had given my brother was turning toward young Jeremy. It was there within me to be given, and I must have something human to turn it upon.

  So I lay and watched the red coals turn black in the grate and heard the sifting of ashes. I watched the bright glow of the snowy night at my window and listened to Jeremy’s breathing as he slept.

  It must have been long past midnight when I too slept, dreamed, wakened fitfully, and then slept again. When a clock somewhere in the house struck three I came wide awake, listening for more than a striking clock. I could no longer hear the rhythm of Jeremy’s sleep and I turned quietly in the bed so that I could look out upon the cold, still room. Between me and the window something moved, and my breath caught in my throat. The boy was up, silhouetted dark against the snowy light beyond. Softly, almost stealthily, he was moving toward my bed. A thrill of unreasoning terror left me weak and breathless. Fear that this was not the harmless child I had claimed. This was a boy who was given to violent angers and who had once deliberately killed.

  “Jeremy?” I managed his name between stiff lips.

  The relief in his own voice was very great. “Oh, you’re awake? I’m sorry if I wakened you. I was so cold—I couldn’t sleep.”

  I flung back my quilts and carried one of them to his pallet. “Lie down quickly and let me put an extra cover over you. You’ll be warm soon. There’s nothing to fear.”

  My voice soothed him, and he slipped beneath the covers, snuggling down into warmth with the sigh of a very young child. I knelt beside him, holding his hand until his shivering ceased, and I sang once more the music box song in French. Drowsily he began to repeat the words and fell asleep murmuring, “Dormezvous?”

  There was only peace in this room, the snow gently falling beyond my window, and no fear anywhere in the Reid household.

  FOURTEEN

  The following days were blissfully uneventful. Miss Garth stayed away, and there was no word from upriver. Jeremy went back to sleeping in his own room, again willing to be nine years old and scornful of babyish ways. I did not, after all, tell Andrew of the things that had happened on that very disturbing night.

  Lessons progressed well during Selina’s absence, and Jeremy seemed to work with a will that surprised Andrew. Once or twice I found the tutor looking at me in a speculative manner as though he were almost ready to give ground a little when it came to Jeremy.

  After Andrew had gone, the afternoon hours belonged to us, and Jeremy and I started our studies of ancient Egypt. The boy’s mind was eager and intelligent, often ready to leap ahead and leave me, who posed as a teacher, far behind. At least I could open the door for him and that was worth doing. Sometimes we forgot about books and walked in the square or explored the nearby Village, but I saw to it that the boy had time for his private concerns as well. I knew he was working once more on the gift for his uncle.

  Something occurred during this period that encouraged me more than anything else. One afternoon Jeremy came to me in the schoolroom where I was reading and dropped something into my lap. I put my book down and saw that it was the green silk I had made for his sister. He spoke to me almost fiercely.

  “I felt like cutting it up! See, I put the scissors in my pocket and went into Selina’s room to get the dress and cut it up.”

  “But you didn’t,” I said.

  He shook his head violently. “No! I remembered what you said about coming to tell you when I felt like doing something wrong. So I brought it to you instead. And here are the scissors too.”

  “That’s fine,” I assured him. “Now we can talk about what made you want to hurt Selina. You’re fond of your sister. You wouldn’t truly want to injure her, would you?”

  “They took her with them when they went upriver,” he said. “I like my grandmother and she likes me. But they left me at home.”

  I nodded my understanding of his feelings. “It’s true they took Selina with them, but that isn’t her fault. Besides, you enjoy being with me, don’t you?”

  “Uncle Brandon never wants me around,” he said, putting his finger on the true source of his brooding.

  There was nothing I could do about the actions of Brandon Reid. Indeed, I tried to think about Jeremy’s uncle as little as possible. I had discovered in myself a tendency to daydream, to recall too often the day we had gone skating, and this I distrusted in myself.

  “I want you here,” I told the boy. “I’d have been terribly lonely if you had gone away with the others.”

  When I returned Selina’s dress to him with complete trust, he took it proudly to her room, having vanquished temptation. I was pleased with him and told him so.

  Once or twice the subject of the Dwight Reid Memorial Home came up. During lessons one morning Jeremy asked whether the date of its opening had been set, and Andrew knew more about the matter than I. There was some dispute, he said, about the setting of the exact date, due to the continued opposition of Brandon Reid. At once Jeremy wanted to know why his uncle did not like the idea of a Home that would take care of some of New York’s homeless children. Andrew told him curtly to work at his lessons and leave grown-up affairs to others. I sensed that the tutor was holding something back, and I wanted to know more about the matter.

  When Kate served Jeremy’s ten-o’clock chocolate and biscuits in the nursery and the boy left us for his recess, I brought the subject up again.

  “Is there something wrong about this memorial for Jeremy’s father?” I asked. “I keep hearing about Mr. Reid’s opposition and the obstacles he seems to be putting in the path of the opening. What does it mean?”

  Andrew shrugged. “Preserve me from a curious woman, Megan. Why should I know any more about it than you do?”

  “I think you do know more,” I countered, and did not deny his accusation of being curious.

  “If you want me to guess,” he said, “it could be that he’s afraid of further publicity. Afraid of having the papers rehash the old scandal. The slightest mention in the papers has a tendency to make Master Brandon nervous. There’s been cause enough in the past for him to be sensitive when it comes to the press.”

  “I suppose there’s always the risk of involving Jeremy again,” I agreed. “We can’t blame him for wanting to avoid that.”

  Andrew left his books and went to the blackboard, where he stood tossing a piece of chalk in a familiar gesture. I had a feeling that he was concerned about something more, something I did not understand. When he turned to me again he had his impatience in hand and spoke to me more kindly.

  “Like your friend Miss Garth, I’ve taken to feeling trouble in my bones,” he said. “In fact, it’s probably Garth’s muttering that has started me off. She seldom opposes Mrs. Reid in anything, but she’s as dead set against this memorial as Reid is himself. She and I have both been smelling disaster in the wind. And when it comes, Megan, I’d like to see you away from this house.”

  His words made little sense, and I remained unmoved by such unexplained warnings.

  “Why aren’t you trying to get away yourself?” I asked.

  “I can take care of myself,” he said.

  There was a sudden harsh note in his voice that surprised me. He seemed deadly serious now, with no mockery in him. But if there was trouble in the offing, I had no notion from what quarter it might come. Nor had I any desire to flee from what I did not see or fear. Jeremy needed me. He was improving. That was all I would concern myself with at the moment. So I merely shook my head at Andrew’s gloomy words.

  On impulse, however, I asked anot
her question, one that I had asked myself many times by now, though without finding an answer.

  “What puzzles me most of all is how Leslie and Brandon Reid came to marry. They seem to have so little—”

  He broke in without waiting for me to finish. “I should think her appeal for a man like Brandon Reid would be clear enough. Why shouldn’t he have been caught by her beauty?”

  “But if she still loved her first husband—then why would she marry his brother?”

  “Perhaps she had her price,” he said carelessly. “Or perhaps he had his. Who can tell?”

  I thought his attitude callous and was sorry I had questioned him. He laughed at the look on my face with one of his sudden returns to good humor.

  “What a prim expression you wear, Miss Megan! You want to hear criticism only in a direction you choose. When I suggest that the master is less than perfect, you turn your head. Is that it?”

  The conversation was out of hand, and it was a relief when Jeremy returned, licking a smear of chocolate from his upper lip. I would know better, after this, than to ask Andrew Beach anything about the Reids and their affairs.

  That afternoon, when Andrew had gone and we had done our lesson on Egypt, the idea came to me that before his mother and uncle returned, I ought to arrange some sort of festive occasion for Jeremy. Often I regretted his lack of friends, but there was nothing I could do about it for the time being. Miss Garth had indicated that mothers in this area did not want their sons to play with Jeremy Reid. What had happened, even though it was considered an accident, left them fearful about him as a playmate for their children. Thus he was left in the unnatural position of having no friends of his own age. I hoped the time might come when we could mend this. But for now I would have to serve as a playmate.

  When we came into the downstairs hall after our walk, I made my announcement. “By the way,” I said, elaborately polite, “I am giving a little dinner party this evening, Master Jeremy, and I would like the pleasure of your company. Though perhaps I shouldn’t invite you formally, since you must be the host in your uncle’s absence.”