She went on as though she mused aloud, stroking the cat absently. “I stopped loving him long ago. I was too young and I married an imaginary man. I’d thought of Simon as strong and wise—like my cousin Porter—but, in reality, he was only weak and ineffectual.”
Porter strong and wise? My sympathy was entirely with Simon Mountfort.
Abruptly, Valerie pushed the cat off her knees. Miss Kitty did a corkscrew turn in the air and landed on her feet, immediately sitting down to wash her face.
“I have an idea, Cecelia. You don’t really want to go back to bed, do you?”
Mischief had touched her, and it made me all the more uneasy. “What do you have in mind?”
“Let’s get dressed. Quietly, so Amelia won’t suspect what we’re up to. Amelia would stop us and I don’t want that. We can take my car—it’s only a little way to go.”
“A little way to where?”
“It’s a surprise. You’ll see when we get there.”
“At three in the morning?”
“That’s the best hour. The time of dark bewitching! Don’t be stuffy, Cecelia. Get dressed and I’ll meet you downstairs.”
Our roles had been reversed. She seemed the younger one now—a girl bent on some escapade. Yet if I awakened Amelia, I might never find out what Valerie intended. I needn’t like or trust this woman to go with her. I just needed to be watchful. Of course, at that time, I had no suspicion of her trickery.
Miss Kitty came with me to my room, and observed me as I put on gray pants and a light jacket. She seemed to find my behavior interesting, but normal. I wondered what went on in her little cat brain. Sometimes she showed her own special intelligence, but she had no way to analyze or evaluate except by interest. Certainly I had no desire to go back to bed.
“Go to sleep, cat,” I told her. “And don’t inform anyone that I’m going off with my mother.”
She gave me a slow blink, and curled up on the bed, closing her eyes, her tail wound under her chin.
When I went down, Valerie was waiting for me at the foot of the stairs.
“You took forever, Cecelia.”
It was the first time I had seen her out of her frilly lounging clothes. She’d put on a swirly flowered skirt and a light pink sweater to protect her against breezes that could sweep up the peninsula from the ocean. What startled me, however, were the clip earrings she had chosen to wear—coral carved in the form of a lotus and set in gold. Duplicates of the single earring I’d seen earlier today, except that the one Garrett had shown me was set in silver. Apparently, whatever the mystery of the single earring, it had nothing to do with Valerie Mountfort, whose earring set was intact.
She touched one ear with a finger. “You wanted to see them, so I put them on.”
“They’re beautiful,” I said, and let it go at that.
When she opened the front door and ran down the steps to the sidewalk, I followed more slowly. A passageway led along one side of the house to where she kept her car in a rear courtyard. I got in beside her, aware of her strange excitement, and of that sense of mischief that still held and made me distrustful.
I had no map of Charleston firmly in mind yet, so I couldn’t follow the turns she took—a fact that would be of no help to me later on when I might need to know where I was.
The streets were empty and quiet, except for an occasional all-night party going on. Even the gardens seemed more mysterious than by day, and were alive only to night creatures. Flower scents were sweeter than ever. From river to river, and clear to the ocean tip of the land, where the two rivers met, Charleston slept.
A few blocks along what Valerie told me was Broad Street I saw an impressive building built squarely across its end, stucco over brick. Valerie turned the car toward the curb and parked in front of the building. Streetlights made it clearly visible and I saw high steps mounting on either hand to a white Palladian doorway.
Valerie’s excitement held, and a strange eagerness drove her. I wondered if I could handle whatever might be about to happen. For now I could do nothing but go along.
When she got out of the car, I followed her up the right-hand flight of steps between iron railings. At a landing we turned up a longer central flight to the door of the building. As I went up, I glimpsed arched windows and a closed door set at ground level between the two wings of steps.
“Where are we?” I demanded, suddenly feeling very vulnerable.
She took a key from her pocket and waved it at me exultantly. “This is the Old Exchange Building—one of the oldest in Charleston. It used to open on the river, where ships could unload onto its stone floor. It was built while the town was still a royal colony. Such history here! I can’t wait to show it to you.”
She used her key to open the door, and laughed at my questioning look. “I still take children’s tours through once in a while, and I’ve kept my key.”
I looked nervously over my shoulder at the street, where nothing moved.
“We won’t turn on any lights,” she assured me. “Then if a police car comes by, they won’t see a thing. Don’t dawdle, Cecelia—come along.”
In dim light from the street I saw the reception desk near the door, piled with brochures. The stone floor stretched out across the enormous room, worn and uneven.
“This is where trading used to take place, with ships unloading back there on the river. All that began more than two hundred years ago, yet the old bricks and stones are still standing. Of course the building was used for other purposes during the Revolution. I’ll show you later, but first we’ll go upstairs.”
I had no idea why she had brought me on this historic tour at such an hour, and with such secrecy. An electric quality still drove her, and I wished I knew what she intended.
Stairs opened on one side and we climbed to the floor above. Again streetlights threw patches of yellow through the windows, so nothing was completely dark. Here the bare floor was polished wood, and two fireplaces gleamed white in the dim lighting. Graceful white columns, whose scrolled tops supported the ceiling, stood out from the walls around the great room. Above twin mantels hung portraits that Valerie said were Queen Henrietta Maria and King Charles I of England (the father of Charleston’s namesake). All this would be lighted by the marvelous overhead chandeliers for a party. It was a ballroom, undoubtedly. But why were we here?
Valerie flung out her arms as though she moved to unheard music. “What wonderful parties have been held here in the Great Hall! What splendid dances! How many times Simon and I have danced in this very room! This is background you need to know about, Cecelia.”
Why did I suspect that this was not her reason for bringing me here?
As I watched, her arms accepted an invisible partner and she moved into the steps of a formal waltz. I could almost see her swirling skirt change into a ball gown of satin and lace as she danced with her tall husband—perhaps in that distant time of her youth when she had loved him dearly. Or loved what she thought him to be? And what about Simon? Had she been what he wanted and expected?
My mother and father, I told myself, and began to believe a little in this fairy tale. As I watched, I could almost hear the music. Not Strauss. Cole Porter perhaps, or Irving Berlin. She dipped and whirled and I knew that a strong arm supported her. The room was peopled in my vision with a throng of dancers.
She whirled to a stop, applauding the invisible orchestra, and came running back to me, light as a young girl.
“I’ve always wanted to do this. I’ve wanted to dance once more in this room with my own partner. Usually I’m herding schoolchildren through and trying to make them understand how real history is. The Federal Government was going to sell this building at one time, and it could have been torn down. Can you imagine? Back in 1913 the DAR got the United States Congress to deed the Old Exchange to be held as a historic memorial in perpetuity. Of course, I am a Daughter of the
Revolution, and so are you, Cecelia. Our Daughters of the Confederacy came later.”
I knew very little of what the DAR stood for today, but the sense of connection with history mesmerized me. Maybe this was why my mother had brought me here.
“Now I’ll show you the real treasure this building holds,” Valerie ran on. “This is the dark time before dawn when you can really experience what is hidden here.”
She hurried toward the stairs and as I looked to where they descended to the bottom floor, I held back. “Is it necessary to go down there?” My alarm suddenly increased again. Her words about the “dark time” and something hidden were far from reassuring.
“Of course, Cecelia!” She ran down the steps ahead of me. “There’s living history here. Don’t you want to know where you came from?”
I came from an old white house on Long Island—a place that carried no history of intrigue and war and murder. Did I need this eerie world into which Valerie Mountfort was leading me? Nevertheless compelled, I followed her down.
When we reached the brick floor at the bottom, she tapped me on the arm. “Step carefully—these bricks are very old and uneven. They’ve been worn down by centuries of feet. This is the dungeon, Cecelia.”
The area smelled dark and warm and shut in, though probably by day there would be air-conditioning for the comfort of tourists. Blind in pitch darkness, I groped until Valerie switched on several lights that hung about the cavernous space. Illumination remained dim and shadowy, so that for a moment I thought we were not alone. Then I realized that former happenings in this place had been depicted with small dioramas of life-sized figures in costumes from the past.
Valerie was playing her role of tour guide now. “Isaac Haye, a patriot of the Revolution, was held here before his execution by the British. There were common criminals, as well—the pirate Steve Bonnard, among others. I’ve always thought it strange that I’ve never felt a sense of the dead in this place. Honoria says that’s because life was so miserable here that they’d rather do their haunting elsewhere. Just the same, if we are very quiet and listen, we may hear the human cries that were impressed on these walls and pillars and arches. Cries that will echo forever!”
I tried not to listen to the silence. She hadn’t told me her reason for bringing me here, but I still felt too vulnerable and alarmed.
She’d brought a flashlight, and when she cast its beam forward I saw the intricacy of groined brick arches rising from the pillars, intertwining overhead. The very artistry of the arches gave the place a terrible beauty.
“Take my hand and we’ll go up on the bridge,” she directed.
Her hand was hot when I touched it, as though she burned with some blood fever that drove her.
I stepped with her onto a runway built over the remnants of an ancient brick wall. Valerie swept it with her flashlight beam and continued her patter.
“Charleston was the only British walled city in North America. The Old Exchange Building is built over what’s left of the seawall. You can see a section of the old wall down there below us. Bits of that wall crop up in other parts of historic Charleston.”
Even as her words sounded reasonable and informative—words she could probably say in her sleep—something ran beneath the routine pattern, and I heard a tremor of anticipation that upset me. But when I tried to persuade her to return upstairs and leave this unhappy place, she dismissed my words carelessly. Leaving was not in her immediate plans, and I had no intention of leaving her until I knew why we were here.
We wandered into another part of the great dungeon, where lifelike figures played out more tragic prison scenes. Great brick arches collected menacing shadows that seemed to move as Valerie’s flashlight moved. Suddenly I’d had enough. I would go no farther into what had begun to seem like a maze. Any sense of direction I might have had was lost, and I no longer knew where to find the stairs. I stood with my back against a brick column, trying not to see the suffering displayed by a ragged figure a few feet away. Suffering that had once been horribly real in this place.
“I’m not moving another step until you tell me why you’ve brought me here.”
A chuckle of amusement escaped her lips before she became serious again. “You can’t call me Mother, can you?”
“I’m sorry—” I began, but she broke in quickly.
“Of course you can’t! You can’t use that word because I’m not really your mother. And you aren’t really my lost Cecelia. I don’t know why you came to Charleston—or perhaps I do. You knew there was an inheritance involved, didn’t you? An inheritance you would share with my daughter, Amelia. Simon took care of that in his letter to you and in his will. If you returned within a period of thirty-five years, you were to share equally with your sister. If Amelia were dead, you would receive it all. The amount has been growing all this time, so this might put Amelia in jeopardy. Though at the end of the period of restriction if you hadn’t claimed your share, what has become a fortune would revert to her. Which might put you in jeopardy.”
“I don’t know anything about this . . .” I began.
“But of course you are an impostor,” she went on, paying no attention. “You fooled Charles and some of the others, including Amelia. But I was never fooled. The likeness startled me at first—even shocked me. But I was able to go behind that with a mother’s true feelings. You aren’t my darling lost baby, and I mean to make you so sorry you came that you will go away and never come back. Tonight you’ll have a taste of the punishment I can manage for you. Just a hint to show you what the real thing might be like.”
Her delusion was complete and I realized there was no way I could reach her. I wondered if it had been her hand that had placed that halberd beside me backstage at the theater—even though she was supposed to be home in bed.
I knew I must escape and find my way to the stairs, then I could reach the street and get help. If only I didn’t feel so lost and confused. This was worse than losing my sense of direction at the theater, where at least there had been adequate light.
Valerie gestured with the beam of her flashlight. “There’s a barrel over there, Molly Hunt. You might as well sit and be comfortable. You won’t have more than a few hours to wait before the building opens and someone finds you. Perhaps you can even catch up on some sleep.”
She meant to leave me here, and I couldn’t let that happen, but even as I reached out to grasp her arm, she touched a switch that extinguished the lights around this cellar area. At the same moment she turned off her flashlight and moved out of my reach. I hadn’t noticed the location of the switch, since it had all happened so fast. Once more, her beam flashed across my face and then went off for good.
Valerie Mountfort, who knew this place by night and day, ran away from me, her feet sounding on the bricks and echoing among the arches of the ceiling. Echoes seemed to come back to me from all sides, so I had no sense of the direction she had taken.
When all the sound died away, the silence seemed as dismaying as the darkness. I couldn’t hear her feet on the stairs, or on the heavy stone floor overhead. I knew she would return to her car and drive home, leaving me here without the slightest qualm.
I made myself be quiet. Primitive fears would be my worst enemy here, and I must keep my imagination from taking flight. I was disoriented—that was all. There was nothing to harm me. I groped my way to the barrel she’d shown me, and sat down to think about my circumstances. I might even entertain myself by thinking like a writer. I must stop the shaking that was affecting my limbs. This experience would work wonderfully in a mystery novel, but I didn’t care for it in real life.
Perhaps, after all, I could remember the direction of the stairs. I would simply open my consciousness, ask for help—and let myself be guided. I sat very still, trying to relax every part of my body, waiting for some—enlightenment?
All around me the silence pressed down with the weight
of those mysterious arches. Nearby something rustled and crept across the floor. Mice—rats? Once ships beyond the seawall had unloaded their wares and brought them into this building. Rats must have had a lovely time in those days. I felt sorry for prisoners chained to these dungeon floors. They, at least, would have been allowed candlelight. And surely all the rats would have been driven out by now.
Darkness—the complete absence of light—can have a strangely stifling effect. Not only because my physical eyes could no longer see anything—but because my inner vision had gone sightless from fear. I hadn’t even a blind man’s stick with which to find my way. Nevertheless I couldn’t wait hours to be rescued. I must find the stairs that would lead me to the floor above. Streetlights would show me the way to the reception desk and a telephone. Someone would come for me when I called. Though I wasn’t sure whom I would call. But that was a problem that lay ahead—when I found my way up.
I’d closed my eyes, since it was better not to stare into blank nothingness. When I opened them to make my first steps toward escape, I realized that the darkness was not absolute—as it had seemed at first. My eyes had begun to adjust, and in the direction of what must be the front of the building a faint sliver of light came through. I remembered that I had seen arched windows under the high steps when we had come in. And there’d been a door between them.
Moving with my hands outstretched against collision, I found my way past pillars that rose into arches, and over rough brick toward the goal of lesser darkness. Once I bumped into a cabinet with a glass top that rattled and set echoes crashing around me. An exhibit of some kind, I supposed.
A few more steps brought me to the cold outside wall, where windows and a central door had been set into the brick. Useless, of course. The door was locked and the shuttered windows wouldn’t open. Now I was farther than ever from the stairs, but at least I knew they must rise against the wall opposite from this one—clear across the building.
Woman Without a Past Page 17
