Child Of The Night

by Lee Karr

  “Yes, ma’am.” The maid bobbed her carrot red head and gave Tyla a quick once-over as she said, “This way, please.”

  Tyla followed Marie’s ample figure out of the room and up the circular staircase. When they reached the second-floor landing, Marie said, “I take care of the little girl. None of the nannies stay long. She behaves better with me than anyone so far. She’s a sweet thing most of the time.”

  “I think so, too,” Tyla said. “And I bet you’re good with her.” The young woman’s ready smile and easy manner impressed Tyla. Quite a contrast from her mistress, thought Tyla, still feeling the chill of Harriet’s hostility.

  “Do you work with a lot of kids like her?” Marie asked pointedly, as if Tyla had to pass her scrutiny.

  “Yes. I’m a clinical psychologist specializing in helping emotionally disturbed children.”

  “You don’t look the way I expected,” she said frankly. “Not like a doctor at all. Gosh, you look like one of them cover girls, all slender and pretty. You’d make a great model.”

  Tyla laughed. “Thanks, but I don’t think I’ll be changing careers very soon.”

  A few steps down the hall they passed an open bedroom door. Tyla didn’t need anyone to tell her it was Clay’s room. Strangely enough, she felt his presence as if he were standing in the doorway watching her. Her steps faltered a moment as his masculine scent overtook her, and she picked up the impression that he was strongly thinking of her at that moment.

  Not likely, she schooled herself as she dismissed the vague intuition. Every ounce of common sense told her she was way off base. She didn’t know where he and Doreen had gone for the day, but the two of them would certainly have other things to think about. She pulled her thoughts away from a pricking sense of loneliness. Before her past relationship with her doctor lover had turned sour, they had enjoyed some pleasant weekends away from work and people. Maybe Barry was right. Maybe she had narrowed her life into that of a workaholic.

  “This is Miss Cassie’s room,” Marie said politely when they reached a door at the end of the hall. “Please ring if you need anything. How long will you be here?”

  “Till four o’clock.”

  Marie nodded. “I’ll be back then.”

  Cassie’s combination bedroom and playroom was almost the size of Tyla’s apartment. Everything that could grace a little girl’s room was there: white French provincial furniture, ruffled curtains and satin pillows, every kind of toy and stuffed animal and a cloud-soft floral rug. The venetian blinds were partially closed, and Tyla didn’t see Cassie in the dim light. Then a soft squeak of a rocker drew Tyla around the foot of the bed, and she saw Cassie sitting in a small chair, holding a stuffed bunny in her lap, rocking and humming.

  Tyla quietly sat down on the edge of the bed, unwilling to disturb the tranquil mood. After a moment the child looked up. “Bunny wants you to sing.”

  “Does Cassie want me to sing?” She wanted the child to feel secure enough to express her own feelings.

  “Bunny and Cassie want you to sing.”

  Tyla smiled. Nothing like hedging your position. How could Harriet believe that the little girl lacked intelligence? “Bunny looks sleepy,” Tyla said.

  The little girl nodded.

  Tyla began to softly sing, “‘Lullaby and good night, with roses bedight…’” Some of the lyrics escaped her and she had to improvise, but Cassie didn’t seem to mind.

  Cassie put a tiny finger up to her lips when the song was finished. “Shh.” Then she carefully put the stuffed animal in a doll’s crib and covered it with a blanket.

  “I’m your mama,” Cassie said. “I won’t go away.” Her little lip began to quiver. “I won’t go away…I won’t…I won’t.” Her voice rose higher and higher and then, with a cry of pain she picked up the bunny and threw it across the room.

  The quicksilver change in mood took Tyla completely by surprise. One moment the child was tranquil and tender, the next explosive and violent.

  Cassie dissolved into a heap on the floor, hiding her head between her pulled-up knees and her tiny shoulders shaking with sobs. “I hate Bunny…I hate Bunny.”

  Tyla slipped off the bed and sat on the floor beside her. Taking a chance, she interpreted the behavior. “Somebody hates Bunny? Someone hates Cassie?”

  In response, the child turned and began to flail at Tyla with her fists. Tyla grabbed her arms and held them firmly.

  “It’s all right,” she said quietly. “Cassie is upset. It’s all right.”

  Sobbing, Cassie suddenly went slack in Tyla’s embrace. It took every ounce of patience that Tyla could summon to remain quiet as she held the child gently but without undue affection. How easy it would have been to hug the child, press her cheek affectionately against her tearful cheek and murmur words of love and caring. But she couldn’t. Her goal was not to become an emotional support for Cassie. She’d betray her trust as a therapist if she created an emotional attachment between them that sooner or later would have to be broken. Her task was to develop Cassie’s inner strength and emotional independence.

  Why had Cassie’s tenderness toward the bunny turned ugly? Why had an expression of love turned to hate? The little girl had tenderly put the stuffed animal to bed and promised not to go away. Was she reliving the night her mother had tucked her in for the last time? Why did she think someone hated her? The answers lay in the tangled threads of the little girl’s thinking. Time and patience, Tyla schooled herself. She knew better than to bombard Cassie with questions that might only lock the door tighter on her wounded self.

  After a little while Cassie drew away and stood up.

  Without saying a word, she picked up the bunny, put it back in the doll bed and then looked expectantly at Tyla as if waiting for her to say something.

  “You put Bunny back to bed. He’s asleep now.”

  “Asleep,” echoed Cassie. “No bad pictures.” Smeared tears on the child’s cheeks caught at Tyla’s heart.

  “Bunny sees things…bad things?” Tyla asked.

  “He saw Papa.”

  Tyla’s mouth was suddenly dry. “He saw Papa?”

  Cassie nodded solemnly. And then a shutter came down in her large blue eyes.

  Damn, swore Tyla. The little girl’s closed expression prevented Tyla from pursuing the subject further. Cassie must have picked up on my startled reaction, Tyla thought. She’d have to control her emotions better around the sensitive child.

  Cassie bounded over to a make-believe kitchen that had a miniature stove, refrigerator, sink and table. “Now we have lemonade,” she said, mimicking a grown-up voice. Very deliberately she placed a set of play dishes on the table and took a miniature pitcher from the toy refrigerator. Tyla was surprised when real lemonade poured from the spout.

  “Cookies,” Cassie said as if reminding herself. She opened the miniature oven and took out a plate of chocolate-chip cookies.

  Tyla wondered who had prepared the little party. She was very skeptical that Cassie had thought up the idea. In a way Tyla was displeased that the hour was being used to carry out somebody else’s ideas. She wanted the child free from all constraints when she was with her. No orders. No instructions. She wanted Cassie to be completely spontaneous and uninhibited. The child’s honest expression of herself was the only way Tyla could look beneath the surface and see what drove the child to behave the way she did.

  Even though Cassie seemed to be interested in the lemonade and cookies, her fixation on the food led to a lack of communication, giving Tyla little insight into what the child was thinking. Hoping to use the stuffed animal as an intermediary and perhaps get Cassie to express herself through the toy, Tyla asked, “Would Bunny like to come to the party?”

  “No.”

  Tyla had to smile at the flat, decisive answer. A good sign of personal integration. For whatever reason, Cassie didn’t want the bunny at the party and she hadn’t hesitated to say so.

  Inside the walls of this room, Cassie seemed to be quite sure
of herself. Tyla wondered about her behavior in the rest of the house. Did the child act differently outside the nursery? If so, how? The next time she came, she might be able to observe Cassie interacting with the other members of the household. What was her relationship with her grandfather? Did she always throw a tantrum in his presence? Or did Cassie sometimes freeze up in his presence the way she did when her grandmother was with her? And what about Cassie and Papa? How did Cassie and Clay behave toward each other in the routine of daily living? And how did Doreen fit into the equation? Discovering how the dynamics of the family affected Cassie could be vitally important.

  Tyla entertained a moment of irritation that Clay Archer had not thought it important enough to change his plans so he could be here for this first visit. She tried to convince herself that her disappointment was purely professional.

  At the end of the hour the young maid appeared at the door. “It’s four o’clock,” Marie said.

  Tyla nodded. “Yes, it’s time for me to go.” She smiled at the little girl. “Next time you can come play in my room.”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Not tomorrow. Tomorrow is Sunday. But the next day is Monday. You can come to see me on Monday.”

  “Tomorrow.” Her little hands were clenched. “Tomorrow. Cassie come tomorrow.”

  Tyla shook her head and said firmly, “No, Cassie. Not on Sunday. Nobody comes to my playroom on Sunday.”

  Cassie fixed those lost little eyes on her, and Tyla stiffened against taking the child in her arms and consoling her. Every therapist had to walk a narrow line between caring and involvement. But Tyla had never found her job so painfully difficult as she did at that moment.

  “Goodbye, Cassie. I’ll see you on Monday.” She gave the child another smile and then walked out of the room. She held her breath, half expecting to hear Cassie’s voice raised in one of her screeching tantrums. She waited a moment in the hall and then moved on.

  “Well, how did it go?”

  The sound of his voice jerked Tyla’s head up. She thought she was hallucinating. Clay stood in his bedroom doorway watching her walk down the hall toward him.

  Chapter 8

  “I’m sorry if I startled you,” he apologized.

  Tyla had trouble finding her voice. “I…I thought you were going to be away for the day.”

  “Changed my mind.”

  They looked at each other as if waiting for the other one to put the encounter into proper focus. As his eyes swept over her face, he admitted to himself that she looked lovelier every time he saw her. Her attire was more casual than it had been at the clinic. She wore a coordinated denim skirt and striped vest with a fullsleeved white blouse. Dark hair drifted forward in a short cut and lay softly on her cheeks. He decided that her beautiful gray-blue eyes were clear as early dawn in a silver sky. Just looking at her stirred a warmth of masculine desire that made his voice husky as he said, “We came back early.”

  “Oh,” she said in a rather inane fashion.

  He took a deep breath. “Did everything go all right? I was worried. I didn’t know how Cassie would behave. She’s so unpredictable.” Was he talking too fast and showing too much anxiety? He was unsure of himself when he talked about his daughter. “I tried to set things up as best I could.”

  “So you were responsible for the cookies and lemonade?”

  He nodded, searching her expression for some indication whether or not she approved. “Cassie used to love tea parties. I thought it might make things go smoother. I suppose I should have checked with you first, but…” He broke off and made a dismissing gesture with his hands. “Well, I guess you know by now that I’m used to managing things. At least, I try to anticipate trouble and avoid it. And I wanted your first visit to go well.”

  “I appreciate your concern,” she said evasively.

  “But I did the wrong thing?”

  Tyla sought the right words to explain why she would have preferred that he stay out of the situation. “Not wrong…but not especially helpful. Since the tea party was your idea and not Cassie’s, you were directing and she was following. The success of play therapy lies in allowing the child to feel secure in expressing her own choices. Cassie has been emotionally and psychologically battered by forces that I’m trying to identify. The pressure of approval or disapproval from you or anyone else won’t mend your daughter’s fragmented psyche and unfortunately only weakens the integrity of her own inner self.”

  “In other words, I goofed.”

  She lightened the moment with a soft laugh. “Plainly put, yes. But with the best of intentions. And I think you’re quite educable. No more tea parties, agreed?”

  “What can I do to make amends? Can I show you around?”

  “A tour of this lovely house might be nice,” she said, unwilling to admit that she would like to prolong her visit, especially if he was willing to be her escort.

  He gestured with one hand into the room behind him. “Behold, the master suite. Would you like to step in and see more?”

  She was aware of a challenging glint in his eyes. “Thank you,” she said, accepting the dare.

  A spacious sitting room occupied a sunny southwest corner of the house, and an equally large adjoining bedroom lay beyond an open door. Compared to the downstairs rooms, his rooms looked cluttered and lacked an overall decor. An assortment of books lay about on tables as if he were reading more than one at once. His taste seemed to be eclectic, she noticed from the variety of titles, both fiction and nonfiction.

  “You might find my hobby of some interest,” he said with a betraying enthusiasm underlying the words.

  “And what would that be?” she asked with a smile.

  He pointed out a collection of seascape paintings on one wall and directed her attention to a large curio cabinet filled with miniature sailing ships and scrimshaw objects. “A distant British ancestor of mine built sailing ships when he emigrated to America at the turn of the eighteenth century. A diary of his came into my hands when I was a youngster and it developed my interest in that time period.” He put his hand on his chest and quoted, “‘I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide/is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied…’”

  She laughed. “‘And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, and the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea gulls crying.’”

  He looked surprised and delighted. “You’re a Masefield fan?”

  “My father was. He loved sea ballads. That poem was one of his favorites.”

  “Your father was a sailor?”

  “No, a doctor. But he sailed up and down the California coast every free moment he could take from his practice. My mother never liked the water, but I’d go with him whenever I could. My parents died in a train wreck several years ago,” she said with a catch in her throat. Her father would have liked Clay Archer.

  “So you’re a gob, are you? Want to go sailing with me sometime? I have a nice little boat I keep at Crescent Lake. It’s not the ocean, but I bet you’d enjoy a day on the water. And maybe you could teach me some sailing tricks?” A boyish enthusiasm surfaced, at odds with the self-assured, commanding businessman.

  The picture of him at the tiller, his strong body bent against the wind and his face lifted to the sun, created a poignancy that defied a sensible response. She avoided a direct answer and continued to move around the room, looking at the varied collections of nautical memorabilia that he pointed out.

  “I was born and raised in Colorado but maybe I sailed the seven seas in a former life. Are you a believer in reincarnation, Tyla?”

  “Are you?” she parried.

  He seemed to give it serious thought, but a quirking at the corner of his lips gave him away. “Do you think we might have met before, Dr. Templeton? Could we have been lovers in some other lifetime?”

  “A well-worn approach, I believe,” she chided. “I’d have given you credit for more originality.”

  He moved closer to
her and eased a wisp of dark hair back from her cheek. “Frankly I’ve never been one to live in the past. Nor in the future. How about you?”

  Her breath was suddenly thin. She searched for some glib reply, but none came.

  He let one finger trail down the smooth line of her chin and his gaze lingered on her mouth. “A single moment is sometimes gift enough.”

  She knew she should move away but she couldn’t. As he moved closer, putting his hands lightly on her waist, desire swept over her. She was about to embrace his lean body when a brisk knock sounded on the open bedroom door.

  Tyla jerked back, appalled to see Doreen leaning up against the doorframe with crossed arms.

  “Don’t pay any attention to me. I wouldn’t want to interrupt an interview, but I must say, Dr. Templeton, that you do have a unique investigative technique. I can see now why Clay was in such a hurry to get back.”

  “Get the hell out of here, Doreen,” swore Clay.

  “Well, excuse me! Would you like to have me shut the door?” Her green eyes flashed angrily.

  “Leave!”

  Doreen gave Tyla a scathing look before she turned on her high heels and left.

  “Sorry about that,” Clay apologized, swearing under his breath.

  “Not your fault.” She had wanted to be in his arms, and that’s what made the embarrassing incident even more devastating. He wasn’t to blame for her lack of professional decorum.

  He reached out to her but she turned away. “It isn’t any of Doreen’s business what happens between us,” he protested.

  She drew a shaky breath. “Perhaps not. But if Doreen decided to jeopardize my work with Cassie, she could slow down any progress.”

  “Why in the hell would she do that? Damn it, I’ll make certain she stays out of this. Doreen doesn’t have any reason to behave in such a possessive fashion.”

  Doesn’t she? Clay must have blinders on if he didn’t realize that the woman was in love with him. Every time Doreen mentioned his name, her eyes took on a glow that was easy to read. Surely the man realized how deftly Doreen was establishing herself in the family by helping Harriet with her husband and grandchild.