The Proprietor's Daughter

by Lewis Orde

  “To a year free of typographical errors,” Sally said.

  “And a year free of libel suits,” Roland responded.

  “We’ll do our best.” Sally was amused at the recent change in Roland’s attitude toward Eagle Newspapers. Ever since Katherine’s assignment at Cadmus Court, and the subsequent attack on her, Roland had become much more interested in the workings of his small newspaper group. Instead of being satisfied with simply reading through the minutes of editorial and advertising meetings, he now attended them. His contributions to the meetings had been significant, as Sally had always known they would be, should he ever decide to become fully involved. He had suggested that the Daily Eagle’s business page be enlarged to a special pull-out section each Monday. The expansion, which had occurred the first week of December, had brought about a notable increase in advertising for banking services and share offerings.

  At twelve-thirty, when Roland asked Sally to telephone for a taxi to take him home, she offered to drive him instead. He thanked her, but said no. “I don’t want you on the roads tonight. Not everyone welcomed in the new year as judiciously as we did, with hot chocolate.”

  Sally did not argue. She made the call, then, while they waited for the taxi, she said, “You know, it’s about time you rejoined the twentieth century and started driving for yourself again.”

  “Cars have changed too much since I last drove. I’m not sure I’d know what to do anymore, so stop trying to get an old dog to learn new tricks.”

  “We’re not talking about a dog; we’re talking about you. Make a New Year’s resolution to book into a driving school.”

  “I don’t think so. I like being chauffeured around.”

  “That’s not the truth, and you know it,” Sally argued, totally unconvinced by Roland’s claim. They had discussed this countless times in the past twenty-six years, and she had never managed to shift Roland’s position. Twenty-six years had passed since Roland had sat behind the wheel of a car — that June day in 1950 when Catarina had died.

  Sally knew the accident had not been Roland’s fault. He had lost control of the car only after braking sharply to avoid hitting a pedestrian who had stepped out right in front of him. Nor had the accident been fully to blame for his young wife’s death. The aneurysm that had caused the massive cerebral hemorrhage might have been congenital; doctors had assured Roland that it could have ruptured at any time. Only it had chosen to rupture when Catarina had hit her head on the dashboard, during an accident where Roland was at the wheel. Because of that tragic fluke of timing, Roland had never stopped blaming himself.

  Part of his self-punishment was refusing to drive. At first, with the memory of the accident so fresh, Roland had been unable to sit in the driver’s seat. As time had passed, he had become accustomed to being driven here and there. For many years he had employed a personal assistant-cum-chauffeur, until the man had retired eighteen months earlier. Now, a company driver picked Roland up in the morning and took him home at night. If he needed to go out when the driver was unavailable, he could always take a taxi or call on Arthur Parsons. In the garage of the house was an old Bentley, which had been used by the chauffeur. Among Parsons’s responsibilities was seeing that the Bentley was maintained and ready for use should Roland need to go somewhere.

  When the taxi arrived, Sally walked down to the street with Roland. He kissed her good night, wished her a happy New Year again, and climbed into the taxi. As it moved away, he looked back at Sally standing in the road, waving. He waved in response, feeling tired in a contented sort of way.

  Roland spent the entire journey leaning back, eyes half-closed, congratulating himself for being one of the luckiest men alive. He had endured his share of heartache — who had not? — but he’d had the good times as well. And who was to say that tragedy did not carry its own silver lining? It made you appreciate life’s sweet triumphs even more. For a moment, he pitied those people who had never known anything but happiness. Such people were unable to appreciate their own good luck. Like being born rich. A man who’d never had to struggle for money could never fully understand just how nice it was to have it.

  Most important, Roland knew he was fortunate enough to be loved by two particularly wonderful and fascinating women. His daughter . . . and his editorial director. He grinned as he recalled Katherine standing up to him in Sally’s office, pointing to her black eye and calling it a badge of courage. The girl had her mother’s fire, no doubt at that.

  Any man could count himself damned lucky if he found one good woman to love him. Including Catarina, Roland had found three.

  On New Year’s Day, Roland indulged himself by sleeping late. It was after nine when he arose. The large house was silent. Arthur and Peg Parsons, who had the day off, had driven out to Cambridge to visit friends. Over a cup of coffee, Roland glanced through the morning paper. The day stretched out ahead like a vacation. Completely alone, with no plans other than doing absolutely nothing. Tomorrow, Sunday, he would be busy enough, when Katherine and Franz brought the children over for the afternoon. Today he would just relax.

  Wrapped up in a sheepskin coat, he took a long walk across the common, nodding to people he passed, wishing total strangers a happy New Year. How should he spend this day relaxing? He knew. He’d sit by the television all afternoon and watch the racing. But first, he would go down to the village and invest some money at the local betting shop. Such a personal involvement would make the racing far more enjoyable.

  The walk down the long, steep hill was invigorating. He made his bets and returned home, striding up the hill with the energy of a man half his age. While his legs remained so firm, he would not miss the convenience of a car at all.

  At midday, he settled down in front of the television, pad and pencil ready on the arm of the chair to compute his winnings. After all, if you couldn’t ride the wave of blind optimism on New Year’s Day, when could you?

  Ten minutes later, he had forgotten all about an afternoon of racing. That was when Erica Bentley telephoned to say Franz had been taken to the hospital following a riding accident.

  *

  Katherine presented an odd figure in the hospital waiting room, riding boots, breeches, and black jacket contrasting vividly with the sterile white surroundings. The hard hunting cap was still perched on her blond hair, and she paced agitatedly from one side of the small room to the other, slapping her right thigh every so often with the leather gloves she had worn to the meet.

  When Franz had been taken from the ambulance, Katherine had tried to follow. As doors closed in her face, a nursing sister had taken her by the arm and gently guided her into the waiting room. “The moment the doctors learn anything, they’ll let you know,” the sister promised. “Now why don’t you just sit down here and try not to worry? I’ll bring you a nice cup of tea.”

  That had been forty-five minutes earlier. The tea was still where the sister had set it down, untouched and cold, the surface congealed. Katherine had been unable to drink it; her stomach felt like a nest of icy vipers.

  An hour after the ambulance reached the hospital, Cliff Bentley arrived, like Katherine still wearing his riding outfit. He began to apologize for taking so long — “I had to be sure that Erica, your housekeeper, and the children got back to the farm safely” — but Katherine brushed it aside. She wanted to know only one thing: “Did you manage to reach my father?”

  “Erica did. He’s on his way here.”

  Katherine breathed a sigh of relief. From Roland, she would draw the strength necessary to face this ordeal.

  “Any word yet on Franz’s condition?” Cliff asked.

  “Nothing.”

  Cliff nodded and tried to keep a glum expression from his round face. He might be only a veterinarian, a man accustomed to treating the maladies of farm animals and domestic pets, but he was sure that his initial off-the-cuff diagnosis, made while Franz lay on the cobblestoned street, was correct. The young man had broken his neck. That was why Cliff had moved Kathe
rine away; the last thing he needed was motion of any kind.

  When Roland arrived, he was not alone. Sally Roberts had driven him to the hospital. Roland had never realized how difficult it was to find a taxi on New Year’s Day. He had telephoned cab ranks and car-hire companies without success. At last, praying desperately that the telephone would not ring unanswered, he had called the apartment in Mayfair. He had caught Sally drying herself after a bath. Ten minutes later, hurriedly dressed in slacks, a thick woolen sweater, and a leather jacket, with her damp auburn hair tucked into a warm angora cap, Sally was driving north toward Roland’s home.

  Katherine rushed into her father’s arms the moment he stepped into the small waiting room. His embrace soothed her frayed nerves, and by the time he asked if she knew anything about Franz’s condition, she was very close to being in total control of herself.

  “Erica mentioned something about a demonstration causing the accident,” Roland said.

  “Anti–blood sport fanatics,” Katherine replied. “Their protest turned vicious. . . .” Cliff Bentley listened in amazement as Katherine described the incident. Moments earlier she’d been on edge, like a caged animal. Now, so close to Roland Eagles, she seemed as cool and smooth as marble. Erica had often told her husband that a special relationship existed between father and daughter, but Cliff had never witnessed it until this moment.

  Even as Cliff pondered the change, Katherine turned to him. “I’ll be all right now. Thank you for coming.”

  Cliff sensed that the family had closed ranks in its crisis. Sally Roberts was obviously a part of that family, but he was not. “Any message for your housekeeper?”

  “Tell her to drive the children home and do whatever she can to keep them from missing their father. I’ll telephone her there the moment I hear anything.”

  When Cliff left to return to the farm, Katherine sat down, her father on one side, Sally on the other. “You know,” she said quietly, “I saw that woman raise her arm to throw the firework. If I had called out a moment earlier, Franz might have been able to anticipate, to maneuver the cob away. He’s a skillful rider; he could have reacted in time.”

  “Don’t you mean,” Sally countered, “that if some criminally insane idiot had not thrown a firework, it would never have happened? The accident had nothing to do with you, Katherine, so you can get that crazy notion right out of your mind.”

  Roland looked across his daughter’s head to Sally, knowing her words had been intended as much for him as for Katherine. The sense of déjà vu was overpowering. Was this what Katherine had inherited from him, what he had willed her as a legacy? Tragedy?

  A doctor entered the waiting room, an elderly man with thin gray hair and a gentle, sympathetic face. “Mrs. Kassler, I’m afraid I have some difficult news for you.”

  “Yes?” A little of the calmness disappeared. Katherine’s face became strained, skin stretched over bone. One hand grasped her father’s hand, the other slipped through Sally’s arm.

  “Your husband has suffered fractures of the sixth and seventh cervical vertebrae. He’s paralyzed from below his shoulders to his toes. He has the slightest use of his arms, that is all. He cannot push them out from himself, but if they are held out for him, he can pull them back.”

  As Katherine sat staring at the doctor, Roland asked, “Will this paralysis be permanent?”

  “At this moment, it is impossible to tell. Our major concern at the present time is performing an operation to straighten the damaged vertebrae and relieve pressure on the spinal cord. Perhaps Mrs. Kassler would leave a telephone number where she can be —”

  “We’ll wait,” Katherine said firmly.

  The doctor left. Around the three people in the waiting room, the hospital carried on its normal routine. Visiting time came, and people thronged the hospital’s wide corridors. Nursing shifts changed. Sally went out, returning with tea and sandwiches from a nearby restaurant. Later, Roland went for a walk, needing the crisp evening air to clear his head. While out, he bought a newspaper. Three of the five horses he’d bet on had won; the other two had both placed. He could not have cared had all five selections fallen at the first fence.

  Katherine never moved from the waiting room, except to visit the washroom. She presented a picture of primness, a rider in a show waiting for her turn to impress the panel of judges.

  Close to midnight, the same doctor returned to the three people in the small waiting room. His face appeared longer now, his eyes tired. “The operation is over. Your husband’s condition is as satisfactory as can be expected.”

  “The paralysis? If he should recover movement — more than just being able to pull his arms toward himself — how long would it take?”

  “Anywhere from two months to, perhaps, several years.”

  “May I see him?”

  “He is sedated. He will not even know you’re there.”

  “I just want to see for myself what’s happened.”

  The doctor nodded. “For a minute, that’s all.” He led her away, leaving Roland alone with Sally.

  Katherine returned five minutes later. The coolness had completely deserted her. Her face was drawn and ashen, her shoulders stooped. Whatever she had seen had shocked her self-control to pieces.

  Roland put his arm around her shoulders. “We’ll take you back to Hampstead. I’ll stay with you tonight.”

  Katherine remained silent until she was in Sally’s sports car, sitting on the bench seat in the back. Only as they cleared the hospital grounds did she begin to speak, and then in a voice so low, so filled with horror and disgust, that Roland and Sally had to strain to hear her words.

  “They allowed me to look at Franz through a window. They wouldn’t let me into his room, just through this window. He was all covered up, except for his head. I could only see his head. It was shaved, and these things were sticking out of his skull. Tongs, with weights attached to them to keep his neck in traction. They must have drilled . . . holes . . . in . . . his . . . skull to insert them.”

  Roland started to say something. Sally touched his arm and motioned for him to remain quiet. Let Katherine carry on speaking, let her spill everything out and feel better for it.

  “He was on a high bed,” Katherine continued, “his head below the rest of his body. The doctor told me it was Franz, but I couldn’t recognize him. Tongs . . .” She enunciated the word with loathing. “Just like you’d use to pick up a piece of ice.”

  Then, leaving that vision imprinted clearly in everyone’s imagination, Katherine lapsed back into silence, saying not another word until Sally pulled into the driveway of the Hampstead house. Franz’s Jaguar was there, driven back from the farm by Edna Griffiths. The only light in the house shone from the hallway. The bedrooms were in darkness. Katherine remembered that she had not telephoned the housekeeper as she had promised to do. Now it was early morning; tired of waiting, Edna had gone to sleep.

  “You don’t have to stay with me,” Katherine told her father as he helped her from Sally’s car. “I’ll be fine.”

  “Are you certain?” Roland did not relish the prospect of leaving Katherine by herself on such a night.

  “I am not alone,” Katherine said. “Edna’s here.”

  “And personally,” Sally broke in, “I could not think of a broader, more staunch shoulder to lean on. Get back in the car, Roland. I’ll take you to Stanmore.”

  Katherine kissed her father good night. After watching the car pull away, she let herself into the house, welcoming the echoing quietness. She was grateful to Sally. As much as her father wanted to keep her company on this night, so Katherine wanted just as much to be on her own. To think, and to wonder what would happen next.

  She climbed the stairs, and looked in on the children. Both slept peacefully. Whatever memories they had of their father’s fall were not disturbing their sleep. Tomorrow, Katherine would talk to them, explain that their father had been hurt, that he would not be coming home for some time. But he would be all right
eventually. He’d be back, getting up at ten minutes to six every morning for his run over Hampstead Heath, his athletic shoes slapping against the concrete in a steady, comforting cadence. God . . . she hoped he would!

  From looking in on the children, Katherine went to her own room. Sitting on the edge of the brass bed, she lifted a hand to remove the hard, velvet-covered hunting cap. A dull throbbing ache pressed against her skull, but it was nothing compared to what Franz must be suffering. The thought of those dreadful tongs sticking out of his head made Katherine shiver.

  A creaking noise came from above, as though someone’s foot had found a bad floorboard in the recreation room. What was up there? A ghost? Franz’s spirit? His body confined in a hospital, but his spirit free to roam? She left the bedroom, took the stairs to the third floor, and turned on the light. The recreation room was empty, of course, the creaking noise nothing more than the monologue of an old house in winter as wood contracted with the cold.

  She looked around at the wall bars, the weights, the rowing machine. When would they be used again? And by whom? A man with a broken neck did not need such things.

  Two months to several years, that’s what the doctor had said. If Franz recovered the ability to move, to walk, it could take anywhere from two months to several years. And if he did not recover?

  Katherine’s mind went back exactly ten years in time, to those first few days of 1967. A short vacation in Monte Carlo, a few days her father had stolen from his full business diary because he did not see enough of his daughter. She’d been out walking. A tall, blond young man had approached. Franz had seen Katherine at the hotel. He wanted to know if he could meet her at that night’s dance. She had told him, very properly, that she would have to ask her father first.

  They had met that night; they’d danced and fallen in love. And then they’d parted, returning to their different countries. Letters . . . visits by Franz to London, by Roland and Katherine to the mountain-chalet vacation home of Franz’s family. And then, in 1970, the request by Franz’s father for Roland to find a position for his son in England.