The Rules of Magic (44 page)

“Considering who he is?” Franny said.

“Considering what the world is like.”

Franny took a taxi to her hotel and sat looking out the window of her room, watching the darkness fall. She felt Vincent's presence in the world, in the beauty of the evening and in the sunflowers Madame Durant had had sent over in a glass vase. That was the message, that bouquet, the most Madame would tell her.

Franny telephoned Mr. Grant at his home in Sag Harbor. It was early in the morning, but he was glad to hear from her.

“They live in the countryside,” she said.

“That would be William to live someplace that reminded him of home. Do you still get the postcards?” he asked.

“Yes,” Franny said.

“They're happy,” Mr. Grant said. “So we must be happy for them, dear girl.”

They made plans for Franny to visit Sag Harbor. She would bring Jet and they would sit on the porch and have lunch and look out at the sea and the island William used to row toward even in high seas. She had been in Paris six weeks. Soon it would turn cold and the paths where Franny liked to walk would be covered with ice. In the countryside the sunflowers would be cut down and their stalks would turn brown. Birds in the hedges
would rise, twittering, to fly over the meadows in the last of the daylight.

“Yes,” she agreed. “Let's be happy.”

Now when Franny came to see Haylin he was no longer in his bed or at physical therapy, but in consultations. The nurses shrugged. A doctor was a doctor, they said. A man's situation might change, but the man himself never did. Such was Haylin's character. He was more interested in the well-being of others than he was in himself.

One day she took him to the Tuileries on an outing from the hospital. He struggled with his walking at first, and called himself a damned peg leg, but by the time they reached a café, he had caught a second wind and his stride was fine. His French was impeccable, hers merely good, so Franny let him order for her. They had white wine and salads with goat cheese and everything was cold and delicious. He spoke about a surgery that had been very successful earlier that day. A sergeant who had taken a bullet to the spine. It was a delicate operation, one Hay excelled at, so the patient had been sent from Germany so that Hay might supervise. He was taking measures to get his French medical license so he would be able do the surgeries himself. He was excited to be helping servicemen who had lost limbs, as he had. He thought he would use some of his father's money to bring these patients here to France to be treated. He lit up when he spoke of his work, and Franny recalled the way he would speak about science when they were young, the way a lover might speak of his beloved.

He poured more wine. It was a perfect afternoon, one Franny
would think about often. He would be in the hospital another six months.

“Just promise me you won't fall in love with anyone else when I go,” Franny said. “That's all I'm asking. You can take them home, do whatever you want, sleep with whomever you want, just don't fall in love.”

“I never would.”

“What about Emily Flood?”

“Emily who?”

They laughed and finished their drinks. “What about the nurse?”

Haylin gave her a look.

“Aha.” Franny made a face. “She's your type.”

“You're my type,” Haylin said. He took her hand and brought it to his mouth so he might kiss her. “You're leaving, aren't you? Why? Because you think it's safer for me if we're apart? After everything that's happened to me do you think I give a damn about being safe? I'm coming back to wherever you are.”

He refused to listen to any arguments against his plan. They walked back to the Rue de Rivoli, where they found a taxi. It was still difficult for Haylin to shift his leg into a car. “I'll get better at this,” he vowed. Once inside the taxi, Haylin drew her to him so that she was on his lap. The driver didn't pay the slightest bit of attention, no matter how heated their kisses became. “We'll outwit the curse,” he told her. “Wait and see.”

Franny liked to sit in the yard wearing her black coat and her old red boots no matter the weather. These days she kept to a
schedule. Every morning, she wrote a long letter to Haylin. She ate the same diet, noodles and apple tart for dessert, or beans and toast and soup. Simple, practical things. She loved the garden: the bats flickering over the pine trees as they devoured insects, the frogs that came to sing in the spring. On most evenings, women arrived, in search of remedies. But tonight was different. She spied a girl standing inside the gate.

Nearly everyone in town was too afraid to walk into the yard. Even the ones who came to the back porch to knock on the door felt they were taking a risk. They remembered the boys who had been struck by lightning and the stories their grandparents told about the women who could turn a hair into a snake and call birds to them and change the weather if they had a mind to. People still crossed the street when they saw the sisters coming, and at the library no one dared to defy Franny when she made suggestions. The grocery boy who made deliveries wouldn't set foot in the kitchen even when offered a ten-dollar tip. But here was a girl, utterly unafraid, staring at Franny.

She thought it was her neighbor's child at first, the one who was writing her life story in a blue notebook, but as the girl came closer Franny recognized her. It appeared to be Regina Owens. Franny still had the drawing of the black dog and the cat. It hung in the kitchen in its original frame. The girl resembled Vincent, with her long black hair and her confidence. She had bloomed and was a true beauty, but then she would be, considering who her parents were.

“You're in California,” Franny said. “You can't be here.”

The girl gazed at her and Franny was reminded of the time when she saw Isabelle on the window seat, or the essence of Isabelle at any rate, when their aunt was actually up in her bed.
It was a spirit that had come before her, a wisp composed of thought rather than deed.

“My mother will be bitten by a spider. I'll run away with the man I'll marry. You should have told me to stay away from love. Not that I would have listened.”

“Well, why don't you listen now?” Franny asked.

“Because I'm not here, silly. Remember one day you must do as you promised. And then you'll get a big surprise.”

“Really? What's that?”

The image of Regina had already begun to fade into transparency. It was possible to see right through her to the leaves of the lilacs.

“Wait,” Franny called.

Regina shook her head and smiled and then there were only the lilacs in the garden, no girl at all.

That night Franny phoned April in California.

“I wondered if you were ever going to call me,” April said. “I read about Vincent in the newspaper, and then Jet called me to tell me he was still alive.”

“Did she?”

April laughed. “He was always
too
alive. Anyway, I knew. He sent Regina a record player of all things. And she always gets a box of her favorite cookies from Paris on her birthday. No note. But it's him.”

“Were you bitten by a spider?” Franny asked.

“Are you mad? I don't even work with spiders anymore.”

“And how is Regina?” Franny wanted to know.

“She's fine. What's all this about?”

“I had a vision, I suppose. Regina was beautiful. She looked like him.”

“She does,” April said sadly. For all this time she had never been in love with anyone else. “It could have been different.”

“No,” Franny said. “We were who we were. No more, no less.”

“He told me we could depend on you.”

“Of course.” Talking to April now, Franny wondered why they hadn't been friends all along. Perhaps they were too much alike. Headstrong, willing to do anything for Vincent, refusing to accept certain aspects of their upbringing and their fate. She looked out the window and saw a fleck of white in the garden. A single rose bloomed.

Dusk was falling. Vincent always said it was the best time of the day. Half in one world, half in another.

“Always,” Franny said.

Haylin came back the following year. He rented a small house near the town green, saying the curse would never be able to figure out where he was, since he slept there on some nights and at Magnolia Street on others. Whenever he came for dinner, he would ask for a salad, since their garden was so marvelous, and of course Franny always obliged. They went out together at dusk. It always smelled the same here, the green scent of weeds, and lilacs, and rosemary. They had several rows of lettuce, the best in the commonwealth. Butterhead, red leaf, Boston, looseleaf, curly oak leaf, Red Riding Hood, escarole. They were both reminded of the evenings when they would meet in the park, when they were sixteen. In all that time Franny had never loved anyone else. He'd kept his promise and she'd kept
hers. They pretended that they meant nothing to each other to keep the curse at bay, but everybody knew the doctor had come here for her.

Hay's favorite season was August. He and Franny always swam in Leech Lake, and he never drowned and Franny never had to rescue him. They didn't wear bathing suits, though he had that leg he had to unhook before hopping in, which could make for precarious going over the flat rocks. All the same, they swam on a daily basis even though half the town knew and was scandalized. People avoided the place and privately called it Lovers Lake and rumors grew up around it. A dip in the water could bring the man or woman who'd broken your heart back to you, and some women took to wearing vials of lake water around their necks on a string to ward off evil and bring luck to their families.

For several years Hay commuted to Boston, where he was on the orthopedic surgery team at Mass General, the hospital where he was treated when he was a student. He continued to be on staff and often consulted, but he decided to open a practice, setting up the first floor of his house as an office and hiring a nurse and an assistant, local women Jet had suggested, as they were clients of hers and in need of jobs. Haylin was the only doctor in town, which was a blessing to everyone. When a child was sick he always made himself available to make a house call. He impressed everyone with his pet crow, and he let well-behaved children feed it a cracker or give it a pat on its gleaming head.