Twillyweed (13 page)

Wendell looked up suddenly. “Wiggly, wiggly, just like my eye.”

“What?”

Impatiently, he pursed his lips. “As blue as the sky! Wiggly, wiggly, just like my eye!”

At last, she understood: He was rhyming her last words again. He was very good at this rhyming game. She leaned over his make-believe store and grasped him in her skinny arms and rocked him. Surprised, Wendell let her hold him. She wouldn't let him go, she promised herself with passion. The room was strange, so strange. She heard herself crying like a child until she realized it was he who was holding her.

Chapter Three

Claire

In the dark I made my way to Twillyweed, grateful I'd thought to wear the cozy tablecloth. The wind blew and I heard below that long, platinum-­haired girl singing to her baby. It was a deep, mournful sound I thought, remembering at once the all-encompassing loneliness of having an infant and the banging-into-walls fatigue. I stopped for a moment, listening, determined to meet her and invite her over first chance I got. But tonight was to be about Jenny Rose, and I hurried along. In the drive, a red Alpha Romeo convertible was parked. Wow. I resisted the temptation to reach in and caress the butter-soft seats.

The door to Twillyweed was propped open with an antique black iron shoe form, size four. One compelling seascape above the mantel in the grandiose foyer caught my eye and I stood there looking up. White sand and way off in the distance a blue ribbon of water sparkled with sun. Simple
boats ferried this way and that. Captivated, I unwrapped my shawl, admiring it. I heard voices and the tinkle of glass from the living room. I took a deep breath—well aware of my two black eyes and inappropriate outfit—and though unannounced, I decided to go in. The grandiosity of the place was intimidating. There could be no mistaking Jenny Rose's employer, Oliver Cupsand. With the perfect lord of the manor air, he poured drinks from a whimsical decanter. I had the feeling I'd seen him before.

“Ah! Claire Breslinsky!” He set the goosenecked crystal container onto a burled walnut Biedermeier bar almost as tall as himself and said in a blustery voice, “Welcome to Twillyweed!”

I knew right away by the respectful way he came forward that Morgan had made his investigatory phone call to Jupiter Dodd, and Jupiter, bless his little heart, had told him all sorts of exaggerations about my uproarious past. “Mr. Cupsand,” I said, shaking his heavy, forthright hand.

“Call me Oliver.” He smiled with charm. “Please. Come in. We're celebrating.”

Well. Things were certainly looking up. Oliver was all Brooks Brothers navy blue, gold buttons, and expensive smile. He cocked his head and regarded me quizzically, shaking my hand. The heft of him was an indication that one day he would run to fat, but for now he was simply manly, even chanticleer.

“We've met … where?” He took hold of his big chin and pointed at me with the other hand.

“The club? No, I remember. Once Upon a Moose! I was alone. Yes, having my tea on my own. You were with Jenny Rose!”

“Of course!” I smiled, for now I remembered him, too. The handsome man at the table in the corner at the Moose where Jenny Rose and I had had tea. Before even they had met.

“I never forget a face.” He grimaced as though this were a burden. He was white blond, Norwegian looking, booming voiced, even boisterous, but nice. He seemed to like me. Smiling eyes. Debonair. He gave a half turn toward someone standing behind him and said, “And this—Of course you will have met Morgan's fiancée … my sister, Paige Cupsand.”

Morgan's fiancée?
“How nice!” I gushed insincerely, my head spinning. I tried to sound delighted. And here I'd been imagining him just out of the seminary! That would have been fast work. But the quick vision of a lithe female flitted by and was gone through the doorway into another grand room with a glimpse of an armload of flowers. I smiled at Morgan with new respect. I had no idea why this should bother me. And of course it didn't. Not a bit. What had I been thinking? He was too old to have just left the seminary. Just left the priesthood, more likely. After all, he was my age. Sometimes I forget how old I am and then it hits me, like a shovel.

Oliver Cupsand said, “Oh. Well, she'll be off to locate a vase.” His lips moved up and down in a meditative consideration as he inspected me, weighing, no doubt, the outdated wench before him against Jupiter's mythical icon. “I hear you'll be staying at the Great White.” He said it in a sweet way, yet I felt his eyes surveying me skeptically as I turned to see Morgan. “Paige, by the way, is damned good at decorating.”

“Yes,” Morgan agreed, moving forward, “I'm sure she can give you some tips.”

I felt myself standing between the two big men when a square-cut black man with gray hair, short legged but with the huge shoulders of a Portuguese fisherman, rolled over with a tray. Oh God, I thrilled, hummus and olives that took you to the Mediterranean. And baba ghanoush and tabbouleh! I helped myself.

“You're very lucky to find a house on the cliff.” Oliver made do with careful nibbles on his hors d'oeuvre, blotting his mouth with his napkin between each one so as not to dribble on his starched shirt. “It's not often one comes up. Of course, Paige will have found you the cottage …” he wrongly surmised, his eyes wet with appreciation.

Morgan Donovan handed me a cut crystal glass of scotch as he said, “Paige is a real estate agent.”

“Oh. No, I see. I misunderstood. The way you said it earlier I thought you had it in for all real estate agents …” I tried to laugh. I hate scotch. I put it on the sideboard and left it there, hoping someone would ask me what I liked to drink.

“Not
this
agent, I hope,” a seductive voice chortled from the doorway and high-heeled into the room.

And then there she was, every woman's favorite nightmare. I won't bore you with the details. No, I will. If you stood beside her, you felt every one of your joints was oversized. Her blond hair was turned and perfected into a frizzless French twist. As big as Oliver was, his sister was equally petite. She wore a string of pearls and a grass green cashmere sweater set. Her nails were wedding-bells pink. And yes, she wore a ring. It was a tasteful yet eye-catching blue-white diamond. Her hands were lovely. She came over, sleek as a cat, and snuggled up into Morgan's armpit. We all stood there grinning. A perfect fit.

My first impression was intense dislike. We all love to hate the blonde. But as the evening wore on, I realized Paige Cupsand was not only cultivated and charming, she was that infuriating mix of goodness and worthiness as well. So try as I might, I couldn't hate her. First impressions, it turned out, were not always correct. Well, after all, what did I care? Nothing, that's what. The reader will know that I hadn't a reason in the world to be troubled by this match. If I was lucky, I chided myself, we would all become friends. Yes. Friends. Don't think you know so much. Paige helped herself to one heaping cracker after another. I was amazed by the voracity of such a little thing's appetite. She gavooned like a cattle rustler.

At last she swallowed. “How long will you be with us in Sea Cliff, Claire?”

“Until the fall, I hope. Six months, to start. After that I don't know.”

She seemed to consider this. “Are you a gardener?” she asked. “Because we have a club. Just local women, I'm afraid, no one very exciting. Just us, digging around getting filthy.”

“Don't be so modest,” said Morgan.

I said, “I can already see what fabulous gardens you have here. Just the bulbs alone are—”

“Yes, isn't it awful,” she interrupted. “Now everything's going back under with this cold.”

“Don't let Paige try to trivialize what she does,” Morgan said with pride. “She raises more money for charity than most people earn in a year.”

“All the niceties.” Paige shook her head modestly. “It's easy. You know. For children. Orphans. Our organization gives girls who aren't looking to get abortions an alternative.”

Oliver put in, “They house them during their pregnancies and provide them with affiliated classes at nearby universities. So when it's over, even if they don't want to keep their babies, they have some sort of an education going on, somewhere to head.”

“That's great,” I said.

Paige picked a thread from her brother's jacket and rolled it between her thumb and forefinger. “Oliver's connections don't hurt,” she teased.

“And, no,” Oliver put in, “it's not funded by the church.”

“I didn't—”

“It's just that everyone always thinks it is,” Paige said. “That's usually the objection. We've been able to buy a quite large house for the girls. Oh, by the way, Oliver, the wind knocked off some more of the roof tiles.” They shared a pained grimace.

“I'll have Mr. Piet look into it,” Oliver assured Paige, then he leaned toward me and touched my arm. “Lucky we have Mr. Piet. There aren't many who know how to fasten the things.” Then he added. “‘Battening down the hatches,' that's what our Mr. Piet does. If you had to hire a fellow to do it, any other man would charge an arm and a leg.”

I looked around the corner for Mr. Piet. He would roll in and out every little while.

“It won't be cold much longer,” Morgan said easily, parking one haunch on the olive leather divan and extending his long legs out into the room. Then, thinking better of it, he placed his feet back in front of himself on the floor. He caught my eye and I looked away.

“You could take Noola's place at the Garden Club!” Paige enthused. But before the words were out of her mouth she looked feebly around the room, “Not that anyone could fill her shoes. I just mean—”

“We know what you meant, Paige,” Morgan comforted her graciously.

“What I really meant was”—she smiled at Morgan with all her charm and her eyes shone, then turned to me—“we would love to have you.”

I was touched. “I'm afraid I'm not much of a gardener,” I warned.

“Oh. Really? Pity. Noola had such a lovely garden. Oh, well. We'll find something for you to join,” she said, smiling prettily at me. “We wouldn't want you to feel left out. Such a little place we are, Sea Cliff.”

“Almost a throwback, it feels like,” I said. “And so remote.”

“How did you drive in?” Paige asked, perching herself neatly beside me on the couch.

“Glen Cove Road,” I said.

“When you've been here awhile, I'll show you how to take the switchback road down by the water. It's roundabout, but it's so pretty. And faster when there's traffic.”

The butler made himself known with an almost imperceptible shifting of the feet.

Paige said, “You'll be joining us for dinner, Claire.”

“Sure. I'd love to.”

“Nothing festive. Just us, you know.” She indicated Morgan with a warm smile. “Morgan's still in mourning, of course.”

“Yes, of course,” I said, remembering with regret my indelicate behavior the day before.

“Our nephew was supposed to come, but …” Paige let this hang in the air.

Just then Jenny Rose, with the little boy by the hand, came into the room.

I was surprised to see her, though of course she was the reason I'd come. But there was something about Jenny Rose that you couldn't quite put your finger on, a shining vividness that brought the whole room to life. It wasn't just that she was young. There was something else, something good, despite all the macabre accoutrements she could come up with to make herself look otherwise: the spiked-up hair, the eye makeup, the henna tattoo, the dark blue nail polish, the naughtiness. I walked over and gave her a kiss on the cheek.

“Here she is,” Oliver Cupsand said, thrusting his glass into the air, “our hero!”

An enthusiastic round of applause followed this. I thought,
Wow, they must really be glad to have her!
I thought this with relief because Jenny Rose was notorious for getting canned. The little boy tried to step back in shyness but Jenny Rose held him fast.

“It was nothing,” Jenny Rose stood behind the boy, petting his hair flat.

“It certainly wasn't nothing!” Paige cried, and they all joined her protest. I realized I hadn't a clue to what was going on and it must have shown on my face because Morgan said, “I take it you don't know, do you? Jenny Rose here saved a girl from drowning this morning.”

“What?” I gasped.

“Radiance. Our Radiance,” Paige said.

“While you were languishing in the emergency room,” Morgan teased.

“Emergency room?” Jenny Rose jumped up. “Auntie Claire! What happened to your eyes?”

“Oh, it's nothing. I fell, that's all. Down at the marina. I'm fine now.”

“Mr. Piet saved some copies of the late edition here somewhere.” Oliver fiddled with his desk.

“Went right into the sound and hauled her out!” Paige said. “Your niece did that!”

Morgan took a firm gulp of his drink. “I didn't know either until I got here. Here it is, right on the table, Oliver. Have a look at this, Claire.”

“Crack Down on Illegal Aliens!” the headline cried and I squirmed with discomfort for her. But my eye cast down the page to the next story and I saw where I was meant to look. “Jenny Rose!” I cried, for there she was in a picture with a policeman's jacket draped over her and an EMS driver with his arm around her. “Tourist Saves the Day” the caption read.

The little boy looked with adoration through thick glasses at his au pair.

“So, Auntie Claire, what do you think? Shall we send it to my mother in Italy? Show her what an ace I am?”

“We're all so proud!” Paige sat with her legs gracefully crossed at the ankle. “But whatever made you do it? Jump in, I mean. Most people would have just called for help!”

“She went down.” Jenny Rose shrugged. “It didn't look like she had the strength to hold on.”

“Wow,” I said. And then I remembered where I'd heard the name Radiance. “It's Mrs. Dellaverna's cleaning lady slash showgirl!” I gasped.

“She works for us,” Oliver stammered, then he added, “part-time.”

“She does
some
cleaning,” Paige said. “But she's quite a bit more than that. Radiance's grown up here. She's practically part of the family.”

“
Phh
,” said Oliver.

Jenny Rose volunteered, “Yes, but she's really a dancer, Auntie Claire! She just does cleaning to make ends meet. She's
always
going to dance classes. Wait until you meet her. She's really cool. Exotic.”