The Sisters Montclair Read online

  “Who are you hiding from?”

  The voice, deep, overtly masculine, had come from behind her. Startled, she raised her head and looked around. She could see a figure in a hat sitting at a nearby picnic table, his cigarette glowing feebly.

  “I’m not hiding from anyone.”

  He made a short, dismissive sound.

  She was not frightened, although perhaps she should have been. “How long have you been sitting there?”

  “Long enough to know you’re hiding from someone.”

  “I told you, I’m not.” She stood abruptly. He rose, too, stubbing his cigarette under his toe, and something in his mannerism, in his spare yet sturdy build, seemed familiar to her.

  “You don’t recognize me, do you?”

  “Should I?” She took a step up the graveled walk, but stopped. She would have to walk past him to get back to the juke joint and she was suddenly hesitant to do that. What had she been thinking, coming out here alone? It was dangerous. Dangerous and foolish.

  He took his hat off and stepped forward into the light slanting across the lawn, and she recognized Brendan Burke.

  “I didn’t mean to startle you,” he said.

  She felt a quiver of anger followed quickly by a wash of relief. “No? Then why are you sitting in the dark? You should have announced yourself.”

  “If I had announced myself, I would have spoiled the vision of you in the moonlight.” His teeth glimmered in the dim light. “You would have left, like you’re doing now.”

  She walked slowly up the path. She could see him clearly in the wash of light from the patio. He looked different than he had that night at the garage, standing there in a dark suit with his hair combed off his face, his pale, straight part shining in the moonlight.

  He fell into step beside her. “I’m fairly harmless,” he said.

  “That’s not what I hear.”

  “You’ve been talking to the wrong people.”

  She stopped and looked at him, holding his gaze. “My sister is only sixteen years old,” she said.

  His expression changed then, became closed and wary. He raised one hand and indicated an empty table and two chairs on the patio. “I’d like to talk to you about her.”

  She hesitated. She didn’t want to hear what he had to say about Laura, about himself and Laura. As if realizing this, he said in a coldly polite manner, “Please. I’ll only take a few minutes of your time.”

  He pulled out a chair for her and she sat down. “You’re cold,” he said.

  “No.”

  He took off his coat and draped it around her shoulders and then sat down facing her.

  The coat was warm and smelled faintly of cologne and tobacco and whiskey. A good, manly smell.

  “It’s my father you should be speaking to,” she said.

  “I’ve spoken to your father. Several times.”

  “Oh?”

  “Would you like a drink?”

  “No. Thanks.”

  The table was near the door, partially hidden by a trellis. If Bill Whittington came looking for her now, she’d have no choice but to answer.

  He cleared his throat and stared out at the dark river as if considering how to begin. After a moment, he sat back. “Do you mind if I smoke?”

  “Go ahead.”

  He pointed vaguely at her. “They’re in the breast pocket,” he said, and she felt her face flush, fumbling in his coat.

  She pulled out a silver case, took out a cigarette, and stuck it between her lips. “Do you mind?”

  “Of course not.”

  She passed the case to him and he lit her cigarette and then his. They both leaned back in their chairs, smoking quietly.

  “Your sister is a fine girl,” he said abruptly. She made a restless movement with one hand and he said quickly, “I met her at the county fair. I saw her across a crowded dance floor and I asked her to dance. I didn’t know how old she was.” He put his head back as he exhaled, looking up at the stars. After a moment, he dropped his chin, taking a long drag on his cigarette. “And later, when I found out who she was and how old she was, I broke it off.”

  She exhaled slowly, watching him with narrowed eyes. “You broke it off?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Well, that’s odd because she sneaks out of the house several nights a week and comes dragging home around midnight. Are you saying she isn’t with you?”

  “Sometimes she’s with me. But never alone. I’m never alone with her. I don’t date her. I haven’t dated her since your father came to see me. She finds out where I’m going to be, I don’t know how, and she just shows up. It doesn’t matter where I am or who I’m with.” He looked at her. “Sometimes I’m with another girl. It doesn’t matter.”

  Alice felt her face heat up with the shock of his words. She waited until she was certain she could control the trembling of her voice. “So you’re saying my sister is a hopeless flirt.”

  “I’m saying she’s young. It’s a school girl fascination. She’ll outgrow it. She’ll find some nice boy her own age and settle down and forget all about it.”

  Alice thought of Laura’s expression those nights when she caught her on the landing, her shoes in her hands. Laura wasn’t like a school girl at all. There was something timeless about Laura, something ancient and knowing.

  Alice tapped her cigarette in the ashtray. “How old are you?’

  “Twenty-five. How old are you?”

  “Nineteen. Almost twenty.” She’d misjudged him, she could see that clearly now. Laura had been right. He was entirely suitable. “You didn’t grow up here?”

  “No,” he said. He smiled faintly, fixing her with a direct gaze. “Kansas. I came down here with my father after my mother died.”

  “And the gas station is his?”

  “No. The gas station is mine. Bought and paid for by me without any help from anyone.” He said this firmly, as if trying to make a point. He continued to stare at Alice and their eyes met, held.

  The door banged open and Bill Whittington walked out. He stood for a moment, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. “There you are,” he said.

  Alice stirred, putting out her cigarette. “I needed some air,” she said.

  He stepped around the trellis, noticing Brendan for the first time, and stopped. “Who are you?” he said.

  Brendan exhaled, casually stubbing his cigarette in the ashtray. He rose slowly, extending his hand. “Brendan Burke.”

  Bill hesitated and then took it. “Bill Whittington.” They shook, briefly, and then let their arms drop back against their sides. “Burke,” Bill said. “Are you related to the Burkes in Riverview?”

  “No.”

  “I didn’t think so.” He turned to Alice. “Are you ready to go?”

  “Almost.”

  “I should see you home. Your parents will be worried.” He hadn’t thought about her parents before; it was only now that he saw her with Brendan Burke that they occurred to him.

  “We were having a private conversation,” Brendan said.

  Bill stared at him for several moments without speaking. “I promised to see Miss Montclair home.”

  “I suppose it’s up to Miss Montclair who sees her home.”

  Alice stood and slid Brendan’s coat off her shoulders. He stepped closer to her. His fingers brushed hers, taking the coat, and she felt a tremor pass through her.

  His voice, when he spoke, was low and smooth. “When can I see you again?”

  She took a deep breath and turned away.

  “Goodbye, Mr. Burke,” she said.

  Six

  Several weeks after Stella began working for Alice, Alice’s cousin, “Dob” Montclair called to say he was coming up for a visit. Dob lived down in Riverview, the exclusive area close to the country club, and he made his own mustard relish. Once a week he brought a bag of hotdogs and homemade relish up to Alice.

  “Pray that he brings Ann with him,” Alice said to Stella.

  “
Who’s Ann?”

  “His wife. She keeps him from talking too much. She tells him when it’s time to go. He’s a retired lawyer and he talks just like he was trying a case in court. After awhile I get tired of listening to him. He’s eighty-nine years old and he and Ann are taking an evening philosophy class at the college. Did you know that once you turn sixty-five you can go to college for free? Well, anyway, I feel sorry for the poor professor because Ann says Dob harangues him the entire class and no one else can get a word in edgewise.”

  “Where’d he get a name like Dob?”

  “It’s a nickname. His real name is Robert.”

  Stella frowned. “Why didn’t they call him Bob then?” she said.

  “I don’t know,” Alice snapped. “Maybe because his name is Dob. Just like his grandfather and his great-grandfather before that.”

  They sat in the library waiting for him. It was a sunny day, unseasonably warm for early spring, and a patch of bright blue sky was visible beyond the roof tops of the grand houses. At the house across the street, a lone yard man with a leaf blower moved slowly behind the wrought iron fence and stone pillars of the drive, leaves cascading at his feet like an unfurled carpet. A verandah with white columns covered in wisteria stood on one side of the large house, and beyond that, a gaily splashing fountain. An old golden retriever walked stiffly around the fountain, nosing the mossy bricks with a studied, incurious air.

  Stella felt warm and drowsy in the bright sunshine falling through the library windows. She closed her eyes, resting them, and then opened them again. Alice sat with her chin on her palm, staring fixedly out the window. Her white curls were nearly translucent in the sunlight and her face was like old parchment, lined and tissue-thin. Lulled by the distant hum of the leaf blower, Stella let her eyelids droop.

  “Oh Lord,” Alice said sturdily. “He didn’t bring Ann.”

  Stella sat up, glancing out the window at a Honda Accord that had pulled into the drive. “Do you want me to come in and make up some excuse after you’ve spent twenty minutes with him?” she asked Alice.

  “I like the way you think,” Alice said, pulling herself to a standing position.

  Stella helped Alice get settled in one of the wingback chairs in the living room, and then she went to open the front door.

  “Hi. I’m Stella. Alice is waiting for you in the living room.”

  “Hello, hello,” Dob said, handing her a plastic bag filled with hot dogs. He was a little stoop-shouldered man with thick glasses and a lively expression. He looked like that cartoon character from the sixties. Mr. Magoo.

  He went ahead of her into the living room. “Hello, old girl,” he called to Alice in a loud booming voice. He was dressed in a t-shirt, a pair of shorts, and tennis shoes. His legs were bowed but muscular. He works out at five-thirty every morning at the YMCA, Alice had told her.

  Stella took the bag of hot dogs to the kitchen and put them in the refrigerator. She could hear Dob and Alice in the living room, Dob talking in a loud, slow voice and Alice answering when she could get a word in.

  “Do you remember Teddy Franklin?” Dob said.

  “No, I don’t believe I do.”

  “Yes, you do. The Franklins lived down in Riverview. They had four boys. Teddy, who was the oldest, then Lem, Sam, and Whitfield.”

  “I don’t recall.”

  “Sure you do, Alice! How could you forget Teddy Franklin? He was your age. He married the Ammons girl.” His voice became increasingly loud and irritated as he quizzed Alice and her answers fell short of his expectations.

  “Well, what about him?” Alice said finally.

  “He died.”

  “He’s dead?”

  “That’s right. Last night at home.”

  “Well, I’m sorry to hear that. I read the obituaries every day to see if I know anyone who’s passed. It’s getting to be a pretty regular occurrence.”

  “The Franklins lived in that big house on the corner, next door to the Susongs.”

  “If you say so.”

  “Damn it, Al, I know you must remember. Little Teddy Franklin? Had the lazy eye? You used to call him Wimpy? Wimpy Franklin.”

  “Now that rings a bell,” Alice said.

  She was giving as good as she got, although Stella could hear the exasperation in her voice. She checked the wall clock and went over and opened the three-ring binder and began to read what the night caregiver had written. Miss Alice had a restless night. She talked quite a bit in her sleep. In the middle of the night she sat up and said, “You should have announced your presence.” This morning when I asked her, she said she’d been dreaming about her childhood.

  Dob had moved on from talking about Teddy Franklin and now he was relating a story about when he was a boy, and overheard Alice’s father and another man talking at the bank.

  “Your father had taken me down to the drug store to get an ice cream cone and we had stopped in at the bank on our way home,” he said.

  “Yes,” Alice said. “He often did that.”

  “Do you remember script?”

  “What?”

  “Script! Do you remember script?”

  “Well, no, I don’t guess I do.”

  “Back during the Depression counties used to issue script to pay their employees. And I remember that man at the bank arguing with your father; it was the first time I’d ever heard anyone openly argue with him, about whether to take script in payment of services. Your father said, ‘It’s as good as paper money,’ and this man said, ‘No, he didn’t believe he’d take it.’ It was an eye-opener to me, having someone dispute your father like that.”

  “I guess it would be,” Alice said.

  “Well, I found out later, the county paid their schoolteachers with script. And you know, Al, schoolteachers have to eat like the rest of us. So the big landowners were going around and buying up script for 30 cents on the dollar from the teachers and other poor folks, and then they were turning around and paying their taxes with script! Now, Alice, that wasn’t right! It just wasn’t right!” He finished with a loud, agitated hoot, his voice cracking slightly like a lawyer summing up his case before an indifferent jury.

  “No, I don’t guess it was,” Alice said serenely.

  “It burns me up, just thinking about it.”

  “I guess the good old days weren’t always so good.”

  “No, they were not.”

  Stella closed the binder, listening. Dob’s voice had risen steadily to a shout. Stella had noticed that Alice and her family talked to each other like this; loud and bullying. There was a sly edge of humor to their teasing, just the slightest hint of cruelty. She had thought it disrespectful, at first, to hear Sawyer talking to his mother this way, but Stella had quickly learned that Alice seemed to expect it, she seemed to appreciate it. Sentimentality would not have been tolerated in the Whittington house anymore than it had been tolerated in Stella’s childhood home, although perhaps for different reasons. Among the Whittingtons it would have been considered cowardly, and among the Nightingales it was unheard of.

  We are all products of our childhood, Stella thought, paraphrasing Harlow. Baby monkeys deprived of maternal contact in the first weeks of life, will never develop normal brains and social relationships.

  Dob said, “I talked to Adeline and she says she and Ann and Weesie are taking you to lunch tomorrow.”

  “Who?” Alice said.

  “Adeline! Your sister, Adeline! And Ann, my wife. And Weesie, your childhood friend.”

  “Oh, they’re taking me to lunch tomorrow.”

  He sighed loudly. “Yes, I know that, Alice. That’s what I just said.”

  “Or I’m taking them, more likely. That’s the way it usually is.”

  He said, “Do you remember that time our fathers took us to the county fair and we got sick eating candy apples?”

  “I don’t guess I do.”

  “Sure you do, Alice! You remember that!”

  “If you say so.”

&nb
sp; “Think, Alice, think! I was only five and you were ten and you teased me because I was too scared to ride on the Tilt-A-Whirl. And you called me a big baby and made me cry.”

  “That sounds about right.”

  “I know you can remember that day. It was in the fall. We were there with our fathers!”

  He was shouting again and Stella couldn’t stand it anymore. She walked into the living room and said, “Alice, I hate to bother you but you were supposed to call Weesie. Remember?”

  Alice looked up at her with a blank expression. “What?” she said. “Why do I need to call Weesie?”

  “To make arrangements for tomorrow. Remember?”

  “I’ve already talked to Weesie,” she said irritably. “It seems silly to call her again when I’ve already talked to her. You know I don’t like talking on the telephone, you know…” She stopped suddenly. “Oh,” she said, looking at Stella. “Oh, that’s right. I need to call Weesie.”

  “Well, I should probably go,” Dob said.

  “Oh, yes,” Alice said, stirring. “I remember now.” She grinned at Stella. “I need to call Weesie.”

  Dob rose, motioning for Alice to stay seated. “No, no, don’t stand up unless she’s there to help you,” Dob said.

  “I don’t need her to help me,” Alice snapped. “I do jump ups every morning.”

  “Jump ups? That sounds dangerous. You shouldn’t put too much strain on your heart, Alice. You shouldn’t jump up too fast because all the blood leaves your brain.” And he began a long, haranguing discourse on the limitations of the circulatory system in the elderly.