A Drowned Maiden's Hair (12 page)

“The spirit has passed,” stated Judith.

“Hyacinth?” said Victoria. Maud heard footsteps, the rustle of skirts, a light slapping sound. “Hyacinth, awake! Oh, heavens — she is so pale — she’s in a swoon. Hyacinth, come back!”

“Her pulse is rapid.” It was Burckhardt speaking. “Oh, God forgive me — what have I done? Shall I go for a doctor?”

Maud heard a gasping sound from Hyacinth. After a moment, Judith announced, “No. She’s better — her eyes are open —”

“Judith?” Hyacinth sounded babyishly meek. “I — I feel so queer. And oh, Mr. Burckhardt, I’m sorry! I — I had no strength. The spirits did not come.”

“The spirit came,” Burckhardt told her. “How can I thank you enough?”

Judith’s voice directed him. “Help me support her — she must go to bed at once — oh, that’s better! Can you carry her all the way up the stairs?”

“Easily,” gasped Burckhardt valiantly. “She weighs nothing.”

The conversation dissolved into murmuring, the voices growing more distant. Maud heard “nervous strain,” “all unselfishness,” “true medium,” and “sea air.” Then there was the sound of footsteps receding and footsteps on the stairs. At long last, Maud was alone. She lifted the tablecloth and crawled out. The fresh air was cool against her sweaty face.

“M
aud,” announced Hyacinth at the breakfast table, “was magnificent.”

Maud stopped chewing her bacon and tried to look magnificent. It was the morning after the séance, and a lovely one: the sunlight stole through the lace curtains and dappled the tablecloth. Maud was eager to discuss the séance. She felt like an actor after a successful show. She knew she had done well, and she was ready for the others to tell her so. Unfortunately, Judith was scanning the columns of the newspaper; Victoria was removing the crusts from her toast.

“She was,” insisted Hyacinth. “I told you she would be.”

Judith looked up. “She did well enough,” she remarked, to Maud’s disgust. Judith felt that lavish praise, like rich food, was bad for children.

“She did a good deal better than well enough,” Hyacinth insisted, defending her protégée. “She did everything at exactly the right time, and she never giggled once. And her singing was perfect — neither too loud nor too soft.”

“Did we get the money?” inquired Maud, slathering her toast with marmalade.

It was the wrong thing to say. Hyacinth made a little moue of distaste. Victoria looked at Maud as if she were a dead mouse in the pantry. “Really, Maud!”

“Why shouldn’t she ask about the money?” broke in Judith. “What we do, we do for money. The child’s part of it now. She might as well speak plainly.”

Maud flashed Judith a look of astonished gratitude. She could scarcely believe that Judith, the strictest of the sisters, was taking up for her.

“Very well, then.” Victoria pushed her plate away. “We will speak plainly. Mr. Burckhardt gave us the money — enough to pay for doctors that Hyacinth doesn’t need and a bit more so that Hyacinth can travel to Cape Calypso for sea air. It seems that Mr. Burckhardt has forgotten that we own the cottage in Cape Calypso —”

“I didn’t remind him,” Hyacinth put in nimbly.

“— and gave us money for rent,” concluded Victoria. “So yes, Maud, we got the money. Quite a lot of it, since Burckhardt is as openhanded as he is foolish.”

Maud regarded Victoria warily. The older woman looked as if she had scarcely slept. Her hair was bundled up any old way, and her collar was open. Usually she wore a cameo with a lady’s head. Maud missed it. She wished Victoria would go upstairs and tidy herself up.

“Speaking of the cottage in Cape Calypso,” Hyacinth said silkily, “why don’t you tell Maud how we came by it, Victoria? Your morals weren’t always as dainty as they are now — were they?”

Victoria gave her sister one murderous glance. Then she rose so violently that her chair rocked back and fell over. Without another word, she swept out of the room.

Judith righted the chair. She frowned at her sister. “You go too far.”

“It’s such a waste,” said Hyacinth. “She used to be a perfectly good medium. Now she’s turned pious. It’s such a bad example for Maud.”

Judith jerked her head in Maud’s direction. “Do you really think she can play Caroline Lambert?”

“I’m sure of it,” Hyacinth said staunchly. “You should hear her read the part of Lord Fauntleroy — you wouldn’t think it, but she’s sweet. She’s quite the little actress.”

“Do you really think that reading
Little Lord Fauntleroy
will prepare her?”

“I don’t see why not,” Hyacinth answered serenely. “As long as she’s properly rehearsed, she ought to be able to play any number of angel children — female or male. She’s quite convincing as a boy, actually — makes Fauntleroy a bit less precious. It’s a pity no one’s lost a little boy.”

Maud leaned across the table. “Is that why we read Lord Fauntleroy? I thought we were just playing.”

Judith said slowly, “Hyacinth doesn’t play.”

“No,” agreed Hyacinth. “I wanted you to make a special study of Fauntleroy because he was an angel child. Sweet and pure and polite. Grieving parents always fancy they’ve lost a little angel child.”

Maud sat back in her chair, crestfallen. So that was what Hyacinth had meant in her letter:
She will be our perfect little angel child.
She had been alluding to Maud’s acting ability. It had been foolish to imagine that anyone, even Hyacinth, would consider Maud angelic. Maud felt her cheeks getting hot. She was glad no one knew the mistake she had made.

“Is she too boyish to play Caroline?”

“No,” answered Hyacinth, “and besides, Caroline Lambert was a little hoyden. Otherwise she wouldn’t have drowned.”

The word
drowned
got Maud’s attention. “Why did she drown?”

Hyacinth gazed across the table, out the window. Her eyes were dreamy.

“‘O Mary, go and call the cattle home,
     And call the cattle home,
     And call the cattle home,
     Across the sands of Dee.’

The western wind was wild and dank with foam,
     And all alone went she.”

There was a brief silence, followed by Maud’s “What?”

“A very sensible question,” Judith said approvingly. “Don’t be poetical, Hyacinth — it tries my nerves and the child doesn’t appreciate it. Hyacinth is reciting poetry about a girl who drowned, but poetry doesn’t come into it. Caroline Lambert died because she went bathing when her mother forbade it.”

“She was alone.” Hyacinth took up the story. “It was the last day of her holiday in Cape Calypso, and there’d been a storm the night before. Caroline wanted to go to the ocean one last time, but her mother — Eleanor Lambert — was too busy packing.”

“Eleanor Lambert spoiled that child.”

Hyacinth shrugged. “Undoubtedly. At any rate, that was one morning when Caroline didn’t get her way. Her mother was too busy to take her to the ocean, and Caroline wasn’t allowed to go by herself. Then Caroline changed her tune. She wanted to ride the flying horses —”

“What flying horses?” asked Maud.

“The horses on the carousel.” Hyacinth saw that Maud had not yet understood. “Gracious, child, haven’t you seen a carousel?”

Maud shook her head.

“It’s a ride at the amusement park. The carousel, the flying horses, the merry-go-round —”

“I’ve heard of merry-go-rounds,” Maud said, eager to regain ground. “Only I’ve never seen one.”

“There’s a fine one in Cape Calypso. The wood carvings are splendid — horses and tigers and zebras. There’s even a giraffe — and a tabby cat — all kinds of animals. Caroline’s favorite was a sort of sea monster. Odd to think of that now, isn’t it?”

Maud had a hazy but dazzling image of herself on the back of a tiger. She wore the white dress trimmed with lace, and her scarlet sash fluttered in the breeze. “Will I ride the merry-go-round?”

“It isn’t likely,” answered Judith, dashing her hopes. “Remember, in Cape Calypso, you’ll be even more of a secret than you are here. You’ll be spending most of your time in the attic.”

Maud digested this news in silence.

“Eventually” — Hyacinth raised her voice and went on with the story she was telling — “Caroline Lambert switched her plea from
one last swim
to
one last ride.
The carousel was close to the hotel where they were staying. Caroline knew the way — she was in the habit of riding every day. So Mrs. Lambert emptied her purse into Caroline’s greedy little paws and told her to come back when the money was spent. Only she never came back.”

Maud’s imagination conjured up another picture: another little girl, almost her twin, vanishing into thin air. “Maybe she didn’t drown,” she said tentatively. “Maybe someone kidnapped her. Or she ran away.”

“She drowned,” Judith informed her. “First she went to the carousel and spent her mother’s money. Then she went in the water — in her street clothes, not her bathing dress. They found the body. She was her mother’s only child.”

“They row’d her in across the rolling foam,
     The cruel crawling foam,
     The cruel hungry foam,
     To her grave beside the sea.”

“Hyacinth,” Judith said disdainfully.

Maud considered the fate of Caroline Lambert. It frightened her that a child had died. It was sadder and scarier than Mr. Burckhardt’s silly Agnes. “What did she look like?”

“Tall for her age — she was eight. Exceptionally pretty, by all accounts. Long curls. An angel child,” Hyacinth answered.

Maud’s sympathy for the victim wavered and dissolved.

“She’ll need a wig,” Judith reminded her sister.

“I know that.” Hyacinth sounded offended. “I’ve ordered one from a theatrical costumer.” She directed her attention back to Maud. “Eleanor Lambert offered five thousand dollars to any medium who could produce a genuine manifestation of her child.”

Maud’s head jerked up. “Five thousand dollars?”

“Five thousand dollars. Enough to pay off the mortgage with a comfortable balance left over.” Judith looked straight into Maud’s eyes. “You see how much is at stake.”

“It won’t be easy,” Hyacinth warned Maud. “Unlike Burckhardt, Eleanor Lambert is no fool. And she’s been tricked before. Last year, she employed a certain Madame Zauberlicht. She caught the medium pretending to be Caroline.”

“How could a grown-up pretend to be a little girl?”

“She was walking around the room on her knees,” Hyacinth explained. “The idiot! Eleanor Lambert reached for her child and found a grown woman kneeling by her chair. It was grotesque. Zauberlicht was ruined, and a good thing too. People like that give the profession a bad name.”

“Hyacinth has spent the last year trying to gain Mrs. Lambert’s trust,” Judith told Maud. “That’s why she’s spent so much time in Cape Calypso. She’s managed to persuade Eleanor Lambert that there
are
honest mediums — and that she’s one of them.”

“She trusts me,” Hyacinth said. “She is fond of me, even. She’s almost ready . . . and now we have Maud.” She brushed her palm against Maud’s cheek. “You see, Maudy? Do you see why we need you so badly?”

Maud nodded, grave-faced. She saw.

H
yacinth was restless. Maud had come to see the power of Hyacinth’s moods: if she was merry, the household seemed brighter; if she was angry or bored, the house fell silent, and the silence was ominous. In the days that followed the séance, Hyacinth’s moods changed a dozen times. Sometimes she darted about like a moth, astonishing Maud with her energy, teasing and flattering so deftly that Maud danced on air. At other times, she withdrew to her room, wanting only to be alone. Maud knocked at her bedroom door, but no one answered, and the door stayed locked.

It was not only Hyacinth who seemed on edge. Victoria had not forgiven her sister for what she had said about the cottage in Cape Calypso; her manner was stiff and cold. Even Judith seemed to have altered a little. She was more matter-of-fact than usual, signaling that she was not going to be drawn into the quarrel between her sisters.