A Drowned Maiden's Hair (23 page)

That was an easy one. “Soon,” Maud promised. “Dear Mama, I hope it will be soon! You must ask the lady to help us.”

“Excellent.” Hyacinth folded the list. “Very nicely done.”

“When is the séance?” demanded Maud, flopping down on the carpet close to the footstool. “Wednesday or Thursday?”

“Thursday, perhaps. Judith and I are still working out the details. She’s nervous.” Hyacinth tapped the folded paper against her palm. “A great deal rests on your shoulders.”

Maud was aware of this. “I know my lines.”

“Of course you do. Besides, people are dreadfully predictable — they all say the same sort of thing, and I have prepared you particularly well. However — if there should be some question you can’t answer —”

Maud recognized this for the cue it was. She rose on her knees and clasped her hands piously. “Dear Mama, I can’t hear you! It is as if there were a gulf between us. . . . Oh, Mama, I can no longer feel your presence. Farewell, dear Mama! I will come again!”

Hyacinth corrected her. “Farewell, dear Mama. I love you. I will come again. You tend to leave out the ‘I love you.’”

Maud sat back on her heels, crestfallen.

“However” — Hyacinth’s voice made her look up again — “on the whole, your performance is remarkable. Quite perfect. I have absolutely no fear that you won’t pull the thing off.”

“I’ll do my best.”

“Of course you will.” Hyacinth lounged against the back of the chair, her eyes half-shut. “You are really the most extraordinary child . . . so clever . . .
such
a little actress. . . .” Her voice trailed off, and Maud wondered if she were falling asleep. She hoped she wasn’t. It was the first time in a week that Hyacinth had spared time to talk to her, and she wanted to hear more about how clever she was. She wondered if she dared rouse her by touching her hand.

Before she could make up her mind, the door opened, and Judith came in with a letter. “Hyacinth, Mrs. Fortescue’s written to you.”

Hyacinth sat bolt upright and put out her hand. Rapidly, she tore open the envelope and read the letter.

“Does she want a séance?” demanded Judith.

“Better than that.” The eyes that had been half-shut glittered with anticipation. “She’s having a house party in Philadelphia — all next week — and we’re invited to come.”

“Which one is Mrs. Fortescue?” asked Maud. She had heard the name but paid little attention to it. Mrs. Fortescue, Mrs. Sheffield, Miss Quigley, Mrs. Lugwig. All of them were Hyacinth’s clients, but they were of no importance to Maud. Their dead relations were all grown-ups.

“The wife of a millionaire,” answered Hyacinth. “Judith and I helped her contact her twin sister, who died thirty years ago. She lives in a veritable mansion — she knows all the most fashionable people in Philadelphia — the house will be full of them! No doubt Judith and I will be the entertainment.”

“Séances?” asked Maud.

“Certainly.” Hyacinth put down the letter. “Judith, it’s a splendid opportunity. We’ll see people we’d never meet anywhere else.”

Judith nodded. “We’ll take the steamer, I suppose?”

“It’s an easy journey — five or six hours, I believe — so much pleasanter than the train. Oh, Judith, it’s perfect!” Hyacinth’s eyes were shining. “Think of the clients we can acquire! Rich as Croesus, every man Jack of them!”

“What about me?” asked Maud.

The two women looked startled. They had forgotten her.

“We can’t
not
go,” Hyacinth said breathlessly.

“I suppose we might ask Victoria to look after —” Judith began.

“No!” Hyacinth’s voice was sharp. “I won’t have Victoria here. Really, I’m surprised at you, Judith! She could put all sorts of morbid ideas into Maud’s head! Why, she could ruin everything!”

Judith glanced meaningfully at Maud. “We can’t leave the child by herself. And I can’t stay with her. You’ll need me for the séances.”

“Can’t I come?” begged Maud. She knew it was futile, even before the sisters chorused, “No.”

“She’ll be with Muffet,” Hyacinth began.

“No.” Judith repeated. “The woman’s close to a half-wit. What if there were a fire — or a burglar? She can’t hear, and Maud —”

“Muffet’s not a half-wit,” interjected Maud.

“Of course not,” Hyacinth said silkily. “She may be deaf, but she’s perfectly well able to look after Maud. Besides, Maud’s not a baby. She’s accustomed to amusing herself, aren’t you, Maud?”

Maud could not think. Her stomach was churning and she didn’t know why. She imagined a week with Hyacinth and Judith gone. She saw herself free, able to walk all over the house, even to sleep on the first-floor sofa, where it would be cool at night. She pictured herself by the ocean every evening, or prowling up and down the boardwalk with Muffet’s dimes in her fist. Nevertheless, she felt a lump in her throat. A moment ago Hyacinth had been saying how clever she was. Now she was leaving.

“How can we tell Muffet?” asked Judith. “We can’t leave her in charge of an empty house, with no one to tell her what to do. How will she know we’re coming back?”

“I can tell her,” Maud said. She was tired of hearing the Hawthorne sisters talk about the hired woman as if she were some kind of animal. “Muffet understands me.”

“There, do you see?” Hyacinth smiled radiantly. “Maud and Muffet will do very well together — and a week isn’t long. Why, it’s no time at all!” Her face clouded. “I wonder if I should buy a new dress. I daresay they will all be very fashionable — my silver moiré is quite —”

“No,”
Judith said grimly. “You’ve already spent a fortune on clothes.”

“My dear Judith, if one wants to go among fashionable people, it is essential —”

Maud scowled. They were forgetting her again. “What about Mrs. Lambert?”

Judith looked uneasy. “Oh, gracious, that’s right. We had promised —”

“Yes, but we can put her off.”

“A bird in the hand —”

Hyacinth shook her head. “Now, don’t fuss, Judith! Delay increases desire — you know that. I can tell Eleanor that Mrs. Fortescue needs my help — urgently — she will
quite
understand if I do it properly, and we’ll have the séance as soon as we come back. Provided” — she inclined her head — “provided our darling Maud practices her lines every day. Will you, Maud?”

“I know my lines,” Maud said gruffly.

“Every day,” Hyacinth said sweetly. She clasped the letter to her breast. “It won’t be long, Maudy. Just a week. Will you miss me so terribly, terribly much?”

Maud stood up. Her eyes met Hyacinth’s. “Actually,” she said slowly, “I don’t expect to miss you at all.”

There was a brief, dreadful pause, during which Maud quailed, certain that she had gone too far. But Hyacinth did not take offense. Her eyes did not even flicker. She ran one finger down Maud’s cheek. “Oh, well said, Maudy!” The whispered words trembled on the brink of laughter. Without another word, she rose from her chair and glided out of the room, leaving Maud torn between relief and something like fear.

T
hree days later Judith and Hyacinth took the steamer to Philadelphia, leaving Maud to the freedom she craved. It was, Maud found, a limited and disappointing freedom. She had the run of the house, but the front rooms were shuttered and still; though she would not admit it to herself, the silence made her nervous. She walked through the house on tiptoe and whispered when she played. After a day or so, she withdrew to the rooms that had never been forbidden: the attic and Muffet’s kitchen.

She never left the house in the daytime. She had been a secret child long enough to develop a fear of being conspicuous; she could not imagine going out in full sunlight. Instead, she waited until the dinner hour, watching the neighbors’ yards from an upstairs window. Stealthily she crept to the kitchen, opened the screen door, and ran barefoot across the grass.

Then the world was hers, and she was off to the ocean. Each night, it was different: warmer or colder, more or less rough; it changed color as the light changed in the sky. Maud could not resist it. In spite of her promise to Muffet, she waded in the shallows, taking care not to get her skirt wet. Once she followed the shore till she came to the rock wall that stretched from the sand to the horizon. Two boys were out on the rocks, wrestling and shoving each other. Maud watched them until their mother shouted at them to come off that jetty before they broke their necks.

So. The rock wall was called a jetty. Maud was intrigued. Something about the jetty struck her as vaguely familiar. She pictured herself walking on it, striding to the very end, with the sunset around her and the frenzied waves lashing her feet. She would feel like a heroine; people on the beach would marvel at her brave silhouette against the sky. As soon as the boys were out of sight, she clambered up onto the rocks. Climbing was harder than she expected. The rocks were slick and sharp, and there was nothing to hold on to. Almost at once she fell, bruising her leg and skinning the palm of one hand. She took half a dozen steps and fell again. This time, she didn’t get to her feet right away, but sat still, licking the blood off her palm. It was easy to imagine slipping off the jetty into the rough waves. She didn’t know how deep the water was, and she had no one to forbid her to break her neck. Slowly she got up and retraced her steps, anchoring each foothold before shifting her weight. When she reached the shore, she let out her breath. Another time she would walk on the jetty. Not tonight.

She left the jetty for the boardwalk, which she had never had time to explore. The next night she strolled from one end to the other, perusing every sign and peering through doorways. She learned that Ping-Pong was not a delicacy but a sort of parlor game. She risked a nickel on a bag of buttered popcorn and found it tasted even better than it smelled. Once it was gone, she scolded herself — Muffet’s gift was too precious to be squandered on food. She must make it last. The next evening, she happened upon a pushcart where damaged books could be had for a nickel. Maud pawed through it and emerged triumphant with a copy of
Ragged Dick: Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot Blacks.

She rode the merry-go-round every night. It was balm to her injured pride to utter the words “One ticket, please” at the ticket booth and to present her ticket to Rory. The carousel keeper greeted her laconically, “Rob a bank?” — to which Maud replied, “No, sir,” in her primmest voice. She was faithful to Angel and rode him night after night, turning a blind eye to the tiger and the stag. It took all her self-control not to ride twice in a row. Each evening, she slid from the saddle with greater reluctance.

There was risk in riding the merry-go-round. More often than not, Maud caught sight of Mrs. Lambert in the surrounding crowd. The rich woman’s gaze was no longer fixed on Caroline’s sea monster. Instead, her eyes followed Maud. One night, as Angel dipped and soared, Maud yielded to impulse: she raised one hand in Mrs. Lambert’s direction and flickered her fingers.

Mrs. Lambert’s face lit up. Her face expanded in a smile; she lifted her gloved hand and waved back so vigorously that Maud could not help herself. With every rotation, she waved at Mrs. Lambert, and Mrs. Lambert beamed and wagged her hand.

It was a mistake — Maud knew it. Once the merry-go-round stopped, she jumped off Angel and fled to the other side of the carousel. As soon as her toes touched the ground, she ran. She didn’t look back until she reached the edge of the ocean. The rich woman stood on the boardwalk, beneath the electric lights. Her eyes scanned the dusk without seeing.

Maud turned away and began to walk at the water’s edge. She told herself she would never wave at Mrs. Lambert again. She would keep away from the carousel the next few nights. There were plenty of other things to do, after all. She would save her crusts and feed them to the seagulls. She would gather shells for the collection she was hiding in the box room. Even as she planned for the next night’s amusements, she was wading deeper and deeper into the water, enjoying the fizz of the foam about her knees. Before long, her dress was soaked to the waist.

Maud sighed. Now she had disobeyed Muffet. She would just have to hope that the hired woman wouldn’t be in the kitchen when she returned. She supposed that she might as well go on bathing. She played alertly, bobbing up and down with the waves, retreating whenever they rose to her armpits. When she skipped home, it was with the smug conviction that she had learned how to handle the ocean.

But her luck was out. Muffet met her at the kitchen door. At the sight of Maud’s wet dress, the hired woman’s face turned to stone. Maud flinched. No one had struck her since she left the Barbary Asylum, but Muffet looked angry enough to slap her. Maud dodged past the hired woman and flew upstairs. Muffet pursued her with such vigor that Maud wondered if the steps would give way.

Muffet did not touch her. Nevertheless, she made it clear that Maud was in disgrace. The next morning, when Maud got out of bed, she was unable to find her clothes. There was no point in sketching them and shoving the drawing pad under Muffet’s nose: Muffet ignored her. Maud spent the day in her nightdress, feeling slatternly and frustrated. She sulked as hard as she could, but the look on Muffet’s face spoke volumes.
We struck a bargain. You broke your promise. It serves you right.