The Shadow Portrait (43 page)

“I’ll never forget it,” Avis said. “My whole life I’ll be telling people how God saved me and healed me.” Then she took a deep breath, brushed the tears from her eyes, and cleared her throat. “Well, are you ready for surprise number three?”

“I’m ready for anything.”

“Then you wait right here. Don’t leave the room.”

Peter stood there as Avis wheeled herself through the door and disappeared down the hallway. He was still tremendously excited and thrilled over the healing that had come to her. The burden of guilt he had been struggling under suddenly was gone. Had she remained crippled for life, he knew full well he would never have gotten over it, but somehow he knew she would be fine now.

Movement caught his eye, and Avis wheeled herself back into the room. “Are you ready?”

“All ready. What is it?”

“Shut your eyes.”

Smiling, Peter shut his eyes, and he heard movement. Then Avis said, “All right. You can open them.”

Peter opened his eyes—and there stood Jolie before him. She was wearing a simple but pretty wine-colored dress, but he did not notice that. What he saw was that her left cheek was clear and smooth!

“Jolie!” Peter gasped. He reached out and touched her cheek, which was rosy and clear, and said, “I can barely see the scar! You wouldn’t even notice it from a few feet away.”

“Even that will get better,” Avis said. “That’s what the doctor said.”

Peter stood there, stunned by the beauty of Jolie’s face. He remembered how Jolie had always kept her face averted whenever possible, or kept her hair over the scar, but now she stood before him, her lips trembling, and tears brimming in her eyes.

“Well, don’t just stand there, you idiot!” Avis called out. “Tell her she’s beautiful!”

“You
are
beautiful, Jolie, but you always have been to me.”

“Have I, Peter?”

“Why, of course. I’m glad for your sake,” he whispered, “that the scar is gone. I know it worried you, but it never meant anything to me. It was always what was inside of you that I cared for.”

“Do you care for me, Peter?”

Peter nodded, and again Avis said loudly, “Do I have to do everything? Kiss her, you dope!”

Peter shot one startled glance at Avis, who raised her hand in a sign of victory. She was smiling and whispered, “Kiss her and tell her you love her.”

“I do love you, Jolie,” Peter said. “I have for a long time.” He bent his head and his lips touched hers. He was surprised
by the sweetness and warmth of her. Her lips were soft and welcoming.

For Jolie it was like coming home. With Peter’s strong arms about her, and his lips on hers, a feeling of goodness and rightness flooded her. She was where she belonged.

Then he lifted his head and said, “I love you, Jolie. I guess I always have—since the first time I saw you.”

Jolie did not answer for a moment, then she whispered, “My dear . . . my dear . . . !” She laid her head on his chest and felt his arms tighten around her, and again the sensation came to her of arriving home after a long voyage.

“That’s enough of that! I’ll dance at your wedding,” Avis said.

Both of them turned and ran over to Avis. Jolie kissed her on the cheek, and Peter raised her hand to kiss it. “I’ll take you up on that.”

“You always were a great dancer.”

With both her hands imprisoned in those of her friends, Avis Warwick knew that her life had truly changed. She said, “We’d better get started.”

“We? What do you mean we?” Peter demanded.

“You don’t think I’m going to miss that race, do you? Jolie, get my going-to-the-race costume out. And figure a way to get this clumsy chair there. We’re going to see Peter Winslow, the best racing driver in America, win, and I’m going to holler my lungs out!”

Oliver Lanier’s right knee had grown worse. He had visited Dr. McKenzie, who had examined him carefully and then shook his head, a scowl of disapproval on his thin face. “Ach mon, you’ve got to get off that leg!” he exclaimed. “Look at it! It’s swollen nearly twice its proper size.”

Oliver had taken the medicine McKenzie had prescribed and obeyed his instruction to stay off of the leg. It was a rare thing indeed for Oliver Lanier to take a day off from the office.
Alice made such a fuss over him that he finally growled, “Alice, dear, I’m not dying! It’s just a rheumatic knee.”

For most of the morning Oliver sat with his leg up on a hassock, staring out the window. It was a beautiful July day with a yellow sun high in the sky, throwing its beams over the street. The younger children were all at school, so the house was quiet. Occasionally Alice would come in and sit down for a while, knitting while Oliver stared out the window. Otherwise he was alone with his thoughts.

Around noon Oliver finally began to grow restless. Alice had come in saying, “I’ve got to go visit Mrs. Childers. She’s been very ill for the past three days. Will you be all right alone?”

“I’m not a child. Of course I will be.”

Alice laughed. “You’re worse than a child, and you’re the worst patient I ever saw. I’ll be back and fix you something very special for supper tonight.” She kissed him on the cheek, then left.

The house was truly silent now. Moodily, Oliver continued staring out the window, but he was taking no pleasure in the beautiful day. He was too disturbed and unhappy about his entire life. Again and again he went over the altercation he had had with Clinton, and the more he thought about it, the more he felt he had mishandled the whole thing. It was no different when he thought of Cara. He had been overly protective of her, to be sure. He thought back on the times he had kept her in the house when she had begged to go outside. Even Dr. McKenzie had told him he was keeping her too confined. Restlessly, he stirred in the chair—making his knee produce a twinge of pain. He stared at it resentfully. The look in his eye was one his employees had learned to dread. He resented anything he could not control, and now the knee had confined him to a chair and taken away his freedom.

At last boredom got the best of him, and he limped across the room and searched the bookcase. A red binder caught his eyes—the family photograph album. With a grunt he pulled
it out, hobbled back, and sat down. He began going through the album, and the first picture was one of him and Alice on their honeymoon. He smiled as he saw how relatively thin he had been back then, and he mused over the youthful beauty of Alice. “We’ve come a long way,” he muttered. “You’ve always been a good woman and a fine wife.” He thought of how Cara had instructed him to tell Alice nice things, and he had been amazed at how it had worked a surprising transformation in their relationship.
I should have done it a long time ago, but a man doesn’t think of those things.
He began turning the pages over and pausing to look at pictures of the children when they were small—first Cara when she was just a baby, so full of life and energy then. She was his first and would always be his favorite. Then little Cara holding her new baby brother Clinton. The pictures of Clinton, Oliver’s first son, brought special anguish to his heart. Picture after picture showed his thin face, and then he grew up into a trim, well-built young man. Oliver had always been so proud of Clinton as a child, but what had happened to their relationship when Clinton grew into manhood? Then Mary Ann, always a beautiful child, and more so now. He traced her history and thought of what a beautiful voice she had and how in the future it would be Africans who would be hearing it instead of himself and others.

Then Benjamin. He turned to a recent picture and looked down at the photograph. Benjamin was looking straight into the camera, his pleasing features in repose, but still there was something unhappy and dissatisfied in his eyes. Here again Oliver knew he had mismanaged something in his son’s life. He took great pleasure in Bess’s and Bobby’s more recent pictures. “I haven’t gone wrong with them,” he said, but then a voice whispered,
But you will. You’ll try to control them just as you have your other children.

“No!” Oliver slammed the album shut and tossed it onto the floor. He sat there a long time, and then a thought began to form in his mind. Looking up, he saw that the clock showed
almost one. As the thought took clearer shape, a stubborn look came into his expression. His lips tightened, his chin began to push forward, and those who knew Oliver Lanier best would have known he had made up his mind.

Heaving himself to his feet, he hobbled to his room and exchanged his pajamas and robe for a lightweight summer suit. It pained him to bend over and tie his shoes, for whenever he flexed his right knee it was like sticking a red hot needle through it. He accomplished the task, however, and heaved himself up, picked up his cane, and headed out the door. “James!” he bellowed, poking his head into the servants’ quarters.

“Yes, sir!” James came at once, saying, “What is it, Mr. Lanier?”

“Get the carriage out.”

“The carriage—? You can’t leave the house, sir. Not on that knee!”

“Get the carriage out, James. Do what I tell you.”

James was too accustomed to obeying to question further. “Yes, sir. I’ll hitch it up at once. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

“Don’t take any longer.”

Oliver stood at the front door, taking out his pocket watch more than once. Four minutes and thirty seconds later James came out of the driveway and pulled the team up in front of the house. Oliver stepped outside and Mrs. Grimshaw asked, “Sir, what will I tell your wife?”

“Tell her I’ve gone to the races,” he said. He smiled and suddenly his face looked different. “Tell her I’ve gone to see my son win an automobile race.”

Ignoring the astonished look on the housekeeper’s face, he limped down the steps, heaved himself into the carriage. “James, do you know where those automobiles are racing today at Coney Island?”

“Why, yes, sir.”

“Then take me there, and don’t spare the horses . . . !”

“Shall I come with you, sir?” James asked as he helped his employer out of the carriage.

“Yes, come if you want to.”

“Yes, sir. Would you care to lean on me, Mr. Lanier?”

“No, I’m not that far gone. Find yourself a place, James. I don’t know anything about these races, but I’m not too old to learn.”

“No, sir, of course not!”

“Meet me here after the race.”

Lanier hobbled off and was amazed at the crowd that had gathered. Apparently there were people from all walks of life, for he saw rich people with expensive clothing standing side by side with laboring men who seemed just to have come from work. The crowd was mostly made up of men, but there were a few women here and there. He stopped one man and asked, “Does one buy a ticket to get into this thing?”

“Why, of course. There’s the ticket office right over there.”

“Thank you.”

Oliver purchased his ticket, paying two dollars for it, and asked, “Where is my seat?”

The ticket taker grinned. “Any seat you can find. Just hang on to that stub.”

Oliver gave him an affronted look, then made his way along with the crowd. The stands were already full, he saw, as he hobbled along in front of them looking for a seat. He had about decided he would have to stand up, when all of a sudden he heard his name called. “Mr. Lanier! Mr. Lanier!”

Looking around, he saw a young woman with jet black hair standing beside a woman in a wheelchair. He recalled meeting the young woman—what was her name? Jolie Devorak, he remembered.

“Seats are about gone, but we’ve got one right here. Would you like to join us?”

“Very decent of you, Miss Devorak.”

“This is Mrs. Avis Warwick.”

“How do you do, Mrs. Warwick.”

“How do you do, sir? You’ve come to see your son win the race?”

Lanier felt as if he were cornered. He had intended to come incognito, and now he was caught.

He did not have to answer, however, for Jolie Devorak said, “It’s going to be a great race. Your son, Clinton, is right beside Peter, the driver. See? They’re going to win, too.”

“Come. Sit down right here. We’ve got a good view,” Avis said. She had heard the story of Oliver Lanier and knew somehow what it had cost him to come. “You ought to be very proud of your son. To hear Peter tell it, he’s the world’s greatest automobile mechanic.” She couldn’t resist adding, “He’s very nice looking, too.”