The Velvet Room (5 page)

Theda must have forgotten what Robin had said to her when she had asked for curlers. At least she didn’t seem to be angry. As they were getting into bed, she gave Robin her choice, as usual. “Shall we curl up first, or stretch out?” she asked. This time Robin chose to curl up first.

Three years before, when Theda and Robin had first started sharing a folding cot, it had not been so bad; but now they were both bigger. So they had worked out a system. A folding cot is much too narrow for two to sleep side by side, so they each took an end. Part of the night they curled up tight, leaving half the bed for the other person. Then, when their knees started aching to be straightened out, they turned on their sides so that each girl could stretch out her legs.

In spite of everything, Robin overslept the next morning, so there was nothing to do, she decided, but go to Bridget’s and get back very quickly so she wouldn’t be missed. After breakfast, Mr. Criley came in the truck to get Rudy. They were going to the highway to get the Model T and haul it to the Williamses’ cabin. Robin went out to watch Rudy off, and then she just stayed outside. After Theda and Shirley went back in, Robin started easing away from the house. She was pretty good at that sort of thing. It was just a matter of looking innocently busy at something — like maybe hitting a rock with a stick — while you edged closer and closer to the point where it was safe to make a run for it.

Robin had knocked her rock clear out in front of the next cabin and had started after it when suddenly, from somewhere quite close, a voice said softly, “Robin’s wandering off again.”

It was Cary’s voice, but she couldn’t see him anywhere. “Shh!” she said. “Where are you?”

“Here, under the house.”

Robin got down and looked, and there he was, stretched out in the dust behind a clump of sickly-looking weeds. He was looking at a book. At least it was part of a book. It must have been in someone’s bonfire, because the cover was missing and the outer pages were charred.

“I won’t say it any louder,” Cary said, “if you’ll tell me some words.” Cary was always after Robin to tell him words. He hadn’t been to school much because there had been so much moving since he was old enough to go. But Cary wanted to read, and nobody ever stopped Cary from doing anything he really wanted to do. His system was to go through every bit of reading material he could get his hands on and underline every word he didn’t know. Then he cornered someone, usually Robin, because she was the best reader, and made that person tell him all the underlined words. Robin had to admit he hardly ever had to be told twice.

But the half-burned book was an old almanac, and there were lots of big words. Cary insisted that Robin pronounce each word slowly and then wait for him to say it over after her. His homely little speckled face was puckered with concentration, and he whispered each word fiercely, as if he could threaten himself into remembering. Robin felt a grudging admiration. Feeling the way she did about books, she couldn’t help but understand, in spite of her impatience. But with all the hard place names, and words like “population” and “agriculture,” it took a long time to go through the three pages that Cary had underlined.

When he finally repeated the last word, Robin jumped up and started off across the yard. Any minute now someone would be calling her from inside the cabin. But Cary called after her softly, “Will you tell me some more when you come back?”

“Maybe.”

“Robin!”

She stopped and looked back. “Shh!” she said. “What is it?” But she saw the wicked blue flicker in his eyes and knew what was coming next. He was going to threaten to tell on her again. “All right!” she said angrily. “All right, I promise.” Cary crawled back under the house, and Robin was finally off down the Village road.

In the orchard she ran as fast as she could go. She came to the wall, climbed over it, and stopped only a second to look at the big stone house. When she reached Bridget’s cottage, she was out of breath. She stood for a minute at the gate, slowing her breathing and looking at the bright flowers and the dark richness of the soil. You would think that dirt was just dirt, but how different Bridget’s looked from the hard-packed, dust-blown soil of the Village. She walked around to the back of the cottage and knocked.

Bridget didn’t ask any questions when Robin explained that she was in a hurry. She only thanked her for coming and watched, smiling, as Robin took down the chain and hammer. Damon and Pythias were asleep on the roof of Betty’s shed, and Robin paused long enough to stand on tiptoe and give them each a quick pat. The staking out didn’t take long at all, because Betty seemed to sense that Robin could move much faster than Bridget, and she trotted along so fast that Robin had to run to keep up. When she returned to the cottage to leave the hammer, Bridget was waiting at the door with something in her hand.

“It was kind of you to come,” she said.

“It was fun,” Robin said. “Maybe next time I can stay a while — if that’s all right.”

“I hope you can, my dear,” Bridget put the small white package in Robin’s hand. “These are for you. You’d best eat them on the way home.”

Just outside the gate Robin stopped long enough to peek inside the package. There, carefully wrapped in clean white paper, were three fat dark cookies, lumpy with raisins. Their sweet spicy odor made Robin swallow hard. It had been a long time since the Williamses had had any extra money to spend on sweets.

The cookies were too wonderful to waste by gobbling, so Robin decided to forget about hurrying and take her chances on being missed. She walked slowly through the orchard, taking very tiny nibbles. They were marvelous cookies, rich and moist and chewy. She was halfway through the second one when there was a sudden thudding rush, and Robin jumped back as a black horse galloped right across her path. The horse saw Robin and shied into an orange tree, almost unseating the blond girl on its back.

“Ouch!” the girl cried, jerking angrily at the reins. “Whoa! Oh, stop it!” The horse was skittering sideways and snorting. Robin stood quietly, and after a moment he seemed to realize that she wasn’t really dangerous. He stretched his neck, snuffed at her, and then stood still. He was beautiful — high-necked, seal-sleek, and quivering with life. Robin finally managed to take her eyes off him and give her attention to the girl on his back.

Now that the horse had quieted, the girl was inspecting her arm where the orange tree had scratched it. She seemed to be about Robins age. She was wearing jodhpurs, black boots, and a plaid shirt, and her fluffy blond hair was tied back with a black ribbon. “Look what that stupid horse did to me,” she said, but there was no real anger in her voice.

“It wasn’t his fault,” Robin said. “I frightened him.”

The girl smiled. She had a nice smile, quick and real, with deep dimples on each side. “Mirlo’s always looking for something to be afraid of.” She drew her brows together and looked at Robin with a puzzled expression. Then she smiled again. “Oh, I know. You must be from the new family that just moved into the Village. What’s that?”

Robin realized the girl was pointing to the package of cookies. “Cookies,” she said, gently pushing back the paper. There was a whole cookie and a half left. She didn’t really want to, but she added, “Would you like one?”

“You must have been to Bridget’s,” the girl said. “Thanks, I love Bridget’s cookies. She makes the best in the world.” She took the whole cookie and, to Robin’s dismay, ate it in two bites. Suddenly she looked puzzled again. “How did you happen to go to Bridget’s?” she asked. “Don’t you Village kids think she’s a witch?”

“A witch!” Robin exclaimed. “That’s silly. I think she’s nice.” For the moment she completely forgot the funny feeling she’d had when she first saw the foreign-looking stone cottage and the bent woman. “Why do they think she’s a witch? Who is she, anyway?”

“She used to be my nurse,” the blond girl said, “until she got so crippled with arthritis. Now Daddy lets her live in the old gardener’s cottage. She’s really awfully nice, and she loves kids. It’s too bad the Village kids are all afraid of her.” She smiled at Robin. “Most of them, that is.” She crossed one booted leg over the flat English saddle and leaned her elbow on her leg. Putting her chin in her hand, she just looked at Robin. It was a friendly look, but it lasted too long to be comfortable. After a while the girl said, “I’m Gwen McCurdy. Who are you?”

“I’m Robin Williams,” Robin said, allowing a small smile.

The girl smiled back. Then she cocked her head and surveyed Robin critically. “You know something?” she said. “You’re really pretty. At least you could be. You have terrific eyelashes — just like Hedy Lamarr’s. I wish mine were like that,” she wrinkled her nose in disgust, “instead of short and blond. You ought to do something to your hair though…”

Robin felt her cheeks get hot, and although she tried to stop it, her hand went to her straight dark hair. She turned quickly and started off toward the Village. In a moment there were hoofbeats, and the black horse was walking beside her.

“I’m sorry,” Gwen said. “I didn’t mean to make you angry.” They walked on side by side. Robin kept her head down, watching her own bare feet and the high proud steps of the horse. “Look! Would you like a ride home?”

Robin stopped almost in mid-step. Pride was important, but some things were more important. “Come on,” Gwen said, leaning down, “give me your hand.”

A few minutes later Mama and Theda and Shirley crowded to the door of the cabin in time to see Robin swing down from the back of a dancing black horse. As the horse pranced away sideways, the girl on his back held him in long enough to wave and call, “Good-bye Robin, see you later.”

“Good-bye Gwen,” Robin called back.

Mama and Theda and Shirley were speechless with amazement, but not Cary. As Robin started up the steps of the cabin, Cary crawled out from under it holding up his half-burned book. “You promised,” he said.

A Mysterious Gift

W
HEN ROBIN WENT TO BRIDGET’S
the next day, she had permission to go there. The evening before she had finally managed to talk it over with Dad, and just as she had expected, he had been very sympathetic. “Yes, I think that would be a very nice thing for you to do, Robin.” he said. “I’m glad you thought about it. Sometimes lately you’ve been too wrapped up in your own little world. You need to see that other people have problems too.”

So when Bridget asked Robin in for tea, she was able to say yes. The inside of the cottage was as unusual as the outside. A lean-to addition along the back was divided into a small en try way, a closet, and a small bathroom; but all the rest of the cottage was just one large room. The inside walls were paneled partway up with smooth dark wood. The paneling ended in a little ledge about as high as Robin’s head, and above that there was gray stone, just like the outside of the house. The windows swung out like little doors and were made up of dozens of tiny diamond-shaped panes set in dark metal frames. Because the stone walls were very thick, the window sills were deep, and each sill held a potted plant or a vase of flowers. The floor of the cottage was also of stone, but years of walking and scrubbing had polished it to a marblelike smoothness. There was a fireplace with a deep hearth, a quilt-covered bed, a small iron stove, and a few chairs and tables. On the seat of a rocking chair near the fireplace Damon and Pythias were asleep, looking like a fat fur cushion.

At Bridget’s request, Robin carried some cups and saucers from a corner cupboard to a small round table near a front window. The cups had pansies and violets painted on them, and they were so thin that you could see the shadow of your fingers through the china. They were so pleasant to touch that Robin rearranged them several times on the white tablecloth, handling them very carefully. Then, while Bridget held the teapot, Robin worked the handle of the pump that was right on the end of the wooden sink board. She had seen pumps before, but always outdoors, never right inside the house.

There were several other things to do while the water heated. Bridget filled dishes at the kitchen side of the room, and Robin carried them to the table. There was a tiny glass tray with a matching sugar bowl and cream pitcher on it, a plate of the fat dark cookies, a pink bowl full of dark red strawberries, and a pale blue china teapot with a looping wreath of white around it. Robin moved a small vase of pansies from a window sill to the center of the table. Behind the table the casement window was partly open on the garden, and the morning sunlight added patterns of light and shadow.

“Look!” Robin said. “It looks like a painting.”

“So it does,” Bridget said. “You’ve arranged it very nicely. Now if you’ll pour the water, we’ll be almost ready.”

“I like your house,” Robin said when they were both seated at the table. “It’s different. It’s like pictures I’ve seen of houses in other countries — England, or maybe Scotland.”

“Yes, it would look something like that,” Bridget said, “but as it happens, it’s an Irish house. At least, it was built by Irish workmen.”

“By Irish workmen? Did they build Palmeras House too?” Robin asked.

“That’s quite a long story, and it goes back a long way. But I’ve heard a bit about it. You see, the present Mr. McCurdy’s grandfather was an Irishman who came to California during gold-rush days. He found some gold — not much, but enough to buy a fine horse and some fancy clothes and have just a little left over. He was tired of the hard work of mining gold, and he’d heard that land was cheap and life was easy in the South. So he decided to go to Los Angeles and buy some land. But on the way his horse went lame.”

Bridget paused, and Robin said, to hurry her on, “I’ll bet that happened right here. It must have!”

“You’re right. It happened right here at Las Palmeras, which was one of the largest ranchos in this part of the state. It was granted by the Governor of Mexico to the Montoya family in 1829. One wing of Palmeras House was built not too long after that.”

“Oh,” Robin said, “I saw it. It’s made of adobe.”

“That’s right. And that’s where Donovan McCurdy stayed while he waited for his horse’s hoof to heal. Only he never got to Los Angeles.”