This was Sunday, the seventh of September. Franklin and Loretta were not scheduled to return to Bramley Hall until Thursday. They said that we would in fact go home on Tuesday, after I had been prepared well for that event. I didn’t know what they meant by “prepared,” but I was too sleepy to ask.
The bungalow provided a charming foyer, a living room, and two bedrooms more beautifully furnished than any place I had ever seen. The air smelled faintly of spices and roses, a scent that I would later discover came from small decorative porcelain dishes filled with potpourri. Each bedroom had its own spacious bath. Although nomore than ten or twelve minutes had elapsed since Franklin asked the front desk clerk if rooms were available, a night maid had been to the bungalow ahead of us to switch on lamps and turn down the beds.
The bellhop, Steven, was a handsome young man, a little cheeky for such an elegant establishment, but in a sweet way. After he placed the luggage where Loretta wished to have it, he smiled at me and winked and said, “Your outfit is very stylish, Miss Riding Hood, but you don’t have to worry about wolves. They’re only to be found in the early evening in a nearby speakeasy.” I thought that was funny, and as Franklin tipped him, I thanked Steven for his advice as to the habits of the local wildlife.
When he had gone, I said, “He was very nice, wasn’t he?”
Loretta smiled. “You’ll be charmed by everyone in this town from the gas-station pump jockeys to the dolled-up shopgirls in the best department stores. They’re all actors hoping to be discovered, and they think anyone they meet could be a casting director or have the ear of one.”
I felt inadequate for the town, yet I was enchanted by the magical quality of it and grateful to be there. As bookish as I am, I thought that Quasimodo must have felt much like this, to an extent enchanted by the magnificence of Notre Dame and yet aware that he would always be an outsider, scorned by many and loathed by some, yet seeking the mercy that surpasseth all understanding.
My eyes burned, and I longed for sleep, but bed would have to wait. My bathroom had both a shower and a tub. The tub was clean and the water was hot and there were plenty of towels—three conditions that never occurred simultaneously in the motels where Captain and I stayed. There was a selection of soaps with different fragrances. If I’d fallen asleep in the tub and drowned in my bathwater, that would have been as fine a way to go as any.
Considering the strange and fearsome body that Nature has given me, I do not expect to have a long life. Although I have never been sick, the wrongness within me must equal the wrongness without. I have not been examined by a doctor or X-rayed, and I hope I never will be. I don’t want to be forewarned that some tangled coil inside of me will one day rupture, filling me with brief pain and eternal darkness. Whatever comes, let it come upon me by surprise.
As dawn arrived, I slipped into my bed and fell asleep at once. In the nightmare, we arrived at Bramley Hall and discovered that Captain Farnam had moved in uninvited. The children were nowhere to be found. When we asked about them, the moonfaced hateful pitchman only smiled. He carried a black bag of the kind that a doctor might carry when making a house call, and he would not let us look in it. Franklin went to search the basement—and didn’t come back. In the kitchen, on the gas stove, something was boiling in a huge soup pot, but Captain prevented us from removing the lid. Loretta opened a drawer to get a butcher knife with which to drive him out of the house, but the knives were all missing.
I woke with a gasp and sat up in bed, shaking so violently that it seemed the bungalow itself was being rocked by an earthquake. The blackout draperies were drawn shut, and only weak light traced the edges of them. Although the room was swathed in shadows, I knew I must be alone. The bungalow was silent. Franklin and Loretta weren’t up and about. According to the bedside clock, I’d been asleep only two hours. A dream is just a dream. It portends nothing. Nothing. I was exhausted. The dream was just a dream, not an omen. I lay down again and soon slept peacefully, untroubled by Captain.
Nine
Loretta rapped on my door at eleven thirty Sunday morning, and by noon I and my new guardians were having breakfast at the round table in the dining nook off the living room. Warm cheese omelets were accompanied by aromatic bacon, crisp toast with whipped butter, and individual compotiers filled with chilled mandarin-orange segments topped with shredded coconut. Rich, dark coffee steamed from the silver-plated pot when Franklin poured it into our cups.
How magical it seemed that this lovely repast could be summoned from the hotel kitchen, each dish hot or cold as required, served on pretty china, and accessorized by a slender glass vase holding a single red rose. All of it might have been conjured by a wizard. An egg-salad sandwich from an Automat couldn’t compare. I wouldn’t have been surprised if it had cost two dollars or even twice that for the three of us.
The rest of the day was likewise enchanting, although I felt some trepidation when Franklin departed for the afternoon, leaving us alone, to prepare the way for us at Bramley Hall, where we would arrive the day after tomorrow. Their estate was but a fifteen-minute drive from the hotel. I thought I concealed my anxiety, but Loretta quickly read my mood and asked the reason for my concern.
“Well,” I said as I perched on the sofa, “I’m sure this sounds silly, and no doubt itissilly, but I dreamed of Captain Farnam last night.” In case she was of a mind to attribute the slightest credibility to the predictive power of dreams, I did not reveal that in the nightmare Captain had intruded into Bramley Hall and that the children had been missing. I didn’t want to worry her, for surely it was foolish to believe that the nightmare had also been a prophecy. I revealed only this: “I dreamed he found us, as he said he could do if he wanted.”
Loretta sat beside me and gently pulled me against her. “He is a monster, and there’s nothing unusual about dreaming of monsters. Everyone does. His threat to find us in three days is just as phony as he is, sweetheart. That galumphing swine is giddy to have fallen into a payday beyond his greediest dreams, and he’ll do nothing to risk his freedom now. He’ll build a house on that plot of coastal land you said he owned, and he’ll sit on his patio, staring at the sea and eating cake and drinking bootleg bourbon until his heart is clogged with fat as dense as the contents of a Swift’s Silverleaf lard can. He’s a cowardly user, not an audacious doer. He’s no more likely to barge into our lives than Valentino, rest his soul, is likely to rise from the grave to remakeThe Son of the Sheikas a talkie.”
Leaning against her, I said, “You sure know how to make me feel better about most everything.”
“I’m not shoveling a lot of hooey at you, dear.”
“Yeah, I know. It’s not just what you say. It’s how you say it, ma’am. You’re so confident and sharp and funny.”
“I’m funny, am I?”
“In a good way.”
“Well, when you’re in the movie business, you better have a sense of humor or you’ll throw yourself out a high window.”
“Is it as crazy stressful as all that?”
“The stress is invigorating. But you’re swimming with sharks all the time, and sharks have no sense of humor. They especially don’t like to be laughed at, even though their insatiable appetite and self-importance are pretty damn funny. Frank and I laugh a lot behind closed doors.”
“I think I understand.”
“I’m sure you do. You’re a very bright girl. But we agreed you won’t call me ‘ma’am.’ Do it again, and severe discipline will ensue.”
“Yeah? Will you make me work in a blacking factory?”
“You never know. At the very least, I’ll make you scrub floors until your knees are blistered and your fingers bleed.”
I laughed, leaned away from her, and met her eyes. “That, too, is very Dickens. If you really could reduce me to such a terrible condition, you must have many floors.”
“Acres,” she said.
