Instead she found a chenille bathrobe hanging inside the closet door and she pulled it around her, oddly chilled in the warm air. She went over to tire window to close it and then stopped, looking out over the wide, curving driveway.
She was at the old Abbott mansion. Where else would she be—that was where Tallulah and Mary had grown up, where Tallulah had lived before she married. Her grandparents had been forced to sell it in the fifties, and a decade later it had been struck by lightning and burned to the ground. All that remained was the garage that she could see to her right The garage where Jake Wyczynski had kissed her.
It was a warm June night and still Susan felt goose bumps crawling on her arms. Tallulah must have been a June bride as Susan was planning to be. For some reason it seemed unutterably sad to die in June.
She heard the door open once more, and she whirled around, only to see little Mary Abbott sneak inside, shutting the door quietly behind her.
“What’s wrong with you, Lou?” she demanded. “Mummy and Daddy would have a fit if they knew you had a man in your bedroom. Particularly that man. Mummy’s already half-tight and Daddy’s furious, demanding to know when you’re coming down. Neddie doesn’t look any too happy either.”
“Half-tight?” Susan echoed, picking up on one small thing amidst Mary’s spate of words.
“Smashed. Loaded. Bombed. She’s been drinking. You know how she gets.”
“Is it my fault?” Susan found herself asking. The question, the instinct was automatic and had nothing to do with Susan Abbott.
“Naaaah,” Mary said with a precocious shrug. “Mummy dear will use any excuse. She’ll get drunk tonight, she’ll have a hangover tomorrow, and then she’ll behave through the rest of the wedding. She probably won’t go on another bender for at least a month. By then you’ll be long gone.”
“I hope so,” Susan muttered, mainly to herself. “But what about you?”
Mary shrugged. “I keep out of her way when she gets like this. Don’t worry about me, Lou. I’m good at taking care of myself. You taught me that.”
Susan looked at the child who would one day be her mother. Mary Abbott had always seemed serene, able to weather the storms of life with surprising equanimity. She’d obviously learned it young.
“You said Ned Marsden is downstairs?”
“Do you know any other Neddie? He’s over here every night. He wouldn’t like it if he knew lick was hanging around. He was always jealous of Jimmy, you know.”
Susan took a deep breath. “Jimmy,” she echoed. The dead war hero.
For a moment Mary looked preternaturally old, worried and maternal. “What’s wrong with you, Lou? And why haven’t you dressed for dinner? You know Neddie’s got an even worse temper than Daddy, and he’s expecting you.”
“I don’t suppose you could convince them I wasn’t feeling well,” Susan suggested weakly.
“Not without having all of them troop up here to check on you. Why don’t you tell me what’s wrong and I’ll see what I can do to fix it.”
“You’re nine years old. What can you do?”
“Well, at least you remember that much,” Mary said. “You had me worried for a moment Jack told me you were acting like you’d never seen him before in your life, but I figured he was making things up. He’s a writer, after all, even if it’s supposed to be tire truth, Daddy says most journalists are born liars.”
“He’s a journalist?”
Mary came up to her and placed her small hands on Susan’s larger ones. Foreign ones, with a big, gaudy diamond ring and nail polish. “What’s wrong with you, Lou?” she asked quietly.
Susan looked at the little girl who seemed to be both her sister and her mother, and she didn’t even hesitate.
“I’m not Tallulah.”
Seven
Mary Abbott blinked. “You’re not my sister?” she echoed. “Funny, you could have fooled me. How come you look like her, talk like her, dress like her and happen to be in the middle of her bedroom, wearing her dressing gown?”
Susan shook her head. It had been a crazy impulse to blurt out the truth. Not only would Mary Abbott not believe her, but she’d think she was crazy, as well.
She turned her face away from the little girl who would someday know her far too well. “Sony, just a stupid joke on my part,” she said in a deliberately casual voice. “Tell Mom I’ll be down as soon as I change.”
Mary didn’t say a word, but Susan could feel her calm blue eyes surveying her. “You don’t call her Mom,” she said finally. “You call her Mummy, or Mother if you’re annoyed with her, or sometimes even Elda. But you don’t call her Mom.”
Susan kept her back turned. “My mistake,” she said. “Go away and let me get changed.”
