“I have to talk with her.Please, John.Let me by.”
“What do you have to talk with her about?”
“Something.”
“What is it?”
Pam wasn’t about to share her excitement with him.“Nothing special.”
“You’re in a pretty big rush for nothing special.Couldn’t you even stop to take off your coat?”
Her coat was the last thing on her mind.“Let me by, John!”She aimed her voice up the stairs.“Mom?Mom!”
“I said, she’s resting.”
“I just have to ask her something quick.”She tried to move his arm, but it wouldn’t budge.Taking another breath, she hollered, “Mom?"
“Shut up, Pam, and leave her be.”Grasping her arm in one very large hand, he began to propel her back down the stairs.
“Let me go,” she protested, squirming.Freed after a step or two, she turned on him.“Who do you think you are?You’re not my father, and you’re not my guard.She’smymother, not yours.If I want to see her, I have a right to!”
“Not when she has other things on her mind.”
“She always has other things on her mind, because you come home and talk about work, work, work with her.Well, this is important.I have to speak to her now.It can’t wait.”
“It’ll just have to, princess, because you’re not going up there yet—”
“John?”Patricia called from the top of the stairs.She was wearing a silk robe and was combing her hair back with her fingers.“It’s all right, John.What is it, Pamela?”
Pam heard the annoyance in her voice and blamed it on John.“I have to ask you something, and he won’t let me.”She tried to dodge him once again, but he deftly shifted his body and continued to block her way.There was no need for him to do it, since her mother was up, but he wasenjoying himself, she realized.He was enjoying her frustration.So she promptly stopped fighting him and moved back down the stairs until she could look up at Patricia around his towering frame.“The Claflins asked me to go to North Conway with them this weekend.They’re leaving right after dinner and will be back Sunday night.Can I go?”
“What’s in North Conway?”Patricia asked.
“They have a house there.It’s less than five minutes from the mountain, Laurie says.”
“Skiing,” John told Patricia.“You can’t go,” he said to Pam.“You’ve never been skiing before.You’ll break a leg.”
Ignoring him, Pam pleaded with her mother.“There’s a ski school at the bottom of the mountain.I’ll take lessons.That’s what Laurie does.Please, Mom?I’ve always wanted to go skiing.”
“You have not,” John argued.“But you and every other little teenager is dreaming about bumping into Jean Claude Killy on the slopes.He won’t be there, princess, and the boys who will be will laugh when you fall.”The doorbell rang.“If you wanted to ski, you should have started when you were little.”He scowled when she turned and ran toward the door.“For God’s sake, Pam, we have a butler.”
Not one to stand on ceremony, she opened the door herself.“Hillary,” she breathed in relief.Despite their shaky start, she and Hillary had become friends.Hillary wasn’t exactly a flower child like the ones on the Common, but she’d loosened up since she’d been at college.Pam thought she looked wonderful.Her eyes were lined in black, her hair was parted in the middle, worn long and loose, andher coat was open over a dress that was far more mini than anything Patricia would allow Pam to wear.“Am I glad you’re here.Have you ever been skiing?”
Hillary regarded her quizzically, then looked past her toward John.The quizzical look became one of interest when she saw his state of dishabille.“Skiing?”Then she caught sight of Patricia at the top of the stairs, and her eyes shot back to Pam.“Sure I have.It’s fun.”
“When did you first go?”
“Three years ago, when I was a freshman.”
“And you didn’t break a leg?”
“Of course not.”
Pam turned a triumphant smile on John before transferring the smile, minus the triumph, to Patricia.“See?It’s perfectly safe.Laurie says I can rent skis and stuff there.I already have a parka.All I have to do is buy ski pants and heavy socks and long underwear.”
“But they’re leaving tonight,” Patricia protested.
“We have this afternoon.”
