The Yonahlossee Riding Camp For Girls Part 28

"Sissy."

She gave a little gasp. It was satisfying to shock her. He watched me impa.s.sively. Did he know me so well that he had predicted what was coming? Had he felt it this morning, had he insisted on accompanying Mrs. Holmes to her office? That would have meant that he knew me better than I knew myself, because I hadn't even known I would go this far. And no one knew me that well.

"I know someone says she saw Sissy in the woods. With Boone Roberts from Harris Academy?" I couldn't keep my voice from lilting into a question. Mrs. Holmes had stopped her pruning, now held a leaf in midair, her mouth parted. "But it wasn't her. It was me."

Now she looked confused, an expression I had never seen cross her face before. She looked mystified, for an instant, before she composed herself. She should have been headmaster, not her husband. And for all practical purposes, she was.

"Yes?" she asked. "And? Tell us."

I hadn't been sure I'd be able to do what I had to do next. But the way Mrs. Holmes used "us," the way she gestured at me like I was harmless, nothing more than a girl-Mr. Holmes caught my eye, and I suddenly felt so exhausted. So reckless.

I looked Mrs. Holmes in the eye. "Ask Eva," I said. "My bed was empty." I paused. My voice wavered, and I took a deep breath. When I spoke again my voice was clear. "Sissy is loved. Her family is loved. No one will want to see her go, least of all her father, her grandfather." I didn't need to spell out what I meant; if nothing else, Mrs. Holmes was a shrewd woman. "Especially if they think it might be a mistake. And I'll see to it that they think it's a mistake. People won't care as much when I am sent home." I shook my head. "Do you see? It won't get you anywhere, punis.h.i.+ng Sissy."

"I see," Mrs. Holmes said. "I see perfectly well. How interesting all of this is. But let me ask you this: Have you thought about what got you here? Have you thought that perhaps it is best for Sissy to be sent to a place where she will not be tempted?"

I looked at her in wonder. "Where would that be? We're already on the top of a mountain."

Mrs. Holmes turned briefly to her husband, as if to say, Do you see this girl in front of me, so impudent, so presumptuous? She shook her head, gave a hard little laugh. Mr. Holmes looked outside the window again, and I knew he wanted nothing more than to be absent from this. He would never help me; he was not capable of it. Mrs. Holmes had always handled the disciplining of the girls, the unpleasant parts of keeping order.

"You're so lovely, Thea, just like your mother was. So lovely. Do you think you own the world? Do you think you have any say in what the world does with you? So lovely, so naive."

"Beth," Mr. Holmes said, a warning, but she acted as if she hadn't heard him.

She crumpled the dead leaf in her fist and flung it into the wastebasket.

"Your mind works in ways I do not understand, Thea. Usually I understand all my girls. You will pretend to have gone behind Sissy's back with her fiance?"

I must have looked surprised-and I was-because she continued.

"Yes, I knew they were engaged. I know everything, Thea." She smiled, and pressed a finger to her lips. "I don't think you really want to go home."

I thought of how regal my house looked on a gray day, its stately lines illuminated by the sky like ash behind it. I wanted to go to that home, the home of my childhood, the home that included Georgie, the home where my family loved me without reservation. But that home was gone now, sold to strangers.

"How could you want to go home?" she asked, her voice softer. "Do you know why they sent you here?"

Mr. Holmes's hand encircled his wife's upper arm, gently, as if she were a child. "Enough, Beth."

But of course I knew why they had sent me here. I almost laughed.

Mrs. Holmes ignored her husband. "They thought you might be carrying a child," she said. She stared at me, but it was she who looked stricken, not I. "They would have known soon enough, but your mother always was a worrier," she said, and turned her head sharply. "Henry. You're hurting me."

I could see how tightly Mr. Holmes gripped his wife's arm. "That's enough," he said quietly. "There's no use in all this."

"She'd rather I deal with the poor child, I suppose. I was always the problem-solver, between the two of us. I used to think that pretty girls didn't have to worry so much about the mechanics of life, the simple procedures. But your father, what of him? He's a doctor, he would have known soon enough whether or not you carried your cousin's child." She gave a little gasp, and put her hand over her mouth. Mr. Holmes let go, then, and Mrs. Holmes ma.s.saged her arm where his hand had been, a faraway look in her eyes. Her face had softened. I thought of all her plants in their slender bottles. It seemed incredible that she felt any sympathy for me. It was so easy to deceive people.

"She needed to know," Mrs. Holmes said, breaking the silence. Then she turned to me. "She should know what awaits her at home."

I shook my head, though no response was required of me. I remembered Mother checking my sheets every day before I left. I remembered what Mrs. Holmes had said when I first met her, to see her if I noticed anything about my body. Of course.

"It's not a surprise," I said quietly. It would have been a surprise if Mrs. Holmes had told me that Georgie was well again, that Mother had forgiven me. That my parents had considered and acted upon the worst possible scenario was really no surprise at all.

"I'll have to make an announcement, you know. I'll have to make an example of you."

"I know," I said quietly.

Mrs. Holmes spoke again, softly now; I had to strain to hear her. "Do you know why your mother was friends with someone like me? We didn't travel in the same circles, no. You'd never even heard of me when you came here. . . ." She trailed off, then shook her head, quickly, and continued. "Your mother was something of a fast girl at Miss Pet.i.t's. Not unlike you, Thea. I was Miss Pet.i.t's favorite. Your mother was given a choice: leave in disgrace, or align herself with me. She wasn't stupid, your mother. She fell into line. But I like to think that we were friends. I like to think that eventually she loved me as I loved her." She did not know about me and Mr. Holmes; of that I felt certain. A small mercy.

"My mother was fast?" I asked.

"Oh," Mrs. Holmes said. "The fastest." Her faraway voice had returned.

- In the dining hall the tables were still being set. Docey looked at me curiously, and I smiled at her, eager to be kind to someone. Emmy was nowhere to be seen. I sat on a bench out of everyone's way. The smell of frying bacon was so pungent I felt sick to my stomach. More girls streamed in, their eyes small from sleep. They barely glanced in my direction as they pa.s.sed by; strangely, I felt a vague sense of disappointment. I didn't matter anymore. I glanced at the clock; I had spent only ten minutes in Mrs. Holmes's office, which seemed impossible.

What were Mr. and Mrs. Holmes doing right now in her office? Perhaps a.s.signing blame, deciding whose fault it was that a girl-two girls, if Sissy was counted-had slipped from their grasp. Or perhaps Mr. Holmes was soothing his wife, had drawn her near, was telling her that this strange thing that had just happened, with Thea Atwell from Florida, was fine, would be fine.

I closed my eyes against the movement in the dining hall and put my head in my hands. There was a dull ache at the nape of my neck.

I had destroyed one family, and then come close to destroying another. The pain in my head deepened, I didn't know how I would be able to rouse myself when Sissy came in.

Sissy was late, of course. I would wait. I saw Katherine Hayes walk in, chatting with Leona, which was odd. Alice Hunt gaped at them. I almost smiled-I'd never seen a person look so astonished.

Mrs. Holmes burst through the stairwell, her face red. Mr. Holmes followed close behind, speaking urgently under his breath. Girls turned in their chairs, startled. Leona and Katherine stopped in their tracks. We'd never seen Mr. and Mrs. Holmes exchange a harsh word. To see them fight, openly-this was unheard of. Everyone started whispering, all at once, the hum of all those voices torture. I shut my eyes, put my hands over my ears.

"Thea?" A tap on my shoulder. I opened my eyes. Docey, with her darting eye. "Are you all right?" she whispered.

Beyond Docey I saw Sissy enter the Castle with Eva. Everyone turned in her direction, the whispering died down, and I watched Sissy notice-scan the room, slowly, put her hand to her throat. I put my own hand to my throat. I'd never seen Sissy frightened before. I saw Henny whisper something to Jettie. She was so typical, Henny-I understood then that's what I'd always hated about her. Of course she would look smug. She was too dull to seem any other way.

Mrs. Holmes raised her voice at the other end of the room, and everyone looked away from Sissy.

"Thea," Docey said, more urgently, "you should go. Go!" she said again, and tried to pull me up.

Time was operating according to a different clock. Everything was moving too slowly. Mrs. Holmes watched Mr. Holmes wind his way through the tables, now set with platters of thick fried bacon, tureens of oatmeal; he was searching for something, as he walked, quickly checking each table, girl after girl averting her eyes. He stopped at my table, and Mary Abbott pointed behind him, and Mr. Holmes followed her finger to me.

Everyone was deadly silent, the hum evaporated. He tilted his head to the door, as if we were alone, back in his library, surrounded by all of his books. Have you read all of them? I'd asked. Most, he'd said, and laughed. I'm old. I've had plenty of time to read. I'd smiled, because he was so young, we both knew that. Then I'd accepted his hand, let him pull me from the couch.

Now, in this dining hall where I'd eaten hundreds of meals, Mr. Holmes still seemed young, if being young meant you seemed untouched by the world. He wasn't untouched, I knew that better than anyone, but he didn't seem haunted, there was no eerie look in his eyes. He looked like an immortal.

He pointed a thumb to the door, and Martha Ladue, who was sitting a table away from me, gasped, a flush spreading over her white skin.

Follow me, he'd said that afternoon, but that was just a formality, a thing he said. I would have followed him anywhere. He took me upstairs, to a room I'd never entered. All done up in pink, with a narrow white bed. Sarabeth's room. I didn't understand why he had brought me here. He retrieved something from her dresser, a pretty marble-topped piece, while I was hungrily taking in the room, and put it in my hands. Look, he'd said, and he'd seemed suddenly shy, his hair falling over his eyes.

But now, in the dining room, I knew it was no longer true. I would not follow him anywhere. I would have, for a moment, and that's how it had been with Georgie, too. I would have followed him anywhere for a moment, and then the moment ended.

I shook my head, and Mr. Holmes watched me in that fierce way of his, as if he were inventorying my soul, and then he left. I looked to the head table; his children weren't here. He would have taken them away had they been. He would go to them now. This was where he would always be. I would leave, but he never could.

"Girls," Mrs. Holmes said, and stepped up to Mr. Holmes's lectern, where he usually led morning prayer, "your attention for a moment. An announcement." She was fl.u.s.tered, her voice unsteady, her hands fluttering in front of her. That I had undone her brought me no pleasure.

But the view, always the view: she stood in front of the window, the same window I had touched nearly a year ago, when Father had dismissed me from Mr. Holmes's office. She was framed by the mountains; despite everything, I could still sight a marvel. Both then and now.

"Theodora Atwell is leaving us. Tomorrow morning. It is all very sudden, of course." Girls started to whisper again, as I'd known they would, as I'd known what Mrs. Holmes would do as soon as I'd seen her enter the dining hall. It was an odd sort of comfort, to know all this and not be frightened.

"For an infraction. Involving a young man." The din grew louder, and Mrs. Holmes raised her voice. "I expect that there will be no more talk concerning this matter. You are ladies, and ladies do not gossip." She looked at me then, across the room.

In Sarabeth's room, I'd looked at what he'd handed me. A photograph of a much younger Henry Holmes in a silver frame that needed to be polished, Mrs. Holmes's absence wrought in little ways like this. Me, he'd said. Me when I was your age. He stood in front of a lake, holding a paddle. He looked directly at the camera, as men always did. He looked the same, except his face was fuller, not chiseled into handsomeness by time. I touched the gla.s.s. So handsome, I'd said. But what I'd meant was this: So new.

"And let this be a lesson, girls, to act your age. To obey the rules."

Sissy looked at me from across the room, along with everyone else, a slow dawning illuminating her delicate features. She knew. She looked away, out the window, touching the diamond horseshoe that rested in the hollow of her neck, and for an instant I thought that what Mrs. Holmes had predicted might be the case: Sissy would believe I had betrayed her. She backed out of the door, everyone watching.

Mrs. Holmes watched me. Then I felt Docey's hand on my shoulder. I took it, and held it, and though Docey's hand was tense at first, she didn't take it away. I could tell by feel that we had matching calluses-mine from riding, hers from the constant work of putting things in order. Our hands felt the same.

- I found Sissy in the woods, where she and Boone went. She sat on a fallen log, crying into her hands.

I told her what I had done, and gradually, her crying stopped. I sat so close to her I could smell her. That's what sleeping in her bed a dozen times had earned me-recognizing the scent, surprisingly pungent, she left on her pillow.

"You'll sleep in the infirmary tonight. That's where they'll put you, before they send you away for good." Still she wouldn't look at me. I tapped her shoulder, and she turned to me, her wide-set eyes swollen.

"Thank you," she said, her voice even more jagged, from the crying. "It was a brave thing to do."

"There's proof. Eva noticed that I was gone that night. I told Mrs. Holmes to ask her."

"Eva wouldn't tell."

Of course Eva would tell, if it was me versus Sissy. "It doesn't matter. She won't ask."

"No," Sissy said, "she believes you, along with everyone else." Her voice broke.

"Mrs. Holmes doesn't believe me. She saw right through it. Through me." I took Sissy's hand. "I'm sorry."

"I know." She flung her hand in the air, as if to say, We're done with all that. That gesture never left me. In my darkest hours I would recall it, extract it from the recesses of my mind. "But who will I talk to, now that you're leaving?"

I thought then that it was always a matter of exchanging one thing for another, losing one kind of love for a new kind.

"And why do you want to go home, Thea? I don't understand."

I smiled. She was right to ask that question: Why did I want to go home? My family didn't want me. "I want to help you. And my brother. I need to see my brother."

She nodded. "But your reputation. What will your parents think?"

I looked away. That was what I feared most, but I couldn't tell Sissy. I would be leaving this place in shame, which was exactly the opposite of how I wanted to leave it. I wanted my parents to love me; no, they had always loved me, I was their child-I wanted them to like me again. And leaving this way, in the midst of a scandal-I had made sure they would not. But better me than Sissy, who still had a chance; in my heart, I knew I was ruined in Mother's eyes; one scandal or twenty, it didn't truly matter. The Thea I had been had disappeared, a puff of smoke.

"I think I am a lost cause, to my parents."

Sissy looked like she might start to cry again. She grabbed my hand. "That is awful, Thea. The most awful thing I've ever heard."

"It's not the most awful thing I've ever heard," I said. "There's worse. I need to do what's good, Sissy. I need to help my brother. I need to be a right girl."

- I wandered the Castle the afternoon before I left Yonahlossee, sneaking out of the infirmary, which wasn't at all hard to do. No one watched me. I knew by the bells that it was rest hour. Sam would know I was coming home, by now. Mother would have told him. Surely he would be glad to see me, in his heart if not in his head.

I'd left a book in one of my cla.s.srooms. But the book didn't matter so much. I had become attached to this place, and I wanted to see where I'd gone first when I'd arrived almost a year ago, once more before I returned to Florida.

I knew what to expect, now, the rapid process by which Yonahlossee would turn alien.

The dining room was clear of the chaos of this morning. I tried to memorize each detail as it lay: the table where I had eaten hundreds of meals; the s.p.a.ce where Mr. Holmes had stood and talked to us of G.o.d.

I climbed the stairs to the third floor, to see it for the last time, but perhaps I knew, somehow, that Mrs. Holmes would be in her cla.s.sroom.

She leaned against the window in an odd posture, her forehead on gla.s.s, her open hand pressed against the wall, as if she were trying to push her way through. I knew the view very well: she was in the mountains, only a window between her and them. I thought she might be crying.

And then she turned and I drew back, certain she had seen me. But she went to a desk, where Decca sat, drawing. Mrs. Holmes smiled, and pointed to something on the paper. Decca nodded. I watched them for too long, Decca engrossed in her drawing-she kept looking at the window, and I realized she was drawing the mountains-and Mrs. Holmes watching, her face constantly moving-her lips, her forehead-in response to Decca's work. She looked pleased. They both did.

When I left, I wound my way behind the cabins-I was meeting Sissy-so that in case Mrs. Holmes returned to the window she would not see me.

- A kitchen girl I didn't know by name brought my dinner to the infirmary. I tossed and turned against the hard mattress all night. I was going to see my parents soon. My brother. What had they been told? I was doubly bad, returned to them for the same sin for which I had been cast out.

The door opened. There was no lock, and for an instant I thought Mr. Holmes had come to see me, and I was so happy.

But the silhouette belonged to a girl. I sat up and turned on the lamp. Mary Abbott.

"Why are you leaving?" she asked in a normal tone of voice.

"Shh. Because I was bad." I sighed. "You shouldn't be here."

"But you weren't bad!" She knelt down next to my bed. "I know who was bad."

My stomach dropped. I remembered the night I'd lain in Sissy's bed and Mary Abbott had called out.

"She shouldn't have done that. She shouldn't have sneaked away all the time." She paused. "But don't be mad at me."

"I won't," I said, "I promise. Just tell me everything."

"I didn't tell Mrs. Holmes."

"Who did you tell?" I whispered slowly, as if I were coaxing a small child.

"Henny," she whispered, her eyes wide. "Henny."

"Oh," I said, and lay back against the iron headboard. "Oh."

"She asked!" Mary Abbott said defensively. "She heard rumors, it was something all the girls have been talking about for such a long time, and then I saw Sissy."

"The night of the dance," I said.

She shrugged. "Lots of nights. I know where they go. I've known for a long time. Sometimes I follow them." She seemed proud.

"You watch them?" I asked incredulously.

She shook her head quickly. "Just for a second, two seconds. Just to see Sissy's safe. I love her, too," she said. "Like you."