Casteel - Dark Angel Part 18

"Yes, Miss Casteel, I'll tell Mr. Troy that you called. He's out for the day."

Unsettled and disconcerted to think Troy wasn't where he should be, I used the elevator again, to find Logan waiting in the hotel lobby for me. He rose politely when I advanced, but didn't smile. "What can I do for you now?"

My hands rose to my forehead. I had four hours before my flight left for Boston.

"Reverend Wise, I have to see him. But I can make it there on my own." My eyes lowered to study his hands while I began my apology. "I'm sorry I was ugly acting. I thank you for helping me, Logan. I wish you all sorts of happiness. You don't need to do anything else for me. From now on take care of myself."

For the longest time I felt his eyes on my face, as if trying to read my mind. Then, not responding with words, he took my arm and led me to his parked car, and while we were on our slow way, he tried to answer my question.

"Does Pa come often to visit Grandpa?"

"I think he comes when he can."

Logan didn't say another word until he let me out on Main Street, directly in front of the parsonage, where the Reverend Wayland Wise lived with his wife, and infant daughter.

"Thank you again," I said stiffly. "But you don't have to wait."

"Who is going to carry your bags and put them in your rented car . . . if you still have a rented car?" he asked with irony.

So he waited, insisting on doing that, and I tried not to stumble or wobble as I made my way up the walkway recently swept free of all storm debris. Once I had reached the high porch, I turned to see Logan waiting patiently, his head slightly bowed, as if he'd fallen asleep behind the wheel from the fatigue of waiting on me night and day.

And as I stood there and waited for someone to respond to my knock, a terrible anger washed over me, erasing my weakness and giving me sudden strength.

The Reverend and his wife had no right to steal f.a.n.n.y's baby! He had seduced f.a.n.n.y when she was just a child, a minor! Fourteen years old. Statutory rape!

Yes, I was here to bring into the family fold at least one child to replace the two I'd lost. Though I doubted very much that f.a.n.n.y should be the one to raise the child.

It was Rosalynn Wise herself who came to respond to my sharp raps on her door. She scowled to see me, though surprise didn't show in her eyes. It was as if she knew from my visit to the church eight days ago that sooner or later I'd show up. As usual, she wore a dark, unflattering dress that succeeded admirably in making her look like a stick wearing clothes.

"We have nothing to say to you," she said in greeting. "Kindly take yourself off our porch and don't come back."

And like f.a.n.n.y had in the past, she prepared to slam the door in my face, but I was ready this time. Stepping forward I shoved her aside and entered the house. "You have a great deal of explaining to do," I said in my coldest sharpest tone. (I'd learned a great deal in Boston on how to act imperious.) "Take me to your husband."

"He's not here."

She moved to keep me from going farther. "You get out! You and your sister have caused enough trouble." Her long, lean face took on the pious air of those in contact with filth.

"Oh, so now you admit f.a.n.n.y is my sister. How interesting. Whatever happened to Louisa Wise?"

"Who was that at the front door?" called the Reverend in the kind of ordinary voice he must reserve for at-home use.

His voice led me to his study, where the door was partially open, and I stepped inside, despite all his wife did to prevent this. Now that I was confronting the most influential man in Winnerrow, I longed for stronger health, for all the words I'd had ready to say before fever came and stole them from my memory.

Half-rising from his chair, "Waysie" Wise smiled in a pleasant way, and that left me at a loss. I'd come expecting to catch them both at a disadvantage. It wasn't quite ten o'clock. Yet she was dressed, and so was he. The. only concession he gave to at-home comfort were black velvet house slippers lined with red satin. For some odd reason those exotic, elegant slippers threw me.

"Aha!" he said, rubbing his dry palms together, his full, handsome face taking on a blank, smooth look. "I do believe it's one of my sheep coming to be embraced, at last, into the fold." He couldn't have found better words to restore my fighting ego. As if I'd been born for this day I felt a rising sense of justification and satisfaction to have a good reason for telling him my opinion of what he was. He seated himself again in his high-backed, comfortable chair before the fireplace where fake flowers took the place of the grate. With care he chose a cigar from a bra.s.s box lined with red cedar that was near his chair; he snipped off the end, checked it over with scrutinizing eyes, and only then did he light it. All this time I was left standing.

Obviously they weren't going to invite me to sit down. I strode forward and selected the twin to his chair and sat. I crossed my legs and watched his eyes as they traveled over my legs, which Troy had told me many times were very shapely. My shoes were brand new.

Lazily, the Reverend's dark, sloe eyes looked me over. Smoldering interest thrived deep in those eyes, and gradually it drifted to the forefront and forced him to smile disarmingly. A smile so sweet it was no wonder someone as naive as f.a.n.n.y had been taken in. Even up close he was a very good-looking man. He had good features, a clear complexion, and robust good health that made his ruddy skin glow. His extra pounds were just beginning to hint at middle age, though later I suspected he'd go from paunchy immediately to obesity.

"Yesss . . . I do believe I've seen you before," he said in a throaty, flattering way, "though forgetting the name of such a lovely girl is simply not my way, absolutely not my way."

When I'd entered this house, I hadn't the foggiest idea of how to approach him, but his very words had given me exactly the impetus I needed. He was afraid. He'd hide behind a guise of innocence.

"You haven't forgotten my name," I said in a pleasant way, swinging my foot and making my high heel a threatening weapon. "No one ever forgets my name. Heaven Leigh has its own distinction, wouldn't you say?"

And all that coughing had done something tor my throat, something that made it different, slightly hoa.r.s.e, and my time in Boston had given my voice a certain sophisticated s.e.xiness that surprised even me. "f.a.n.n.y is very well, thank you for asking, Reverend Wise. f.a.n.n.y sends her best regards."

I smiled at him, feeling a kind of power growing just because I could tell he was taken with my youth and beauty. I suspected he'd been an easy foil for f.a.n.n.y's seduction, even though he was a man of the cloth. "f.a.n.n.y is very appreciative to both you and your wife for taking such good care of her daughter, but now that she has given up a stage career and will soon settle down to married life, she wants her child back."

He didn't blanch or blink an eye, though behind me I heard his wife gasp, then sob.

"Why isn't Louisa here to speak for herself?" he asked in a soft purr.

I tried to find exactly the right words. "f.a.n.n.y trusts me to say what she cannot say without crying. She regrets her hasty decision to sell her unborn child. She knows now that a woman can never be the same after giving birth. Her arms ache to hold her little girl. And she isn't asking that you take a great loss, for I have come prepared to repay you the ten thousand dollars." His smile stayed pasted on. He even managed to talk while still smiling. "I really don't understand what you mean. What ten thousand? What do my wife and I have to do with f.a.n.n.y's baby? We realize, of course, that dear Louisa was free with her s.e.xual favors, being hill-born and hill-trained, and wild as a b.i.t.c.h in heat, and if she sold her baby and regrets it, indeed we are sorry . . ."

Standing, I strode to his desk and picked up a silver-framed studio portrait of a child about four months old. The baby smiled into the camera lens with f.a.n.n.y's own dark eyes, true Casteel Indian eyes. The little girl's mop of hair was not straight and coa.r.s.e like f.a.n.n.y's, but soft and curly, as the hair of the Reverend must have been when he was an infant. And oh, she was lovely, this baby that f.a.n.n.y had so heedlessly sold. Plump, dimpled hands, a tiny little ring on one finger. Sweet little white dress with lace and embroidery. A cherished, pampered, beloved daughter.

Suddenly the portrait was s.n.a.t.c.hed from my hands!

"Get out of here!" screamed Rosalynn Wise. "Wayland, why do you sit and talk to her! Throw her out!"

"I came prepared to pay for f.a.n.n.y's child," I stated coldly. "You can accept twenty thousand dollars. Ten thousand for your care of the child. If you don't I will call in the police, and tell them what you did when you drove to our cabin and paid my father five hundred dollars for f.a.n.n.y. I will tell the city authorities that you used f.a.n.n.y as your slave to do housework. I will tell them that their good minister molested and s.e.xually abused a fourteen-year-old girl, and forced her to have his child because his wife was barren . . ."

The Reverend stood up.

He towered above me, his eyes turning into cruel, dark river stones. "You have threat in your voice, girl. I don't like that. A hill-sc.u.m Casteel can't threaten me, not with your tone, not with your fierce glare and your silly words. I know all about you and your kind." His confident smile came back as he sought to intimidate me. "Louisa has not called or written to us, after all we did to make her happy and comfortable. Yet it's often that way with our Lord's chosen , . . to try and be the good Samaritan, and in turn be given nothing but malice from those who should be grateful."

He intoned other words, quotes from the Bible that were apt, as if in a million years I could never disturb his equilibrium.

"Stop!" I yelled. "You bought my sister from my father." I named the day and the year. "And my brother Tom and I were there as witnesses to swear this took place in our cabin." I paused, watching him slip his large feet out of the velvet slippers and into loose loafers before he moved to sit ponderously behind his immense desk, kept exceptionally neat. When he settled back in his swivel chair, he tipped it far back, then templed his fingers beneath his chin. He held his hands clasped like that very high so his mouth was hidden. It was only then I found out the lips combined with the eyes made for the best mindreading abilities. Now I had only his eyes, and they were hooded.

"You can't come to me and make demands, girl. You may wear diamonds, and costly raiment, but you are still a Casteel. And between your word and mine . . who do you think those in authority will believe?"

I found my own confident smile. "Darcy looks like f.a.n.n.y."

His smile turned oily and evil. "Let's not debate a proven fact. We have papers to prove my wife gave birth to a baby girl on the third day in February of this year. What legal proof do you have to indicate that f.a.n.n.y has even had a baby?"

My smile wavered, then grew strong. "Stretch marks. Does your wife have those? Fingerprints. Footprints. We Casteels are not quite as dumb as you think. f.a.n.n.y stole a copy of her daughter's birth certificate. On that certificate she is named as the mother, not your wife. You had a forgery made--how will that sit with those in authority?"

Behind me Rosalynn Wise groaned.

The Reverend blinked his eyes once or twice. And I knew I had them! And I had lied! As far as I knew f.a.n.n.y didn't have any proof. None whatsoever.

"No man would ever need go to the trouble of seducing your promiscuous sister!" yelled Rosalynn Wise, her face gone paper white as she backed toward the door.

My head jerked higher. "That is beside the point. The point being, Reverend Wise took advantage of a fourteen-year-old girl. He, a man sworn to the cloth, fathered f.a.n.n.y's baby when she was a minor! A baby that this honorable minister now tells everyone was conceived in his wife's own womb! It can easily be proven by a physical examination that your wife has never given birth. f.a.n.n.y wants her little girl. I want her to have her daughter. I have come to take Darcy home to her mother."

Rosalynn Wise whimpered like a beaten dog.

But the Reverend hadn't finished his battle.

The Reverend's eyes turned harder, colder. "I know who you are. Your maternal grandmother married into the Tatterton Toy clan. And so you have millions behind you, and you think that gives you power to wield over me. Darcy is my daughter, and I will fight you tooth and nail to see she stays here in my house and not in the home of a tramp. So get out, and stay out!"

"I will go to the police!" I cried with my own anger growing.

"Go on. Do everything you say. See if anyone believes you. There isn't one soul in this city that doesn't know what f.a.n.n.y Casteel is, and was, and will always be. My congregation will sympathize with me. Knowing that in my own home that wicked, sinful girl did steal into my bed and with her lewd, naked body that she pressed against me, she seduced me, for I am only a man, and human . . . pitifully, shamefully human."

It was his scornful winning smirk that made me say without hesitation, despite his clever plea, "You either give me Darcy so I can take her to f.a.n.n.y, or I will enter your church tonight and stand in front of your congregation and tell them exactly what transpired on the day you bought f.a.n.n.y for your own s.e.xual gratification! And I believe they will be shocked and outraged. You could have left her alone! You have just admitted that you knew what f.a.n.n.y was before you brought her into your home--and still you did it! You deliberately put temptation in your home, and you failed to resist that temptation! In the case of the Devil versus Reverend Wayland Wise, the Devil won. And I know your congregation. They will not forgive you!"

The Reverend thoughtfully eyed me as if I were still only a white p.a.w.n on his chessboard, and if he could but move his black queen he'd find a way yet to thwart me.

"I hear you've been sick," he said in a soft, conversational voice. "You don't look well, girl, not well at all. And by the way, what do you think of that nice house your grandfather is living in? Do you believe your paltry gifts could build such a fine log cabin? Out of the kindness of my heart I took from my own pocket the extra money needed to see that cabin was finished after the foundation was laid, so the great-grandfather of my daughter would have enough cash to see it through. For I am human . . . pitifully, shamefully human."

Minutes pa.s.sed, many minutes, and the Reverend never moved his eyes from my face.

I heard the baby wailing upstairs, as if suddenly awakened from a nap. I turned to see Rosalynn Wise carrying f.a.n.n.y's child. And when I saw her tearful eyes, her red pouting lips, dark curling hair, and very fair skin, I was more than touched by her beauty. I was also touched by her small hand that clung tightly to the fingers of the only mother she knew. And then my storm of rage began to break, and I realized that f.a.n.n.y was only using Darcy as an instrument of revenge. What was I doing here upsetting this baby and her mother? And all the time the Reverend droned on and on, filling my ears with just what I didn't want to think about.

"I had a feeling one day you would come after me, Heaven Casteel. You used to sit on a back pew and stare at me with those clear blue eyes of yours, and you questioned every word that left my lips. I could tell by your face that you wanted to believe, needed to believe, and were trying hard to believe, and yet I could never put the words in the right order to convince you that there is a G.o.d, a loving, caring G.o.d. So I began to judge all my sermons by your reaction to them . . . and once in a great while it seemed I did manage to reach you. Then that day came when your granny died, and I said the words over her grave, and over the tiny grave of that stillborn child of your stepmother; I felt a complete failure. I knew I would never reach you, for you don't want to be reached. You seek to control your own destiny, when that is not totally possible. You want no help from man, and none from G.o.d."

"I didn't come for a lecture on what you think I am," I said stiffly. "You don't know me."

He jumped to put himself always in front of me. His eyelids parted to mere slots so his eyes glittered in the shade of his lids. "You are wrong, Heaven Leigh Casteel. I do know you very well. You are the most dangerous kind of female the world can ever know. You carry the seeds for your own destruction, and the destruction of everyone who loves you. And a great many will love you for your beautiful face, for your seductive body; but you will fail them all, because you will believe they all fail you first. You are an idealist of the most devastatingly tragic kind--the romantic idealist. Born to destroy and self-destruct!"

His solemn, hateful, pitying eyes gazed at me, seemingly staring through me and reading my mind.

"Now it's time for me to discuss my daughter, Darcy. I did not, as you said, bring your sister into my home with anything but good intentions, hoping to help by taking one more mouth to feed from your father at the time of his great distress. You refuse to believe that, I can tell by your expression. Rose and I have done what we think G.o.d wanted us to do. We legally adopted (and we have papers signed by your sister) the child your sister gave birth to. And now to tell you the real truth, if your father had not shoved his second daughter at us so forcefully, I would have chosen you! Do you hear that? You! Now ask me why." When I only stared at him with shock, he answered himself. "I wanted to explore at close hand your resistance to G.o.d . . ."

Contemplating me with serious eyes, with compa.s.sionate eyes, with eyes expert at concealing duplicity, I realized I was no match for anyone as clever as Reverend Wayland Wise, and it was no wonder he had managed to become the richest man in our area of the state. Even knowing all the games he played to gain respect from those too ignorant to know better, I was feeling snared in the same web as any stupid fly.

"Stop talking, please stop!"

Flooded with guilt, I knew I had lost everything. Tom was already headed for his goal, and he didn't need me. Keith and Our Jane were wise enough even when they were young to turn away from a destructive sister. Grandpa, living where he most wanted to be, close to his Annie, in a mountain cabin ten times better than he had any right to expect, would lose his home. I was cras.h.i.+ng the world down on everyone's head.

My fever seemed to come back. I slumped in the chair. A hot flush of nerves rose up from my waist and tingled behind my ears. f.a.n.n.y didn't need this baby. f.a.n.n.y had refused to do one thing for Keith and Our Jane, so why had I thought she'd be a good mother for her own? My head throbbed with sharper pain. Who was I to try and take this baby from the only mother she had ever known? It was clear that the child belonged here, with the Wises, who loved her and were in a position to give her the best of everything. What could a Casteel offer this child in comparison to this happy home? I wanted to get away from there as quickly as I could. Shakily I stood up and looked at Rosalynn Wise. "I'm not going to help f.a.n.n.y take the baby away from you, ma'am," I said. "I'm sorry I came here. I won't bother you again." And as my tears began to flow, I turned and hurried to the door, even as I heard the Reverend calling after me, "G.o.d will bless you for this."

Nineteen Rising Winds .

LOGAN DROVE ME TO THE NEAREST AIRPORT AND SAT WITH me in the terminal until my flight was announced. He gazed solemnly into my eyes and told me again that I had done the right thing when I left f.a.n.n.y's baby in the arms of Rosalynn Wise.

"You did the right thing," said Logan for the third time, when I voiced my doubt to him about the logic of my rationalizations. "f.a.n.n.y isn't the mother type, you know it and I know it."

Far back in my mind maybe I'd harbored the thought of taking the baby back with me to Farthinggale Manor, praying against hope that her sweet innocence and beauty would win Troy over, and he'd want to raise her as his daughter. Foolish, idiotic thought. What an idiot I'd been even to make an attempt. f.a.n.n.y didn't deserve a child like Darcy. Maybe I didn't either.

"Goodbye," said Logan, standing and gazing over my head. "I wish you all kinds of good luck and happiness," and whirling on his heel, he strode off before I could thank him again for taking care of me.

He looked back and smiled in a tight way. Across fifty feet we stared at one another before I turned and hurried onto the plane.

Hours later I arrived in Boston. Exhausted, half-sick, and ready to collapse into bed, I slipped into a taxi and hoa.r.s.ely whispered the address. Then slumping to the side, I felt dizzy and faint. I closed my eyes and thought of Logan and the way he'd smiled at me when I told him how I'd left things with the Wises. "I understand why you did what you did. And you keep remembering if f.a.n.n.y had really wanted that little girl she could have found a way to keep her. You would have found a way."

It was all so unreal, so terribly unreal. The smile the butler Curtis wore when he opened the door because I couldn't find my key, not like him at all. Nor were his welcoming words. "It is good to have you back, Miss Heaven."

Startled that he would speak to me and address me by my Christian name, I watched him disappear with my suitcases before I turned to stare into the huge room that had been formed by throwing open the wide doors to the major salon and the one beyond that. A party. And I wondered absently what occasion was about to be celebrated? But then Tony was home, every day was a reason to celebrate.

From room to room I wandered, staring at the huge bouquets of fresh flowers everywhere. Crystal, silver, gold, and bra.s.s gleaming. And in the main kitchen, where the entrees were prepared, Rye Whiskey smiled as if he hadn't even noticed my absence. I left the kitchen, the sight of all that food making my stomach queasy, and headed for the stairs.

"So, you are back!" called a strong, authoritative voice. Tony strode from his office, his good-looking face grim. "How dare you do what you did? You didn't keep your word. Do you know what you have done to Troy, do you know?"

I felt myself go pale. My knees began to quiver. "He's all right, isn't he? I was sick. I wanted to come back."

Tony strode closer, his full lips set in a long thin line. "You have disappointed me, girl. You have disappointed Troy, and that's more important. He's over there in his cottage in such a deep depression he refuses to answer his telephone. He doesn't leave his bed, not even to finish work that he's started."

My legs gave way and I sagged to sit on a step. "I had the flu," I said weakly. "My fever rose to a hundred and two. The doctor couldn't come because it rained every day and the bridges went down, and the roads flooded." He heard me out, patiently heard me out. He stood with his hand on the newel post, looking up at where I crouched on the steps, and in his eyes I saw something that I'd never seen before. Something that scared me. My excuses took too long. He waved his hand, dismissing what else I had to say. "Go to your rooms and do what you have to, then come to my office. Jillian is giving a shower this evening for one of her friends who plans to marry soon. You and I are going to settle a few things."

"I have to see Troy!" I cried, as I wearily rose to my feet. "He'll understand even if you don't."

"Troy has waited this long. He can wait another hour or so."

I ran up the remaining stairs. I felt his eyes following me until I disappeared into my rooms. The maid Percy was in my bedroom unpacking my bags. She gave me a small smile. "I'm glad you are home again, Miss Heaven."

The look I gave her was distraught. Home? Would I ever feel at home in this huge house?

Quickly I washed my face and changed my clothes and did what I could for my hair, which had not been set after my shampoo in the rebuilt cabin. My dressing room mirror showed shadows under my eyes, and a weakness in my expression, and yet there was strength in the set of my lips.

As I descended the stairs, my makeup only a light dusting of face powder, the door chimes began to sound. Curtis hurried to answer the door, admitting several women carrying beautifully wrapped gifts. They were so taken with the party appointments they didn't seem to notice me, thank G.o.d. I didn't want to be seen by any of Jillian's friends, who always had too many questions.

Lightly I tapped on the door to Tony's office. "Come in, Heaven," he called. He was seated behind his desk. Through the row of windows behind him, shades of night were chasing away the soft violet colors of twilight. Because the first floor of Farthy was at least fifteen feet above the ground, his windows gave a perfect view of the maze that seemed so private when you were within it. The maze represented to me the mystery and the romance of Troy, and the love that we had found. I couldn't pull my eyes away from the ten-foot hedges.

"Sit down," he ordered, his face shadowed and hidden in the deepening gloom. "Tell me now about your shopping spree in New York. Tell me again about the days of deluging rain, and the bridges going down, and the flooded roads, and the doctor that couldn't come."

Thank G.o.d Logan had talked to me a great deal about the weather when he washed my face and brushed my hair, so easily I could speak of the terrible rainstorm that had brought disaster to the entire East Coast, even as far north as Maine. And Tony listened without asking one question until I had thoroughly hung myself.

"I, despise people who lie," he said when my voice faded away, and I could only sit with folded hands that tried not to twist, just as my feet tried not to shuffle nervously. "A great many things have happened since you went away. I know that you did not go to New York to shop for a trousseau. I know that you flew to Georgia to visit your half-brother Tom. You drove to Florida to see your father. You later flew to Nashville to visit your sister f.a.n.n.y, whose stage name is f.a.n.n.y Louisa."

I couldn't see his expression. By this time the room was in deep shadows, and he made no effort to turn on even one of his many lamps. Through the walls I could very faintly hear the voices of many women gathering. Nothing they said was distinguishable. I wished like crazy to be out there with them, instead of in here, with him. Heavily I sighed and started to stand.

"Sit down." His voice was cold, commanding. "I have not finished. There are a few questions you have to answer, and answer honestly. First of all, you must tell me your truthful age."

"I am eighteen," I said without hesitation. "I don't know why I lied to you about my age when I came and said I was sixteen, except it has always made me a bit embarra.s.sed the way my mother rushed into marriage with my father, when she had never seen him before that day they met in Atlanta."

His silence was so viable it quivered the air. I wished desperately for light.

"And what difference does one year make?" I asked, gone breathless from the scary way he just sat there in the dark and didn't speak. "I told Troy right from the beginning that I was seventeen, and not sixteen, for he didn't seem as critical as you are. Please, Tony, let me go to him now. He needs me. I can pull him out of his depression. Truthfully, I was very sick. I would have crawled back to Troy if I could have."

He moved in his chair, to put his elbows on his desk, and he cradled his head in his hands. The window light behind him made a dark-purplish frame, and the quatter moon slipped in and out of dark, stringy clouds. Tiny stars twinkled on and off. Time was slipping by. Time that could be better spent with Troy. "Let me go now to Troy, please Tony."

"No, not yet," he said, his voice hoa.r.s.e, gritty. "Sit there now and tell me what you know about how your mother met your father--the month, the day, and the year. Tell me the date of their marriage. Tell me all that your grandparents said about your mother, and when you have answered every question I ask, then you may go to Troy."