Neither Present Time Page 3

  “Let me know how you make out, my dear,” he said with a wave.

  She hurried to 19th street and waited for the next bus that would take her back to Georgetown. Thirty minutes later, she nearly ran up the paved walk of her parents’ brick Federal house.

  “Hi,” she called out as she unlocked the last of the three deadbolts securing the front door. She deposited her backpack in an overstuffed armchair in the living room and headed toward the kitchen.

  “You’re late. Again,” Edith Gray said to her daughter reprovingly.

  “I know,” Beryl said, giving her mother a quick kiss on the cheek. “Sorry. Big crowds on the bus today. Ummm, smells good.”

  Her mother’s frown gave way to a grudging smile. “I hope it’s not ruined.”

  Beryl grinned and pulled down dinner plates, bread plates, salad bowls to set the dining table. “Your family eats this formally every night?” Claire had asked in disbelief when she first met Beryl’s family.

  “Gerald, dinner,” Edith announced, and Beryl’s father emerged from his den, taking his place at the head of the table. Beryl gave him a quick kiss also on her way to her place.

  “How’s work, Beryl?” her father asked as he passed the platter of pork chops.

  “It’s fine,” she answered automatically. “How’s yours?”

  Her father, now in his thirtieth year of civil service working for the Treasury Department, launched into a description of some of the recent office politics he was caught in.

  “How can you have the same non-conversation week after week?” Claire had asked back when she used to accompany Beryl on these Thursday evening dinners.

  “Better than your family who never talk at all except to snipe at one another,” Beryl had wanted to say, but didn’t. Now, she found even these boring conversations with her parents preferable to listening to Claire and Leslie go on about their work for Social Services where Claire, as Leslie’s supervisor, was responsible for overseeing her case load.

  Just last night, Claire had brought Leslie home for dinner – “again,” Beryl had very nearly said – and Beryl had sat with nothing to contribute as they discussed a domestic violence case they’d been called in on. At one point, in an attempt to be polite, Leslie had asked Beryl how her day was.

  “She’s a librarian!” Claire had laughed. “How exciting can it be?”

  “Beryl? You haven’t heard a word I’ve said,” came her mother’s voice.

  Beryl blinked and looked up.

  “I was saying we’ve moved your brother’s birthday dinner to a week from Saturday.”

  “Why?”

  “Your sister had something she had to do this weekend,” Edith said.

  Beryl frowned a little. “Couldn’t you have asked me first? What if I had plans for that next weekend?”

  “You never go anywhere,” Edith said in surprise. “It never occurred to me to ask. Do you have plans?”

  “No, but –”

  “Well, then, why on earth are you making such a fuss?” Edith asked as she stood, sweeping Gerald’s plate out from in front of him. “Help me clear the table.”

  Chapter 4

  Cory slipped out of bed, her thin summer night gown flapping about her ankles and slippered feet. In her hand was a small bouquet of lilacs – its fragrance wafting powerfully in her wake. Thin strips of moonlight coming through the slats of the shades lit up what had been her father’s den. After the sale, she had agreed to have her bedroom furniture moved to the main floor of the house as a concession to Aggie and Veronica to keep them from worrying about her being upstairs by herself.

  She walked out to the foyer, where the wide oak boards gave way to slate laid in an intricate sunburst pattern sited under the dramatic oval staircase so that when one looked down from the upper floors the sunburst was perfectly framed within the oval. Moonlight lit her way, but she did not need light. She knew every inch of this house. She turned to the wide, sweeping staircase, its oak treads clad in a handknotted Persian runner, “from when it really was Persia,” she would have said. The oak banister, worn smooth by generations of the family’s hands running up and down it, felt familiar to her gnarled fingers with their knobbly joints. She knew Aggie didn’t want her to go upstairs – “you’ll fall and break something and no one will find you for hours,” she’d said – but upstairs, at night, was one of her favorite places to be. A medical alert pendant bumped against her chest – another concession to Aggie’s worry.

  Upstairs were six bedrooms and four bathrooms – an extravagant expense when the house was built in the eighteen sixties, but brilliant foresight. On the third floor were the servants’ rooms, with three more bathrooms for their use. As she wandered the halls, visiting each room, Cory visited with the occupants – the occupants as she remembered them. Her mother and father’s room, a room they had always shared – contrary to the custom of having separate, adjoining rooms – was a room where she had been welcomed as a child. Younger than her brother and sister by nearly ten years, Cory had grown up almost an only child. She would happily climb into her parents’ enormous bed in the mornings, and lie snuggled between them, loved and protected.

  Farther down the hall was her brother’s room. Terrence, too, had indulged his baby sister, inviting her in and letting her watch as he made detailed models of airplanes and ships. He had left for college before she was eight, but, oh, how she had adored him.

  Opposite was her sister’s room. Candace had not shared the rest of the family’s adoration of little Corinne. She strove, always, to force Corinne to follow the same rules she’d grown up with, but Candace never seemed to grasp or accept the fact that the rules she lived by were of her own making and Corinne could no sooner have followed them than change the color of her eyes. “She looks like a china doll,” Candace often said spitefully, trying to make it an insult, but unable to hide the jealousy she felt at Corinne’s naturally curly blond hair and large light blue eyes that did, after all, make her look like a doll while Candace was woefully plain with her straight, dark hair and little eyes hidden behind thick spectacles. Poor Candace, Cory thought with a smile.

  The room at the end of the hall had a wonderful bay window with a deep window seat. This had been Cory’s room. A rocker near the bay was the only piece of furniture remaining on this entire floor.

  Those auction people had nearly wet their pants when they were shown the house’s furnishings: beds, dressers, highboys and tables made in Philadelphia and Boston; Chippendale and Queen Anne mostly, with Tiffany table lamps in nearly every room as well as Tiffany stained glass windows in many rooms. And the art. The house had an extensive collection of landscapes and portraits by mostly American artists. “This will all fetch a very good price,” the auction people had said greedily.

  “I’m sorry, Aunt Cory,” Aggie had said, nearly in tears herself. “But if we don’t find a way to pay the back taxes, the city will take the house.”

  The “others” – Cory refused to name them, the other relatives – had argued that she should be “sent somewhere” and the house should be sold after all the furniture and books were gone. After all, why should one old woman rattle about in such a huge house all by herself? They didn’t care where she went, just as long as she was gone. Agatha had stood up to all of them, including her own father, Terrence’s son. She had insisted that Cory should be allowed to stay as long as she could be safe in the house by herself. It had been then that Cory had reminded them all that, as trustee, only she could decide when and if the house ought to be sold, but even she couldn’t come up with an alternative to the auction. Agatha was the one who saved the books, or most of them. A few boxes had been taken and auctioned before they realized what was happening. But Aggie had kept enough furniture for Cory to be comfortable, and the books to keep her company for as long as she wanted to stay in her home.

  “The books can always be auctioned off separately later,” Cory had overheard her arguing with the others. “You can’t take everything from her
.”

  Now, in the night, Cory settled creakily into the rocking chair. “Is it me or the rocker?” she wondered. She knew they all thought she was off her rocker – she chuckled at her own pun – but she didn’t care. Reaching forward, she pulled open a panel under the window seat so cunningly hidden that it was undetectable unless one knew it was there. This had been her secret hiding place for all her treasures as a child, but now, it held something far more precious. Lovingly, she placed her lilacs.

  * * *

  “I’m Helen. Helen Abrams,” the woman says, extending her hand.

  “Corinne Bishop.”

  “Well, Corinne, I can’t thank you enough,” Helen says. “A week in that hotel and I’ve had absolutely no luck finding a room or a flat anywhere.”

  Corinne looks at her. Who says “flat”? she wonders. “Where are you from?” she asks.

  “New York, most recently,” Helen replies with a bored air. “But I was schooled in Switzerland, France and England.”

  “Well,” Corinne says, a trifle uncertainly, “my place isn’t big, and you’ll have to sleep on the couch, but if that’s all right with you, you’re welcome to it. While you keep looking for a place of your own,” she adds quickly. She does not want there to be any misunderstandings.

  Helen leads the way down the stairs to the foyer of their building where she has managed to talk the doorman into letting her leave three enormous suitcases stacked inside the entrance. The doorman is usually surly and hostile to all of them, but Corinne suspects that no one says no to Helen Abrams.

  Corinne tries to lift one of the bags and immediately sets it back down. “Uh, my apartment is six blocks from here,” she says dubiously, “and I don’t think –”

  “I’ll get a taxi,” Helen volunteers. A taxi, for six blocks? Corinne almost laughs, but Helen steps outside, wearing grey slacks and a white shirt that make her look like Katharine Hepburn, Corinne thinks. She looks down at her own boring tweed skirt and hose, the left one marred with a run, but these are the only good hose she has left. A couple of minutes later, Helen returns, cab driver in tow. The three of them manage to get the suitcases loaded into the cab’s voluminous trunk. A short drive later, the cab deposits them and the bags on the sidewalk.

  “I’m afraid we’re three floors up,” Corinne says apologetically.

  “Pas de problème,” Helen says.

  “Aprés vous,” Corinne replies as Helen’s handsome face breaks into a smile.

  Together, they manage to haul the cases up three flights where they take up nearly all the available floor space of Corinne’s tiny apartment.

  “Well,” Helen says, somewhat disdainfully, “we could always turn them into a table.” She looks around and asks, “Couldn’t you get a larger place?”

  Stung, Corinne says, “This is all I could afford on my salary.”

  “Salary or not, I’d be cabling my parents to ask for more money,” Helen says absently.

  “Yes, I believe you would,” Corinne says coolly, regretting her offer to let Helen stay. “But I came here despite my family’s objections. I’m not going to ask them for money. They’d simply say to come home.”

  Helen appraises her more closely. Though Corinne looks sweet and pretty, there is steel under the surface. She smiles in grudging admiration.

  Corinne tries to squeeze by, saying, “Let me show you the kitchen, such as it is.” She loses her balance as her foot catches on one of the suitcases and she falls into Helen. “Sorry,” she mumbles. Her hands, in a clumsy effort to catch her balance, have landed squarely on Helen’s breasts.

  “It’s my fault,” Helen assures her, catching her around the waist and helping her regain her balance.

  Helen is only an inch or two taller, but to Corinne, as she raises her eyes to find Helen smiling down at her, she seems immensely tall. She finds herself mesmerized by those changeable eyes and….

  “You were going to show me the kitchen,” Helen reminds her, and her deep voice sounds amused as they both realize that Corinne’s hands are still resting on her chest.

  Corinne blushes furiously. What is the matter with you? she asks herself. But as Helen follows her around for a very brief tour of the apartment, for in truth, nearly everything can be seen by simply pirouetting in place, she keeps catching whiffs of Helen’s scent, a scent that reminds her of a summer garden, and makes her want to keep inhaling.

  For some reason, Corinne blushes again and cannot meet Helen’s eyes as she shows her the bedroom with its double bed.

  * * *

  Cory chuckled again as she rocked. The moon had shifted so that only a tiny sliver of light came angling in through the window. She closed the panel under the window seat and pushed to her feet, slowly making her way back down through the sleeping house.

  Chapter 5

  “It’s like the steambath from hell out there,” David complained, removing his glasses to mop his red, sweaty face with a napkin.

  “I know,” Beryl sympathized, looking up from her computer. “It wasn’t bad when I got here this morning, but it’ll be murder when I leave. The tourists will be keeling over by the dozens.”

  “They should have shot the first person to suggest putting the nation’s capital in the middle of a swamp,” David said as he dropped into his desk chair. His scant hair was plastered against his scalp with sweat, and his cotton shirt was soaked through, especially where his backpack had rested. Like Beryl, he took public transportation as driving and parking were such a hassle. Unfortunately, this left them at the mercy of the weather.

  “Do you have any ibuprofen?” he asked. “I have a splitting headache.”

  “Sure,” Beryl said, reaching for her own backpack and digging in one of the pockets. As she pulled out a small pill bottle, a folded piece of paper fell to the floor. She handed the pills to David and bent to pick up the paper. Unfolding it, she saw that it was the information about the book auction. She still hadn’t called to follow up since Mr. Herrmann had given it to her last week. Every time she thought about it, she could hear Claire’s voice telling her she was being stupid. But the book remained safely tucked in another pocket of her backpack.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” David said. “I’m going to get some water.”

  “Mmmm,” Beryl responded, not really paying attention. She began an internet search for Wharton’s Auctions in Philadelphia. She glanced up as he returned.

  “Are you all right?” she asked. “You’re awfully red in the face.”

  “I’m fine,” he muttered, rubbing his knuckles against his forehead. “If my head would just stop pounding.”

  A student came to the desk requesting help with a search. “I’ll take care of this,” Beryl said as David started to get up.

  The search turned out to be more difficult than usual, involving an obscure reference in a journal that was hard to locate. This was what she loved about her job. She knew it seemed boring to other people, but for her it was a combination of a treasure hunt and preserving something important. “Someone, somewhere put a lot of time and effort into this research, just like you will,” she often reminded students. “Don’t stop with the first few results when you do a search. Something really useful might be buried way down on your list of references.”

  She was occupied at another computer for several minutes before she became aware of commotion from the desk area. She hurried back there to see a crowd gathered at the reference desk. Pushing through the throng, she saw David lying on the floor, his face now an ashen grey. Someone had already called 911, and another quick-thinking individual had retrieved the automatic defibrillator from the wall. The pads were jolting him, but there was no response. She could only stand there helplessly as the paramedics rushed in, pushing a gurney loaded with equipment. They asked for space as they took over working on him and attempting, unsuccessfully it seemed, to revive him.

  She gently shooed curious bystanders away from the scene, aware of how strange it was that her heart was beating a mil
lion times a minute while her friend’s heart had stopped beating at all.

  * * *

  Beryl heard muffled noises and laughter as the front door was opened.

  “What are you doing home?” Claire asked in surprise a couple of minutes later as she came up the stairs to find Beryl sitting in an armchair with Winston curled up on her lap. “I thought you were working late today.”

  “I was,” Beryl said quietly. “David died of a heart attack at work today.”

  “David who?” Claire asked blankly.

  “David Morris. The man I’ve worked with for the past five years. David, whose daughter just graduated from Edison.” She suddenly realized Claire was still standing on the stairs, wearing sweaty tennis clothes, her bag over her shoulder.

  “What –?”

  Beryl got to her feet, dumping Winston to the floor with a grunt. She came to the stairwell where Leslie was standing on the landing, also in tennis clothes.

  As Beryl stared silently down at her, Leslie cleared her throat and said awkwardly, “I should go.”

  Claire set her bag down and said, “I’ll walk you back down.”

  When she returned a few minutes later, she found Beryl curled up in her chair again, Winston sitting with his back to her with an unmistakable air of indignation.

  Ignoring Beryl’s frosty expression, Claire went to the kitchen and got a soda.

  “Did I ruin your plans by coming home early?” Beryl asked.

  “I didn’t have any plans,” Claire said calmly, sitting on the floor and placing a towel behind her sweaty back so she wouldn’t get the couch damp. “We played tennis after work and were just going to get something cold to drink.”

  “Is this what you do on the nights I work late?” Beryl asked coldly.

  Claire tilted her head in amusement. “It depends on what you mean by ‘this’,” she said. “If you mean, have friends? Have a life? Then, yes.”

  Beryl pressed her hand to her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she murmured.