Midnight Voices

CHAPTER 11

There was a soft rap at the door, which then opened just far enough for Rebecca to see Alicia Albion’s eye peek in.

“It’s all right, Aunt Alicia. I’m up.”

Pushed by Alicia’s shoulder, the door opened wider and Alicia backed in, carrying a tray with both hands. Even from her chair by the window, Rebecca could smell the aroma of a fresh cinnamon bun, and as Alicia turned around, she could see steam curling from the spout of the silver teapot that Alicia always used — and that Rebecca was always afraid she’d drop. So far she hadn’t, but anyone could tell just by looking at it that it must be very valuable.

“It’s just an old teapot,” Alicia had assured her the first time she’d brought it in and Rebecca had refused to touch it. “If it’s survived this long, I suspect you won’t hurt it even if you drop it. It was made to be used, not just to be admired.”

So Rebecca had gingerly picked it up, clutching its handle so tightly her knuckles turned white, and using her other hand to hold the top on, the way she’d seen Alicia do.

“Miss Delamond made the cinnamon roll,” Alicia said as she set the tray on the table next to Rebecca’s chair. “Doesn’t it look yummy?”

“Is she still here?” Rebecca asked, eyeing the cinnamon roll uncertainly. Even though Miss Delamond’s cinnamon rolls always smelled wonderful, there was a funny — almost bitter — taste to them that always made Rebecca feel slightly nauseous. Still, it was better to feel a little sick than to hurt Miss Delamond’s feelings, so she took a bite of the steaming bun.

Alicia shook her head. “Her sister’s not feeling very well this morning. But she says if you like this, there are lots more where it came from.” Alicia settled onto the straightbacked chair on the other side of the table, poured Rebecca a cup of tea, then eyed her critically. “I do believe you’re looking better this morning,” she pronounced. “Did you take the remedy Dr. Humphries left for you?”

Rebecca nodded. “I feel a lot better. I’ll bet by tomorrow I feel good enough to go to the park.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice.” Alicia glanced out the window. Across the street, the summer foliage was starting to look slightly faded and droopy under the late August heat, and the people in the park seemed to be moving in slow motion. Rebecca’s room was still comfortably cool though, and as Alicia picked up the worn copy of Anne of Green Gables that she and Rebecca had been reading during the last two weeks, she was almost glad that Rebecca wasn’t feeling quite good enough to go outside yet. “So where were we?” she asked, opening the book. “Ah, here we are. Chapter thirty-seven: The Reaper Whose Name Is Death. ‘Matthew, Matthew, what is the matter? Matthew, are you sick?’ ” But before she could read any more, Rebecca interrupted her.

“Don’t,” the little girl said. “I don’t like this chapter.”

Alicia frowned. “But you don’t even know what happens yet.”

“Matthew dies,” Rebecca replied. “I read it last night, after I went to bed. It made me sad — I kept thinking that Matthew was Uncle Max, and I started crying.”

Alicia set the book aside. “But it’s only a story, Rebecca.”

“I know. But it’s so awful that people have to die. If you or Uncle Max—” Her voice faltered, and her eyes glistened with tears.

“Now don’t you worry,” Alicia assured her. “We’re not going to die. Not Uncle Max, or me, or anyone else who cares about you.” She picked up the book again. “I’ll tell you what — we’ll just go right on to the next chapter. All right?”

But suddenly Rebecca wasn’t paying attention at all. Instead she was out of her chair and at the window, struggling to pull it up. “They’re here!” she said, fumbling at the latch. “Aunt Alicia, they’re here!”

“Who?” Alicia asked, dropping the book back on the table and rising to her feet.

“Laurie! Laurie and Ryan! They’re back!” Finally getting the window unlatched, she pulled it up and leaned out. “Laurie!” she called. “Laurie! Up here!”

“Rebecca, be careful!” Alicia cried, grabbing the girl around the waist and pulling her back inside.

“Can I go down and see Laurie?” she pleaded. “Please?”

Alicia hesitated only a second. “Of course you can,” she said. “But don’t stay too long — they’ll want to get settled.”

Tony Fleming was just unlocking the door to the duplex on the fifth floor when Rebecca Mayhew came flying down the stairs. “Laurie! You’re back! How was it? What was Mustique like? You have to tell me everything! Oh, I can’t even imagine being somewhere like that.”

“What about the rest of us?” Tony asked. “Don’t we even get a hello?”

Rebecca flushed with embarrassment. “I’m sorry, Mr. Fleming — I didn’t mean to be rude. Hello, Mrs. Fleming. Hi, Ryan.” But even before anyone could reply, she’d turned back to Laurie. “Can I see your room?”

Laurie hesitated. It was only the third time she’d ever been in her stepfather’s huge apartment, and the first since the wedding, when they’d all spent the night at the Plaza, then flown down to the Caribbean Sea the next morning, to the house Tony had rented for them on a little island named Mustique. The house, a yellow Victorian cottage with white gingerbread trim and one whole wall open to the sea, had its own saltwater swimming pool, a private beach, a cook, a maid, and a gardener. For two whole weeks, all they had done was lie around the pool, snorkel off the beach, or go to one of the other beaches to play in the surf. Her head was still swimming with images of the palm trees and bougainvillea that covered the little island and now that she was back in the city where everything should have been familiar, everything was as different as it had been on Mustique. Instead of going back to the apartment on 76th Street, they had come straight to Central Park West.

“Aren’t we going home?” Ryan had asked when the limousine that picked them up at the airport had turned on 71st instead of going on up to 77th.

“We’re going to our new home,” her mother had explained. “Don’t you remember? That’s why we packed up everything before the wedding. We had everything moved while we were gone. Someone else lives in our old apartment now.”

As the limo pulled to a stop in front of The Rockwell and Ryan peered nervously out the window at its dark façade, Laurie had hardly been able to keep from laughing out loud, so clear was it that he was remembering all the stories she and her friends had told him over the years. “Scared to go in?” she’d taunted him. “Afraid the troll might get you?”

That got her a glare from her mother, but Tony had just laughed. “I always thought Rodney was strange. Now I know why.”

But even though she’d teased Ryan about the stories, the truth was that she, too, was feeling more nervous about moving into her stepfather’s apartment than she was willing to admit, and now that she was standing outside the door to her new home, she also realized that she didn’t even know where her room was.

As if reading her mind, Tony tilted his head toward the wide staircase in the apartment’s foyer that led to the second floor. “Upstairs, then all the way down the hall. The door on the right.”

Laurie, grinning at Rebecca, turned to her mother. “Is it all right?”

“Of course it’s all right,” Caroline replied. “But take your suitcase, okay?”

With both of them hanging onto Laurie’s suitcase, the two girls started up the stairs, and when they got to the enormous landing — big enough to hold a sofa and two easy chairs — Rebecca gazed around at the floor-to-ceiling bookcases and the wheeled oak ladder, attached to a brass rail at the top, that could be slid along the wall to allow easy access to even the highest of the bookshelves. “This place is huge,” she whispered. “It’s at least twice as big as Aunt Alicia and Uncle Max’s.”

They moved down the long, wide hallway and finally came to the last door on the right. As Laurie pushed it open, Rebecca squealed with excitement. “It’s right underneath my room. We can pass stuff back and forth in a basket on a rope!”

But Laurie barely even heard her, for she was staring at the room in utter disbelief. It was huge — nearly twenty feet square, with a ceiling that was at least three times as high as Laurie was tall. A brass-and-crystal chandelier hung over the center of the room, and a four-poster bed — heavily hung with velvet curtains — stood against one of the walls. When she punched the old-fashioned button to turn the chandelier on, barely enough light emerged from its bulbs to cut the gloom in the immense chamber, and what little light there was seemed to get soaked up by the dark flocked wallpaper that had once covered the walls, but was now curling at the seams to expose mildewy-looking plaster beneath.

When Laurie reached out and touched the curled wallpaper, it cracked beneath her finger, and a little bit of the plaster crumbled away.

Other than the bed, the furniture in the room was from the old apartment. Her dresser, that had looked so large in her room at home, now crouched against the far wall, looking small and forlorn, almost as if it was embarrassed to be in such a huge room.

Her desk and chair were there, too, looking just as lonely as the dresser.

When she opened the closet all her clothes were there, but instead of filling the huge space, they barely occupied a quarter of it. And her shoes filled only one of the six tiers of compartments that were built into one end of the wardrobe.

Though all of her things were there, and the room was far bigger than anything she’d ever dreamed of, Laurie Evans felt like crying.