Flowers in the Attic, Page 39

  He called up the stairs. "It's time to go, Cathy."

  Quickly I raced back to the schoolroom. On the blackboard I wrote very large, using white chalk.

  We lived in the attic,

  Christopher, Cory, Carrie, and me, Now there are only three.

  I signed my name, and wrote down the date. In my heart I knew that the ghosts of the four of us would override all other ghosts of children shut away in an attic schoolroom. I left an enigma for someone in the future to unwind.

  With Mickey in a paper sack along with two poisoned doughnuts stored in Chris's pocket, he used that wooden key and opened our prison door for the last time. We'd fight to the death if the grandmother and the butler were below. Chris carried the two suitcases filled with our clothes and other possessions, and over his shoulder he slung both Cory's beloved guitar and his banjo. He led the way down all the dim halls, to the back stairs. Carrie was in my arms, partially asleep. She weighed but a bit more than she had the night we'd taken her up these same stairs more than three years ago. Those two suitcases my brother carried were the very same ones Momma had been burdened with on that terrible night so long ago, when we were young, so loving and trusting.

  Pinned inside our clothes were two small bags holding bills stolen from Momma's room, divided equally just in case some- thing unforseen separated Chris from me--then neither of us would be left penniless. And Carrie was sure to be with one of us, and taken care of. In the two suitcases were the heavy coins, also put into two bags, to weigh them evenly.

  Both Chris and I were very much aware of what lay waiting for us on the outside. We hadn't looked at so much TV without learning the worldly and heartless lie in wait for the naive and innocent. We were young and vulnerable, weak, half-sick, but no longer naive, or innocent.

  My heart stood still as I waited for Chris to unlock the back door, fearful every second someone would stop us. He stepped out, smiling back at me.

  It was cold outside. Patches of snow lay melting on the ground. Soon enough the snow would fly again. The gray sky above foreboded that. Still, it was no colder than in the attic. The earth felt mushy beneath our feet. Strange feeling after walking so many years on hard, level wooden floors. I was not yet feeling safe, for John could follow. . . take us back, or try to.

  I raised my head to sniff the clean, sharp mountain air. It was like sparkling wine to make one drunk. For a short way I kept Carrie in my arms. Then I set her on her feet. She wobbled uncertainly, stared around, disoriented and bedazed looking.

  She sniffled, swiped at her reddened nose so small and finely shaped. Ohhh was she going to catch cold so soon?

  "Cathy," called back Chris, "you two have to hurry. We don't have much time, and it's a long, long way. Pick up Carrie when she tires."

  I caught her small hand and pulled her along. "Take deep, long breaths, Carrie. Before you know it, the fresh air, good food, and sunshine will have you feeling strong and well again."

  Her small pale face tilted upward to mine--was that hope sparking her eyes at last? "Are we going to meet Cory?"

  The first question she'd asked since that tragic day when we learned Cory had died. I gazed down at her, knowing her deepest yearning was for Cory. I couldn't say no. I just couldn't put out that flicker of hope. "Cory is in a far-far place from here. Didn't you listen when I said I saw Daddy in a beautiful garden? Didn't you hear when I said Daddy took Cory up into his arms, and now Daddy is taking care of him? They're waiting for us, and someday we'll see them again, but not for a long, long time."

  "But, Cathy," she complained, puckering her fault brows, "Cory won't like that garden if I'm not there, and if he comes back looking for us, he won't know where we are."

  Earnestness like that put tears in my eyes. I picked her up and tried to hold her, but she struggled free to drag her feet and hang back, twisting halfway around so she could stare back at the huge house we were leaving.

  "Come, Carrie, walk faster! Cory's watching us-- he wants us to escape! He's down on his knees, praying we'll get away before the grandmother sends someone to take us back and lock us up again!"

  Down all the winding trails we tagged along behind Chris, who set a very fast pace. And just as I knew he would, he led us unerringly to the same little train depot that was only a tin roof supported by four wooden posts, with a rickety green bench.

  The rim of the dawning sun peeked over a mountaintop, chasing away the low morning mists. The sky turned lavender-rose as we drew nearer the depot.

  "Hurry, Cathy!" called Chris. "If we miss this train, we'll have to wait until four o'clock!"

  Oh, God, we couldn't miss this train! If we did, the grand- mother might for sure have time to catch us again!

  We saw a mail truck, with a tall, broomstraw man standing near three mailbags on the ground. He took off his cap, displaying a Brillo pad of reddish hair. Genially, he smiled in our direction., "You folks are sure up early," he called to us cheerfully. "On your way to Charlottesville?"

  "Yep! On our way to Charlottesville," answered Chris, as, with relief, he put the two suitcases down.

  "Pretty little girl you got there," said the tall mailman, sweeping his pitying gaze over Carrie, who clung fearfully to my skirt. "But if you don't mind my sayin' so, she seems kinda peaked."

  "She's been sick," Chris confirmed. "But soon she'll be better."

  The mailman nodded, seemingly believing this prognosis. "Got tickets?"

  "Got money." Then Chris added sagaciously, practicing for less reliable strangers, "But just enough to pay for the tickets."

  "Well, get it out, son, 'cause here comes the fiveforty-five."

  As we rode on that morning train, headed toward Charlottesville, we saw the Foxworth mansion sitting high on the hillside. Chris and I couldn't take our eyes from it, couldn't help but stare at our prison from the outside. Especially we fixed our gazes on the attic windows with the closed black shutters.

  Then my attention was drawn to the northern wing, riveted on that end room on the second floor. I nudged Chris as the heavy draperies parted, and the shadowy, distant form of a large old woman appeared there, staring out, looking for us . . . then vanished.

  Of course she could see the train, but we knew she couldn't see us, just as we'd never been able to see the passengers.

  Nevertheless, Chris and I slipped down lower on our seat. "Wonder what she's doing up there so early?" I whispered to Chris. "Usually she doesn't carry up our food until six-thirty."

  He laughed, sounding bitter. "Oh, just another of her efforts to catch us doing something sinful and forbidden."

  Maybe so, but I wanted to know her thoughts, her feelings when she entered that room and found it empty, and the clothes gone from the closet and the drawers. And no voices, or steps overhead to come running--if she called.

  In Charlottesville we bought bus tickets to Sarasota, and were told we had two hours to wait for the next Greyhound heading south. Two hours in which John could jump into a black limousine and overtake that slow train!

  "Don't think about it," said Chris. "You don't know that he knows about us. She'd be a fool to tell him, though he's probably snoop enough to find out."

  We thought the best way to keep him from finding us, if he was sent to follow, would be to keep on the move. We stored our two suitcases and the guitar and banjo in a rented locker. Hand in hand, Carrie in the middle, we strolled the main streets of that city, where we knew the servants of Foxworth Hall came to visit relatives on their day off, and to shop, go to the movies, or pleasure themselves in other ways. And if this were Thursday, we'd have really been fearful. But it was Sunday.

  We must have looked like visitors from another planet in our ill-fitting bulky clothes, our sneakers, our clumsily cut hair, and our pale faces. But no one really stared as I feared they would. We were accepted as just a part of the human race, and no odder than most. It felt good to be back in crowds of people, each face different.

  "Wonder where everyone's going in such a hurr
y?" asked Chris, just when I was speculating on the same thing.

  We stopped on a corner, undecided. Cory was supposed to be buried not far from here. Oh, so much I wanted to go and find his grave and put flowers there. On another day we'd come back with yellow roses, and we'd kneel and say prayers, whether or not it did any good. For now, we had to get far, far away and not endanger Carrie more. . . out of Virginia before we took her to a doctor.

  It was then that Chris took the paper sack with the dead mouse and the powdered-sugar doughnuts from his jacket pocket. His solemn eyes met mine Loosely he held that bag in front of me, studying my expression, asking with his eyes: An eye for an eye?

  That paper sack represented so much. All our lost years, the lost education, the playmates and friends, and the days we could have known laughter instead of tears. In that bag were all our frustrations,

  humiliations, tons of loneliness, plus the punishments and disappointments--and, most of all, that bag represented the loss of Cory.

  "We can go to the police and tell our story," said Christopher, while he kept his eyes averted, "and the city will provide for you and Carrie, and you won't have to run. You two might be put in foster homes, or an orphanage. As for me, I don't know. . . ."

  Chris never talked to me while he kept his eyes elsewhere unless he was hiding something--that special something that had to wait until we were outside of Foxworth Hall. "Okay, Chris. We've escaped, so out with it. What is it you keep holding back?"

  His head bowed down as Carrie moved closer and clung to my skirt, though her eyes were wide with fascination as she watched the heavy flow of traffic, and the many people hurrying by, some who smiled at her.

  "It's Momma," Chris said in a low voice. "Recall when she said she'd do anything to win back her father's approval so she could inherit? I don't know what he made her promise, but I did overhear the servants talking Cathy, a few days before our grandfather died, he had a codicil added to his will. It states that if our mother is ever proven to have given birth to children by her first husband, she will have to forfeit everything she inherits--and return everything she's bought with the money, including her clothes, jewels, investments--everything. And that's not all; he even had it written in, that if she has children by her second marriage, she will lose everything too. And Momma thought he had forgiven her. He didn't forgive, or forget. He would keep on punishing her from his grave."

  My eyes widened with shock as I added up the pieces. "You mean Momma. . . ? It was Momma, and not the grandmother?"

  He shrugged, as if indifferent, when I knew he couldn't be. "I heard that old woman praying by her bed. She's evil, but I doubt she would put poison on the doughnuts herself. She would carry them up to us, and know we ate the sweets, when all along she warned us not to eat them."

  "But, Chris, it couldn't have been Momma. She was on her honeymoon when the doughnuts started coming daily."

  His smile came bitter, wry. "Yeah. But nine months ago the will was read; nine months ago Momma was back. Only Momma benefits from the grandfather's will--not our grandmother--she has her own money. She only brought up the baskets each day."

  So many questions I had to ask--but there was Carrie, clinging to me, staring up at me. I didn't want her to know Cory had died from any but natural reasons. It was then Chris put the bag with the evidence in my hands. "It's up to you to decide. You and your intuition were right all along--if I'd have listened, Cory would be alive today."

  There is no hate such as that born out of love betrayed--and my brain screamed out for revenge. Yes, I wanted to see Momma and the grandmother locked up in jail, put behind bars, convicted of premeditated murder--four counts, if intentions were counted, too. They'd be only gray mice in cages, shut up like us, only they'd have the benefit of being in the company of drug addicts, prostitutes, and other killers like themselves. Their clothes would be of gray prison cotton. No trips twice a week to the beauty salon for Momma, no makeup, no professional manicures--and a shower once a week. She'd even lose the privacy of her most personal body places. Oh, she'd suffer without furs to wear, and jewelry, and warm cruises in southern waters when the winter rolled around. There wouldn't be a handsome, adoring young husband to romp with in a grand swan bed.

  I stared up at the sky where God was supposed to be--could I let Him in His own ways, balance the scales and take the burden of justice from me?

  I thought it cruel, unfair, that Chris should put all the burden of decision on my shoulders. Why?

  Was it because he would forgive her for anything--even the death of Cory, and her efforts to kill all of us? Would he reason that such parents as hers could pressure her into doing anything--even murder? Was there enough money in the whole world to make me kill my four children?

  Pictures flashed in my mind, taking me back to the days before my father died. I saw us all in the back garden, laughing and happy. I saw us at the beach, sailing, swimming, or in the mountains skiing. And I saw Momma in the kitchen doing her best to cook meals to please us all.

  Yeah, surely her parents would know all the ways to kill her love for us--they'd know. Or was Chris thinking, as I was, that if we went to the police and told our story, our faces would be splashed on the front pages of every newspaper in the country? Would the glare of publicity make up for what we'd lose? Our privacy--our need to stay together? Could we lose each other just to get even?

  I glanced up at the sky again.

  God, He didn't write the scripts for the puny little players down here. We wrote them ourselves--with each day we lived, each word we spoke, each thought we etched on our brains. And Momma had written her script, too. And a sorry one it was.

  Once she'd had four children she considered perfect in every way. Now she had none. Once she had four children who loved her, and considered her perfect in every way--now she had none who saw her as perfect. Nor would she ever want to have others. Love for what money could buy would keep her forever faithful to that cruel codicil in her father's will.

  Momma would grow old; her husband was years younger. She'd have time to feel lonely and wish she'd done it all differently. If her arms never ached to hold me again, they'd ache for Chris, and maybe Carrie . . . and, most certainly, she'd want those babies that would be ours one day.

  From this city we'd flee southward on a bus to make of ourselves somebodies. When we saw Momma again--and to be certain fate would arrange it that way--we'd look her straight in the eyes, and turn our backs.

  Into the nearest green trashcan I dropped the bag, saying good-bye to Mickey, and asking him to please forgive us for what we did.

  "C'mon, Cathy," called Chris, stretching forth his hand. "What's done is done. Say good-bye to the past, and hello to the future. And we're wasting time, when already we've wasted enough. We've got everything ahead, waiting for us."

  Just the right words to make me feel real, alive, free! Free enough to forget thoughts of revenge. I laughed and spun about to run back to where I could put my hand in his, stretched ready and waiting. With his free arm, Chris swooped down to pick up Carrie, and he hugged her close and kissed her wan cheek. "Did you hear all of that, Carrie? We are on our way to where the flowers bloom all through the winter--in fact, flowers bloom all year long down there. Does that make you want to smile?"

  A tiny smile came and went on pale lips that seemed to have forgotten how to smile. But that was enough--for now.

  Epilogue

  . It is with relief that I end the telling of our foundation years, on which we were to base the rest of our lives.

  After we escaped Foxworth Hall, we made our way, and managed, somehow, to always keep striving toward our goals.

  Our lives were always to be tempestuous, but it taught both Chris and me that we were survivors. For Carrie, it was far different. She had to be persuaded to want a life without Cory, even when she was surrounded by roses.

  But how we managed to survive--that's another story.

  C. Andrews, Flowers in the Attic

  (Series: Dollenganger # 1)