Rainbow’s End

12

We sat for a long time holding close. Then, around 4:00, she pointed out the window. Another car was turning in from the highway to the lane. It was a Ford, one of the new compacts, and shiny black. It pulled up in front of the house, but when I saw who was getting out, I couldn’t help giving a yell. “Who is she?” Jill asked.

“Aunt Myra,” I told her.

“Dave, she’s beautiful!”

She was, all right, with her big black eyes, pale skin, and soft willowy figure. She had on a mink coat, one I’d never seen, over a dark red dress. Her straight, black hair was combed over her shoulders. She looked like the queen of England, and we stood there gaping at her. Then Jill gave me a push and I went piling out to greet her. I took her in my arms, kissed her, and held her close, and she clung to me. After she’d kissed me two or three times, I took her inside where Jill was waiting to be introduced. But Aunt Myra didn’t wait. “Oh I know who you are!” she burst out. “You’re the most famous girl in the whole United States. I’m so happy about it!”

At last Aunt Myra asked: “Dave, where’s your mother?”

Jill looked at me, and I closed my eyes to think what I wanted to say. Then I knew. “I think right here,” I told her.

I went over, knelt by her chair, and kissed her. She broke down and wept on my shoulder, then rubbed her face against mine, so her tears were smeared against me. Then I was crying with her.

“Then Little Myra told you?” she asked.

“Yes, she did.”

“When?”

“Last night.”

“Why?”

She kept looking at me, wanting more details, but what was I going to say? I hadn’t even told Jill all of what had happened, especially that visit to my bed, and I certainly didn’t intend to spill it now. “Actually, she didn’t mention why, if she had some particular reason. Just that there was something she’d wanted to tell me, something I ought to know.”

“Where is she, by the way?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? She moved, is that what you mean? To the other house? Or what?”

“I mean, she left.”

“How, left?”

“Just took the car and blew.”

“There was a quarrel? Is that it?”

“You could call it that.”

“About what?”

I was getting pretty uncomfortable, not doing well at trying to make up stuff, and wanting to knock it off. But once more Jill got in it, with the same answer she’d given Sid. “About me,” she snapped.

“Oh — I see.”

“She didn’t like me much.”

Aunt Myra, my mother, sat looking at Jill a long time, and then at last remarked: “That I can well understand.” And then, to me: “Dave, Little Myra was getting ideas, or at least I felt she was, that made me very uneasy, ideas that may have accounted for the way she spoke out at last, about me, about herself, and the new relationship she wanted to have with you. Was that her reason? For breaking her pledge at last? Of silence she’d taken to me? In return for what your father did for her?”

“I’d rather not say.”

“Then it was?”

She sat there, staring down at the floor. Then after a long time: “I should have come sooner. I’ve known it was in the wind, that something like this would come. What I didn’t know was that it would come this way, with a girl dropping out of the sky.”

She went over and touched Jill’s hair, and Jill patted her hand. Then she asked me: “What about the police? Or the sheriff’s deputies, whoever they are, who have charge of the case? The papers say they told you, and told her, and told Jill, to be available for questioning. What did they say about it? Did they give her permission to leave?”

“I didn’t tell them about it.”

“Has anyone?”

She turned to Jill who said: “I didn’t know it this morning when I called from my hospital room to tell them where I was going. They told me all right, come out here, but her name didn’t come up.”

“Then nobody’s told them about it?”

“No, but somebody’s going to.”

She aimed that at my mother as though expecting approval and maybe a kiss. If so, she got a surprise. My mother’s face turned stony and she sat there staring at Jill who suddenly seemed all crossed up. “Miss Howell,” she said, “perhaps I ought to explain something Dave hasn’t mentioned that’s pretty important to me. This woman who he thought until now was his mother has skipped with all my money, my hundred thousand dollars that Russell Morgan gave me, so I couldn’t be charged in any way — and as a reward for what I did. If I’m to get it back, she has to be caught. They can’t go after her; the police or the sheriff or anyone, until they’ve been told she’s gone. So that’s why I have to tell them.”

But all that got was more of the same from my mother, a stony stare and no answer at all. After a long time she turned to me, kissed me, and whispered: “I have to be going now.”

“What do you want me to call you?”

“What did you call her?”

“Mom — I thought you knew.”

“David, call me Mother.”

“I’d love to. I want to. Mother.” And then, after holding her close: “Mother, who is my father?”

“He’ll tell you.”

“Yes, but when?”

“As soon as he’s free to speak. It won’t be long — but don’t ask me to say more, David. If I do, I may find myself hoping — and I mustn’t, mustn’t, ever.”

“You mean that someone would die?”

“Yes, that’s what I mean.”

“And when that happens, what?”

“Your father and I can be married.”

“And it’s going to be soon, you say?”

“I didn’t say! Don’t ask me.”

“You said it wouldn’t be long.”

“Then all right, I said that. I didn’t say how long is long.”

Then at last she turned to Jill and took her face in both hands. She kissed her, then picked up the mink coat, which she had thrown over a chair, put it on, and pulled it around her. Then she opened the door and went out. We both followed, and I put her into her car. She started it, pulled ahead, and swung around the circle in front of the house. As she made the turn, where the circle joined on to the lane, she blew kisses, one to me, one to Jill.

“What did I do?” asked Jill. “I must have done something to change her.”

“She didn’t change. She blew you a kiss, didn’t she?”

“She changed from warm to ice.”

“You said you were telling the officers, so they could find Mom.”

“Well? Why shouldn’t I?”

“OK, but don’t ask any help of me.”

“Her, we’re talking about.”

“Or her.”

“I’m going nuts. Why not?”

“I’ve tried to explain to you. I’m mountain. She’s mountain. Mom’s her kin, that’s all.”

“Didn’t you hear what she said? She doesn’t respect her.”

“You can say that again.”

“And yet, on account of this Mom being kin, she’d block me off from making her give back what’s mine?”

“I didn’t notice any blocking.”

“For Christ’s sake, I’m going nuts.”

“Don’t ask her to help.”

“Or you to help?”

“I told you, she and I have been close.”

“I have to think this over.”

She went in the house and sat down off by herself. I sat down and put my arm around her. But she got up, put on her coat, and went out.