A Girl's Room

A Girl’s Room

         “Don’t be nervous.”

         They were the first words the driver had said since the last naked brick buildings of the colony disappeared. The wheels caught ruts in the primitive road and the little automobile jerked and bobbled like a wind-up toy.

         “I’m not,” she said.

         In the slice of mirror, she saw the corners of his eyes crinkle. She did not return his smile. She touched her hand to the warm window as she turned in the seat to look at the draperies of vines, the unnamed flowering plants that trailed in the dust. When she moved her hand, a haze of sweat remained.

         “Your parents are here for the harbor business, I see,” he said.

         She nodded.

         “And they live in a townhouse.”

         “Yes, right on the square.”

         “So why are they sending you to this boarding school? If I may ask.”

         She hesitated. “They don’t like me to be near the docks.”

         “Why not send you back to England, then?”

         “I don’t know – would you mind? I’m trying to think of a letter.”

         He fell silent and Lucie returned to her thoughts. If she had someone to write to, she might have been thinking of a letter. But at the moment, she was thinking of the sticky plastic of the seat behind her calves. A tickle of moisture sprang at the back of her neck in the humid air.

         When they approached the boarding school, Mrs. Crowther was standing at the head of the stone path. Her frame looked as if it was being smothered beneath a layer of curdled, dimpling milk. Lucie took her suitcase and stepped out.

         “Miss Lucie,” she said. “I’m glad you arrived safely. I’ll show you to your room.”

         Lucie followed the woman to the stone building, out of place as a fortress somehow carried from England to the tropics. The upper story windows stared, pale. As they stepped into the front room, a gray cat jumped from the couch. It disappeared into the kitchen and they began to climb the stairs.

         It was warm in the hall and their footsteps were dulled by the rectangle of rose carpet. Mrs. Crowther opened the door and they stepped inside. Dusky rose curtains hung motionless in front of the open window. An older girl sat at the large desk, dark hair pulled into a knot of waves at the nape of her neck. She did not turn around and Mrs. Crowther simply gestured Lucie towards her bed. Lucie set the suitcase on the bedspread.

         The door closed behind her with a scrape of swollen wood. She unlatched her suitcase and a light lavender fragrance wafted out. At the desk, the pen stopped scratching. When Lucie looked up, the girl had turned in the chair.

         “I hope you’re not too surprised at having to share a room,” the girl said. “I certainly was when I arrived.”

         “No, I don’t mind.”

         Lucie unfolded her dresses and began hanging them in the closet, watching the girl from the corner of her eye. She was intimidating, nearly an adult and fully self-composed.

         “I know you’re Lucie,” the girl went on. “I’m Thalia Livingston. What do you think of the view?”

         Thalia went to the window and pulled one curtain aside. Lucie joined her and looked out into a fecund mass of twisted green vines.

         “Ghastly, ghastly,” Thalia murmured. “They’re letting the jungle grow right to the back door.”

         Lucie caught the curtain as Thalia let go. A few orange blossoms shone like late stars in the deep green. She was horrified at the sense of enclosure and eternity made visible by the callous growing plants.

         “You haven’t been in the country long, have you?” Thalia asked.

         Lucie admitted as much, turning away from the dark jungle.

         “Before long, you’ll be wishing for England again. This place is nothing but flies and dirt.”

         The girl went to the couch and stretched out languorously, one arm draped over the side of the couch, fingertips brushing the burgundy rug. Lucie poured a glass of water from the pitcher sweating on the bureau.

         Within a few weeks, Lucie was homesick. She began having headaches. One night Thalia found her crying, kneeling at the nightstand.

         “I’m just homesick,” she said.

         “Who wouldn’t be? It’s so different here, hot and bright all the time.”

         Lucie began to notice the heat after that. Their desks were illuminated on top with a flat gloss of light. When the sun climbed high enough to pierce the windows with a direct beam, Mrs. Crowther pulled the blinds closed with a heavy click. Their bedrooms were only bright at dawn; by noon, it was so hot they had to have the curtains closed, and the bloody glow of sunset was cut short by the jungle growth.

         “We’ll cure you,” Thalia said one morning, smiling at her in the mirror, dabbing rosewater behind her ears and down her throat. “We’ll take a day off and go exploring.”

         “Where?”

         “There’s a whole jungle out there.”

         “But you hate the jungle,” Lucie said, pulling on her button-up shoes.

         Thalia corked the bottle of rosewater and set it against the mirror so there were two delicate pink glasses.

         “Mrs. Crowther takes a nap in the afternoon – did you know that? We’ll just go out the back door and take a walk.”

         “Not far,” Lucie said. “It’s against the rules to leave the grounds.”

         “Do you think I’d lead you astray?” Thalia laughed. “We won’t go so far.”

         After the first few classes of the day, the girls went to the study. One of the mammoth chairs held a girl like a frail insect. She didn’t look up when they came in, her pale face downcast to the French grammar in her lap.

         “Who is that?” Lucie asked in a whisper as they perused the shelves. “Is she new?”

         “Edith Slackpoole,” Thalia replied, faintly contemptuous.

         They waited, Lucie reading from an encyclopedia, Thalia reading Walter Scott. At last she spoke.

         “She’s got to be asleep by now. Let’s go to the kitchen.”

         They wrapped biscuits and twin wedges of cheese in a white cotton cloth. As they slipped out the back door, the first breath of air touched Lucie’s face.

         “We can just sit here,” she said.

         “No. You need a vacation. An expedition.”

         She went to the fence that separated the school from the jungle and snapped the gate open. Lucie followed her down the short trail and between the thick ropes of vine. The green shadows cooled the back of her neck and she smelled damp dirt. A trail led off around a curve and disappeared.

         “They must come through here from their villages – I saw a woman with a basket on her head once, carrying some blankets. She came through the yard and went down the road to Paukhaven.”

         “Where’s that?”

         Thalia pointed in the opposite direction from the town.

         “There’s more back there?”

         “Of course,” Thalia answered, turning an amused look on her. “Did you think we were the last bit of civilization in South America?”

         After a while, Thalia chose a picnic spot and they sat down. It was shady and everything was moving softly and sibilantly through the leaves. They couldn’t see far into the jungle on either side of the path. Best of all, the school had disappeared, its chill stone back obscured by the vines and the curves the path had taken.

         “This is heaven,” Lucie said, leaning back on one elbow and nibbling the biscuit.

         “Heaven is dancing with a tall man,” Thalia corrected. “At Winterhall, we had dances every few weeks. And my beaus changed just as often.”

         “I couldn’t do it,” Lucie said, touching the side of her neck. “I always feel they’re… staring at it.”

         “Really, it’s only a bit red. It doesn’t come near your eyes.”

         Lucie knew the dappled crescent stain along her neck. Although it was as smooth as the rest of her skin, she could trace it without looking, following the warm shame with her fingertips.

         “Don’t let it concern you,” Thalia said. “When you’re in England, I’ll introduce you to some of my old – friends, and you’ll see. What’s this?”

         Lucie followed her gaze to the edge of their little hollow. Edith was standing there, the toes of her shoes pointed in, hands knotted in front of her.

         “I saw you leaving,” she said, without being asked, “and thought I would come, too.”

         “You did?”

         “Yes, I thought I would bring a bit of dessert along.” She held out the pale yellow cookies in one hand as evidence of her goodwill.

'          “And what,” Thalia asked, “made you think we wanted any other company?”

         Edith smoothed a blonde wisp of hair back to meet with the girlish braid she wore.

         “Mrs. Crowther said all the boarders would be like sisters – that it was like a family.”

         Thalia laughed. Lucie smiled nervously, half in agreement with Thalia and half in consolation towards Edith. Stung, the girl lifted her head.

         “I believe we are not to be out beyond the gate,” she said.

         “That’s why this is the most perfect spot,” Thalia retorted.

         “If you are not coming in, I’ll have to tell Mrs. Crowther.”

         Thalia’s hazel eyes narrowed slightly but she did not move or give any sign of anxiety.

         “I’m not sure that will foster a sense of sisterhood between you and the other girls. They’ll hear that it was you who told and then – you might as well be in exile, my dear.”

         Edith looked from one to the other. Lucie turned to Thalia, about to say, Let’s go in. Let’s eat in the yard instead. But Thalia didn’t return her gaze and a moment later Edith left, tripping on a root in her pained haste. They did not talk for a while.

         “You’re thinking I was too harsh – maybe even cruel,” Thalia said finally.

         “No, no.”

         “On top of that, you’re no good at lying.”

         “Please, Thalia – ”

         “You can’t let these pious twits get the best of you,” she went on. “Give in once and you’ll always be beneath someone.”

         Lucie watched uncomfortably as Thalia pinched the last ocher crumbs of cheese into a ball. She yearned to be a self-contained, as closed from influence. But she didn’t like to see Edith’s crestfallen face.

         “She was right,” she said quietly. “I think we really should go back now.”

         “It’s time anyway,” Thalia said. “We’ll have to do this again. I need a respite from school sometimes, too.”

         They went up to the house and nobody was any the wiser.

         There was little change in the seasons. The only indication that fall had arrived was the increasing drizzle. On the third straight day of rain, Mrs. Crowther stood up at dinner and adjusted the heavy fabric of her blouse.

         “Mr. Crowther and I have planned a very special event for you all,” she announced. “In two weeks’ time, we will be attending the autumn social in Paukhaven – to liven up this dismal season we’re about to enter. There will be a dinner and dancing afterwards.”

         Thalia did not join in the celebratory squeals and questions that followed. She kept her hands folded coolly in her lap. Lucie found herself watching the younger girls like an outsider, scornful of their silly aping of adult women.

         They sat in their nightgowns that evening, Thalia at the bureau, Lucie leaning against the scant windowsill. She looked down at the stone path below and the deepening shadows like long fingers of jungle stretching towards the house.

         “Just think,” she said at last, “how busy it will be. Don’t you look forward to it?”

         Thalia smiled a little, turning her head down as if looking askance at something on the floor.

         “My parents told me I would only have to stay here six months,” she said finally. “It’s been two years since I saw them. I’ve finally gotten my father to promise that this fall is my last here.”

         She snatched the combs from her hair, ignoring the jerk of tangles.

         “They’ll be picking me up before Christmas. I can’t wait.”

         Lucie felt the crisp, even scallop of lace batting on the counterpane and listened to the distant hoot of a gibbon. She swallowed her words but changed her mind and asked anyway.

         “Thalia. You don’t – do well with them, do you?”

         “Why do you ask?”

         Her voice was chilly with denied pain.

         “You never mention them.”

         “Why should I? They left me here while they go sailing merrily away on the Asiatic sea. I don’t know them anymore.”

         “You could get to know them again.”

         Thalia flicked the sheets down and got into her bed. They did not speak again. Lucie lay in her bed facing the open window; the stir of air felt like the small warm panting of a dog. Insects beat themselves senselessly against the screen and a few gnats floated in the streak of light that touched the carpet.


         The next afternoon Lucie took a book from the library and sat on the back steps. Inside, everyone was snappish, trying to study before the social. She had just finished the first chapter when the door scraped behind her and Thalia poked her head out.

         “Come inside,” she said. “Show me what dress you’re going to wear.”

         “I’m reading,” Lucie said.

         She had already seen Thalia’s dress, a confection of lilac with charmeuse embroidery. She had nothing in her closet that compared.

         “Come on.”

         Thalia tugged on her arm.

         “I really don’t want – ”

         “You don’t have anything chosen yet, do you?”

         “No,” Lucie admitted.

         “I can’t let you be at the gala without proper attire. You have to look nice – no, you have to look stunning.”

         Lucie laughed but followed Thalia inside. They passed the drawing room, where Mrs. Crowther was napping, and the library, where a few of the girls sat around the cherry wood table. Thalia flung open the wardrobe doors and began snatching clothes from inside. She spread them out.

         “I don’t know,” she said at last.

         She held up a light yellow dress and laid it against Lucie’s shoulders.

         “Hold that,” she commanded.

         Thalia retreated across the room and studied her. Slowly she began to shake her head.

         “It makes you look altogether too girlish,” she said. “There will be naval officers there, merchants’ sons, ship owners.”

         They looked over the other dresses but Thalia did not approve of any of them.

         “For the boarding school, they’ll do,” she said, “but not for something adult like this.”

         Lucie felt her hope slipping. Now that she knew the depth of her ignorance, she did not feel like going at all.

         “Let me see what I have,” Thalia said.


         Lucie would wear Thalia’s amber gown, the one with the tiniest possible sleeves like scarlet petals, and if Thalia had her way, she would also wear Edith’s garnet earrings. In the hall one day the three girls met; Edith stepped aside so she was nearly touching the wall as they began to pass each other. Thalia reached out and touched her arm.

         “Edith,” she said, “whatever are you planning to do about the gala?”

         “What do you mean?”

         Thalia laughed softly.

         “First of all you’ll have to keep that tongue of yours from stumbling in front of all the officers.”

         Edith bridled, knowing herself insulted, knowing she was clumsy in every way. Lucie felt a reluctant pity.

         “And a girl never introduces herself,” Thalia went on mercilessly. “Who do you know that will be there?”

         “I don’t know anyone,” she replied.

         Thalia gave her a sympathetic look. “What a shame.”

         In a last attempt at defiance, Edith raised her chin and asked,

         “Who do you know?”

         “The Bowens, the Cargills. Plenty of others.”

         The girl’s eyes lit with a faint hope. Lucie knew she would ask, willing to humble herself even to Thalia for a chance at the social. She felt compelled to warn her.

         “You could introduce me.”

         “I could,” Thalia said, “but what would you do for me?”

         Lucie felt Edith’s gaze on her but she did not look back. Edith stood dumb for a moment, then said,

         “I don’t have anything you want.”

         Thalia put her hand on Lucie’s shoulder.

         “Don’t you think she’d look pretty in those earrings you have?”

         “I can’t give those away. They were my grandmother’s.”

         “Just for the night,” Thalia said.

         Lucie shook her head, pulling away.

         “Don’t,” she said. “I don’t really need it.”

         Thalia shrugged as made as if to walk away.

         “Ah well,” she said sorrowfully.

         “Wait, I don’t mind – she can wear them to the gala,” Edith stumbled in her hurry to appease. “As long as you’ll introduce me to the people you know.”

         Thalia nodded.

         “You’ll charm them, I’m sure,” she said.

         Edith did not hear the irony in the older girl’s tone, but touched both hands to her cheeks in a flattered gesture.

         “I’ll give the jewelry to you that night,” she said, then turned and went quickly to her room, hand slapping flat against the door.

         They went downstairs. Lucie felt ill. She couldn’t go against Thalia, against a friend, but to gauge Edith’s misery and play on it – it made her uneasy.

         “You see how easy that was?” Thalia asked.

         “I don’t want them anymore,” Lucie said. “It doesn’t seem right.”

         “She practically begged you to take them. Besides, it gives her something to hope for.”

         “You’re going to do your part of the bargain, aren’t you?”

         Thalia was silent.

         “Well, aren’t you?” she asked, sounding childish and hating it.

         “You have to understand,” Thalia said. “If you always give an even exchange in life, you’re never going to gain anything.”

         “I won’t wear them. You promised.”

         “Lucie, you are so devout it’s frightening.”

         At lunch, Lucie felt sick. Egg salad sandwiches wilted on the serving tray and the water was lukewarm. Across the table, Edith ventured a smile her way. Lucie pretended not to have seen and took another bite of crust. The voices seemed to be coming from another part of the school, drifting sleepily to her with no sense of meaning.


         The weekend before the party brought cooler weather and most of the girls went out in the spacious front yard to play croquet. Thalia even joined in, hitting the ball with restrained ferocity. Her aim was a bit off, but she seemed to gain steadily. Lucie had come too late to join and watched the other girls, the flick of their skirts as they swung the mallets. Thalia hadn’t spoken much with her since their disagreement about the earrings.

         She went inside to find a snack and took a heavy, floury scone from the basket. She ate slowly, sipping the water that tasted of clay. The game was slowing down now and she could feel the heat pressed like a sticky hand to the back of her neck. She went back upstairs to lie on the bed and cool off.

         Thalia was coming up the stairs, laughing with one of the girls at another of the girls – Lucie could tell by the sound of it, like little glass chips flaking off a lamp. She sat down at the bureau and waited.

         “Alright,” Thalia said as soon as she came in, “I’ll do it. I’ll try to find someone who’ll dance with her, and it won’t be easy. I’ll have to ask a favor of one of them, I guess. Just so long as you’re happy about it.”

         “Oh yes,” Lucie exclaimed, sitting up. “Thank you.”

         “It would be a waste to get you the earrings if you’re going to make me miserable the whole evening,” she said dryly. “Besides, who else would I talk to?”

         Lucie was touched. She hadn’t imagined herself important to Thalia. But as she thought about it, hardly anyone spoke to Thalia. Even Mrs. Crowther gave her space and solitude, as if afraid to say much. The rouge Thalia wore was against the rules. It was also ignored.

         She wondered why she had become Thalia’s friend. Maybe because she was eager to please and could be counted on to be loyal. Maybe because Thalia wanted to be admired, looked up to – if so, they were matched friends; the flawless Thalia and scarred Lucie, bold and timid, romanced and ignored. Lucie knew herself to be on the plain side, an observer nobody noticed. Or it might be, she thought bitterly, that they were room mates, and Thalia was only making the best of it.


         On the night of the party, Thalia laced her into the amber gown and began to fix her hair. Lucie sat at the bureau, looking at her face over the crystal bowls that served as flower vases. The orange and red petals drooped in the heat and the late afternoon sun gave her face the same tinge. The little bier of flowers was extravagantly arranged; ferns peeped out from between the blossoms and Thalia had morbidly placed a handful of mushrooms near the mirror, pale bonnets in the orange shadow. It smelled like a bowl of burning spices and silk.

         “See,” Thalia said, “these pins hold it all together.”

         She skewered a coil of Lucie’s hair and pronounced her done. Lucie stared at herself, the borrowed earrings glistening in her ears. Everything was perfect – with her face turned half away she could see only the right side of her face. Thalia turned her to face the mirror, pinning up a wayward wisp. Edith winced as the red streak caught her eye, a flame of color beneath her jaw.

         “Did I pull?”

         Lucie didn’t answer and Thalia stopped.

         “It’s not as bad as you imagine,” she said, truly gentle this time.

         “I’ll be the only one,” Lucie replied.

         Thalia stopped to think.

         “I have some powder,” she said at last. “It was a gift from – well, from someone I knew at Winterhall.”

         She went down on her knees and took a box from beneath her bed. A powder puff brushed Lucie’s face and she closed her eyes. Thalia dabbed a wet paste on her neck, following the scar, and then covered it with powder. When Lucie looked again, she was flawless. She could not breathe for a moment – this was what it meant to be beautiful. She was like any girl now.

         She looked at their two faces glimmering in the mirror. Hurried footsteps went by the door and Mrs. Crowther put her head in.

         “Girls,” she cried, “hurry downstairs – everyone else is already waiting.”

         They followed her into the last of the afternoon sunlight. The Crowthers had borrowed carts that the natives usually used for transporting their fruit to market, and the girls rode in these to the town of Paukhaven. A forgotten mango was sitting beneath the seat, its skin mottled with age. Lucie watched it bobble as the road got rough. She leaned away from the side of the cart, trying to keep Thalia’s dress from snagging on the splintered boards.

         The old building that they had turned into a social hall had a sprinkling of bullet holes across the front wall. It sat a few feet off the ground and had a makeshift porch. But inside, it was lit up like the Christmas holidays. The young soldiers and their civilian friends were already there, leaning against the walls or sitting down with their hands on their knees.

         Lucie had not realized how beautiful Thalia was, how her mere presence overwhelmed any group of people, until they entered. The gentlemen rose, to the last one, as they became aware of her. Thalia gave no sign that she noticed anything out of the ordinary; it was her due. The few girls from the nearby seaside towns looked at them and dimpled with envy, turning half away in their seats to engage their gentlemen again.

         Mrs. Crowther hurried to the punch table and wrested the serving spoon from the Paukhaven woman who had been holding it. She loved to preside, Lucie thought. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Edith making her way closer to them. Silently she begged them all to see the difference between her and Edith. She was Thalia’s friend, she was her confidant. Edith was not.

         Just as Edith came near enough to be noticed, Thalia lit upon someone she knew. She took Lucie’s elbow and glided to one of the windows. Standing in front of the green chintz curtains, a couple had recently parted from their conversation. Thalia more than filled the void.

         “Good evening, Harold,” she said. “I didn’t know you were still near Paukhaven.”

         “Yes, yes,” he said, rearranging his posture.

         “But last year you told me you were going back to England.”

         “Something came up,” he said, “I certainly didn’t mean to – ”

         “Oh, you’re all the same,” Thalia said blithely. “The minute you want out of something.”

         Lucie watched her friend chatter, noticed the man’s tailored jacket and the cuff links, the hair cultivated with brilliantine.

         “I had thought to introduce you to my friend,” Thalia said, “but only on the condition that you not lie to her, too. This is Lucie Havers. Her parents are in business along the coast.”

         “Taking in the natives for all they’re worth, eh?” he chuckled.

         They touched hands and her palm tingled as though with cold.

         “No, not really – they’re very honest.”

         Thalia squeezed her arm and Lucie stopped talking while Harold chortled; even Thalia joined in.

         “She’s a regular baby, Thalia,” he said. “Only joking, sweet.”

         He pinched her cheek, and as Lucie moved back she saw Edith again, trying to get through the crowd. Can’t she wait! Lucie thought. She’ll ruin it.

         “I guess we’ll have to leave you to your own devices,” Thalia was saying. “Come along, Lucie. Don’t let him pinch you anymore - you’ll bruise.”

         They went by the punch bowl and Mrs. Crowther poured them each a red cupful. Thalia led her to the far corner of the room. They made a circle through the room and ended up with three gentlemen and a girl, none of them familiar to Lucie but well-acquainted with Thalia. One of the men had a persistent downward slant to one eyebrow that made him seem to be loving you the minute he met your eyes. Another had a pleasant, young face and always seemed to look over the heads of those he talked to. The girl had an old dislike for Thalia.

         “Robin,” Thalia said, touching the one with the far-off gaze. “I saw you and thought, there’s someone Lucie would like to meet.”

         She pushed Lucie forward a little and Robin looked down at her. He made a half-bow and smiled, nervously, she thought.

         “It’s a pleasure,” Lucie dared to say.

         She listened to Thalia and her friends talking, walking with them as they moved around the room. She felt she was learning more in this hour than she had in the whole rest of her life together. When Robin’s hand touched the back of her shoulder for the first time, she flinched. She covered it by sipping punch. Thalia was arm-entwined with the man of the flattering eyebrow.

         “Excuse me.”

         Lucie turned to see Edith.

         “Yes, dear,” Thalia replied, all innocence.

         “I came because – ”

         “Speak up, please,” Thalia said.

         “You know, you said – ”

         “Go on. What do you want?”

         Lucie saw then what she was trying to do. Thalia would do nothing until Edith asked her aloud, until it was clearly only an arrangement, a favor given to an inferior. In Edith’s face a shamed persistence.

         “I think you understand,” Edith said, firm in her voice but a quiver in the hand she kept her cup with.

         “Yes,” Thalia said, “but I’m afraid you didn’t.”

         “You promised. How can you – look at those,” she said, gesturing at Lucie.

         A stunned guilt went through her and did not go away even when she realized it was the earrings Edith was indicating.

         “Those aren’t hers,” Edith said. “They’re mine. We had a bargain, Thalia and I – and she’s as good as stolen them. You’re nothing but a thief.”

         Thalia laughed, but Robin’s arm went out from behind Lucie’s back.

         “What’s all this about?” he asked her. “What bargain?”

         “Really, you can’t blame her,” Thalia said. “She’s jealous, poor thing, that nobody wants to dance, or kiss her hand.”

         Edith was humiliated but she was not cowed.

         “I don’t need people like you,” she said. “Lucie’s good enough to tell them. Isn’t it right, we had a bargain?”

         Lucie looked at Robin and his temples damp with sweat. She saw Thalia, silently waiting, and saw Edith, so sure that she would be proven right.

         “Are you sure?” she asked Edith.

         The girl looked at her once and saw the price, her entire pride laid bare, and shook her head. Thalia was rigid beside Lucie, holding her breath.

         “There was no bargain,” Lucie said. “What are you talking about?”

         Edith left, her back stiff with shame and anger. At Thalia’s insistence, they went out onto the porch. The jungle air was dense with over-ripe fruit, the scent touching their faces like a handkerchief dripping with cologne.

         “What is that?” Robin asked, pointing beyond the track into the edge of the forest.

         Lucie peered at the inchoate shape emerging from the dark vine shroud. It shuffled on towards them, strangely indirect. Its head was lumpy, patches of fur missing and the flesh crumbling, a red enamel.

         “It’s a monkey,” someone said.

         Lucie recognized the dragging tail and the prominent ears, the hands that were too human as they groped the earth, raw fingertips miming in the dirt.

         “It’s sick,” Lucie said. “Let’s go in.”

         “No,” Thalia said. “It’s too close in there. I don’t want to see her. She’s nearly spoiled my evening.”

         Robin looked uneasy.

         “I think we should leave it alone,” he said. “It’s coming this way.”

         “It won’t come up,” Thalia said.

         The man at her side touched her hair, fingers twining a bit of it.

         “So sure?”

         “Stop that,” she said, but automatically, not worried at all.

         He laughed and dropped his hand. Lucie felt Robin’s arm around her waist and the warmth and the languorous fragrance in the air sickened her.

         “Let’s go inside,” she said. “It’s getting closer.”

         “Frightened, all of you?” Thalia taunted. “I’m not. I’m not afraid of anything.”

         She jumped from the porch and took a few running steps at it. The monkey turned a blind face to her, and Lucie saw the moment of horrified backward movement, Thalia’s skirt flying forward as she stopped and began to stumble. In panic, the animal leaped up and caught Thalia’s hand. There was mingled growling and screaming and Lucie was pushed back as Robin and the other man ran down. The monkey was already crashing away into the vines when they reached her. She was sitting in the dirt, holding her hand and crying.

         Lucie watched as they lifted her to her feet and led her up the stairs. Thalia was looking down at a ragged scarlet tear in the back of her hand and didn’t seem to notice when Lucie took her other arm and tugged her away from the men. They were stunned, useless.

         “What’s happened?” Mrs. Crowther shrieked, coming out on the porch. “Who did this?”

         The men explained. Lucie took Thalia inside, pushing between the crowd of girls and their gentlemen. She was wiping the blood with a wet cloth when Mrs. Crowther came.

         “Come along. We’re going back.”

         “But the social,” Thalia wailed.

         “It’s over. We’ve got to tend to that.”

         That night they moved Lucie to another room so Thalia could rest.

         “You’ll talk all night,” Mrs. Crowther smiled. “I know girls and parties.”

         In the silent room, Lucie took off the gown and laid it across the mauve chair. It still held shape and there was a sighing as the fabric settled into recumbent folds. Her white nightgown was crisp and should have been comfortable in the breathing night, but she felt cold. Howler monkeys and frogs wailed in the jungle.

         The next morning, Thalia was not at breakfast. Lucie looked to Mrs. Crowther for an answer, but the woman shook her head heavily.

         “After we eat, I want Lucie to come see me in the study,” she said. “The rest of you girls may go to your rooms, or to the yard.”

         Her name spoken alone was chilling. Lucie swallowed the strong tea in her cup and looked at the yellow light piercing the high windows. The other girls looked at her and then back at their plates.

         In the study, Mrs. Crowther made her sit down and then took her hands. Lucie waited in silence. Mrs. Crowther cleared her throat.

         “I’m afraid I have to tell you that Thalia is very ill.”

         Lucie did not answer.

         “Last night she began running a fever. It hasn’t gone down.”

         “She’ll be alright?”

         “We don’t know.”

         The clock ticked, Lucie’s leather shoes creaked as she moved her feet. The woman’s upper eyelids crinkled with pain.

         “I’m sorry, Lucie.”

         After a while she left, closing the door. Lucie sat in the chair and the sun grew hot, pressing against her back. She felt every footstep in the hall, heard every voice pass by the window. It was late afternoon when she finally left the study and went upstairs. The carpet deadened her footsteps and all sounds below. From her room, she heard the bed rock once or twice on its slightly unbalanced feet. She opened the door and went in. It was warm in spite of the open window. Thalia, for once, said nothing. She was sighing in her sleep.

         Mrs. Crowther found her at suppertime. She gestured furiously that Lucie should come out to the hall. Lucie went to the door.

         “You mustn’t be in here. It could be catching. You’ve no idea – ”

         “Thalia won’t make me ill,” Lucie said. “It can’t happen.”

         “You’re just a child.”

         “I’m staying with her.”

         Lucie moved back inside.

         “Wait,” Mrs. Crowther said.

         She passed her dimpled hand to her chest, searching for the glasses she always wore on a chain. But she was not wearing them and her hand dropped empty and foolish.

         “I’ll bring you some supper. Will you have toast and cheese?”

         “Yes.”

         Lucie sat in the windowsill to eat. She broke off the hard edges of the toast and crumbled them down on the withering English ivy below the window. Someone had planted it but there had been too much water or not enough sun, and it would not lift up its flowering stems again.


         That night Thalia began to come out of her illness. She and Lucie spoke for several minutes at a time between her hours of sleep. Lucie gave her a drink of water and a few scant spoons of broth she found cold in the kitchen. Mrs. Crowther came to the room once and saw Thalia asleep. She nodded and smiled to Lucie.

         “You’ve done it,” she said.

         Lucie tried to smile back but the movement died on her lips. She watched the gray and creeping light come over the floor.

         In the morning, Thalia wanted to go down to breakfast.

         “You’ll have to help me down the stairs,” she said, sitting on the edge of the bed.

         Thalia stood up straight as Lucie buttoned up the back of her white day dress. It hung in pure folds from her waist, and Lucie handed her the comb and guided her shaky hand to her hair. She began to help Thalia get her shoes laced up. As soon as the first few hooks were laced, Thalia pushed her hand away, and although it was a slow process and painful to watch, Lucie let her finish.

         “I’ve always loved these shoes,” Thalia said. “I can’t give them up now.”

         They went downstairs then, Thalia trying not to lean on Lucie’s shoulder too much. When they walked into the dining room, stunned silence greeted them. Mrs. Crowther rose from the table with a gasp of relief, putting her napkin to her face. Thalia let go of Lucie.

         “I would like something to eat,” she said calmly. “I feel starved.”

         Lucie wanted to warn her but could not. She had to watch as Thalia stepped forward too far and stumbled into the table. Her hands hit the polished table top with a smack that echoed in the quiet room. None of the girls were looking at her now. Mrs. Crowther turned bewildered eyes on Lucie. Thalia reached out, feeling for a chair in the early darkness. She found a seat and sat down, put her hands on the empty plate, the empty glass, and began to weep.


         Because Thalia was blind, she could not return to England alone. Because Lucie was her only friend, she sent her parents an expensive telegram and begged them to let her go as a companion. They were reluctant. Lucie’s mother met her at the boat, hugged her and kissed her on the forehead and told her a hundred times to write, to write. Lucie felt the soft linen of her mother’s sleeve and brushed at the damp spots appearing there.

         The journey was long. Thalia would not eat with anyone until she had learned how to cut her own food and eat soup without staining the front of her blouses, which were inevitably white now, self-punishing, showing any streak left by her new clumsiness.

         In England, they rode in a train car for half a day. Thalia’s parents sent their butler with a green car to pick the girls up at the station.

         “We must be passing the London shops now,” Thalia said. “Aren’t we?”

         “Yes.”

         “Your first time and I can’t see your face,” she said, her voice rising wistfully.

         They rode in silence for another block. Lucie felt guilty for looking so greedily on the flower-selling girls, the men with pipes stalking through the rain.

         “That doesn’t matter,” Thalia said firmly. “I can imagine how you must be looking.”

         She turned her face with a semblance of sight and smiled. Even blind, she was beautiful. Lucie felt an unworthy jealousy, but in the same instant that she named it to herself it was gone.

         Thalia’s mother fell on her daughter with a frenzy of crying. While the two women embraced, Lucie stood aside, looking at the portraits on the walls, the clock making its well-orchestrated music as the hour struck. Recalled by the chimes, Mrs. Livingston wiped her eyes and gave Lucie a perfunctory hug.

         “You mst be her friend, and here I haven’t said thank you. Well, come along and I’ll send Florence to help you get all unpacked. You may come to lunch as soon as your suitcases are in your rooms.”

         Lunch ws restrained. Mrs. Livingston watched every move her daughter made, reaching to help her find the saltshaker. Between the two of them, they spilled it. The woman was flustered but Thalia only smiled and brushed it into a shimmering pile.


         It was decided that Lucie would stay with Thalia and complete her education through tutoring. The Livingstons felt they had to repay her for the loyalty she had shown, besides making certain that Thalia had a trustworthy and not too attractive companion, and Lucie’s parents could not afford private schooling any longer.

         One afternoon in late autumn of the next year, Lucie and Thalia were sitting in the parlor, arranging flowers. Thalia was snipping the green stems at an angle and peeling off the extra leaves. Lucie had just placed a posy in the vase when Florence entered, carrying a brown package.

         “Ma’am, it’s from a school friend of yours,” she said. “That’s what the man told me.”

         She handed it to Thalia.

         “It won’t do me any good to hold,” she said, handing it to Lucie. “Open it, please.”

         Florence lingered a moment, but then gathered up the discarded stems into her apron and left the room. Lucie opened the end and then handed the package to Thalia. She watched as Thalia shook out them out, the two glistening red earrings falling into her waiting palm. A look of confusion crossed her face.

         “Is this all?” she asked. “What is it?”

         Lucie didn’t look at her.

         “It’s only some jewelry – probably some admirer, don’t you think?” she asked lightly.

         Thalia froze.

         “You mustn’t ever lie to me,” she said. “Tell me what it is.”

         “It’s from Edith. It’s her earrings.”

         Lucie took the package and slid out a sheet of verbena-scented paper.

         “She writes that she felt you ought to have them. She says she forgives you, and that they will look lovely on you whenever you dance again.”

         Thalia did not answer at first. After a few minutes, she asked Lucie to take dictation. She sent her thanks to Edith, for both gifts, and hoped they would meet if Edith ever visited the area. She folded the letter and sent it out with Florence. She held the earrings and the paper and they both thought for a long time, about the dance, about the swirl of dresses and the music, which was bad enough but all that could be had in the jungle, about the young men neither had ever heard from again, but mostly about the wild scents of the jungle flowers and the monkeys howling in the shadows.