“Witch, get away from me,” Carlotta had said, seething with anger. “You and all your kind.”
“Ah, but I know, and your brother’s in the straitjacket, yes, but you’re the killer! You put him up to it. You used the music, you knew the trick.”
It had taken all her strength to say those words, but her love for Stella had demanded it. Stella. Evelyn had lain alone in the bed in the little French Quarter apartment, holding Stella’s dress in her hands, crying against it. And the pearls, they would never find Stella’s pearls. She had turned inward after Stella, she had never dared to want again.
“I’d give them to you, ducky,” Stella had said of the pearls, “you know, I really would, but Carlotta will raise hell! She’s read me the riot act, ducky, I cannot give away the heirlooms and things! If she ever knew about that Victrola—that Julien let you take it—she’d get it away from you. She’s an inventory taker that one. That’s what she ought to do in hell, make sure nobody’s gotten out to purgatory by mistake, or is not suffering his fair share of fire and brimstone. She’s a beast. You may not see me again so soon, ducky dear, I may run away with that Talamasca person from England.”
“No good can come of that!” she said. “I feel afraid.”
“Dance tonight. Have fun. Come on. You cannot wear my pearls if you won’t dance.”
And never again had they even spoken together, she and Stella. Oh, to see the blood oozing on the waxed floor.
Well, yes, Evelyn had answered Carlotta later, she did have the pearls but she’d left them there at the house that night, and after that she would never answer another question about them.
Over the decades, others asked. Even Lauren came in time and asked. “They were priceless pearls. You don’t remember what happened to them?”
And young Ryan, Gifford’s beloved, and her beloved, even he had been forced to bring up the unpleasant subject.
“Ancient Evelyn, Aunt Carlotta will not drop the question of these pearls.” At least Gifford had kept her counsel then, thank heaven, and Gifford had looked so miserable. Never should have showed the pearls to Gifford. But Gifford had said not a word.
Well, if it hadn’t been for Gifford, the priceless pearls would have stayed in the wall forever. Gifford, Gifford, Gifford, Miss Goody-two-shoes, Miss Meddler! But then they were in the wall again, weren’t they? That was the lovely part. They were in the wall right now.
All the more reason to walk straight, to walk slow, to walk sure. The pearls too are up there, and surely they must be given to Mona, for Rowan Mayfair was gone and might never return.
My, so many houses on this long avenue had vanished. It was too sad, really. Whatever made up for a magnificent house, full of ornament and gay shutters and rounded windows? Not these, these mock buildings of stucco and glue, these dreary little tenements all got up for the middle class as if people were fools after all.
You had to hand it to Mona, she knew. She said quite flatly that modern architecture had been a failure. You had only to look around to see, and that was why people loved the old houses now. “You know, I figure, Ancient Evelyn, that probably more houses were built and torn down between 1860 and 1960 than ever before in human history. Think about the cities of Europe. The houses of Amsterdam go back to the 1600s. And then think about New York. Almost every structure on Fifth Avenue is new; there is hardly a house left standing on the whole street from the turn of the century. I believe there is the Frick mansion, and I can’t think of another one. Of course I’ve never been to New York, except with Gifford, and it wasn’t Gifford’s thing to go examining old buildings. I think she thought we went there to go shopping, and shop we did.”
Evelyn had agreed, though she hadn’t said so. On all accounts, Evelyn always agreed with Mona. Though Aunt Evelyn never said.
But that was the great thing about Mona; before her computer had drawn off all her love, Mona had used Ancient Evelyn as her sounding board, and it had never been necessary to say anything to Mona. Mona could make a long conversation all on her own, proceeding with manic fire from one topic to another. Mona was her