me want to laugh. Perhaps I was going a little crazy.
“Okay,” I said. “Bring Ryder back.”
Both smiled like two successful conspirators.
I was more interested in the look on Samantha’s face when she returned with Ryder. She seemed a little confused but not as upset as I had feared. I had made up my mind that if they had lied to me and this was going to disturb her, I would refuse. She cradled Ryder lovingly and gently brought him to me when Mrs. Cohen set up my pillows.
“I want to know how it feels,” she said. “I want to know everything so years from now, when I tell him, he’ll believe me.”
I nodded, and she brought him to my breast.
As I had anticipated, time at Wyndemere was different after I had given birth and begun to breastfeed. I almost thought when Samantha and I began to breastfeed. I had yet to do it once without her beside me, sometimes even lying beside me, both of us touching Ryder, both amused at his hunger. Every time the question of my leaving to visit Mummy and Julia arose, I put it off. I called them often, and they were continually asking when I would arrive. Soon, soon was my chant. I questioned it myself. Was I growing too attached to Ryder? Was it because I didn’t want to disappoint Samantha and Dr. Davenport? Was I afraid to go home, afraid to enter that house, knowing my father wouldn’t be there? The very idea of visiting his grave was a nightmare.
Dr. Bliskin still stopped by from time to time. Now that Samantha wasn’t worrying about my every move, she didn’t join us for our walks or remain in the living room when we talked. Despite what Samantha had assured me about his marriage, he rarely mentioned his wife or even his own children, for that matter.
One night, when Dr. Davenport was home early and Franklin had stopped by, he remained for cocktails. I wasn’t permitted any alcoholic beverages because I was breastfeeding, but I didn’t mind. I went to the piano and played and sang some of the songs I used to sing at the Three Bears. Of course, they were all very complimentary, and Dr. Davenport reinforced his offer to “find me a great way to take off into a real singing career.” I thought they had all had too much to drink. Both doctors looked like they had needed to relax or, like Mummy used to even tell my father, “Oh, Arthur, let your hair down.” “What hair?” he would say, and they would laugh. There was laughter once, too, I thought.
During these months, I did a lot more with Samantha. We went shopping, had delightful lunches, and read and watched television together. Dr. Davenport seemed busier than ever. We learned that patients were coming from as far as a hundred miles away to be under his care. His reputation was growing that much.
Finally, at the start of the fourth month after Ryder’s birth, I asked Dr. Davenport to make my arrangements for a visit home. He had offered to do so almost weekly during the first two months. Samantha was quite nervous about it, not so much because she was afraid of any interruption in Ryder’s feeding as because of her fear of what I now saw as the possibility our friendship would end, that I wouldn’t return. She actually accompanied me to the airport.
Mrs. Cohen was still at the house, mainly to care for Elizabeth Davenport, who was practically a recluse by now. Mourning her husband and seeing herself as much less in the social world had taken their toll. Aging was making her mad, too. Her plastic surgeon, perhaps afraid of Dr. Davenport, refused to perform any more procedures, claiming her skin would tear like tissue. She even stopped dyeing her hair, no longer sending for her personal stylist.
“How far we’ve come together,” Samantha said at the departure gate. She was holding on to my hand. “I owe you so much.”
“I’ve been paid very well,” I said, smiling.
“Money is the least of it,” she said.
I almost said Not for me, but held back, thinking she would be hurt. Instead, we hugged, and I promised to call her soon after I had arrived.
Julia met me at Heathrow Airport. She looked like she had aged worse than Elizabeth Davenport. I could almost see the shadow of depression and sadness hovering around and over her. Instead of smiling and rushing to