Ширли Мерфи - The Grass Tower

Bethany stayed still for a long moment. Then, “What was in the box?” she asked breathlessly. “Open the box, Justin.”

Watching Bethany closely, Justin lifted the lid.

“Open it more,” Bethany whispered.

Justin reached inside the box and pushed the inner panel. It slid back, and the eagle shone up, catching the light so that Justin gasped. After a moment, she lifted the eagle out, its two heads screaming, and held it on the palm of her hand. She stared at Bethany, perplexed. “I’ve never seen this before. You wanted to know if I knew about the secret compartment, and I did. But I have never seen this. You want to know—”

She stopped short and studied Bethany, and the atmosphere of the room seemed to steady. Their minds touched easily for an instant. “You want to know the name of the man Kathleen had planned to marry,” Justin said. “It was Ruiz. Teodoro Peron Ruiz. But you—you already knew it was Ruiz, didn’t you? How did you know, Bethany?”

“Ninea told me. Well in a way she did. Ninea Ruiz,” Bethany said, watching Justin. She took the eagle from Justin, turned it over, and held it under the light. Why had Ninea—? She peered, trying to find a clue in the mass of tiny intricate lines that seemed to change their patterns depending on the way you looked at them. She glanced up, staring at the reflection of light on the kitchen table, and when she looked at the eagle again the lines seemed to have converged in a different way. They had taken shapes she could now recognize; and all at once she saw it: the letters woven into the pattern, letters that spelled Bethany—

Bethany McAllister Ruiz.

Wordlessly, stunned, she handed the eagle to Justin.

The smell of pancakes filled the room. Justin sat silently studying the scrollwork. But Bethany’s mind led her, could not help but show her, and she read the name with widening eyes, then looked up. Reid, turning pancakes, could only remain puzzled, watching them both.

“You are,” Justin breathed, “you are—oh, Bethany!”

And their arms were around each other, spilling Justin’s coffee.

“I have to confess,” Justin said over her second stack of pancakes, “that I thought—that I suspected it. But I couldn’t tell you, not and have it come, perhaps, to nothing. What did you think I was doing on the phone for days, and writing all those letters?”

“Well—research,” Bethany said vaguely.

“It was research all right, but research about you. There were such strong clues. For one thing, the way you described the city and the heat and the rain pelting down so suddenly was just the way Kathleen had described it. And then I started thinking about dates, because several months after Kathleen’s death, Marjory and Tom took a rather unexpected trip, no one knew where, and returned with an adopted baby. Fifteen years ago, Bethany. Marjory said something vague about a friend putting the baby up for adoption. When I began to work all this out in my mind, I telegraphed the hospital where Kathleen died. I received an answer two days ago, but it said only that they had no record of her death, or of her having ever been confined there for childbirth, nor could they locate a birth record for you. But these Latin countries’ record keeping isn’t always— Well, they did locate a doctor who had had, as a patient, a Senora Ruiz, and could give me her address. I wrote to her, and also several other letters to inquire about records; but I’ve had no answers yet.”

She put her arm around Bethany. “There’s no need for all that now, though. Except—who is Ninea?”

“There could have been twins,” Bethany said slowly. “I think we are twins. But why did they give me away and keep Ninea? Or why didn’t Mama take us both to adopt? I don’t think she could have known there were two of us,” she said reflectively. “She would never have separated us.”

It was two days later that the letter from the Ruiz household arrived. Teodoro’s mother had not answered Justin’s letter; Corrinne had answered it. Her handwriting was delicate, and her words and phrases were sometimes strange, English being her second language. But her meaning was very clear.

Dear Miss McAllister:

You have recently directed an inquiry to Sra. Ruiz regarding a possible child of her son. I believe truly that she will never answer you. Perhaps I am forward, and will make trouble by writing to you, but I have thought for a long time that I must one day do this.

To try to begin, yes, your sister, Kathleen McAllister was married, as you asked, to Sra. Ruiz’s son, Teodoro Peron Ruiz, on September 9, 19—. There was a birth, not one baby, but two. Both were girls, and both did live, but their mother died in childbirth. The babies were named and baptized three weeks before Sr. Ruiz was shot in the political riots of that year.

I cared for the babies in Sra. Mendoza Ruiz’s home. It was I who sent the cablegram to Mrs. Marjory Light, after Sr. Teodoro was killed, asking that she come. It was Sra. Kathleens last request, that if anything should happen to her, I would do this. I did so without Sra. Mendoza Ruiz’s knowledge. When Mrs. Light arrived, Sra. Ruiz found not time to deny the existence of a child, for Mrs. Light gave no warning, and baby things were everywhere.

But she sent me out the back with one baby, and I have raised Ninea ever since. Sra. Ruiz could not bear to give up all that was left of her son.

There existed in Sra. Kathleen’s home two huacas, two golden eagles that Sr. Ruiz had had engraved with the babies names, for their luck. Ninea McAllister Ruiz and Bethany McAllister Ruiz. I took them because they were the only proof I knew of the babies’ family. Although I promised Sra. Ruiz not to tell about Ninea, I felt inside that someday this proof might be needed.

I sent Bethany’s huaca to Mrs. Light. It proved nothing about the two babies, but it did show Bethany’s heritage.

Several months ago Ninea overheard an argument between Sra. Ruiz and me, in which Sra. Ruiz accused me of taking the huacas, as she had many times before. At last, for some reason I cannot explain, I felt I must tell the truth. 1 gave the huaca to her. Later Ninea, unknown to me, searched for the huaca and finally found it, and just today she has come to me asking about her middle name, McAllister. I have told her nothing, but she is very persistent. She has been a disturbed child these last months, for she knows truly inside herself that there is much she has not been told. All Sra. Ruiz ever said was that her mother, a Panamanian woman, had died and there were no relatives.

Ninea has always been an angry child, with hate rising sometimes in her, and for this I blame Sra. Ruiz. She is a fine woman in many ways, but she knows little of children, and Ninea has never been happy with her. The hate that grows in the child is painful to me. Now she says she has strange visions of a girl so like herself one could not tell them apart, and I know it must be Bethany.

I do believe that it is God’s intervention that has made Ninea aware of her sister. For this reason, and because the child is unhappy, and because you write that perhaps the same thing is happening to Bethany, then I must break my promise to Sra. Ruiz and write to you.

I may have caused pain by this letter. Surely in her own way Sra. Ruiz cares for Ninea, but I think it is because she represents the dead son, not for the child herself. If the children will be together as they should be, and happy, then it is meant that 1 should write.

Your servant Corrinne Fraser

Chapter 11

Justin read the letter aloud again as the sunlight streamed through the bay window across her desk and bright hair. When she looked up at last, her smile was touched with wonder. “That you found each other is incredible, Bethany. But the way it happened—” Her blue eyes studied Bethany seriously. “You two have a talent almost beyond believing.”