Anne Siddons - Fault Lines

He reached up and felt, and the rat ran up to his neck and nestled there, peering now from directly under his ear. It was not a small rat, either; this Rattus rattus had, as my beloved Felicia back in Baton Rouge used to say, undoubtedly, seen the elephant and heard the owl. He was big, fat, sleek, and obviously as comfortably at home on this man’s shoulder as he would have been in my woods at home.

“Goddamn, Forrest, I thought you were bedded down for the night,” the man said mildly, and shrugged his shoulder, and the rat disappeared from his shoulder. Through the flowers I saw it wriggle into his shirt pocket and settle there.

“Pardon us both, ladies. Again,” he said. “I’m used to him, but I know most people don’t like them. It’s not like they were cute little mice or ground squirrels. He’ll stay put now, and I’ve got to get on back. I’ll see he stays home from now on. I’m T.C. Bridgewater, by the way, Caleb’s hermit, as this lady has already noted.”

His smile widened, and I gave way to the laughter that was tickling at my mouth.

“ Rattus rattus ,” I gasped. “I feel absolutely at home. Do you know, I go swimming with them almost every day of my life? I live in a house by the river back home, and I’m supposed to take them down there and drown them, but instead I let them go, and they make for the water like Labrador retrievers, and there we all are, skinny-dipping in the Chattahoochee.”

I stopped laughing and blushed. Glynn and Laura and T. C. Bridgewater were all staring at me.

“Mom, do you really? I never knew that,” breathed Glynn. Laura said nothing, just stared from me to T. C. Bridgewater, who began to laugh. It was an infectious sound, deep and flat-out and young. It sounded younger than I thought he was: He looked, in the firelight, to be about Laura’s age. Maybe forty.

“Swim with the rats,” he said. “Forget the goddamn dolphins; go South and swim with the rats.”

All of a sudden he and I both were laughing so hard that we could not get our breath, gasping and bending at the waist, holding ourselves. Stopping and wiping our eyes and starting again. The sloped, distinctly untrustworthy head of Rattus rattus appeared over the flowers, nose quivering, and bobbed back down again. His pocket nest must be bouncing uncontrollably. I dissolved into a fresh gust of laughter.

When we finally stopped, Laura said sourly, “Well, now that the floor show is over, perhaps we can collect our flowers and let you and your rat be on your way, Mr.…Bridgewater, I think you said? We’ve had a long, long day.”

“Of course. Are you Ms. Mason? Laura Mason? There’s a package for you in the kitchen, too, and one for Miss Glynn Fowler.”

“I am,” Laura said. “The young, beautiful one is my niece, Glynn, and this crazy woman is my big sister, Merritt Fowler. The ratwoman of Atlanta. Thank you for the delivery and the fire and the welcome, and good night.”

He handed her the flowers and nodded to all of us and said, “I brought you down a pot of chili in case you didn’t stop for groceries. I can pick up whatever you need in the morning; I’ve got to go into town. Just bring me up a list before nine. And you know there’s a phone up at my place, too. Good night and once again, we apologize, Forrest and I. If you hear a dog barking don’t worry, it’s my Lab, Curtis. Good watchdog…”

“Good night , Mr. Bridgewater,” Laura said.

He opened the door and disappeared into the swirling fog. I heard him laughing all the way up to where, I thought, the trail turned. Then night and fog swallowed the sound.

“I hope he isn’t going to be the man who came to dinner,” Laura said. “God, these are gorgeous. Look, they’re to all of us, from Pring. What a darling.”

She smiled and buried her face in the blossoms.

“I never got any flowers before,” Glynn said. “They’re neat. So is the rat. And a dog…I’m glad there’s a dog.”

“Me, too. Maybe he’ll come sleep with you,” I said, hugging her, delight at nothing at all bubbling along my veins like champagne. The joy I had missed on the trip had lain up here all along, waiting for me.

Laura went into the kitchen and came back with two parcels wrapped in silver paper and tied with silver stretch cord. She was still smiling, a misty, tender smile. She looked very young. She handed one of the packages to Glynn and began to open the other.

“Pring does it in style when he does it,” she said.

“It’s not from Caleb,” Glynn said. She had ripped her package open and stood staring at the contents of the flat box. “It’s from Mr. Margolies. Mom; oh, Mom, look!”

I looked into her box. The cross that she had worn that morning in the screen test lay nested in cotton, with a card that said, “For the only Joan who should ever wear it. I hope she will. Regards, Leonard Margolies.”

“Mom, does he mean…” she lifted a radiant face to me.

“He only means that he thought you were very good,” I said. “But what a nice thing to do. It looked just right with your tunic. You can wear it with that.”

“Mama—”

“I’m not going to discuss this movie business anymore, now or ever, Glynn,” I said, and she saw in my face that I was not. She walked over and sank down into the sofa, fingering the cross, her eyes faraway. But she did not pursue it.

Damn that man, I thought fervently. Damn him and Caleb Pringle, too. I should take her home.

I looked over at Laura. “So what did he give you, Pie?” I said.

She did not answer. She sat holding something in her hands, her face still and blank. Then she looked up.

“He thinks I’m playing the Dauphine,” she said in a low, stricken voice. “He’s sent me this silver crown pin from Cartier, and a note that says ‘Vive la’dauphine and vive Arc !’ He’s got it all wrong; I’m sure Pring’s told him I’m doing the adult Joan. Oh, I’ve got to set this straight right now! I can’t let him think I’m playing that monster; not even for one more night.”

She scrambled to her feet.

“Where are you going?” I said. “It doesn’t matter, Pie; you know it’s just a misunderstanding. It can wait until morning. You can call him then or call Caleb. I don’t want you scrambling up that trail in this fog and dark, and climbing all the way to the top of that tower, it’s not safe—”

“I’m going,” she said in a tight, thin voice, and she grabbed up a leather jacket that hung on a peg beside the great front door and went out into the fog, the door banging behind her. Glynn and I sat and stared at each other, listening until her sliding, scrambling footsteps faded away completely. She still wore the soft, soleless driving moccasins she had slipped on that morning. I was afraid that she would fall on the treacherous path.

I was afraid of something else, too, but I would not let it into my mind, or put a name to it. I got up and helped Glynn bring our bags in, and stowed them into the bedrooms we chose off the main room—low-ceilinged, beamed, dark, intimate, places to nest in all the wilderness…and then we went into the kitchen and I heated up the chili and made coffee and cocoa for Glynn. We waited and waited, and finally we ate, sitting at the huge, scrubbed trestle table. Food, I thought mindlessly, and then a long, hot shower, and then bed.

I did not hear the front door open, and only when she stood there did I look up suddenly and notice Laura. She was misted all over with droplets of fog; they stood in her hair and on the scarred, buttery old leather of the jacket she wore. Her feet were wet with black mud and there were smears on both hands and the knee of her jeans, as if she had slipped on the path and caught herself on her palms. There was a thin scratch across her cheek, shockingly red against the pallor. I knew that a branch had whipped her face. Her eyes looked like the eyes of someone who had just been taken from deep, cold water after a long time: black-pupiled, blind.