Part 28 (1/2)

”Thanks dearly,” I said as she left, and hugged her. She hugged me back, hard.

”You take care,” she said.

Back inside, I wheeled Camilla into her living room and helped her into a deep chair and lit the little apple-log fire that was laid. She stretched and sighed deeply and smiled.

”That wasn't very nice,” she said. ”I'll apologize tomorrow. I just get so...tired of it all. It never stops.”

”Of course you do,” I said warmly. ”It's nice to have you to myself for a while.”

We sat for a s.p.a.ce of time, staring at the whispering blue flames. Then Camilla said, ”Do you think we'll lose Henry to Charleston?”

”Not at all,” I said. ”Not in the near future, anyway. He doesn't want to go back to town. And besides, he promised.”

”What about you? Do you ever miss it?”

I thought about it, and was vaguely surprised.

”Sometimes,” I said. ”Not the things you'd think, the things Lewis and I used to do. Just Charleston things. I miss walking on the Battery on a windy winter day. I miss rooting around King Street. I miss the horses. I miss the bells of St. Michael's, and the sunset at the end of Broad Street, over the palm trees. I miss the pluff mud.”

She laughed.

”You've got plenty of that right here.”

”Pluff mud ought to be filtered through wisteria and gasoline and horse p.o.o.p,” I said. ”Sometimes I miss the sense of neighborhood. Not that I ever really knew many of my neighbors on Bull Street. But I knew they were there.”

”Are you lonely out here?” she said.

”Never. Not for a minute. I can get all the Charleston I need anytime I want it. No. This is home for me now.”

”You're sure of that?”

”You know I am. I promised, too.”

She sighed, and said, ”I know you did. I just have to keep picking at it, to see if you've changed your mind. I guess I still think you might....”

”Not a chance,” I said, and got up and went over to her, and kissed her cheek.

She put her hand up to my face, lightly.

”I've always loved you, Anny,” she said.

”And I've always loved you. And I do love you. And I will love you. Now, how about some of that champagne?”

She looked up at me. There were tears in her eyes, but she smiled.

”I would absolutely love some,” she said.

I brought the champagne and two of her Waterford flutes, and poured us both a frothing fluteful.

”This is like old times,” I said, and held up my gla.s.s. ”To us. Still the Scrubs, by G.o.d.”

”Still the Scrubs,” she said, smiling. I knew neither of us believed that, but it was comforting to say it.

It was, in fact, a comforting night. Peaceful. Full of the old, easy affection we had felt for each other from the beginning.

”I'm glad we had this time,” I said. ”We'll have to make it a regular date.”

”Second that,” she said, sipping her champagne. ”Oh, listen, I forgot. I've got something for you. I came across it today and thought about you. Will you go look on my bedside table and bring me that little tissue-paper package?”

I did. When I came back, she was still staring at the fire, her champagne barely touched.

”Open it,” she said, and I did. Inside the nest of colored tissue paper lay a choker of tiny, matched pink pearls.

”Oh, Camilla!” I cried. ”They're lovely. But I can't-”

”I'm never going to wear them,” she said. ”I never have, really. Daddy bought them for me when I made my debut, and I wore them that night, to please him, but pink makes me look like old cheese, and my neck's too long for such small pearls. They'll be beautiful on you. Please let me do this.”

I smiled, feeling tears start in my own eyes.

”I'll put them on right now,” I said, and did.

”They look perfect,” she said. ”Let's toast the final, happy disposition of Daddy's debut pearls. It sounds like a limerick, doesn't it? Drink up.”

We drained our gla.s.ses. The champagne was cold and lovely. I wondered who had chosen it.

”Want some more?” I said, pouring a second gla.s.s.

”No. I'm nodding as it is. Just tuck me in and have another before you go to bed. I'll guarantee you sweet dreams.”

I wheeled her into her bedroom and helped her into the white silk nightgown that was laid out, and watched as she slipped under the covers.

” 'Good night, sweet princess,' ” I said, kissing her forehead. ” 'Flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.' ”

She turned her face into her pillow.

”And you to yours,” she whispered. I turned off her lamp and went out of the room.

I did have another gla.s.s of champagne, but it wasn't the same without Camilla, so I corked the bottle and put it in her refrigerator and let myself out, thinking that it would undoubtedly go flat overnight, but would make a good sauce for cold salmon. I trudged up the driveway to my own house, suddenly so tired I could hardly put one foot in front of the other.

It must have been the emotion, I thought, smiling to myself, sliding between cool sheets and turning off my bedside lamp. ”That was a real love fest. She was Camilla again. Maybe, just maybe, we've gotten her back.”

I wanted to think some more about that, but sleep seized me suddenly and bore me down, fathoms deep, where dreams lay.

Even in the middle of it, I knew that it was a dream, but that did not spoil the sweet reality of it. Reality is often more vivid in that kind of dream because the dreamer knows he must soon leave it whether or not it is a happy dream. This was a very happy one.

I was in a house by the water. Not one of the three new ones, but the one we all owned together, the big, old rambling 1920s cottage on stilts down at the un-chic western end of Sullivan's Island. It was the first one that I knew; Lewis took me there the summer we were married, and I loved it as much in that first instant as I did in all the years we went there. I never said that to the others, because it sounded somehow presumptuous, as if an outlander were laying claim to something he had not yet earned. And even though they enfolded me and took me in as one of them from the first, I knew that I was indeed an outlander. It was Lewis they loved, at least then.