"You mean reform schools," Gisselle said.

"Gisselle," I said, "stop arguing. It's no use."

She gazed at me with her teary eyes.

I shook my head. "She almost had me committed once. She's capable of anything."

"That's enough," Daphne snapped. "Go up and pack your clothes and remember my warnings about your behavior at school. I don't want to hear a bad word. It's enough that Pierre went and died and left me to be guardian over the offspring resulting from his wild indulgences. I don't have the time nor the emotional strength for it."

"Oh, you have the strength, Daphne," I said. "You have the strength."

She stared at me a moment and then put her hand on her chest. "My heart is beating a mile a minute, Bruce. I have to go up. Will you see to it that they do what they're told and the limousine is here to take them to school in the morning?"

"Of course," he said.

I rose quickly and pushed my sister out of the parlor. Maybe she realized it now; maybe she understood that when Daddy died, we had become orphans, albeit orphans from a rich family, but poorer than the poorest when it came to having someone to love and someone to love us.


12

  Dark Clouds

Despite what Gisselle had heard and seen in the parlor the day before, she somehow blamed me, insisting I hadn't done enough to persuade Daphne to let us remain at home and return to school in New Orleans.

"At least you have something there you like," she moaned before we went to sleep the night before. "You have your precious Miss Stevens and your artwork to occupy yourself, and you can run up to the Clairborne mansion to tease Mrs. Clairborne's blind grandson, but all I have is this group of stupid, immature girls with which to amuse myself."

"I don't tease, Louis," I said. "I feel sorry for him. He's someone who's suffered great emotional pain."

"And what about me? Haven't I suffered great emotional pain? I nearly died; I'm crippled. We're sisters. Why don't you feel sorry for me?" she cried.

"I do," I said, but it was half a lie, Despite Gisselle's being confined to a wheelchair, I found it more and more difficult to sympathize with her plight. Most of the time, Gisselle managed to get what she wanted no matter what, and usually at someone else's expense.

"No you don't! And now I've got to go back to that . . . that hellhole," she groaned.

She threw a tantrum and wheeled herself about her room, knocking things off the dresser and scattering clothing everywhere. Poor Martha had to come in and straighten it all out before Daphne discovered what Gisselle had done.

In the morning she sat rigidly in her wheelchair, as stiff as she would be had she been calcified, not moving a limb and making the transference from chair to chair to car that much more difficult. She refused to eat a morsel of breakfast and kept her lips so tightly pressed together, they looked stitched closed. Although Gisselle was doing all this for our step-mother's benefit, Daphne witnessed none of her tantrum. She merely sent down orders for Edgar, Nina, and the chauffeur and reminders with warnings attached for us. Bruce Bristow arrived just before we were to leave to make sure our departure went smoothly and on schedule. It was the only time Gisselle uttered a word.

"Who are you now," she taunted, "Daphne's little gofer? Bruce, go for this; Bruce, go for that." She laughed at her own derisive comment. Bruce's face turned pink, but he simply smiled and then went to see to the luggage. Frustrated and furious, Gisselle gave up and sat back with her eyes closed, resembling one of the patients strapped in a straitjacket in Uncle Jean's institution.

The trip back to Greenwood was almost as depressing as our journey home to Daddy's funeral. It was far more bleak, the dark gray skies following us all the way, with some light sprinkles dotting the windshield and creating a need for the monotonous sweep of the wipers. Gisselle closed up as tightly as a clam in her corner of the rear seat, not so much as gazing out the window once we left New Orleans. Occasionally, she would throw me a hard look.

For my part I found myself looking forward to doing just what Gisselle had said: returning to work with Miss Stevens and throwing all my energies and attention into the development of my artistic talents. After spending days under Daphne's glaring eyes and oppressive thumb, I actually welcomed the sight of Greenwood when we pulled up the drive and saw the girls scurrying about the grounds after class, all of them laughing, giggling, talking with an animation I now envied. Even Gisselle permitted herself to brighten a bit. I knew she wouldn't show her defeat and disappointment to her disciples.

In fact, once she was back in our dorm, she immediately reverted to her previous demeanor and behavior, refusing to acknowledge anyone's expression of sympathy, acting as if Daddy's death and funeral had been just a terrible inconvenience. She wasn't in her room two minutes before she opened fire on her new whipping boy, her roommate Samantha, screaming at her for having the nerve to move some of her things while she was away. All of us heard the commotion and came out to see what was happening. Samantha was in tears in the doorway where Gisselle had driven her during her tirade.

"How dare you touch my cosmetics? You stole some of my perfume, didn't you? Didn't you?" she hammered. "I know there was more in the bottle."

"I didn't."

"Yes you did. And you tried on some of my clothes too." She spun around in her chair and glared at me. "Look at what I have to put up with since you forced me to move out of your room and share a room with her!" Gisselle screamed.

I nearly burst out laughing at the lie. "Me? I told you to move? You were the one who wanted to move, Gisselle. You were the one who insisted," I said. Vicki, Kate, and Jacki all looked at me sympathetically because they knew what I said was the truth. But none was willing to come to my defense and risk Gisselle's wrath.

"I did not!" Gisselle yelled, her face so red with anger and frustration, she looked like the top of her head would blow off. She pounded the arms of her wheelchair with her fists and shook her body from side to side so vigorously, I thought she would topple over. "You wanted to be with that quadroon so bad you drove me out." She pulled her eyes back under her trembling lids and foamed at the lips, gagging and choking. Everyone thought she was going into a convulsion, but I had seen her behave this way many times before.

"All right, Gisselle," I said with a tone of defeat, "calm down. What do you want?"

"I want her out of here!" she demanded, pointing her right forefinger at Samantha, who looked as confused and frightened as a baby bird driven out of its nest.

"Do you want to move back in with me, then? Is that what you want?" I asked, slowly closing and opening my eyes.

"No. I'll live by myself and take care of myself," she insisted, wrapping her arms around her body and sitting back firmly in her chair. "Just as long as she's out of here."

"You can't toss people in and out of your room like you would one of your stuffed animals, Gisselle," I chastised. She turned her head slowly and fixed her eyes on little Samantha, burning her gaze into the diminutive strawberry blonde, who stepped farther back.

"I'm not tossing her out. She wants to leave, don't you, Samantha?"

Samantha turned helplessly and gazed at me.

"You can move in with me, Samantha," I said, "if my sister is so positive she can be on her own."

Now that Daphne had forced us to return to Greenwood, I knew that all Gisselle was out to do was make everyone else's life as miserable as her own.

"Sure," she whined, "take someone else's side, just like you always do. We're twins, but do you ever act like we are? Do you?"

I closed my eyes and counted to ten.

"All right, what is it you want, Gisselle? Do you want Samantha to move out or don't you?"

"Of course I do! She's a pathetic little . . . virgin!" she thundered. Then she twisted her lips into a wry smile before adding, "Who dreams of sleeping with Jonathan Peck." She wheeled toward her. "Isn't that what you told me, Samantha? Don't you wonder what it would be like to have Jonathan touch your precious little breasts and kiss you below your belly button? And bring the tip of his tongue—"

"Stop it, Gisselle," I screamed. She smiled at Samantha, who now had large tears streaming down her cheeks. She didn't know how to react, how to deal with this violent betrayal.

"Get your things together, Samantha," I told her, "and bring them into my room."

"And I want any of my things that were left in there brought into MY room," Gisselle commanded. "Kate will help, won't you, Kate?" she asked, smiling at her.

"What? Oh, sure."

Gisselle widened her smile for me, glared at Samantha, and then twirled her wheelchair about to return to her room, mumbling loudly about having to check all her things now to see what else Samantha had stolen or used.

"I didn't take any of her things. Honest," Samantha exclaimed again.

"Just move out, Samantha, and don't try to explain or defend yourself," I advised.

I didn't mind having a new roommate and I thought it would serve Gisselle right to have to struggle on her own for a while. Maybe then she would appreciate the help everyone else gave her. But whether it was out of spite or out of defiance, she surprised me by unpacking her own things, changing her dress and shoes for dinner, and fixing her own hair. Kate was given the privilege of wheeling her about now that Samantha was persona non grata. At least for a while, it looked like things would calm down.

After dinner that night, while Vicki was helping me catch up with the work I had missed in the classes she and I shared, Jacki came to my doorway to tell me I had a phone call. I hurried out, assuming it was either Beau or Paul, but it turned out to be Louis.

"I found out from Mrs. Penny about your father," he began. "I wanted to call you in New Orleans, but my cousin wouldn't give me the telephone number. She said it was inappropriate. Anyway, I'm sorry."

"Thank you, Louis."

"I know what it means to lose a parent," he continued. He was silent for a moment and then he changed his tone of voice. "I've been making slow but definite progress with my eyesight," he said. "I can distinguish shapes even better and more clearly. There's still a gray haze over everything, but my doctors are very optimistic."

"I'm happy for you, Louis."

"Can I see you soon? That sounds so great to say, 'see you.' Can I?"

"Yes, of course."

"Come tomorrow. For dinner," he said excitedly. "I'll have the cook prepare a shrimp gumbo."

"No, I can't for dinner. I have serving duty, and it wouldn't be right to ask anyone to take my place."

"Then come after dinner."

"I'll probably have loads of schoolwork to catch up on," I said.

"Oh." Disappointment dripped through the phone. "Just give me a little while to catch up on everything," I pleaded.

"Sure. I'm just so anxious to show you my progress. Progress," he added softly, "that came after I met you."

"That's nice of you to say, Louis. But I don't know what I could have had to do with it."

"I do," he said cryptically. "I'm warning you. I'll drive you crazy until you visit me," he teased.

"All right," I said, laughing. "I'll come up on Sunday after dinner."

"Good. Maybe by then I'll make even more progress and surprise you by telling you the color of your hair and the color of your eyes."

"I hope so," I said, but after I hung up the phone, I felt a dark anxiety spiral its way up from the bottom of my stomach to my heart, where it settled like a dull ache. It was nice to have Louis feel that I was helping him, and it was flattering to think I could have such a dramatic impact on so serious a problem as blindness, but I knew he was putting too much importance on me and developing too much reliance on my company. I was afraid he would think he was falling in love with me and that he might even imagine that I was falling in love with him. Soon, I promised myself, soon I would tell him about Beau. Only now I was afraid it might shatter his delicate improvement; and his grandmother and his cousin, Mrs. Ironwood, would only have something else to blame on rue.

I returned to my room and to my work and buried myself in the reading, the notes, and the studies because it kept me from thinking about all the sad things that had occurred and the heavy burdens I had been left to bear. The next day all of my teachers were understanding and cooperative, the warmest being Miss Stevens, of course. Returning to her class was like coming out of a dark, summer storm into the brightness of sunlight again. I returned to my unfinished paintings and we made a tentative date to meet at the lake on the school grounds Saturday morning to start some new work.