The Catswold Portal

She fled for the bathroom, chagrined and hurt. If she’d had anywhere else to run to, she would have gone. In the bathroom she dropped her dress and turned on the shower, trying with panic to remember the spell Mag had used with the dye.

And, in the shower, whispering the reverse of the spell, scrubbing her mass of hair, she watched brown dye flow away mixing with the running water.

She toweled and knelt before the little electric wall heater, drying her hair just as she and Alice used to kneel side by side, warned by Aunt Carrie over and over never to touch the heater while their hair was wet.

When her hair was dry, she rose and stood looking at herself in the mirror.

Her hair was all in streaks: shades of rust, and streaks so pale they were almost white, and streaks nearly black, all in a patchwork of colors. This, with her green eyes, gave her such a resemblance to the calico she was afraid to go back into the studio, for fear that secret would be destroyed.

But that was silly. No upperworlder would think of shape shifting. To be Catswold would be beyond an upperworlder’s ability to believe.

She dressed slowly, combed her hair with Braden’s comb, and went out.

He was opening a bottle of wine. When he looked up at her, his dark eyes widened. She swallowed.

He said nothing for a long time, then, “It’s beautiful. It suits you. It’s the way she drew you.” He paused, then, “She loved you, Melissa. She never stopped searching for you.”

She took the wine he offered. She wanted to weep for Alice, not only with her own pain but with the pain in Braden’s eyes.

She said, “When I was small, she would wake me in the mornings hugging me, her long, pale hair down around us like a tent, making me giggle.” She took his hand. “You loved her very much. I am just beginning to remember how much I loved her.”

They were quiet for a while, then she said, “There was another house, too. A tall house on a hill, with a view of the bay. I think that was where we lived.”

“The Russian Hill house.” He searched her face. “We can talk over dinner. I think we could both use something to eat. I’ll wash, just be a minute.”

Before he went to wash he put food on the veranda for the cat, and stood on the terrace calling her, looking up the garden as if he might see the white flash of her face threading along through the dark foliage. And Melissa sat alone in the studio trying to reconstruct the dark time before she knew Alice.

There had been a tangle of strangers, one after another. And Siddonie had come sometimes—a handsome, terrifying young woman with strange games she wanted Melissa to play. But then when she went to live with the Kitchens in the Russian Hill house, Siddonie had not come so often. There she was happy for the first time.

Braden returned wearing a sport coat and pale slacks. His glance slid across her long skirt, making her wish she had other clothes. She said, “I think your little cat was here. Is she orange and black and white? I tried to let her in but she ran. Cats don’t like me much. I guess I should have let her eat in peace. How beautiful she is, really lovely.” She hid her smile. “I expect she’ll come back when I’ve gone.”

Walking out to the car, she wanted to look at the door. But when they stood before it, a chill touched her. He would be thinking of the drawings and of Alice’s death. And again she was ashamed and sorry that she had stirred his pain.

Chapter 36

The cars racing by them, the speeding lights and the speed of their own car dizzied and terrified her. Again she felt the little cat’s panic as trucks roared past on the highway. She told herself that as a child she had ridden in cars. And she hid her fear from Braden. He was telling her about McCabe.

He had met McCabe only briefly, but he knew a lot about him from Alice and from McCabe’s newspaper column. Her father had written regularly for the Chronicle. “An off-beat column,” Braden said, “about art, politics, whatever came to mind. McCabe had an original, sharp way of looking at things. He was a building contractor but he also moved within the art community. He was a good friend of the Kitchens’. Before he met your mother, long before you were born, he encouraged Alice’s interest in drawing animals. Later when Timorell moved in with him, Alice and she became friends. Timorell was about seventeen—she was eighteen when you were born. Alice was then about thirteen.

“McCabe knew that Timorell had a husband—she left him for McCabe, but he was in the city. He lived in a Russian Hill apartment with his small sister, a child about nine. Alice described her as totally evil; Alice was afraid of her.”