The hall was very dark, but a rim of light showed under Faye’s door. Kate tapped softly.
Faye called, “Who is it?”
“It’s Kate.”
“Don’t you come in yet. You wait outside. I’ll tell you when.” Kate heard a rustling and a scratching in the room. Then Faye called, “All right. Come in.”
The room was decorated. Japanese lanterns with candles in them hung on bamboo sticks at the corners, and red crepe paper twisted in scallops from the center to the corners to give the effect of a tent. On the table, with candlesticks around it, was a big white cake and a box of chocolates, and beside these a basket with a magnum of champagne peeking out of crushed ice. Faye wore her best lace dress and her eyes were shiny with emotion.
“What in the world?” Kate cried. She closed the door. “Why, it looks like a party!”
“It is a party. It’s a party for my dear daughter.”
“It’s not my birthday.” Faye said, “In a way maybe it is.”
“I don’t know what you mean. But I brought you a present.” She laid the folded handkerchief in Faye’s lap. “Open it carefully,” she said.
Faye held the watch up. “Oh, my dear, my dear! You crazy child! No, I can’t take it.” She opened the face and then picked open the back with her fingernail. It was engraved.—”To C. with all my heart from A.”
“It was my mother’s watch,” Kate said softly. “I would like my new mother to have it.”
“My darling child! My darling child!”
“Mother would be glad.”
“But it’s my party. I have a present for my dear daughter—but I’ll have to do it in my own way. Now, Kate, you open the bottle of wine and pour two glasses while I cut the cake. I want it to be fancy.”
When everything was ready Faye took her seat behind the table. She raised her glass. “To my new daughter—may you have long life and happiness.” And when they had drunk Kate proposed, “To my mother.” Faye said, “You’ll make me cry—don’t make me cry. Over on the bureau, dear. Bring the little mahogany box. There that’s the one. Now put it on the table here and open it.”
In the polished box lay a rolled white paper tied with a red ribbon. “What in the world is it?” Kate asked. “It’s my gift to you. Open it.”
Kate very carefully untied the red ribbon and unrolled the tube. It was written elegantly with shaded letters, and it was well and carefully drawn and witnessed by the cook.
“All my worldly goods without exception to Kate Albey because I regard her as my daughter.”
It was simple, direct, and legally irreproachable. Kate read it three times, looked back at the date, studied the cook’s signature. Faye watched her, and her lips were parted in expectation. When Kate’s lips moved, reading, Faye’s lips moved.
Kate rolled the paper and tied the ribbon around it and put it in the box and closed the lid. She sat in her chair.
Faye said at last, “Are you pleased?”
Kate’s eyes seemed to peer into and beyond Faye’s eyes—to penetrate the brain behind the eyes. Kate said quietly, “I’m trying to hold on, Mother. I didn’t know anyone could be so good. I’m afraid if I say anything too quickly or come too close to you, I’ll break to pieces.”
It was more dramatic than Faye had anticipated, quiet and electric. Faye said, “It’s a funny present, isn’t it?”
“Funny? No, it isn’t funny.”
“I mean, a will is a strange present. But it means more than that. Now you are my real daughter I can tell you. I—no, we—have cash and securities in excess of sixty thousand dollars. In my desk are notations of accounts and safe-deposit boxes. I sold the place in Sacramento for a very good price. Why are you so silent, child? Is something bothering you?”
“A will sounds like death. That’s thrown a pall.”
“But everyone should make a will.”
“I know, Mother.” Kate smiled ruefully. “A thought crossed my mind. I thought of all your kin coming in angrily to break such a will as this. You can’t do this.”
“My poor little girl, is that what’s bothering you? I have no folks. As far as I know I have no kin. And if I did have some—who would know? Do you think you are the only one with secrets? Do you think I use the name I was born with?”
Kate looked long and levelly at Faye.
“Kate,” she cried, “Kate, it’s a party. Don’t be sad! Don’t be frozen!”
Kate got up, gently pulled the table aside, and sat down on the floor. She put her cheek on Faye’s knee. Her slender fingers traced a gold thread on the skirt through its intricate leaf pattern. And Faye stroked Kate’s cheek and hair and touched her strange ears. Shyly Faye’s fingers explored to the borders of the scar.
“I think I’ve never been so happy before,” said Kate.
“My darling. You make me happy too. Happier than I have ever been. Now I don’t feel alone. Now I feel safe.”
Kate picked delicately at the gold thread with her fingernails.
They sat in the warmth for a long time before Faye stirred. “Kate,” she said, “we’re forgetting. It’s a party. We’ve forgotten the wine. Pour it, child. We’ll have a little celebration.”
Kate said uneasily, “Do we need it, Mother?”
“It’s good. Why not? I like to take on a little load. It lets the poison out. Don’t you like champagne, Kate?”
“Well, I never have drunk much, it’s not good for me.”
“Nonsense. Pour it, darling.”
Kate got up from the floor and filled the glasses.
Faye said, “Now drink it down. I’m watching you. You’re not going to let an old woman get silly by herself.”
“You’re not an old woman, Mother.”
“Don’t talk—drink it. I won’t touch mine until yours is empty.” She held her glass until Kate had emptied hers, then gulped it. “Good, that’s good,” she said. “Fill them up. Now, come on dear—down the rat hole. After two or three the bad things go away.”
Kate’s chemistry screamed against the wine. She remembered, and she was afraid.
Faye said, “Now let me see the bottom, child—there. You see how good it is? Fill up again.”
The transition came to Kate almost immediately after the second glass. Her fear evaporated, her fear of anything disappeared. This was what she had been afraid of, and now it was too late. The wine had forced a passage through all the carefully built barriers and defenses and deceptions, and she didn’t care. The thing she had learned to cover and control was lost. Her voice became chill and her mouth was thin. Her wide-set eyes slitted and grew watchful and sardonic.