The Second Ardath Mayhar Read online

  Berthold carefully switched off his torch and set it neatly beside his utility belt. He would try to escape, but he had a feeling these beings had built with that in mind.

  The walls were changing. A scene of distant mountains, a lake washing against foothills began to form. Plants and flowers grew on the floor, which was now grassy, and the sound of leaves filled his ears. A vivarium...Berthold laughed. After a very long time, he began to cry as well.

  THE LAST PAS SEUL

  If I had possessed good knees I might well have become a ballet dancer. Unfortunately, I had a pair of trick knees, so that was ruled out, though I have always been an avid fan of the dance.

  Natya leaned her forehead against the glass, feeling the chill of the night beyond the window. The terrace glinted with frost and moonlight, and sparks of frozen light splashed from a row of chrome and webbing chairs leaned against the wall for the winter. Behind her, the room was clearly reflected: a great cedar tree had been decorated the day before by a group of chattering young women from a local church. There were billowing drifts of discarded Christmas wrappings, among which the unobtrusive attendants moved, assisting patients, straightening their clothing...caretaking. The thought was bitter.

  Natya’s gifts lay behind her, untouched. One was from Boris, of course, for he always remembered her on holidays. Others were from faithful admirers out of the past. Even the members of the corps de ballet sent her gifts for which she had no present use. The gift she needed most was withheld, she thought. She needed to dance! Only that mattered.

  Lighted by the backwash of moon glow from the terrace, her triangular face stared back at her from the polished glass. Big dark eyes seemed to search themselves despairingly for some lingering trace of Natasha Grigorievna Petrova. Natasha, the beloved baby, whom the great Diaghilev had lifted to a table-top amid a Christmas feast, many, many years before, and named one of the great dancers to come. She had been fourteen.

  Now she examined her reflection critically. She was still straight, still slim (thanks be to God!) for a woman of sixty-eight—she was not bad. Her chin quivered, and she leaned against the window, hiding her face from an inquiring attendant.

  She felt useless and sick, thrown away into this chrome-plated junk heap. Christmas Eve had always been a magical time for her, a time of giving. She had reached out and affected those who were not of her own world. She slid out of the present into that warmly remembered past...

  Holding a sheaf of roses almost as long as her body, young Natasha made a deep reverence, right, left, center, to her partner, who raised her gallantly and kissed her hand. She smiled up at Boris—the great Boris—through a mist of excitement. His eyes twinkled at her, amused and pleased. The applause wearied at last, they made their last bows, and floated into the wings.

  The prima ballerina had been watching, still in her costume and makeup. Taking Boris’s hand she smiled at the young dancer. “You danced verry well,” she said in her kindest tone. “Will you drrive with us to the rreception?”

  Natasha blushed, knowing they would prefer to be alone. “No, I thank you. But I have...plans...for the evening.” She hurried up the break-neck iron stair to the dressing room shared with three other principal dancers, hoping they would be almost ready to leave. “I want to dance,” she whispered to herself. “I must give something to someone tonight—some of the magic to someone who has none. It is, after all, Christmas Eve.”

  Natasha paused at the thought, while her two companions passed her with smiles and went giggling down the stair. She smiled as she removed costume and makeup, packed toe-shoes and tutu into a case, and locked the door behind her. She laughed all the way to the stage door.

  Late hangers-on surrounded the doorway, hoping to meet some of the dancers, but she knew that to them she seemed a child—perhaps a maid—on her way home. There was no trace left of the fairy-like being who had brought them to their feet so short a time ago. Grinning into the wide collar of her gray coat, she passed them without being noticed.

  She looked up and down the street. The lights of a police station gleamed a block away, and she thought that might be the very place to learn what she needed to know. She tapped down the icy walk and up the frosty steps. She looked up at the sergeant behind the tall desk, who was staring down in surprise.

  “And what might I be doing for you, young lady?” he asked in a delightful Irish brogue.

  “I am Natya, a dancer from the ballet,” she said. “I want to dance for someone...for a Chrristmas gift, you know. But I do not know this city or who might like it or would still be up. Could you help me?”

  He blinked. Then his ruddy face wrinkled into a smile. “The old folk are abed,” he said. “So are the orphans, but the Salvation Army has an all-night open house downtown. It is no place for you to go alone, but the patrol will be going down there in a bit. You might go with them. Then they will come back and see you safely home.”

  Happiness bubbled up in her. “That will be perrfect!” she exclaimed, hopping from toe to toe. The sergeant’s smile dissolved into a ripe chuckle.

  Once in that great barn of a building, she had danced to the spirited if erratic music of a drunk at an upright piano. They managed the doll dance from Coppelia, a bit of Lac de Cygne, part of the divertissement from La Belle au Bois Dormant.

  The audience, she thought, had fortified their spirits, before they came, with stronger stuff than the coffee and cocoa this party offered. In a mellow mood, they responded with enthusiasm to this unexpected and unfamiliar entertainment. The Salvation Army officers were delighted, and even the policeman, arriving near the end of her performance, applauded her vigorously before driving her to her hotel.

  That night, in a mist of happiness, she had slept as she had not slept since leaving her father’s house in Petrograd, two years before. That was the first of her Christmas Gifts to the world. Before or after performances, she had danced for pensioners and prisoners, bums and orphans.

  But now there was no longer a need for her. She was treated kindly, but as though she had nothing to offer anyone, ever again. That was a bitter pain in her heart, the treacherous heart that six months before had cut short her teaching years in the only world she loved.

  The moon shone as it had done on that long-ago night. Again she was shunning a party. Perhaps, just once more, she might make a small gift of herself, to the starry sky if to nothing else. She slipped from the window, pulling the draperies closed behind her, and left the room. For once, no one stopped her to ask where she was going.

  In her cramped room, she caught up the long white shawl from the chair and draped it around her shoulders. Then she sat before her mirror and caught back her hair (white now, instead of raven black) with a practiced hand. Fastening it firmly into place, she set her Spanish comb at the crown, the black contrasting nicely with her white.

  Beneath her fingers, the face became, once again, that of Natasha Grigorievna Petrova. The brows winged darkly, the eyes sparkled, the wrinkles disappeared under the makeup. When she was done, she stood and turned on her toe. The pale gray fullness of her skirt swirled satisfactorily, and she nodded at her reflection. “Boris,” she whispered, “tonight I will dance for you. Drream of the way we danced, you and I. Dream of me tonight, Boris, in your hospital bed. Perrhaps we will both soon be frree.”

  The hall outside was empty. She flitted across and out onto the terrace, her dancing slippers soundless on the tiled floor. By the bird bath in the center of the area she paused to look up. There was no wind. The stars were just above the reach of her fingertips, she thought, frozen in the winter sky. She listened for internal music, and when it came she stretched upward, her arms rising, her whole body flowing into motion; as the music moved in her mind, her limbs followed its rhythms.

  Her arabesque was still a matter of steely strength and grace. Slowly, turning, she folded into fifth position, made a preparation, and leaped, the jeté ri
ght, strong, soaring, with the stretch at the top that made her seem to hang in the air.

  Still the music moved inside her, and her muscles ached with the old delight, her bones feeling light and young, for all their aching. Turning, whirling, dipping, gliding, she moved upon the tiles of the terrace, a creature of air and moonlight. Startled faces at the windows were inconsequential. Gesticulating attendants were unnoticed, for her joy was almost suffocating. Her throat throbbed with the wild impulse of her blood as slowly, slowly, the music died, leaving only an echo hidden in her heart.

  Her shawl became a shawl again, instead of a wisp of moonbeam. The skirt fell gently to stillness, and her hands drifted into repose. She smiled at the dumbfounded nurse, a smile of infinite delight, as she followed her into the house.

  Faces smiled back at her, touched with a bit of her wonder and joy. Hands reached out shyly, as if she were somehow magical. The director, obviously prepared to scold her, was unable to find words, and her expression held a touch of awe.

  The bitterness Natya had felt seemed to wash from her spirit. In that mood of perfect peace, she knew her final gift had been accepted. Now she could face her future, long or short, with tranquility. She closed her eyes as she sat in her chair, and a sharpness ran down her left arm, across her chest. She smiled more broadly.

  “Good night, Boris,” she whispered. Perhaps tonight they would both go free.

  MY FRIEND EDDY

  Cat stories delight me, for I find cats to be almost as independent-minded as I am.

  I have to admit it—I worry about Eddy. Not that I’m responsible for him, of course. We’re not that kind of friends, both of us being totally independent. He ignores me, and while I pay pretty close attention to him, I try never to let that show. The bozo may be a drunk and a drifter, but he has his pride, just like me.

  We both get into fights from time to time too. We have the scars to show for it, and I’m pretty proud of my chewed-off ears and crooked tail, which has been broken more times than I can count. Whenever Eddy truly notices me, which isn’t often, he grins. We’re pretty much of a match, the two of us, though he lost his right eye and wears a patch over it, while mine is a mess of scar tissue.

  Sometimes when he staggers down the street, humming gently between hiccups, I trail along behind him, my tail as straight up as it will go. People stop and stare as if we were some kind of parade, though Eddy often seems not to notice. Even other bums give us little salutes, and poor old Ed thinks they’re for him. I know they’re for the combination of ragged Eddy, staggering all over the place, and me, marching straight as a string behind him. We have a style of our own.

  By now you probably guess that Eddy is a few pickles shy of a pint. He can wander into the craziest situations, and I don’t seem to be able to keep from pulling him out of them, sometimes literally. A big tough tomcat can make himself felt, believe me.

  We had gotten along so well for a couple of months that I suppose I got a bit slack. When Eddy unexpectedly hopped a slow freight that night I gave a growl, for I hate having to leap aboard those things. Just one second off in my timing, and I’d be ground to hamburger beneath the wheels.

  I made it, of course, and found myself in an empty boxcar with only Eddy for company, and this was one of the nights he was thinking I was some kind of delusion. He tucked himself into a corner and covered himself up with the old Army overcoat he’d bought for a buck at Goodwill a couple of winters ago. I went over and nosed him, just to make sure he was all right. Then I curled up with my tail warming my nose and dozed off. The train picked up speed and clacked along for hours before it slowed again in a big rail yard. I yawned and moved to the doorway to look out. It was pitch dark, still.

  A heavy boot almost squashed me as someone jumped aboard. Behind him came another big fellow, swearing almost as well as I do. I slid aside silently, baring my fangs at the smell of that boot. Then I scooted through the darkness to the corner where Eddy was hidden by his olive drab overcoat. Many of my scars were given me by men who made my whiskers tingle just the way these two did. I knew bad news when I smelled it.

  I pushed up under the coat and nipped Eddy’s stubbly chin. He grunted softly—I hoped the sound was covered by the clacking of the wheels. I nipped him again, harder. He fumbled around until he felt me. Then he froze. I had known for years that he usually believed I was a delusion, and that suited me. But now we needed to act together, and he had to know I was real.

  Before I had to nip him again in warning one of the men let out a curse. Just what I needed. Eddy ran his fingers over my fur. “Um-hmmm,” he grunted, almost silently. He might be short of smarts, but nobody without a well-honed sense of self-preservation could ever have survived so long.

  Then I heard something that made my fur stand straight up. A small child whimpered, and one of the men said, “Shut that kid up, Moberly. He’s worth as much dead as alive, now we’ve got him. Once they pay off, there’ll not be any way they can trace us—or him, if we drop him off in a river someplace.”

  Eddy heard, and for once he understood what was going on. He went so still he might have been dead, except for the thumping of his heart. Once he’d had a kid of his own—he often talked about him when he reached the maudlin stage in one of his worse drunken spells. I knew there was no way he’d ever let anybody kill a child, no matter how impossible it seemed to rescue him.

  I was thinking hard myself. Some tomcats kill kittens, I know, but the thought made my whiskers bristle. I like young things, human or otherwise, and I knew we had to do something to save the child those creeps had in the opposite corner of the boxcar. Still, when Eddy silently slid from under the coat and felt his way up the wall, it almost took me by surprise.

  Then I realized what he had seen, his head not being under the coat. One of the men was standing, outlined against the slightly lighter darkness beyond the open doorway. He was holding a big bundle as he moved closer to the opening. I could see it squirming. Just at that moment the engineer blew the air horn for a crossing, covering the sound as we moved. Eddy took the left side and grabbed the kid. I took the right and jumped as high as I could, raking my claws down the man’s neck and kicking my hind claws into him. He was completely surprised, and my attack knocked him off balance.

  Eddy hurled himself backward, and I could see that he had the child wrapped tightly in his arms. The kidnapper fell forward, toppling out of the door onto the right-of-way. By then his companion had roused himself to action, but, not being a cat, he wasn’t able to see what was happening. He headed for the sound of the child, who was crying in Eddy’s arms. I wove around his legs and pushed hard, and he fell onto his knees.

  “Get out, Eddy!” I yowled, but of course he couldn’t understand me. Still, I could hear him scrambling across the floor toward the door. The old boy could get it in gear, when things got tight, I had to admit. The train howled again and began to slow. Eddy jumped out, and I leaped onto the back of the man who tried to grab him as he went. He yelled as my claws sank into his shoulders and my teeth met in the nape of his neck.

  He rolled, trying to dislodge me, as the train rattled past the spot where Eddy had gone overboard. When it began to pick up speed again, I jumped free of my struggling captive and sprang out of the door. I had to find Eddy...that other villain might not be so far behind that he couldn’t locate him, by smell, if no other way. Eddy tended to be pretty fragrant, most of the time.

  I hit running, my paws scrambling among the gravel for an instant before I gained the grass beyond. Now I could see well in the starlight. There was still a half-mile of train left to rumble past me.

  I moved into the sunflowers along the embankment and sped back along our track. Eddy would, I hoped, have had the good sense to move away from the railroad as fast as he could. We had to get that child into safe hands before the snatchers found him again. I only hoped he was old enough to know his own name and address.

 
; Once hidden in the shadows among tall grass and sunflowers, I paused and waited for the rest of the train to pass. Then I listened hard, trying to hear, through the shrilling of crickets, the sound of someone running. A mockingbird ran through his repertory, but I could hear nothing that didn’t belong among the sounds of the night. A field mouse rustled through the grass and I killed him cleanly and ate, still listening. Then, far down the line, I heard running footsteps. The villain we had pushed out must be following the train, hoping his friend would also get out and join him. Too bad he didn’t break a leg in the fall onto the right-of-way.

  I gave a low growl of amusement. I suspected the other one would keep going with the train, because neither of the two had the faintest idea who—or what—had attacked them. That kind of human being had no courage, I had found in my rough life, and risking the unknown was probably not in him.

  I slipped deeper into the grass as the steps came nearer. Wherever Eddy had gone to ground, I hoped he would stay there and keep the child quiet until this one had passed by. Eddy was no strong-man, and though I had muscles I’d never had to put into action, you had to admit that there was a pretty big size difference.

  As the steps came nearer, I heard, in the distance, a faint wail. The child was awake. While the villain coming toward me couldn’t know that his captive had been taken out of the boxcar, he might investigate a child’s cry, out here where there shouldn’t be anyone at this time of night. I crouched under a clump of sunflowers, waiting in ambush as he angled toward the sound we both had heard.

  When he reached me I hurled my weight against his near knee. He stumbled, tried to balance on his moving foot, then fell full length among the briers and scrub beside the fence dividing the right of way from pastureland. I sprang onto his head and dug in my claws. Then I leaped free.