A Bloodsmoor Romance by Joyce Carol Oates Page B

girls by winning at these trifling entertainments, she gave no evidence of enjoying them, or, indeed, even of exerting herself o’ermuch, as if her melancholy was far too sacred, to be so lightly dispelled.
    And the girls sang together, accompanied by Mrs. Zinn at the old spinet piano, that they might entertain Mr. Zinn, or aid him in relaxing by the parlor fire, after his long day’s labor. Malvinia’s strong soprano led all the rest in such beloved tunes as “Is There a Heart That Never Lov’d,” “When the Swallows Homeward Fly,” and “What Is Home Without a Mother?” Upon occasion they sang Civil War songs, of the nature of “Stonewall Jackson’s Way,” and “All Quiet Along the Potomac Tonight,” and “The Bonnie Blue Flag,” and “The Battle Cry of Freedom,” which never failed to bring glistening tears to Mr. Zinn’s ruddy cheeks. In frolicksome spirits they sang “Baa-Baa, Black Sheep,” and “Tramp! Tramp! Tramp!” (with appropriate stomping, in which gay Constance Philippa was the most demonstrative), and the lugubrious “Come Home, Father,” the sheet music of which Great-Aunt Edwina had given them, that good lady being a founding member of the Philadelphia branch of the Temperance Union, and most intolerant of alcoholic indulgence. (It was part of the lightsome comedy of the situation, that John Quincy Zinn was a resolute teetotaler, and oft declared that he would as soon drain a glass of kerosene, as of alcohol!)
    Thus, many a chill, windy, rain-lash’d evening was spent, in the snug parlor of the Octagonal House, with all the Zinns gathered together, in boisterous merriment—save for Deirdre, who held herself a little apart, and but rarely smiled, and begged to be excused from the singing: for her voice was hoarse, or her throat sore, or her head ached, or she “had not the inclination to sing.”
    â€œNay, but singing is a pleasure, Deirdre!” Thus Octavia warmly expostulated. “It is not an obligation, or a chore: but a delight. ”
    Whereupon Deirdre stared at her with those o’erlarge silver-gray eyes, all unblinking, and murmured, in a near-inaudible voice, that, to her, singing was not a delight: and she would be very grateful indeed, if she might be excused.
    â€œAh, you are hopeless!—you will never be a Zinn!” Thus the exasperated Malvinia declared one evening, when no one else could hear: thereby wounding the unhappy child the more.
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    THAT THE ACCOMPLISH’D Malvinia Zinn was secretly jealous of her youngest sister, and in some confused manner envied her, should strike us as highly implausible, if we were not conversant with the mysterious ways of the human heart, and the wanton caprices of girlhood. In truth, Malvinia understood that Deirdre was a most wretched child, and that, in any case, her protracted melancholy was not Deirdre’s fault; Malvinia had but to gaze at her own radiant reflection in a mirror, and then at Deirdre, to register the grave distance betwixt them, and all the advantages that were hers.
    As the years passed, Deirdre grew taller, and acquired a very little of the soft roundedness of the female form; and some small—indeed, begrudging—measure of social tact and poise, the which she could scarcely have failed to absorb, dwelling amidst the Zinns and the Kidde­masters. Yet her manner remained feral; her cheeks were excessively pale; her thin lips rarely smiled; and her eyes queerly glared, as if with an unnatural light. And the irregular tuft of hair at her forehead!—it suggested a widow’s peak, though altogether lacking in the subtlety and delicacy of Malvinia’s own.
    â€œHow unjust it is, that, to the casual eye, we might appear to be sisters! —I mean sisters related by blood, and not by the whim of law!” Malvinia shuddered, making her complaint to Octavia, in the privacy of their