Jamintha by Jennifer Wilde Page A

in the small study. I would read them.
    The room was empty when I entered, the fireplace cold with ashes, but there was an empty glass on the rolltop desk, and his smell. It was as though he had left his impression on the air, for I could feel him strongly as I examined the titles and selected half a dozen books. I expected him to step into the room before I was finished. He didn’t. Gathering the books up in my arms, I left, relieved that I had been spared another encounter. I told myself that it was relief, but it was very like disappointment.
    It continued to rain all during the week. I stayed in my room and read until my eyes were sore, and during the night I slept poorly. I kept hearing noises in the west wing. Once I awoke with a start, convinced someone had just walked down the hall past my bedroom door, but when I listened in the moonlit darkness there was no sound. Days stretched out, so long, so lonely, and my headaches were returning. I was tense without knowing why, and I was bone tired without having done anything more strenuous than turning the pages of a book.
    On Saturday afternoon the house was particularly silent. Charles Danver had gone to the mill, and Brence was out, as usual. Susie had the afternoon off, and Cook was in the basement putting up preserves. I assumed Madame DuBois was in her apartment in the east wing. I was restless, unable to concentrate on the French history I was reading. The rain was a monotonous, steady patter, and I had the feeling I was alone in a deserted ship cast adrift on the ocean.
    I left my room and wandered through the empty halls, aimlessly exploring the house, avoiding the east wings, on the second floor there was a ballroom with blue silk panels edged in gilt, the sky blue ceiling adorned with flaking gilt leaves. The floor was warped, the chandeliers coated with dust, the silk panels dark with moisture stains. No balls had been given here for a very long time, and yet I could almost hear music and see ghostly figures waltzing through the emptiness, colored skirts spreading, flowing like wings vivid for a split second, then nothing but motes of dust swirling in empty space. A little girl stood in that doorway, long brown curls bouncing as she tapped her foot, and she laughed, so happy, and then shadows filled the doorway, nothing else.
    I wandered down a long hall. The air was fetid, the sour smell of mildew almost overwhelming. Turn here , the voice said, open this door, yes, you know the way … The sitting room had been so lovely with ivory walls and white fireplace and large yellow velvet sofa. There had been flowers, and pictures, yes, pictures of court ladies in flowered swings. Watteau. I remembered them distinctly. The pictures were gone. The ivory walls were damp. Dust sheets covered the furniture. I lifted one of them. Yes, yellow velvet, dingy now, splitting with age.
    I had sat on this sofa beside my mother. She had read to me from a big book with brightly colored pictures, the two of us on the sofa, flowers in the pretty white vases, a fire burning cozily in the fireplace. I stood in the middle of the room, sensing so many, vague, misty memories straining to materialize, eluding me just as they were about to become clear. I felt impressions just as I had in the library, but there was no fear, only a warm, pleasant sensation. My mother’s voice, soft and lilting, seemed to speak. “Jane, my little Jane” … No, not quite those words, but words so similar.
    I stepped into the bedroom. I had rarely been in here. I couldn’t remember anything about it, no fleeting impressions. The Chinese silk wallpaper was peeling. The beige and ivory canopy was moth-eaten, hanging from the frame in shreds. Dust sheets covered the furniture, as in the other room, and the chandelier had been disconnected and left on the floor in the corner, pendants yellow with age, cobwebs strung across the branches. A picture in an ornate gold frame leaned against the