Taltos (Lives of the Mayfair Witches #3)(66)
Author: Anne Rice

“Oughtn’t be sleepin’ in your pretty clothes!” declared Eugenia. “And look at those beautiful big sleeves all rumpled, and that lace, that delicate lace.”

If only she could say Buzz off. “Eugenia, it’s meant to be rumpled.”

There was a tall glass of milk, frosty, luscious looking, in Eugenia’s hand. And in the other, an apple on a small white plate.

“Who’s this from?” asked Mona, “the Evil Queen?”

Of course, Eugenia didn’t know what she was talking about, but it didn’t matter. Eugenia pointed to the phone again. Mona was about to pick up the phone when her mind, veering back to the dream, discovered the dream was gone. Like a veil snatched away, it left nothing but a faint memory of texture and color. And the very strange certainty that she must name her daughter Morrigan, a name she’d never heard before.

“And what if you’re a boy?” she asked.

She picked up the receiver.

It was Ryan. The funeral was over, and the Mayfair crowd was arriving at Bea’s house. Lily was going to stay there for a few days, and so would Shelby and Aunt Vivian. Cecilia was uptown, seeing to Ancient Evelyn, and was doing well.

“Could you offer some old-fashioned First Street hospitality to Mary Jane Mayfair for a while?” asked Ryan. “I can’t take her down to Fontevrault till tomorrow. And besides, I think it would be good if you got to know her. And naturally, she’s half in love with First and Chestnut and wants to ask you a thousand questions.”

“Bring her over,” said Mona. The milk tasted good! It was just about the coldest milk she’d ever tasted, which killed all the ickiness of it, which she had never much liked. “I’d welcome her company,” she went on. “This place is spooky, you are right.”

Instantly she wished she hadn’t admitted it, that she, Mona Mayfair, had been spooked in the great house.

But Ryan was off on the track of duty and organization and simply continued to explain that Granny Mayfair, down at Fontevrault, was being cared for by the little boy from Napoleonville, and that this was a good opportunity to persuade Mary Jane to get out of that ruin, and to move to town.

“This girl needs the family. But she doesn’t need any more of this grief and misery just now. Her first real visit has for obvious reasons been a disaster. She’s in shell shock from the accident. You know she saw the entire accident. I want to get her out of here—”

“Well, sure, but she’ll feel closer to everybody afterwards,” said Mona with a shrug. She took a big, wet, crunchy bite of the apple. God, was she hungry. “Ryan, have you ever heard of the name Morrigan?”

“I don’t think so.”

“There’s never been a Morrigan Mayfair?”

“Not that I remember. It’s an old English name, isn’t it?”

“Hmmm. Think it’s pretty?”

“But what if the baby is a boy, Mona?”

“It’s not, I know,” she said. And then caught herself. How in the world could she know? It was the dream, wasn’t it, and it also must have been wishful thinking, the desire to have a girl child and bring her up free and strong, the way girls were almost never brought up.

Ryan promised to be there within ten minutes.

Mona sat against the pillows, looking out again at the Resurrection ferns and the bits and pieces of blue sky beyond. The house was silent all around her, Eugenia having disappeared. She crossed her bare legs, the shirt easily covering her knees with its thick lace hem. The sleeves were horribly rumpled, true, but so what? They were sleeves fit for a pirate. Who could keep anything like that neat? Did pirates? Pirates must have gone about rumpled. And Beatrice had bought so many of these things! It was supposed to be “youthful,” Mona suspected. Well, it was pretty. Even had pearl buttons. Made her feel like a … a little mother!

She laughed. Boy, this apple was good.

Mary Jane Mayfair. In a way, this was the only person in the family that Mona could possibly get excited about seeing, and on the other hand, what if Mary Jane started saying all kinds of wild and witchy things? What if she started running off at the mouth irresponsibly? Mona wouldn’t be able to handle it.

She took another bite of the apple. This will help with vitamin deficiencies, she thought, but she needed the supplements Annelle Salter had prescribed for her. She drank the rest of the milk in one Olympian gulp.

“What about ‘Ophelia’?” she said aloud. Would that be right, to name a girl child after poor mad Ophelia, who had drowned herself after Hamlet’s rejection? Probably not. Ophelia’s my secret name, she thought, and you’re going to be called Morrigan.

A great sense of well-being came over her. Morrigan. She closed her eyes and smelled the water, heard the waves crashing on the rocks.

* * *

A sound woke her, abruptly. She’d been asleep and she didn’t know how long. Ryan was standing beside the bed, and Mary Jane Mayfair was with him.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” said Mona, swinging her legs over the side of the bed and coming round to greet them. Ryan was already backing out of the room.

“I presume you know,” he said, “that Michael and Rowan are in London. Michael said he would call you.” Then he was off, headed down the stairs.

Here stood Mary Jane.

What a change from the afternoon she’d come sprouting diagnoses of Rowan. But one had to remember, thought Mona, that those diagnoses had been correct.

Mary Jane’s yellow hair was hanging loose and splendid, like flax, over her shoulders, and her big br**sts were poking against the tight fit of a white lace dress. There was a little mud, from the cemetery, probably, on her beige high-heeled shoes. She had a tiny, mythical Southern waist.

“Hey there, Mona, I hope this doesn’t hang you up, my being here,” she said, immediately grabbing Mona’s right hand and pumping it furiously, her blue eyes glittering as she looked down at Mona from her seemingly lofty height of about five foot eight inches in the heels. “listen, I can cut out of here any time you don’t want me. I’m no stranger to hitchhiking, I can tell you. I’ll get to Fontevrault just fine. Hey, lookie, we’re both wearing white lace, and don’t you have on the most darlin’ little smock? Hey, that’s just adorable, you look like a white lace bell with red hair. Hey, can I go out there on the front porch?”

“Yeah, sure, I’m glad to have you here,” said Mona. Her hand had been sticky from the apple, but Mary Jane hadn’t noticed.