"I'll go right home and tell Ma," he said after we arrived at Grandma Olivia's. "Take it easy. I'll call you later."

"I'll be all right," I said and kissed him.

I found Grandma Olivia in what was Grandpa Samuel's office talking on the phone. She looked up when I appeared, but continued her conversation with the mortuary.

"Yes," she said, "I want the service short, but I'll stay with the deluxe flower arrangements. No," she added firmly, "you can close the coffin immediately.

Thank you."

She cradled the phone.

"Actually, I thought she would live longer than I would. She's younger, and nothing bothered her half as much as it bothers me."

"Maybe you just never saw how much things bothered her. You hardly visited her up there," I attacked.

"Don't use that tone of voice with me. I won't be blamed for trying to protect her and take care of her. One day you'll realize all that, especially when you see how most people look after their sick relatives. The country is full of discarded people," she continued. "At least I made sure she died with some dignity and in some comfort with professionals looking after her day and night."

"She didn't belong there. She belonged at home," I wailed. "She wasn't crazy. She was just confused. Grandpa Samuel doesn't belong there either.

You have enough money to keep him taken care of right here in his own home, in his own surroundings."

"To do what? Sit around and dribble down his chin, be carried out and left in a chair on the lawn for everyone to see? None of his so-called cronies would come see him. Most of them are worse off or dead. It would just be another family embarrassment, prolonged; and even if I spent a fortune and got him round the clock assistance, I couldn't change his condition. At least he has good medical care, good dietary care and some companionship where he is.

"Don't be so quick to make judgments about things you know very little about," she advised sharply. "You've come late to this family. You have no real idea about the twists and the turns, the ridges and the valleys that were crossed, the storms I've weathered. Belinda was always difficult and always a problem in one way or another, and Samuel was no prize, but I did the best for everyone," she concluded firmly. "I bear no guilt. Her daughter, that's who bears all the guilt."

She took a deep breath and for a moment looked very pale herself. Then she gathered her resolve and stood up.

"There's much more to do, even though I tried to have everything in order." She paused in the doorway and turned to me. "Were you there when it actually happened?" she asked almost in a soft, concerned tone of voice.

"No. She was already gone by the time I found her in the garden. She ... was smiling," I said.

Grandma Olivia nodded.

"She probably thought of the Grim Reaper as just another gentleman caller asking her for a date,"

she said wistfully. "She was a pretty little girl.

Everyone always remarked about her perfect features.

It won't be long before I'll be taking care of her again.

You don't lose your burdens just because you leave this world," she muttered and left the office.

I stood there for a while looking around, thinking, feeling such a smorgasbord of emotions: sadness and grief, confusion and sympathy. I went behind the desk and sat.

Mommy should know, I thought. She should be told her own mother had just died. I stared at the phone. I hadn't attempted to contact her once since my return and she hadn't contacted me, yet I hadn't forgotten the phone number. I sucked in my breath, lifted the receiver and dialed. It rang once and then there was an automated voice.

"I'm sorry, but this number is no longer in service," I was told.

"What?"

I dialed again and again received the same automated message. Where was she? I wondered. She always emphasized how important the telephone was to someone trying to get auditions and parts and assignments. I called information and asked the operator if there was a forwarding number. She told me she had nothing listed.

Frustrated, I thought about calling Mel Jensen, but wondered how I would explain not knowing what had happened to the woman who was supposedly my sister. Nevertheless, I finally called and spoke to his roommate because Mel was at an audition.

"Gina Simon?" he said. "I haven't seen her for a while, months. I don't know where she went. Matter of fact, I think Mel said something about her running out on her lease and the landlord being after her," he added.

"Oh. Well thanks, anyway."

"Do you want me to have Mel call you? Where are you?"

"No, it's all right," I said even more embarrassed. "Just say I wish him luck."

Sure."

I hung up and sat there a while thinking about Mommy. She hadn't been much interested in her mother all these years that her mother was alive as far as I knew. As sad as it was, I didn't think she would be that upset not finding out when her mother had died.

Maybe Grandma Olivia was right: maybe Grandma Belinda was far better off at the home. At least there, no one pretended to be more than he or she was. They took care of you because they were paid to take care of you, and if they liked you and did something extra, it was honest and simple.

Grandma Belinda's funeral was well attended, but not because so many people remembered her. In fact, some people thought she had died long ago.

People came because it was Grandma Olivia's sister and Grandma Olivia still commanded great respect in the community. Government officials attended, as did most of the influential businesspeople and professionals. I saw my father and his wife there, but I avoided looking at him as much as possible and he said nothing to me.

Grandma Olivia did not greet the mourners afterward.

We all went to the cemetery and then the mourners went their separate ways, except for Judge Childs, Kenneth, Holly, Cary, May and Aunt Sara, who returned to the house with us. Grandma Olivia said wakes and feeding large numbers of people only prolong the final good-bye and delayed getting on with life.

Nevertheless, we had something to eat and afterward, we all sat out in the back and talked. Holly took Aunt Sara for a walk with May along the beach.

Holly and Aunt Sara got along well these days. She was actually helping Aunt Sara shed her burden of mourning. Grandma Olivia fell asleep in her chair while Cary talked about the boat with Judge Childs and Kenneth.

Finally, Cary and I went down to the dock and watched the approaching twilight with the gulls gliding gracefully over the silvery water.

"I wonder if Holly is right. I wonder if we all return to some spiritual body full of love and then start again," I said.

Cary was silent for a moment and then he turned to me and smiled.

"I started again. I started when you came here,"

he said. "So maybe it's true: Maybe love is what makes us alive."

I leaned against his shoulder and he put his arm around me, making me feel secure and safe. The sun continued to dip. Clouds drifted toward the horizon as if they were sinking, too. The gulls called out through the shadows.

And I said a soft good-bye to the grandmother I had hardly known, but whose soft eyes filled me with promises to keep.

17.

An End to the Silence .

As Cary had promised, Kenneth's boat was ready for its maiden voyage the following weekend.

Of course, Cary took it out on some test runs beforehand and spent the week tuning and perfecting it until he was satisfied. Weatherwise, luck was with us. When Cary came for me early on Saturday morning, it was a nearly perfect day with just a few dabs of clouds over the face of a pale blue sky, and most important, the sea was calm, but with just enough breeze to make for good sailing.

Grandma Olivia said nothing either negative or positive about it at all. She knew where I was going and why, but she ignored my preparations. There was a dramatic change in her demeanor during the week after her sister's death. She was more withdrawn, said less at dinner and spent more time alone in Grandpa Samuel's office reviewing old papers. She dozed a great deal and had fewer visitors.

Judge Childs came around about as frequently as usual, but his visits were shorter and he had dinner with us only once. Toward the end of the week, immediately after he arrived, he and Grandma Olivia went into the office and spent an hour or so behind closed doors going over documents. When he emerged, he looked flustered and tired. He barely spoke to me before he left and after he was gone, Grandma Olivia went directly up to bed, not so much as glancing my way.

She still made daily inquiries as to my progress at school, commented about my appearance, and warned me about not doing anything to ruin the success I had enjoyed and would enjoy, but her words sounded emptier. They were words of duty, automatic words, sentences without passion. Could it be that Grandma Belinda's death really had affected her? I wondered. I was beginning to feel sorry for her, something I thought I would never do.

I didn't mention any of this to Cary, especially the morning of our maiden voyage. He talked excitedly all the way to Kenneth's beach house, giving me little opportunity to get a word in anyway. I had to laugh at his exuberance, but at the same time, I was thrilled by it.

Holly had prepared our cold lobster lunch with salads and Portuguese bread, wine, coffee and carrot cake. She and Kenneth surprised us by buying new matching sailing outfits. It was the first time I had seen her dressed in something reasonably fashionable and I thought she looked fresh and attractive.

"I've got to look the part now, don't I?" Kenneth said, parading about in his captain's hat.

The aura of happiness that settled over all of us was infectious. We fed each other's laughter and joy.

Kenneth and Cary got us underway and we set out to sea, bouncing gently over the waves, the wind stroking our faces, making our hair dance over our foreheads, all of us bathing in the sunlight and the sea spray. The boat was as sleek and as fast as Cary had predicted. It sliced gracefully through the water.

Kenneth said it handled with such ease, it could make a novice appear to be a seasoned sailor. He even let me steer to prove it. Cary beamed with pride, strutting over the desk, checking every joint, every mechanical part, just daring something to fail.

After we set the anchor, Cary and Kenneth did some fishing while Holly and I prepared our feast.

After we ate I played the fiddle and taught them some of the mountain songs Papa George had taught me. I couldn't recall a time in my life when I felt more contented. All of us sprawled out to rest and actually dozed off a bit before springing back into action and turning the boat toward shore, this time sailing faster, Holly and I shrieking at the waves that splashed over the sides of the boat to soak us. It had been one of the happiest days of my life and I hated to see it come to an end.

Kenneth and Holly had decided to have their wedding the next day at Judge Childs's. It wasn't going to be a very big affair. The Judge would marry them in front of a few friends and there was to be a small dinner party, after which Kenneth and Holly would leave for their week's honeymoon in Montreal.

Cary and I had promised to look after the beach house and their puppies, Prometheus and Neptune. Cary said he would take the dogs home with him every night.

We all knew he was going to be busy. Mr.

Longthorpe had decided to go ahead and contract with him to build him his yacht. Kenneth offered his home for Cary to use, which meant Cary could utilize the studio and shop. Now there would be reason for him to be at Kenneth's anyway. While he had been working there on Kenneth's boat, the house had become our little paradise, our hideaway from the prying eyes of the world around us. We had only the terns and other birds as witnesses. Now that would continue.

And so as the school year was drawing toward its end, I gradually permitted myself to believe there really was such a thing as a rainbow after the storm.

Mommy didn't trouble my thoughts anymore. I accepted that she was gone. I rarely saw my father and never saw or heard from Adam. Michelle avoided me more than I avoided her. It was easy to put it all behind me, to think now of the future, a future that had a place for Cary's and my love.

It was really what I believed as I returned from our day of sailing. Tanned and very contented, I was even eager to share the experience with Grandma Olivia. However, I found the house dark and quiet and discovered Loretta alone in the kitchen. She told me Grandma Olivia had not come down for her dinner.

"It isn't like her to do so, but I brought dinner up to her and she ate in bed," Loretta told me. "That woman isn't right. Something's wrong," she declared, but not with any loving concern. She said it as a matter of fact and went on doing her chores.

All the time I had lived at the house, I always felt uncomfortable going to Grandma Olivia's bedroom while she was in bed. I hesitated to do it now. Although I had developed some level of respect for her, I still wasn't fond of her. I didn't think she was the kind of person who permitted anyone to care for her affectionately anyway. Even the Judge rarely spoke to her tenderly, at least not in front of me. It was as if he thought that if he did, she would either ridicule him or criticize him for it.

Nevertheless, I felt some concern and knocked on her door. There was no response so I knocked harder until I heard, "What is it?"

I opened the door and gazed in at her. She looked like a tiny child in the large bed, her hair loose, her body diminished even more by the oversized pillows.

"I just wondered how you were. Loretta said you didn't come down to dinner and-"

"I'm fine," she said firmly, but then added, "as fine as I can be."

"Is there anything you need?"

She stared at me and then, as if I had asked the silliest question, she uttered a ridiculing groan.

"Need? Yes, I need a new body. I need youth. I need a family with a man as strong as my father was.

No," she said, "I don't need anything you can give me." She paused and nearly smiled at me. "You think you've come to where you can start to do things for me?"

"I just meant . . ."

"I'm tired, very tired. The battles wear you down. However, I don't want sympathy and I don't want anyone to feel sorry for me. I'm just stating a fact you will learn yourself one day. You live, you work hard and you die. Don't expect anything more and you won't be disappointed. You can send Loretta up to take my tray. That's what you can do," she said, waving her hand to brush me away.

I started to close the door.

"Just a moment."

"Yes?"

"I don't believe I will be going to the wedding tomorrow. I don't feel up to festivities and parties. It's not much of a wedding anyway."

"Won't the Judge be disappointed?"

This time instead of smiling disdainfully, she laughed mockingly.

"I can't think of anything that means less to me than Nelson Childs's happiness," she said and then, as if her head had suddenly turned to stone, she dropped it quickly to the pillow.

I stared at her. Despite her money and her power, I did feel sorry for her. I had the urge to shout it at her: "I pity you, you and your concern for what's perfectly proper or what's good for the family. Look at what you've become! Look at what you have at the end of your hard, angry life."

The words were teasing my lips, but I swallowed them back and instead I closed the door and went to tell Loretta to pick up her tray. Then I went to bed thinking about Kenneth and Holly's wedding and dreaming of my own, grateful I wouldn't end up like this sad old woman.

Grandma Olivia remained in bed the following morning. She didn't ask for me and I didn't stop by to say good-bye before going to the wedding. Cary, May and Aunt Sara picked me up and were all surprised to learn that Grandma Olivia wasn't coming.

"Isn't she feeling well?" Aunt Sara asked.

"I don't think so, although I can't imagine the disease or the germ that would have enough nerve to invade her body," I said. Cary laughed, but Aunt Sara looked as if I had blasphemed and had to hide her shock.

The wedding was simple, but very sweet. Judge Childs didn't seem all that surprised at Grandma Olivia's failure to attend. He was too happy about Kenneth's permitting him to perform the ceremony to allow anything to interfere with the joy of the moment. A long table had been set up on the patio.

There was champagne and caviar and other assorted hors d'oeuvres first. Then we had a sit-down dinner, catered by the same people who had catered Kenneth's party for Neptune's Daughter. That was followed with a beautiful wedding cake.

I met Kenneth's brother and sister and their families, but they were the first to leave. Kenneth and Holly left before any of the other guests because they had to get to Boston to catch an airplane to Montreal.