The Night Strangers - Chris Bohjalian [57]
“Well, wherever they’d like!” said Clary, waving her arm at the living room as if she were a fairy godmother with a wand. “The couch, the divan, the carpets. Wherever they’d like!”
Emily recalled John’s invitation at the office—the way he had stressed that there was a playroom upstairs where the twins could escape the grown-ups. The last thing Hallie and Garnet wanted this evening was to sit like dolls on the divan. And so, even though it was awkward, she said to her hostess, “That’s really very sweet of you, but I know the girls are tired. They had dance in the morning and were doing yet more unpacking this afternoon. John said something about a playroom. Would it be okay if they just curled up there and dozed in front of a movie? They brought some of their DVDs.”
“Oh, of course. Just let us have them for a few minutes,” Clary said, and she smiled at the children. Her eyes hadn’t wavered, but in those two short sentences her voice had lost its saccharine lilt and grown demanding. Just let us have them. The words echoed in Emily’s head, and they sounded vaguely threatening. This was, she understood, a ridiculous and completely unhealthy overreaction. Still, she wanted her children to have a quiet evening upstairs. It was what she had promised them—and what she had been offered.
Reflexively Emily turned toward Chip for help, because the old Chip would have found a diplomatic way to have the girls excused as soon as John returned with their drinks. But the moment she saw him with that odd new posture of his—his left arm dangling down at his side, his right arm bent across his stomach, and his right hand cradling his left elbow—she knew there would be no cavalry approaching from that direction. He was still gazing at that bizarre chandelier. And so she grinned at her children and did nothing as Sage pressed her palm behind Garnet’s back and Clary did the same with Hallie, and the two older women guided the girls into the living room. Emily followed them, feeling a little obsequious and a little put upon. For a second she was afraid she was going to have to escort Chip into the room, but abruptly he pulled himself together and followed her.
“No one asked you two what you would like!” Peyton said to her. “That’s John for you—always the grandfather. Oblivious to adults when there are children present whom he can spoil. Would either of you like some wine? I brought a couple of very nice Malbecs from Sonoma.”
“That would be lovely, thank you,” she murmured.
“Chip?”
He waved his hand as if brushing a fly from his face. “Oh, that’s fine.”
Peyton nodded approvingly, clearly pleased to have a task, and went to the kitchen, where John was concocting the Shirley Temples.
“Now,” Clary was saying, sitting both Hallie and Garnet down on a round velvet pouf the color of a raspberry in August. “Tell me how you’re enjoying New Hampshire.” She and Sage sat on the floor before the children, as if the girls were storytellers or—and when the word came to Emily, she thought it, too, was an unhealthy connection—royalty. Clary was sitting with her legs straight before her while Sage had curled hers underneath her. Emily was impressed with the woman’s elasticity. She contemplated recommending to her daughters that they offer their hostess and her friend the pouf, but there were plenty of other places where these ladies could sit. They had chosen to sit on the floor before her daughters.
Hallie and Garnet glanced briefly at each other, deciding who should answer, and then Hallie rocked forward a bit and replied simply, “I like the greenhouse.”
“Me, too,” said Garnet.
“I am not at all surprised,” Sage said.
“Why?” Emily asked. She realized the moment the word had escaped her lips that it sounded like she was cross-examining the woman. But Sage didn’t seem to be disturbed by the tone.
“What’s not to love in a greenhouse?” she answered. “Think of the beauty and the magic inside and the fact the world is always new in a greenhouse. It can always be spring. You can have flowers every day.”
Emily noticed Hallie looking at her