They had all spring and summer to enjoy Manhattan. The magnolias and ornamental cherry trees were blooming in the park. They met at twilight, free spirits, no longer tethered to their parents’ wishes. They explored every acre of the park they so loved and would sorely miss, watching constellations from Sheep Meadow, wading in the chilly Loch, studying the white-footed mice that collected acorns along Cedar Hill, tracking the red bats nesting in the English oaks and black locusts. Lewis the crow followed them, and Haylin fed Franny’s familiar bits of crusts when they brought along sandwiches.
“You’ll spoil him,” Franny said. “He’s supposed to be wild.”
“Maybe he’d rather be tame,” Haylin responded thoughtfully.
Hay had already confided that if he were ever to inherit his family’s money he would dispose of it, for every time he walked into their limestone mansion on Fifth Avenue, he felt he had made a wrong turn and had mistakenly come to live with a family who would have been much happier with a different son. “You’re the only person who really knows me,” he told Franny.
She kissed him then. She didn’t plan it. She simply felt a wave of emotion she couldn’t name. It was impossible for anything to happen between them. Still she kissed him again, and then once more for luck.
Vincent was at the Jester, where he had become a regular, and he was drunk. He hadn’t told his sisters how much of the future he could see, because he didn’t like it one bit. Luckily Franny rather than one of their parents picked up the phone when the bartender called to say the Wizard might need help getting home.
“Who on earth is that?” Franny said.
“The kid who does magic tricks. He gave me your number. He said he was your brother.”
When she said that he was indeed, Franny was informed that Vincent could usually be talked into performing tricks after he’d had a few: the lights would flicker, matches would flame with a puff of breath, silverware would rattle as though there was an earthquake. Now, however, he was plastered, and likely a danger to himself. Franny took a cab, then made her way into the dimly lit bar.
The bartender waved her over. “He’s been drinking since noon,” he said.
Franny asked for a glass of tomato juice, extra large, then proceeded to a booth where Vincent was resting his head on the red plastic padding behind him.
“Hey there, sister,” he said when Franny flung herself into the seat across from him.
She’d brought a cure for drunkenness: a powder composed of cayenne, caffeine, and St. John’s wort, which she now dispensed into the tomato juice. “Drink,” she said.
Vincent sipped, then shuddered in disgust.
“You’re better than this,” Franny said.
“Am I? I see things I can’t change, Franny. When I drink I stop the visions. It was in pieces but it’s coming together in one picture. And lately, what I’ve been seeing is an accident. A bad one. And soon.”
“If you keep drinking like this, I’m sure there will be one sooner or later.”
Franny sounded flip, but all the same she felt a chill. Vincent’s eyes were nearly black, never a good sign.
“I’m serious,” he said. “Our family. This month. When there’s a full moon.”
“Well, then, you don’t have to worry.” There had been a full moon at the beginning of the month. “It’s come and gone.”
Franny remembered the moon because she and Hay had sneaked out to meet at Seventy-Fourth Street in front of the statue of Alice in Wonderland. Midnight had been bright as day and they could easily read the lines chiseled in granite around the sculpture: ’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe. Franny had started something between them with a kiss and now what was done could not be undone, nor would she want it to be. Brillig was said to mean four o’clock in the afternoon, but surely it must mean more: broiling, brilliant, luminous, shimmering, unstoppable.
“Stop worrying about the moon,” she told Vincent, “and start worrying about your drinking.”
She gestured to the glass before him, and Vincent gulped down the rest of the drunkenness cure. He already seemed more clearheaded, but when he set the glass down it shattered into thin shards and turned blue.
“You’re paying for that, Wizard,” the bartender called.
Vincent looked into Franny’s disapproving eyes. He seemed shocked and concerned. “I swear I did not do that.”
A glass breaking on its own portended death.
“I’m telling you the truth,” Vincent said. “Death is close by. I’ve never felt anything like this. I can almost touch it. It’s like a black circle coming closer and closer.”
He reached his hand into the air, and when he opened his closed fist soot appeared in his palm.
“Ashes,” he said. “Franny, you have to listen to me.”
Franny felt a scrim of fear. Still, she approached his prediction logically. “Certainly, somewhere someone will die. It doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with us.” She grabbed her brother’s arm and shook it so that the ashes lifted into the air, where they turned white and scattered into the corners of the room. Then she used a napkin to gather the slivers of glass and brought the mess up to the bar. “He’s underage,” she told the bartender. “Don’t serve him again.”
They walked home together deep in thought. They didn’t hear the bees until they reached the corner. As they neared their house they could see swarms at every window.
They stopped where they were. Bees tried to get into a house when a death was imminent.
“I’ll have Mother call an exterminator,” Franny said.
Vincent was suddenly stone-cold sober. “It won’t make a difference. We can’t stop it.”
“Of course we can. You can change your fate.”
“Can you?”
They stepped closer to each other.
“Do you know who’s in danger?” Franny asked.
“I can’t tell. I don’t think it’s us, because we’re seeing the omen.”
They stood there, shoulders touching. Bees don’t swarm at night. Glass doesn’t break without a cause. Ashes do not fall from above. All the same, Franny still didn’t quite believe Vincent until they entered the front hallway. There on the threshold was a beetle.
“Fuck,” Vincent said. He went to stomp on the creature.
He knew what it was from his readings in The Magus, and he now advised Franny that deathwatch beetles are wood borers that can be heard in the rafters calling for mates. They signified a death. You cannot destroy destruction, The Magus warned. Though you may try. Vincent had gotten rid of the beetle, but not its message. You cannot unwrite a death that has been written. There was no spell strong enough to do so.
Franny went for a broom and a dustpan to dispose of the remnants of the beetle. Jet was in the kitchen. “What’s that?” she said when the creature was tossed in the trash.
“Something to avoid. From now on, no taking chances, no talking to strangers, no walking through the park at night.”
“I thought we were supposed to have courage?”
“Just for now. Don’t do anything out of the ordinary.”
It was decided that Franny would be the one to wait up and tell the parents. They had debated and, when it came down to it, they felt that the parents had to be told for their own protection. They’d been to a party at the new Guggenheim Museum and were tipsy upon their return.
“Amazing evening,” her father remarked. “That building is the future.”
“Speaking of the future,” Franny said, “I have information about our family I’d like to discuss with you.”
“You handle this,” Dr. Burke-Owens said to his wife. “It’s your family.”
Once he’d left the room, Franny turned to her mother. “There was an omen, and we need to pay heed.”
“Franny.” Their mother was exasperated. “Let’s not have any nonsense tonight. I don’t think I can take this any more than your father can.”
“I know you don’t
want to believe in any of this, but there were bees swarming the house.”
“Fine. I’ll call an exterminator in the morning.”
“And a beetle in the hall.”
That stopped Susanna. “What sort of beetle?”
“The bad sort,” Franny said. “A deathwatch beetle.”
Susanna reconsidered. There was no reason to be impulsive when all signs pointed to caution. “I don’t see the harm in doing as you say. No chances will be taken. Now convince your sister of that since she’s been so foolish lately.”
“She’s already agreed,” Franny said.
“Fine. We will all be cautious.”
Yet Franny continued to have a nest of nerves in the pit of her stomach. She went to the bedroom and perched on the edge of Jet’s bed. She felt a rush of love for her sleeping sister, the most kindhearted person she had ever known. Rather than going to sleep herself, Franny crept out the open window. Lewis was there, waiting for her. She’d swiped a dinner roll, which she now broke into three pieces, signaling to each crust. She called each crust by name: Mother, Father, Sister.
“Which one?” she asked, but Lewis flew off, disappearing into the pitch-black sky. “You’re supposed to do as I say,” Franny called after him, distraught, wounded by his refusal to predict the future. Her familiar had made it clear that a crow may be a confidant and a companion, even a spy, but never a servant. In this regard, he mirrored his mistress’s flinty independence. If he cried, as she now did, surely no one would ever know.
On Jet’s birthday the parents surprised her with tickets to a Broadway musical and a special dinner at the Russian Tea Room. She was turning seventeen and was as near to perfect as she’d ever be. Ever since the winter Jet had collected canned food for the local soup kitchen, and she often worked there on holidays, peeling potatoes and slicing carrots. People said she resembled a young Elizabeth Taylor, whose photograph had graced the cover of Life magazine earlier in the year, when Miss Taylor won the Oscar for best actress in BUtterfield 8. Jet was an A student at Starling and had never caused her parents a single bit of worry until this Levi Willard business, but the parents were relieved that folly seemed to be old news now. Jet seemed to have turned a corner on that score. Not that they would allow her to go to Magnolia Street this summer, even though her time to visit Aunt Isabelle had come. That would be tempting fate.
“You’re still the favorite,” Franny remarked with zero jealousy. She was sprawled across her bed watching Jet choose her dress for the evening.
“I am not,” Jet insisted. “Has our mother ever slapped you?”
All the same Jet was pleased with the fuss being made over her. Her birthday was indeed a special occasion, although no one in the family knew quite how special it would be. Franny had bought her a silver bangle bracelet in the jewelry department at Macy’s. Vincent presented her with a record album by a folk singer named Pete Seeger, whose songs were so filled with humanity they brought Jet to tears. But best of all, Levi would be waiting for her at the Bethesda Fountain later tonight. He’d sold a watch that had belonged to his great-great-grandfather so he could rent them a room at the Plaza Hotel. Jet was nervous, but ecstatic. All she had to do was sneak away after the theater and she’d be free. It would be worth the trouble she’d be in when she returned in the morning.
She had tried on nearly all of her dresses when Franny suggested she wear the black minidress April had sent as a present from a shop on Newbury Street in Boston. Even Franny had to admit, April had style. “It’s your birthday,” Franny told her sister. “Live a little.”
Vincent straggled in and threw himself onto Jet’s bed, which by now was piled with discarded clothing. “Live a lot,” he advised.
Jet was persuaded to add a floppy hat, then Franny dabbed on some lip gloss and mascara, and there Jet was, utterly gorgeous. Franny was a little in awe of her younger sister’s shimmering beauty. “If those bitches at Starling could see you now they’d hate you even more. Just be careful tonight.”
Once the parents had left with Jet, Vincent grabbed his leather jacket and nodded to Franny. “Let’s get out of this mausoleum.”
“The sooner, the better,” Franny agreed.
Haylin was probably already at their usual meeting place. Franny latched the front door and they set out into the lovely summer evening. A limo sped by with a whoosh of air and Franny felt a chill, which she ignored. Surely, there was nothing to worry about on this perfect night.
When they reached the corner of Eighty-Ninth and Fifth, brother and sister went their separate ways.
“Use caution,” Franny called to her brother, who waved to her before he headed downtown.
Franny then went directly to the Ninetieth Street entrance, eager to step into the cool, silent park. Lately she was disturbed by her strong feelings toward Haylin. She just couldn’t seem to control them, though she tried her best. Every time they were together, she held back. They would be all over each other, and then she would pull away to stalk off by herself, not wanting him to see how she was burning for him.
“Not again,” Haylin would say, twisted with desire. “Jeez, Franny, I’m dying here.”
Franny had vowed she would not go anywhere near love, but here she was standing on the very edge of it, about to fall. She wasn’t certain how long this denial could go on or if she even wanted it to.
Tonight she wore her usual outfit of a black shirt, black slacks, and a pair of sneakers. It didn’t matter what she wore or how she might try to downplay her looks, Franny possessed a rare beauty. With her long red hair and pale flawless skin, she resembled a woodland creature as she ducked under thickets.
Caution above all else, she told herself. But there he was waiting for her on the path, and Franny had never been an admirer of caution.
They headed for the Ramble. It was a glorious evening. They stopped once to kiss and could go no farther, until Franny broke away, fevered, far too attracted to him. As they came to the model-boat pond, formally called Conservatory Water, Hay reached for some change so he could buy lemonade from the kiosk. “Hey, look at this,” he said. All of the quarters in his hand were tarnished. He had no idea that the silver in a man’s pockets always turns black if he kisses a witch.
There were inky clouds in the even darker sky, and the horizon was painted with a blue-black tint. What was pale glowed brilliantly through the dark: Franny’s freckled skin, some renegade white nightshade growing nearby, the moon, bright and full. It was a blue moon, the name for the second full moon in a single month, the thirteenth full moon of the year. If Franny had remembered Vincent’s remark about the danger of the moon, she might have heard the clamor of a warning bell; instead she and Hay went to Belvedere Lake, which they called Turtle Pond due to the dozens of pet turtles released there. It was set just below the imposing Belvedere Castle. The castle was made of gray granite, a bronze winged dragon in the transom.
Haylin grinned and said, “We could live there and no one would know.”
It was the grin that always tugged at something inside Franny. He seemed so pure. Wrong and Right were fixed points in Haylin’s mind. When he spoke about the many inequities facing those people who had no say in their own futures, Franny felt the sting of tender admiration stirring inside her. Still, she did not wish to have a heart, for such a thing could be broken. She thought of the women who knocked on the back door at Magnolia Street, desperate for love, crying at the kitchen table, each willing to pay any price to win the attention of some man who didn’t know she was alive. Franny had been convinced it was only a rumor that Aunt Isabelle was given all manner of jewelry as payment until she saw a neighbor take off her cameo necklace and leave it on the kitchen table. And then one day, as she was searching a cabinet for the saltshaker, she found a plastic container that rattled. Inside were a dozen diamond rings.
She thought Jet was a fool to look for love, but here she was with Haylin trying to make sense of her frantic heart. Sooner or later she would figure out the curs
e. Mysteries could be solved, if one applied logic and patience.
As they sat on a flat rock, with the evening floating down around them, Franny and Hay traded tales they’d heard about the pond, urban legends about snapping turtles so huge they would leap into the air to catch pigeons that were then drowned and devoured, and of pet fish released from their small bowls that had grown enormous, with sharp teeth and wicked dispositions. There was a lady rumored to live in the shrubbery who was said to catch turtles for her supper. She could be spied begging for spare change on the corner near the Starling School.
Don’t think this won’t happen to you, she hissed at all the pretty young girls passing by. Youth is fleeting. It’s nothing but a dream. I’m where you’re going. I’m what you’ll be.
They called her the Pond Lady and ran from her, shrieking, but they couldn’t get her warning out of their minds. Caution, these girls thought. As for Franny, she always gave the Pond Lady a dollar when she saw her, for she had no fear of who she would turn out to be.
When the theater let out, Jet was walking on air. She quickly worked a Believe Me spell before telling her parents that the girls from Starling were having a slumber party in honor of her birthday. Wasn’t that what they had wanted? For her to be popular and accepted?
“Address please,” her father said.
“Ninety-Second and Third,” Jet responded, having already practiced the answers to most of the possible questions she might be asked.
“Let us drop you,” Susanna said, hailing a cab.
“Oh, Mother, they’ll think I’m a baby.”
Jet kissed her parents good-bye, then she slipped into the taxi and leaned forward to ask the driver to take her to Fifty-Ninth Street. Off they went, for there was a plan, one that had nothing to do with the girls at school, who couldn’t have cared less that it was Jet Owens’s birthday. But someone cared desperately, and had already been waiting for her for over an hour at the entrance to the park on Central Park South. They would spend the night together at the Plaza Hotel, the grandest, most romantic hotel in New York, built in 1907, designed as if it were a French château. In the park across the street from the hotel there was the elegant golden equestrian statue of General Sherman and his horse by the sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens.