AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Nearly four in the morning,” Kiran says. “Ivy and I have been talking.”
“Actually,” Ivy says to Jane, “I wanted to talk to you too.”
“Right,” Jane says, trying not to gawk at Ivy. Her dress is long and black and so elegant that Jane’s Doctor Who pajamas make her feel twelve years old.
“I’m going to bed,” Kiran says smartly, then sets off down the steps.
“You were magnificent tonight,” Ivy calls after Kiran. “We’re really grateful. We couldn’t have pulled it off without you.”
“I didn’t do it for Patrick’s sake,” Kiran says.
“Yeah, okay,” Ivy says, “whatever. I’m really grateful.”
Kiran turns and gives Ivy a broad, warm smile before walking away. Jane has never seen Kiran smile like that before.
Jane turns to Ivy. “I’m awfully tired. Can I talk to you tomorrow too?”
“Sure,” Ivy says.
“G’night, then,” Jane says. Then she stands there looking at Ivy for another moment, until Jasper head-butts her. “Damn demented dog!” She turns away toward her rooms.
But when Jane and Jasper return to the stairs a few minutes later, carrying the umbrella Jane has made, Ivy is still on the second-story landing, staring intently at the umbrella in the painting. Her nose is probably two inches from the paint, her glasses pushed to her forehead and her eyes focused on the gore that lies limply on the checkerboard floor.
It’s too late to turn back; Ivy hears them. She stands straight and raises her eyes to Jane. Loose wisps of dark hair swing around her face.
And so Jane continues bravely down the stairs, umbrella in hand.
Ivy’s steady blue gaze takes in Jane, Jasper, and, with interest, the red-and-green umbrella in Jane’s hand.
“Going for a walk?” Ivy says, glancing at Jane’s pajamas.
“Possibly,” Jane says.
“Do you want company?”
“Yes,” Jane says. “I mean, yes. I do, very much. But I should probably go alone.”
“Okay,” says Ivy. “I looked for you during the gala. Weren’t you feeling up to it?”
The excuse is on the tip of her tongue. She ate something that disagreed with her, she slept through the gala. She hates parties, she hid in the west attics. She spent the night in a bedroom with one of the guests. “I don’t want to lie to you,” Jane says. “I want to tell you the truth.”
In her long black dress, with her hair up, Ivy looks like a woman in a portrait by Renoir, or John Singer Sargent. She studies Jane. “I want to tell you the truth too,” she says.
Another silence fills the space between them. It’s not an awkward silence. It’s full of something like hope, and curiosity.
Jane knows, finally, what she wants.
She speaks in a whisper. “Ivy?”
“Yes?”
“Can you keep a secret?”
“Hell, yes.”
Jane thinks through her words before she says them. “Would you please touch that painting?”
“This one?” Ivy says, pointing to the painting, then wrinkling her nose in puzzlement. “Mrs. Vanders would crucify me.”
“Please?”
“Okay,” she says, and stretches her finger to the painting. When she touches it, her finger sinks in. Her entire hand falls through. With a cry of alarm, she snatches it back. She inspects her own recovered hand, carefully, closely. Satisfied that she still has all her fingers, she raises amazed eyes to Jane.
“I can’t wait to hear what you ask me to do next,” she says.
“I’d like to bring you to meet a woman who communes with sea bears,” says Jane.
Ivy blinks. “Sea bears?”
“I want to show you. Will you come?”
Ivy cocks her head at the painting. “Are the sea bears through there?”
“Yes.”
Ivy blinks again. “Will you be with me the whole time?”
“Yes.”
“Promise?”
“I swear it.”
“Okay, then,” says Ivy.
“What do you think, Steen?” Jane says, looking down at him. “Can a strayhound and his human make a home in two different worlds, with an aunt and a friend?”
Jasper holds Jane’s eyes and cants his head to the side, as if considering. Then he walks into the painting.
Jane turns to Ivy, whose mouth has dropped open. “Do you trust me?” Jane says.
Ivy’s eyes on Jane are wide and deep. She nods.
Jane takes Ivy’s hand and leads her into another world.
