Cassie's eyes slid cautiously up to Diana's face. In her opinion, Faye knew exactly what she was doing. But she didn't say anything-they were pulling up to the pretty Victorian house.
“Come on,” Diana said, jumping out. “Let's get you cleaned up before you go home.”
Cleaned up? Cassie found out what she meant when Diana led her into an old-fashioned bathroom on the second floor. Soot stained her gray sweater, her hands, her jeans. Her hair was a mess. Her face was smudged with black and striped with tears. She looked like a war orphan.
“I'll lend you some clothes while we get yours clean. And you can get clean in this.” Diana was bustling around, running hot water into a claw-footed bathtub, adding something that smelled sweet and bubbled. She put out towels, soap, shampoo, all with a speed that bewildered Cassie.
“Throw your clothes outside when you get undressed. And you can put this on afterward,” she said, hanging a fluffy white bathrobe on a hook on the door. “Okay, you're set.”
She disappeared, and Cassie was left staring at the shut door. She looked at the slightly steamy mirror, then at the bathtub. She felt cold and achy inside. Her muscles were trembling from tension. The hot, sweet-scented water looked perfect, and when she climbed in and it rose around her, she let out an involuntary sigh of bliss.
Oh, it was lovely. Just right. She lay and basked for a while, letting the heat soak into her bones and the light, flowery smell fill her lungs. It seemed to clear the last tired cobwebs from her head and refresh her.
She took a washcloth and scrubbed the grime off her face and body. The shampoo smelled sweet too. When she finally got out of the tub and wrapped herself in the big white terrycloth robe, she was clean, and warm, and more relaxed than she could remember being in weeks. She still could scarcely believe this was happening, but she felt filled with light.
The bathroom was old-fashioned, but not in an ugly way, she decided. Pretty towels and jars of colored bath salts and what looked like potpourri made it nice.
She slipped on the soft white slippers Diana had left and padded into the hall.
The door opposite was ajar. Hesitantly she knocked, pushed it open. Then she stopped on the threshold.
Diana was sitting on a window seat, head bent over Cassie's gray sweater on her lap. Above her, in the window, prisms were hanging. The sun was striking them so that little triangles of rainbow fell in the room: bands of violet and green and orangy-red. They were sliding across the walls, dancing on the floor, on Diana's arms and hair. It was as if she were sitting in the middle of a kaleidoscope. No wonder the window had sparkled, Cassie thought.
Diana looked up and smiled.
“Come in. I was just getting the soot out of your sweater.”
“Oh. It's cashmere-“
“I know. It'll be all right.” Diana took some book that had been open on the window seat and put it into a large cabinet that stood against one wall. Cassie noticed she locked the cabinet afterward. Then she went out with the sweater.
Cassie looked at the window seat curiously. She didn't see any spot remover. Only a packet of potpourri and what looked like part of somebody's rock collection.
The room itself was lovely. It managed to combine pretty, antique-looking furniture with modern things, as if the past and the present existed side by side in harmony here.
The hangings on the bed were pale blue with a delicate trailing-vine design, light and airy. On the walls, instead of movie posters or pinups, there were some kind of art prints. The whole place looked-classy. Elegant and artistic, but comfortable, too.
“Do you like those? The prints?”
Cassie turned to find that Diana had noiselessly entered the room again. She nodded, wishing she could think of something intelligent to say to this girl who seemed so far above her. “Who's in them?” she asked, hoping that wasn't something she ought to know already.
“They're Greek gods. Or Greek goddesses, actually. This one's Aphrodite, the goddess of love. See the cherubs and doves around her?”
Cassie gazed at the woman in the picture, who was reclining on a sort of couch, looking beautiful and indolent. Something about the pose-or maybe it was the exposed bosom-reminded her of Suzan.
“And this is Artemis.” Diana moved to another print. “She was goddess of the hunt. She never married, and if any man saw her bathing, she had him ripped to pieces by her dogs.”
The girl in this picture was slim and lithe, with toned-looking arms and legs. She was kneeling, aiming a
bow. Her dark hair fell in tumbled waves down her back, and her face was intense, challenging. Deborah sometimes looked like that, Cassie thought. Then she glanced at the next print and started.
“Who's that?”
“That's Hera, queen of the gods. She could be-jealous.”
Cassie bet she could. The young woman was tall and proud, with an imperious set to her chin. But it was her eyes that held Cassie. They seemed almost to blaze from the print, full of passion and will and danger. Like a crouching jungle cat…
Shuddering uncontrollably, Cassie turned away.
“Are you all right?” Diana asked. Cassie nodded, gulping. Now that she was safe, it was all coming back. Not only the events of the last day, but of the entire last week. All the hurt, all the humiliation. The hanged doll in her locker, the scene in the cafeteria. The rubber snake. The game of keep away with her backpack…
“Cassie?” A hand touched her shoulder.
It was too much. Cassie turned around and flung herself into Diana's arms, bursting into tears.
“It's okay. It'll all be okay, really. Don't worry…” Diana held her and patted her back. All the tears Cassie hadn't been able to release in front of her mother or grandmother were flooding out now. She clung to Diana and sobbed like a little child.
And it was just like the images she'd had in the library. As if she were seven years old and her mother was comforting her. Somehow, Diana made Cassie feel that everything was going to be all right.
Eventually, she slowed to hiccups and sniffles. Finally she lifted her head.
“Tell you what,” Diana said, handing a Kleenex to Cassie. “Why don't you stay here for dinner? My dad won't be back until late tonight-he's a lawyer. I can call a couple of friends and we can order a pizza. How does that sound?”
“Oh-great,” Cassie said, biting her lip. “Really great.”