The Hook (1991) Read online

  Why did the words stick with him? Why did they hang about like whispers of something he should understand and didn't?

  He placed his finger carefully on the delete key. The flashing cursor began to move backward across the screen, gobbling up the letters of the riddle. One by one they dis-appeared until all were gone and nothing remained but a blank screen.

  The 747 hit an air pocket that sent the computer skidding off the tray and into Peter's lap. Peter clutched the arms of his seat frantically, trying to balance the computer with his knees. The turbulence continued, sharp and unrelenting bumps that made him feel like he was on a sled racing down a rutted hill.

  Seated next to him, closest to the window, Maggie looked up. "1 want a bigger bump."

  Peter sat rigid. "That one was big enough for Daddy."

  She grinned. "Just pretend it's a big, bouncing bus, and you won't be scared."

  Doubtful, Peter thought darkly, wishing he were anywhere else but cooped up on this airplane. He hated airplanes. He hated flying. He hated anything at all that had to do with heights, for that matter. He liked the grounds- good, old, solid terra firma. If man had been meant to fly, he would have been given…

  Maggie nudged him, and he looked over indulgently. His daughter's blue eyes stared back. She had Magic Marker all over her hands and face. Before her lay a sheet of paper that the markers had transformed into a riotous collection of colorful lines and squiggles.

  She took the drawing and handed it to him. "It's a map of my mind," she explained. "So I won't get lost in my thoughts. See? This is our house in San Francisco, California. This is where Great-granny Wendy's house is in London, England. This is the orphan hospital they're naming after Granny."

  Peter released his grip on one armrest long enough to take the drawing from her. He pretended to study it, all the while conscious of the airplane shaking beneath him. Another heavy jolt sent the laptop sliding down his legs toward the cabin floor. Dropping Maggie's drawing, he gripped the armrest anew.

  "Daddy, look what Jack drew," Maggie persisted, shoving a second drawing at her father.

  Reluctantly, Peter accepted it. In the picture an airplane crashed earthward in flames. Moira, Jack, and Maggie were parachuting to safety. Peter was falling headfirst beside them.

  "Where's my parachute?" Peter exclaimed.

  He glanced over the seat top to where Jack and Moira sat one row back. Moira was studying the back of a baseball card. Jack was watching her from his window seat, his hands closed protectively over the large stack of baseball cards resting on the tray in front of him. If he saw his father looking at him, he didn't let on.

  "Okay, Mom, ask me another. Ask me another one."

  Moira spent a further moment studying the back of the card she held, then said, "Give me the American League batting champion, 1985."

  "That's way easy. Wade Boggs. He's probably the best third baseman ever. Why? Because after seven seasons in the majors, he has the third highest batting average ever. Did you ever see him play, Mom?"

  Moira shook her head, glancing at Peter. "No, I never did. But I'll bet your father saw him. Ask him about Wade Boggs."

  Jack seemed to consider the idea for a moment, intense dark eyes fixed on the cards before him, then said, "Ask me another one."

  Moira's disappointment in the response was obvious. She brushed back her chestnut hair and handed back the card she was holding to Jack. "In a moment."

  Jack accepted the card without comment, without looking at anything, and began flipping through the remainder of the cards with deliberate, forced interest.

  The turbulence had eased now and the Fasten Seat Belt sign was off again. Moira rose, smoothed out her clothes, and stepped into the aisle, where she knelt next to Peter's seat. Her green eyes were intense.

  "Peter…"

  "Moira, you've got to help me with Granny Wendy's speech. It just doesn't sound right."

  She put a hand on his arm. "Do me a favor first, Peter. Before we get mere, will you please resolve this baseball business with Jack? He's still very, very upset."

  As always, there was a faint hint of an English accent in her speech, a little of her heritage left over from the days before she married him and came to live in the United States. He liked the sound of her voice, the pleasant cadence it carried, different from anyone else's, distinct and resonant.

  He nodded dutifully. "I will. Want to hear what I have so far?"

  Her hand tightened. "You should have gone to the game, Peter."

  Peter stared wordlessly at her, aware of his failure, uncomfortable with it. He knew he had let Jack down, had let them both down, by not coming to the game. He intended to make it up to Jack; he just hadn't figured out how to go about it yet.

  Moira fixed him with a deliberate stare, then indicated Jack with her eyes. She reached down and retrieved the laptop computer. She waited. Peter sighed, rose, and moved back to the seat she had vacated, settling down beside his son.

  Jack had put away the baseball cards and was tossing his ball in the air and catching it.

  "Listen, Jackie…"

  "Jack," his son corrected, tossing the ball higher.

  Peter took a deep breath, then reached for the armrests as the airplane hit a new series of bumps. The fasten seat belt sign flashed on once more. Jack kept tossing his ball.

  "You're going to hit a window," Peter warned, testy now.

  Jack kept his attention fixed on what he was doing. "Yeah, well, it's probably the only time you'll ever see me play ball."

  "How about if when we get to London we watch the tape of the game?"

  "Oh, all twenty minutes of it? The part where I strike out and we lose?"

  Peter's lips tightened. "I'll give you a few pointers on beating the curve."

  There was no answer. Jack threw the baseball higher. It banged off the cabin ceiling. Passengers all about lifted their heads from their magazines and books. The baby was crying harder. Jack started to throw the ball up again, and this time Peter reached out and caught it.

  "Stop acting like a child!" he snapped.

  Jack snatched the ball back. "I am a child!"

  Peter saw the anger in his eyes and visibly sagged. "I'm going to be there next season to see you play-I promise."

  His son looked over at him in despair. "Dad-don't make any more promises, okay?"

  "Six games, guaranteed!"

  "Dad-I said, don't promise!"

  "My word is my bond," Peter insisted, and reached up to cross his heart.

  Jack looked away. "Sure." The anger in his face was palpable. "A junk bond."

  He flung the ball at the ceiling, striking it so hard that the oxygen mask compartment dropped open and a tangle of masks and lines collapsed downward in front of Peter's face. Peter's hands gripped the armrests for dear life, and he closed his eyes tight.

  Granny Wendy

  Kensington Gardens offered rows of turreted, gabled Tudor homes built of painted boards and stone and brick, their cloistered domains gated and walled, their patchwork lawns drifted with snow, their gardens brilliant with cyclamen and holly. Tree limbs shadowed the homes with spiderweb designs, the trunks from which they branched old and stately columns bracketing the walkways and hedgerows. From out of shadowed alcoves and niches, lights burned like damp fireflies through the late-afternoon mist. Christmas decorations hung brightly from doors and windows and eaves.

  Somewhere in the distance, Big Ben chimed the half hour and went still.

  The cab pulled into the drive at number 14, and the Banning family, both exhausted and high-strung, piled out. The driver stepped clear and moved around to the trunk to remove their bags, wheezing from a cold he had been fighting for the better part of a month. Jack started to skip toward the front entry of his Great-granny Wendy's home, lank hair damp with moisture, dark eyes bright, but Moira reached out quickly to rein him in. Maggie, her face and hands washed clean now of Magic Marker, tugged at her mother's hand anxiously.

  "Mom!" she kept
saying. "1 want to see Great-granny Wendy!"

  Standing by the front passenger door of the cab, Peter was engrossed in resetting watches. He held his pocket watch, Moira's Rolex, and Maggie's Swatch.

  "Just a minute, just a minute," he muttered to no one in particular.

  "There you go, sir," the cabbie offered, after carrying the bags to the door. Peter paid him, counting the English money carefully so as not to overtip, and didn't bother to watch him drive away.

  "Mom, is Great-granny Wendy really the real Wendy, the Wendy from Peter Pan?" Maggie asked suddenly.

  "No," Peter replied wearily. "Not really."

  "Yes, sort of," answered Moira at the same instant.

  They stared at each other uncomfortably. Then Peter reached out and handed his wife her watch.

  "Okay, everybody," he announced briskly, rubbing his hands to generate enthusiasm. "Let's look your best now. First impressions are the most important." He moved to arrange the children in formation behind Moira, Jack first, Maggie second. "Socks pulled up, shirts tucked in, stand up straight. We're in England, the land of good manners."

  He marched them the few steps to the door, checked them a final time, and clanked the knocker-a heavy brass affair attached to a metal plate. They waited patiently. Finally the latch clicked, and the door swung open. A white-haired old man stood framed against the light, dressed in trousers and a plaid jacket with numerous pockets, all stuffed to overflowing. His face was slack and expressionless, and his eyes were rheumy. He seemed to look right through them to something beyond.

  "Uncle Tootles," Peter greeted softly. "Hello…"

  The old man fixed his watery eyes on Peter as if seeing him for the first time and slammed the door.

  Jack and Maggie were in stitches, hanging on to each other gleefully.

  Peter colored. "Jack, spit out your gum before you laugh."

  The door opened a second time, and a sharp-faced, redheaded woman peeked around the edge. Then the door swung open all the way and out bounded a huge, shaggy English sheepdog. The dog went past Peter as if he wasn't there, spinning him around in passing, heading for the children. Peter cried out in warning, but the kids were already embracing the huge beast, hugging it and shouting, "Nana, Nana!"

  The pinched face of the woman in the door reappeared- Liza, the Irish maid, laughing and talking a mile a minute. "Miz Moira! Hullo, now! Lookit 'eze adorable l'ttle children! 'Darlings' down to their pins, they are! Welcome home, welcome home!"

  Moira enfolded her in a warm hug. "Liza, it's good to see you."

  "Ah, Mr. Peter." Liza looked at him almost pityingly. "Poor Uncle Tootles. He's not hisself today-not most days lately." She sighed. "Well, come in, now, come in."

  They trooped in out of the weather, out of the gloom of the misted dusk into the bright lights beyond, Liza and Moira leading the way, Jack and Maggie following with Nana. Peter stayed where he was a moment, brushing at the dog hair that had attached itself to his suit pants, feeling slightly out of place for no reason that he could immediately identify. He paused on the threshold to look upward at the old house, up past the rows of windows, most of them dark, to the gabled eaves of the roof. It was a long way up, he thought uneasily-and a long way down. He stood there, unable to take his eyes away, a feeling of vertigo settling in.

  Moira reappeared suddenly, took him firmly by the arm, and marched him inside.

  The door closed behind them. They stood in the entry way of die old house, looking ahead into the living room, right into the dining room, and left into the study. Polished oak trim gleamed at every turn-from floors, cornices, and mop boards, shelves and cabinets, beams and paneled doors. Pieces of furniture that dated back three centuries crowded one another for space, strange knickknacks and collectings from antique stores and white elephant sales, beautiful and wondrous or ugly and plain, depending on your point of view. Bits of brass and iron glistened in the glow of the Tiffany lamps and the chandeliers. Books lined the shelves, musty and worn and well read. In the study, the lights of a Christmas tree burned cheerfully.

  Moira relieved Peter of his raincoat and hung it with the children's coats on the unicorn-head rack. Following Liza and Nana, they moved along the hallway toward the living room. A stairway curved upward before them toward a balcony and hall. Arched entries opened off the living room in several directions. Peter glanced about, taking it all in, remembering.

  Through the opening leading into the dining room he could see Uncle Tootles down on his hands and knees searching for something.

  "Lost my marbles," the old man was muttering to himself. "Have to find 'em. Lost, lost, lost."

  Tootles glanced up suddenly to see the others staring at him. Crawling out from under the table, he rose to his knees and smiled brightly at Maggie. She smiled back. He beckoned, and she approached. Reaching into his pocket, he drew out a crumpled paper flower, displaying it abruptly, as if he had produced it by magic. He handed it to her, and she giggled. Rising, he turned to Jack and made a modest bow.

  Jack backed away, feigning interest in a ceramic pot with tigers painted on it.

  "I thought he was back in a home," Peter whispered in Liza's ear.

  The maid shook her head. "Broke Miz Wendy's heart, that. She couldn't stand it. After all, he was her first orphan, wasn't he?"

  Moira called to Peter. She was standing in front of an old, well-preserved grandfather clock. The clock bore the face of a smiling moon.

  "The man in the moon, Peter," she said. "Remember? He used to look down on me from so much higher up."

  Peter stared at the clock, thinking of Uncle Tootles instead, missing the warm look Moira gave him.

  There was a movement on the stairs behind them, and they turned. Granny Wendy was descending, slowly, regally, her eyes sweeping past them all to fix on Peter. He straightened without realizing it, a puzzled look in his eyes, a hint of a smile or maybe a frown crossing his face. Granny Wendy was tall and slim, crow's-feet at the corners of her eyes and mouth, her hair gray, but her eyes so vital that she might have been any age and not the ninety-two years she had actually lived. She was wearing a comfortable white dressing gown belted at the waist, with purple ribbons at the sleeves and throat and a sprinkling of lace on her breast.

  Jack and Moira stood wordlessly with Liza and stared up at her. She was conscious of them, of Moira as well, but she never took her eyes from Peter.

  When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she stopped. "Hullo, boy," she whispered.

  Peter took a step forward, trying to make himself taller, straighter, younger for her, trying to be things he had given up trying to be for anyone else a long time ago. "Hullo, Wendy," he whispered back.

  Then suddenly he seemed to remember himself. "Gee, I'm sorry we're running so late. I'm up to my ears in this new deal, and, well, it's just one thing after the other and…" He was so flustered he could not seem to stop talking. He was aware of his children looking at him.

  Wendy held out her arms. "Oh, never mind all that. Come here, Peter, and give me a squdge."

  Peter went to her immediately, and they embraced. Her arms came about him and held him with a strength he did not expect she possessed. His own hug was tentative, uncertain.

  "Oh, Granny. Gran. It's so good to see you," Moira greeted, and gave Wendy a hug of her own.

  "My Moira." Wendy patted her granddaughter's slim back. She stepped away and looked down at the children. "Well. This lovely young lady can't be Maggie, can it?"

  Maggie beamed. "Yes, it can. And know what, Great-grandma? I just played you at school in our play!"

  Peter frowned, but Wendy smiled encouragingly. "And don't you look just the part, too." She turned to Jack, cocking her head slightly. "Can this giant fellow be Jack?"

  Jack blushed, flustered and pleased all at once. "I'm s'pposed to congrat'late you on your orphan hospital, Great-granny." The words tapped coming out of his mouth, spilling in a jumble.

  Wendy ruffled his hair gently. "Why, thank you, Jack." S
he brought both children together before her, a hand on the shoulder of each. "Now, mind you, there's one rule I insist be obeyed as long as you are in my house. No growing up. If you are, stop this very instant!"

  Jack and Maggie laughed, charmed and relieved. Wendy bent to hug them both, laughing as well. She glanced up suddenly at Peter. "And that goes for you, too, Mr. Chairman of the Board Banning."

  Peter smiled uncomfortably. "Sorry, too late."

  Wendy broke from the children and came back to him, tucking his arm firmly under her own, wheeling him toward the living room. "Important businessman, are you? And just what are you doing these days that is so terribly important, Peter?"

  Her bright eyes fixed and held him once more, mesmerizing, depthless. He found himself squirming to find a reply. "Well, you see, I, I, well…" He gave up and spat it out. "I'm doing acquisitions and mergers, and recently I've been dabbling in land development, ah, and…"

  Behind him, Jack made a sound like a cannon being fired. "Yeah, Dad blows 'em right out of the water."

  Wendy glanced down at the boy, then smiled at Peter. "So, Peter," she said softly, and her eyes were almost sad, "you've become a pirate."

  In the Nursery

  Night settled down about number 14 Kensington, a gradual darkening of the afternoon light, a quieting of sound into a restful hush, a fading of that day toward the beginning of the next. As Peter paused to stare out the hallway window thick flakes of snow shone like bits of silver in the glimmer of the streetlights.

  He shuffled his feet on the worn carpet and stared down thoughtfully at his polished shoes. He could see them by bending forward a bit, he discovered. He pushed at his stomach and sighed.

  He passed down the hall toward the sound of laughter coming from Granny Wendy's bedroom. Peeking in, he discovered Wendy dressed in an elegant silk gown of rose and mauve with lace sleeves and trim. She was seated at her dressing table, composed and smiling as Moira bent close to hook the buttons of her sleeves. With a glint of mischief in her eyes, she moved her arms just so, foiling Moira's attempts. Moira slapped her hands gently, and they both laughed. It was as if no time had passed since they had last been together, as if the bond between them was as strong today as it had been in Moira's childhood.