Houses of Stone, KATHY [classic literature books TXT] 📗

like that? As I recall, the heroine replies, 'Generous youth!' "

"The Mysteries of Udolpho, The Heir of Mondolpho, Melmoth the Wanderer . . . Finally, here's one I know. I was beginning to feel like an illiterate. Frankenstein. Don't you have nightmares?"

Karen's smile stiffened. He couldn't know about the dreams; had that question been a sarcastic reference to the moment when she had flung herself into his arms like one of the timorous heroines of Gothic fiction? "Generous youth!" indeed!

He didn't mean anything by it, she told herself. He's being helpful and friendly, and he seems more at ease with me. Don't slap him down.

Cameron tossed the empty box aside and brought another. "They are research materials," she said. "I've read them all, of course, but not recently."

"Even this? 'Many were the wretches whom my personal exertions had extricated from want and disease . . . There was no face which lowered at my approach and no lips which uttered imprecations in my hearing.' "

Karen took the book from him. "Charles Brockden Brown's work is marred by touches of Godwinian didacticism, as one critic put it—in other words, he's a pompous son of a gun—but Wieland is a classic. It can scare the hell out of you once you get involved in the story."

"Hmmm," Hayes said skeptically.

"Did you ever read Dracula? Or The Turn of the Screw.7"

"No. Should I?"

"They may not affect you the way they do me," Karen admitted. "Like Wieland, they were written by men. About women, as victims."

"I thought in The Turn of the Screw the kids were the victims." He added soberly, "I saw the film."

"Victims or villains? That's one of the great debates about the book. The governess was unquestionably a victim, whether from diabolic forces or growing insanity. In Wieland, Clara, the innocent sister, is the one terrorized, first by a villain whose only motive is love of emotional sadism for its own sake, and then by her own brother. The sexual threat in the vampire tales ..." She broke off with an apologetic shrug. "Don't get me started."

"It's very interesting," Cameron said politely.

"Only to me and a few other pedants. Well, that's it. I may have to buy another bookcase," she added, looking at the filled shelves, from which she had removed the former contents—one shelf of Reader's Digest Condensed Books and a collection of ceramic animals. "Will Mrs. Fowler mind?"

"I don't see why she should. Aren't you going to need a desk?"

"That table will be adequate. I'll be transcribing by hand—that method seems to work best for me—and then making a typewritten copy."

There was no sign of life from the house, but Karen felt sure Mrs. Fowler was watching from behind the discreetly curtained front windows as they drove past. Hayes had suggested they take her car; feeling sure she knew why, Karen decided to settle that matter once and for all. "I've not only ridden in trucks that looked worse than this, I've driven them," she said firmly. "Let's skip the Southern gallantry, shall we? This is a business deal, not a date."

Hayes watched as she opened the door and climbed nimbly into the seat. "I'll give it my best shot," he said, and went around to the driver's side, leaving her to close the door.

He took her to an unpretentious restaurant outside town. "The food is terrible," he said coolly. "But we're not likely to encounter any of my innumerable acquaintances or kinfolk. Is the manuscript in that briefcase you're clutching with all ten fingers?"

The abrupt question caught her by surprise. It was a logical deduction, though.

"A copy. The original is in a safe-deposit box."

His eyebrows lifted. "It's that valuable?"

"It is to me."

Indicating a booth, he slid into the seat facing her. "I have no right to ask this, but you've aroused my curiosity. What's it about?"

"The plot, you mean?"

Obviously that was what he meant. But asking the question and awaiting his response gave her time to consider his request. There was no reason why she shouldn't tell him, she supposed.

Cameron nodded. "Since you dragged all those boring books with you, I assume this is the same sort of thing. Gothic novels, isn't that what they're called?"

There was no reason why she shouldn't tell him.

Her summary of the plot didn't impress him. "So what's the point of it all? This woman—Ismene?—doesn't seem to have done much except wander around wringing her hands and finding sinister meanings in perfectly innocent activities. She's got a home and servants and friends and a kindly guardian—"

"1 haven't gotten very far yet," Karen interrupted. "But the sinister overtones aren't just in her mind. You'll have to take my word for it."

"I guess I will. You're the authority. What would you like?"

Karen realized that the question was about food. The waitress was hovering. Without looking at the menu she ordered a tuna-salad platter; every restaurant of this type offered a tuna-salad platter.

"I don't want to sound any more ignorant than I can help," Cameron said, "but I'm trying to get this straight. You think the house in the book is based on Amberley, and that the author once lived there? That she is, in fact, an ancestress of mine?"

"It's a strong possibility. I can't prove it unless I find documentary evidence. That's why I need all the family records I can get my hands on."

"Uh-huh." He waited until the waitress had deposited their plates on the table. "You know those boxes of papers I mentioned? They're gone."

"What?" Karen gasped. "How? Gone from where?"

"They weren't in storage. I had them ... in a place I considered secure. Especially," he added, with a wry twist of his lips, "since I had no reason to suppose they had the slightest value. The only person who could have taken them was Lisa. She must have done the job yesterday, when I was working at the house. I looked for them this morning, meaning to bring them to you."

"Can't you get them back?"

"I can try. She can't sell them without my