The sisters were absently sipping tea while watching the snow fall. They watched it fall the whole afternoon. They were thin and pale, noses small, eyes almond, hair black and long and were often mistaken for triplets although they were each born a year apart. Sarah, the second oldest, pushed the fat orange cat with her foot; it rolled onto its back then slowly over. “If it doesn’t stop soon mother and father will be stranded, we shall not be able to leave the house and we will be left here,” she paused dramatically, “to die.”
The other two sisters said nothing.
“Well?” said Sarah.
Alice, the oldest, put her cup and saucer on the arm of the sofa, adjusted her glasses and looked up. “Well?” she said back.
Elizabeth, the youngest, got up, crumbs falling from her dress, taking with her the book she had been trying to read. “I suppose we could telephone,” she said.
“Sarah,” Alice said, “they’ve only been gone the afternoon, they said they’d be back after tea. It’s just a snowfall, it’s perfectly natural.” She took up her tea again and sipped.
The room was bathed in the orange glow of the fire as the dead grey of the afternoon light too tired to penetrate the thick windows. The fire crackled while ice pellets hit the window as if someone were petulantly throwing pebbles against it. The clock chimed absently in the distance.
Beneath the house in the icy root cellar the rows and rows of jams and preserves sat on the wooden shelves, chinking in the cold. There was no light save one electrical bulb that dangled umbilically like a pupa from a long wire. There was no sound save the lashing of the wind and snow against the storm cellar door. Robert curled on the dirt floor and closed his eyes.
In the book Elizabeth was holding she found a ticket stub to an opera from three seasons ago. Her father would use them for bookmarks as he carried books with him wherever, whenever. The book was titled The Old Grey Clock and was a mystery; both Elizabeth and her father liked a good mystery. The stub was from The Pearl Fishers. Elizabeth remembered that opera, not because she went (she didn’t) or that her favourite aria was in it (which it was) but because of the story her father had told them when he and her mother had returned.
That night the sisters had stayed up past their bedtime. They were playing Mahjong, eating crackers, changing the rules. They heard the car crackle on the pea gravel drive, then the sound of the front door opening. They held their breath as an autumnal gust of air raced up the staircase and swirled about the room. Father would be cross finding them still up; Mother, characteristically, would probably not notice.
“Mother, Father?” Alice said.
“We’re in here, we couldn’t sleep,” said Elizabeth.
“Did you enjoy the opera?” asked Sarah.
Their parents’ black silhouettes filled the doorway, framed by the light from behind. First came their scent: Mother’s perfume and her spent cigarettes, Father’s lemon hair tonic. Then came their mother, dressed in black with feathers that spread out around her neck and shoulders, her elegant thinness, her makeup icy white, her lips blood red below her small pointed nose. Their father, in his opera suit with the satin collar, followed behind, his coat over his arm, his wise, comfortable roundness. He was still in his top hat and had another in his hand.
“Father, you have two hats,” Sarah said.
He looked down as if surprised to find it there and stepped into the room. Their mother pulled off her feathers, like an exotic bird slipping off its skin. “I desperately need a drink,” she said and crossed the room to the bar. “Fix me one also,” their father said, very much out of character.
“What’s wrong?” Alice asked, growing concerned that their truancy with bedtime had not been commented on.
“Wrong?” said their father, looking pale in the light. “Had a shock.”
“Was someone hurt?” cried Elizabeth, pulling her father onto the sofa. His wife handed him a large drink, he took it and drank it down quickly. “This burns,” he said.
“Father!” shouted Sarah. “Mother, what happened?”
“That nice young man,” she quietly replied. “That nice young man. His lovely, lovely hands.”
Their father continued, “That actor fellow, he was in the audience tonight. It was distressing as everyone knew and spent the whole of the performance twisting their necks to look.”
“They were looking at the woman with him,” their mother said. “Why she was with him is anyone’s guess. The divorce isn’t even final, the lawyers . . . and there she was, as if holding a placard.” She paused. “Holding a placard,” she reiterated into the glass as she drank.
“What actor fellow?” cried Elizabeth, and pushed her father with her hands as if fluffing a pillow. The other two girls piled onto the couch.
“What’sit. Always playing Latin lovers and Sheiks.”
“His hands, that nice young man.” their mother said, far away.
“Dancer, from New Jersey actually, seemed nice; we featured him in a piece last fall in the magazine. Very concerned we keep his provenance out of it. What was it to me?-- we were writing about his house, fluff, colour piece.”
“His floor was sprung for dancing. He asked me to waltz with him; his hands were so small and delicate,” their mother said quietly.
“But what happened?” Alice whined.
“Died. Right there in the street.”
“What?” the girls screamed.
“We were leaving, people were making damned fools of themselves trying to get an eyeful. Your mother and I were stuck in the throng. Nothing moving. The heat, like a damned sheik’s harem the way those women were acting. The perfume and crush; the flashbulbs blinding. People were shouting her name, his, like they were old friends. Rude! We could see him close by, then we were right behind him. Someone pushed me, or fell and I knocked right into him. He turned, his face hostile, never seen such a thing, then he recognized me and it went away … like that. Of course I apologized but we were being jostled by the crowd. He took my hand, “You kept your word,” he said. “You are a true gentlemen.” He looked right at me. Never seen such sad eyes, like a dog’s.
From the other side of the room came the sound of their mother dropping fresh ice into her glass.
“Looked so lonely, the only way I can describe it. He smiled. I thought, how could someone be so lonely in this sea of adoration, that woman on his arm risking scandal just to be seen with him, and yet . . . then we were pushed again, reporters, flashing, his name being shouted. A sea of black hats and fur just took him and washed him to the door.”
Their father paused and raised his glass, surprised to see that it was empty. “By the time we did get to the front it was over, he was being loaded into an ambulance. Women were screaming, I’ve never seen such a display. Screaming. Did you see that, Pet? Screaming!”
Their mother didn’t answer, just turned her back and stood looking at the black window.
“But father,” Alice asked, “the hat?”
“Oh, yes, the hat,” he said startled. “It’s his. It must have fallen off when he fell. Someone said he’d had a heart attack, seemed so young, in good shape. He fell into the street, that dirty street.” He stopped. “You mother saw it. The hat. Obviously it had fallen off, rolled into a puddle. It’s beautiful. Beaver.” Their father looked at it, looked inside, “Hm, Hollywood. I will have it cleaned and return it. Must be someone, family.”
“Girls, it’s well past your bedtime,” their mother suddenly said. “You will be three monsters in the morning if you don’t get your sleep right now.”
Resigned, the girls got up and went up to their rooms. They brushed their teeth and brushed each other’s hair and turned out the lights. They knew they wouldn’t sleep tonight.
Downstairs their mother moved the hat and sat beside her husband. He placed a hand gently, lovingly upon her lap. “Right there in the street,” he said. That was the only time the girls had heard their mother weep.
The storm continued unabated. The girls turned on the light and moved to the window seat in the large bay window. They sat with pillows and blankets and stared out at the icy frozen desert. The early evening light had faded to black and they watched the reflection of themselves watching in the window. “I wonder if Father gave back the hat?” asked Elizabeth, waking them from their silence.
Sarah spoke, “Father never mentions it. . . They are late now.”
“But still not that late,” said Alice.
Elizabeth went back to her book.
“What’s that, there on the lawn?” asked Sarah, pointing excitedly.
The girls pressed their faces to the freezing glass. There on the lawn a black shape was winding its way among the drifts.
“Is it a dog?” said Alice.
“No,” said Elizabeth, “it’s a fox, look at its tail, that’s a huge fox.”
“But aren’t they supposed to be asleep by now?” Alice asked. “If I could sleep all winter I certainly would.”
“What is it doing out in the snow? Do you think it’s lost something?” said Sarah.
They all watched as the lone black shape moved across the whiteness below.
“Is it hurt? It must be hungry,” said Elizabeth.
“Look,” shouted Sarah, “there’s another!”
“And another,” pointed Alice.
And suddenly there were five foxes moving sequentially on the front lawn. They circled elegantly and then went out of view.
“I think I’m frightened,” said Sarah.
Alice brought her knees up to her chest and pulled her dress over them. “I can’t imagine what they are doing out there. They should be asleep, they must be confused, it isn’t warm out yet. It’s been freezing all winter, the pond is solid ice.”
“Look!” shouted Elizabeth, “they’ve come back.”
The girls looked out.
“They’re looking up at us,” whispered Alice. “Put out the light.” Sarah got up and turned off the lamp. The lawn was instantly transformed into a stormy blue tundra punctuated by the black shapes of the foxes. They formed a line and sat.
“They really are looking at us,” said Sarah.
Then came a loud knock on the door. “That must be Mother and Father!” Alice said excitedly.
Sarah frowned, “How could it be? We’ve been staring out at the front this whole time.”
Elizabeth whispered, “Should we answer it?”
The sound again, three definite knocks. The girls stiffened.
“We’ll answer it together,” said Alice.
The girls found their slippers then crept out into the hall. They inched their way along the wall to the upper landing and peered down the stairs; there definitely was a shadowy shape in the glass of the door. They moved down the stairs to the entrance hall. Alice put the chain across the door then reached for the latch, opening it slightly. A mean blast of arctic air came rushing in.
“Who’s there?” Sarah asked, standing behind Alice, pushed in the back by Elizabeth.
“My name is Alfred Rutherford,” the voice shouted through the half opened door. “I am a philosopher -- well, economist-philosopher. My car has run aground in a drift and I simply cannot motivate it out. May I use your telephone?”
The girls looked at each other; they were expressly forbidden to allow anyone into the house but this seemed an emergency so Alice opened the door. In stepped a very tall, very thin middle-aged man covered in snow. He had a scarf wrapped very high around him; it started below his shoulders and went all the way up to his nose. He wore three impractical dress jackets — a tweed, a dinner and a school blazer — and had on some sort of summer fishing hat that exposed his ears, which were bight red, as was the tip of his nose. His very bushy eyebrows were caked with ice. He took off his hat and ice fell to the floor.
“Oh dear. Thank you so much. I am lucky to have found my way at all. I never venture out to the country as I am absolutely terrified of spiders, however I thought it being winter my chances of an encounter would be slim.” He pulled off his gloves to reveal another pair underneath, which he pulled off to reveal another. “I am so ill prepared. I have no winter clothing. I tend to keep indoors during inclement weather such as this.” He looked at the three girls.
“My name is Elizabeth, this is Sarah and Alice.” Elizabeth said.
“How do you do. Please forgive me. I am sorry, I have a terrible relationship with nature.” He was beginning to drip.
Alice said, “You are defrosting, you need to dry off or you will freeze up like pole once you step back outside.”
“Very wise. And your telephone? I am expected and my hosts are apt to fear the worst, for I had bravely said I’d make the journey by motorcar. What was I thinking?” He waved his hand about. He undid his boots and slid them off then followed Alice and Sarah down the hall to the phone, leaving a trail of oddly shaped footprints on the tile.
When they were out of sight Elizabeth looked out the front door window. Through the gloom and the blowing snow she made out the black shapes of the five enormous foxes still sitting patiently watching the house.