Tender Betrayal

by Rosanne Bittner

  Audra quickly sat up. “You are the only one who is not married,” she added. “Surely you have someone special in your life, Lee Jeffreys. You are of an age when a man usually thinks about marrying.”

  When he did not answer right away, she looked back at him, saw the pain in his eyes. “I’m sorry if I said something wrong.”

  He sighed and sat up straighter. He bent his legs and crossed them, resting his elbows on his knees. “It’s all right. I’m over it now, as much as can be expected anyway.” He threw another pebble. “I was engaged to be married six years ago. Her name was Mary Ellen, and she was the daughter of one of my first clients. We were going to be married here at Maple Shadows, but she died of pneumonia.”

  “Oh, I’m so very sorry.” Audra wished she had not brought up a subject that took away his handsome smile. She had enjoyed watching him laugh. She was amazed to feel so relaxed around this man. She could not remember laughing with Richard. Maybe a forty-two-year-old man just didn’t have enough in common with a seventeen-year-old girl to find things to laugh about.

  “Well, it was a long time ago,” Lee went on. “Life goes on, and I decided I had to go on with mine. Besides, I was only twenty-three myself, and after two years at West Point and four at Yale, just getting started in my own law firm, I probably wasn’t ready for marriage anyway. I am now, but there just hasn’t been anyone else to come along who interested me that much.”

  Audra sifted some sand through her fingers. “I am to be married myself next summer, after I turn eighteen next April.” Why had she told him that? A woman shouldn’t discuss such things with a man she hardly knew.

  The statement surprised Lee. She seemed so young, and she couldn’t possibly know what marriage involved, either physically or emotionally. She hadn’t had a mother since she was seven years old, no woman to teach her about men and sex and being a wife, as far as he could tell. Why did it disturb him to think about her being married to another man? He shouldn’t give a tinker’s damn what she would do when she went back home.

  “I never have told your mother,” she admitted. “I don’t even know why I am telling you, of all people.”

  “Well, as long as you have told me, you might as well tell me more. Who is he?”

  Audra kept toying with the sand as she spoke. “His name is Richard Potter, and he is twenty-five years older than I. He’s a widower, the son of the wealthiest plantation owner in Louisiana. Other than my own father, of course. His plantation is called Cypress Hollow. Maybe you have heard of it.”

  “I don’t keep track of such things,” he said with a hint of sarcasm. Lee felt a little irritated, not only because she was surely marrying a man old enough to be her father, and for all the wrong reasons, but that she had an inflated notion of how important her father and his fellow plantation magnates were.

  “Our marriage will make Richard the most powerful man in the state,” she continued, “maybe in the whole South, especially once my father and his father are gone from this earth. I, in turn, will be the most important woman in Louisiana.”

  The statement irked Lee to the bone. “Is that the only reason you’re marrying him? Do you love the man?”

  Audra felt a rush of embarrassment at the question. Love? What did love matter in such a marriage? “It’s what Father expects of me,” she answered proudly, “and it would be good for Joey. He will probably never be able to take over our own plantation. It is important for me to marry someone who understands how to run such a place, who can control it, so that it can stay in the Brennan family. There are not many men capable of such a difficult job, Lee. I cannot marry just any old city man or even a small farmer. Richard would let Joey live with us forever. He would even agree to living at Brennan Manor, so that Joey and I can both stay on there in our own home. He is a good man. He will take good care of us.”

  Like a father, Lee thought. He let out a sigh of disgust. “For God’s sake, there’s more to marriage than just taking good care of someone, Audra. You have to have feelings for him. You have to want to be with him, especially—” He suddenly stood up. “Forget it. It’s none of my business. Here comes Joey.”

  Audra said nothing for a moment, refusing to look at him for fear he would read her thoughts. For the first time since Richard had danced with her at her sixteenth birthday party, and in all the times he had courted her since, she realized something was missing. It had taken only one night’s talk with Lee Jeffreys, and one picnic with him, for her to realize what that something was. The only name she could give it was desire. She did not desire Richard Potter, but no one had ever told her that might be important. She would never have thought that it was, until these last two days when she had become close to Lee.

  She was shocked to realize how she felt. She desired Lee Jeffreys, desired his company, actually wondered how it would feel to have him touch her lovingly, take her in his arms. It was a forbidden thought, surely a sinful feeling. Of all the men besides Richard she could want, Lee Jeffreys was as far removed from a proper husband as he could be. Only yesterday she would have thought him the last man on earth who could make her feel this way. This was ridiculous! She felt engulfed in confusion, suddenly a stranger to herself.

  “Do you want to walk along the beach?” he was asking.

  She finally managed to meet his eyes again. “Yes, I would like that. Since I arrived, I have seen it only from the house.”

  He gave her a wink, his irritation seemingly disappeared. “Maybe we should go for a swim.”

  “A swim! I have no bathing clothes with me, and even if I did, I would not wear them in front of a man I hardly know!”

  Lee shrugged. “I figured swimming naked would be the most fun. I do it all the time. Feels wonderful!”

  Audra reddened deeply. “Mr. Jeffreys! Don’t you dare begin removing your clothes in front of me!”

  Lee laughed and held out his hand. “Come on. I’ll help you walk through the sand. You really ought to take off those shoes and stockings.”

  “I declare! Now it’s my bare feet he thinks he’s going to see!”

  “Feels good between the toes.” He squeezed her hand. “Come on. I promise not to make you remove one article of clothing. We’ll just walk.”

  Audra studied his handsome face, admiring the way his dark hair blew across his forehead. There was a daring recklessness about the man that attracted her. She let him help her to her feet, and she liked the feel of his strong hand grasping her own. He rubbed the back of her hand with his thumb. “Feeling better about being here now?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she answered softly.

  “Good. Come on. Let’s go out and meet Joey, see what he’s collected.” He turned, keeping hold of her hand as he led her closer to the waves. Audra hung on tightly, wondering how good it would feel to let the sand squish between her toes.

  4

  Audra’s voice carried strong and clear, and although she was putting on her first performance before an audience, she was really singing only for Lee, who sat near the parlor fireplace. The room was filled with specially invited guests, neighbors whom Anna Jeffreys had invited for evening drinks and to listen to her latest protégé. She did not want to let Anna down, but, strangely, it seemed more important not to let Lee down.

  Over a month had passed since Lee arrived. He had already stayed longer than he had intended. Was it because of her? They had gone for many rides, both in the buggy and on horseback; had frolicked on the beach. They had sat quietly together in the study, reading, discussing northern and southern culture. Lee seemed to be trying to understand her views on slavery, but most of the time they both tried to avoid the subject completely and talk about other things.

  Inwardly she fought and argued over the reasons why she wanted to please him tonight, why she had fussed for hours getting ready so that she would appear more womanly. Toosie had rearranged her hair several times until it looked as close to perfect as possible, drawn up into a mass of auburn curls on top of her head. She wore a m
int-green evening dress, the bodice cut low and off the shoulders, her slender waist accented by a wide dark-green sash that was tied into a huge bow at her back. Double-puffed sleeves fell from her middle upper arm to her elbow, decorated with narrow satin ribbon that matched the sash. The upper skirt of mint-green tulle fell over an underskirt of silk puffings, each puff tied, again with darker green satin ribbon; and the hemline was quilled in dark green.

  Old Henrietta, her family’s seamstress, had made the dress for her sixteenth birthday. Henrietta was just about the fattest woman she had ever seen, but nobody could sew the way she could. The woman had chosen green to bring out the green in her eyes, but when she tried the dress on for the first time, Henrietta had lamented that perhaps she had cut the bodice a little too low. Audra didn’t mind. It had made her feel very grown-up at the time, daring to reveal the pale curve of her breasts.

  As she got ready, she had thought about the grand ball her father had held to celebrate that birthday. Young men had lined up to dance with her, but Richard Potter had danced with her most of all. It was that night that the widowed plantation owner had suggested to her father the benefits of marriage between the two of them. Richard’s first wife had never been able to give him children. Audra was young and could produce many offspring to rule one day the combined empire of Brennan Manor and Cypress Hollow.

  She had not given much serious thought to marriage and children. Marrying Richard was something she had just taken for granted, and it had always seemed like something unreal, something that was always far in the future that she didn’t really have to think about. She would still not be thinking about it if not for the feelings she had begun to experience when she was with Lee. Neither Richard nor anyone else had made her heart beat faster or stirred new, strange desires that made her ache.

  Did Lee see her as a woman tonight? At her throat she wore the diamond necklace her father had given her the night of her birthday ball. More diamonds dangled at her ears. She was no longer sixteen, but seventeen—going on eighteen. She knew it was foolish to have these womanly feelings for a Yankee man, and her father would be angry if he knew how she felt about Lee.

  Down in Louisiana and all over the south, the term “Yankee” had come to represent the enemy. Lee hated slavery, and he still enjoyed irritating her by talking to Toosie as though she were a neighbor from next door. He was the last man she should be falling in love with, but she did love him. She wondered if he knew how she felt. He was a worldly man, experienced. He probably knew her every thought and was laughing inside. If only she could find the courage to tell him, to let him know she had written a song just for him, a song she was too bashful to show him or sing for him.

  There was so much she didn’t understand about men, things that had never mattered until now. Lee had awakened something new and wonderful in her soul. It was as though a woman she hardly knew was trying to break free from her own body, a body she had begun to study at times in the mirror, wondering what a man would think of it.

  She forced herself to concentrate on the forty or so people who were packed into the spacious parlor, Anna Jeffreys had taught her to give her attention always to the whole audience, whether forty people or a thousand. Make each individual think you are singing just to him or her alone, she had told Audra.

  Before beginning, she had practiced the deep-breathing exercises Anna had taught her to help relieve her nervousness. There were so many “firsts” tonight—first true performance in front of a real audience, first time singing an aria from Italian opera. Mrs. Jeffreys had taught her how to pronounce the words, explained their meaning so she could sing the song with real feeling. She prayed inwardly she would not stumble on the words or forget them. It didn’t really matter what the others would think, but Lee was watching, listening.

  She finished another song, and everyone applauded. Some rose to their feet, including Lee, and she felt the elation of having pleased an audience. She had never given much thought to taking voice lessons or performing before a crowd, but Anna Jeffreys had told her about her own career, and that she, too, could enjoy such fame if she wanted to work at it. All her life she had thought of nothing more than staying right at Brennan Manor, marrying, having children, living the quiet, genteel life of a rich southern woman.

  Now her mind whirled with other possibilities. She could sing in the opera. She could turn down Richard’s marriage proposal, which she knew would come formally soon after she went back home; she could think about a career instead. Or…she could fall in love with a Yankee man and stay right here in Connecticut. Still, in these restless times, it would not be easy to live here, surrounded by the “enemy.” Many of these people had been cold and rude when first meeting her and hearing her accent. They had asked ignorant questions about plantation life, questions that hurt her feelings and her pride. Besides, there was her father to think about, Joey, and Brennan Manor.

  She moved her gaze to Lee again. He was smiling, still clapping. Could two people so different fall in love and find happiness? Was that a hint of love she saw in those melting blue eyes, or was it just wishful thinking on her part? Part of the reason she loved Lee was his kind patience toward Joey. He had taken her brother hunting several times; and they had gone swimming, had studied together. Joey had changed dramatically over the past month, was becoming more self-confident. Lee had helped her see she was smothering her brother with love, was not allowing him to be his own man. Joey’s speech had actually improved since Lee began working with him, and Joey practically worshiped the man. There seemed to be a special bond there, as though Lee actually understood how Joey felt. He had never told her his exact troubles with his own father, but she could tell from the way he usually avoided the subject or glossed over it that there was a rift between them.

  Maybe it was that loneliness in his eyes that had made her love him even more. How quickly a month could fly by when one preferred that time stand still. Lee would be leaving soon for New York, and that would surely be the end of her short but sweet friendship with him. She was beginning to feel a desperate urge to blurt out her feelings, afraid he would go back without ever knowing, and maybe she would never see him again.

  She finished her planned performance and began taking requests, singing more familiar songs for her audience, who seemed enraptured.

  ’Twas a calm, still night, and the moon’s pale light

  Shone soft o’er hill and vale,

  When friends mute with grief stood around the deathbed

  Of my poor lost Lilly Dale.

  “Lilly Dale” was the name of the sad song a woman had asked for, and she sang it with such feeling that the woman actually sniffled and wiped at her eyes. By the time Audra finished all the verses, several more women were dabbing at their eyes. She went on to sing several other songs, lighter ones, some with words that made people laugh.

  “How about ‘My Old Kentucky Home’?” one man requested then. He had a strange look in his eyes and was not smiling. It was Cy Jordan, another wealthy family friend here on vacation from New York. He had inquired if she was one of those “southern rebels” when he was first introduced to her, and even though he had laughed about it, Audra had caught the slight sneer in the remark.

  “Fine,” she answered, holding his eyes boldly. The room hung silent for a moment. Although “My Old Kentucky Home” was written by Stephen Foster, everyone knew it was based on a Negro spiritual. Cy Jordan was challenging her, and she was not going to back down from the challenge. She turned to Mrs. Jeffreys and asked her to play a few lines first. Audra thought how Anna had a way with the piano that made any song, even a most familiar one, sound like the greatest music ever written.

  She glanced at Lee, who gave her a nod, as though to tell her to stand right up to Cy Jordan. She looked at Jordan then and began the song.

  The sun shines bright on the old Kentucky home.

  ’Tis summer, the darkies are gay;

  The corn top’s ripe and the meadow’s in the bloom,
/>   While the birds make music all the day.

  The young folks roll on the little cabin floor,

  All merry, all happy and bright;

  By ’n’ by hard times come a knocking at the door,

  Then, my old Kentucky home, good night!

  She sang the chorus, the second verse, into the third verse.

  The head must bow and the back will have to bend,

  Wherever the darky may go.

  A few more days and the trouble all will end,

  In the fields where the sugar canes grow…

  Weep no more, my lady, oh, weep no more today!

  We will sing one song for the old Kentucky home,

  For the old Kentucky home far away.

  The song brought back a longing for her own home, for the quiet elegance of Brennan Manor. She missed Lena and fat old Henrietta. She missed her father, and she realized then that Lee had taken up so much of her time and thoughts that she had not dwelled so much on them. The song brought it all back, and she felt a sudden urge to cry. She breathed deeply and forced back the tears.

  “How about your own blackies?” Jordan asked her then. “Do they bend their backs in sugarcane fields, or is it cotton your father’s slaves have to pick? How many Negroes does your father own, anyway? You ever see one whipped?”

  “That’s enough, Cy,” Lee put in. “She is here as our guest.”

  Everyone was staring at Audra then, and she felt the old southern pride beginning to burn in her heart, a desire to defend her father, defend Brennan Manor, defend even the Negroes. “My father grows cotton, Mr. Jordan,” she answered proudly. “He is one of the richest men in Louisiana, owns one of the biggest plantations. Yes, we own Negroes, but they are well treated.”