“Is that supposed to be an endorsement, Seth Cane?”
The sharp edged voice came from a second doorway leading into a dining room. Great Aunt Eudora was perhaps the tallest, thinnest woman Ginny had ever seen. Her floor length gown hid the movement of her feet, providing the startling illusion of gliding into the room on rollers.
Seth was astounded. At first impression in the poor light, she seemed not to have aged a whit in the past twelve years. However, as she came up to them, he could see added aging lines around her eyes and mouth. She still wore her hair piled high upon her head, further elongating her horsey face. Her dark brown hair had to be the result of some type of coloring process. The only concession to frivolity in her dress was a long double strand of orange beads.
“So this young girl is Ginevra?” she asked, bending slightly forward to peer at Ginny.
“Yes, Aunt Eudora, this is our Ginny,” Seth replied.
“I am not your aunt, Seth Cane,” Eudora snapped. “Come here, child, and let me look at you.”
Ginny looked at her father apprehensively and made a hesitant step toward her great aunt.
“Come, come child! Don’t dawdle. Despite what your father may have told you, I am not an ogre.”
Ginny flushed defiantly and marched quickly up to Eudora and made a quick curtsy.
Seth smiled. Well what do you know? Those expensive five years of ballet demanded by Elizabeth were worth something.
“How do you do, Great Aunt? I’m most pleasured to meet you,” she said.
“Not pleasured, child. The word is pleased.” She placed her right forefinger under Ginny’s chin, gently tilted her head and gazed searchingly at her face. “Hmm, I see that Elizabeth did things right. Yes, there is a strong Hartwell family resemblance there and that hair—you do look a great deal like your mother at this age.”
“I am also a Cane and a Singletary,” Ginny said defiantly.
“After Martha died,” Eudora continued, ignoring the outburst, “I raised your mother until she was sixteen. Martha was your grandmother and my baby sister. She was a beautiful and promising person and might have gone far, had she not married Matt Singletary. Yes, Ginevra, I think we shall get along nicely. Would you like to see your room? Mavis has it all ready, with your dresses correctly hung in the closet and other apparel in the bureau drawers.”
Ginny looked uncertain, but managed to say, “Yes—thank you.”
“Very well, child,” Eudora said and raised her voice to call, “Mavis, come here, please!” She was unaware that the young Irish girl had come in the door and was standing at her elbow.
“Mum?” Mavis said, causing Great Aunt Eudora to jump in surprise.
“How many times have I told you not to creep up on me like that? You startled the wits out of me.”
“Sorry, Mum,” Mavis said, barely concealing a grin. “You were after calling me, Mum?”
“Not after, I was calling you. Will you please show Ginevra to her room?” She shook her head in annoyance and said to Seth, “It’s a trial trying to train these Irish girls to speak properly.” Looking at Ginny, she said, “I wish to state right now, you will be properly addressed in this home by your given name, Ginevra. It is a beautiful Italian name, not common like Ginny or Mavis. Now run along with Mavis and see your pretty room.”
“Will you come too, Daddy?” Ginny said with an imploring expression.
“Not just yet, dear. You run along with Mavis. I need to talk with Aun—Eudora for a minute,” he said, touching his daughter’s cheek lightly.
After the double doors to the foyer closed behind them, Eudora gestured commandingly to the sofa, while selecting a fragile straight back chair. For an interminable three minutes they sat, neither looking at the other, each reaching for the words that neither wanted to speak. With characteristic directness, Eudora broke the silence.
“Did she die easily?”
Seth concentrated on the toe of his boot, unable to keep the huskiness from his voice. “She—she never complained, but there must have been a great deal of pain.”
“She wouldn’t have,” Eudora said, tapping the arm of her chair. “She had Hartwell blood.”
Of course, Singletary blood was of no consequence.
Half in apology and half in defiance, Eudora added, “I wanted to come but the Admiral is in such poor health, I couldn’t leave him.”
“She understood,” Seth said.
“I know—I know, but I should have been there with my baby,” she managed to get out, her voice breaking.
“It was her final wish that I bring Ginny to you so that she might attend her old school.”
“Yes, so you wrote me. She was like my own, you know, I really raised her.”
“Yes.”
“It was that horrid ranch! I was always afraid something would happen down there, so primitive—no place for a proper young girl.”
Young girl? “Elizabeth was in her early thirties, mother of a fifteen year old daughter and we didn’t live on a ranch but in a nice town in Oklahoma.”
“I always believed that ranch killed poor Martha too.”
“Eudora, the accident didn’t happen on the Bar-5 but at Triple Stake, my brother’s ranch. You could hardly describe it as primitive. The accident could have happened anywhere—right here in Rock Creek Park, for that matter.”
She glared at him accusingly. “Why were you not with her? It was your responsibility to be with her and protect her from being hurt.”
He could not bring himself to say that Elizabeth had left him and was going to divorce him and marry his brother Zack. Instead, he explained he had been over in Baltimore attending the National Democratic Convention.
They sat in silence for a few moments. Then Eudora asked, “What are your plans, Seth Cane? Will you be going back to—what is the name of that place where you and Elizabeth lived in Texas?”
“Pawhuska—and it’s in Oklahoma, not Texas. No, I won’t be returning there. I have closed out my practice and I think I might be going to South America on a mission for a friend of mine.”
“South America? Ginevra know that?”
“Of course, we have discussed it.”
“She will want to write you, naturally. Where shall I address her letters to in South America?”
“I’ll be in Bolivia but I shall write and send you my address when I get settled.”
“How long will you be staying here in Washington?”
“A day and a half, at most. I must meet with my friend who will be sponsoring the trip, and I have promised to drop in on Congressman Langdon and his family, briefly. My boat sails from New York on Thursday.”
“Yes, well, you need have no anxiety about Ginevra. I shall see that she is duly enrolled in Dunstan Hall. The headmistress is a longtime friend of mine. Ginevra will be properly processed, I can assure you.”
“I know,” Seth said and withdrew an envelope from his inside jacket pocket and handed it to Eudora. “This should cover the initial tuition and fees, as well as sundry expenses. It also provides funds to you for three months of my daughter’s room and board with you and the Admiral. I’ll be sending you more on a regular basis once I am settled.”
She accepted the envelope and laid it on the small lamp table beside her, without opening it. “I wish that I didn’t have to accept that,” she said with uncharacteristic diffidence. “You see, the Admiral’s pension, well, it does not go quite as far as it once did. Except for a few stocks, the Hartwell legacy has run out.”
Seth shook his head. “Ginny is my obligation and I wouldn’t think of imposing a financial burden on you and the Admiral for her care. Besides, her grandfather has set up a small trust for her educational expenses.”
“Matt Singletary did that?”
“Yes, he set it up on the day
she was born.”
“I declare! I never would have credited that man being capable of doing that.”
Seth let it pass. “Anyway, knowing that Ginny will be in your care while I’m gone takes a great burden off my mind. I am truly grateful.”
She looked as if she were deciding whether to say something, and then ended up not speaking.
“I’m sorry to hear that the Admiral is not in the best of health,” Seth said, to fill the lull in the conversation.
“He should be joining us shortly. Will—will you join us for supper?”
“Thank you, but I have to go. In addition to the calls I mentioned, I must find a hotel that is not fully booked for the inauguration.”
She looked embarrassed. “You know, Seth, you would be welcome to stay here with us. Unfortunately, apart from Ginevra’s bedroom, we have no extra space.” Seeing the questioning look on Seth’s face, and knowing that he knew their three story home contained five bedrooms, she hastened to add, “I am ashamed to admit this, Seth, that we have been forced by financial circumstances to take in a boarder.”
Seth waved her expression of shame aside. “Please, Eudora, you have no call to explain.” He stood. “Now, I really must be going as soon as I tell Ginny goodbye.”
She entered the room at that moment. “Oh Daddy, you can’t go now. You must come up and see my room.”
“Ginny—I would like to see it, but right now, I have to—”
“Surely, you have time for tea,” Eudora said. “Or perhaps you would prefer coffee?”
He looked uncertainly from Eudora to the imploring eyes of his daughter. “Yes, well, for a few minutes. Coffee would be nice.”
“Very good,” Eudora said rising. She extended her hand to Ginny. “Do come, Ginevra and I shall show you my kitchen and you can help me make your father’s coffee. Mavis makes such a deplorable mess of coffee. You know, we might even be able to find some freshly baked nut-bread to go with it. It was a favorite of your mother’s. We shall be but a moment, Seth. Please make yourself comfortable.”
Seth sat back down on the sofa, withdrew his watch from his vest pocket and noted that it was getting on toward five o’clock. He really didn’t want any coffee but he couldn’t ignore his daughter, who was, perhaps, using the tour of her room to keep him there a bit longer. This tea and coffee thing of Eudoras might serve the same purpose. He was beginning to feel the time pressures on him because of his intended short stay in Washington and the need to catch his ship in New York. Then, there was Annaliese. He had decided that it would be damn foolishness to try and see her. Baltimore had been special, but it was past. Her note then had made that clear. Bill Murray was another matter. He needed to get his final instructions for Bolivia, but more important, he needed to get the money for his expenses.
The double doors from the foyer were pushed open by Mavis and Admiral Perry Franklin Larimer, hero of Manila Bay, tottered into the room. Seth was shocked by his appearance. Where was the tall, white-haired arrogant naval officer that Seth had met before? This person shuffling into the room, wearing carpet slippers and a wool shawl, was bent almost double. The skin on his face was waxen over the bone structure, as if it had been gathered and drawn back over his bald head and tightly knotted.
He took no notice of Seth but proceeded past him to the rocker near the iron stove in the hearth. In a surprisingly familiar strong quarterdeck voice, he shouted, “Woman of the house, where are you?”
“Excuse me, Admiral,” Seth ventured. “She is in the kitchen with my daughter making coffee and tea.”
For the first time, the old man became aware of Seth in the room. He staggered, almost falling over the rocker. He stared at Seth, blinking in confusion. Then, seeming to recall something, he tried to draw his bent over body erect in a feeble effort to emulate his old command presence. “And you, sir! Please be so good as to explain your presence on my bridge!”
Seth opened his mouth to explain, but the Admiral had lost interest in his presence on his ship’s bridge. He lowered himself into the rocker where he sat staring into the fireplace. The ensuing silence soon became uncomfortable and Seth tried to think of something to say to the old man, who now was rocking back and forth.
“Do you miss the sea, Admiral?”
Admiral Larimer said nothing and continued rocking. Well I tried. Just as Seth resigned himself to the situation, Admiral Larimer suddenly turned and looked at him.
“Commanded the Raleigh at Manila, I did.” In fact Admiral, you were not in command of the Raleigh at Manila Bay. You were the first officer.
“I see—commanded the Raleigh, did you? A good ship, was it?”
“Was with Dewey. Ever hear tell of Dewey?”
“Admiral Dewey? Sure thing.”
“He wasn’t an admiral then, just a commodore.”
“Right.”
“Clean wiped out the Spanish and their damned fleet. You understand what I’m saying?’ He glared at Seth defiantly with watery gray eyes.
“I sure do.”
“Lined up like ducks, they were. Anchored in front of those forts at Cavite. In May of ninety-eight, I think.”
“Did your ship suffer any damage in the fight?”
“Fine,” the Admiral said.
“I asked, Admiral, did your ship suffer any damage?”
“It was Manila Bay. You ever hear of Manila Bay?”
The arrival that moment of Eudora and Ginny, with coffee, tea and a tray of nutbread, didn’t save Seth from replying to the Admiral, because he wasn’t going to answer him anyway, even if it got him thrown in the Raleigh’s brig.
Eudora placed the tray on a small table, patted her husband gently on the head. “Surely, you must remember Seth Cane, my dear. Seth is—was—Elizabeth’s husband,” beckoning to Ginny to come forward, “and, this is Ginevra, Seth’s and Elizabeth’s daughter, your grand niece. Remember I told you several weeks ago that she would be coming to live with us while attending Dunstan Hall?”
The Admiral looked from his wife to Ginny and asked, “Elizabeth?”
“Yes dear, Elizabeth Singletary, Martha’s daughter, your niece.”
Comprehension flickered in the old man’s eyes, reaching for Ginny’s hand, he had a wide smile of welcome. “You are looking very well Elizabeth,” he said.
Aunt Eudora looked at Seth and shook her head. Turning back to her husband she said, “No, Perry, this is not Elizabeth. She is no longer with us, remember? This is her daughter, Ginevra.”
“Ginevra?” the Admiral brightened and said in his best quarterdeck voice, “Welcome aboard!”
5
THAT EVENING THE NATION’S CAPITAL wore its garish best for tomorrow’s Inauguration of Woodrow Wilson. Quadruple arcs of red, white and blue electric lights marked the entire length of Pennsylvania Avenue, while lights from store fronts and eating establishments spread their yellow glow upon the sidewalks. The locals thronged those walks along with out-of-towners, many of whom were soldiers and sailors come to march in the parade. Souvenirs were plentiful for buyers in stores and sidewalk vendor stands. A big seller was a gold painted yardstick, lettered “WOODY’S RULE.” Schoolmaster blackboard pointers were also plentiful, in reference to the presidentelect’s former college professorship.
It did not take long for locals in the crowd to realize they should have eaten at home before coming down to see the sights. Most of the cafes had happily jacked up prices by more than fifty percent. Out of towners apparently were not deterred that every eating place on the avenue was packed. A particularly favored establishment displayed a large electric sign of three foot tall letters proclaiming, “WHITE HOUSE LUNCHES LIKE MRS. WILSON WILL COOK THEM—50 CENTS”. Wilson’s portrait was everywhere, even on the greasy menus in the scruffiest of eating places.
Dinners purchased on Pennsylvania Avenue were not to
be compared with that being served in the Langdon’s narrow, three-story brick residence one block off Washington circle on 23rd Street NW. It was the home of Congressman Henry Dalworth, his wife Bessie Mae and daughter Molly. Bessie Mae referred to that meal as her real down home Texas feed. The “her” referred to was actually Olivia, the genius of the Langdons’ kitchen.
Upon orders of Bessie Mae, the diners adjourned to the more comfortable combination library and sitting room. The group consisted of Congressman Henry Dalworth, Bessie Mae, daughter Molly and Seth , who immediately went to the hearth and took up a position with his back to the glowing warmth of the ornate iron stove. He was still feeling evening chill in his bones from his walk, carrying his suitcase, from where his motor cab had broken down at 19th and N Street. All the cabs that passed him seemed to be carrying other passengers.
“How would you like a small libation, my boy?” Henry Dalworth asked. “I’ve got some jim dandy Kentucky sour mash.”
“Thanks Henry, I reckon not tonight, but don’t let me stop you.” He was feeling a mite weary. The day had begun to take its toll on him and it still wasn’t over. He had to see Alfalfa Bill Murray, Oklahoma’s new at-large Congressman, tonight.
This Congressman allowed as how he would have a small indulgence. He went over to a round table holding an assortment of liquor, poured himself two fingers of Old Storm King, and returned to his easy chair.
Bessie Mae, sitting in a rocker near the fireplace, produced a net bag from which she extracted some half finished brown knitted material. “The scarf is for Henry,” she explained. “He’s weak in the throat, you know.”
The Congressman, glass of bourbon in hand, gingerly lowered his angular frame beside his daughter, who had curled up with her feet beneath her on the sofa. Henry Dalworth pointed toward the knitting in progress and said to Seth, “Well, here it is March with most of the winter gone, and Bessie Mae is still working on that damn scarf for me.”
Call Down The Hawk Page 3
