“Connemara House,” Aunt Felicity repeated reverently.
“Well, Miss Lauryn,” Uncle Johnny asked. “What do you think of Brant now that he’s unbound for all the world to see once more?”
Aunt Felicity reached up and pinched Brant’s cheek lovingly. “Isn’t he the devil of the handsomest man?”
There was no manner in which Lauryn could give answer without sounding the complete starry-eyed fool. Instead, she inquired of Brant, “You’ve recovered then? Fully?”
“Yep,” he assured her. “My vision is about as good as new.”
“That’s…that’s wonderful,” she stammered. For Pete’s sake! She’d turned into a squid, all limp and nervous with no backbone whatsoever. It had been one thing to talk with him, look at him when he had been blind and unable to look back. But now! Now, especially since the complete, magnificently attractive magnetism of him was revealed, the way his eyes seemed to drill right into her soul…now Lauryn was entirely a frazzle!
“Surprised to see me, aren’t you?” he chuckled, again appraising her from head to toe.
“Yes,” Lauryn admitted, smoothing a wild strand of hair from her cheek again.
“Well,” Aunt Felicity sang. “Let’s have it, Lauryn. Let’s see Connemara! I’ve only been here once before…and so many years ago that I hate to tell!”
“Yes, let’s,” Uncle Johnny added. “You can woo and win the girl later, Brant, my boy. There are people to meet! Things to do. Lead on, Miss Kensington.”
Lauryn forced another friendly smile and turned to lead the party home. A mere matter of one block was bound to seem like an eternity. Lauryn’s legs could hardly propel her body forward. She was so anxious! Her nerves were completely frayed. She kept wondering if she’d torn her skirt anywhere while climbing the tree. She could only pray that she had not, that she still remained completely modest.
“So,” she began cordially. “Did y’all have a nice trip down?”
“That we did, angel,” Aunt Felicity chimed. “The scenery was beautiful. Just beautiful!”
“And the food wasn’t too bad,” Uncle Johnny added.
“Well, Nana and Mama will be so surprised,” Lauryn couldn’t believe that Brant hadn’t warned them that he was coming home.
“Actually, Lauryn,” Brant began to confess. “Your um…your Nana and Mama know that we’re coming. I guess they wanted it to be a surprise to you.”
Lauryn stopped dead in her tracks and turned to look at him. He shrugged rather boyishly and she swallowed the instant irritation she felt with her Nana and Mother saying, “I guess so.”
Turning she began to walk even faster.
“I’m certain you can mend that tear right up, Lauryn. Don’t worry. I’m sure the skirt can be saved. It’s so becoming to you.” Again Lauryn stopped, putting her hand to the seat of her skirt to discover with horror that, indeed, a large tear was gaping open on her right hip.
“Now you’ve done it, Felicity!” Uncle Johnny scolded. “Go on and ruin all of the boy’s fun, why don’t you?”
Lauryn looked at Brant who simply smiled mischievously and winked at her. For pity’s sake! He winked at her! Lauryn tried to walk calmly at a pace considerate to the older couple. But, by now, she was ready to burst into explosion of tears of humiliation. Furthermore, she was angry. Angry with her mother and Nana for not telling her Brant was returning. Angry at Patrick for throwing his ball up into the tree. Angry at Sean and Mindy for even purchasing the blasted ball for him in the first place!
Finally, they reached the tall, iron fences that surrounded Connemara. Lauryn anxiously pushed the front gate open and started up the path to the porch. She paused when, looking back, she realized only Aunt Felicity and Uncle Johnny followed her. Brant stood outside the gate, the color completely drained from his face as if he felt ill. He stood motionless, staring up at the house. No. He was staring at the wisteria! For a moment, Lauryn thought she understood for Connemara house had long been the talk of Franklin for its beauty in the spring. Everywhere one looked there were beautiful, fragrant blossoms hanging like large clusters of lavender grapes among miles of green leafed vines that wound themselves, seemingly, over everything! The front arbor and all the fences were covered in it. The columns of the porches were drenched in it. And the trellises that lined the house on all four sides, gave the illusion that the walls of Connemara themselves were actually constructed of wisteria vines and blossoms. A breeze breathed then, whimsically sending the lavender colored flowers dancing like a million silent bells of Heaven.
Wisteria trees were here and there on the surrounding grounds at Connemara as well. The gazebo was adorned in its fragrant flowers and, though it wasn’t visible to Brant then, Lauryn wondered at his reaction when he saw that even the old spring house and servants house was covered in it. Wisteria trees grew above the old cellar and along the creek down the hill behind Connemara. Even the fences that bordered the family cemetery boasted its loveliness. Wisteria had always been the fame of Connemara house.
“It’s…it’s awe inspiring!” Aunt Felicity whispered reverently as she too paused in her admiration. But Brant’s expression was different, not so much that of admiring beauty.
“Brant?” Lauryn asked, going to him. “Brant? Are you well?” He looked at her, and yet she wasn’t sure that he was seeing her. His eyes seemed oddly glazed over and a frown puckered his brow.
“That…that scent,” he managed to whisper. “Is it the vines?”
“The wisteria?” Lauryn asked. “Yes. It’s only in bloom for a little while each year. It’s the blossoms you’re smellin’.” Why did he seem so stunned? Lauryn had always loved the fragrance of the blooms. To her, it was one of the most beautiful of God’s creations. Still Brant looked unsettled. “What is it, Brant?” she asked.
“It’s her,” he mumbled. “Laura’s perfume. It’s the fragrance of her name.” Even before he explained, Lauryn understood. For once, a long time ago, the day she had first opened Lauralynn’s trunk, she too had recognized the fragrance of wisteria and had associated it with Laura. “The scent she carries with her when…”
“She loved the wisteria, no doubt,” Lauryn offered. “It was even embroidered on her weddin’ gown. Do you think it’s significant?” she asked, suddenly realizing it might be.
Brant shook his head and seemed to dispel the shocked state he had been in. “I don’t know. I don’t know,” he mumbled. Then forcing a smile he reached out and took Lauryn’s hand in his. “We’ll talk about that later. I want to see your Nana and the others.” His touch was more stimulating to Lauryn’s senses than it had been even before, and she shivered as the goose bumps broke over her.
Still, she worried for Brant. It seemed to have completely unsettled him to discover the wisteria of Connemara, the scent of Lauralynn’s spirit. Walking past her and pulling her along with him, they joined his aunt and uncle on the porch.
As all three visitors looked at Lauryn expectantly, she smoothed her wild hair once more and said, “Well…welcome to Connemara!” Opening the front door, the visitors were greeted with squeals of elation as Nana and Lauryn’s mother rushed forward.
“Land sakes, you’re a handsome one, Brant!” Nana cooed as she threw herself into Brant’s willing embrace.
“Mr. and Mrs. Jenson!” Georgia greeted. “Welcome to Connemara.”
“Felicity and John, Mrs. Kensington. Please,” Uncle Johnny chuckled.
Georgia shrugged delightedly. “And Georgia to y’all!” Nana greeted the elderly couple next while Lauryn’s mother gasped at the sight of Brant. “Why, look at you!” Georgia exclaimed. “Oh, Brant! We’re so happy to have you back.” She hugged him and Lauryn felt awkward, being the only female in the room that hadn’t received a hug. She thought of how different these few moments with Brant had been compared to the last time she stood in the entry way with him. She felt her face go crimson as Brant looked to her then as if he, too, was remembering the last moments he’d spent at Connemara.
/> “If y’all will excuse me a moment,” Lauryn stammered. “I need to change out of this skirt.”
“Lauryn?” Georgia asked.
“Well, apparently she had a little incident with a tree just before we arrived,” Aunt Felicity explained. “But I’ve told her that I really do think we can mend it.”
“Oh, don’t you worry about it, Lauryn,” Uncle Johnny chuckled. “Brant and I think it’s just fine the way it is!” His teasing wink was that of a playful imp.
“Now, you behave, Jonathan.” Felicity scolded.
Brant grinned and winked at Lauryn just before she turned from him, her cheeks beet-red, and rushed up the stairs.
Once inside her room, Lauryn couldn’t decide whether to burst into tears of humiliation or explode with pure delight. He was fabulous! Brant was more than that. He was magnificent! And he’d come back! But why? What was his reason? For a moment, Lauryn let herself dream that maybe, just maybe, it had something to do with her. But she knew better than that. He’d come for Lauralynn. He was sighted once more and ready to help Lauryn search. That was all.
And yet, her heart raced with hope. Suddenly, thoughts were leaping about in her mind. What if they did succeed in finding Lauralynn? Maybe then Brant would be ready to see beyond his torment to…no. One shouldn’t hope for such things. But still, it was there; the secret hope that Brant had come back for more than just to solve the mystery of Laura.
“I told you he’d be back,” the Captain said as he suddenly appeared in Lauryn’s bedroom.
Lauryn couldn’t help her excited squeal as she threw her arms around his neck. “He did! He did! And I don’t even care that it’s not for me that he came back. As long as he’s back.” Then she realized the selfishness of her reaction. “And he’ll help us, Captain. He will! We’ll find her for you.”
“I know, angel,” the Captain chuckled. “And he’s a fine figure of a man.”
“He is!” Lauryn clutched her hands to her bosom. “I nearly fainted when I first saw him! Isn’t he so handsome? Even more so with his eyes showin’. And his hair trimmed short…” Then she paused, as her heart began to pound with nervous anxiety. “I can’t…I have to remember why he’s here.”
“Let your heart tell you why he’s here, Lauryn.” The Captain seemed sincere, his smile warm and loving. But it was too dangerous to imagine that there was any other reason Brant had returned, than for Laura’s sake.
“I’ll be fine. And I’ll find her for you,” she promised.
“Find her for you, Lauryn,” the Captain said, and he kissed her cheek and vanished. “Find everything for you,” came the final echo of his voice.
That evening at supper, Lauryn tried to concentrate on the conversation among the others. But, every time her gaze wandered to Brant sitting across from her, he was looking at her with that familiar amused grin. That was more unnerving than anything. Lauryn realized that, if he hadn’t been blind, if he had been able to look at her when he was at Connemara before the way he looked at her now, she never would have felt comfortable enough to talk with him the way she had. His gaze was piercing as if he knew what she was thinking and feeling each time he looked at her.
“I do remember you, Felicity.” Lauryn’s attention was drawn back to the conversation as her Nana spoke. “I was young…and even though you had married Johnny before I was in Knoxville…I remember when we buried dear Brand. You were here. I remember how beautiful I thought you were.”
Aunt Felicity smiled and dramatically placed a hand to her bosom. “Oh, youth? Where art thou, beauty?” Everyone chuckled at her humor as she folded her napkin before going on. “My dear brother, Brandon. How I adored him. How I adored Laura.” Everyone was silent.
“I was at home…healing when they buried him here,” Uncle Johnny interjected. “He was a good man.”
“After supper, Nana and I will take you out there to visit his restin’ place, Felicity,” Georgia offered. “No doubt, it’ll do him good to hear from you.”
“Will he hear me?” Felicity asked Lauryn.
Lauryn was uncomfortable. She wasn’t comfortable when people who knew about the Captain asked her too many questions about him. Surely this was different. This was a member of his family. His own sister.
“Yes,” Lauryn answered.
“I wish I had a ghost,” Patrick sighed.
“Maybe you do, my boy,” Uncle Johnny suggested.
“Really?” Patrick brightened.
“Heaven forbid!” Georgia mumbled.
“Well, everyone has angels about them, boy. Guarding them. Especially little boys with pocketknives hidden in their shoes.” Uncle Johnny chuckled and tousled the boy’s hair.
“Patrick Kensington!” Georgia scolded. “What’re you doin’ with a knife hidin’ in your shoe?”
“Ah, Mama,” Patrick said.
“Tell you what, boy,” Uncle Johnny suggested. “If it’s all right with your Mama…after supper I’ll take you out on that front porch and teach you how to put that knife to good use on a whittling stick. What do you say?”
“Mama? It would be good for me to learn,” Patrick begged.
Georgia sighed and shook her head. “Very well. But y’all be careful. I knew a boy once that lost a finger a whittlin’ a pencil down.”
Lauryn looked across the table to see Brant smiling at her little brother. He seemed pleased enough to be back with them. Surely he wouldn’t have come back if he’d expected to be otherwise.
After dinner, Nana and Georgia took Felicity to the cemetery. Uncle Johnny and Patrick were sitting on the front porch steps cutting things up with pocketknives, and Brant sat in the parlor in the big chair near the hearth, staring across the room at Lauryn.
Lauryn squirmed in her seat on the sofa, uncomfortable under his gaze, until finally he said, “I can hear her now.”
“What?” Lauryn asked. Surely she hadn’t heard him say what she thought she did.
“I can hear her.”
Chapter Eight
“I can hear her…Laura. Not very well and only some things,” he explained in a whisper. “But I can hear her.”
Lauryn was amazed. His first letter had implied as much, but she had been certain she had misinterpreted.
“Why now and never before?” Lauryn asked.
Brant shrugged. “I think…I think I listened differently when I couldn’t see. It’s so quiet…her voice. Like a breeze…when you think you’re hearing something but you’re really not. Only…I do.”
“What has she said to you?” Lauryn’s curiosity was fast overcoming her discomfort in Brant’s handsome presence. “Tell me.”
Brant leaned forward and kept his voice very low. “Well, she keeps saying ‘my sister’…especially when I ask her about the tea cup she doesn’t have anymore.”
“Nana?” Lauryn asked.
Brant ran his fingers through his hair in frustration. “That’s all she’ll say. I ask, ‘Virginia gave you the cup?’ and she asks, ‘My sister?’ And that’s it. Then I tell her Virginia is fine and happy and she smiles…seems satisfied.”
“What else?” Lauryn pressed, her hopes and excitement rising.
Brant shrugged. “She’s says your name. Points to me and says, ‘Lauryn.’ And she holds her skirt and says, ‘there’s blood here.’ I don’t know.” Brant shook his head in discouragement. “I thought maybe…”
“You thought I’d know what she was tryin’ to say right off,” Lauryn finished for him.
“And I looked through the Captain’s trunk again,” he added. Lauryn sat up straight.
“What do you mean?” she asked him.
“The Captain’s trunk. The one in our attic. I spent a whole afternoon rummaging through that smelly old thing again.”
“You never told me he had a trunk at your house!” Lauryn was a bit irritated. It seemed, somehow, to be important.
“I’m sorry. I…we’re looking for Laura and I never thought…besides,” he began to admit. “I had only looked throu
gh it once before and it upset Laura so badly that I thought maybe it wasn’t the right thing to do.”
Instantly Lauryn was humbled. Brant obviously had a respect for the Captain’s personal belongings that she had maybe been lacking where Lauralynn’s were concerned.
“I’ve gone through Laura’s trunk over and over,” Lauryn confessed.
“Maybe we need to go through it together,” Brant suggested.
“It wouldn’t bother you?” Lauryn ventured.
“No. Not now. The clock is ticking Lauryn. Life has to go on. This life and the next.” He seemed angry and somewhat resentful for a moment, but appeared to force himself to brighten and asked in a very friendly manner, “So, how’s your friend Penny?”
“Penny?” Lauryn repeated. Why should Brant be interested in Penny, or how she was doing?
“Yes,” he chuckled. “You remember that I met her when I was here. She’s your friend still isn’t’ she?”
“Well, of course,” Lauryn said. But why should he concern himself? It bothered her. The odd sort of jealousy that she felt in her heart when Brant spoke of Laura so lovingly, now rose in her bosom when he asked about Penny. “She’s fine.”
“And Sean and Mindy and the baby?”
“They’re all just dandy,” Lauryn told him realizing he was just making polite conversation.
“That’s good to hear,” he sighed, leaning back in his chair.
“Did you come back to stay?” Lauryn blurted out. Then realizing how revealing her question had been she added, “To stay and help me find her?”
He paused, not answering right away. His eyes narrowed as he looked at her, almost suspiciously. “I came back to help you look for her, yes.” It was an answer that rather avoided answering. In other words, he wasn’t staying, but he had come back for Laura. No one else.
Trying to seem unhurt, Lauryn said, “Good. So…where do we start?” She’d asked herself that same question many times. She’d asked the Captain. And now, asked again. There was nowhere to search that she hadn’t already. Or so she thought.
The Fragrance of Her Name Page 16
