The Amorous Heiress

by Carrie Alexander

  “How’s Great-grandfather?” Gussy whispered. “Should I go in to say good morning?” She was supposed to, most days, but it wasn’t something she looked forward to.

  “Schwarthoff will have one of her conniptions if you interrupt breakfast while the oatmeal is hot,” Rozalinda said. “You can try later, but somet’ing tell me Elias sleep most of the day.” She nudged Gussy and pointed into her large woven carryall. An oversize deck of cards and a score pad attested to the night’s activities. Elias’s sole remaining pleasure was two-handed, penny-a-point canasta.

  “Roz!” Gussy said, pretending censure. Then she smiled. “How much did you take him for?”

  Rozalinda rattled the bulge of coins in the pocket of her white polyester uniform. “Enough to pay the fee on another of my daughter’s college applications.” Her mellifluous laugh burbled like a waterfall in the vast space of the two-story front hall as they made their way down the staircase.

  Gussy wished she could be as easy in her great-grandfather’s company. Rozalinda had counseled Gussy not to take any of his guff, but whenever Great-grandfather shouted thunderously and pounded the floor with his cane she quavered like the mouse that she was.

  The mouse that you were, she reminded herself. Still, she was glad to have escaped his inspection for the day. It would be better to test out her new attitude on someone less formidable.

  Not Grandmother, not yet, but maybe someone like…Thwaite.

  After Rózalinda had departed by the side door nearest the parking court, Gussy tiptoed across the polished marquetry floor of the front hall and started edging open the various doors leading off it. The library was dim and unoccupied, smelling faintly of wood smoke from last evening’s fire. The hearth was scraped clean, with new applewood logs set in the andirons, so Thwaite had already been there. Next door was the formal drawing room, empty as usual. Gold-flecked dust motes danced in the strong sunshine flooding the tall windows, making the ancient watered silk drapes look particularly shabby. The Throckmortons preferred tradition to change; even when new drapes were finally made, it would be from an antique fabric and in the same style that the very first Throckmorton had chosen.

  Gussy crossed the drawing room, inched open one of the French doors of the solarium and stuck her head inside. She gaped at the occupants, gasped audibly and, before they could react, slammed the door so hard its wavy glass panes rattled.

  “Miss Augustina?”

  Gussy whirled around. Darn it. Thwaite had crept up behind her on his sneaky, quiet-as-cat’s-paws feet. Grandmother labeled Thwaite’s stealth discretion; Gussy thought of it as just plain creepy.

  She told herself that she was no longer the seven-year-old whom Thwaite had once caught red-handed in the gazebo, spying on April playing doctor with Vito Carlucci, the chauffeur’s son. Drawing a deep breath, keeping hold of the door latch behind her back, she confronted him. “Thwaite, exactly whom have you put in the solarium?”

  The butler pursed his lips, making his wrinkled turtle face look like a lemon with all the juice sucked out. “Your gentlemen callers, Miss Augustina.”

  Accustomed as she was to living in Thwaite’s coastal-Maine version of The Glass Menagerie, Gussy said only, “But there are three of them.” Her heart was still pounding like a kettledrum from that discovery, and she was certain it wasn’t because of the presence of Andrews Lowell and Billy Tuttle.

  Thwaite nodded. “As you say, Miss Augustina.”

  “Well, I recognize Billy and Andrews…but who’s the third?”

  “The gentleman—” Thwaite’s paper-thin nostrils fluttered slightly “—gave his name as Kelley, I believe. I put him in with the others, miss.”

  Gussy nipped her bottom lip with her teeth. There were no Kelleys in Sheepshead Bay, not among the Throckmorton’s admittedly limited circle. “And when was I to be informed of his…their arrival?”

  “In due time, Miss Augustina. Your grandmother is waiting on the terrace.” Thwaite slipped a silver pocket watch from his waistcoat, flicked the cover up and checked the time. “You’re already eight minutes late for breakfast.” He closed the watch with a snap and tucked it away again, the links of its fob jingling softly.

  Gussy could on occasion avoid Great-grandfather, but breakfast with Grandmother was without exception de rigueur. Even for the new Gussy.

  Her gentlemen callers would have to wait. Thinking that perhaps she’d fallen into an odd game of Mystery Date instead of a Tennessee Williams play, Gussy nodded coolly to the butler and made her way to the dining room at the back of the house. Another pair of French doors was standing open to a pink granite terrace overlooking the ocean. The water was a cheery blue today, a welcome change after three days of rain and fog. The surf battered the steep cliffs, breaking into geysers of spume that glittered in the sunshine.

  Marian May Andrews Throckmorton sat in the shade of the patio table’s umbrella, serenely drinking coffee while she waited for her granddaughter. She was a handsome woman, deceptively slender for someone with her strength of character and constitution, traits that were also reflected in a regal bearing that remained unbowed after seventyone years. Her dress was a stylish but subdued designer original.

  Gussy hesitated in the doorway, nibbling on her lower lip, then briskly stepped outside when Thwaite arrived to hover at her elbow. “G’morning, Grandmother,” she said, and kissed the older woman’s tilted cheek, sniffing talc, lavender water and antiseptic mouthwash.

  “Good morning, Augustina. Mind your mumbling.”

  “Pardon me, ma’am,” Gussy said automatically. Thwaite pulled out her chair. She started to sit and he scooted the chair beneath her until she was wedged in tight against the table, just as locked in place as if she’d never made the resolution to take charge of her life. The butler slipped her napkin from its ring, snapped out the accordion pleats and dropped it into her lap.

  “That will be all, thank you, Thwaite,” Marian said, dismissing him in the midst of lifting the domed lids of the serving dishes to reveal warm muffins, buttery yellow scrambled eggs and thick pottery bowls of oatmeal. Thwaite stayed long enough to position one of the bowls at Gussy’s place setting, then turned on his heel and vanished into the house, missing the cutting look Gussy knifed at his retreating back.

  Stubbornly she set aside the oatmeal. The Victorian Throckmortons had been sticklers about prescribing oatmeal and cod liver oil to the younger generations, which explained a lot about Great-grandfather’s sour personality. While Gussy’s doses of cod liver oil had ended at age eighteen, the oatmeal was still a constant. She’d learned to dread its appearance at the table.

  Marian looked askance, but for once did not utter a word of protest—possibly because her mouth was all gummed up with a spoonful of oatmeal. Gussy poured a glass of juice from the sterling-silver pitcher. Prune this morning, yuck. It was difficult living with a woman whose comportment was so rigid she always did what was best for her health or most suited to her station in life. Beside Grandmother, Augustina felt her own conduct was middling at best, and middling was not good enough for a Throckmorton-Fairchild. Which explained a lot about Gussy’s personality, since middling was the story of her life.

  “I think I’ll have just a blueberry muffin,” she announced.

  Marian dished out the eggs anyway, passing a plate to her granddaughter.

  “I’m already running late,” Gussy persisted. And there was a very interesting gentleman caller waiting for her in the solarium…although she wasn’t going to tell her grandmother that.

  Not to be rushed, Marian scanned the serving dishes and added a sausage to Gussy’s plate. “It will do the boys good to wait for you.”

  Thwaite was a tattletale, Gussy thought with disgust. Then her eyebrows went up. Did Grandmother already know about…? She couldn’t. Gussy was certain that not even her grandmother would call the definitively manly stranger named Kelley a boy.

  “It’s best for a young lady not to appear too eager.”

  Gussy b
owed her head. “Yes, ma’am.” If April had been there, she’d’ve been muffling giggles in her napkin and plotting a rendezvous with the tempting stranger. It would take place right under Grandmother’s nose and probably employ a maid’s apron, a feather duster and a chauffeur’s uniform. Gussy, however, listened without protest and silently marshaled her forces. She was planning to choose her battles more judiciously.

  The scalloped edge of the striped umbrella flapped in the breeze. Marian waved her napkin at a wayward honeybee. “How is Andrews’s courtship progressing?” she asked.

  At the word courtship, Gussy choked on a piece of the crumbled muffin. Her grandmother was sincerely deluded if she believed that Gussy would become engaged to Andrews. At least not so soon. Not before she tried someone—something—else.

  “We don’t have an understanding, if that’s what you mean, Grandmother.” Gussy cleared her throat. “Anyway, I think I might go sailing with…”

  Since Grandmother’s serene countenance did not waver at the pause, Gussy decided it was safe to presume that the older woman didn’t know about the maybe-tattooed hunk in the solarium. If she had, she’d have been issuing orders for her granddaughter to keep her distance.

  “…Billy Tuttle,” Gussy finished, crossing her fingers under cover of the tablecloth.

  “Splendid,” Marian approved. “We can’t have Andrews being too sure of you.”

  Just what Gussy needed—a dinosaur like Grandmother Throckmorton giving her dating tips. Silently she finished her blueberry muffin and began rearranging what was left of the scrambled eggs to hide the uneaten sausage. Grandmother’s ideas on the subject of dating were strictly old-fashioned. She even thought that Gussy was still a virgin, which was probably Gussy’s fault, since she hadn’t dared to inform her grandmother otherwise. Of course, she wouldn’t be in the predicament of pretending she was one if she’d had the gumption to break free years ago, the way her sister had. Gussy sighed softly. She had somehow always managed to just miss the moment of escape.

  Marian looked at her granddaughter’s plate. “Mind your manners, Augustina. You mustn’t toy with your food.”

  “Pardon me, ma’am.” Gussy set aside her utensils, then said, most tentatively, “Grandmother…”

  “Speak up, child. Don’t dawdle.”

  “Grandmother, I’ve decided to…” Gussy’s throat clenched. Spit it out, she thought. Tell her you’ve decided to take charge of your own life from here on out. Do it Do it. Now or never.

  Then again, there were the laws of inertia, she remembered, starting to waffle. Okay, she was a mouse, still a mouse, always a mouse, but this would be so much easier on her if the pattern of her inertia was broken by an outside force.

  An outside force like…marriage.

  The notion had popped into Gussy’s head out of nowhere; her eyes widened at its possibilities, then narrowed at its impossibilities. Marriage? What was she thinking? Getting married was exactly what Grandmother wanted her to do!

  But that was the beauty of it, Gussy realized in the next moment. To all outward appearances, she’d be conforming, when in reality marriage would be the perfect vehicle for her to declare her freedom.

  Grandmother Throckmorton and the rest of the grand dames of Sheepshead Bay revered marriage as a sacred trust. A married woman was instantly, almost without exception, accorded their respect. And once granted, only the worst of transgressions—made publicly or, worse, scandalized in print—could cause a woman to lose that standing. Maybe not even then. Look at Mrs. Ann Owen Gilmore, perpetually three sheets to the wind at every yacht-club function; Mrs. Catherine Chalk, belle of the Episcopal Sisterhood’s charity ball even though she was suspected of embezzling from their quilting fund; and Mrs. Vanessa Van Pelt, who carried on flaming affairs with every gardener she hired, but was nonetheless still the president of the Junior League.

  Why, a certificate of marriage was practically a license to run wild!

  Going the wedded-bliss route had worked for Gussy’s sister. Already having the courage that Gussy lacked, April’s first step to freedom had been enrolling at a California university instead of the traditional Throckmorton choice, Vassar. Then, after four years of relative freedom and before the grandparents could begin issuing ultimatums, April had accepted the best of her various marriage proposals and returned triumphant to Maine with both a degree and a fiancé. Because the fiancé was from a family nearly as rich and connected as the Throckmortons, Great-grandfather had bestowed his grudging approval. After a lavish society wedding, April had departed in a blaze of glory to live her own life on her own terms.

  Gussy, a junior at Vassar at the time, had remained firmly under her grandparents’ thumbs. Where she’d stayed to this day.

  But no longer, Gussy confirmed silently.

  If marriage was the easiest way to squirm out from under, then so be it.

  She squared her shoulders. The fact that there was a dreamboat of a gentleman caller awaiting her approval in the solarium had very little to do with her decision. The mysterious Mr. Kelley’s arrival was simply fortuitous happenstance.

  “Augustina,” Marian finally snapped, “please be so kind as to finish your sentences. Honestly, but you’re woolgathering this morning.”

  Resisting the impulse to blurt out another “Pardon me, ma’am,” as she’d been taught to always do, Gussy instead looked straight into her grandmother’s clear hazel eyes, which widened slightly as Marian patted her lips with a napkin, then tilted her chin at a haughty, lady-of-the-manor angle. Without averting her gaze from her granddaughter’s, Marian smoothed her palms over the princess roll of dove gray locks haloing her face; as usual, there was not a hair out of place.

  The silence between them lengthened. Gussy’s muscles tensed as she fought not to avert her stare.

  Then it happened.

  Grandmother Throckmorton blinked. She looked away. She even fiddled with her napkin, waving it about distractedly.

  Whether it was silly or not, Gussy was elated. She’d gripped the arms of the chair until her knuckles were white, but for once in her life she hadn’t given in. She’d won a contest of wills. So what if it had been only a minor skirmish?

  “Grandmother,” Gussy said firmly, which was much easier to do when she knew she was about to say what the older woman wanted to hear, “I’ve decided that you’re right. It is time for me to select a husband. In fact, I’m going to see to it at once.” She stood and shoved her chair back, scraping it across the stones with a screech. Naturally, Grandmother would assume she was speaking of dear, stuffy old Andrews. There would be another clash if things worked out in a different direction, but that tussle could be put off for another day.

  Marian nodded with satisfaction and picked up her coffee cup. “I was certain you’d see the wisdom of my advice, Augustina.”

  Suddenly lighthearted with munificence, Gussy leaned down to kiss the older woman’s cheek, hugging her lightly around the shoulders for good measure. “You are so wise, Grandmother,” she murmured, and twirled around to go back into the house; her skirt flaring out.

  Marian’s face had softened at the unexpected affection, but then stiffened with reproach when Gussy whipped off her sweater as she stepped inside, revealing her bare back. Marian tensed, remonstrations on her lips. A second later she relaxed back in her chair and reached again for the coffee. It wouldn’t hurt Augustina to appear immodest just this once. Perhaps the Lowell boy would be inspired enough to propose now that Augustina was prepared to comply. At times like these, a good, measured, unblinking stare could work wonders on a reluctant bride, even when it was interrupted by a persistent honeybee.

  The morning had been unexpectedly prosperous; Marian rewarded herself by adding an extra dollop of cream to her coffee.

  Although she prided herself on her active social life and the fact that she looked not a day over sixty, Marian May Andrews Throckmorton was more than ready to settle down to being a great-grandmother.

  She liked the ide
a of being called a matriarch.

  2

  Of Mice and Men

  GUSSY WASN’T THINKING about providing her grandmother with great-grandchildren when she paused outside the lacecurtained glass doors to the solarium. She was thinking of men.

  She’d known Andrews since they were baptized two weeks apart. They’d attended school together, back when Gussy’s parents had mostly stayed put in their Manhattan co-op and used Throckmorton Cottage as their summer home. When Philip Fairchild’s itch for adventure had grown too strong to ignore, he’d quit his executive job in advertising to travel the globe. Nathalie, Gussy’s mother, had decided that she must go along to take photographs and fax her husband’s I-Skied-the-Matterhorn articles to upscale travel magazines. Gussy and April had been shipped off to Miss Fibbing-White’s, a boarding school in rural England, around the same time that Andrews Lowell was enrolling in Groton. Still, Gussy had seen enough of Andrews during the long summers of sailing and tennis in Sheepshead Bay that her feelings for him might have remained strictly sisterly if he hadn’t been the first boy who kissed her. And the first boy who…

  “Let’s not travel that train of thought,” Gussy whispered aloud, then whirled around, coughing and clearing her throat in case Thwaite had sneaked up behind her and was trying to eavesdrop.

  Andrews opened the French doors. “Gussy—there you are! What happened? We’ve all been waiting for you to reappear.”

  Gussy peeped into the solarium. Billy Tuttle stood craning his neck a few paces behind Andrews, his hands stuffed in the pockets of his windbreaker. Billy was an off-and-on sales rep, mostly off during the summer so the prime sporting months weren’t all bollixed up with something as dull as work. He fancied himself a ladies’ man, and often imported young models from New York for the weekend to prove it. He probably wouldn’t have been interested in Gussy if his own grandmother hadn’t threatened him with nonpayment of his yacht-club bar bill unless he started dating someone respectable like the Fairchild girl.