Pride's Folly

by Fiona Harrowe

  Lavinia Gan was quite happy to write out the invitation, a flowery scroll on her precious store of vellum, delighted that we would have as company a baronet’s son. Life got rather dull at Wildoak. Widowed by the war, Lavinia had married Gerald Gan, an elderly bachelor, shortly after the end of hostilities. Their relationship was marked by a formality I sometimes found ludicrous. For example, they did not address each other by their Christian names; it was Mr. or Mrs. Gan. To me Lavinia had always seemed distant, absorbed in herself or in the welfare of her two sons by her first husband, twins, now married, one living in Norfolk, the other in Raleigh. But I liked Alfred. He was a thin little man with a wiry, clipped beard and dark-brown eyes, which were slightly farsighted but still keen. Alfred had been downriver on a law case when Lavinia penned her invitation. Returning shortly thereafter to a house in the throes of a “spring cleaning,” he was surprised to learn the identity of our anticipated guest. “So it’s lan Ramsey Montgomery,” he mused.

  “You’ve met him?” I asked.

  “Several years before the war. In England. I knew his father fairly well. He put me up in his home, as a matter of fact, for a fortnight.”

  “In one of his castles?”

  “At Penhames. More a heap of rubble, my dear, than your idea of a castle.”

  “What do you mean, ‘a heap of rubble’?”

  “Just that. I don’t believe any repair work has been done on it for the last hundred years, probably longer, and I would be much surprised if it has been shored up since my own visit a decade ago.”

  “But surely the old baronet has the money.”

  “Not at all. Poor as a churchmouse.”

  “Land poor, you mean.”

  “Hardly. The barons of Marksbury have been selling their land off piecemeal for centuries. That is the only way they have been able to maintain themselves. Heaven forbid any one of them should have thought of gainful employment. ‘The pursuit of money as an end is beyond the purlieu of a gentleman,’ the old baronet told me. A medieval concept that unfortunately applies to many of our own Virginia planters and their sons even now.”

  This discussion was taking place over a late breakfast in the dining room. A May breeze billowed the curtains, wafting the scent of wisteria inside to mingle with the aroma of freshly brewed coffee. I had sat down to that meal only a half hour earlier with a light heart and the sweet knowledge that one day less divided me from Ian. But now ... I did not know what to feel.

  “Mr. Montgomery’s family has another castle—he mentioned it—Invernean in Scotland,” I pointed out.

  “Yes, I’m aware of that. And the farm there operates on a meager scale. I’m sorry to disappoint you, Deirdre, but the Montgomerys have scarcely more than their titles and their pride to commend them. The father, Sir Montgomery, hinted as much, even going so far as to say—in a half-humorous way—that when his eldest son came of age he would have to find an heiress. I suspect that is why Ian is here in America.”

  “That couldn’t be so. Mr. Montgomery told me that his father sent him here to broaden his education.” But even as I protested, I realized how foolish it sounded. Alfred Gan was a perceptive man; he was not prone to exaggeration or misrepresentation. If he said the Montgomerys were impoverished, they probably were.

  “You haven’t set your cap for him, have you?” Alfred asked, observing me with his candid brown eyes.

  “As a matter of fact, yes,” I answered truthfully. “But if I had known . . . Well, it is a disappointment, Uncle Gan.” I had taken the liberty of calling him ‘Uncle,’ a custom in our part of the world. “I haven’t made it too obvious.”

  “I should hope not. I don’t like to dash your hopes, girl, but I doubt there is a prayer of him marrying anything less than a very rich lass. Ian Montgomery comes of the true aristocracy. His honor lies in his reverence for tradition, an unwritten law of preservation. If his father asked him to bring home a bride whose dowry would save Penhames and Invernean, then he would obey and no questions asked.”

  “But how could he be so base as to marry for money!” I cried, forgetting I had set the same goal for myself.

  Alfred shrugged. “It’s done all the-time, by good folk and bad.”

  “I’m sorry I invited him,” I said.

  “Come, now,” Alfred chided. “Simply because you can’t have him for a husband does not make him any the less welcome, does it?”

  “I suppose not. And I promise I shall be the perfect hostess.” But, I added silently, no more than that. No kisses, no intimate moments, no silent communication of the eyes. I was not going to make a goose of myself over Ian Ramsey Montgomery.

  But I hadn’t reckoned on the quickening of my pulses when I saw him again, on the surge of excitement at the accidental touch of his hand. I hadn’t counted on the tempest that drove us into the barn. Nor had I calculated the power of love.

  * * *

  The storm had passed over, but the rain still pattered on the roof and window.

  “God!” Ian exclaimed under his breath, breaking a long silence. “God! I’m not proud of what I’ve done.”

  “Hush! I’m as much at fault.”

  “No. I’m older, more experienced—the man. I should have been able to control myself.”

  Another silence. Somewhere outside, a bird began to peep and chirp.

  “Such behavior . . Ian’s voice trailed off.

  Divining the struggle going on in his mind, I said, “I know that your duty prevents you from marrying me.”

  The night before, while candidly discussing the sad state of postwar agriculture in Virginia, Alfred had inadvertently admitted that Wildoak was struggling to keep afloat. Moreover, he had referred to Uncle Miles as its owner. So Ian was perfectly aware of my own impoverished situation. And yet . . .

  “After what has happened,” Ian said, turning his head, looking into my eyes, “a gentleman must. I must marry you.”

  It was not what I wanted to hear. I wanted him to tell me that he loved me passionately, that nothing mattered except we be man and wife, that his father’s wishes were irrelevant, that Penhames and Invernean could disintegrate to dust, that he loved me, that he was as willing as I to forgo the dream of restored wealth, that he loved me, loved me, loved me. But he had only said, “I must.” He might just as well have dashed cold water into my face.

  I sat up and pulled on my blouse.

  “I don’t want a man who feels he must marry me.”

  “Deirdre, be reasonable.”

  “I know, I know!” I said fiercely, donning my underclothes, my petticoat. “There’s Duty, Responsibility, Tradition, all spelled with capitals. Why don’t you say it? ‘If you weren’t so poor I’d marry you.’ Say it!”

  How quickly love turns to anger, the kisses are forgotten, the ecstasy that binds one to another vanishes. Two words—“I must”—and all was changed.

  “I want to do what is right,” Ian said. “If you would listen—”

  “What’s right? Spare me. I don’t want to listen. You are the last man on earth I would marry. Do you think I wish to spend the rest of my life hearing about your great sacrifice, how your father turned you out because you married a dowerless girl from the ‘Colonies’?”

  I stamped into my boots.

  “Deirdre, please believe me, there has never been anyone like you. Never.”

  “Well,” I said bitterly, “that’s some consolation. It makes me feel less the trollop.”

  “Deirdre . . .”

  Not a word about love, not a syllable about feeling.

  “I take the blame,” he said.

  Still nothing about the tie that had bound us in those deeply passionate moments, nothing about our future together. One caring word, two, would have convinced me that I had been loved, not casually used.

  “I never for one moment believed,” Ian went on, “nor do I now, that you are less than a lady.”

  “Oh, what does it matter?” I flung at him, angry, bitter, wanting desperately to cry.
But I wouldn’t, not in his presence. I had too much pride for that.

  “You’d best get into your clothes, Mr. Montgomery. Hurry. We should get back or they will wonder. You wouldn’t want that to happen, would you?”

  He rose, an angry flush on his face. “I find such sarcasm beneath you.”

  “It isn’t. What is beneath me is having been duped by a starched popinjay like you.”

  And with that I strode down the length of the barn to my horse, who stood nuzzling the hay at its feet.

  Chapter 4

  Ian left the next day. He had promised to speak on Byron at Mrs. Stanton’s literary tea, he said—a lame excuse that Lavinia accepted with regret and Alfred with barely concealed skepticism.

  I shook Ian’s hand, murmuring proper social banalities, saying I hoped he would make a return visit and stay longer. I did not look directly into his eyes. I was afraid my anger and bitterness would show, and I did not want him to think that he, or what had happened in the barn, mattered to me.

  “Perhaps,” I said offhandedly, “I shall see you in Richmond at the Caldwells’ ball. All the belles of society will be there, one or two richly dowered and eager to meet nobility.”

  “Then I shall not miss it,” he said, his thin mouth lifting faintly at the corners in a sketchy smile, while his eyes shot me a scathing glance.

  “A pity if you did.”

  As his chaise clattered down the drive, Uncle Gan turned to me. “I won’t ask you what brought that on, but I do think you could have been less spiteful.”

  I couldn’t tell him that my spite was a buttress against tears.

  Four days later, still sore at heart and forcing myself to put lan out of my thoughts, I began to pack for my return trip to Aunt Jane’s. I had already sent her a short note and knew without waiting for a reply that she would welcome me as gladly as she had a month earlier.

  At the last moment little Page begged to be left behind. He and the manager’s visiting nephew had become inseparable companions, and I couldn’t blame Page for wanting to remain at Wildoak. For an only child brought up in a household of adults, the novelty of having a playmate was irresistible. But I hated to go without him. I always imagined something horrible happening while I was gone, an accident or an illness. He was such a dear, handsome, and bright little boy. In two or three years he would need a tutor, a good one, since he must have the best. When he was eight or nine he would be sent to an excellent boarding school. But where the money for his education would come from I did not know. I certainly couldn’t ask Uncle Miles for it.

  We had a strained relationship, Miles Falconer and I. We had not met until just before the war when he returned to Wildoak after a long absence, bringing his wife with him. A quarrel with my grandfather, who had died in the meanwhile, had sent Miles to San Francisco, where he had acquired his fortune and later married my Aunt Carmella.

  After going off to war with Papa (killed later at Gettysburg, bless his memory), Miles had come back on one of his last leaves, to find I had been married to Beasley and given birth to Page. It was then that our differences began. He guessed that Page was not Beasley’s, and though he never called my child a bastard, his disapproval was apparent. Fiercely protective of Page from the day he was born, I resented Miles’s attitude. We had words. I remember him saying that Page “would have to prove his worth” before he, Miles, would make any arrangement for a transfer of the plantation. Yet Miles was the most unsentimental of men, not interested in Wildoak as a home and, I imagine, dissatisfied with the farm’s poor showing. If it continued to be a financial drain, I felt Miles would probably part with it for a good price. And I wanted to be the one who would offer it to him.

  The problem was money, a rare commodity with the South still reeling from the war. Only men like Judah Harrison had come out of it with any real wealth. But I was young and resilient and, despite my recent bitter disillusionment, optimistic. Even in those unsettled times, under the shadow of near poverty and Union troops, people still traveled, coming to Richmond, the capital and hub of Virginia, to visit friends and relatives. It was among these journeying callers that I hoped to find a husband. Perhaps he would turn up at the Bainbridges’ one afternoon for tea, or—who knows?—at the coming Caldwell ball.

  * * *

  The Caldwell house was on Leigh Street, a whitewashed brick mansion, its flat facade embellished with one of those boxy Greek Revival porches so dear to the architects of the 1850s. As the Bainbridges and I drove up we could see carriages, landaus, and gigs (many of them old-fashioned and in poor repair, for few could afford new ones) standing along the curb and far down the street. Little Negro boys given pennies to tend the horses during their masters’ absence eyed us with curiosity and anticipation.

  Uncle Morton Bainbridge said, “Seems from the look of it we’re a little late. I’ll let you two ladies off and see if I can’t bribe one of these pickaninnies to find a place for our gig.”

  Music, the murmur of voices, and the sound of laughter came from the opened casement windows.

  “They’ve already started the dancing,” Aunt Jane remarked, indicating the shadowy frock-tailed and crinolined shapes flitting, dipping, and bobbing behind the curtains.

  Amy Caldwell came out into the foyer to greet us with her usual exuberance.

  “Mrs. Bainbridge! How nice! And Deirdre, aren’t you the one! That gown—I’m sick with envy!’’

  It was of amber shot silk trimmed with dainty white illusion lace around the low neckline and at the edges of the capped sleeves, part of the wardrobe Uncle Miles had allowed me to order when Aunt Carmella sent for hers. Thank goodness for his burst of generosity.

  “Who’s here?” I whispered.

  “The Fairchilds, Conways, Stantons—the usuals. I didn’t invite Aaron Sadler, if that’s what’s worrying you. I know you dislike him.”.

  “Yes, Thank you, Amy.’’

  “Do come in. Ah, here is Mr. Bainbridge! There’s a bridge game going on in the library, sir, if you don’t care for dancing. Whiskey and punch in the dining room. Now, Deirdre, you must come and meet Captain Tucker.”

  An elderly, stiff-gaited veteran of the Army of Virginia, he gallantly admired my dress (“the color goes with your lovely hair, my dear’’), then launched into a bitter denunciation of the Federal ruling that forbade Confederate officers to wear their uniforms without first removing the buttons and insignia. I was waltzing with him when Judah Harrison and his daughter Agnes arrived. Agnes was leaning on the arm of Ian Montgomery. I had expected his appearance at the Caldwells, and it had even crossed my mind that he might escort her. But seeing that proprietary hand of Agnes’s on his sleeve sent a hot dagger through my heart.

  Turning to Captain Tucker, I suddenly became very animated, flirting outrageously with him. “How you do go on!’’ I cried. “Such a flatterer!’’ The exclamations tumbled off my tongue while in my heart jealousy struggled with suffocating anger.

  I thought I had conquered my passion for Ian. Why should I care? Why should I allow myself to feel anything for this man who had used me like a tart, thrown me aside, and then, adding insult to injury, gone straight to Agnes. Agnes!

  Out of the corner of my eye I could see Ian dancing with her. He had his arm about her waist, and I thought he was holding her closer than necessary. Suddenly taking the lead, further puzzling my elderly partner, I managed to maneuver him around so that I could have a better view. Ian was speaking to Agnes and she was looking up at him with doggielike adoration. He was courting her, I was certain of it. She had money and she came of good family. Why not? That she would make an unattractive Lady Montgomery did not matter. The title would lend her glamor. She would learn to be a chatelaine. She would find that Ian’s kisses could enflame and burn, that his arms were strong and manly, that beneath the dark-blue serge and immaculate broadcloth lurked a passionate lover. Oh, damn him!

  “Is something wrong?’’ the old captain asked.

  I must have stepped on his foot.
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  “Sorry. Do forgive me, but I am tired—and thirsty. Some punch, perhaps?’’

  Over a cup of Strawberry Fizz I brooded. I had no cause to feel resentment, I told myself. Ian was merely pursuing a course similar to mine. But why Agnes Harrison, of all people? Because she was rich, rich. Forget him. Forget them.

  “Excuse me,” I said to Captain Tucker, putting my cup down. “I’ll only be a few moments.’’

  I went up the winding staircase to where our wraps had been taken, needing a few moments of silence to collect myself. The last thing I wanted people to know was that I envied Agnes Harrison or that I cared a whit for Ian Ramsey Montgomery. As bad luck would have it, Agnes was in the bedroom, sitting before the mirror, patting her head, sticking pins into her false-haired chignon. I would have retreated, but she had already seen me in the mirror.

  “Well, Deirdre,’’ she said, turning, “you’re looking well— considering.”

  “Considering what?”

  “Ohhhh, everything.” She rolled her crossed eyes.

  “And just what do you mean by ‘everything’?”

  “I understand that Mr. Montgomery stayed only two nights at Wildoak, and when he came back he called me directly. So your little wiles didn’t work.”

  “What wiles?”

  “Oh, come now.” She fingered the skimpy fringe of hair on her forehead. “I for one don’t feel I have to use wiles.”

  “No. You have all that money.”

  She was nonplussed. “So I do.”

  I wanted to tear her limb from limb. I wanted to wipe away that complacent look. Not only was she getting Ian but she was crowing over it, rubbing my nose in my hurt and disappointment. And if I knew her, she would add to my humiliation by publicly bragging about her triumph.