by Denney, Hope
“Here is the jewel in the box,” said a resonant voice.
She jumped and then turned around to face the danger, the inkling phantoms that were Wilson’s Raiders causing her hair to stand on end.
Eric—no, Phillip Russell stood smiling genially in the center of the room.
“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I didn’t know anyone was in here, least of all you. It seems we’ve gone from Blind Man’s Bluff to hide-and-seek.”
She wrapped her arms around herself for comfort and then patted her pocket to reassure herself of its valuable contents.
“I didn’t hear you come up. You nearly scared me to death.”
“I didn’t know I needed to warn someone of my presence.” He grinned. “What place is this? It wasn’t here the last time I visited the Grove.”
“I call it the Unnamed House,” said Somerset. “Eric Rutherford built this house for us to live in before he died. I think of it as mine, but it isn’t. It went to his family after he died.”
“The Unnamed House,” repeated Phillip, turning in place and looking over the room. “It doesn’t look real.”
“He tried to base it on the plantation my mother lived in in Louisiana. It’s a tribute to me, my preferences, and the love he had for me. I’d give anything for it to be mine.”
“A sort of Taj Mahal then.”
“Far better,” she flashed.
“Touché.”
Somerset knew it wasn’t a good idea to be alone with him in an abandoned house on the Rutherfords’ property, but he was too interesting to let alone. She felt compelled to sit down on the chest and invite him to sit down on the window seat. She was rattled that she’d managed to forget about him so soon after the most exciting social event she’d taken part in as an adult. He was a new handsome stranger forgotten in the tumult of the past few days. She drank in the blue eyes and dark hair while trying to look bored. She felt it in the center of her stomach that she wanted to touch him, caress the curve of a bicep or the musculature of a hand, so she turned the arrowhead between her fingers and waited for him to say something else.
He sat down on the rosewood chest so that he was too near her.
“So you roam around crypts when you aren’t doing the work of a kitchen maid?” he asked.
Somerset looked down at her plain calico work dress with several lard smears on the front and cursed herself for not checking the mirror before she went out.
“This isn’t a crypt. I came to rescue a few precious keepsakes, and now I don’t know how I’m going to get them all home. If I look like a kitchen maid, it’s because I work as a kitchen maid most of the time. We aren’t all fortunate enough to be wealthy and well-dressed all the time.”
“I think you look charming in that dress. I wasn’t trying to make you angry with me. I’m just getting to know you better. I have a habit of being forceful although I’m learning to rein it in. You’re disarmingly complex, and the more I see you, the more questions I’ll have about you. It’s a compliment. I find most people to be transparent and dull-witted, but just when I think I know what you’re going to say next, you surprise me.
“I should have known the house was yours from the moment I laid eyes on it. It’s just as surprising and lovely as you are.”
It was always on the tip of her tongue to ask him who he was. The answer couldn’t be as simple as Sawyer’s elder brother. That would be too simple. Her insides turned upside down around him. His compliments were outrageous but delivered in much the matter as discussing whether it would rain or when a meal would be served. He had the uncanny ability to stay two steps ahead of her in conversation. The two characteristics together somehow made her feel beautiful but foolish. She wanted to slap his mouth, but she also wanted to kiss it. She walked away from the trunk that he made his seat and settled on the window seat across the room from him where she felt safer in spirit.
His gaze followed her across the room.
“What is that dark painted silhouette there on the wall that you’re sitting by?” Phillip asked, pointing to her left.
Somerset looked over her shoulder at it, already knowing what he referenced.
“Eric had that painted before he died. It’s a silhouette of him holding me. It’s the most romantic gesture anyone has ever made for me.”
She heard the softness in her voice as she looked at the crisp gray image. They stood in profile. The man’s hands were on the woman’s waist. Her arms went up and around his neck. She was looking up at him so that her back arched back gently while his face angled down.
I’ve never seen anything like it,” remarked Phillip. “I’d much prefer a full color portrait of the two of you although your outline is beautiful. It is sentimental. No wonder you never married after him.”
“No, it’s no wonder at all.”
“Your face changes when I talk about him.”
“My heart changes when you talk about him.”
“I’d like to hear more about him.”
“I think you can deduce everything you need to know about him from this house and the painting behind me.”
“I see how he appealed to your romantic side, but those things don’t tell me much about the man, the person who got up and earned a living. Come, help me know my cousin better.”
“He was a lawyer on a family mission to get a Rutherford in Congress. They do love their politics, their government, and their organizational involvement, but I’m sure you’ve noticed all that being part of the family.
“He was calm and relaxed to be accomplished. Nothing ruffled him. He possessed a surety, a self-confidence that was unusual. Joseph says he was logical and it makes sense to me—whether it was a legal issue or a matter of the heart, he had an uncanny ability to sort the ramifications of a problem and settle it. I call it intellect but no matter.
“We used to go riding for whole afternoons and evenings. We’d stop on the river and catch fish and build a fire to cook them on. One time we were caught in the rain just as we got the fish into the frying pan and we were soaked to the skin and lost our supper, too. We didn’t care, though. We dried out before the fire and raced home. He never let me win in a race. If I won, I had to do it fair and square. I respected that about him. He appreciated me as a woman but he didn’t make silly allowances for it. He wanted a wife to be a partner.”
Somerset realized how much she was saying and how Phillip’s eyes were locked on her and she stopped talking.
“Go on. I was enjoying what you have to say.”
“He had hobbies galore,” remembered Somerset. “He carved the chest you’re sitting on. His could carve nearly anything with not much more than a pocketknife. I remember the archway he carved for his sister, Caroline, to get married under. It was ripe with pomegranates and honeycomb and all these beautiful natural things carved into the wood. They were all fertility and prosperity symbols, although most people didn’t notice. They were too in awe of the craftsmanship.
“With his steady hands and eyes he was good at everything, like my brother Theodore. It follows that he was an excellent shot. He could hit anything from any distance. He was a sniper during the war with Joseph, Sawyer, and Theodore. They were in the same troop, and they called their little quartet “The Brotherhood.” I was comforted that they were out there protecting each other. They became the four most important people in my life. So long as they had each other nothing could happen to them. I used to sit on the stone posts flanking the gates of Orchard Rest and wait for their homecoming. Eric didn’t return, though.”
“His is a life worth hearing about. You make me sorry I didn’t know him better.”
“Well, I knew him better than anyone, and I’m left wanting to know more about him.”
“You mentioned loving nursing. I assume you nursed during the war?”
“I ran away to Georgia to look for Eric’s body. I stayed with a relative. Mother demanded I come home, but by the time she had located me, I was on every nursing committee in town. She rec
eived dozens of letter extolling my virtues and usefulness and let me stay in Atlanta a while longer.” Somerset laughed. “I was being selfish at heart. I thought I had a greater chance of finding Eric if I worked seven days a week, but ultimately I enjoyed my work. It taught me compassion, which I desperately needed, and revealed to me a whole world of people with all their flaws and strengths and sufferings.”
Phillip raised an eyebrow in surprise. He scooted off his makeshift seat and approached her.
“See? No one would think in eons that those kinds of thoughts were going on inside your head.”
“You mean that no one would think to look beyond the color of my eyes or the smile on my lips?”
He rested a hand on the lower curve of her jaw. Somerset smelled pine and light cologne with a hint of cloves. She took a step away and circled behind him for the bedroom door while praying that she was successful at hiding the excitement on her face. She’d have to come again for her belongings but it was no matter compared to the titillation of being trapped alone with him. She wanted to move closer to him, an excellent indication to get away from him, to her thinking.
“It was very nice meeting you again,” she threw over her shoulder. “I’d like to stay and talk, but kitchen maids don’t have much leisure time.”
“You said you would let me call on you.” He said it as a definitive statement.
“So I did,” she replied as she descended the stairs, forcing him to follow after her.
“I’m going to visit Orchard Rest soon, Miss Forrest.”
“I’ll be glad to see you if I am home,” she answered and stepped out the front door before he could reply.
***
As she and Cleo washed dishes that night, Somerset fought to keep him out of her mind. There were many other things to occupy her thoughts. She meant to carry Joseph a newspaper that Thomas brought back from Tuscaloosa, and she laughed until her sides hurt over Victoria’s escapades with Myra in the washhouse. Myra had used an entire box of starch in the laundry, and now all their aprons had the consistency of plywood. Cleo grumbled in tired asides to Bess about Birdy’s continued usefulness around the plantation. Somerset found that her thoughts kept returning to Phillip. She thought it insensible that she could still smell his clove and pine odor on the right side of her face, and as she washed the gravy boat, she asked herself what she meant by falling out of love only to develop immediate interest in someone else.
She was fighting with the memory of the astounded look on his face as she detailed her short-lived nursing career when Myra ran into the kitchen looking excited.
“There’s a heap of things outside on the front porch for you, Somerset. The hired help from Riverside brought it up and unloaded it all just now. I’ve never seen the like of it. There’s a beautiful jewelry box and this wonderful carved chest that I’d give anything to own. All the girls in my circle would be wild to have any of it! Oh, and before I forget, this letter came with it. They said it was to be given only to you.”
Somerset, knowing exactly who the letter would be from, caressed the arrowhead in her pocket as she unfolded the thick paper.
I am happy to have had the pleasure of conversing with you once more. I do enjoy your company and hope that you will decide to stay at home to receive my call tomorrow evening.
I have sent your belongings by our servants. It is with sincere regret that I am unable to give you what you most desire, so enclosed is but a cheap reproduction.
Regards,
Phillip Royce Russell
Somerset held the second page up to the light with trembling hands.
In black ink was a perfect recreation of her silhouette with Eric. Every curve of her body, every line of Eric’s hair, and each flowing line of her dress were captured without flaw on the heavy stationery.
“Did you have that commissioned?” asked Myra as she stood admiring it over Somerset’s shoulder.
“No. Look, Bess. Do you think we might have a spare frame for it somewhere? I want to hang it in my room so I can see it first thing when I wake up in the morning. It’s thoughtful enough to make my heart ache.”
“I suppose we got a spare frame in the attic.”
“Whoever sent that means business,” opined Cleo.
“It’s about time someone did,” grumbled Bess as she wiped her hands off on her skirt and went down the hall in search of a frame.
“I want to go through your trunk,” begged Myra, grabbing Somerset’s hand. “Tell me all about this great love you had!”
Still cradling the image in her hands, Somerset followed Myra out onto the porch and regaled her with stories until long after dark about the couple in her new picture.
***
Chapter 14
Somerset took elaborate care with her appearance that week and went so far as to borrow some of Myra’s dresses. Myra brought to Orchard Rest several dresses that Somerset imagined were only good for curtseying to the queen at court. She had teased Myra about them and asked what she planned to do with them there when she had such a profound fear of living outside the city.
“I’m prepared for anything,” said Myra who only that morning had been thrown out of the kitchen by Cleo for failing to properly lid her canning jars. “If someone wealthy and handsome wanted to see me here, I’d want to look grander than all the other girls, now wouldn’t I?”
“If you cain’t settle in Richmond, you ain’t gonna be settled here,” huffed Bess.
Myra pointed at Somerset.
“There’s someone worth dressing up for right here or she wouldn’t be asking to go through my trunk,” she said in triumph. “I want to know who it is! Oh, please. I won’t come running down the staircase to meet him when he knocks. I just want to see him, and everything I’ve said about knowing who all is worth your time holds true here, too. I can just meet someone and know. All I’d have to do is ask him a couple of questions about his family and I could tell you things that you didn’t even know you wanted to know about him. I’m connected to everyone!”
Somerset hid her amusement and asked to go through her trunk again, which Myra was proud to display.
“I wore this to a tea with Jefferson Davis’s wife. I spilled tea on it right there. Do you see the spot? Well, there’s a spot there. I know there is. This pink silk is nice, but I daresay it’s too tight in the bust for you. It’s bad luck, too. This was the dress I was wearing when Whitman ruined my reputation. I’m going to wad it up and hurl it from the window on the train ride home. Do you like it? Maybe I shouldn’t throw it away. Here, Somerset, this blue matches our color eyes exactly. It will be more striking on you with your brunette hair.”
She held up a royal blue dress with a fragile overskirt of silvery light material that Somerset thought might be woven out of fairy’s wings. Somerset grabbed it and begged Bess to lace her for it right away.
The dress fit like a second skin. She and Myra were built almost the same way. Myra was slightly taller and Somerset had a fuller bust, but their figures were comparable enough that Somerset planned to make frequent use of Myra’s wardrobe. When the dress was on and all forty carved white pearl rose buttons were fastened, she clapped and demanded Somerset keep the garment.
“I can’t take this!” protested Somerset. “It was kind of you to loan it to me but I’m not keeping it.”
“You must. If I wear it again, I’ll feel discontented the entire time because I know that someone is better looking than me in it. Take it and keep it or Birdy will just end up making quilting squares out of it.”
Somerset seldom had the urge to hug others, but with Myra she wanted to all the time. She grabbed her around the waist on impulse and gave her a tight squeeze. Bess chuckled.
“I can’t thank you enough. It’s the most becoming dress I’ve ever worn. I’ve always wanted something to match my eyes.”
“I’ll let you borrow my slippers tonight, too. You’ll look like a doll. You girls are so nice here that I should have visited a long time ago,” sa
id Myra, nibbling on her candy. “I don’t think a single girlfriend has ever hugged me back home.”
“Somerset, Ivy is on her way up,” called Victoria as she passed by the bedroom door, carrying a sleeping Warren.
“What is she doing here this time of day?” wondered Somerset aloud as she sat down to do her hair.
“I came to bring some of Momma’s aspic for your mother,” said Ivy. “She’s missing her in the sewing circle and thought some might give her a better appetite. Cleo is putting it on a tray for her right now.”
