by Denney, Hope
All the green light cast in the room couldn’t disguise the crimson that crept from Ivy’s collarbones to her hairline.
“He was patient and understanding,” she replied as she picked at the stitching on the counterpane. “I guess it was daunting to take someone as naïve as me to bed. His back has so many scars. I’d give anything to know what happened to him. It would explain so much.”
“Elmira,” said Somerset. “He doesn’t talk about it but I’ve seen those old wounds a couple times now. I’ve treated flogged and branded patients in the hospital. He was disciplined without mercy in New York. Who knows, he may come to confide in you one day. Don’t ask. Whatever you do, don’t ask.”
“I want you to understand that I’m happy. I’m safe. I’m loved. I promise you that I’m going to make Joseph feel safe and loved.”
“I know you’ll try.” Somerset’s lip quavered. “Sometimes I don’t think there’s enough love in existence to heal all of us.”
“Then it’s a blessing we’re friends because I do.”
Ivy lay down beside her and they hugged each other.
“Now show me these bedrooms. Joseph may not want to stay here but I do. He looked out of place in my tiny peach room and I’ll wager he felt out of place. There wasn’t room for either of us to turn over in my narrow bed. We raked knees and elbows across each other’s backs all night.”
Somerset wiped her nose with the back of her hand and dried her eyes as she sat up and pulled back the canopies.
“We’re in one of them now. It adjoins to a guest room larger than this one with a large enough area in front of the fireplace that we could fit in wing chairs and a drop-leaf table from the attic. It would make the nicest sitting area for the two of you.”
Ivy went to the wall and opened the door to the adjoining bedroom.
“This is much larger than anything at home. It must give us four times the space compared to my corner room. I like your idea about the sitting area in front of the fireplace, too.”
Blanche, Thomas, and Joseph appeared in the doorway of the adjoining bedroom.
“It sounds as if she’s made up her mind,” said Blanche, with a glance sent Joseph’s way. “Birdy said she would maid for Ivy until Myra goes home. Birdy has a little crush on Ivy. She says there’s no lady in Richmond to match her.”
“Even I can admit this is palatial compared to our current accommodations,” muttered Joseph, but his eyes looked playful. “Thank Birdy for her generosity. I didn’t expect her to say that about a local.”
“I think I should pay a visit to Maple Pool,” said Thomas. “We’ve always been on good terms with your family, but I feel compelled to say something to them about how happy I am for this latest turn of events. I want them to know we’re going to take excellent care of you. Would you like to come with me to gather some belongings?”
Ivy nodded without daring to utter a word, and Thomas, who was accustomed to the tantrums and demands of other women in his household, looked awkward as he put his arm around the quiet woman who was now his daughter and showed her back down the hall.
Blanche turned to Joseph.
“That child doesn’t have a ring to her name. You could have come to me. I still have some jewelry that would have been appropriate to the occasion. You can’t marry a girl and not give her a ring. Let me give you something to put on her hand when she comes home if she doesn’t die of fright from being alone with your papa.
“You are going to have to treat that girl well, Joseph. Papa and I like her, but we can’t be good enough to her to make it up to her if you treat her ill. You chose well. I want you to continue to choose well. Am I making sense?”
Joseph was about to answer when Bess found them.
“Miss Somerset, you got a guest in the drawing room.”
“Who is it?” asked Somerset.
“Mr. Russell.”
Somerset hurried back into the main portion of the house, casting frantic glances into Blanche’s various mirrors as she passed them.
Phillip stood at the end table in the drawing room perusing a beloved book of Thomas’s on English history. Somerset’s heart stuttered when she saw him and she stood for an instant with her hands clasped in front of her as she admired his carriage and the set of his mouth. Her instinct was to throw her arms around him and bawl, she was so glad to see him, but they weren’t familiar yet. To complicate matters, Bess was polishing a section of the floor and would never get over it.
“I wasn’t expecting you,” she said.
He dropped the book on the table at the sound of her voice and looked her way. Standing under the light from the window as he was, Somerset could just make out the hint of a dimple and she gulped to see it.
“Good morning,” he said. “Wait, you’ve been crying.”
Somerset wiped at her eyes with the backs of her hands and blinked. There was no hiding it and she should have known he’d notice.
“It’s been an emotional morning. Joseph eloped with Ivy last night. They’re moving in here today. Papa just took Ivy home to get some of her things.”
“Are you sad? I thought you loved Ivy.”
“Sad? No! Worried? Yes. I’m content to have a sister in her, but she did marry my brother, who is known for all manner of—I’d like for it to work out well for Ivy.”
Somerset’s tongue felt as if she had a cotton boll in her mouth and her mind felt as thick and slow. She sat down on the settee and waited for her manners, thoughts, and speech to coincide.
“I came here to ask you to dinner tonight at Riverside but it can wait. I can see how you’re needed here. I’ve been remiss in my family duties, and now that I see the evidence, I won’t ask you to ignore your own in a time of need.”
“No, there’s no time of need. Neither Joseph nor Ivy owns many possessions. They’ll be well settled before dark. I wouldn’t miss dining with the Russells. I’ll ask Papa to escort me out tonight.”
Phillip smiled and the corners of his blue eyes crinkled the same way Eric’s did when he howled with laughter.
“I’m glad it’s settled.”
“I’ll see you out.”
“Gonna go get my broom. The porch needs sweeping,” mumbled Bess.
Somerset followed him out. She noticed how his butternut waistcoat was covered in silk leaves that complemented the trees in the landscape that were all going to sleep early that year. She wondered if the leaves were turning in Charleston and if he missed seeing the landscape there, as foreboding as he found this one. The hills and trees would probably always remind him of Virginia. The stories she would tell him one day, if she ever got the chance. There was nothing she wanted to tell him more than that he was correct, that they were alike because the past was never far from them. Tragedy burned itself on both of them and left profound marks, but they were stronger for it.
She tried to imagine Eric’s face, for she had felt the same about him, but she couldn’t summon the memory. When she was with Phillip all she saw was Phillip. A future without him seemed very straightforward and dull. Already she was dreading his return to Charleston.
He used his thumb to wipe traces of tears from her face.
“That is all? An emotional morning? You aren’t leaving anything out, are you? I never thought someone else’s tears could be this distressing for me.”
“They were mostly happy tears although I am worried, confused, and even jealous. Then I just thought how I hated for you to go home.”
“My employees will rob me blind if I stay away any longer. If my brother hadn’t worried for our mother I’d already be at the mines again, but as I said earlier, I’m trying to make up for my extended absences.
“The idea of you feeling jealous is foreign to me, but I’m flattered that you don’t want me to go. I don’t want to go either. I used to think of this backwoods place as just that, a prison filled with cotton and outmoded manners. Thinking of it would make me walk down to the shore and stare at the water with a drink in my hand for an
hour, but after this trip home I’ll be divided. I’ll fret over the price of gold while wondering what man is taking you out for the afternoon.”
“Bess is coming with her broom,” predicted Somerset. She could hear the heavy footsteps rattling the floorboards.
“Then I’ll take my leave. I don’t want to turn over my hard-earned respect and have to fix another range in a suit. My vest was ruined,” he grinned.
“Someone will bring me over tonight.”
“Around six.”
He bent down once more without permission and kissed her on the forehead. Somerset felt comforted. She wanted him to wrap his arms around her and hold her for a few hours while she watched the leaves fall from the trees. She thought about raising her face for a kiss after all, but Bess had her knobby hand on the doorknob, turning it so Phillip tipped his brown stovepipe hat and was down the steps before Bess could come out.
Joseph was on her heels, and Bess, satisfied that their guest was mounted and galloping away, deposited her broom by the steps and went back inside.
“I was coming out to apologize to him for my boorish behavior yesterday,” Joseph said. “I like the man very much and hate for him to think ill of me over it. I can’t believe he’s a veteran of Spotsylvania. It makes me like him even more, although now I feel compassion for him, too. There’s a connection between men who have done hard killing for their country.”
Joseph dropped onto the steps by Bess’s corn husk broom and chewed his thumbnail.
“I don’t think he thinks poorly of you. I don’t think he knows what to make of you either, but I think bad feelings are far off yet,” Somerset said.
“I’m glad to hear it. I hope to cultivate a long-lasting friendship with him. I’d like to apply some of his business practices to crop sharing here. We could bring in a passel of money if we rented out our land, Somerset, and I think he’s the man to get us started.”
“I hate to let strangers live out here,” dithered Somerset. It was her usual way of ending the conversation.
“Well, let me have it.”
“I’m not going to let you have it.”
“That’s good to hear.”
“Why did you marry her, Joseph? How cruel!”
“I love her. This marriage is an act of faith on both our parts. I believe that she’ll make a man out of me, the real thing beyond some womanizing drunk who once killed everyone he ever stalked on the battlefield. She believes I’m going to treasure her, care for her, and see more to her than being a shy, overlooked girl. We’re compromising, Somerset, and we’ll find our way together. We came to the marriage on unequal footing but neither of us has been married before so we’ll slog through it together.”
“She’s going to want more of you in the end than flippant banter and hands all over her. She wants to know you, all of you, even the parts you keep buried in your drink. She’s thoughtful and intense to be as quiet as she is.”
“You said she’s clever, Somerset, and she is. Her one demand before saying yes to me was that I cut back the drinking. I don’t know how she knows as much as she does, but I’ll never be able to get anything past her. I figured she was going to ask for my fidelity. I’m relieved it wasn’t that important to her. Somehow it makes it easier to be faithful because she didn’t beg for it.
“I’m going to try to drink less. It’s a good idea on its own, and I don’t want to end up like Mother because if I try to find my way out of this life, you know I’ll succeed. Sobriety is a confusing state of mind, like making up my mind to be good-natured when my heart has no desire for it. I feel like the unclean cup in the Bible.”
“I asked if you were kind to her last night.”
“What did she say?” Joseph’s face became hopeful.
“She said yes but she is concerned about your scars, which brings me back to my original thought. She is going to want to know what made you the man you are. You should tell her.”
“The only person I ever talked to about Elmira was Theodore. The only good point about his death is that no one else knows how low I was brought. Now it’s only me.”
“I can’t hear you out when you say things like this.” Somerset reached for the door.
Joseph took her hand and kissed it.
“I am sorry for being a cad. Tell me you think I can do this. Tell me you believe that I can make Ivy happy.”
“Of course you can,” said Somerset before opening the door. She prayed that she was telling him the truth.
***
Thomas agreed to go with Somerset to Riverside. He remarked that he’d lost a full morning of work and might as well squander an afternoon as well. Somerset suspected he actually wanted to look at a rare map of the Mississippi that the Russells owned in order to plan a business acquisition for the steamboat company, but she didn’t care so long as she had a proper escort out.
She borrowed a gauzy white dress from Myra that put her in mind of the cut paper snowflakes she and Victoria decorated their rooms with at Christmas as little girls. It was edged in yards of narrow blue ribbon that accented her eyes and had an ornate bustle so high and wide that her waist looked as narrow as a sapling in front of it.
She left Orchard Rest with Thomas after taking a guilty peek at Joseph and Ivy in their new quarters. The door was open so it wasn’t the same as spying, she told herself. Joseph tried to build a fire in their fireplace, although they wouldn’t actually need one for several more months, while Ivy sat barefoot on the hearth with her chin on her knees and her long, shining hair glistening each time Joseph made a young fire and it flickered out. He said something in a low voice to her, and she laughed and kissed him square between the eyes. Blanche, in her wisdom, had sent their supper to their rooms on a tray. It sat untouched on the drop-leaf table. Somerset fled down the hallway before they could catch sight of her gaping at them like a child.
Riverside was a beacon of joy after her day. She was less lonely at the sight of it rising white, wide, and winsome beside the water. Phillip was inside its walls. He knew her through and through. They were like two travelers of the same culture meeting on a bridge in another country. Somerset’s face lit up as Thomas assisted her to the front door.
Trademark Russell dishes comprised the meal. Sarabeth’s fried catfish was succulent and spicy and the fried potatoes, roasted carrots, and pickled beets tasted as good as anything that Cleo could make. They all sat at the crowded dining room table, barely able to eat without knocking each other’s forks out of hand, but it was a companionable, cheery atmosphere.
“Thomas, we’ve heard rumor that that young buck of yours stole off to Maple Pool and rode off with Ivy Garrett in his saddle,” said Lawrence as he took hearty seconds.
Thomas inclined his head.
“There is no rumor to it at all. I’m happy to confirm it. We’ve finally got another child settled, and they are to live at Orchard Rest until he can build them their own home.”
“I’ll be switched. I never saw it coming. She’s a dainty, quiet thing, and you wouldn’t have thought she’d catch the eye of a ripping, roaring young cub like him.”
“We couldn’t have a better daughter. She’s as sweet as our Victoria.”
Somerset looked at the despondent expressions on Laura’s and Eve’s faces and saw that they wished someone would come for them as well. With their sunny, golden brown hair and introspective green eyes, they both looked like Russells through and through. Somerset watched them squeeze hands under the table.
“There’s no one left for girls to marry,” Sarabeth said. “We’re happy for your young pair, Thomas. I hope they get years of blessings together. Young people today know what loneliness is. We never suffered that affliction when we were young.”
Somerset turned her face away from Sarabeth. She’d welcomed her in effervescent fashion when they arrived and her manners were nothing short of impeccable, but each time Somerset made eye contact with her, Sarabeth’s forehead puckered. She guessed that she wanted to ask her what happene
d.
Why did you let him go? Her expression flickered between resolve and pain each time Somerset look up from her fish. Didn’t you love my boy?
“I like that they ran away. No one does that anymore,” ventured Laura.
“Because everyone inherited so many guns through the war,” said Phillip. “Men are afraid they might get shot when they return with married daughters.”
“I’d elope and not come home,” continued Laura. “People are starting to say I’m an old maid.”
“You are twenty-five, missy,” laughed Lawrence. “What would you call yourself?”
“Sawyer says it has as much to do with the way I dress and act as anything,” protested Laura. “I don’t think I look like an old maid.”
Somerset looked at her and she didn’t look like one. In her rose and white striped gown she looked vibrant enough to turn a man’s head. Then she looked at Eve. Eve looked sour. Eve hadn’t uttered a word throughout the meal. Somerset caught her eye and smiled, but Eve’s eyebrows slanted down and her chin jutted out.
He’d be here if it weren’t for you, her cool piney eyes said.
“Yes, Sawyer,” said Thomas. He wiped his mouth and laid his napkin on the table. “Any word from Sawyer? He’s come to be a second son since Theodore died at the foundry—not that George isn’t, mind you. Sawyer was in my home every day for three years straight. It’s an odd sensation that he won’t be keeping watch over my plantation anymore.”
“We’ve heard no word yet but it’s too soon,” said Sarabeth. Somerset could tell she strove to keep buoyancy in her tone. “It could be weeks before we know if he made it safe and sound.”
She addressed Somerset as she spoke although her words sounded like they were meant for everyone.
He’ll tell you he made it before he tells me, her eyes seemed to implore. You’ll know before anyone.
“Momma, you’ll get a telegram in a week’s time, and then you’ll be bragging to everyone at church about how he’s helping to tame the west,” soothed Phillip. “You’ll be calling him a pioneer and talking about his achievements to anyone who will listen.”
