Miller's Secret

by Tess Thompson

“Let Seb do it.” Pierce plopped next to his sister.

  “I know. Stop bossing me around,” said Audrey.

  “We have one wish for Christmas,” said Seb. “And that’s for Julius to adopt us.”

  “Adopt you?”

  “I know I’m a little old for adoption, but I want you to be my legal father,” said Seb.

  Audrey bounced in the chair. “Me too, me too. And Pierce, too, but he’s too shy to say it out loud. I told him I’d do it.”

  Pierce nodded in agreement. “I do have something I want to say.”

  Caroline turned slightly to peer at Julius. His eyes were glassy with unshed tears as he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket.

  Pierce scooted forward in the chair, bowing his head as he spoke. “You’re the one we would’ve chosen if we could’ve chosen our father, and since we can now, we choose you.”

  Julius dabbed at his eyes. “When I was about Audrey’s age, my mother left us. I never saw her again. I was sad, like you all have been about your dad. Your mother was my best friend and she comforted me and loved me, as did your grandparents. Sophie told me something I’ll never forget. ‘Family isn’t always blood. Sometimes, when you’re lucky, you get to choose who you want for your family.’ I didn’t feel as sad after that.” He tapped his chest. “I chose you as my own a long time ago. If I could’ve chosen from any kids in the world, I would’ve chosen you.”

  Audrey cocked her head to the side, observing Julius. “Does this mean you’re saying yes?”

  “Yes. I’m saying yes.” Julius laughed as he stood up from the couch. “Now get over here and give me a hug. All of you.” He held out his arms and they fell into them at once. When he extricated himself, he grabbed Caroline and held her for a moment, kissing the top of her head.

  Tears made her cheeks wet. Despite all the mistakes she’d made, she got to have all this: her family, imperfect, shaped from both tragedy and joy, here in the glow of the fire.

  She squeezed Julius’s hand. “Merry Christmas, Julius.”

  “Merry Christmas, Caroline.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Phil

  PHIL FINISHED HER LAST DRESS around noon on Christmas Eve. She wrapped it in tissue paper, and put it in a box. It was a gift from the town doctor to his wife, and Phil had promised to drop it by his office on her way home. The back of her shop was tidy, other than the usual patterns and rolls of fabric. She’d closed the front of the shop an hour ago. No one would come in to order a dress on Christmas Eve and she wanted to get home as soon as she could. There were cookies to make and a turkey to stuff. She put away her scissors and put the top on her sewing machine, catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Her stomach was getting bigger by the moment. An April baby, the doctor had told her, but she had a feeling she or he might come a little earlier.

  Henry and the children walked in through the back door. “We’re here, Mama.” Teddy ran to her, hugging her legs.

  “I can’t wait to get home and wrap my presents for you all,” said Mary. She’d been out shopping with her friend from school and carried several shopping bags. Mary glowed this afternoon, with pink cheeks and brown eyes that danced with mischief. She was growing so fast that the dress Phil had made her two months ago was almost too short. No one would ever know that a bullet had gone through her shoulder, although she had the scar to prove it. Phil watched for signs of trauma over the events of that day, but thus far the vibrant girl in front her hadn’t shown any. The bullet had entered and exited in a clean line, leaving no permanent damage to her bones or muscles.

  “Did you finish the last dress?” asked Henry. He kissed her cheek. “My poor wife, slaving away the day before Christmas.”

  “Yes, just now.” She pointed to the box, reminding him that she had to drop it off on their way home.

  “I worry about you working too hard,” he said, placing his fingertips on her round stomach.

  “I have to admit, I’m happy to take some days off. As much as I love my shop, I’m tired.” She sighed, feeling happy. “But many more customers this year than last.” She had more orders for her spring designs than she had time to make them. She would have to hire another seamstress. A business of her own, with employees! What a difference a year and half could make. When she accepted Henry’s offer of a loan, she had made it clear that she would pay him back in full, which she did.

  After the initial shock and subsequent hospitalization of Mary were over, it had taken her a few months to let go of the awful guilt weighing her down like a gunny sack of rocks on her back. She was head over heels in love with Henry, but she wouldn’t allow herself to have him, not after everything she’d done. The only thing that seemed to help was to work hard. She had buried herself in the shop. Over time, with Henry and Mrs. Thomas’s steady friendship, her guilt subsided. When she accepted Henry’s second proposal of marriage, she made it clear that she would always make her own money, even though he had plenty. Independence was important to her, no matter if she was a married woman or not.

  Before they walked out to the car, she gazed at her beautiful family. Then, she remembered Miller and shuddered. How easily she could have lost everything. It was clear from his journal entries that Miller had ordered a hit on Henry as well as his wife. The horror of those days and the shame of her part in it would never leave her, and yet, here she was: married to Henry, with Mary and Teddy healthy and happy, plus another baby coming. Despite all her mistakes, she had all this.

  “Good, because we’re all anxious to start Christmas,” said Henry.

  Teddy jumped up and down. “Daddy bought a tree. It’s on top of the car.”

  “We saw Mrs. Thomas here in town. She said they’d be over around five,” said Henry.

  “Mrs. Thomas said she had presents for me and Mary,” said Teddy. “A whole bunch of them.”

  “Mary and me, Teddy,” said Phil.

  “That’s what I said.” Teddy wrinkled his brow.

  “Grammar, Teddy. Anyway, she spoils you both rotten.” How was her baby talking this well and pronouncing his r’s? Time marched forth, measured by the growth of both the children. Soon there would be another baby, and Teddy would be her big boy.

  “She said we’re like her grandchildren and that you can’t say a word about it,” said Mary.

  “She did, did she?” Phil laughed. “Well, that sounds like a real grandmother to me.”

  Phil grabbed her purse. “All right, my loves. Let Christmas begin.”

  She held Henry’s hand as they walked to the car. The briny scent of the sea mingled with the spicy scent of the Christmas tree tied to the top of Henry’s car. He held the door for her, and as she slid into the seat, the soft coo of mourning doves nesting in the rafters of her shop called out to her. She rolled down her window, hoping to catch a glimpse of them, but they were hidden, snuggled together on this cold day before Christmas.

  EXCERPT FROM

  DUET FOR THREE HANDS,

  AVAILABLE NOW

  From Jeselle Thorton’s journal.

  June 10, 1928

  When I came into the kitchen this morning, Mrs. Bellmont handed me a package wrapped in shiny gold paper, a gift for my thirteenth birthday. A book, I thought, happy. But it wasn’t a book to read. It was a book to write in: a leather-bound journal. Inches of blank pages, waiting for my words.

  Mrs. Bellmont beamed at me, seemingly pleased with my delight over the journal. “You write whatever ideas and observations come to you, Jeselle. Don’t censor yourself. Women, especially, can only learn to write by telling the truth about themselves and those around them.”

  I put my nose in the middle of all those empty pages and took a deep breath, filling my lungs with the clean smell of new paper. Behind us Mama poured hotcake batter into a frying pan. The room filled with the aroma of those sweet cakes and sizzling oil. Whitmore came in holding a string of fish he’d caught in the lake, the screen door slamming behind him.

  “Tell me why it matters that you write?” asked
Mrs. Bellmont in her soft teacher voice.

  “I cannot say exactly, Mrs. Bellmont.” Too shy to say the words out loud, I shrugged to hide my feelings. But I know exactly. I write to know I exist, to know there is more to me than flesh and muscle being primed for a life of humility, servitude, obedience. I write, seeking clarity. I write because I love. I write, searching for the light.

  Mrs. Bellmont understood. This is the way between us. She squeezed my hand, her skin cream over my coffee.

  Tonight, for my birthday present, Whit captured lightning bugs in a glass jar, knowing how I love them. We set the jar on the veranda, astonished at the immensity of their combined glow. “Enough light in there to write by,” I said, thinking of my journal now tucked in my apron pocket.

  “They spark to attract a mate,” he said, almost mournfully.

  “They light up to find love?” I asked, astonished.

  He nodded. “Isn’t it something?”

  We watched those bugs for a good while until Whit pushed his blond curls back from his forehead like he does when he worries.

  “What is it?” I asked him.

  “They shouldn’t be trapped in this jar when they’re meant to fly free, to look for love.”

  He unscrewed the lid, and those flickers of life drifted out into the sultry air until they intermingled with other fireflies, liberated to attract the love they so desperately sought. I moved closer to him. He took my hand as we watched and watched, not wanting the moment to end but knowing it must, as all moments do, both good and bad, light and dark, leaving only love behind to be savored in our memories.

  CHAPTER 1

  Nathaniel

  ON A HOT AND HUMID DAY in the middle of June, Nathaniel Fye rehearsed for a concert he was to give that night at the Howard Theatre with the Atlanta Orchestra. It was late afternoon when he emerged from the cool darkness of the theatre into the glaring afternoon heat and noise of Peachtree Street. He walked toward the large W that hung over the Hotel Winecoff, where he planned to eat a late afternoon meal and then head up to his room for a rest and a bath before dressing for the evening concert. Thick, humid air and gasoline fumes from passing automobiles made him hot even in his white linen summer suit. Across to Singapore, starring Joan Crawford, was displayed on the Loew’s Theatre marquee. What sort of people went to the moving pictures, he wondered? Ordinary people who had lives filled with fun and love and friendship instead of traveling from town to town for concerts and nothing but practice in between. All the travel had been tolerable, even exciting, when he was younger, but now, as his age crept into the early thirties, he found himself wanting companionship and love, especially from a woman. Lately, he daydreamed frequently of a wife and children, a home. The idea filled him with longing, the kind that even the accolades and enthusiastic audiences could not assuage. But he was hopeless with women. Tongue-tied, stammering, sweating, all described his interactions with any woman but his mother. His manager, Walt, was good with people. He could talk to anyone. But Nathaniel? He could never think of one thing to say to anyone—his preferred way of communication was music. When his hands were on the keys it was as if his soul were set free to love and be loved, everything inside him released to the world. He would never think of taking the astonishing opportunities his talent had afforded him for granted, especially after the sacrifices his parents had made for him to study with the finest teachers in the world. Even so, he was lonely. The disciplined life and his natural reticence afforded little opportunity for connection.

  A young woman stood near the entrance of the Winecoff, one foot perched saucily on the wall while balancing on the other, reading a magazine. She wore a cream-colored dress, and her curly, white-blonde hair bobbed under a cloche hat of fine-woven pink straw with a brim just wide enough to cover her face. He caught a glimpse of his reflection in the door’s glass window, suddenly conscious of his own appearance. Tall, with a slight slump at his shoulders from years at the piano, dark hair under his hat, high cheekbones and sensitive brown eyes from his father but a delicate nose and stern mouth from his mother. Handsome? He suspected not. Just because you wish something didn’t make it so, he thought. As his hand touched the door to go in, the young woman looked up and stared into his eyes. “Good afternoon. How do you do?”

  Porcelain skin, gray eyes, perfect petite features, all combined to make a beautiful, exquisite, but completely foreign creature. A beautiful woman. Right here, in front of him. What to do? His heart flipped inside his chest and started beating hard and fast. Could she tell? Was it visible? He covered his chest with his hand, hot and embarrassed. “Yes.” He lifted his hat. Oh, horrors: his forehead was slick with sweat. Yes? Had he just said yes? What had she asked him? He moved his gaze to a spot on the window. A fly landed on the glass and went still, looking at him with bulging eyes.

  Her voice, like a string attached to his ear, drew his gaze back to her. “It’s unbearably hot. I could sure use a Coca-Cola.” With a flirtatious cock of her head, she smiled. She had the same thick Georgian accent as all the women in Atlanta, but there was a reckless, breathless quality in the way she oozed the words.

  “Quite. Yes. Well, goodbye, then.” He somehow managed to open the door and slip inside.

  The hotel was quiet. Several women lounged in the lobby, talking quietly over glasses of sweet tea. A man in a suit sat at one of the small desks provided for guests, writing into a ledger. A maid scurried through with an armful of towels. He wanted nothing more than to be swallowed by the wall. What was the matter with him? How was it possible to hold the attention of hundreds during a concert, yet be unable to utter a single intelligible thing to one lone woman?

  He stumbled over to the café counter and ordered a sandwich and a glass of Coca-Cola. He allowed himself one glass whenever he performed in Atlanta during the summer. The heat, as the young woman had said, made a person long for a Coca-Cola. But only one, no more or he might never stop, and next thing he knew he’d have one every day and then twice a day and so forth. Sweet drinks were an indulgence, a dangerous way to live for a man who must have complete discipline to remain a virtuoso. If he allowed himself anything or everything he wanted, where might it lead? He could not be like other people, even if he wanted to be.

  Waiting for his drink, he heard, rather than saw, the door open, and then the blonde woman sat beside him, swinging her legs ever so slightly as she perched on the round bar stool. “Hello again.” She placed her hands, which were half the size of his and so white as to appear almost translucent, upon the counter. She interlaced her fingers, rather primly and in a way that seemed to belie the general forwardness of sitting next to a man she didn’t know at an otherwise empty counter. He nodded at her, catching a whiff of gardenia he supposed came from her smooth, white neck.

  “Would you like to buy me a Coca-Cola?” She peered up at him from under her lashes. Her eyes were the color of storm clouds.

  What was this? She wanted him to buy her a drink? Had she hinted at that outside? What a ninny he was. Of course. Any imbecile could have picked up on that. Walt would have had her in here with a soda in her hand before the door closed behind them. He tried to respond, but his voice caught in the back of his throat. Instead he nodded to the man in the white apron behind the fountain, who, in turn, also in silence, pulled the knob of the fountain spray with a beefy arm.

  “I’ve just come from the Crawford picture. It was simply too marvelous for words. I do so love the moving pictures. What’s your name?” She pressed a handkerchief to the nape of her neck where soft curls lay, damp with perspiration. What would it feel like to wrap his finger in one of the curls?

  “Nathaniel.”

  “I’m Frances Bellmont. You from up north?”

  “Maine originally. I live in New York City now.”

  Her gray eyes flickered, and an eyebrow rose ever so slightly. “I see. A Yankee.” He thought he detected an excitement as she said it, as if to sit by him were an act of rebellion.

  “As north as
you can get and still be an American,” he said. At last. Words!

  “’Round here we’re not sure any of y’all are true Americans.” She took a dainty sip from her soda and peered at him out of the corner of her eyes. “Now wait a minute. Are you Nathaniel Fye, the piano player?”

  “Right.”

  “Oh my.” She turned her full gaze upon him. “That is interesting.” She had full lips that looked almost swollen. “My mother and I happen to be attending that very concert tonight. I don’t enjoy such serious music, but my mother simply adores it. We’re staying overnight here at the Winecoff. We live all the way across town, and mother thought it would be nice to stay overnight. Together.” She rolled her eyes.

  Before he knew what he was saying, a lie stumbled from his mouth. “Party. Later. In my suite. You could come. Your mother, too.”

  “A party? I’d love to attend. Do I have to bring my mother?” She sipped her soda while looking up at him through her lashes.

  “I, I don’t know.” He stuttered. “Isn’t that how it’s done?”

  She slid off her seat, touching the sleeve of his jacket like a caress. “I’m just teasing. We wouldn’t think of missing it. I’ll see you then.” And then she was out the door, leaving only the smell of her perfume behind, as if it had taken up permanent residence in his nostrils.

  ***

  Later that night, before the concert, he stood at the full-length mirror in the greenroom of the Howard Theatre, brushing lint from his black tuxedo jacket. Walt sat across from him in one of the soft chairs, scouring the arts section of the New York Times and occasionally making notations in a small notebook.

  “I’d like to have a small group up to my room. After the concert tonight.”

  “What did you say?” Walt, a few years younger than Nathaniel, possessed light blue eyes that were constantly on the move, shifting and scanning, like a predator looking for his next meal. He was once an amateur violinist who had played in his small town of Montevallo, Alabama, at church and town dances before he went to New York City. “Played the fiddle, but I didn’t have the talent to go all the way,” he told Nathaniel years ago, during their first interview. “But the music, it gets in a person’s blood, and I aim to make a life out of it however I can.”