My One True Love

by Deborah Small

  “It would be lovely to stay and enjoy your company longer,” she said, “but if we fall asleep and fail to wake up on time...” She touched his jaw, sharp with bristles and hot with the chagrin and disillusion he was trying, and failing, to hide behind a rueful smile.

  “Good night, Mr. Banner. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Chapter 29

  Simmy

  “I’LL SEE YOU TOMORROW.”

  The nonchalance of her statement ground in Joe’s gut like crushed glass. The pain might have made him toss up his breakfast, had he bothered to eat. He hadn’t.

  After a long night lying rigid and fixedly awake on his loaned bed, he had levered himself up with the first birdsong, dressed, and scratched out a pair of notes. Then he grabbed his hat and roused Magnus, who took the notes for later delivery, before taking him to the train station as the sun tossed the first spears of pink, gold, and red at the retreating night sky.

  Thirty-six hours later, he was in a dimly lit restaurant on Peachtree Street in Atlanta, wondering if he should leave before it was too late.

  The ice in his glass sighed and shifted as it melted, reminding him of the soft noises and subtle adjustments Margaret had made to improve his tongue’s contact—

  Put her out of your mind, for God’s sake. You gave her what she wanted, and she’s done with you. Accept it. It was never going to be more than what it was. You were a fool to even entertain the idea. You’re a distraction at best, a fool at worst. You’ve been that before. You’ll survive.

  So why did he feel like someone had sucker-punched him?

  He should have eaten. It was hunger making him feel ill, his chest and throat hard around a bolus of sour air.

  He took a swig of his drink and instantly regretted it. The whisky splashed into his stomach like hot acid.

  Gripping the sweating glass between thumb and fingertips, he stared at it, waiting for the burn in his chest to subside from an inferno to smouldering embers.

  “Hello, Joe. Don’t look around.” The husky feminine voice came from behind him. “Stay as you are, or I’ll leave and never agree to talk to you again.”

  “Simmy?”

  Her laugh was soft, barely audible.

  “Simone,” she murmured. “No one’s called me Simmy since...you.”

  He exerted additional pressure on the glass, using it as an anchor to stop him from spinning in his seat, and applied similar force with his tongue against his teeth to keep from blurting out the questions her strange behaviour prompted. Like...why the subterfuge? Why didn’t she join him at the table? Why did she want to meet him in a dimly lit restaurant-bar?

  The Emerssary was a dark-panelled corner establishment with a curved bar on the inside wall. Small glass holders on round tables held smaller candles that provided the only illumination, save shaded lamps hung above the bar that suffused the mirrored back wall of liquor bottles with an amber glow and made it difficult to clearly see the shadowy form in the booth behind him. All he could see was a shadowy portion of a wide-brimmed hat.

  He willed a smile to his voice.

  “It’s been a long time.”

  “What do you want, Joe?”

  He swallowed and frowned.

  This was not how he imagined this would go. When Miss Alma gave him the telegram from Atlanta and he opened it to find a note from Miss Lyons advising him that she’d located the person he’d requested she find and that said person had agreed to meet, with conditions, he’d suffered a moment’s indecision. His angst had quickly transformed to relief, however, which brought him round to the realisation that on some level, he’d feared her truly dead. Why else hadn’t he heard a word from her in ten years?

  But, as he’d read the conditions laid out in the letter, his relief had faded to head shaking and only partially amused acceptance.

  The girl he remembered had thrived on drama.

  Her request that he tell no one where he was going or whom he planned to see, and that he come alone and to a specific location on a specific day at a specific time, was not as unusual on the face of it as it might seem. But he was rethinking that assessment.

  This was strange, even for Simmy.

  “How do I know you’re the person I came here to talk to?”

  Another soft, derisive laugh.

  “Don’t you trust your private investigator?”

  Did he? He trusted her father, which, he supposed, by extension meant he put his faith in Abigail Lyons. To a point.

  “If you know me at all,” he said, “you know I don’t put money on any horse its first time out the gate.”

  “Yes. I remember. You told George I was a losing proposition.”

  He had, but with regard to George’s ability to win over his father where she was concerned. A girl fifteen years younger than him, from the wrong side of the tracks...He’d been right, too, but he wouldn’t bring that up now, any more than he had rubbed it in George’s face back then.

  Being right wasn’t something to crow about, especially when it involved the wounding of people you cared a great deal about.

  “Why the subterfuge, Simmy?” he asked. “Why don’t you come sit with me, or me with you?”

  “Because my husband is a very jealous man, and I’d prefer we both keep our heads.”

  “I’m not here to—”

  “Why are you here, Joe? You have five minutes, and then I really must go. I’m meeting my husband for dinner.”

  For some reason, the prospect she might be married hadn’t occurred to him.

  Just because you’re determined to die alone on a monument of paternal martyrdom...He angled his jaw forward to stretch taut muscles as the memory of Lyons’s comment exacerbated how much of a fool he’d really been. And still was.

  What was he doing here? What did he hope would come of talking to her? She was married, for Chrissake. And probably had other kids.

  Jesus. Why hadn’t he thought of that—the possibility she had a whole other family and might not want to hear from him or Maisie?

  He should go. Apologise and go before he made a bigger fool of himself.

  He glanced at the bar mirror—the same section of hat brim was in the same position. He cleared his throat.

  “It’s...Maisie.”

  A barely audible intake of breath was followed by silence.

  “She’s asking questions about you.”

  “Me?” A faint note of alarm underscored her whisper. “Why would she ask about me?”

  “She’s curious. She’s growing up, and has questions. Ones best answered by a mother. And you’re her mother.”

  This time her silence was longer and, he fancied, heavier, much the way his heart and lungs sat in his chest like blocks of ice.

  When she finally spoke, however, there was no trace of regret, remorse, or motherly concern in her voice—only hard conviction. “I agree. She needs a mother. But her mother died, Joe. Just like you told everyone she did. Yes, I know what you told people. Your investigator told me, though I didn’t need to hear it from her. I kept tabs on you and Maisie for the first year, but then I met the man who’s now my husband, and...” She released a quiet, controlled exhalation. “Simmy’s dead, Joe. Let her lie. Go home. Be the wonderful father to your daughter that you’ve been—”

  “But she’s asking about you—”

  “She’s asking about her mother. Who is dead.” Her tone was low, adamant. “Go to Oakland Cemetery. Look for Simone Villeneuve’s headstone. Ask your investigator to use her fancy camera to take a photograph of it, if you must, to prove it to yourself and your daughter. But make no mistake: your Simmy, the one who trusted you with her daughter, is dead. She has been dead for years. So don’t waste time trying to resurrect a ghost. Find yourself a living woman, one worthy of you and your daughter. Be well, Joe. Goodbye.” With a rush of air and rustle of fabric, she walked away, into the darker shadows at the rear of the bar.

  He started to turn, prepared to beg her to stop and talk to him, and maybe Maisie
, and then he sagged back in his seat, filled with defeat—and paralytic relief—as through the bar mirror he watched her go, a curvaceous shadow topped with a floppy, wide-brimmed hat.

  “ANYTHING ELSE I CAN get you, Mrs. Sweeney?”

  “No. This is fine,” Margaret said, spreading her napkin on her lap. “Thank you, Miss Alma.” She paused then looked up and added, “Actually, there is something.”

  “Ma’am?” Miss Alma regarded her expectantly.

  “Did Mr. Rufus mention to you about my offer of a vacation?”

  “He did, ma’am.” She nodded.

  “And have you given it any thought? Where you’d like to go, and when?”

  “Well, yes, ma’am.” She nodded slowly. “I have been thinking on it, and if I go anywhere, it’ll be to see my sister, Dottie, in California. My daughter was named for her.” She paused, throat working, before she went on in a soft voice. “She moved to the west coast from Louisiana after her husband died, about the same time Master George inherited. And she’s always come to visit me here the whole of December, ’cause I told her I couldn’t get away, not knowing when Master George might show up, but she’s doing poorly...”

  “Go,” she said. “For all of December and longer if you wish.” She nodded firmly when Miss Alma frowned. “I mean it.”

  “Well, that’s something else I’ve been meaning to talk to you about, ma’am.” Miss Alma swallowed. “Just...I’ve been waiting for the right time.”

  “The time is now, Miss Alma.” Margaret willed a resolved smile. “Fire away.”

  “Well, I’m not sure you noticed, ma’am, but I’m getting on in years. And as Coral seems to be doing so well under your teachings, I was thinking...” She compressed her lips, her cheekbones elevating higher than normal as she sucked her cheeks before breathing out. “I’m thinking of retiring, ma’am.”

  “Good for you, Miss Alma,” Margaret said, careful not to let her voice quaver or her smile slip despite the mix of grief and joy at what she would lose—and Miss Alma would gain—that gripped her throat like a merciless hand. “Good for you. We’ll work out the details later. All right?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She waited until Miss Alma, her eyes also damp, had left the dining room, before she reclined in her seat to stare dazedly over the dishes of food.

  One confirming her pending retirement. One potentially in search of work elsewhere. Should he find it, she’d be down four, not one, beloved face. Though she selfishly hoped Mr. Banner wasn’t off interviewing elsewhere, how else was she to explain his sudden departure?

  Per the terms of his contract, he was permitted one full day in seven to take off work, and one full week per year. He had chosen Sundays as his day off. Her perusal of his contract advised her of that much. But a review of time records indicated he rarely took the full day Sunday, limiting his personal time to half-days. And only once in ten years had he ever taken a full week off. Yet Sunday morning, he’d given Magnus a note to give her. In it, he advised that he was making up for missed personal days, and that he’d be away through the week.

  He’d apparently sent similar word to the Guenthers, because shortly after breakfast the day he left, a note arrived from them inviting Maisie and Miss Lisette to spend the coming week at their estate, not just the coming weekend. They were packed up and gone by noon.

  She ran her finger around the circular base of her wine glass.

  You wounded him. You saw it in his eyes. He tried to hide it, but you saw it.

  And ignored it.

  Exhaling, she dropped her shoulders.

  Just because he’d left hours after she turned down his invitation to spend the night with him didn’t mean he’d gone away angry. Perhaps something important had come up. Miss Alma said that he’d received a telegram and a letter on Saturday. And he’d left at dawn Sunday. Maybe something in the letter or the telegram had prompted his hasty departure. A job interview. Family emergency?

  A woman?

  With a wince, she pressed a hand to her abdomen. “Eat,” she muttered. “You skipped lunch today. It’s not a wonder your stomach hurts.” Retrieving her knife and fork from the table, she immediately set them down again to grasp the dish of rice in front of her. “Get yourself together, Margaret,” she murmured. “What he’s doing, or with whom, is none of your business. Focus.”

  The monotonous ticking of the grandfather clock and the clink of her utensils were the only sounds filling the room as she spooned a small measure of the fluffy white grain to her plate and repeated the careful portioning from the remaining tureens without any real cognisance of what she was doing.

  She’d forced herself to eat in the dining room, alone, the previous evening, too. This was her life now, and how it would be for years to come. She needed to make peace with it.

  Call me Joe.

  She slowly chewed the chanterelle she’d forked out of the spoonful of slivered beans, and paused when she caught sight of herself in the mirror above the fireplace.

  She raised her chin, lengthening the flare of pale, freckled skin rising from the V-line bosom of her navy-blue gown up to the russet curls carefully secured off her neck with combs. Contrasted against the blue silk, her skin was nearly as white as the sparks let off by the tiny diamonds in her earrings. Nearly as white as fresh-sculpted snow. And that suited her mood perfectly: cold and colourless.

  An ice queen.

  So why did she see the wild-haired, wanton waif that had gazed lazily—unrepentant—two nights ago from a different mirror?

  She closed her eyes, forced the image from her mind, and, looking at her plate, stabbed another mushroom and lifted it to her mouth.

  She should know no later than next weekend what had drawn Mr. Banner away. Until then, she had much business to occupy her.

  She’d not heard anything yet from Mr. Lyons about his petition to Judge Fairview. Nor had she seen or heard from Barrister or his mother. But not for a minute did she believe they’d given up their venal quest to oust her. Predators were always the quietest and least visible right before they pounced.

  She took up her wine glass, sipping from it as she watched a candle flame dance and flicker on its wick.

  At least her meeting with Coral’s friend Winnie and her family had gone well. Miss Alma had wholeheartedly embraced the idea of Winnie’s assistance in the kitchen and Margaret’s decision to better staff the house. Miss Alma planned to begin interviews the following Monday to fill the positions of chambermaid, housemaid, and laundress, while Mr. Rufus would recruit two footmen and at least two more grooms to assist Magnus in fleshing out the stable.

  A quartet of coach horses, a single gelding to either ride or pull the gig, and a pair plough oxen might suit Mr. Banner’s idea of adequacy, but Margaret felt it insufficient. Sugar Hill’s fortunes were such that she could afford to expand, and it was into thoroughbred racing she wished to go. It would be nice to regain at least one English tradition she dearly missed.

  For the first time in her entire life, she felt emboldened to satisfy her interests and wants without awaiting anyone else’s approval. For whatever Barrister Griffiths thought to sell her or anyone with regard to the second will, she wasn’t buying it. She had to trust Judge Fairview wouldn’t either. She had to trust that truth would prevail. In the meantime, she’d act as though it already had. And that raised the question of what to do about Mr. Banner’s cottage. Or rather, the need to get the building of its replacement under way.

  Whether he stayed or went, she needed housing for an overseer. She certainly wasn’t going to move a stranger into the manor should he leave.

  She set down her glass, took up her fork, and plunged it into a slivered green bean.

  Oh, no. If Mr. Banner left, there was no way in hell another man would ever again reside under her roof.

  But that didn’t mean she couldn’t entertain one or two. Or even a few. Though to do that, she’d need to rejoin society.

  Miss Alma turned away from the coun
ter with a startled gasp when Margaret pushed into the kitchen.

  “Mrs. Sweeney,” she exclaimed. She set the knife in her hand on the counter next to the pie she’d been slicing up, then wiped her hands on her apron. “Is something wrong?”

  Besides everything?

  “No.” Margaret willed a smile. “I’ve only decided it’s time to come out of hibernation and get to know some of my neighbours. Make...friends. And I was wondering if you might know whom would be most receptive to attending a small gathering?”

  “Here?” Miss Alma glanced around the kitchen.

  “The front parlour should suit,” Margaret said. “Not too many people. No more than thirty. Do you think we could pull something together for this Saturday, seeing as our houseguests will be away? It seems less disruptive for everyone.”

  The surprise on Miss Alma’s face flared to incredulity and almost as swiftly faded as purpose and thought took its place.

  “Saturday?” she murmured, touching her chin. “Thirty people.”

  “Or fewer,” Margaret offered. “It depends on how many you believe would be receptive to an invitation, and how many could make it on such short notice.”

  “And by receptive,” Miss Alma said, brown eyes twinkling, “you mean smart enough to not fall for Barrister Griffiths’s lies and innuendos?”

  “Yes.” This time Margaret didn’t have to force her smile. “I mean exactly that.”

  Chapter 30

  A Job Well Done

  MIST SHOT THROUGH WITH the first blades of morning sun purled between headstones, sinuous as it rose from the ground to obscure whole sections of the cemetery. Joe turned up his coat collar and shoved his hands deep in his pockets.

  He hadn’t expected to find it, hadn’t really believed her when she threw out the bit about having Miss Lyons take a photograph, but here it was, white marble etched with black lettering: