“We are leaving for the country this afternoon instead of Thursday,” snapped her father. “I want no discussion on the topic.”
Annabel didn’t, either. Being sent to the country was no punishment. Daniel’s Camp couldn’t be twenty miles away. “All right,” she said agreeably. Once when she’d had a crush on a local boy in the landscaping crew, she had referred to the Jayquith estate as “the country.” All New Yorkers referred to their New England or Long Island weekend places as “the country.” Her father even called the highway to get there “the country.” How the boy had laughed. You see any crops? he had said. You see any cows? This isn’t the country. This is just a Manhattan town house stuck in a field.
Annabel had wanted to go out with this boy. Jimmy, his name was. Aunt Theodora put a stop to it. We’re looking for better things, she said firmly.
Things, thought Annabel. Now even more she did not want to tell her father that she had met Daniel Madison Ransom, because no “thing” would impress them more. How they would congratulate her, for finding “a better thing.”
Her father, knowing he had made no dent in her thinking, regrouped. Annabel always thought of her father that way: in the plural: a man who was his own army division. “Sweetheart, you can’t do things like that. No matter how attractive a man is. Maybe especially if he’s attractive. You have to exercise great caution. You more than any girl! There are a lot of men out there who would cozy up to you for your money and your name.”
Not this man, thought Annabel.
Her father knelt beside her. It was not his posture. He wanted so much to be eye level that he was willing to sink instead of having Annabel stand. “I have a world of enemies, Annabel. They can’t hurt me, but they could take it out on you. Somebody who knows nothing but the gleam of gold from your necklace. A cokehead who’d as soon strangle you as look at you. That could be the man with whom you take that taxi. Promise me you will never go off with a stranger again.”
She had misjudged him. He was not angry so much as terribly worried. Contrite, she opened her mouth to promise, or at least explain that Daniel Madison Ransom was a stranger to nobody, but her father did not wait. When Hollings Jayquith spoke, people obeyed, and he assumed his daughter would be among the obedient. Besides, he was too restless to stay any longer. He left, his hard shoes clattering on the marble floor, room after room, like pebbles scattered to leave a trail.
Her private phone rang before she could flick the TV on again.
Other than Emmie and a few other friends from Wythefield, people who needed to reach a Jayquith were given Hollings’ office number. A pleasant voice requested the caller’s name and number and announced that the Jayquiths, should they wish to return the call, would do so at their convenience.
Annabel had received one hate call in her life and that was enough. People were crazy out there, and jealous of wealth and fame. Giving clues about how to find you was against the rules. Last night had been a night for breaking rules, and she had broken that one easily. She had given Daniel both her phone numbers—Manhattan and Connecticut. And he had given his: Manhattan and Massachusetts. He didn’t say The Camp for that second phone number and he didn’t know that she knew.
She picked up the phone. Let it be Daniel. Not Emmie, wanting to talk wedding talk. Let it be Daniel. She closed and rolled her lips, but not for courage: for miming a kiss. “Hello?” She even crossed her fingers. It had been a magical night, after all, and maybe she should go on trying magic. Annabel had tried to coax Daniel to take her back to the museum to get the pennies back. They were so powerful, she explained, that I want to have them in my jewelry chest. Daniel said no, because her wish would be destroyed. Whatever she had asked for might evaporate. So the Nile kept the pennies.
“Annabel? It’s Daniel.”
He had not evaporated. She laughed silently, so happy to hear his voice she’d be laughing all night. He had been fishing, Daniel told her. Fishing at his camp.
Some camp, thought Annabel. But she let him get away with it. She loved having more knowledge, holding secrets in her heart.
They talked for hours. Annabel sprawled on her back and then on the carpet. She did step exercises on a needlepointed footstool. Then she lay upside down, draping her feet over the sofa back. Telephones were gifts of the gods.
“What are you doing the rest of the week?” he asked.
“Getting ready for a wedding.” Annabel made a bet with herself when he would break in to her description. “My best friend’s sister’s wedding. I’m one of ten bridesmaids. I’ll blend in.”
“You could never blend in,” Daniel assured her.
“Venice was going to wear leather instead of a bridal gown and make the guests bungee jump instead of drink champagne, but—”
“There cannot be another bride named Venice!” cried Daniel. “I’m in the same wedding! I’m sure of it. I was at Harvard with Michael. I’m one of ten ushers!”
“You won’t blend in, either,” Annabel said softly.
She could feel the emotion between them, remembering each other’s textures and scents and sounds. Who is he remembering? she thought. Nefertiti? Cleopatra? There was no Annabel there. What if he meets the real me and he’s disappointed? She shivered, suddenly afraid, suddenly counting on Venice’s wedding as she had never counted on anything.
“So,” said Daniel finally.
“So I’ll see you at the rehearsal,” she said. Her throat was tight. She had not been nervous through the entire phone call and now she was sick with fear that something could go wrong. That the penny wish would evaporate after all, and she would be lonely forever.
“I’ll miss the rehearsal,” said Daniel. “I … uh … have a project. But I’ll see you at the wedding.”
Miss the rehearsal! But it was going to be a wonderful party! Twenty college kids, a wild silly all-nighter, perfect for a second date. Could Annabel risk suggesting they walk down the aisle together? She said, “It’ll be a long week, waiting.” That was risky, too, hinting he should ask her out before the weekend. Would he be threatened?
“If we could get together before then, I would. But this—endeavor—is—keeping me involved.”
He didn’t know her well enough to tell her what his project was. But he would! They would do it together, whatever it was.
Daniel said, “In another week or so I’ll be free.” He paused. “Will you?”
She threw back her head in silent joyful laughter. “Yes.”
Jade was the only person under sixty. The white-and gray-haired ladies (all the men, they told her, had died) thought she was adorable. “Doesn’t she look like that reporter?” they said to each other. “What’s-her-name? The one who does the specials.”
“Theodora Jayquith!” the rest cried. “Exactly like her!”
“Did you know,” said one, “that Theodora’s brother Hollings has a magnificent estate in Litchfield?” They spoke as if they knew the Jayquith family, and in a way they did. Anybody who read checkout counter magazines and newspapers was up-to-date on the Jayquiths.
“Have you been there?” asked Jade.
“Goodness me, no! Nobody can go there. It’s enclosed. Guards. Attack dogs. Barbed wire. But we drive past the entrance and I’ll point it out. Hollings Jayquith would be a catch, wouldn’t he, girls?” said the girl who had to be seventy-five. “Wife died years ago,” she confided to Jade. “He never remarried. All that money, just waiting to be spent.”
On me, thought Jade. On a niece, not a second wife.
The scenery was lovely—hills, villages, black-shuttered white-painted colonials. The girls played bridge as if still in each other’s living rooms. “Millionaires live in those,” said the “girls,” pointing out the bus windows. “The richer you are, the more likely you’ll own a country house up here. Nice drive from the city. Litchfield has ’em all: millionaires, billionaires, producers, stars. Must drive the locals crazy, all those demanding New Yorkers who show up for a weekend now and then to play tenn
is and sniff the mountain air, give parties and go home.”
It sounded perfect to Jade, who could not imagine wanting to sniff mountain air when the atmosphere at home was the Jayquith.
Eleven Levels Road turned right off the main road. It must have had twenty levels. Probably whoever named it got sick of counting the bumps and rises. “There’s the drive!” crowed her friend.
Jade would have missed it. A woods of evergreens—hollies and hemlocks and pine—backed against a remarkably high stone wall. Deep in the greenery was a black iron gate, flanked by stone pillars. As the bus groaned by, trying to get up to the eleventh level, Jade saw electronic gear fastened to the gate.
Her fantasies ground to a halt.
Nobody would swing those gates open for her.
Sweaty and dusty in her Ohio clothes, she would be forced to plead by wire. “I’m Theodora’s daughter, please let me in.”
The only difference from New York City would be that the police would take longer to arrive, having to cover such a distance.
Five
ANNABEL AND EMMIE WERE being nasty, placing bets on how long the marriage would last. “I give it two years,” said Annabel.
Emmie hooted. “Six weeks,” she said firmly. “Remember this is my sister that poor old Michael is marrying. How long could anybody live with her?”
The two girls were in the second limousine, headed to the church. Venice’s family had of course supplied the rest of the limousines, but Annabel’s father had insisted she must go in her own.
Annabel felt as if her skin had blistered. Sunburned from love, she thought. She could not wait to see Daniel. Every word he had spoken replayed like a cherished cassette in her mind.
If only she were wearing something romantic. Any other wedding in the world, and she’d be sweet and frothy, her gown long and delicate. Not Venice’s. Venice had chosen black and white for the bridal party, every bridesmaid slightly different, so when the girls lined up, they presented a violent zigzag slash across the front of the church.
When I marry, thought Annabel, I’ll choose colors to celebrate by. Colors to send up fireworks by. My colors will be the colors of hearts beating faster and pulses racing.
Annabel cupped her long thin fingers over her face, hiding her wild excitement and pleasure behind her own hands. How it magnified love to keep it instead of share it! She, Annabel, to whose room every Wythefield girl had come to hear the best gossip, had managed to keep a secret.
Emmie dug her elbow into Annabel. “Well?”
Annabel hauled herself back to the topic. Daniel leaned dark and perfect against the wall of her mind. She felt out of breath. “Six weeks with Venice would knock the stuffing out of anybody,” she agreed.
Emmie, of course, had brought reading material, because even at her own sister’s wedding, Emmie wasn’t going to risk being without something to read. She leafed through Famous, noting that Prince Andrew had visited the Serengeti and Madonna had written a book.
Annabel wanted a television career like her aunt’s. She loved the excitement; meeting important people, traveling to exotic places. She loved to visit the twelfth floor of the Jayquith Building, from which Theodora’s thirty minutes were broadcast. Aunt Theodora said it was going to be tricky—Annabel as a TV reporter. “You’re too lovely,” said her aunt. “I’m handsome. It’s good for women in journalism to be handsome. But you are ethereal. It doesn’t inspire people to believe in you. The other problem is your name. There cannot be another Jayquith in television journalism.”
Theodora was matter-of-fact about this. She was the Jayquith. She was the Jayquith. Even for her beloved niece, there would be no sharing that last name. “You’ll have to change your name or get married,” said Theodora, “and use his last name.”
I’ll just have to get married, thought Annabel, shivering with her own heat. Annabel Ransom. I like it. Two against fame is better than one. With Daniel, fame might even be fun.
“Look at this!” cried Emmie, waving Famous in Annabel’s face.
Annabel glanced over.
The first photo was so poor Annabel didn’t recognize her own father. The media were not invited to her father’s events. Hollings Jayquith kept fame at bay with tinted windows and private jets, high fences and security guards, but mostly he kept fame at bay with silence.
The photo was grainy and had been taken from a distance by a photographer who had been kicked off the site. Readers of Famous would not recognize the subject if they ran into him on the street. But that was not a problem, because Hollings Jayquith was never on the street.
The second was a rerun of their famous birthday party photo of Annabel. They’d have loved an Egyptian night picture, she thought.
“Read it,” commanded Emmie.
Even movie stars and rock singers are not as fascinating to the American public as the very rich, and Hollings Jayquith is among the richest of all. His wealth is awesome. Impossible to measure, it spans the globe. His parties, given on his yacht or his own ballroom in his own New York hotel, are the stuff of legend. He is known for astoundingly large donations to charity.
His wife, Eleanor, died years ago. Last winter, his daughter, Annabel, had America’s most splendiferous eighteenth birthday party. Like Princess Caroline of Monaco and Princess Diana of England, Annabel Jayquith was born to this life. So far, Annabel has done nothing except go to school and be beautiful. Where are the scandals and wild behavior we expect in our princesses? Does Hollings Jayquith keep her escapades out of the news? He certainly has the clout. Come on, Annabel, stop being somebody’s daughter or somebody’s niece! Show us yourself. We want action!
Annabel had to laugh. “I’ve been telling Daddy for years that what our family needs is a really good scandal. How shall I begin?”
Emmie was full of scandalous ideas. The first was that just before Venice and Michael said their vows, Annabel should change places with the bride. What had Venice ever done to deserve Michael Thiell, anyway? This would save Venice and Michael from getting divorced later and would actually be an act of decency.
“Stop this!” said Tommy. The chauffeur had driven Annabel’s father for years and listened to a lot of conversations. This one was too much. “First you place bets on the marriage when we haven’t even arrived at the church. Now you want a different bride for Michael. You two are sick and perverted.”
A wonderful scandal, Annabel thought, would be for Daniel and me to step up to the altar when Michael and Venice are done, and tell the minister we want to say I do, too.
“It’ll be a messy divorce,” warned Emmie. “Can’t you just imagine my sister, Venice, versus Michael’s father, J Thiell?”
“Why not Venice versus Michael?” Annabel wanted to know.
“Michael loves her. He’d give in. J Thiell never gave in to anybody in his life. Mr. Thiell’s rather disgusting, really. I don’t believe I’d want to celebrate Christmas and Thanksgiving with him. Venice likes to take on things like that, though. It will be a very exciting divorce,” said Emmie. “I hope I’m not off at college when it comes.”
“Stop it!” said Tommy. “You ghoul!”
“Oh, good,” said Annabel. “At least we’ve scandalized somebody.” She smiled at the chauffeur. He was a fixture in her life, as comforting as mail in the morning or hot water in the shower.
She forgot Tommy and Emmie. She stared at the dark limousine window, not seeing through it, a mist of diamond-dusted love between herself and the world. Daniel had become all weather, all events, all places, all people.
After a week of waiting, a week that had felt like generations, she was going to be with him. Only a minute now.
The limousine slowly halted at the church steps.
Only seconds.
The seven limousines were black, their windows shadowed. Slowly, in complete possession of the roads, they drew up in front of a stone church with sharp-peaked Gothic windows.
Traffic stopped. Heads turned. Tourists paused.
On the opposite side of the manicured New England village green, a boy in an ordinary car drew a deep breath and straightened his tie. This was it. In spite of the heat, he shivered slightly.
A bride, wearing the most unbridelike gown that the boy had ever seen, emerged from the first limousine. Stiff swoops of white damask arched around her shoulders as if she herself were a Gothic window. She was more sculpture than girl. Her hair was not just blonde, but truly golden, and on her head she wore a crown of flowers.
A stout father, traditional in striped trousers, ascot, and long tails, took his daughter’s arm. He would be Mr. Pearse.
Video cameras recorded it. Photographers knelt and circled, getting every angle. Wedding guests smiled gently. Out of the second and third limousines poured bridesmaids in black.
The boy had recently come from a funeral and for him black meant death.
He had thought bridesmaids should wear bright happy colors, shiny taffeta and dyed-to-match slippers. Not these girls. Harsh vertical shafts of black with asymmetrical slashes and shoulders.
He got out of his car, closing the door carefully. His breath was coming in short spurts. His hands were cold. He forced himself to walk casually, imitating the pace of the wedding guests: a languid, attention-getting, liquid walk.
You are not committing a crime, he said to himself. Not yet, anyway. They’re the ones who commit crimes. You are only crashing a wedding. The worst that can happen is that you’ll be refused entrance.
Even then, they wouldn’t recognize his name. And his face? No recognition there, either. He bore no resemblance to his brother. He was safe. He thought of his brother, also safe. Safe in the grave.
The lot filled with more limousines, Mercedes, lovely old Rolls Royces, and a multitude of tiny European sports cars shaped like triangles shooting for the moon. The people who got out were, like the bride, dressed to stun the world.
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