A real family...
For the span of a moment, the thought of a happy home and warm marriage flitted through Clarissa’s mind, teasing her with its sweetness. She stole a glance at Samuel, his strong profile, his dark hair shining in the late-morning sun...
Then he turned those brown eyes on her with an intensity that suggested he’d been thinking similar thoughts. Thoughts neither of them should entertain.
Samuel’s eyes lost their hint of yearning at the same moment she stopped her own dangerous line of thinking, before its appeal could take root. They couldn’t have a real family, because they didn’t have a real marriage. And never would. She rose and turned her back to him, setting her gaze on the sanctuary’s stone walls. No matter how kind and protective he was, how gentle and handsome, she could never give her heart to him. He was a man, and men weren’t to be trusted...
“That’s what I want too, Emma. Trust.”
Now how did he know what she was thinking? She faced him again, but he focused on Emma as she fidgeted beside him. A bit squirmy herself, Clarissa turned toward the sanctuary. “With this issue settled, we should probably discuss the repairs we need to make. Emma, would you please make a list in your notebook?”
Emma opened her book, found a fresh page and poised her pencil over the paper as Clarissa told them her plans for hosting the Spring Festival. Samuel ticked off projects for the grounds. Replace broken and missing bricks in the walks, repair the garden terrace steps, weed the lawns. Paint the bridge, gazebo and outbuildings.
“We need to clear the brush around the sanctuary.” Clarissa wandered to the rear of the little chapel and stopped under her grandfather’s favorite live oak, its branches sprawling and all but touching the west wall. “The woods took over back here.”
Samuel approached the tree. “Emma, add ‘prune sanctuary tree branches’ to the list.”
“No, let’s leave them,” Clarissa said, gazing upward. “Grandfather always let this tree grow wild. He loved the way it shaded his special place of prayer.”
“As you wish.” Samuel ran his hand up the wall. “There’s an inscription on this stone near the top. ‘LA III XXII.’”
Clarissa hastened to see it and reached up to touch the crude etching. “Grandfather etched this himself. It refers to his favorite Bible verse. Lamentations, chapter three.”
“‘It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.’ A comforting verse.” Samuel consulted his pocket watch and then glanced up at the noonday sun. “I’ll start trimming the trees as soon as I can. But for now, let’s have dinner before I go back to church for the afternoon.”
As they turned toward the kitchen, Emma peered over her shoulder. “What’s Drusilla doing?”
Clarissa looked that way. Absalom’s wife stood beside the duck pond, a thick, leather-bound book in one hand. She kept glancing from the book to the sanctuary and back, her pencil gliding over the pages as if she was sketching the building.
An unsettled feeling hovered around Clarissa’s heart. She shook it off. “I wish she’d help with the cooking instead.”
She turned around, putting Drusilla from her mind.
With Emma beside her, Clarissa felt every step Samuel took behind her. His nearness and helpfulness with the estate went a long way toward easing her mind about Camellia Pointe’s future. He seemed as eager as she was to win this contest. Then again, perhaps he was merely impatient to get it over with and move them all out.
Inside the kitchen, they found Grandmother Euphemia rattling the skillets and saucepans. “Clarissa and I survived on our meager kitchen skills these past years, but we aren’t good enough cooks to feed this household. And Drusilla’s no help. I’ve asked Ophelia to cook our dinners for us, starting tomorrow.”
Emma straggled in behind them and flopped onto the corner rocker, opening her book.
“You may help prepare the meal,” Samuel said, gently taking her by the elbow and guiding her to her feet.
“Me? Cook?” Emma’s eyes grew as large as the lid Grandmother set on the pan of potatoes.
“Yes, you. This is a good opportunity to learn a practical skill.”
“But I don’t like kitchen work.” She sat in the chair again and dropped her gaze to the pages.
“You can either help cheerfully, or Miss Ophelia can give you cooking lessons in place of your French class.” Samuel slid the book from her hand and stuck it into his morning coat pocket.
“My book—”
“I’ll give it back after you serve dinner.”
Emma turned from him, eyes closed and face red.
Grandmother set the ham before her and gave her a bone-handled knife. “Take out your frustration on the ham, sugar.”
Sugar? When had Clarissa ever heard her grandmother use a pet name?
Silently, Samuel crossed the room to the east window and laid Emma’s book on the sill. The poor man, having to discipline Emma in front of them all, and now he must be starved and in need of a hot drink. Well, since Grandmother had Emma well in hand, Clarissa might as well focus on her husband.
As she hastened to the coffeepot and spooned in the grounds, she heard a little baritone moan. Well, if she was going to uphold her side of the bargain and be a good wife, she’d do it with all her heart, mind and strength.
She opened the coffee can again and added an extra spoonful to the pot.
Chapter Eight
Finally, a place of tranquility, of sanity.
In Christ Church’s sanctuary early the next morning, Clarissa introduced Samuel as the community choir’s new choirmaster as well as her new husband. Then she settled into her usual spot beside Grandmother in the first soprano section. On her other side, where Clarissa’s friend Tessa usually stood, Emma stopped flipping the pages of her sheet music and pressed it to her chest.
“‘Misty Morning.’ I know this song,” she whispered.
Good. If she did well at rehearsal, Clarissa would ask Samuel to give the girl a duet part.
With the music distributed, Samuel tapped his baton on his rosewood music stand. “We have less than a month until the spring festival, so please work on your parts between now and Saturday’s rehearsal. Remember, practice is personal, and we should learn our parts at home. Rehearsal is when we put those parts together and learn to sing as one voice to the Lord.”
Apparently there was a lot Clarissa didn’t know about her new husband, including his aptitude as choirmaster.
“Let’s run through ‘Misty Morning.’ I’ve made phrasing and articulation notes in your individual scores. Just sight-read the best you can for now.” He glanced up at Missus Porter, seated at the piano in the gallery. Then he counted out three beats, setting the tempo, and led them into the verse.
To Clarissa’s surprise, Emma sang out with certainty, her pitch sure and her tone clear. Her sweet voice was mature for her age, something Clarissa didn’t often hear from a new student. Yes, she should definitely ask Samuel to let Emma sing a duet part.
After the grand ending, Samuel gave them a few instructions on dynamics and timing. They’d just begun the verse again when the vestibule door swung open, and a woman in a hooded gray cape crept in, her head down, carrying a baby wrapped in a blanket.
A few yards down the aisle, she pushed back the hood. Tessa Collins. As she came nearer, the tears on her cheeks glistened in the early morning lamplight. And she had little Lilliana with her, so she wasn’t here to sing.
Something was terribly wrong.
Clarissa handed Emma her music score and hastened toward her friend.
Tessa had taken a few more steps, now stopped, swaying as if she could barely stay on her feet. By the time Clarissa reached her, she’d clutched the back of the nearest pew, her face pale beneath its veil of tears.
Clarissa swung open the pew door and helped Tessa
in.
“I can hardly bear it.” Tessa’s voice wavered, tinny. “The others were hard, but I don’t know if I can do it...”
“What don’t you know? What happened? Is it Hugo?” Tessa’s brawny husband had suffered enough during the War and afterward. Surely he hadn’t taken a turn for the worse.
“It’s Hugo, it’s me, it’s the children...” She pulled in a shuddering breath. “He tried his best, but a man needs two legs if he’s to grow cotton. If only he hadn’t been too proud to sharecrop out his family ground. Even though he worked the fields as hard as he could, we couldn’t scrape together enough money for our mortgage. The bank has called our note.”
Not another Natchez family farm lost. Not the Collins family. “What are you going to do?”
“Texas is less war-torn than the rest of the Confederacy, and Hugo can’t bear to leave the South. He hopes he can eventually get a Texas land grant.” She anchored her faded blue gaze on her sleeping child. “Carl is going with us because he’s fifteen and old enough to get a job. And our neighbors took in the other boys, to let them work on their farms. But I don’t want them to raise Lilliana. We heard you’ve taken in an orphan...”
“Oh, Tessa...”
“We can’t provide for her.” Tessa’s staccato words shot out as if she feared she’d lose her nerve if she didn’t say them fast. “And your home is so large, and you love Lilliana. It’s just until Hugo can find work in Texas and we can save a little money.”
“But I’ve never taken care of a baby...”
“You’ll know what to do, and Miss Euphemia will help.” Tessa swiped at the tears coursing down her cheeks. “Believe me, I’ll be knocking on your door the moment we can take care of Lilliana again.”
“Surely there’s work somewhere in Natchez.”
“If there was, Hugo would have found it.”
“There has to be another way.” But for the life of her, Clarissa couldn’t think of one.
“He’s outside in the wagon, waiting for me. He couldn’t bear to come in and see me leave Lilliana. This is breaking his heart even more than mine.” The choir’s song faded to an end as Tessa pulled the baby’s blanket more snugly around her and then laid her in Clarissa’s arms. “You’re the only person I trust with her,” she whispered.
Tessa’s quick hug was over almost before it began. With an agony that seeped into Clarissa’s heart as well, she kissed the still-sleeping baby’s pink cheek and tore herself away from her child. Pulling her gray hood over her head again, she stumbled from the box pew and up the aisle.
The vestibule door slammed behind her, a cold draft in her wake.
In her sleep, the baby snuggled against Clarissa’s body, warm and content and oblivious to the fact that her mother was gone. For how long? Perhaps forever?
Would Lilliana see her mother again?
Samuel hastened to Clarissa and the baby, his face awash with questions. “Isn’t she your neighbor?”
“She—used to be.”
Quick comprehension flashed across his face. “What happened?”
Indeed, what? Hugo’s small cotton fields had provided for his family for three generations. Now they’d had to farm out three of their four children—break up their family—
And the same thing could well happen to Clarissa.
Her heart skipped a beat and she pressed her hand to her chest as Grandmother had been doing more frequently these last days. Just as poverty had taken Lilliana’s mother from her, Absalom could separate Clarissa from her grandmother if he beat her in the contest for their home.
Absalom had only to repair a few doors and windows, restore some minor damage the occupying Yankees had caused. He had the money to hire laborers, and the cost would be minimal. Clarissa, on the other hand, had acres of grounds to restore...
And who knew what the third stipulation would require?
Could she do it? Could she save this home while caring for a baby, a new husband, a new stepdaughter and an orphaned drummer boy?
She drifted her gaze over the church and thought of home. The gazebo, the sanctuary, the gardens. The statues she’d pretended were her childhood friends. Could she give them up?
Yes, if Grandmother would live elsewhere in Natchez, with Clarissa and Samuel. But she clearly would not.
As it was, Camellia Pointe—that most elegant of Natchez manor houses—was the place her family had always been happy, had laughed, had loved. The place her mother had drawn her last, precious breath. The place Clarissa and Grandmother wanted to live—together.
Had they not decided to try to fulfill Grandfather’s will, they could find a different home together, perhaps in Memphis, and be happy there. But they had. And so Clarissa was married, had a stepdaughter and now a baby, and had to stay in Natchez.
It all came back to Camellia Pointe. The place where she still hoped her father would return to her. Because if he ever did heal of his grief over her mother’s death enough to reunite with Clarissa, Camellia Pointe was the only place that could happen. She knew it as if he’d told her so.
She looked at the child sleeping in her arms, glanced at Samuel by her side, Emma and Grandmother in the choir. They all depended on her now, and she couldn’t let them down. And if she lost their home, she would never reunite with her father. She had to save Camellia Pointe, so her father would hear and would come back to her. At this year’s Spring Festival.
Then she caught Grandmother’s gaze. She knew exactly what was going on, both with Lilliana and with Clarissa’s heart. Clarissa could see it in the set of Grandmother’s head, in the little glint of fear in her eyes.
Her grandmother depended on her too, to save her home, preserve her heart. Even if everyone else turned against Clarissa, Grandmother rooted her on, cheered for her. Believed in her.
And Clarissa would not let her down.
The baby shifted in her arms. Clarissa looked down in time to see tiny eyelashes flutter and tiny lips smile at her. She would care for this child and love her, as she’d love Emma and Willie.
She would also save Camellia Pointe.
No matter what.
* * *
Late the next afternoon, Samuel pulled up at Camellia Pointe to refresh himself before their wedding reception, although he would rather face a line of armed Yankees than the deaconate at a social function.
A high-pitched whine burst forth from beside him, and Samuel picked up the black-and-white puppy Colonel Talbot had given him this afternoon. He got out and held the squirming pup in the crook of his arm as he fastened Strawberry’s reins to the hitching ring.
But wait—the weeds were gone from the camellia beds on either side of the porch. And from the drive in front of the house. Someone had replaced the dining-room window glass as well. What was going on here?
Hearing voices from the east side of the house, he ventured that way. Moments later he found a tawny-haired young gentleman in the east flower beds with Willie and Beau, all on their knees, pulling weeds. The new tutor? With his broad shoulders and muscled arms, he looked as if he’d be as proficient in a game of tug-of-war, or archery, or even swordplay as he would in a classroom.
“Reverend Montgomery?” When he looked up, his bright blue eyes and quick smile, not to mention the fact he’d gotten the boys into the flower beds, made Samuel like him instantly.
“Mister Forbes, I presume. I’m relieved to have you here. None of us will get into a disciplined schedule until we get our three hooligans into school.”
“Oh, these two already are. This is part of horticulture class.”
Which Absalom would put an end to as soon as he saw Beau helping with the gardens. Samuel set the pup on the ground, and she immediately wobbled over to Willie.
“A dog!” Willie scooped her up, the weeds clearly forgotten, and let her lick his face.
“An English setter,” Miste
r Forbes said, striding over. He rubbed the dog’s floppy ears. “What’s her name?”
“I thought I’d let Willie name her. Her mother is Colonel Talbot’s dog, Sugar.”
“Then I’ll call her Honey.” Willie set her on the ground and ran with Honey around the nearest magnolia tree, the pup nipping his heels.
With the dog in good hands, Samuel stepped to the front gallery, where piano music greeted him. He must have stumbled upon Emma’s voice lessons. He braced his shoulder against the door, turned the knob and shoved as usual. This time, the door didn’t stick. He all but fell into the center hall, as if Absalom had planned it.
As Samuel caught himself on the door frame, he recognized the sweet strains of “Meet Me by Moonlight.” His mother’s favorite song—the one she used to sing to him on summer nights when he couldn’t sleep in his hot, second-story bedroom...
Eager to hear more, he hastened farther into the hall, in case the song could bring him some healing balm as it had in his youth.
There, Clarissa’s dulcet soprano voice flowed, pitch-perfect and clear-toned, from some deep well of liquid love within her heart. He paused just inside the door, savoring the honeyed sounds. The old-fashioned love song touched something within him, something he’d neglected for more time than he wanted to admit. Unwilling to break the moment, he crept closer to where Clarissa held court from her piano stool. She’d captivated her audience of Miss Phemie, baby Lilliana and Emma, who stood next to Clarissa at the polished Steinway as she sang of shewing the night flowers their queen.
And “queen” Clarissa was. Were he to meet her here at moonlight, what those beams might do to her raven hair, her porcelain skin. She would surely rival the night flowers in beauty and sweetness.
An Inconvenient Marriage Page 13