Patricia Hagan

by Loves Wine

  Claudia flung back the covers and leaped from the bed to embrace her daughter. “I’m delighted. He’s just about the handsomest man I’ve ever seen—and so well bred. A real gentleman. Though he strikes me as a man you wouldn’t want to cross.” She laughed with delight. “With your peppery temper, I imagine you have had differences! Yes, I do approve. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look so happy.”

  Holly welcomed her mother’s approval. It meant more than she’d known it could. “It’s like a sudden ray of sunshine in the midst of a storm,” she told Claudia. “But then the clouds come back, and you wonder how long before the sun is going to shine again. Does that make sense?”

  Claudia blinked back fresh tears. “I felt the same way about your father. I’m so happy for you. I love you so much.”

  Both warmed by their new understanding, Holly left and went downstairs. The next hours were heartbreaking. The caskets arrived, and the undertaker. When the remains were prepared, there was nowhere to take them but the stable because the newly-converted barn didn’t have room for all the mourners. So, amidst the soft stirrings of horses and the sweet, pungent odor of hay, the Negroes sang their spirituals, and paid their last respects.

  The afternoon passed that way, hours blending together. Roger stopped by but not for long, displaying, he felt, just the correct amount of respect. Later, Claudia came with Jarvis, and as they were leaving, Jarvis whispered to Holly, “Please don’t resent me. I’m not a monster. I don’t know what’s happened between us, but I’m not a bad man, Holly. I love your mother and I want to make her happy. If you’ll let me, I’d like to love you as I would my own daughter.”

  Holly listened, then quietly thanked him. She was grateful when he took her mother and left.

  Darkness fell. In the distance was the sound of carriages as people arrived for the evening’s festivities. The Negroes continued to sing, and candles were lit, casting eerie lights around the stable. The atmosphere remained reverent and respectful, despite the sounds of revelry drifting out to them from the great house.

  Holly was sitting with her head bowed, hands folded, lost in thought, when someone touched her shoulder. Thinking it would be Roger, she looked up with the greatest reluctance. It was Scott.

  He knelt, covering her hands with his own, and whispered, “I’m sorry about all of this, and sorry I had to leave you last night, but I had no choice. Is there anything I can do for you?”

  She shook her head, wishing she could say that seeing him was enough, but this wasn’t the place for that. Realizing he was in his regular army uniform, she asked, “Aren’t you going to the party? You’re not dressed for it.”

  He wanted to tell her everything, how bad things were in town, thanks to Lisa Lou. But he could say nothing with the other mourners so close by. Yet, if he didn’t tell her himself, she’d hear it from somebody else. The story was spreading quickly.

  He drew her to her feet. “Please. I have to talk to you.” Not giving her time to protest, he led her away from the gathering, all the way to the far end of the stable, into an empty stall. He drew her close to him. “There are a lot of things I’d like to tell you, Holly, too many for right now. But there is something you’ve got to know now, because you’re going to hear it soon enough from somebody. I’m surprised you haven’t already.”

  There was almost no light at all, and she strained to see his face, searching for something to dispel her fear. He drew in a deep breath, about to begin, and just then Roger Bonham walked in.

  “Well, well, Colonel Colter. From hotel rooms to stables? You’re not very elegant about where you take your women, are you?”

  “How dare you say such a thing?” Holly hissed at him, enraged. “What right do you have sneaking in here? This is none of your business, Roger, and I’ll thank you to leave.”

  “The honor of this family is very much my business,” he bellowed. “I have every right to resent your sneaking off with a rapist.”

  “Rapist?” Holly echoed, looking first at Scott and then back at Roger.

  Scott’s arms fell away from her and he stepped back. “Far be it from me to rob him of the pleasure of telling you.”

  Roger was quick to oblige. “It’s all over town, Holly. He raped Lisa Lou Pollock last night.” Roger snickered. “I’m surprised he had the nerve to leave the post, considering that people are saying he ought to be hanged.” He reached over and placed a possessive hand on her arm. “Come along, Holly. I can’t allow you to be with him. It isn’t—”

  He never saw Scott move, but his next awareness was of a hand around his throat, and he felt himself slammed against the wall. The wind was knocked out of him.

  “She’s safe,” Scott growled as he squeezed Roger’s wind pipe. “You aren’t.” He released his hold, letting him crumple to the floor. “Get out of here before I kill you.”

  Roger thrashed in the dirt as he struggled to speak, eyes bulging. He coughed, spat, gasping, “I’ll have your head for this. You can’t treat me like this…”

  Scott took a menacing step forward and Holly placed herself between the two. “Stop it!” she cried. “This is a place of mourning and you’ve already stopped their singing with all this hollering.”

  Roger backed away and left the stable. Lowering her voice to a whisper, Holly said, “Let’s go outside, where we can talk without intruding on the funeral.”

  As they stepped outside, she looked up at him and said, “I think you owe me an explanation.”

  He smiled slowly. It was not a nice smile. “I did not rape Lisa Lou.”

  “Then why would she say you did?” Holly pleaded. “I think I have the right to—”

  “The right!” Scott echoed. “I made love to you, Holly. Is that what gives you the right to question me? I came here to explain, not to deny. I was fool enough to think you wouldn’t assume I was guilty. Let’s don’t talk about rights, Holly. Let’s talk about trust—something you evidently don’t have, or not for me.” He was weary. “It’s best I go now. We can talk when we’ve both calmed down.”

  Holly made no move to leave. “You’ve slept with her, haven’t you?” she said. The pieces were slowly coming together. “You’ve slept with her, and she came to you sometime later and you rejected her. You made her mad, so she said you’d raped her.”

  “That’s about the way it was, Holly.”

  She stepped away. “Then go. I don’t think we have anything else to discuss, do we?”

  “That was before last night, Holly, before our lovemaking.” There was a pleading note in his voice.

  “I can appreciate that,” she flashed him a bitter smile, “but it was also after our time in the woods, wasn’t it? You didn’t waste any time finding another woman, did you? I guess you don’t care who you make love to. The trouble is, I do care.”

  She whirled around and went to the house, leaving him there.

  Chapter Twenty

  Sally and Norman were buried on Sunday morning, beneath an ominous gray sky. As the first clouds of dirt from the gravediggers’ shovels splattered against the wooden coffins, the clouds unleashed cold raindrops. None of the mourners moved to escape the pelting rain. The wind increased, and the rain came down harder.

  Finally, his clothes plastered to him, Roger contained himself no longer. “Can we please leave?” he whispered to Holly impatiently. “We’re both going to be sick, standing out here like this. It’s over now. Let’s go.”

  “Go on back to the house,” Holly said crisply. “I’ll be along later.” Why must he act like her watchdog all the time?

  He stiffened, squared his shoulders, and jutted his chin higher. “If you insist on standing here all day, catch cold, miss the wedding, then I’ll stand here beside you, damn it.”

  She wished he would go away, but there was no point in remaining, so she took a final look at the graves and turned toward their waiting carriage…

  In a couple of hours, the house was filled with ebullient guests. Servants scurried through the parlors s
erving champagne and fruit punch, sandwiches and cookies. Cooks were bustling in the kitchen, preparing food for the buffet luncheon and planning for the feast to be served after the wedding.

  The rains did not let up, so the guests couldn’t spill out onto the lawn, as Jarvis had planned. The house, large though it was, became stuffy. The day got more and more humid. The flowers decking every available surface were soon wilting. There was a feeling of wanting the day to hurry on. It was not the gala Jarvis had worked so hard to bring about.

  Holly, dressed in a gown of yellow lace over green taffeta, was determined to perform her duties as hostess as cordially as possible, but she quickly learned how hard that was going to be. In every room she entered, it was the same, the men on one side growling about that “animal,” Colonel Colter, the women on the other side, saying he looked like a savage, and they weren’t at all surprised. Poor little Lisa Lou Pollock! What the child must have endured! Holly would have to explain all the gossip to her mother, she knew.

  An hour before the wedding, Jarvis came rushing to tell Holly that her mother had fainted. “The heat, the closeness,” he fumed, as they hurried upstairs together.

  Claudia was lying in bed, terribly pale. Two doctors, present for the party, were beside her. “I’m fine, really,” she protested over and over. “It’s just the heat. Give me a moment to rest, something cool to drink, and I’ll be fine.”

  “You don’t look fine to me,” Jarvis said, then turned to the doctors. “What do you think? Should we postpone the wedding? Say what you really think.”

  “No,” Claudia cried, tears in her eyes. “Don’t you dare say I can’t go on with our wedding.”

  Dr. Burlington, the older of the two, cleared his throat nervously and exchanged a glance with his colleague. The woman was pale, weak, but it was a humid day, after all. The patient’s excited state—her wedding day—had to be taken into consideration, too.

  Dr. Grant turned to Jarvis. “If Dr. Burlington concurs, we’ll yield to Mrs. Maxwell’s wishes. After all, her only symptom is that she’s fainted.”

  “Thank you,” Claudia said quickly. “I’m going to put on my wedding gown now, and we’re going ahead. I feel fine. Holly, help me get dressed, will you?”

  The three men left the room, and Holly knew there was nothing to do but oblige her mother. She helped Claudia dress in the beautiful blue and ivory lace gown. Perhaps, she thought, as she stood back to appraise her, it was the soft colors that made her mother appear so pale…

  In a twinkling, with Holly standing beside her mother and Roger beside his father, Claudia Maxwell and Jarvis Bonham were married, to the delighted smiles of two hundred guests.

  Jarvis kissed his bride, and at that very moment, someone cried, “Look! It’s a blessing on the marriage!”

  All eyes turned to the south windows and saw the sun bursting from behind thick, gray clouds. A brilliant rainbow appeared. The rains tapered, ceased, and, with many cries of delight, people began spilling from the stuffy house into the cool gardens.

  Jarvis held Claudia tightly and said with a grin, “It’s an omen, darling. Heaven will bless us.”

  Claudia was as radiant as the sunshine streaming through the doors and windows. “Yes,” she whispered, gazing up at him. “Oh, yes, darling. We are blessed.”

  Holly turned away. It was their world now, and she must not intrude.

  She retired to her room, wanting to lie down, but she heard some noise in the dressing room and remembered that the room had been offered for use by the lady guests. There was nothing to do but wait and hope whoever was in the dressing room would not be in a talkative mood.

  She sat down on her bed. She did not have long to wait. In barely a moment, she gasped as Lisa Lou came out of the dressing room. Stunning in a gown of coral satin, the skirt beaded with tiny gleaming seed pearls, Lisa Lou’s beauty was marred by the fierce grimace that swept her face. Hotly, she exploded, “What are you staring at me like that for? I’ve got a right to be here. My family was invited, and what am I supposed to do? Hide forever? I’m sick of people staring at me. I’ve done nothing to be ashamed of.” Taken aback by the outburst, Holly continued staring at her in stunned silence. “Well, say something!” Lisa Lou challenged, hands on her hips. “You’re the one who should be upset about all this. You were chasing him, weren’t you? So, you must find it devastating that he tried to force me into giving him what you were offering freely!”

  “Forced you, Lisa Lou? Scott forced you? But why should he? What about before, when you met him in secret? What happened that he suddenly had to force you? Did you have a lover’s quarrel? Were you getting even for something when you cried ‘rape’?” Lisa Lou took a retreating step as Holly rose and came toward her. She struggled to recover her balance in the face of this unexpected attack. How did Holly know the truth? How? “Or did you get caught, Lisa Lou, and this was your way of saving yourself from scandal?”

  Holly had a flash of memory, lying in Scott’s strong arms, his passion melding with hers. Her eyes burned into Lisa Lou’s. She had experienced the same joy, and the realization made Holly blind with furious jealousy. “Well?” she cried. “Why did you lie about him?”

  Lisa Lou blustered, “You have no right to say these things, you bitch! You don’t know what you’re talking about. You’d better watch your mouth, because my father is pretty upset, and if you go telling lies about me, there’s no telling what he might do.”

  Holly felt her fury collapse all at once. “I feel sorry for you, Lisa Lou. What a lonely person you must be. I was a fool to doubt Scott. His only mistake was getting involved with you in the first place.” She turned toward the dressing room. “And I believe I’ll just go tell him that right now!”

  Lisa Lou laughed shrilly. “Oh! You’re the one, aren’t you? The slut he was waiting for that night?”

  Holly turned around. “What?”

  “Come now, Holly. The game is over. Let’s settle this now. There’ll be no reason for us to hate each other then. You won. I lost. It’s that simple. Just admit it was you he was waiting for in the hotel that night. You were the reason he turned me down.” Holly stayed silent, bewildered, and Lisa Lou grew exasperated. “Oh, come now, Holly,” she cajoled. “What difference does it make now? Surely you can understand how I feel. When a woman loses out to another woman, she likes to know who the rival was. Besides, it wasn’t so hard for me to figure out. Your cabin burned down that night, so you couldn’t meet him. That’s what happened, isn’t it?”

  Holly wasn’t going to admit anything, not even the fact that Scott hadn’t been waiting for her at all. What he’d been doing at the hotel late at night was beyond her.

  Knowing before she even spoke that her words would make no difference, she asked, “Why don’t you tell the truth, Lisa Lou? You can’t feel very good inside when you know your lies have hurt an innocent man.”

  “Doesn’t matter to me.” Lisa Lou smiled with a shrug. “Serves him right for being such a ladies’ man. He got what he deserved. Besides, my reputation is more important than his.”

  Holly turned away. She reached into the wardrobe to find a proper riding dress, wishing Lisa Lou would just go away. “I’m going to Vicksburg, to find Scott, to straighten everything out.”

  At least Lisa Lou could enjoy a triumph. “You’re too late. He ran away during the night.”

  “I…I don’t believe you,” Holly stammered.

  The other girl shrugged. “Go ride into town and see if he’s there. Make a fool of yourself. See if I care. I’m tired of talking about it anyway.” She whipped around, skirts flouncing, and strode out of the room.

  Holly stood rooted, knowing intuitively that Lisa Lou wasn’t making it up. Scott had left. But why? It wasn’t like him to run. Nothing made sense any more, nothing.

  Her worried study was intruded on all too soon by Roger, pounding on her door. “Holly, what’s wrong? I’ve been knocking and knocking.”

  She shook her head. “Nothing. I’m
fine. I just needed to be alone.”

  He laughed. “Feeling left out, are you? So am I. Seems our parents are deserting us, so we should wish them well and take solace from each other. Come on. They’re getting ready to leave.”

  She reached slowly for the hand he was extending, and he clasped her fingers, pressing them against his lips. “Holly, about the scene in the stable yesterday, I…I apologize. Please understand that, well, seeing you with that…that rogue,” he growled, “I admit I went too far. I’m sorry.”

  “You thought you were protecting me, I know, but believe me when I say it wasn’t necessary. I’m in no danger.”

  “Not any more,” he retorted. “The man is gone. Left in the dark of night like the belly-crawling snake he is. He deserted, I guess, with his sidekick, Neil Davis.”

  She blinked. Scott desert? Never! What was behind this nightmare? She wanted desperately to figure it out, but Roger was squeezing her hand, coaxing her along.

  Everyone was gathering at the bottom of the stairs in anticipation of Claudia’s tossing the bouquet. Roger left Holly for a moment, then returned with a specially prepared drink for her that would set the mood for the evening he had planned. He watched intently as Holly finished it all. Everything was going to be easier than he’d hoped for.

  Claudia walked to the railing, smiled, and gaily tossed her bouquet, which flew directly at Holly. But Holly made no move to catch it. It bounced off her shoulder and fell to the floor. Roger was quick to grab it and thrust it into her reluctant hands. “So,” he said heartily, “you’ll be the next to get married. I wonder who the lucky man will be.”

  Holly pressed the flowers against her cheek. Marry? Not she. It seemed the man she loved had left, left without a single thought for her.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Only with the greatest effort was Holly able to get through the rest of the evening. The single drink she’d taken seemed to have gone straight to her head. She was dizzy, sleepy, having a hard time staying awake. But her mother and Jarvis had left, so the role of hostess fell to her. It was her duty to see that the guests enjoyed the reception and lavish dinner.