Loved Me Once (Love, Romance and Business)

by Gail Hewitt

  "Miss Maggie . . ." Amanda started to say, but Elizabeth McLaurin interrupted her.

  "Well, I guess I showed her." Then she turned on her heel, brushed past Amanda and strode into the living room of the large house. "I don't want her coming here again. I don't want anybody coming here again, except . . ." She stopped and looked back at Maggie, "Except for that nice Scotty Williams. You should marry him as soon as possible, Maggie. Nice young men like that can get away."

  Maggie was puzzled for a moment, then remembered, and shrugged. "But Mother . . ."

  Amanda shook her head. "We can talk when it's time for her nap," she whispered.

  When Maggie followed her mother into the living room, which ran the full depth of the house at this point, she saw that a half-decorated Christmas tree stood in the corner between the fireplace and the French doors to the rear terrace. Boxes of ornaments sat on nearby chairs and on the emptied shelves of the built-in bookcase to one side of the fireplace.

  "Where are my father's books?" Maggie asked.

  "Your mama let that man who runs the old-book place out toward Lenox have them. You remember I told you he'd been sniffing around."

  "She gave them away?" Maggie asked incredulously. "Some of them were very valuable. Couldn't you stop her?"

  "I wasn't here," Amanda said stoically, obviously expecting to be blamed. "It was that day I had to go to court about my grandson's custody and we had the lady from the temp service in."

  Mrs. McLaurin, looking up from the box of ornaments through which she was rummaging, saw the direction of Maggie's eyes and overheard enough to realize they were discussing the bookshelves.

  "You'll be glad to know I got rid of those nasty books," she crowed. "That nice man who's been calling about them offered me $10 for each book, and I took it. Wasn't that clever of me? It came to over $900. It's in my jewelry case upstairs."

  A wave of fury so violent that it made her incoherent washed over Maggie, and she involuntarily stamped her foot.

  Amanda reached out and grabbed her arm, which was trembling. "Remember, she's not herself. She can't help it. I knew it would upset you, being your daddy's books and all, so I called the bookseller and tried to get them back, but he just laughed at me."

  Maggie, tears in her eyes, forced herself to relax. It was not easy. She wondered just how much her mother understood the hurt she had inflicted. Elizabeth had always resented the books, probably because collecting them was something her husband enjoyed doing without her. Maggie looked at the large blue eyes that continued to stare at her, almost glittering in triumph. It was interesting, Maggie thought, how her mother's actions these days so often seemed an extension of something she'd always wanted to do, interesting also that everyone overlooked them because she "can't help herself."

  "If it's done, it's done," she said dully. "What happened with Cousin Ella? She looked absolutely furious."

  Amanda became as close to indignant as Maggie had ever seen her. "That lady showed up here a while ago, as pretty as you please, without calling ahead or anything. She's just lucky I remembered her. Her excuse was that she had a Christmas present for Mrs. McLaurin. We were decorating away on the Christmas tree when that red SUV pulled up outside. I didn't think your mama would recognize her — she doesn't most people these days — but she knew her right off and insisted she come in and have some coffee and cake even though it was right at lunch time and I already had that tuna salad made that she likes so well."

  "Did they have an argument?"

  "I think she said something that upset your mama. I wasn't in the room. Your mama told me to go to the kitchen to get fresh coffee and some more cake, and she seemed all right with her cousin – she has these spells where she seems almost normal so I thought it was okay. Anyway, I couldn't have been gone more than five minutes, and when I came back they were going at it hammer and tongs. Then your mama threw that package so hard it bounced off her cousin, and then she jumped up and took off and that's when you showed up."

  As they talked, Maggie and Amanda had instinctively moved toward the front of the long room, away from her mother, so when she flung open the French doors and ran out into the rear garden, neither was close enough to stop her.

  "You wait here, Miss Maggie, I know where she'll go," Amanda said, already moving toward the open doors.

  "Don't be silly. I'm here. I'll help." She followed Amanda, and they broke into as much of a run as the undergrowth would allow.

  Ahead, through the ruined yard, its tangled shrubs and perennial flower remnants a faded gray and brown, they could hear Elizabeth McLaurin lumbering along. She was making surprisingly good time.

  "Where is she going?" Maggie asked, feeling foolish that she was already becoming winded and surprised at how bothered she was by the dripping branches that slapped coldly at her face and arms.

  "Toward the house next door, the one that burned. She usually slows about halfway down the path, so we can probably catch her then."

  Maggie realized that this must happen a lot, and she wondered how Amanda coped alone with a mentally inconsistent charge whose physical strength continued unimpaired, as evidenced by the fact that the two of them didn't catch the runaway until she was stopped by the derelict fence that formed the boundary between this property and the next. There, to Maggie's surprise, they found her mother standing only yards away from two women and a little girl who were on the other side of the fence.

  "You people are trespassing," Mrs. McLaurin was saying grandly, her tall, lanky body regally erect, her attitude imperious. "My husband, Laurence McLaurin, the famous columnist you know, is a close personal friend of the sheriff and he will certainly call him as soon as I tell him you are here. These are our properties and that of our good friends the Worthingtons, and you have no business being here."

  Amanda began to turn Elizabeth McLaurin back the way she had come. When Maggie attempted to take the other arm, her mother jerked away from her touch in distaste, "Horrid girl, something dreadful always happens when you are here, and the only reason you come is to . . ." The rest of what she said was lost as Amanda hurried her along the path.

  Maggie turned back to the fence to apologize and saw that one of the women, the one not holding the hand of the obviously alarmed little girl, was gesturing toward her.

  "I'm so sorry if my mother frightened her," she said, nodding toward the child, who now tugged at the second woman's hand, trying to pull her back toward the cars in the drive behind them. It was then that Maggie got a good look at the house in which the Worthingtons had lived. It was odd to see it boarded up, with black smears around several of its windows.

  Distracted, it took her a few seconds to register what the first woman, the one who'd gestured, was saying. "Maggie, don't you remember me? It's Ann Worthington, Ann Worthington Longstreet."

  "I thought your family moved," Maggie was so surprised that the tactless remark slipped out.

  "My mother sold several years ago," Ann confirmed. "My firm — Tudor & Associates — is selling the property for the current owner. This is Heather Mybawr, Mrs. Richard Mybawr. She's thinking of buying it."

  Maggie looked at the second woman, who was, she now realized, burnished like a jewel in Tiffany's window. She was so well-dressed and groomed that she almost shone. The name sounded familiar, and then it hit Maggie. Richard Mybawr? His wife was thinking of buying the Worthington place? She nodded to Heather, who barely bothered to acknowledge the gesture. Glancing at Ann, Maggie saw a look of appeal. This sale evidently mattered, and Ann, just a couple of years her senior, had been something of a childhood friend.

  "It's a beautiful old place," Maggie assured Heather. "Well worth repairing and redecorating."

  "That dump?" Heather said contemptuously. "Who'd waste the time? No, Dick and I are looking for a teardown with large-enough grounds to hold the footprint of the house we want to build. Dick's thinking neo-Palladian." She introduced the term with amazing confidence, given that she appeared to have spent most of her lif
e alternating between the gym and a really good salon and so almost certainly had no idea what it meant.

  "Well, it was good to see you," Maggie said to Ann, "and nice to meet you, Heather. Good luck with the property." She couldn't resist glancing back at Ann, to see if she were upset at what Heather had said, but the two women had already headed toward the cars, a Mercedes and a BMW, the now-screaming child in tow.

  Back at the house, Amanda was coming down the stairs. "I managed to get her to eat a bite of the tuna fish, and put her to bed. I've given her the afternoon shot the doctor recommended for these manic spells, so she'll sleep for a couple of hours."

  "That's good."

  "I've got some fresh coffee made," Amanda continued. "Why don't I change out of these wet clothes and I'll get us a cup and bring you up to date on everything that's been going on."

  In the living room, Maggie scrounged around in the log basket and found the makings for a fire. By the time that Amanda returned, she had the beginning of a respectable blaze laid. Amanda deposited a papier-mâché tray onto the low ball-and-claw-footed table between the wing chairs and took a seat opposite the one in which Maggie now sat. Maggie was touched to see that Amanda had set the tray with the small silver service and the Iris-patterned porcelain that her mother had always used at breakfast. Her mother did have some beautiful things, and Maggie had done everything she could to keep from having to sell them. Still, was she remembering wrong, or was the silver Jensen, and the china Herend? Suddenly, she wanted to cry. These lovely bits of the life her mother had once had, things that she herself had taken for granted as part of the background and dear for that very reason, were they now just objects of value, things that she had to view as assets, which would – it was to be hoped – prove to be liquid, however much their disposal might distress her mother? Everything was getting so horrible, she didn't think she could stand it. She pretended to cough, to cover her sudden emotion.

  She realized Amanda was waiting for her to pour, which seemed strange in itself, for in this house that had been a prerogative reserved exclusively to her mother. Once they'd each done sugar and cream to taste and settled back, cup in hand, Amanda wasted no time.

  "You remember how, when you were here visit before last, she got so mad at you and said those terrible things?"

  "That wasn't unusual," Maggie reminded her. "Mother has never found me very satisfactory, even before she became . . . ill. Especially before." It struck Maggie how odd it was to be discussing this, but by now she and Amanda had few secrets when it came to her mother.

  "Well, she doesn't know how well off she is," Amanda said indignantly. "The things I've seen some other places, you wouldn't believe, but that's as may be, Miss Maggie. What I'm trying to tell you is that she's talking even worse now, to just about everybody, and she's getting away from me more often. She usually heads next door, like today, but once I caught her just as she was about to get out of the gate on the road. And most days she seems to think your daddy is still alive, and she roams through the house, calling for him. And that's not all . . ."

  For half an hour, Maggie sat and listened as Amanda detailed the ncreasing frequency and intensity of her mother's irrational behavior. Behind her, through the tall French doors at the end of the room, Maggie could see the light growing grayer. The only illumination came from a few table lamps notable more for their shapeliness than any pretense at efficiency, leaving the room so dim that the subtle pagoda-and-tree pattern of the old wallpaper almost disappeared. Her father, Maggie remembered, had hated the pattern, but her mother had vehemently defended it. She forced herself to return her full attention to the conversation.

  "The worst thing," Amanda said at last, "was when we went to the new doctor last week. I don't like this Dr. Fowler as well as old Dr. Sherrill. He asked Mrs. McLaurin some strange questions, like how often did she eat and did we give her any medicine except what his office prescribed and was she allowed out of her room? Odd questions, like he thought she was being mistreated. I think that's why he insisted on meeting with you."

  Maggie sighed. "How'd she act around him?"

  "Better than usual. If you didn't know her, you might not even have been able to tell anything was wrong."

  Maggie shook her head, understanding at once where the doctor was coming from. Her mother had probably made some outrageous claim, and he suspected elder abuse. Well, she could set him straight about that. No one could be kinder or more conscientious than Amanda.

  "The final straw was when I got back from the courthouse and saw what she'd done with the books," Amanda continued. "I know what those books mean to you, and there's no getting them back unless you want to go to that man's store and pay his full price. I don't think he's a very nice man."

  "He doesn't sound like it," Maggie agreed. "I'm afraid the books are gone. If I had that much money on hand, it'd have to go toward the roof."

  "That leak is getting worse," Amanda agreed, "just like I told you."

  "I'll see what I can do," Maggie said wearily.

  "You look all done in, young lady. Why don't you just stretch out there on the sofa in front of the fire? I'll put on some Christmas music, and you can lie there and relax while I finish decorating this tree. It's like everything else. Your mama just had to have it. Nothing else would do, and then we hadn't been working on it for ten minutes when she got bored and wandered off. I had just brought her back and we'd started to work on it again when that cousin of hers showed up. Here, put this over you." She handed Maggie a silk throw made from an antique kimono Laurence McLaurin had brought back from Japan after World War II. That was another sign of how times were changing. Her mother had never allowed anyone actually to use the throw.

  Suddenly, Maggie's eyes were so heavy that she barely managed to pull the soft yellow fabric over her before she was asleep. When she awoke some time later, the fire on the hearth had died to a remnant surrounded by embers, the now-decorated tree's lights were glowing softly, and a light rain was falling in the twilight visible through the partly open drapes. Still groggy, Maggie went to the car and retrieved the case that held the work she needed to look at over the weekend. Back inside, she wandered toward the kitchen, from which the sound of a TV or radio could be faintly heard. Amanda was putting a bowl of soup and a sandwich on a tray. It was the radio that was on, playing a classical version of Handel's Joy to the World.

  "Nice, if unexpected," she thought, then caught herself. It must have something to do with being back in her mother's orbit, but she really was beginning to think in clichés. Miles was a Bostonian; therefore he had to be starchy. Amanda was an employee; therefore, she wouldn't be listening to classical music.

  "Can I get you something, Miss Maggie?"

  "I'll grab a sandwich in a few minutes. I had a big lunch. I'm not really hungry. I just came to ask where I'm to sleep."

  "In your old room, of course." Amanda looked faintly shocked.

  "I appreciate it. I just wanted to be sure."

  "The bed is made up fresh, and there are plenty of towels in the bathroom. You just let me know if you need anything else."

  "I'll be fine," Maggie assured her. "Can't I spell you tonight?" She nodded toward the tray. "You must get tired of being on call all the time."

  "She gets upset when I don't sit with her while she eats," Amanda said matter-of-factly. "You just go on and do whatever you want. The TV still works in the library if there's anything you want to watch."

  "Thanks, but I'm going to work a few minutes and then make an early night of it." Upstairs, she unpacked pajamas and the outfit she planned to wear the next day. Then she took a long hot shower in the white-and-lilac tiled bathroom. She hadn't slept in this house in years, and the bathroom was much smaller than she remembered. The bedroom, however, remained the same gracious room that had provided the only reliable refuge during her teenaged years. She ran her fingers across the faded sprigs of violet on the wallpaper and lightly touched the creamy fishnet of the canopy. Pulling back the croche
t-covered down comforter, she was surprised to see that the sheets and pillowcases were exactly as she remembered, cream-colored with violet trim, smooth and soft. Surely these couldn't be the same linens that had been here when she was a teenager? Even as she wondered, she knew the answer. Her mother had always been frugal with such things, about the only mark of frugality in her housekeeping arrangements.

  Retrieving the large Manila envelope crammed with mail, she tossed it onto the bed, then slipped between the covers and opened it. She wasn't in the mood to do much of anything else, but at least she could deal with this, which would be mostly junk. The first thing that fell out when she upended the large envelope was this week's issue of a business magazine, clipped open to a two-page article directed toward older job hunters about how to use seminars to update your business vocabulary, as well as your understanding of the current concerns of your industry as a whole, both more important than ever these days according to the author. Attached to it was a note from her assistant, "Thought you might enjoy reading this." Kimberly was right; she did. Grinning, she removed the clip so the magazine would return more easily to the envelope. As she shut it so that its cover became visible, she found a craggily handsome male face staring up at her, a confident face, a very familiar face. Her hands went cold and her face hot. He was older, a lot older. There were laugh lines around his eyes and a crease at either side of his mouth that hadn't been there before. His hair looked as thick and curly, but it was now cut short and somewhat spiky in the mode of the moment and was almost certainly sprinkled with gray. It had, after all, been twenty-seven years. Still, there was no mistaking those piercing eyes, that lazy grin, and the natural arrogance that informed the tilt of his head. He was wearing a well-cut gray pinstriped suit – almost certainly Savile Row in origin – and held a cowboy hat, of all things. The cover teaser read, "T. Merriman Scott . . . Ready to Ride into the Sunset?"