Thunder Heights

by Whitney, Phyllis A. ;

  Letty busied herself with Mignonette, and one would have thought by her manner that she had heard nothing of the talk going on about her. Yet there was a rigidity in the movement of her head that told Camilla how intently she listened. It seemed as though some duel went on below the surface among these three—as though each knew something Camilla did not know, and each suspected the other two.

  Camilla let the rest of the tea cool in her cup. The bitter taste in her mouth gave it a flavor she could not endure.

  That afternoon at Ross’s request, Camilla had a talk with him in the library. After what had happened to Mignonette, she was in no mood to discuss business matters, but Ross insisted and she lacked the strength to oppose him.

  They faced each other beneath Orrin Judd’s picture, and Camilla found it difficult to attend to his words. She would have preferred to pour out her own doubts and bewilderment, but Ross, she suspected, would dismiss such notions as feminine nonsense. His own manner was as correct and impersonal as Mr. Pompton’s would have been, and such a bearing did not invite confidences.

  “Did you have any trouble getting Hendricks to agree to move out of the coach house?” Ross began.

  “None at all,” Camilla said. It was not to Ross that she would admit her confusion about Booth.

  He studied her with a skeptical air, as if he were ready to discount anything she might say. She blinked in the face of such scrutiny, finding him no more an easy person to be with than was Booth. Or did most men leave her ill at ease? she wondered, thinking of Booth’s words. Not vulnerable—merely uncomfortable.

  She made herself meet Ross’s eyes and take the lead. “Why are you so anxious to move out of the house?” she asked.

  “Frankly, I don’t want to be under the same roof with your Aunt Hortense or her son. I’m sure no love is lost between us and we’ll be glad to avoid chance meetings that wear on the nerves when we meet constantly about the house.”

  “What about mealtime?” Camilla asked. “Won’t you be joining us then?”

  “Only for dinner,” he said. “I can manage the rest myself. The coach house is set up for light housekeeping, and I can work straight through the day out there, with plenty of room for office space. But this isn’t why I wanted to see you. If I’m to stay on here for a time, I’ll need to know your wishes in various matters.”

  Camilla nodded. She had no idea what he expected of her.

  “If you choose,” he went on, “you can make final decisions from here, just as your grandfather used to do. Even though he remained at Thunder Heights, he never let the reins go slack. It’s to be hoped that you’ll follow in his footsteps.”

  His face was expressionless, but Camilla could hardly believe that he meant what he was saying.

  “How could I possibly—”

  He broke in at once. “Or you can go down to New York yourself and meet the directors of his business holdings and discuss problems with them whenever you like.”

  Now she was sure he was baiting her. “I can’t make decisions concerning matters I know nothing of.”

  “I agree.” He nodded as though her answer satisfied him. “A few days ago you said you wanted to learn about your grandfather’s affairs. If you like, we can meet for a time every day so that we can go into them together.”

  She could imagine him as a stern, remote tutor, and herself as his humble student. The prospect did not please her.

  “Isn’t there another choice? Since you understand all this so well, can’t you make the necessary decisions and talk to the businessmen in New York?”

  His smile was cool. “You’ve mistaken my identity,” he told her. “I’m Mercury, not Jove. I’ve played messenger for your grandfather, and on occasion I’ve advised him on engineering projects. But I’ve never made final decisions. I doubt that anyone would listen to me.”

  Camilla gave him a sidelong glance, once more aware of his look of vigor, as if he were made for an outdoor existence and never for the work of a clerk—or a messenger.

  “You’d have to begin at the very beginning,” she said with a sigh.

  “Shall we start tomorrow morning at nine, then?” he said.

  When she nodded, he stood up, as if only too eager to escape her presence. Whether she liked it or not, a period of tutelage lay ahead, with Ross Granger as her mentor.

  ELEVEN

  Now a tidal foam of cherry, pear, and apple blossoms surged north along the Hudson. This was a joy not to be experienced to any such extent in New York, and Camilla reveled in the pink and white beauty. She found a favorite spot beneath the plumes of a flowering peach where she could often sit overlooking the Hudson, watching the busy river traffic. Here petals drifted on every breeze, settling about her on the young spring grass.

  Escaping the house and its submerged antagonisms, she could make herself forget the episode of Mignonette’s poisoning. Or at least she could convince herself that in so lovely a world such forebodings as grew out of the incident were foolish. These days she felt an increasing, comforting affinity with the river.

  With Ross’s occasional help, she was learning to identify by name some of the boats that passed. She knew the cargoes of the flat barges, and the freighters that plied their way up and down the Hudson. She might have preferred her instruction from Booth, but he had little interest in the river.

  It was unfortunate that her business conferences with Ross were less amiable than her river discussions and that the tension between them increased. At first he tried conscientiously to make clear the complicated details on construction that he set before her. But with no background for understanding the vast reaches of the Judd building empire, and no natural flair for the figures and blueprints Ross laid before her, she was soon weltered in confusion and, at length, boredom. When she tried to talk to him about her own eager plans for the house and the grounds, he shrugged them aside as being of no consequence. This, more than anything else, infuriated her. Why should he expect of her talents that she did not have, and ignore the real gifts she felt she was bringing to Thunder Heights?

  The outdoor painting was nearly finished, and she could regard the old house with new pride. She had refused to have it painted a frivolous yellow, like Blue Beeches. Silver-gray seemed to suit its seasoned quality, and now its turrets gleamed a clean, pale gray against the surrounding green of the woods, with the roofs a dignified darker gray. The house had lost none of its eerie quality in the painting and there was still a somber air about it, but at least it was handsome again, as it had been in its youth. Camilla had already had the satisfaction of seeing passengers on the riverboats look up at the house and gesture in admiration.

  Yet all this Ross ignored, as though she were a child playing with toys and not to be taken seriously. He thought it a waste of time and money to trouble about the house when there were matters of moment at stake. The real quarrel between them, however, came over the bridge.

  Perhaps the matter would not have brought on such a crisis if she and Ross had not been particularly at odds with each other that day. Their disagreement came over the improvements she insisted upon for the coach house. So far Booth had not found a saddle horse for her, but Camilla wanted the stable to be ready for one when it was found. The invasion of his premises with pounding and sawing and the noise of workmen had irritated Ross. The place had been all right, he said—let it alone!

  As a consequence he was shorter than usual at their morning sessions in the library, which had become their schoolroom. When he mentioned the bridge out of a clear sky one morning and said they must soon go seriously to work on this as an important future project, she asked flatly why they should consider building a bridge across the Hudson, with all the enormous expense and complications such an undertaking would involve. Mr. Pompton was urging her to sell more and more of her holdings and invest the money in other ways. He thought it foolish of Ross to try to teach her anything of her grandfather’s business affairs, and she was ready to agree with Mr. Pompton.

  R
oss contained himself and tried to be patient about explaining the matter.

  “Camilla, you must realize that for miles up and down the river, there is no way for people and commerce to cross, except by ferry. How do you think this country can continue to grow, if those who have the means and the imagination shun their responsibility? Can’t you see what such a bridge would mean to the entire Hudson valley? And can’t you imagine how it would look?”

  His hands moved in a wide gesture, as if he built before her eyes a great span of steel and concrete. He had come to life as she had never seen him do before. She had not thought of him as a man who could dream and the realization surprised her. Nevertheless, she could not go along with so staggering a project.

  “Did Grandfather think such a plan practical?” she challenged.

  Ross looked thoroughly exasperated. Perhaps all the more so because for a moment he had let down the guard he seemed to hold against her.

  “He was certainly for the idea in the beginning. I’ll admit he lost interest in a great many things in the last few years, and perhaps he was no longer as pressingly keen on the bridge as he was at the start, but I’m sure he never gave up the idea completely. The legislature in Albany is interested. I’ve appeared before committees more than once. And we’re in a position to underbid the field when the time is ready for action. But a great deal of preparatory work must be done. The location we will recommend must be settled on. Materials must be selected well ahead of time, construction contracts worked out in advance—oh, a thousand details must be taken care of before we can even present our story for a final contract.”

  He reached into a briefcase and drew out a sheaf of engineering drawings he had brought into the library.

  “Here—you might as well see what I’m talking about,” and he spread before her the detailed drawings for a suspension bridge across the Hudson.

  None of them had any meaning for Camilla, but she could recognize the gigantic nature of the project, and she could well imagine the myriad difficulties it would represent. Perhaps her grandfather would have taken to the task eagerly in his younger days, but she could well imagine his shrinking from its complexities in his last years.

  “For one thing,” she said, trying to sound reasonable, “I don’t see why such a bridge hasn’t been built before, if it’s really needed. Would it justify the amount of traffic it would handle?”

  “With that reasoning,” Ross said, “no one would ever try anything that hadn’t been done before. But of course we’ve looked into that very question, and I’ve been able to convince the authorities that the bridge is needed. However, we’d be building for the future as well. You don’t think traffic is going to remain at the horse and wagon stage, or even be confined to trains and boats with the motor car coming into use, do you? Roads and more roads are going to be needed. And bridges to connect them, as we’ve never needed bridges before!”

  He almost fired her with his enthusiasm. She had never seen him so eager and alive and persuasive. The picture he was painting was one to stir the imagination. Yet her grandfather, who knew a great deal about such things, had held back, had not been ready. His reasons had probably been good ones, and not merely the reasons of a man grown fearful and tired. She could not know. And since she didn’t know, she could not take so reckless an action as to let Ross go ahead on this.

  She rubbed her temples wearily with her fingertips and drew back from the papers Ross laid before her.

  “If such a bridge needs to be built, let someone else build it,” she said. “With Grandfather gone, it’s not for us.”

  Ross stared at her for a moment. Then he scooped up his papers and went out of the room without another word. Camilla knew how angry he was. For a long while she sat on at the library table wondering despairingly what to do.

  Then a slow, resentful anger began to grow in her as well. Somehow Ross Granger always managed to put her in the wrong, and she would not have it. He was not going to involve her in the frightening responsibility of building bridges. Only recently there had been a terrible disaster where a new bridge had collapsed, killing a great many people. Remembering the dreadful stories and drawings in the newspapers, her will to oppose him strengthened. There could be no bridge built under the Judd name unless she gave her consent, and she did not mean to give it.

  After that, matters went badly between them. The morning “lessons” became painfully formal, with Ross performing a duty in which he plainly had no interest, until they finally ended altogether. Camilla had a feeling that he might resign again at any moment, and she was resolved to let him go. He, more than anything else, was the fly in her ointment these days. Even Mr. Pompton agreed with her about the bridge, when she told him of it a few days later.

  It was a good thing there were other satisfactions for her. Letty had found two skillful seamstresses and Camilla had sent for dress goods and household materials from New York, throwing herself into an orgy of sewing. A whole new wardrobe was being prepared for her, as well as a new wardrobe for the house.

  Hortense had been indifferent to an offer of new clothes for herself. In her own eyes she was dressed in the grand styles she had admired as a girl, and she preferred them, she said firmly, to the ridiculous way women dressed today. As for Letty, she was satisfied with her own soft, drifting gowns, and Camilla had to admit that they suited her.

  Having new clothes was a pleasure she had never been able to indulge to such an extent before, and she was feminine enough to enjoy it wholeheartedly.

  Lately she had caught Booth’s eyes upon her admiringly more than once, and she had been pleasantly aware of his approval. Since the day when she had gone out to the coach house to talk to him, she had continued to be drawn to him in an oddly uneasy way. She was not altogether comfortable with him, but she could not help but feel flattered by his admiration.

  One late afternoon in May Camilla sat on the marble bench in the rear garden, savoring the fragrant company of Aunt Letty’s “herb people.” She could always find balm for her spirits here, and things to think about as well. It pleased her that she was learning to identify the herbs and could watch their progress with recognition.

  Lungwort had followed coltsfoot, with early blooming flowers of pink and blue. Wild thyme sprouted between the stones around the sundial. The bee balm was growing quickly, and Camilla loved to pinch off a thin green leaf and rub it between her fingers for the lemony scent. Rosemary, Letty said, belonged to warm climates and always faded away in pained surprise at the first touch of winter. But she loved it and planted it anew every spring—so it was up again now, with its narrow leaves breathing more fragrance into the garden.

  It was good to sit here and breathe the sweet and tangy perfumes, pleased that she was beginning to separate one scent from another.

  She had worked hard inside the house today, helping the seamstress with the rich materials that had come from New York and which were now bringing new life to the dreary interior of the house. Rose damask draperies in the parlor would give the room a softer, more gracious look. The dining-room wallpaper was now a cool, pale green that didn’t give her indigestion every time she looked at it. The draperies there were to be a rich golden color—luxurious and expensive. She could imagine their folds as they would hang richly at the dining room windows, and satisfaction flowed through her over what she had accomplished and still meant to accomplish.

  The feeling swept her weariness away. She mustn’t waste what remained of the afternoon light. Her gaze, roving possessively, pridefully over the house, moved to small windows beneath the main roof. So far she had never explored the attic. Why not have a look at it now, while daylight lasted?

  After one last breath of the fragrant garden, she went inside and up two flights of the octagon staircase. At one end of the third-floor wing, a narrower, enclosed flight led to the attic. She found candles and matches and climbed the final steep steps that ended in the low-ceilinged area above.

  Up here the air was dusty an
d dim, but she lighted two of her candles and set one of the small holders on a shelf, retaining the other to carry about. Beneath the eaves of the house, she was more conscious of the irregularities of the roof than she had been on the floors below. Overhead the ceiling beams slanted upward here, and down there, at sharp angles, with the dormers and gables that cut up the roof plainly evident. A room that must have been a servant’s bedroom had two dormers overlooking the front of the house, and along one side of the room, just beneath the ceiling slant, was a long row of clothes hooks. Perhaps some long ago lady’s maid, ironing her mistress’s starched petticoats and lace-trimmed drawers, had hung them on those hooks as she finished them.

  Another room held old trunks, and Camilla raised the lid of one, to be greeted by the pungent odor of lavender buds and other mixtures of herbs in small bags, used against moths. Clothes of a style long past were stored here. Garments which must have belonged to her grandfather and grandmother, and undoubtedly to Letty, Hortense, and Althea as well.

  She moved on to a smaller room at the back of the house, carrying both candles now. Here she had to stoop to avoid dusty beams overhead, and a strand of cobwebs brushed across her face. There was another smell here, besides the stuffy odor of dust and the tang of herbal bags—the smell of leather. Holding her candle high, she saw that leather harness of various types had been tossed over the beams. These must have belonged to the day when Thunder Heights had kept its own horses and carriages. She reached up to touch dry leather, cracked and rough beneath her fingers. No care had been given these things in years.

  Circling a post in the middle of the room, she came upon a saddle which had been set apart from the rest of the gear. It lay across a slanting beam within easy reach, a single bright stirrup hanging toward the floor. It was, she saw, an elegant sidesaddle with elaborately embossed silver trimmings, and a silver horn for milady to hook her knee over. She had never seen so beautiful a saddle and she held up a candle to examine it more closely.