by Debra Diaz
“Lloyd will show you into the drawing room,” Edwina said, as more guests began to mount the veranda steps.
Lloyd escorted the ladies into a large, heavily furnished room, where two dozen or so young people had already gathered. Greetings were exchanged…the girls already knew almost everyone present. A uniformed butler stiffly presented them each with a glass of punch. Clarissa immediately went off on her rounds, leaving Genny alone with Lloyd, who seemed suddenly at a loss for words.
“A lovely evening, isn’t it?” he commented, and coughed nervously. “It’s been such a pleasant spring.”
“Oh, yes. Spring and summer are my favorite times of the year.” Genny refrained from tapping her foot. Why hadn’t she had the gumption to refuse to come here? She hadn’t wanted to rouse her father’s temper. But really, the futility of it! Her eyes moved listlessly across the room and paused on a bearded, well-dressed man of about thirty, who was blatantly staring at her. He stood near Edwina, sipping from a glass holding a dark amber liquid.
“Who is that?” she asked, turning to Lloyd.
“Who?” he said, peering through his monocle. “Oh, you haven’t met Slade? But of course you haven’t. Allow me to introduce you.”
She wasn’t sufficiently interested to endure an introduction…she’d only been mildly curious, but she suffered herself to be led across the floor. The man set his glass down on the butler’s passing tray and turned to face her.
“Slade Malone, may I present Miss Genny Romayne? Miss Genny, this is a friend of mine from the university.”
“Miss Romayne.” Mr. Malone gallantly bent over her hand. “I am always pleased to meet true daughters of the South. The rumors of their beauty reach far and wide, and may I say they are not exaggerated.”
“Such flattery, Mr. Malone! Am I to understand you’re not from the South?”
He made a mock bow. “I regret to say, I am not.”
She laughed lightly. “Your accent, sir, is unfamiliar to me. Where are you from?”
“Have you ever been out west, Miss Romayne?”
“No, I haven’t.” It seemed as distant as another planet, but Genny was determined not to be left alone with Lloyd, so she engaged herself in a spirited discussion with Slade Malone. In a few moments several people converged upon them, complimenting Genny on her dress, exclaiming over her hair, and she quickly became the center of attention as she exchanged pleasantries with her friends. Mr. Malone stood back and seemed to enjoy the picture she made until one of the chaperones approached and gained his attention.
After a few moments Genny’s friends drifted away, while she paused to glance impatiently about the room for a timepiece. A small clock on one of the dainty tables revealed the time to be only half past eight.
“Miss Genny.” There was a dry cough behind her, and she turned to see Lloyd with an uncertain smile on his lips. “Are you, by some happy chance, interested in lepidopterans?”
“I beg your pardon!”
“Oh, I do beg your pardon, Miss Genny! I meant butterflies.”
“Butterflies? I daresay I never gave them much thought. I detest bugs, you know.”
“Bugs!” Lloyd couldn’t have appeared more horrified had she uttered an obscenity. “My dear Miss Genny, butterflies are not bugs! They are exquisite creatures, magnificent — such colors — ”
Genny yawned. Fortunately Lloyd had turned to replace his monocle, which had fallen out of his eye and was swinging agitatedly about his chest, and so failed to notice her lack of enthusiasm. He peered at her myopically and said, “I have a collection of some very interesting specimens in the next room. Would you allow me to show them to you?”
On the verge of declining, Genny glimpsed an opportunity to make Lloyd think twice about proposing marriage. She gave him a tight smile and said, “Just for a moment, Mr. Grayson.”
He opened the door, and they stepped into a dimly-lit room with an unpleasant, musty smell faintly tinged with the odor of some sort of chemical. Glass cases lined the walls, and inside them reposed specimens of virtually every kind of insect imaginable, pinned to a dark cloth backing.
“How horrible,” she said, putting her handkerchief to her nose. “How utterly pitiful they look.”
Lloyd’s face fell. “Miss Genny, if I might say so myself, these are wonderful specimens!”
“Specimens of death, you mean! I declare they’re right depressing. What on earth do you do with them?”
“Why, study them, of course.”
“Study them? Why? I must say I wouldn’t have these horrible creatures in my house.”
“Miss Genny, if I may be so bold…should a time ever come that you and I should, legally, of course…share a house, you would never have to gaze at my collection if you didn’t desire it.”
“I hate them,” she announced. “I will not have them in my house.” She pretended to be surprised. “Why, Mr. Grayson, what on earth do you mean? Are you supposing that we might one day live together as man and wife? Because I must tell you, I would never dream of coming between a man and his insects!”
Lloyd had broken into a sweat. This time he didn’t seem to notice that his monocle had fallen, and he squinted at her in the dimness. “Miss Genny — ”
Genny put a hand to her forehead. “That smell – I fear I’ve developed a most severe headache. My sister and I must be leaving. I’m terribly sorry.”
“How dreadful. I am so sorry.” He seemed to be about to say something when he caught sight of one of the servants, signaling to him from the doorway. He excused himself and walked away from her with a brisk, loose-jointed gait. Genny followed him across the room and found Clarissa in a group of girls, yelling with laughter.
“Clarissa, it’s time we went home,” she said in a low voice, when her sister paused to catch her breath.
“Is Eli here already?” Clarissa asked, her eyes wide.
“No. We’ll ask for the Grayson’s carriage.”
“No, Genny! I’m not ready to go yet!”
“Is something wrong?” Edwina squeezed through the crowd toward them, laying her hand on Genny’s arm.
“Besides, Edwina has asked us to spend the night and I told her we would!” Clarissa glared balefully at Genny, who returned the look and then turned sweetly to their hostess.
“This is so nice of you, Edwina, but I couldn’t possibly. I have a blinding headache. I’m afraid that Clarissa and I will have to leave now.”
“I’m not going!” Clarissa cried. “And you can’t make me!”
“Clarissa, if you don’t — ”
“Oh, please don’t fuss, girls!” Edwina began to look alarmed. “I’ll have one of our servants drive you home, Genny. Lloyd will be glad to escort you.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t hear of it, Edwina. I shall be awfully vexed if you make Lloyd leave his guests. Please say nothing to him.”
“Is there a problem, ladies?”
They all glanced up to see Slade Malone regarding them with concern. Genny saw his eyes dip to her low, rounded neckline, but she was accustomed to such covert glances and didn’t give it a second thought.
“Genny is ill. I’ve told her Lloyd simply must escort her home.”
“I think I can help, if you will permit me, Miss Grayson. I was just leaving to return to my hotel. I’ve spoken to your brother and thanked him for his hospitality, but I must rise early in the morning to board the train.” He turned to Genny, his hands clasped behind his back. “I would be honored, Miss Romayne, if you will allow me to accompany you. Lloyd has already sent for his carriage.”
“Yes, yes, do go, Genny,” Clarissa urged. “Tell Mama I won’t be home tonight and not to send Eli until in the morning.”
Genny smiled grimly at her sister. “Yes, dear, I will. Mr. Malone, this is most kind of you.”
She bade her hostess farewell and made her excuses to Mrs. Grayson, who sat in a corner with the chaperones. She didn’t see Lloyd. She felt Mr. Malone’s hand, heavy and hard, underneath her elbow
as they stepped outside into the cool, night air. A quarter moon shone down from a clear, star-spotted sky.
“You didn’t seem to be enjoying the party, Miss Romayne,” he remarked, his hand tightening on her arm as he handed her into the Grayson’s carriage. There was a subtle difference in his voice…it wasn’t as respectful as before, and seemed to stress her name almost with mockery. A small warning signal ticked off somewhere in her brain and she glanced up, trying to see his face, but the interior of the carriage was dim.
“It’s just that I have a headache. Mr. Malone, you really needn’t hold my arm now.”
He loosened his grip, but his arm went back across her shoulders. “You society girls,” he said softly. “You’re all alike, Yankee or rebel.”
He ran his finger lightly around the neckline of her bodice. Shocked, with the warning bell at full clang she gasped and pushed him away, staring at him from her corner of the carriage.
“Mr. Malone, my father will be most displeased to learn of your behavior!”
“Indeed, Miss Romayne?” His voice was contemptuous, and now she could see a harsh, ill-natured cast to his features. “And what of your own behavior? Your dress, your flirting little smiles. Your going off alone into a dark room with Mr. Grayson.”
She was flabbergasted. “You’ve made a mistake,” she said at last, a little breathlessly. “You — you don’t understand our ways.”
“As I said, you’re all alike. And so are men, whether from North or South or the wild, wild West.”
“My father will —”
“Your father doesn’t scare me, Miss Romayne. It will be your word against mine, if you would be so foolish as to tell him. What will he say when he discovers you willingly got into a carriage with a stranger?” He laughed quietly. “Now come here so I can bid you a proper goodbye.”
She opened her mouth to scream but he moved swiftly and jerked her toward him. Her breath left her in a grunt. A melee of thrashing arms and legs, and the stifled screams of her own hot, determined rage filled the carriage. It drew to a stop, and Malone instantly pulled away from her. She huddled in the corner and stared at him wildly, too shocked to even think what to say.
“When you’ve grown up, perhaps we can resume our acquaintance.” The man laughed shortly and got out of the carriage, then leaned back inside, offering his arm. She ignored it and got out on her own side, half falling, her dress askew and her hair tumbling out of its combs.
The driver was adjusting something on the horse and didn’t even look at her, apparently assuming that the gentleman would see the lady to the door. Slade Malone gave a mocking bow. She turned and fled toward the house, slipped inside and bolted the door behind her. She paused in the empty kitchen to correct her appearance, in case someone saw her. Then she flew up the servants’ stairway to her room.
A stunned numbness pervaded her entire body. It was almost as if he had raped her, not that she knew much about such things. If the drive had been longer he would have raped her! He was a crude and callous man…he had assaulted her and for that he could go to jail. Her father would see that he paid a heavy price for what he’d done!
Why had he done it? How did he expect to get away with it?
And why, she thought, as she locked her bedroom door behind her, don’t I run and tell Father right away?
Because I know that Father will blame me. Philbert would be outraged, as he should be, but he would blame her — Genny — for leaving the party in the first place, and with a stranger. Certainly he would deal with Slade Malone first, but then he would decide that Genny needed protection, the protection of a husband. He would force her into marriage before she could say Jack Robinson.
Maybe it was what she deserved. She’d been a fool to get into a carriage with a stranger. Still, he was Lloyd’s friend, and she had naturally assumed she could trust Lloyd’s judgment. But, of course, he didn’t know the truth about Mr. Malone. Mr. Malone was obviously not sane.
I’ve got to leave! The thought came from nowhere, but she caught it and held onto it and examined it minutely. She had to leave this city. If she left, she would escape two things — the possibility of ever seeing Mr. Malone again, and the probability of an unwanted husband in her immediate future.
Anger began to replace shock. She pulled off her dress, her petticoats and corset, and threw them in a heap on the floor. She wished she had done some lasting damage to that…that madman. She wished she could cry out to the world what he had done and have him put away for life! But no, that would never do. No one, not even her family, must ever know, for if Clarissa heard it she would blab the news far and wide. And it was too humiliating. She shuddered at the thought of what the gossips would say.
Maybe that was why Malone thought he could get away with what he had done. Perhaps he had done it before, even made a habit of it, and knew that young ladies were not anxious to have such things made known. Maybe some young “ladies” even encouraged him! At any rate, he had not seemed concerned that she would tell anyone, and that alone told her that he did not think rationally. He was a dangerous man.
Shaking now, she crawled into bed, squeezed her eyes shut to stop the burning behind them, and began to lay her plans.
CHAPTER THREE
The late morning sunlight pricked her eyelids, making her groan and press her face into the pillow. A warm breeze floated into the bedroom from the open window, accompanied by light traffic noises from the street. Birds twittered and chirped in the tall ash tree outside her window, and Genny heard the slow swishing sound of someone sweeping the veranda below.
“I declare, Miss Genny,” came an irate voice from the middle of the room. “It looks like a cyclone come through here. How come you scatter your clothes like that?”
Genny raised herself up on an elbow and watched Abra moving about, picking up her discarded clothes, her gloves, her fan. The slender young black woman straightened and peered sharply at her.
“You look funny,” she said.
“Never mind,” Genny said irritably.
Abra raised an eyebrow and puckered her lips. “Your mama’s a mite provoked you left the party early last night.”
As if on cue, the bedroom door opened and Gwendolyn swept into the room, wearing a high-collared gown with purple and pink stripes. “Abra,” she said, “please leave us for a moment.”
Abra exchanged a look with Genny, gathered up the wrinkled clothes, and left the room.
“Virginia.” Gwendolyn tried to assume a severe tone. “I am most displeased with you. Why did you not inform me last night that Clarissa was not coming home? Eli had to make a completely unnecessary trip.”
Genny plucked at the edge of the sheet. “I wasn’t feeling well.”
“Indeed? Are you coming down with something?”
Genny shrugged.
“And who is this Slade somebody who Clarissa says escorted you home? I’ve certainly never heard of him.”
“He’s a friend of the Grayson’s from — I don’t know where.”
“Well, you shouldn’t have done it. There are men who might take advantage of being in a carriage alone with a young lady. Not that such a thing would happen with any of the Grayson’s acquaintances.”
Genny turned her face away so that her mother couldn’t see it. Tears burned in her eyes. There was a clatter on the stairs and Clarissa burst into the room, dancing and swirling the skirt of Genny’s blue gown. “Oh, it was such a wonderful party!” she exclaimed. “Edwina is such a dear, dear friend! Genny, she’s invited us to go with her family on a picnic by the river next week! Won’t it be fun?”
“Oh, yes, great fun.” Genny leaned her head back against the mahogany headboard and closed her eyes, having a vision of the lanky, loose-jointed Lloyd frolicking about with his butterfly net. “But I’m not going.”
* * * *
Genny had no sooner finished dressing than someone knocked loudly on her bedroom door. Before she could reply, the door was pushed open and Abigail stood there, her
reddish-brown braids poking stiffly out from either side of her freckled face.
“Papa wants to see you right away,” she announced importantly. “In his office.”
Genny mentally braced herself and brushed past her sister. She ignored her brothers, who were punching each other on the staircase, and tapped lightly on her father’s office door. At his gruffly-given bidding, she entered the room and sat down in a chair before his desk.
“Virginia,” said Philbert, “there is something I wish to discuss with you.”
“Yes, Father.” Genny felt a qualm of anxiety. She sat perfectly still and watched her father intently. It was almost an unnatural stillness, Philbert observed, and thought it quite unlike her usual display of impatience and resentment. He cleared his throat and idly shuffled some papers on his desk.
“Clarissa tells me you have refused to go to the Grayson’s picnic. Would you mind telling me why?”
Genny thought vaguely, Something is happening to me. Some underlying sense of rebellion, felt only superficially for some time, was rising to the fore. She could almost feel her heart hardening, her emotions growing cold. After all she had been through, no one understood her, no one held any sympathy for her. True, they couldn’t know what had occurred in the carriage, but couldn’t they look at her and see that something had happened to her? Would anyone care if they did know, or would they say she had brought it on herself?
She smiled faintly at her father. Philbert thought it a very odd smile. “Is it really important?” she said softly. “After all, it’s just a picnic.”
“Yes, confound it, it is important! It’s important that you stop this infernal dillydallying and get yourself a husband! Good heavens, girl! Who are you waiting for, the Prince of Wales?”
“Of course not, Father.”
“Well, it’s good to see that you have at least some sense. Besides, he already has a wife. And I’m telling you — not asking you — I’m telling you that you are to make yourself available to Lloyd Grayson whenever he wishes to see you, and what’s more, when he proposes I want you to accept him. He is heir to quite a fortune, and he’s quite sensible. You don’t know that yet. But he’ll be a good match for you.”