Shadow Bride

by Jane Peart

  chapter

  17

  Arbordale

  Virginia, 1879

  THE SMALL COMMUNITY of Arbordale was abuzz. A medieval castle, so rumor had it, was being transported stone by stone from England and rebuilt on Virginia soil! And its eccentric owner was said to be an English lord or perhaps a duchess.

  For months, dray wagon after dray wagon had rumbled through the main street from the harbor city of Norfolk to the dock at the narrow point of the river. When the crated contents were loaded onto the ferry and taken across to the wooded island known locally as Hunter’s Haven, conjecture ran rampant.

  The island itself was so heavily forested that not much could be seen from the town side of the river, so very few had even caught so much as a glimpse of the building. Although many tried ferreting out what was going on over there through workmen on the job, the actual structure remained shrouded in secrecy. As the mystery continued unsolved, curiosity grew, with more and more questions asked and none answered.

  Gossip flew faster and more furiously than ever when it was learned that the rebuilding was almost completed and that the owners would soon take possession of the reconstructed dwelling.

  When the new residents arrived, however, it was during the night, with no one in Arbordale the wiser. Prepared for the arrival of possible royalty, the townspeople experienced some disappointment when the true identity of the owner was discovered. Instead of the earl or duke they had imagined, the occupants of the island mansion proved to be an attractive widow and her young son.

  For all their effort, Arbordale citizens did not find out much more than that. Through local tradespeople it became known that she had brought a small staff of servants with her, that the boy was attending Brookside School for Boys as a day pupil, and that she kept a small stable and had hired a groom.

  Gradually the avid interest in the house on the island diminished as other, more immediate events captured the attention of the townspeople. Still, when they thought of her at all, they wondered where she had come from and why anyone so young and pretty would choose to isolate herself on a remote estate far from the possibility of a social life—the distractions and the cultural advantages offered even by a town the size of theirs.

  Blythe was unaware of the speculation that had swirled about her coming. She was busy and reasonably content, for there was much for her to do upon moving in at Avalon. Periodically, furniture from Dower House arrived, and decisions as to its placement had to be made. Then, Corin’s library, a valuable collection with many rare first editions, had been sent. When the books arrived, they had to be unpacked and shelved again in the fine oak bookcases that had been rebuilt in the transported room.

  In addition, the rest of the house onto which the library and “keeping room,” the staircase and balconied gallery from Dower House were added had to be completely furnished. Blythe spent hours thumbing through furniture catalogs and wallpaper books, making selections.

  One reward in this year of transition, however, was the reassurance that Blythe’s decision to move to Virginia was the right decision. This was the first time a home had been a place of her own choosing. She had never felt she belonged at Montclair, after which came a series of temporary living places—the hotel in Bermuda, the Ainsleys’ London town house, the rented cottage in Kentburne. Through all those years she had experienced a transitory feeling, as if she were “a bird of passage,” always on the brink of change. All that time beneath the surface of her daily life, she had felt unsettled, as if she had no real home.

  Though Blythe was occupied throughout the hours of the week while Jeff was at school, as soon as he got home, her life revolved around her son.

  They changed into riding clothes and rode the many wooded paths on the island. Jeff was becoming an expert rider, and Blythe was learning the finer points of horsemanship not afforded by the early days of riding bareback at her father’s California ranch.

  Not often, but once in a while, Blythe recalled the times she had ridden with Rod along similar woodland trails. Usually she was able to rein in her wayward thoughts, knowing how dangerous they were to her peace of mind, but most of the time her love for Rod was sealed within her barren heart. Determinedly she did not allow herself the luxury of dwelling on the past, even that part of the past she considered the happiest time of her life.

  As the first year at Avalon passed into the second and then the third, Blythe’s existence took on a pleasant, if solitary, pattern. Her life, of course, was centered around Jeff. As the little boy grew into a self-reliant youngster, excelling in his lessons at school and evidently popular with his classmates, he would often invite a special friend home for the weekend. Blythe always welcomed Jeff’s friends, and soon invitations to Avalon were prized by those fortunate to receive them. The two boys Jeff liked best, the Bancroft brothers from Williamsburg, were favorite and frequent guests, and as Jeff got older, he spent many weekends in their home as well.

  At first Blythe was reluctant to let Jeff go where his name might provoke questions, but as the years went by, she felt less and less fear of discovery. Continuing to use her maiden name “Dorman,” however, seemed wise, since she did want to avoid detection by anyone known to the Camerons.

  When they had lived in Virginia for six years, Jeff celebrated his twelfth birthday by asking Blythe if he could become a boarding student for the coming fall term. His request shocked her because it proved to her that Jeff was growing up, capable of independent thought. In spite of the prospect of lonely weeks without him, she agreed.

  Nevertheless, on the September day he left to begin the school year as a boarding student, Blythe was stunned by her feelings. When he gave her his good-bye kiss and hug, she was startled to realize he was almost as tall as she. Holding him at arms’ length, she gazed into his face for a long moment, noting that it was losing its boyish chubbiness and becoming the face of a young man.

  Jeff’s good looks bore the unmistakable mark of his father, but she also saw something of her father, Jed Dorman, in them—his strong jaw and high cheekbones. Before releasing Jeff, she sighed. How quickly the years had passed!

  Although Blythe knew she would miss Jeff terribly, she had not anticipated the full impact of his absence. The entire household had operated on Jeff’s schedule—the breakfast hour set in time for him to be ferried across the river to catch the Brookside School omnibus, a hearty English tea when he got home at four, a horseback ride together before dinner.

  Most of all, Blythe missed their evenings together in the library, with the curtains drawn against the night, the lamps lighted, a fire glowing in the fireplace. It had been such a comfort to see Jeff sitting at the library table, his tousled head bent over his homework when she looked up from her embroidery or book. There were no more such evenings.

  Blythe recalled Corin’s gentle warning to her, recalling situations of some of his own boyhood friends, only sons of doting mothers. Determined she would never become one of those odious creatures—a widowed mother who loaded guilt on her son for her own misfortune—she resolved to accept cheerfully Jeff’s decision to spend an occasional weekend with some friend rather than come home.

  Indeed, she attempted to cultivate an interesting life of her own independent of Jeff’s companionship. She spent a great deal of time reading not just the popular romantic novels, but books on history and biography, particularly those chronicling the lives of women who had had significant accomplishments. In a time when women’s roles were strictly limited, it pleased Blythe to think that some were overcoming the prejudice of both race and gender.

  She had always felt her lack of formal education to be one of the subtle barriers separating her from Malcolm, and now that her son would be well-educated as well, she set about to learn as much as possible.

  She began to teach herself Spanish, with the idea of one day returning to Spain for a longer period of time. She took up china painting, discovering a talent for it, and spent hours painting delicate flowers on porc
elain, then firing and glazing them and displaying them in racks she had built around the wall of the windowed breakfast room. One lovely demitasse set, on which she had created her own design of Virginia’s native flower—the pink dogwood blossom—was sent as a gift to Lydia Ainsley.

  Nonetheless, try as she might to keep herself busy and occupied during the long winter while Jeff was away at school, as the summer of 1885 approached, Blythe was eagerly awaiting his homecoming and making plans for his vacation.

  It had long been Blythe’s desire to take Jeff to California, and since the completion of the transcontinental railroad, it was now possible to travel to the Pacific coast in comfortable Pullman cars. The itinerary she planned was extensive—first to Sacramento, where as a little girl she had stayed at a convent school while her father, Jed, was making his fortune in the gold fields of the Sierra mountains. She also wanted to make a sentimental journey to the northern part of the state, to revisit Lucas Valley, the scene of some of her happiest years. There she had grown up, had met, and fallen in love with the stranger who had stumbled onto their ranch, Malcolm Montrose, Jeff’s father.

  She was anxious that Jeff should know that part of her history and his own background, too, so, when Jeff came home to Avalon the last of May, Blythe had made all the arrangements for them to leave at once for the West—

  Part V

  All losses are restored and sorrows end.

  —Shakespeare, from the Sonnets

  chapter

  18

  London

  1885

  EVEN IF Garnet had not been expecting her, the slam of the front door, the clatter of sturdy boots on the stairs, then the rush of running feet along the hall outside her bedroom, would have signaled that Faith was home for the holidays.

  In the very next moment the door burst open and her rosy-cheeked thirteen-year-old daughter exploded into the room. “Mummy! I’m home!” Then she plunked herself down on the nearest chair and thrust her black-stockinged legs in front of her, sighing, “Oh, heavenly! It’s so good to be out of that prison! I can’t wait to get out of this wretched uniform!”

  She yanked impatiently at the thick tie with her school emblem on the front, then tugged at the wide, square collar under the serge pinafore. “When are we going down to the country? I’m absolutely dying to get on Fazia and ride forever and ever!”

  Garnet smiled indulgently at Faith’s outburst, while wondering why she and Jeremy were paying such outrageously enormous fees to the boarding school that was supposedly turning this hoyden into a lady! She repressed the urge to lean forward and tuck back the tumbling hair that was falling forward into the wide, dark-lashed eyes. Even at this age, Garnet mused, her daughter gave promise of being incredibly beautiful someday.

  Suddenly Faith jerked herself upright, knocking the wide-brimmed blue felt hat askew, and gave her mother a sweeping glance.

  “Oh, bother! You’re going out, aren’t you?” she accused. “My first night home, and you and Papa have a social engagement!” she wailed. “I haven’t seen you in nearly three months!”

  “I know, darling, and I’m sorry. It couldn’t be helped. It is a business event we must attend.”

  As if taking the explanation as a cue, Garnet got up from where she had been sitting in front of her dressing table and revolved slowly in front of her daughter. Her gown was of the finest royal blue velvet, cut with a portrait neckline that showed to advantage the lovely line of her shoulders. Stylish puffed sleeves narrowed to elbow length, and from a long fitted waistline, the skirt was gathered into a modified bustle and draped into a small train. “How do I look?” she asked.

  “You look gorgeous—naturally,” Faith admitted reluctantly.

  “I suppose I should accept that as a compliment,” commented Garnet, lifting her eyebrows.

  “Of course, but then you always do!” Faith pretended a scowl. “I shall never be anywhere near as striking looking as you. So, where are you and Papa off to tonight? To a ball?”

  “Oh, no, not a ball. To a dinner party at the home of your father’s publisher. One of the company’s American executives is here in London, and Mr. Sewell is entertaining for him.”

  “Will there be dancing?” Faith’s foot tapped unconsciously.

  “No dancing, I’m afraid.” Garnet shook her head regretfully. “Nothing but a long, eight-course dinner and dainty conversation among the ladies while the gentlemen linger over brandy and cigars discussing the publishing business for an hour afterwards. It will probably be a deadly dull evening with no sparkle, no surprises!”

  But as it happened, and not for the first time in her life, Garnet would be proven wrong. Although the first part of the evening proceeded pretty much according to Garnet’s predictions, once the ladies excused themselves from the dining room and gathered in one of the twin parlors of the Sewell’s’ London town house, the evening became much more interesting.

  Expecting the usual exchange of trivia—gossip, comments on the current theater offerings, the doings of the Royals and members of the Court—Garnet settled on one of the sofas, distracting herself by looking around the over-decorated room with her characteristically critical eye.

  The interior followed the fashion of all upper-class homes of the time. The furniture, carved and curlicued, was richly upholstered in dark plush fabric and accented with small petit point pillows. Gilt-framed paintings of gloomy landscapes hung about the room, and marble-topped tables held glass domes encasing arrangements of artificial flowers.

  As the other ladies took seats, Garnet found herself studying each one, wondering which, if any, would be an amusing conversationalist. Anyone at all would be welcome to ease the tedium of waiting for the gentlemen to join them and to enliven the conversation with more pertinent topics and a little harmless flirtation.

  All of the women were exquisitely dressed. There must be a small fortune in dressmaker fees represented among the less than dozen women gathered in this one room, Garnet surmised. She had often heard it said among American socialites that a wife was a living advertisement for her husband’s wealth. From the look of this assemblage of English wives, the British had drawn the same conclusion.

  As the beruffled maid brought around the tray of demitasse and mints, murmurs of individual conversations drifted around the room. As Garnet lifted a tiny cup of after dinner coffee and helped herself to a chocolate wafer, Lucille Edgerton spoke.

  “Garnet, my dear, I sat next to your handsome husband at dinner tonight, and he informed me that you are departing soon for America.”

  “Yes, to visit my mother. We plan to travel with her and my brother to our nephew’s wedding in Massachusetts.”

  “How nice for you. And how long do you expect to be away?”

  “Oh, several months, I expect,” Garnet replied.

  “I suppose when traveling such a great distance, it behooves one to make a real visit of it,” Mrs. Edgerton mused. “However, I fear Jeremy will be devastated during your absence.”

  “Not at all. Jeremy has business to attend to in his New York office, and I will join him after the wedding to sail back … to England.” Garnet gave a little shrug. “I almost said sail home. After all these years, I suppose I am beginning to think of England as home.”

  “And where did you used to call ‘home,’ if I may ask?” interjected a pretty woman with a gentle voice and warm smile, whose name had slipped Garnet’s memory.

  “Virginia.”

  “Virginia?” the other lady exclaimed, her eyes lighting up. “One of my dearest friends moved to Virginia a few years ago. I do miss her terribly. We were very close. As a matter of fact, my husband and I were godparents to her little boy. We plan to visit her there someday. Where in Virginia are you from, Mrs. Devlin?”

  “Oh, a place you’ve probably never heard of!” Garnet laughed. “Mayfield is very small. The nearest large town is Williamsburg, once the capital of the colonies.”

  “But that must be very near where my friend moved!”
declared the woman, and she got up from where she was sitting to join Garnet on the sofa. “Have you heard of a place called Arbordale … or of a school for boys called Brookside?”

  “Why, yes … I think if s about forty miles from Mayfield,” Garnet replied, interested now.

  “Wouldn’t it be a wonderful coincidence if you knew my friend, then? Her name is Blythe … Blythe Montrose.”

  A queer little prickle tingled along Garnet’s scalp, and her stomach gave a small lurch. Her fingers tightened on the handle of the delicate cup she was holding.

  “Her son, Jeff, attends Brookside,” the lady continued, not noticing Garnet’s startled reaction. “She sends us pictures, of course, but I long to see him myself. He is getting to be such a big fellow that I’m afraid he will forget all about us.” She paused. “If it would not be too much of an imposition, perhaps if I gave you her address, you might send her a note when you’re in Virginia … mention that we met? Oh, how rude of me, I don’t think I ever introduced myself properly. I’m Lydia Ainsley.”

  chapter

  19

  Cameron Hall

  Mayfield, Virginia 1885

  UPON HER ARRIVAL in Mayfield, Garnet was confronted by two facts for which she was unprepared. The first, merely disappointing, was that Rod was in Kentucky on a horse-buying trip, and she would have a further delay in telling him the astonishing news about Blythe.

  The second reality Garnet had to face was much harder to accept. She was distressed to see that her mother had aged visibly since their last meeting. Of course, Kate was nearing seventy. Her mother had always been there for all of the Cameron family—their strength, their anchor, their heart—the fact that she would not always be was a devastating thought.

  Still elegant, fastidious in her dress, Kate had become frail. The arthritis that afflicted her had cruelly twisted her once beautiful hands, and, as if aware of this, she wore lace mitts to cover their deformity. She also walked with some difficulty, using a cane. However, her head was still held regally and the slim shoulders kept as straight as she could manage. She never spoke of her pain and would not permit anyone else to. She was, as Garnet newly acknowledged in a rush of pride and tenderness, a magnificent lady.