“How can you be sure of that?” Mary Scarlett snapped.
Frankie shrugged. “Just a guess. But it sounds likely. I wonder what she’s like.”
“Like weird,” Donny supplied. “I heard from my first customer this morning that after she ran off and left Conrad practically standing at the altar, she married a bullfighter.”
“To each her own,” Frankie said with a grin. “Come to think of it, I go for guys with tight pants, too.” He cast a glance at Donny’s clinging white ducks.
“Please,” Mary Scarlett said, “can you two change the subject?”
She spent the next hour in misery while Frankie trimmed, washed, and dyed her hair. She could hardly wait to get back to Bolt’s place. She had so many questions for him. And, too, the conversation between Frankie and Donny kept drifting back to the fantastic exploits of the notorious Mary Scarlett Lamar. She thought she’d scream if they didn’t shut up. It seemed that the citizens of Savannah had taken the bare-bone facts of her life and embroidered them beyond recognition. She was now guilty of everything including the gross national debt and the ruination of at least a dozen men in Savannah, ten of whom she had never even met.
Ah, Savannah, she thought as Frankie put the finishing touches on her long, dark tresses, it’s so nice of you to welcome me home again!
Bolt would be at his office this afternoon. He had told Mary Scarlett earlier that he had a meeting with a client that wouldn’t wind up until five, so there was no need for her to rush back to his apartment. And she didn’t dare risk more gossip by dropping in on him at work. She decided to take a stroll to see if the center of the city had changed as much as the beauty shop on Broughton Street. She knew her main destination—the old Lamar house. But when she reached the corner of Broughton and Bull, she couldn’t quite work up the nerve to visit her former home just yet. She crossed Bull, headed east, then turned south at Abercorn. Without even thinking about it, she found herself heading for the Colonial Cemetery.
Probably because her parents had forbidden her to go there as a child, the old burying ground had always held a special fascination for her with its list of notable Georgians—James Habersham, Hugh McCall, Archibald Bulloch, and Declaration of Independence signer Button Gwinnett.
She found the cemetery in much better condition than she remembered. The wrought-iron fence had been repaired, the grass was neatly cut, and no litter defaced the silent tombs. It looked more like a park than a burial ground. Tourists wandered among the tall oaks, snapping photos, making grave rubbings, and consulting guidebooks and maps. Some of the older stones, which had been knocked over by Sherman’s troops back in 1862, now stood upright again for the first time in over a century. But many markers still bore the vandalism of Yankee soldiers who had defaced them by changing the dates and the names as they whiled away boring hours at the campsite.
Traffic flowed smoothly around the boundaries, the drivers keeping their horns silent out of respect for the dead. The place had an eerie stillness about it, even at this busy time of day.
Although the afternoon was hot and muggy, Mary Scarlett felt a chill as she walked past certain monuments. A sense of sadness overcame her at one point, so deep and hopeless that she glanced up from the tabby footpath she had been following. She realized the source of her inexplicable depression the moment she saw the marker. Near the spot where she stood lay the mass grave containing the remains of seven hundred victims of the terrible yellow fever epidemic of 1820. After a moment’s pause to regain her composure, she moved on quickly, drawn to another, slightly earlier grave.
As she neared the spot, clouds seemed to cover the sun, although a glance at the heavens told her the sky was still clear. A deeper chill, a deeper sadness gripped her. She could no longer hear birds singing or the sounds of traffic. She focused her gaze on the plain, weathered tablet ahead. The closer she came, the darker the skies turned until it seemed to be nighttime.
“‘My life is like the summer rose, That opens to the morning sky; And ere the shades of evening close, Is scattered on the ground—to die.’” She murmured the lines softly, trying to think where she had heard the verse, and why the words evoked such painful emotions that tears filled her eyes.
And then she saw it. The stark, gray stone beside a taller, green historical marker which read “DUELLIST’S GRAVE.” She spied the very verse she had just recited. It was printed at the bottom of the marker, attributed to the duellist’s brother, Baltimore poet Richard Henry Wilde.
With a sigh of grief, Mary Scarlett sank to the grass beside the stone. “Oh, James,” she whispered. “Why, my darling? Why?”
Her fingers trembling, she traced the weathered inscription. The stone should have felt warm from the sun, but instead seemed cold to the touch. Even with her eyes closed, she could read the epitaph. She had seen it in her dreams, her nightmares.
This Humble Stone records the filial piety of
JAMES WILDE, Esquire
late District Paymaster in the Army of the U.S.
He fell in a Duel on the 16th of January, 1815 by the hand of a man who, a short time ago, would have been friendless but for him and expired instantly in his 22nd year dying as he had lived: with unshaken courage and unblemished reputation.
By his untimely death the prop of a mother’s age is broken; the hope and consolation of sisters is destroyed, the pride of brothers humbled in the dust and a whole Family, happy until then.
Overwhelmed with affliction.
Once again, Mary Scarlett felt herself drifting into the past Still gripping the stone, she heard voices, far away at first, then close at hand. She opened her eyes to a cold, stormy night. The dark shoreline of the Savannah River. She was alone with young James Wilde, although a group of perhaps a dozen other men stood a distance away from the couple, near the boats at the water’s edge.
She was weeping, begging, mourning him already.
“Don’t do this, James. Please! I can’t bear it.”
“Dry your tears, sweetheart. I’ll be back when the sun comes up. I’m a far better shot than he is.”
“But no less a fool,” she sobbed.
Clinging to this man she loved with all her heart, trying to make him give up this dangerous business, she sensed that all was lost.
“James, you will not be back.” She stared up into his dark eyes, trying to make him understand. “I had a dream last night. I saw the duelling ground at Screvens Ferry. I saw it drenched in blood—your blood, my dearest. Think of your mother, your sisters, your brothers. James, think of me!”
“I am thinking of you and only you. He’ll not speak that way of the girl I love. As for your dream, it was woven of a woman’s fear. No more, no less. Watch for the rising sun, my love. I’ll be back in your arms before you know it. We’ll be together forever.”
Mary Scarlett’s vision of happiness faded into a cold, gray mist. The wind whipped around her. The water churned to dark foam. She stood alone now on the riverbank, searching through her tears for the first hint of the rising sun. A moment before daybreak, she felt a sharp pain through her chest. She could barely breathe. She sank to the damp ground, gasping.
When dawn finally broke, it was not the glorious gold that she had seen in happier times, but blood-red storm clouds tinged with dirty-gray. What little hope she had held in her heart faded in that fierce dawn.
The sound of oars drew her gaze. She struggled back to her feet. Straining to see across the river toward the South Carolina side, she spied a boat returning. She could not make out the figures, but she knew. She had known all along. She had guessed the outcome of this deadly folly even before James left for the duelling field.
Wrapping her black cloak more closely about her, she walked to the edge of the water. She held herself stiff and erect, like the soldier who had been her love. Her gaze never left the boat. Closer and closer it came, like a ghostly apparition out of the river fog. Finally, she could make out forms. Two men rowed
while a third supported the head of the man lying prostrate in the craft.
“Oh, James, my James,” she murmured. “Why? Why, my love, my life?”
The cold of the grave passed through her as the men pulled the boat ashore. “I am sorry,” one of them said in a husky whisper. “This should never have been.”
She didn’t wait for the men to haul the boat onto dry land. Wading into the icy water, her long skirts dragging her down, she went to him. She climbed into the boat and wrapped James in her trembling arms.
“So sorry.” His dying whisper was little more than a soft rush of air. “Love you … always…”
She leaned down, putting her lips to his, trying desperately to steal her James from the Dark Angel. But it was no use. The blood on his chest seeped into the fabric of her bodice, staining them both with his death. She thought for a moment she felt his lips move under hers.
“James, my dearest,” she murmured. “James, you cannot leave me. Stay, my love, stay!”
“Come away,” another made voice said gently. “The lad’s done, miss.”
The men forced her arms from around her dead lover and lifted her from the boat. She fought them, screaming his name, begging for death to take her, too. Finally, she fell to the ground, sobbing.
She felt a gentle hand on her arm. “Mary Scarlett? What in the world?”
Looking up through a torrent of tears, she was forced to squint against the bright sun at the dark figure leaning over her. Slowly, his features came into focus. Bolt stared down at her, his face darkly troubled.
She shook herself slightly. “Bolt? Is that really you?”
His voice seemed to come from far away. “Who were you expecting it to be?”
James, she thought without saying it aloud.
“What’s wrong, darlin’? Why are you so upset? And what are you doing out here in the cemetery?”
She glanced about. People—strangers—were staring. She must have made quite a spectacle of herself.
“Help me up,” she begged. “I’m all shaky. I don’t know what came over me, Bolt I came here just as a sightseer, thought I’d see if Savannah had changed while I was away. But something happened…”
“Well, that’s pretty obvious. But what?”
She wiped at the tears drying on her flushed cheeks. “I don’t know. I’m not sure I can explain it. It was sort of like a vision. But, Bolt, it was so real!’’
“Mary Scarlett, you’re hurt!” Bolt exclaimed. “You’ve got blood on your dress. What have you done to yourself?”
The horrible vision of her beloved’s bloody chest flashed back through her mind. For a brief, hysterical moment, she wondered if modern day DNA testing would identify the stains as the blood of 1815 duellist James Wilde.
Her knees went weak and she sagged against Bolt. “Just take me home,” she begged. “I’ll tell you about it when we get there. But if you don’t get me away from here, I swear to God, Bolt, I’m going to faint right here in the middle of the cemetery.”
He half-carried her to his car, parked on Abercorn Street. Once he had her in her seat, seat belt in place, he started the car and flipped the air-conditioning up to maximum.
He glanced at her, his face still solemn, but warm lights danced in his eyes. “I almost didn’t recognize you. Your hair.”
Still reeling from what she had experienced at James Wilde’s grave, Mary Scarlett made no sense of his remark at first. Then she remembered. Before coming to the cemetery, she had been to the beauty salon on Broughton Street. That memory brought back another. She could still hear Hattie Thorndyke’s shrill voice, harping on and on. She could still feel the shock of the woman’s words and the pain that lingered from her revelation.
Bolton Conrad was engaged and hadn’t told her.
“We need to talk,” she said in a stony voice.
He nodded, but said nothing.
“A lot’s happened since I went away, hasn’t it, Bolt? A lot more than anyone’s told me.”
“You only returned last night. You can’t expect to catch up on eight years in that short a time.”
She was trying to give him a chance to tell her. He wasn’t taking her bait. The rest of the short drive to Bolton’s apartment passed in silence. She had no idea what he was thinking, but her mind was awash in questions. Questions about the past, the present, and the future.
Five
Bolt pulled off his coat and tie as soon as they got home. Then he went straight to the refrigerator, took the vodka bottle out of the freezer, and mixed a pitcher of martinis. He had a feeling they were both going to need a drink by the time they finished the talk Mary Scarlett was insisting upon. Although she hadn’t come right out and said it, he suspected she had learned that he and Kathleen had been seeing each other.
Mary Scarlett had gone directly to the bedroom to change out of her bloodstained dress. She had yet to explain what had happened. Not to his satisfaction anyway. When he had questioned her again as they were coming up the walk, she’d made an offhand comment about cutting her hand on some thorns. But he hadn’t noticed the slightest scratch on either of her hands. And what kind of thorn could make her bleed that much?
Along with the martinis, Bolt placed a plate of cold, boiled shrimp and cocktail sauce on the small table out on his balcony. There was a pleasant breeze off the river, and River Street provided its own kind of music this time of day. He loved to listen and lose himself in the slow-paced, long-ago feel of the place.
Mary Scarlett joined him just as he was arranging two blue canvas director’s chairs next to the table. He stopped breathing for an instant when he saw her. Her naturally dark hair gleamed with bronze highlights against her apricot-colored lounging suit. Seeing her this way made him feel young again, as young and hopeful as he had been eight years ago, before she went away. Back then it had seemed that nothing could ever come between them to mar their happiness. She had been everything he wanted in the world.
God help me, she still is! he thought.
“Why are you looking at me that way?” Her tone was still icy.
“What way?”
She brushed her hair off her right shoulder with an unblemished hand. “I don’t know. Like you’re seeing a ghost or something.”
He forced a smile. “Maybe you seem like a ghost to me. The ghost of Mary Scarlett past. With your hair blonde, you were a stranger. I guess I’m only now realizing that you’re really, truly back here, standing so close I can reach out and touch you.”
She took a step back, a tacit warning that he shouldn’t try. Her face was placid, but he read anger in her eyes.
“I fixed martinis,” he said cordially, trying to coax her out of her sullen mood. “And some shrimp with hot sauce the way you like them. Come sit. The breeze is fine.”
He tried to take her arm, but again she avoided his touch, circling to the far side of the tiny table and moving her chair a few inches farther from his. She couldn’t put much distance between them, though. The balcony was minuscule.
She took one sip of her martini, then went straight for his jugular. “So, why didn’t you tell me you were spoken for? Who’s the lucky girl? Anyone I know?”
“Mary Scarlett, you’re just upset.” Bolt glanced at her quickly, then looked away.
“Damn right I am! Mad as hell, that’s what!”
When she raised her voice, Bolt noticed several tourists on the street below look up and shade their eyes to see what was going on. Maybe the balcony hadn’t been such a good idea after all.
“Mary Scarlett, you’re the one who left me, remember? You ’re the one who ran off. After eight years, I really don’t think you have a right to act like the injured party just because I’ve been seeing someone else. You were married, after all. I had no idea you would ever come back. What did you expect me to do? Join a monastic order?”
Her fingertips went to her cheeks. She was blushing furiously. In anger? Embarrassment? Bolt had no
idea.
“Don’t bring all that up,” she begged. “You don’t know what happened. No one does. I’m the only one, and I have to live with what I did.”
Bolt gazed out over the shimmering river and took a long, slow sip of his drink. He waited, hoping she would go on. He had no idea where he should try to guide this conversation.
“Who is she?” Mary Scarlett finally demanded, but this time in a whisper.
“Kathleen,” he admitted. “Kathleen O’Shea.”
Mary Scarlett remained silent, trying to let this information sink in. She was obviously shocked to hear her old friend’s name.
“So that’s why you were so outraged when I said she might be a good match for Allen.” She laughed softly, a humorless sound. “Poor Bolt! You should have told me then and saved yourself from all my blathering. But, no! You just let me go on and on making a fool of myself” She laughed again, then exploded. “Goddammit! What a stupid little idiot I am!”
With the rush of words came a torrent of tears. She buried her face in her hands and sobbed. Bolt reached over and touched her shoulder. She didn’t pull away this time.
“Mary Scarlett, nobody thinks you’re a fool or an idiot. You’re just—well—Mary Scarlett. You’re right. I should have told you up front. But you were so exhausted when you got here and you’ve been through so much. I was trying to ease into things.”
Bolt pulled the clean handkerchief out of his back pocket and pressed it into her hands. She wiped her eyes, then blew daintily. After a few deep breaths, she was able to speak again with only a slight quiver in her voice.
“When’s the wedding, Bolt?”
‘‘Wedding? What wedding?”
“You and Kathleen.”
He stared at her, frowning in disbelief. “We haven’t even discussed marriage.”
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