“Poor Annie,” Bolt said, shaking his head, knowing in his own heart how the deserted girl must have felt. “And the mirror?”
“Will gave it to Annie after his marriage. He promised her that he would always love her, even though they could never be together. He told her that whenever she looked into it, she would see his face and know that she was his one true love. Ever since then, each woman in Annie’s direct line has only to gaze into the mirror to see the face of her true love.”
Bolt could certainly understand why Lucy Lamar had claimed this was nonsense. “Have you looked in the mirror, Mary Scarlett?”
“Not for a long time,” she whispered.
“Have you ever seen a face?”
She nodded.
“Whose was it?” He held his breath, waiting for her answer.
“A man I’ve never met.”
A flash hit Bolt out of the blue. “Don’t tell me that’s why you ran away eight years ago.”
“I thought that was at least part of the reason.” She turned and looked at him solemnly. “But I know better now. Back then, I was so tom, Bolt. I didn’t know what love was. I knew about parties and flirting and petting and trousseaus. Love and marriage were just this kind of smoky, indistinct dream. I was scared, too,” she admitted. “The only marriage I knew anything about was my parents’. That wasn’t what I wanted. Not with you, not with Allen, not with any man. I couldn’t stand the thought of spending the rest of my life with someone like Big Dick.” She uttered a laugh completely devoid of humor. “Ironic, isn’t it? I ran away and wound up with … Raul!”
“The man you saw in the mirror—you don’t know who he was?”
“Now you will think I’m crazy. I told you I had a visit from Granny Boo’s ghost that night and she took me to a party at Bonaventure. Remember?”
Bolt nodded, not wanting her to hear the total disbelief in his voice.
“Well, I met the man there. His name was Jacques St. Julian. He died in New Orleans back around 1800, but I saw his face in the mirror that night in 1988.”
Bolt took Mary Scarlett’s arm. “I think it’s time we got out of here. This place is giving me the creeps.”
“No, wait!” she said. “Let me tell you the rest. Jacques was in love with another ancestor, Miss Louise Manigault Robillard, Granny Boo’s great-grandmother. He died before they could marry. According to Granny Boo, his spirit lives on in some other man, and I won’t be happy until I find Jacques St. Julian, whoever he is in this life.”
“God, Mary Scarlett! You actually believe that?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know what I believe any longer.”
“Well, I tend to side with Miss Lucy on this one. Let’s go. I’ve had enough.”
“You go on down. I’ll be there in a minute. I want to get some of my things.”
“I’ll wait and help you carry them down.”
“No. Go on. I want a few minutes alone here.”
Bolt hesitated, uncertain about leaving her alone for a minute in this place. Finally, when she insisted, he went downstairs to wait.
He waited impatiently in the hallway, hearing shutters rap and boards creak in the storm until he almost convinced himself that the old house was haunted. When he heard a sound above, he went to the foot of the stairs. He opened his mouth to speak, but found the words frozen in his throat. Perspiration beaded his brow. His hands went clammy.
“Mary Scarlett?” he whispered at last, gazing up at her. “What the hell?”
“Aren’t you pleased? I thought you’d like this.” Mary Scarlett’s voice was that of a stranger. Her face was totally colorless, her eyes glazed as she came slowly down the stairs. “I wanted to make you happy. I wanted you to love me the way you used to.”
Before Bolt could move or speak again, Mary Scarlett’s scream split the silence. In her trancelike state, she forgot the trick step and lost her footing. In a tumble of white lace and satin, she crashed down the stairs, landing in a limp pile at Bolt’s feet.
“Mary Scarlett!” he yelled.
Then he was kneeling over her, gathering her into his arms, and seeing her for the first time in the gown she would have worn at their wedding.
Mary Scarlett swam back to consciousness through a gray haze of swirling, disorienting images from her past. When she opened her eyes, Bolt’s troubled face staring into hers chased away all else.
“Darlin’, can you hear me?” His voice sounded loud in the silent old house.
“I fell,” she whispered. “Just like Mama. I fell!”
“Don’t think about that. Are you all right, Mary Scarlett? I’m taking you to the hospital.”
She pushed out of his arms and sat up. “You’re doing no such thing! I’m fine. I’ve had worse falls off horses. Just give me a minute. I feel a little dizzy.”
“It’s a concussion. Who am I? What day is this? Where are we?”
“Of course I know you, Jacques. What day is this? Why, the day of the party!”
Bolt winced when she called him Jacques, but released an anxious, pent-up breath when she mentioned Overman’s party. Her next words threw him into another panic.
“The party at Bonaventure. That’s where we are. That’s why I’m all dressed up.”
He gripped her shoulders, staring into her eyes to see if her pupils were dilated. “Mary Scarlett, listen to me. My name is Bolton, not Jacques. Good God, we should never have come here!”
She hugged him with anxious desperation. “Bolt, I know who you are. I don’t know what came over me, but it’s gone now. I’m back in the present. I only wish I knew what I’m supposed to do next.”
“Go to the hospital, that’s what.”
“No, Bolt,” she said firmly. “I’m fine. Really!”
He drew back and stared at her, frowning. “If you’re fine, whatever possessed you to put on that damn dress?”
She was taken aback by his gruff tone. Only then did she look down and realize how the sight of her in the wedding gown must have shocked and wounded him. Did he think she was playing a cruel practical joke—parading around in the gown she had bought for their wedding? That hadn’t been her intent. Actually, she didn’t quite know what had come over her once he left her alone in her old bedroom. She had gone to the closet to see what clothes she might still wear since most of her things were somewhere between Spain and Savannah. The long, plastic garment bag had caught her eye immediately. At first, she hadn’t remembered what it contained. She had eased the zipper down, thinking it might be something appropriate for Allen’s party. But when she spied the white lace shimmering in the glow from her candle, she was overwhelmed by a great urge to try it on.
“Why did you do it, Mary Scarlett?” Bolt asked in quiet agony.
Tears filled her eyes. “Oh, Bolt,” she whispered. “The last thing I ever want to do is hurt you. You’re the only person in the world I’ve always been able to count on.”
“Then why, Mary Scarlett?”
She shook her head and stared down at his hand on her wrist. “You know how I said earlier that I wish everything could be the way it was?”
He nodded even though she didn’t look up to see.
“Well, when I saw the wedding gown in my closet, I got this wild notion that if I put it on all the terrible years would fade away. It seemed like a kind of magic would flow into me if I was wearing this dress. I’d be back in my room eight years ago, back when you were still in love with me and I was still a sweet, innocent girl who thought she was about to have the marriage, the husband, and the life she’d always dreamed of. Granny Boo and Mama and even Big Dick would still be here, but there would be no Raul, no terrible memories of my years away from Savannah, away from you, Bolt.”
She looked up at him, her eyes pleading, tears making silver streams down her pale cheeks.
“I wish it worked that way, Mary Scarlett.”
“But it doesn’t,” she whispered. “There’s no magic. It
’s just a dress. An old, faded, never-worn wedding gown that smells of mothballs, decay, and sadness. I’m sorry, Bolt.”
Silently, he took her into his arms and held her close. For a long time, they sat on the floor of the empty house, holding each other and listening to the beat of their hearts and the raging storm.
After a time, Bolt helped Mary Scarlett to her feet. He brushed the damp hair back from her face, then caressed her cheeks with his palms. Looking frightened, hopeless, lost, she stared into his eyes—questioning, begging.
“Would you believe me if I said I’ve never stopped loving you, Mary Scarlett?”
Again her tears flowed and she closed her eyes against the torrent. Through trembling lips, she whispered, “No, Bolt. We mustn’t lie to each other any longer. I know I was never good enough to deserve your love. That’s part of the reason I had to leave.”
Bolt uttered a groan of sheer pain, then crushed her in his arms. “Don’t say that, darlin’. Don’t ever even think such a thing!”
Bolt and Mary Scarlett clung to each other for support, both feeling wounded by life, by love, and by the past.
Seven
After a silent ride back to Bolt’s apartment, Mary Scarlett thanked him almost formally for going with her to the house on Bull Street. He accepted her thanks in like manner. Neither of them mentioned the wedding gown incident or the things Mary Scarlett had said after her fall down the stairs.
She went straight to her room and closed the door. She didn’t come out for the rest of the day. After her sleepless night and the fall she had taken, Bolt assumed she was resting.
He could use a nap, too, before the party, but he was too keyed up. Hurt and bewildered by Mary Scarlett’s words and actions at the old house, Bolt buried himself in paperwork for most of the dull, rainy day. It was far easier not to think about her, not to try figuring out what was going on between them. Nothing much seemed to have changed since she ran away from Savannah. He still didn’t know where he stood with her or what to expect next.
If Bolt was confused, Mary Scarlett was distraught. She hid out in her room because she simply couldn’t face Bolt She knew she had hurt him deeply.
Stripped of her soaking clothes, wrapped only in her robe, she stood at the window and gazed out over the river. The water was a flat, dull gray, pounded down by the wind and rain. Clouds scudded low on the horizon, looking dirty and angry. The weather mirrored her state of mind. Could she do nothing right? Was it her fate always to hurt and disappoint those she loved?
Somehow she had to pull herself together and get ready for the evening at Allen’s house. God, how she dreaded it! All those people that she hadn’t seen in years. All those gossips who had whispered about her and were still whispering. At least she could count on Allen to be the cheerful and accommodating host. None of his guests would dare make any remarks about her under his roof. He simply wouldn’t tolerate it.
If Bolt had always been her rock, Allen had been her protector and defender, her perennial escort since Miss Felicia’s Cotillion classes back in sixth grade. Maybe if she had narrowed her sights to Allen a long time ago, things might have turned out differently. She would be standing by his side tonight—married, smiling, confident—welcoming their guests to their home. There would have been no lingering feelings for Bolton Conrad, no hasty flight to Europe, no past with Raul.
“Mary Scarlett Overman.” She tested the sound of the name aloud. It had a good, solid ring that smacked of old Savannah, blue blood, and Southern aristocracy. Maybe she should go after Allen, put Bolt out of his misery once and for all. With her out of the picture, Bolt would marry Kathleen and live happily ever after.
She stretched out on the bed with a sigh, staring up at the ceiling, focusing on nothing at all, trying to make her mind a blank.
“If only I’d found the mirror.”
Somehow, if she had it, she could find her way again. She might even be able to sort out her life and her feelings.
“Where could it be?” she said in a drowsy whisper.
A moment later, her eyes closed and she slept.
Or was she sleeping?
Her dream journey began immediately. She found herself running down Bull Street. It was unpaved, muddy, strewn with filth and the carcasses of dead animals. With all the able-bodied men gone to war, Savannah had a serious sanitation problem.
She pulled her black cloak closer against the chill breath of December. She knew instinctively which December this was—that fateful month in 1864, the year Sherman came and a whole way of life changed in the South.
She passed two ragged boys playing soldier in the street. One of them sang out, “Jeff Davis rides a very fine horse and Lincoln rides a mule. Jeff Davis is a gentleman and Lincoln is a fool!”
She smiled in spite of Savannah’s dire situation. Little Rebels to the last, she mused, hurrying on. Before she was out of earshot, she heard the other boy sing a snatch of another popular song. “All de Rebels gone to hell, now Par Sherman come!”
Her smile faded. This youngster had hit the nail on the head. Sherman’s troops were poised outside Savannah, ready to attack and torch the city at a moment’s notice from their general. The secret meeting called by Mayor Richard Arnold concerning the defense of the city was the reason for her haste. She would be the only woman there. But then she was the only female in Savannah who had spent much of the war traveling through enemy lines, carrying messages back and forth for the Confederacy. Not one to sit at home and roll bandages while her lover was off fighting with General Lee, Lilah had volunteered for her dangerous missions. Now that she was back in Savannah, she had one last mission to accomplish, her most important of the entire war.
As she neared the cotton warehouse on the river, she sent up a silent prayer that Mayor Arnold might have received some news of Captain Brandon Patrick’s whereabouts. It had been months since one of his letters had reached her. For weeks, praying that she would not find his name, she had scanned black-bordered casualty lists as they were posted. Her prayers had been answered, but that left her knowing nothing at all. The uncertainty nagged at her day and night.
She mustn’t think about Brandon now. She must put Savannah first.
Thanks to her whining Cousin Amalee, she was late for the meeting. Mayor Arnold was already speaking by the time she slipped into the dank, gloomy warehouse. “I don’t see that we have any other choice, gentlemen. General Hardee’s plan seems to make good, solid sense to me. He’ll build pontoon bridges across the river to Hutchinson Island and then across Back River to South Carolina. All troops will be evacuated from the city under cover of darkness.”
“The hell you say!” a man shouted. “You mean to leave us here undefended against Sherman’s cutthroat hordes?”
“If you’ll kindly allow me to finish,” Arnold said in a strained voice. “Once our troops are out of harm’s way, I’ll personally lead a delegation to Sherman’s camp. Welcome him to Savannah. Present the city to him as a Christmas gift.”
“Shit!” cursed another man. “We’ll be the laughingstock of the whole damn Confederacy. I say we fight!”
“With what, sir?” Lilah spoke up boldly. All eyes turned to her. Few of the men had even noticed the lone female in their midst. She lifted her chin to a defiant angle and continued. “Would you rather preserve our city or your own pride?”
“What does a woman know about war?” the first man grumbled. Others joined in the fray, arguing against a female even attending such a crucial meeting, much less being allowed to speak her mind.
Mayor Arnold raised his hands for silence. “Gentlemen, please! Miss Lilah has been riding secret missions for the Cause. She holds an honorary major’s commission signed by Jeb Stuart himself, received for her valuable services to the Confederacy. If we are able to carry off this deception, we will need the help of our ladies once the Yankees arrive in Savannah. Miss Lilah has agreed to coordinate their efforts.”
Angry voices
interrupted the mayor once again, but they were little more than mutterings now.
“As for our pride,” he continued, “I believe the rest of the South will understand and appreciate our plan. We’ll be freeing up troops needed elsewhere—troops that will most certainly be captured or killed should they stay to defend Savannah. A needless loss against Sherman’s superior forces. And even Sherman, monster that he is, could hardly bum his own Christmas gift. If there’s no more discussion to be heard, shall we vote now?”
Vote after vote was taken, but no decision was reached. Heartsick and disgusted with the stubborn leaders of the city, Lilah waited until they all filed out so that she could have a private word with Mayor Arnold.
“Is all lost, sir?” she asked him.
“They’ll come around. They must! They simply need more time to think about it.”
“There’s not much time,” Lilah reminded him.
“Less than anyone can calculate,” he admitted. “Sherman is even now surrounding the city. My scouts have reported that guns are in place, their trajectory aimed at the very heart of Savannah. Everything is quiet now, but they could begin firing at any time. But that first shot will be to our advantage, Lilah. I think the men will see the hopelessness of trying to defend our homes once the barrage begins.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t take them too long to see our peril.” Lilah stared up at the tall man, her indigo eyes misted with a trace of hopeful tears. “Have you any news for me, Mayor Arnold?”
He pressed her hand gently. “I’m sorry.” His deep voice cracked as he uttered those two words.
“Still no news,” she whispered, turning away.
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