by Karen Kelly
She nearly jumped out of her skin at a staccato rap. “Susannah?” It was her mother’s voice, concern radiating through the wood.
Stepping back quickly, Susannah smoothed her hands over her dress and her hair, plastering a smile on her face as she opened the door.
“Hello!” She blinked brightly at her mother.
Helen looked quizzical. “I noticed you rushing out—I wondered if everything was all right.”
“Oh yes … just fine. I think the champagne may have gone to my head. I needed a bit of a break.”
A small frown appeared. “Susannah, I’m surprised at you. I would think you’d know better. Ladies never have more than one drink.”
Susannah patted her mother’s shoulder and turned conveniently away. “Oh, Mother, it wasn’t that much. Just a couple of glasses. More likely, I overdid it a bit on the dance floor.” As the words left her mouth, she felt a flush race from her chest to her cheeks. “I’ll be there in a tick—I need to touch up my lipstick.” She moved toward her dressing table, step measured and spine straight.
From the doorway, Helen gazed at her daughter’s back with a thoughtful expression. And then, with a slight shake of her head, she turned and left.
* * *
Susannah reentered the ballroom to the strains of the orchestra—back on the bandstand again—playing “I Cried for You.” She had no idea what would happen next. She had a fleeting memory of being at a carnival fun house when she was four years old, nervous and a little dizzied by the distorted images in the wavy mirror. It was exactly how she felt now.
Chap was dancing with India. Susannah’s eyes landed on him without even trying, as if there were a lighthouse on the dance floor. At the exact moment she found him, he found her, too, his eyes settling into hers with a certitude—sure and unwavering—that steadied the reeling yaw.
“There she is! We thought maybe the girl of the hour had decided this motley crew wasn’t worth the bother!” It was her uncle Ronald, her mother’s brother from Boston, standing nearby with a clutch of aunts and cousins.
“Dear Susannah—you’re as glamorous as a movie star!” Aunt Tabitha was clearly feeling the effusive effects of the Pol Roger. “I just have to compliment that dress—it’s simply stunning. Where on earth did you find something like that? I’ve always said, Helen Avery Parrish sets the bar high, but my goodness, I think she has broken it tonight! What an affair!”
“Hello, Sassafras.” Hollins walked up and gave his daughter a light kiss on the cheek. Taking a sip of scotch, he put a fraternal arm around Ronald’s shoulders. “Are these people bothering you? I told Hedy we should have a special section for the Bostonians. They’re a sordid bunch.” Although he addressed Susannah, his smile was cast teasingly around the circle of his wife’s family.
En masse, the clan burst into a spirited defense of the superior qualities of Beantown, while over their clamor a gong sounded. Alvin was standing in the wide center archway, holding a brass cymbal. Hollins glanced over his shoulder at the butler, and then checked his watch. “I believe that’s our signal—dinner shall be served.”
The band had taken the cue and started in on “Goodnight, Ladies” as people moved toward the stairway, fanning out to the sides to wait for the host to lead the way. Helen appeared at her husband’s side, and Susannah looked around hesitantly—hovering in a brief, nervous limbo. Hollins waved his arm high as he spotted Chap across the room. “If Itty will relinquish her hold on your escort’s arm,” he murmured, “we can proceed.”
Chap made his way over and Susannah hoped she was the only one to notice the slight tremor of strain in his upper lip as he smiled amicably at her parents. He bowed his head slightly as he held his arm out to Susannah.
She clasped a gloved hand to his forearm and they fell into step behind her mother and father. The pressure of her hand was light, and there were several layers of fabric separating skin from skin, but there was no mistaking the surge of twin pulses beating in rapid, reverberant accord.
Nine
DECEMBER 1962
“What do you do when the ground is frozen?” Joanna watched as Daniel rocked the shovel back and forth with the heel of his work boot, chipping away at clumps of frosty topsoil to get to the more pliable earth below the surface.
“It isn’t too bad until about January. They’ve started using a backhoe over at Greenwood, but we aren’t that fancy here. Just good old elbow grease.” He pitched a wedge of packed dirt onto a small pile. “Sounding can be a little tough if the frost goes deep. But I’ve got a couple of tricks up my sleeve, passed down from the tribe elders.” He straightened and rested his arm on the handle of the shovel, exhaling a puff of steam in the cold afternoon air.
“Sounding?” The stone obelisk at Joanna’s back was tall and narrow—its base providing the perfect width and angle to lean against, feet pulled up and arms wrapped around her knees. Her wool coat was long enough to cover her legs, and her hands were snuggled into a fur muff like a pair of small rabbits in a burrow.
“If there are any other graves nearby, you have to poke around with a rod before you dig to be sure nothing has shifted over. Wouldn’t want to disturb anyone’s sleep.”
Joanna smiled at the typically droll explanation. “What are your tricks?”
Letting the shovel drop, Daniel stepped over to the monument and stood at her feet. “I could tell you,” he said, his voice low and serious, “but I’d rather show you.”
A confluent ripple, emanating from the separate origins of Joanna’s knees and shoulders, rushed to meet in the middle as she looked straight into the depths of his crystalline eyes. He gazed at her, and in that long moment the brisk white day and the bare trees and the chipped earth all disappeared. Then he turned and went to the flatbed cart parked a few yards to the south.
Heaving a large sack of charcoal over his shoulder, he moved back to the dig site and dropped it to the ground. He went back for another bag, and one more after that. Then he pulled a box of long matches from one of the deep pockets in his canvas jacket and gave it a little rattle as he looked back at Joanna. “One of my most effective tools.” He threw several lit matches onto the bags, and when they began to take, he got onto his hands and knees to blow lightly at the smoke. Then he sat back on his heels and held his hands over the heat. “Come over here.” He twisted around and motioned Joanna toward him. “I have to watch it for few minutes before I put the cover on.”
Joanna stood and stepped lightly to his side, then dropped to her knees, hands still tucked into the muff. They sat in silence, absorbing a warmth that had little to do with the coal. After a while, Daniel asked quietly, “How did the party go?”
It had been a week since Joanna had been to St. Gregory’s. The last time had been just before the children’s birthday party, and she hadn’t been able to contain her exasperation. She had found herself, once again, opening up to Daniel. Something in the way he listened made her feel safe with her confidences. And there was something else. It had become increasingly undeniable—she felt a certain contentment when she was with him.
“It was fine, I suppose. I was a little appalled that Daisy took to it all like a fish to water—presiding over everything like some kind of pint-sized empress.” Joanna laughed and rolled her eyes, sweeping her arm out as she demonstrated, with a spot-on imitation of Daisy’s lisp: “Please be seated. The show will begin soon. Refreshments will be served after. There are very many delicious treats.”
She went on to describe the authority with which her daughter took the stage as Fredo’s assistant, crestfallen and a bit put out when the magician didn’t have the required props to saw her in half. “And then one little boy got sick from too much cotton candy, and Charlie started to cry because he was worried the rabbit might have died. When it finally reappeared, Charlie was so embarrassed that he disappeared. I found him in his room, sulking.”
“Did your husband make it back?” The question was delivered with careful neutrality.
; “Yes. As a matter of fact, he was home by Friday night. He was nearly as excited as Charlie and Daisy were about the party. After the magician left, he came up with his own tricks. I think the kids were as taken with him as they were with Fredo.” She pictured Frank in the center of the room, making a quarter disappear and then pulling it from the nearest child’s ear, and she could hear the echo of squeals as he seemingly made a Dixie cup float through the air. The previous night, when Joanna had come into the bedroom, he’d been standing there with his thumb poked through the paper cup, practicing his technique.
Daniel stood to fetch the long metal lid that would contain the heat, and while he was positioning it over the bags of charcoal, he glanced at his watch. “Don’t you have to play the piano this afternoon?”
An appreciative smiled curved Joanna’s lips. The fact that he knew and remembered her mundane schedule never failed to please her. He paid attention to everything she told him, processing and storing each detail as though it were important. He knew the ins and outs of the children’s lives—their latest interests and developments and challenges. He knew that Daisy’s best friend was named Rosie. He called them “the flower girls,” remembering to ask—with some amusement—if they had worked things out after last week’s spat. He knew that Charlie liked to watch McHale’s Navy and that he had gotten 100 percent on his latest math test. He knew that the little boy missed his father when he was gone.
“Yes. I guess I should go.” With the holiday sing-along approaching, the students at Trinity were practicing twice a week now after school. The acoustics were very good in the gymnasium, but Joanna had to roll the old upright out of the music room and down the hall, so she needed to get there early. As she started to stand, Daniel took her arm, helping her up just as he had that day in early September when she had tripped on the sidewalk. It was the first physical contact they’d had since then, and she felt something like an electrical current zip through her arm where he grasped it, straight to an area dangerously close to her heart. His face was near enough that she could feel the warmth of his breath on her cheek, but when she looked up at him, he turned away.
Taking a couple of paces toward the path, Daniel began to whistle a quiet tune. It was just a few notes, but Joanna recognized it as one of the carols the kids were practicing. As he grasped the handles of the cart, he turned back. For a couple of beats he just stood there, with a look she couldn’t define. And then he asked her a question, so quiet that she almost didn’t catch it.
“Do you see what I see?”
He walked away before she could respond, and it wasn’t until he was gone that she realized it was only a line from the song.
* * *
After dinner, the children wanted to play in the ballroom. It hadn’t quite been restored from the party—balloons and streamers lingered like persistent, bedraggled revelers, and there was some leftover delight to be had there. The other pressing incentive was Daisy’s newly acquired skill. With patient coaching from her brother, she had finally mastered a headstand, and the need to show it off was unrelenting. Joanna knew her hope for a quiet evening with Jack London was a lost cause.
She took her usual seat on a Chiavari chair, making a mental note to haul up something more comfortable for the future. It was becoming clear she would be spending a fair amount of time in the capacious opulence of the third-floor space. After compulsory attention to dual headstand performances, Joanna remembered the photo albums in the bookcase. As Charlie and Daisy hurled themselves over the old Persian carpets, Joanna wandered across the room and selected another volume, settling back in her chair with the heavy leatherbound pages.
The pictures didn’t seem to be in any particular order. It appeared that someone had finally responded to some nagging impulse for tidiness or historical obligation, mounting a disorganized stack of photos onto the pages. The first one was of a young man in a graduation cap and gown, tassel hanging on the left and diploma in hand. An older man in a dark suit stood next to him. Both had serious expressions and cleft chins. Joanna recognized them as Wyatt Collier and his father, Charles. She could see the name and emblem of Yale University on the folio cover of the diploma, and she could make out an ivy-covered building in the background.
Next, there were several pictures of a party in the ballroom where Joanna sat. Frank’s aunt India was the center of attention, wearing a full-skirted white gown that looked something like a wedding dress. She was posed formally in front of one of the balcony doors, and the tall young man standing at her side was Charlie in about thirteen years. Of course, it was Wyatt’s brother, Chap … but the likeness was so uncanny that it rattled her again.
There were a few photos of a young Kit Parrish—dangling keys next to a shining convertible with huge, curving fenders; grinning with a Princeton pennant; waving from the deck of an ocean liner—and then Joanna turned the page to photos of another party, this time in evident celebration of Susannah. In one, she stood on the landing of the grand stairway in a dress that produced a swell of admiration in Joanna’s chest. She recognized the style as that of the flapper era, beaded and perfectly draped, as if it had been made for her. Studying this young version of her mother-in-law, Joanna felt something like pride. Susannah had been stunning.
As she took in the details of the photo, Joanna noticed something strange. Susannah was posed in front of the large, segmented window that overlooked the courtyard, but instead of intricate rows of clear beveled panels set in slender leaded joints, the window consisted of an elaborate peacock-themed mosaic. Although the photo was in black and white, Joanna could tell by the tonality that there were deep variations of color in the glass. She couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to replace it. Perhaps the landing needed more light, or a better view of the courtyard … or maybe some decorator had deemed the design out of style. Whatever the case, Joanna thought it was a shame. The window was beautiful.
Looking through the rest of the party pictures, she discovered that the curiosities didn’t end there. The photographer had taken quite a few candid shots. In addition to the pictures of the ballroom, there were several that featured the courtyard and the great hall, with tables of guests in formal attire, laughing and conversing over china and crystal and elaborate floral arrangements. From previous experience, Joanna expected to see a young Wyatt Collier somewhere in close proximity to Susannah. But when she spotted the debutante at the head of a long linen-draped table, she noticed that the young man sitting to her right wasn’t Wyatt; it was his brother. She peered at the photo, studying the other faces at the table. Although several heads were turned away, she didn’t think Wyatt was among them. After a moment she turned the page with a shrug, relegating the question to the murky depths of life’s insignificant and forgettable mysteries.
Hollins Parrish was the subject of the next few pages—holding a bottle of champagne against the hull of a ship, at a ribbon-cutting ceremony on some unrecognizable construction site, at a podium in what was probably a boardroom. And then there was an image of Hollins and Helen Parrish, seated with two other people at one end of an enormous, gleaming mahogany table. It didn’t take more than a split second for Joanna to recognize the other couple. At the head was Franklin Roosevelt, and next to him, his wife, Eleanor. Looking closer, Joanna could make out the famous Gilbert Stuart portrait of George Washington hanging on the wall behind the president. This was the dinner at the White House that Helen had mentioned. Joanna had been flummoxed then by the very idea of it; seeing it was stranger still.
She was shaking her head a little at the bizarre path her life had taken when, out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a figure coming through the archway.
“Grandmother, watch what I can do!”
As Daisy clamored for her attention, Susannah added to the surprises of the evening by crossing the floor and pulling a chair up next to Joanna. The rumpus of the ersatz gymnasium was under Joanna’s purview, and the last thing she expected was that her mother-in-law would join her in the ballr
oom that evening. “My amazement is at the ready, and I’m prepared to be impressed. Show me what you’ve got, Davida.” Expectantly erect, she gave her granddaughter her full consideration.
Because of her mother-in-law’s restrained manner, Joanna had not expected her to be particularly hands-on with Charlie and Daisy. But Susannah had proven to be a mischievously playful grandmother. She treated them like small adults, advocating free will in regard to eating vegetables, and flexible bedtimes. On school nights, Joanna held firm at eight o’clock, but on weekends Susannah prevailed in her belief that “It’s more important to spend time in the company of those with whom one lives than it is to follow a silly schedule. Children will go to bed when they’re tired.”
It had been Susannah’s idea for the children to learn to play chess, and she often played with them, offering sly, cryptic suggestions—“Her majesty is very fond of dancing, but she never gets to lead”—and applauding high in the air if they found the move. Charlie almost always won, so Susannah had lately been rooting for Daisy. During one particularly spirited game, she had sweetened the incentive by vowing somberly to come to dinner wearing a lampshade on her head if Daisy won the day. Charlie didn’t waste a minute sacrificing his king, and that evening Susannah showed up in the dining room with the small, fringed shade from the floor lamp in the nursery perched on her head like the latest fashion from Paris. The children giggled throughout the meal while their grandmother comported herself with sublime sangfroid.
But after living for nearly half a year under the same roof as Frank’s mother, Joanna was learning for herself what her husband had tried to explain, on the rare occasions that he talked about it. Incidental whimsy aside, there was a quality about Susannah that could only be called guarded. She was contained and private—in stark contrast to Joanna’s own mother, who had a natural warmth that extended to complete strangers. Eileen Rafferty took a worried, proprietary interest in anyone who wandered across her path, digging out details like a world-class archeologist; but Joanna had never had anything even remotely resembling a personal conversation with her mother-in-law.