by Alice Ayden
Alexander wouldn’t hurt me. A small part of me hoped that was true. A bigger part of me feared what I still didn’t know. Looking back, maybe I shouldn’t have pushed. I was right to fear the unknown.
30 Jane
The next morning, I woke up with a smile and dressed quickly to find Alexander. I couldn’t wait to see him. I opened my door and heard Karenda clanging at her computer. She didn’t have a light touch with anything. Part of me wanted to keep walking. The other part told me to talk with Karenda.
I sighed. The responsible part won. I smoothed out my wild hair and knocked softly on Karenda’s door.
“What!” she bellowed like a drill sergeant.
I took a deep breath and opened the door.
Karenda sat behind her antique carved desk and punched something into her laptop. I winced for the poor bastard machine.
Beside Karenda’s desk, a large rectangular table held Ausmor notepads, small boxes of A Year in the Life of Ausmor daily calendars, snacks and giant ass Ausmor coffee cups that held a week’s worth of coffee.
On the side table, three different sized baskets burst with gifts. “New?”
Karenda answered me with an abrupt hand wave like she was shooing away a Satanic gnat.
I peered past the colored cellophane and bright ribbons to see Christmas ornaments, wrapped gifts, Ausmor wines, sparkling grape juice, cheeses, greenhouse pamphlets, packets of seeds, an Ausmor brick, a Virginia map and a book detailing Ausmor from the Revolutionary War through the Civil War to today. In the middle of each basket - the real object of my obsession: Ausmor’s world famous fudge.
“That’s what I’m talking about.” An inviting mocha chunk ambushed with a naughty leer. Too many walnuts in the divinity for my liking, but I could taste the maple pecan and wanted to wallow in the rocky road. I noticed something missing. “Where’s the milk chocolate?”
Karenda didn’t take her focus from her laptop. “There was an incident.”
“An incident?”
“A few dozen pounds had to be tossed. No big deal.”
“No big deal? A few dozen pounds? What kind of treacherous malady befell something so innocent and—”
Karenda slammed her laptop shut. “Something about the thermometer. Big Colleen is on it.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. Big Colleen was Ausmor’s main fudgerer. She lived and breathed it. She could fix anything plus she liked me. She’d have kept the leftovers or ruined part for me. Mental note to slip off to the confectionery later. “You see the website?” I flinched. Why ask her? It’s not like she’d smile, hug me and tell me what a good job I’d been doing. Why ruin today?
With the girls squeezed into another of her corsetty type tops, Karenda stood up and smoothed out her jacket.
I couldn’t help but curl my lip and mentally apologize to her boobage for the torture.
Karenda opened one drawer, pulled out a package and threw it to me. “Memorize it.”
I had barely caught it before it decapitated me, but I managed to see the spine. “Jane Austen’s Christmas at Ausmor Plantation.” On the cover, a bonneted girl looking somewhat like the famous writer waited forlornly in a carriage in front of snow covered Ausmor. “Nice expression. She bite into Bitty’s mocha covered radish?”
Karenda tapped her foot against the floor and folded her arms across her already tortured chest. “Well?”
I took a deep breath and flipped through the pages. “White cover with one hundred—”
“Not that.”
“Famous writer Jane Austen visited the Austens and Morgans in Virginia.” I heard my monotone spiel and fell asleep a few dozen times. “This is an account of—”
“What kind of account?”
“A fictionalized account of Jane Austen visiting Ausmor. It has to be fictionalized because I mean, hello, Jane didn’t Concord it to Virginia in 18—”
“Memorize the story. It’s already being sold in the giftshop. Tourists will comment.” She looked me up and down.
Suddenly I was aware of my modern jeans, black boots and Mrs. Kiness’ knitted blue sweater.
“Be Janed for the Christmas party tomorrow night.”
I resisted the urge to ask, ‘tomorrow night? Is that when the party is?’ because Karenda killed with glares. It had been in the news last year.
“We won’t have tourists today or tomorrow since the house is closed for the party preparations.”
I nodded then wondered if I knew that, should have known it or had already forgotten.
Karenda grabbed her phone, keys, laptop, and other gadgets and stomped toward the door. Before she left, she glanced back at me. “Try not to slip on the stairs, break bones, stab yourself or do anything that requires medical attention before the party. Let’s try to make it through one party without embarrassing the family.”
I nodded. “I’ll try.”
Karenda glared and chewed her lip. “And redo the website. It looks like a mental patient did it after an overdose.” She left.
I finally let out a breath that I’d been holding for five minutes and walked out of her room.
“Hey Jane!” Lillia said in mid twirl.
“How’s Fanny Dingo?”
Lillia righted herself. “Good. She’s in Evan’s room. Likes all those old books.” She continued twirling down the hallway bouncing into everything.
I fled down the stairs and saw Evan.
“Jane, you look good.”
“Thanks.” It was difficult readjusting to normalcy after breathing the Karenda atmosphere.
Evan studied me. “You have color in your face.”
“What do you think of the website?” I needed an honest opinion and not one filled with arsenicky goodness.
“I like it. The blogs are perfect. You have everything there, and we’ve already gotten a lot of hits and emails.”
I smiled. “Thanks, Evan.” I moved past him.
“Jane, can you help me with something?”
I stopped. Did I hear him correctly? I glanced around. He must have been talking to someone else, but there wasn’t anyone else. “You need my help?”
Evan nodded. “I’d like to do something…else with the decorations, but your sister…”
“And you need my help?”
Evan shrugged. “Who else would I ask?”
I didn’t know. The foxes on the property? I saw a snakeskin a couple months ago. “Grand Maeve?”
“She’s occupied.” Evan recoiled.
“Ah.” I didn’t ask. Occupied: Evan’s code for Grand Maeve had a new man in her room.
“This one’s younger than me.” He shook off any images.
I smiled. “I want to be her when I grow up.”
“Anyway…” He led me through the hallway of the New Wing and through the connecting door to the main house.
Overnight, the staff had upped the Ausmor decorations for the Christmas party. On each table normally reserved for a large bouquet, smaller Christmas trees protected miniature golden presents. Gold was this year’s theme. Better than a few years ago when Lillia chose the theme of striped pink. Some of the staff thought she’d said, ‘stripper pink.’ Memorable party.
Twinkle lights wrapped around the portraits of the long dead. Red and green rugs decorated the hardwood floors, and candles lit in each window. The normal drapes were taken away and replaced with festive colors. “How? When?”
Evan smiled. “They worked all night.”
I peeked up at the second and third floors. Hints of red, gold and green protruded. “You did all this?”
Evan proudly looked around. “We have a great staff here.”
“Yes we do.”
“Son-of-a-bitch!” Aunt Bitty screamed as she stomped toward Evan. “You have to fire them now!”
“Who?”
“The servants! Useless.”
Several staff members on the second and third floors peered over the balconies to witness the fuss.
“What is the issue?” Evan asked in
his most patient and official manner.
Bitty fumed and fussed. She tried to right her struggling bun. When that didn’t work, she tore the barrettes out and threw them to the corner leaving her hair dangling like lopsided scaffolding. Her face flushed, and she fled out the front door.
We all breathed easier. “Was she ever a real person?” I heard a few giggles from above me. It was nothing I hadn’t heard them ask a thousand times with much more colorful phrases.
Evan smiled and bent down to gather up the misshapen barrettes. Nothing, not even a fuming Bitty, could distract him from his good mood.
I couldn’t think about The Bitty. It required too much energy, medication and a power drink. I returned my concentration to Ausmor. “I love it.”
“You do?” Evan asked with the eagerness of a chocolate starved five year old.
“I do.” There was nothing I would change. Nothing I could change. “It’s so beautiful. If I didn’t already, I would wish I lived here.”
Evan smiled. “Thank you. The staff seemed happy, but I couldn’t get confirmation from others.”
That meant Karenda. “That’s just her.” We’d been desperately looking for Karenda’s crumbs of kindness for years, but none of us had found any. “Can it stay up through January?”
“I think so. I’ll have to ask—”
“Evan…” I interrupted. “You are the oldest Morgan. Karenda can’t have all the say. You’re older than she is.”
He studied the floor and ran his fingers through his hair which meant he had to sort things through. “You’re right. I’m the oldest Morgan. Karenda and I are equal partners…” That last part came out wonky and higher pitched as if he had a hard time saying and believing it.
“Yes. Equal. I’m assuming the Old and New Wings will remain unencumbered with decoration?” Karenda’s decree from years ago. The house alone could be decorated with cheer, but the wings had to remain plain.
“The New Wing. Yes. But I thought the staff needed some cheer in the Old Wing.”
I smiled. “That’s good.”
“I’m sure you’ll see it on one of your many trips to visit with a certain restoration specialist/handyman.”
I blushed. “Maybe.”
Grand Maeve glided down the Grand Staircase with a dark haired man much, much younger. “Evan, my darling grandson, you have outdone yourself. And Jane, my grand niece, how bright and cheery you look.”
Evan and I looked at each other and wondered why the formality. I stared at Grand Maeve’s man and wondered if he was old enough to shave. He looked so factory new.
Grand Maeve touched her young man’s cheek. “Now, be a dear and return tonight with the supplies.”
He kissed her hand and left without saying a word. Evan and I watched until he was out the front door and slipping on the snow in the path.
“Grand Maeve,” I said. “Is he even of age?”
Grand Maeve shrugged. “He’s old enough to do what I need him to do.”
Evan withered like an old raisin, and his coloring evaporated. He blended into his white Celtic knotted sweater.
“I am sorry, Evan…” Grand Maeve said. “Not all of us can be as chaste as you.”
“Shame.” He said before walking away.
She smiled then took my arm. “He does not approve of my companions.”
“He’s traditional.”
Grand Maeve nodded. “Indeed.”
“Plus...” And I had to state the obvious. “You’re married.”
She shrugged and returned her attention to me. “Now, tell me about Alexander. How are you two getting along?”
I tried to hide my smile but couldn’t.
“Aw. There’s much to tell I see.”
“What do you think?” I didn’t know why I bothered to ask Grand Maeve’s opinion concerning men. She didn’t care about gossip or decorum - obviously.
“Well,” Grand Maeve led me around the Entrance Hall and into the Rose Parlor. “I prefer to discuss men in here.”
“You just want to entice Charles.”
“Perhaps.”
Charles was the British soldier rumored to haunt the Rose Parlor. Grand Maeve believed him to be handsome because she assumed bright Revolutionary War uniforms transformed all British soldiers. She’d been trying for ages to contact him, but the most Charles did was destroy whatever was placed on the mantle.
Grand Maeve was despondent until she placed a picture of herself on the mantle beside one of her husband Uncle V. Uncle V’s picture was destroyed while hers remained untouched. Grand Maeve convinced herself that Charles longed for her and disliked her being with any other man. She wouldn’t hear that Charles destroyed most everything placed on the mantle: toothpicks, a feather, a half-eaten sandwich.
“There is much to admire in Alexander. I did so love his grandmother, Josie Cardenia. She and I were like sisters.”
“I know,” I said. “Mrs. Kiness talks about her all the time.”
“Yes, Mrs. Kiness and I were close many years ago,” Grand Maeve said coldly.
I wondered about the animosity’s source. “And you knew Carolina, Alexander’s mother.”
Grand Maeve nodded. “Hers was a tragic soul. We were so heartbroken she refused to accept our help. Stubborn little thing. She believed she had to withstand all hardship even though it was none of her own making.” She threw up her hands in disgust. “Once she married Alexander’s father, she thought her life was over.”
I flinched. “But Mr. Ravenswirth was so nice.”
“He was. The nicest of men. A pure heart. And he loved Carolina. He would do anything for her...but he was a gardener and perfectly happy with that.” She stopped and shook her head. “I always believed she hoped for rescue back to the life she was born into.”
“Covil Bashley?”
Grand Maeve nodded. “I think she loved him and would have married him but was forced away…” She stopped and bowed her head. “We never believed the rumors about Alexander.”
My heart skipped faster. “What rumors?”
Grand Maeve kissed my forehead. “He is a good man and incapable of what he was accused of. Never forget that.” She sighed and looked at the mantle. “Charles, I will be entertaining a young man in my room tonight. Do not remain silent and jealous. You know where my room is, you naughty soldier.” She glided towards the door.
“Grand Maeve…” I stopped her. “What rumors about Alexander?”
She shook her head. “Now is not the time to discuss such things, and I will never mention them in this house. After the party, we will go into town and have lunch at that little cafe you like. Until then, trust your heart.”
“But there are things I can’t remember, and everything’s all jumbled.”
She smiled. “Trust your heart, Jane. Deep down, you know the truth. Trust how you feel when you’re with him.” She turned around and walked away.
My eyes took in the Christmas tree with all red ornaments, the red walls, the bare mantle with just a picture of Grand Maeve, the red sofa and uncomfortable red chairs, but my thoughts didn’t register anything but confusing memory fragments. Panic rose, and a searing pain pierced my brain I knew from experience was sure to be a visiting migraine – as exciting as the visits from the rest of the Austens and Morgans as they descended for hours of excruciating dullery.
Alexander rushed down the hallway and walked past. A calmness overtook me, and I could breathe again. It was going to be alright.
He stopped quickly and returned. “Jane, didn’t know you were in here.”
“Trust myself.”
He walked further in the room. “What?”
“Grand Maeve told me to trust my heart.”
Alexander frowned.
I rushed over to him and kissed him. “I trust you.”
Alexander didn’t say anything. I wasn’t sure if he didn’t know what to say or if I scared him when I kissed him suddenly.
“Grand Maeve told me you couldn’t have done what you
were accused of.” I said it offhanded because I was afraid of keeping things to myself. Tired of secrets, I needed help to figure things out.
Alexander paled. His eyes, so full of life before, dulled, and he looked at me as if he was looking at a stranger. He backed away. “She told you or you remembered?”
“She wouldn’t tell me anything. She just said you were a good man and would never do whatever it was.”
He turned his back to me and walked to the doorway. He stopped. “I didn’t. I wouldn’t.” He finally faced me, but his eyes aged. “You have to believe me. I didn’t do that. I couldn’t.” He moved closer to me.
“Grand Maeve said she wouldn’t speak of it in this house.”
Alexander relaxed. “She’s always believed me. It was seven years ago. That’s why my mother and I had to leave. Don’t think she ever forgave me…” His voice trailed off as his memories took over. He recovered and grabbed my hands. “You have to know I’d never hurt you. Ever.”
I nodded. I believed him, but I had to learn the truth.
31 Alexander
Think Jane believed me, but her eyes told me she still didn’t trust me completely. The fact she told Byron to go instead of me meant something. Didn’t mean much to her. But, to me, it was everything. After last time of spilling my guts and having her tell me she was still in love with Byron… It took everything to cross Ausmor’s property again. I swore I wouldn’t do it, but something keeps dragging me back.
Any chance with Jane - I swore long ago I’d take it. Thinking of Jane kept me going. It kept me sane. She said Byron was her first love, but she’s my only love. Couldn’t imagine life without her. There wouldn’t be a point. Fixing the banister and thinking of Jane, I was preoccupied. That’s why I didn’t hear him. I turned around and saw him. “The hell are you doing here?”
Byron grinned like he does to subordinates. “I’d watch that tone with me.”
“Evan told you to leave.”
“Evan?” Byron laughed. “Wouldn’t that be Mr. Morgan to you?”
I ignored him. “Mrs. Kiness told you to leave. Jane told you to go.”
“Say it with me: Miss Austen.”